NOVEMBER 1
"Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his."—Rom 8:9
The Spirit of Christ is the great convincer of sin. Have you thus received Him? Has He shown you the moral leprosy of your nature, the exceeding sinfulness of sin? Do you know anything of the conflict of which the apostle speaks in the seventh chapter of this Epistle to the Romans—the law of the mind in battle with the law of the members? And has this discovery led you to self-condemnation, self-renunciation, and to lay your mouth in the dust before God? If this is so, then the Spirit of Christ is a Spirit of conviction in you, and by this you may know that you are Christ's.
The Spirit of Christ leads to Christ. He is to the sinner what John was to the Messiah; He goes before as the Forerunner of the Lord's salvation. He prepares the way and heralds the coming of Jesus into the soul. This was one specific object for which He was sent, and which entered essentially into
His mission: to lead men to Christ. Has He led you to Christ? Can you say, "Christ is made unto me 'wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption' (1 Cor 1:30)"? What think you of Christ? Is His blood precious? Does His righteousness give you peace? Does His grace subdue your sins? Do you travel to His sympathy in sorrow, take hold of His strength in weakness, seek His counsel in perplexity, acknowledge and wait for Him in all your steps? Is Christ thus all in all to you? Then you have the Spirit of Christ. This we venture to assert for your encouragement.
You may resort to Christ, and there may be no sensible apprehension, no realizing touch, no manifested presence; yet, if your heart goes out after Jesus, if your spirit travels alone to Him, praying for His sympathy, panting for His grace, thirsting for His love, and you are led to say, "Lord, the desire of my heart is to Thy name, and to the remembrance of Thee. I seem not to see Thee, touch Thee, or apprehend Thee; yet I come, and I find a heaven in coming; and for ten thousand worlds I dare not, I could not, stay away." Then, dear reader, you have the Spirit of Christ, and are Christ's. Not only does the Spirit lead to Christ, but He also conforms those thus led to the image of Christ. He guides us to Christ, not for consolation and instruction only, but also
for assimilation. If we are humble, we have the Spirit of Christ, for He was humble. If we are meek, we have the Spirit of Christ, for He was meek. If we believe, we have the Spirit of Christ, for He lived a life of faith. If we love God, we have the Spirit of Christ, for He was the incarnation of love. If we are holy, we have the Spirit of Christ, for He was without sin. If we are obedient, meek, self-denying in suffering, silent in provocation, submissive in chastisement, patient in tribulation, and rejoicing in hope, then have we the Spirit of Christ, for He was all this. Thus the possession of this immense, this indispensable blessing, comprises two grand things: first, to become the subject of an actual and permanent indwelling of the Spirit; and second, to be assimilated in character and disposition to the Savior. And while it is most certain, that if the first mentioned blessing is attained, the second follows, yet it is to the second we are to look as the fruit and evidence of the first. The question, "Am I Christ's?" hinges upon the answer to the question, "Have I the Spirit of Christ?"
NOVEMBER 2
"If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the Father chasteneth not?"—Heb 12:7
As our chastenings are marks of our sonship, equally so are our consolations. The kindly view the Spirit gives of our Father's dispensations, the meek submission of the will, the cordial acquiescence of the heart, and the entire surrender of the soul to God that He creates, supplies us with indisputable ground for drawing a conclusion favorable to the reality of our being the children of God. There is a depth of sympathy and a degree of tenderness in God's comforts which could only flow from the heart of a father—that Father, God Himself. "As a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him" (Ps 103:13). Sweet it is to know that the correction and the consolation, the wounding and the healing flow from the same heart, come from the same hand, and each bear a message of love and a token of sonship. Is the God of all comfort sustaining, soothing, and quieting your oppressed, chafed, and sorrowful heart? Oh, it is the Spirit's witness to your adoption. Bending to your grief, and associating Himself with every circumstance of your sorrow, He seeks to seal on your softened heart the deeper, clearer impression of your filial
interest in God's love. And oh, if this overwhelming bereavement, if this crushing stroke, if the bitterness and gloom of this hour is the occasion when the Spirit will gently, graciously lift you from the region of doubt and distress as to your sonship into the serene sunlight of your Father's love, so that you shall question, doubt, and no more deny your acceptance in the Beloved and your adoption into His family, will you not kiss the rod and love the hand and bless the heart that has smitten?
Forget not that the outward seal of sanctification testifies of the inward seal of adoption, and that if the Spirit of Christ is in your heart, the fruits of the Spirit will be exhibited in your life. Then, see that you are meek, gentle, and lowly, like the Savior, separated from the world; that you live not and joy not as the world does; and in the secret chamber of your soul you shall often hear the voice of God saying He "will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters" (2 Cor 6:18).
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NOVEMBER 3
"Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth."—John 17:17
"How may I know," is the anxious inquiry of many, "that sin is being mortified in me?" We
reply, by a weakening of its power. When Christ subdues our iniquities, He does not eradicate them, but weakens the strength of their root. The principle of sin remains, but it is impaired. See it in the case of Peter. Before he fell, his easily besetting sin was self-confidence: "Although all shall be offended, yet will not I" (Mark 14:29). Behold him after his recovery, taking the low place at the feet of Jesus, and at the feet of the disciples, too, meekly saying, "Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee" (John 21:17). No more self-vaunting, no more self-confidence; his sin was mortified through the Spirit, and he became as another man. Thus often the very outbreak of our sins may become the occasion of their deeper discovery and their more thorough subjection.
Nor let us overlook the power of the truth, by the instrumentality of which the Spirit mortifies sin in us: "Sanctify them through thy truth" (John 17:17). The truth as it is in Jesus, revealed more clearly to the mind and impressed more deeply on the heart, transforms the soul into its own divine and holy nature. Our spiritual and experimental acquaintance, therefore, with the truth and with Him who is essential truth will be the measure of the Spirit's mortification of sin in our hearts. Is the Lord Jesus becoming increasingly
precious to your soul? Are you growing in poverty of spirit, in a deeper sense of your vileness, weakness, and unworthiness? Is pride more abased, and self more crucified, and God's glory more simply sought? Does the heart more quickly shrink from sin, is the conscience more sensitive to the touch of guilt, and do confession and cleansing become a more frequent habit? Are you growing in more love to all the saints, and to those, who, though they adopt not your entire creed, yet love and serve your Lord and Master?
If so, then you may be assured the Spirit is mortifying sin in you. But oh, look from everything to Christ. Look not within for sanctification; look up for it from Christ. He is as much our sanctification as He is our righteousness. Your evidences, your comfort, and your hope do not spring from your fruitfulness, your mortification, or anything within you, but solely and entirely from the Lord Jesus Christ. Looking unto Jesus by faith is like removing the covering and opening the windows of a conservatory to admit the sun more freely, beneath whose light and warmth the flowers and fruits expand and mature. Withdraw the veil that conceals the Sun of Righteousness, let Him shine in upon your soul, and the mortification of all sin will follow and the fruits of all holiness will abound.
NOVEMBER 4
"But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom."—1 Cor 1:30
To survey the effects of this manifold wisdom on our individual character will exalt our views of Christ as the wisdom of God. To see a man becoming a fool "that he may be wise" (1 Cor 3:18), his reason bowing to revelation, his knowledge and attainments laid beneath the cross, his own righteousness surrendered, "counting all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord" (Phil 3:8), and as a little child receiving the kingdom of God; oh, how glorious the wisdom of God appears in this, the light of which shines in Jesus' face! Behold how determined is the Father, in every step of His grace, to humble the creature, and to exalt, magnify, and crown his coequal Son, Lord of all!
We see Jesus, the mediatorial Head of all wisdom and counsel to the church. "It pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell" (Col 1:19). "In whom," says the same apostle, "are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge" (Col 2:3). He is the "Wonderful Counselor," of whom it was thus prophesied, "the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord"
(Isa 11:2). Oh divine and precious truth, unutterably precious to a soul having no resources adequate to the great purposes of knowing self, Christ, and God; of salvation, sanctification, and guidance.
Reader, are you wanting the wisdom that is profitable to direct you at this moment? Acquaint now yourself with Jesus, in whom all the treasures of this wisdom are hid. What is His language to you? The same which Moses, the great legislator, spoke to the people of Israel: "The cause that is too hard for you, bring it unto me, and I will hear it" (Deut 1:17). What a cheering invitation is this! A greater than Moses speaks it, and speaks it to you. You find your case baffling to human wisdom, too difficult for the most acute skill of man. Take it, then, to Jesus. How sweetly He speaks: "Bring it unto me." One simple exercise of faith upon His word will remove all that is difficult, make simple all that is complex, and make clear all that is dark in your case. With Him, nothing is impossible. To Him, all is transparent. Knowing the end from the beginning, there can be nothing unforeseen in it to His mind; by His prescience, all is known; by His wisdom, all is provided for. His precious promise is, "I will bring the blind by a way that they knew not: I will lead them in paths that they have not
known: I will make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them" (Isa 42:16).
Thus is Jesus "made of God unto us wisdom" that all our perplexities may be guided, all our doubts may be solved, and all our steps may be directed by one on whom the anointing of the spirit of wisdom and understanding rests without measure, and who, from experience, is able to lead, having trod every step before us. "And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him" (John 10:4). "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally" (James 1:5). Let him repair to Christ, whom God has set up from everlasting, "to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God" (Eph 3:10).
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NOVEMBER 5
"For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us."—Heb 9:24
Is it a privilege to be borne upon the affectionate and believing prayers of a Christian friend? Ah, yes! The intercessions of the Lord's people on our
behalf are precious channels of heavenly blessing. But there is a Friend still closer to the Fountain of mercy, still nearer and dearer to the Father, than your dearest earthly friend; it is Jesus, who "ever liveth to make intercession for them" who come unto God by him (Heb 7:25). Oh, how precious is that declaration upon which in any assault, trial, or perplexity you may calmly and confidently repose; "I have prayed for thee" (Luke 22:32). Yes, when from confusion of thought or pain of body or burning fever, you cannot pray for yourself, and no friend is near to be your mouth to God, then there is one, the Friend of friends, the ever-skillful Advocate and never-weary Intercessor. No invocating saint nor interceding angel, but the Son of God Himself appears in the presence of God moment by moment for you.
Oh, keep, then, the eye of your faith immovably fixed upon Christ's intercession; He intercedes for weak faith, for tried faith, for tempted faith—yea, for him who thinks he has no faith. There is not a believer who is not borne upon His heart, and whose prayers and wants are not presented in His ceaseless intercession. When you deem yourself neglected and forgotten, a praying Savior in heaven is thinking of you. When you are tried and cast down, tempted and
stumble, the interceding High Priest enters within the holiest at that moment to ask for strength, consolation, and upholding grace on your behalf. And when sin has wounded, guilt distresses, and unbelief beclouds, who is it that stands in the breach, that makes intercession, that removes the darkness, and brings back the smile of a forgiving Father? The Lord Jesus, the interceding Savior. Oh, look up, tried and assaulted believer! Thou hast a Friend in the court, an Advocate in the chancery of heaven, an Intercessor curtained within the holiest of holies, transacting all your concerns, and through whom you may have access to God with boldness.
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NOVEMBER 6
"Verily I say unto you, Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he."—Matt 11:11
If there are degrees of glory—and we see no reason to question the fact—we believe that those degrees will be graduated not by the strength or capacity of the intellect, but according to the measure and standard of holiness which the believer attained in this life. If glory is the perfection of grace, then it follows that proportioned to the degree of
grace here will be the degree of glory hereafter. If the great and grand perfection of God is His holiness, then the more clearly I approximate to that holiness, the more deeply must I partake of the glory of God, and the higher must be my degree of glory. It is acquaintance with and conformity to God's moral being, and not His intellectual being, that will constitute the highest source of our happiness in heaven. That our enlarged intellectual capacity will be a vast inlet to expanded views of God we do not dispute; but it will be the conformity of our moral nature to His that will constitute and augment our perceptions of glory.
Were we asked to pass through the church of God, and from its various communions select the individual whom we should regard as the richest heir of glory, whose degree of happiness would perhaps transcend that of the glorified philosopher, we should, it may be, find him the inmate of some obscure hut, dwelling amid lonely poverty, sickness, and neglect, yet holding communion with God, so filial, so endearing, and so close as to present to our eye his soul's uplifted and soaring pinions, "as the wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold" (Ps 68:13). We should go to him whose heart thus breathing after holiness whose spirit thus
imbibing more and more of the mind of Christ; who in this lowly and suffering school was learning more deeply of God and what God is; and who thus was gathering around him the beams of that glory whose unclouded visions were so soon to burst upon his view. We would unhesitatingly point to him as the man whose degree of glory will be transcendently great—grace enriching and encircling him with more glory than gift.
Do you, my reader, desire to be a star of the first magnitude and luster in heaven? Then aim after a high degree of grace on earth. The nearer your present walk with God, the nearer will be your future proximity to God. The closer your resemblance to Christ, the deeper your holiness, the more spiritual and heavenly-minded you become on earth, be assured of this, the higher and the more resplendent will be your glory in heaven. As the ungodly man is treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath and growing more and more ready for hell, so the godly man is laying up glory against the day of glory, and is growing more and more ready for heaven. We need not speculate and guess about the future. Let the child of God be careful about his growing fit for glory, and he may calmly and safely leave his degrees of glory to the period when that glory shall be revealed.
NOVEMBER 7
"God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew."—Rom 11:2
In this place, the word "foreknew" assumes a particular and explicit meaning. In its wider and more general application it must be regarded as referring not simply to the divine prior knowledge, but more especially to the divine prearrangement. For God to foreknow is, in the strict meaning of the phrase, for God to foreordain. There are no guesses, conjectures, or contingencies with God as to the future. Not does He only know all, but He has fixed, appointed, and ordered "all things after the counsel of his own will" (Eph 1:11). In this view, there exists not a creature and there transpires not an event which was not as real and palpable to the divine mind from eternity as it is at the present moment. Indeed, it would seem that there is no future with God. As an Eternal Being, His foreknowledge cannot be prospective. There must be an eternity of perception, constitution, and presence; and the mightiest feature of His character, that which conveys to a finite mind the most vivid conception of His grandeur and greatness, is the concurrence of all succession and variety and events to His eye. "He is in one mind, and who can turn him?" (Job 23:13).
But the word "foreknew," as it occurs in the text, adds to this yet another signification, more definite, and to the saints, more precious. The foreknowledge spoken of here is limited to a particular class of persons who are said to be "conformed to the image of his Son" (Rom 8:29). Now this cannot, with truth, be said of all creatures. The term, therefore, assumes a particular and impressive signification. It includes the everlasting love of God towards and His most free choice of His people to be His special and peculiar treasure. We find some examples of this: "God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew." Here the word is expressive of the two ideas of love and choice. Again, "Who verily was foreordained [Greek: foreknown] before the foundation of the world" (1 Pet 1:20). "Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God" (Acts 2:23). Clearly, then, we are justified in interpreting the phrase as expressive of God's special choice of and His intelligent love to His church, His own peculiar people. It is a foreknowledge of choice, love, eternal grace, and faithfulness.
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NOVEMBER 8
"He also did predestinate."—Rom 8:29
This word admits of but one natural signification. Predestination, in its lowest sense, is understood
to mean the exclusive agency of God in producing every event. But it includes more than this: it takes in God's predetermining appointment and fore-arrangement of a thing beforehand, according to His divine and supreme will. The Greek is so rendered: "For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined beforehand to be done." Again, "Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will" (Eph 1:5). It is here affirmed of God that the same prearrangement and predetermination which men in general are agreed to ascribe to Him in the government of matter extends equally, and with yet stronger force, to the concerns of His moral administration. It would seem impossible to form any correct idea of God that is disassociated from the idea of predestination. And yet, how incredibly difficult is it to win the mind to a full, unwavering acquiescence in a truth which, in a different application, is received with unquestioning readiness! What is there in the application of this law of the divine government to the world of matter which is not equally reasonable and fit in its application to the world of mind? If it is necessary and proper in the material, why should it not be equally, or more so, in the spiritual empire? If God is allowed the full exercise of sovereignty in
the one, why should He be excluded from an unlimited sovereignty in the other? Surely it would be even more worthy of Him that He should prearrange, predetermine, and supremely rule in the concerns of a world over which His more dignified and glorious empire extends, than that in the inferior world of matter He should fix a constellation in the heavens, guide the flight of a bird in the air, direct the falling of an autumn leaf in the pathless desert, or convey the seed, borne upon the wind, to the spot in which it should grow. Surely, if no fortuitous ordering is admitted in the one case, on infinitely stronger grounds it should be excluded from the other.
Upon no other basis could divine foreknowledge and providence take their stand than upon this. Disconnected from the will and purpose of God, there could be nothing certain as to the future; consequently, there could be nothing certainly foreknown. Were Providence not to regulate and control persons, things, and events—in fact, every dispensation—by the same pre-constructed plan, it would follow that God would be exposed to a thousand contingencies unforeseen, or else that He acts ignorantly or contrary to His will. What, then, is predestination, but God's determining will?
Now all this will apply with augmented beauty and force to the idea of a predestinated church. How clearly is this doctrine revealed! "According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world" (Eph 1:4). Whose names are "written in the book of life, from the foundation of the world" (Rev 17:8). "Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father" (1 Pet 1:2). "Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began" (2 Tim 1:9). What an accumulation of evidence in proof of a single doctrine of Scripture! Who but the most prejudiced can resist, or the most skeptical deny its overwhelming force? Oh, to receive it as the word of God! To admit it not because reason can understand or man can explain it, for all truth flowing from an infinite source must necessarily transcend a finite mind, but because we find it in God's holy Word. Predestination must be a divine verity, since it stands essentially connected with our conformity to the divine image.
NOVEMBER 9
"To be conformed to the image of his Son."—Rom 8:29
No standard short of this will meet the case. How conspicuous appears the wisdom and how glorious the goodness of God in this: that in making us holy, the model or standard of that holiness should be Deity itself! God would make us holy, and in doing so He would make us like Himself. But with what pencil, dipped though it were in heaven's brightest hues, can we portray the image of Jesus? The perfection of our Lord was the perfection of holiness. His Deity was essential holiness; His humanity without sin, the impersonation of holiness; all that He was, said, and did was holiness emanating from the Fountain of essential purity, and kindling their dazzling and undying radiance around each step He trod. How lovely, too, was His character! How holy the thoughts He breathed, how pure the words He spoke, how humble the spirit He exemplified, how tender and sympathizing the outgoings of His compassion and love to man! Truly, He is "the chief among ten thousand ... the altogether lovely" (Song 5:10,16).
Such is the believer's model. To this, he is predestinated to be conformed. And is not this predestination in its highest form? Would it seem
possible for God to have preordained us to a greater blessing, to have chosen us to a higher distinction? In choosing us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy, He has advanced us to the loftiest degree of honor and happiness to which a creature can be promoted: assimilation to His own moral image. And this forms the highest ambition of the believer. The great study of all His true disciples is to transcribe those beauteous lineaments which, in such perfect harmony and lovely expression, blended and shone in the life of Jesus.
But in what does this conformity consist? The first feature is a conformity of nature . This is reciprocal. The Son of God, by an act of divine power, became human; the saints of God, by an act of sovereign grace, become divine. "Partakers of the divine nature" (2 Pet 1:4). This harmony of nature forms the basis of all conformity. Thus grafted into Christ, we grow up into Him in all holy resemblance. The meekness, holiness, patience, self-denial, zeal, and love traceable in us, though faint and imperfect indeed, are transfers of Christ's faultless characteristics to our renewed soul. Thus the mind that was in Him is in some measure in us. And in our moral conflict, battling as we do with sin and Satan and the world, we
come to know a little of fellowship with His sufferings, and conformity to His death.
We are here supplied with a test of Christian character. Many professors of Christ anxiously question, "How may I arrive at a correct conclusion that I am among the predestinated of God? That I am included in His purpose of grace and love? That I have an interest in the Lord's salvation?" The passage under consideration supplies the answer: conformity to the image of God's Son. Nothing short of this can justify the belief that we are saved. No evidence less strong can authenticate the fact of our predestination. The determination of God to save men is not so fixed as to save them, be their character what it may. Christ's work is a salvation from sin, not in sin. "According as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy" (Eph 1:4). In other words, that we should be conformed to the divine image. That we should be like Christ—like Christ in the purity of His human nature, like Christ in the humility He exemplified, in the self-denial He practiced, in the heavenly life He lived; in a word, in all that this expressive sentence comprehends—"conformed to the image of his Son."
As we grow day by day more holy, more spiritually-minded, more closely resembling Jesus, we
are placing the truth of our predestination to eternal life in a clearer, stronger light, and consequently the fact of our salvation beyond a misgiving and a doubt. In view of this precious truth, what spiritual heart will not breathe the prayer, "O Lord! I cannot be satisfied merely to profess and call myself Thine. I want more of the power of vital religion in my soul. I crave for Thine image. My deepest grief springs from the discovery of the little real resemblance which I bear to a model so peerless, so divine; that I exemplify so little of Thy patience in suffering; Thy meekness in opposition; Thy forgiving spirit in injury; Thy gentleness in reproving; Thy firmness in temptation; Thy singleness of eye in all that I do. Oh, fill me wholly with Thyself."
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NOVEMBER 10
"That he might be the firstborn among many brethren."—Rom 8:29
The Son of God sustains to us the relation of the Elder Brother. He is emphatically the "Firstborn." In another place we read, "Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same" (Heb 2:14). He is the "Brother...born for adversity" (Prov 17:17). Our relation to Him as our Brother is evidenced by our conformity to Him as our
model. We have no valid claim to relationship that does not spring from a resemblance to His image. The features may be indistinctly visible, yet one line of holiness, one true lineament, drawn on the heart by the Holy Ghost, proves our fraternal relationship to Him the Firstborn.
And how large the brotherhood! "Many brethren." What the relative proportion of the church is to the world or how many will be saved is a question speculative and profitless. But this we know: the number will be vast, countless. The one family of God is composed of "many brethren." They are not all of the same judgment in all matters, but they are all of the same spirit. The unity of the family of God is not ecclesiastical nor geographical; it is spiritual and essential. It is the "unity of the Spirit" (Eph 4:3). Begotten of one Father, in the nature of the Elder Brother, and through the regenerating grace of the one Spirit, all the saints of God constitute one church, one family, one brotherhood, essentially and indivisibly one.
Nor is this relationship difficult to recognize. Take an illustration. Two brethren in the Lord of widely different sections of the church, and of much disagreement on some points of truth, meet and converse together. Each wonders that, with the Word of God in his hand, the other should
not read it as he reads it, and interpret it as he interprets it. But they drop the points of difference, and take up the points of agreement. They speak of Christ, the Christ who loves them both and whom they both love. They talk of the one Master whom they serve; of their common labors and infirmities, trials and temptations, discouragements, failures and success; they talk of the heaven to which they are journeying; of their Father's house, in which they will dwell together forever. They kneel in prayer; they cast themselves before the cross; the oil of gladness anoints them. Their hearts are broken, their spirits are humbled, their souls are blended. They rise, and feel more deeply and more strongly than ever that they both belong to the same family and are both of the "many brethren," of whom the Son of God is the Firstborn, the Elder Brother. Oh, blessed unity! What perfect harmony of creed, what strict conformity of ritual, or what similar denominational relation is for a moment to be compared with this? Have you, my reader, this evidence that you belong to the "many brethren?"
NOVEMBER 11
"But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."—Gal 6:14
Conformity to the death of Christ can only be obtained by close, individual, realizing views of the cross. It is in the cross that sin is seen in its exceeding sinfulness. It is in the cross that the holiness of God shines with such ineffable luster. This is the sun that throws its light upon these two great objects—the holiness of God, the sinfulness of the sinner. Veil this sun, remove the cross, blot out the atonement, and all our knowledge of holiness and sin vanishes into distant and shadowy views. Faith, dealing much and closely with the cross of Christ, will invariably produce in the soul conformity to His death. This was the great desire of the apostle: "That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death" (Phil 3:10). This was the noble prayer of this holy man; he desired crucifixion with Christ, a crucifixion to indwelling sin, to sin in its every shape—to sin in principle, in temper, in worldly conformity, in conversation, in thought, in the very glance of the eye. He desired not only a crucifixion of one particular
sin, but of all sin; not only the sin that most easily beset him, the sin that he daily saw and felt and mourned over, but the sin that no eye saw but God's, the sin of the indwelling principle, the root of all sin, the sin of his nature.
This is to have fellowship with Christ in His sufferings. Jesus suffered as much for the subduing of the indwelling principle of sin as for the pardon of the outbreaking of that sin in daily practice. Have we fellowship with Him in these sufferings? There must be a crucifixion of the indwelling power of sin. To illustrate the idea: if the root be allowed to strengthen and expand, and take a deeper and firmer grasp, what more can we expect than that the tree will shoot upward and branch out on either hand? To cut off the outward branches is not the proper method to stunt the growth of the tree; the root must be uncovered, and the axe laid to it. Outward sins may be cut off, and even honestly confessed and mourned over, while the concealed principle, the root of the sin, is overlooked, neglected, and allowed to gather strength and expansion.
We do not assert that the inherent evil of a believer will ever, in his present existence, be entirely eradicated. To expect this would be to expect what God's Word has not declared. But the Word of God leads us to the hope and aim
that it may be greatly subdued and conquered and its power weakened and mortified. How is this to be attained? Faith dealing frequently and closely with Christ, the atoning blood upon the conscience, the "fountain opened" daily resorted to, the believer sitting constantly at the foot of the cross, gazing upon it with an eye of steady, unwavering faith that looks to Jesus. In this posture, all sin—the sin of the heart, the sin of the practice—is mourned over, wept over, confessed, mortified, and crucified. Let the reader again be reminded that all true crucifixion of sin springs from the cross of Christ.
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NOVEMBER 12
"Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."—Matt 5:3
Cultivate poverty of spirit, above all spiritual conditions, most assiduously, prayerfully, earnestly, and fervently. Rest not short of it. This is the legitimate fruit and the only safe evidence of our union to Christ and the indwelling of the Spirit in our hearts. Nothing can suffice for it. Splendid talent, versatile gifts, profound education, gorgeous eloquence, and even extensive usefulness are wretched substitutes for poverty of spirit. They may dazzle the eye, please the ear, delight the taste, and awake the applause of man, but,
dissociated from humiliation of mind, God sees no glory in them. What says He? "To this man," to him only, to him exclusively, "will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word" (Isa 66:2). We may think highly of gifts, but let us learn their comparative value and true place from the words of our Lord, spoken in reference to John: "Verily I say unto you, Among them which are born of women, there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist: notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he" (Matt 11:11). Behold the true position that Christ assigns to distinction of office, place, and gifts, namely, subordinate to lowliness of spirit. This is their proper rank, and he who elevates them above profound self-abasement and deep lowliness of spirit sins against God, impeaches His wisdom, and denies the truth of His word.
But how shall we adequately describe this blessed state? How shall we draw the portrait of the man that is "poor, and of a contrite spirit"? Look at him as he appears in his own apprehension and judgment: the chief of sinners (1 Tim 1:15), "less than the least of all saints" (Eph 3:8), "though I be nothing" (2 Cor 12:11). Prostrate, where others exalt him; condemning, where others approve him; censuring, where others applaud
him; humbling himself, where others have put upon him the greatest honor. Confessing in secret and in the dust before God the flaws, the imperfections, and the sins of those things which have dazzled the eyes and awoke to trembling ecstasy the souls of the multitude. Look at him in the place he assumes among others—taking the low position; in honor preferring others; washing the disciples' feet; willing to serve, rather than be served; rejoicing in the distinction, promotion, gifts, usefulness, and honor put upon his fellow saints; and ready himself to go up higher at his Master's bidding. Look at him under the hand of God—meek, patient, resigned, humbled, drinking the cup, blessing the hand that has smitten, justifying the wisdom, the love, and the gentleness which mark the discipline, and eager to learn the holy lessons it is sent to teach. Look at him before the cross—reposing all his gifts, attainments, and honors at its foot, and glorying only in the exhibition it presents of a holy God pardoning sin by the death of His Son, and as the hallowed instrument by which he becomes crucified to the world, and the world to him.
NOVEMBER 13
"To this man will I look, that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and that trembleth at my word."—Isa 66:2
How shall we array before you, in their strongest light, the motives which urge the cultivation of this poverty of spirit? Is it not enough that this is the spiritual state on which Jehovah looks with an eye of exclusive, holy, and ineffable delight? Splendid gifts, brilliant attainments, costly sacrifices are nothing to me. "To this man will I look, that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and that trembleth at my word" (Isa 66:2). To this would we add, if you value your safe, happy, and holy walk, and if you prize the manifestations of God's presence, the "kisses of his mouth" whose "love is better than wine" (Song 1:2), the teaching, guiding, and comforting influence of the Holy Spirit, seek it. If you would be a taste of Christ in every place; if you would pray with more fervor, unction, and power; if you would labor with more zeal, devotedness, and success; seek it. By all that is dear, precious, and holy, by your own happiness, by the honor of Christ, by the glory of God, by the hope of heaven, seek to be found among those who are "poor and of a contrite spirit," who, with filial, holy love, tremble
at God's word, and whom Jesus has pronounced blessed here and meet for glory hereafter.
Though in approaching the Great High Priest, you have no splendid and costly intellectual offerings to present, yet with the royal penitent you can say, "Thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise" (Ps 51:16-17). "This, Lord, is all that I have to bring Thee." Avoid a spurious humility. True humility consists not in denying the work of the Holy Ghost in our hearts, in underrating the grace of God in our souls, in standing afar off from our heavenly Father, walking at a distance from Christ, always doubting the efficacy of His blood, the freeness of His salvation, the willingness of His heart, and the greatness of His power to save. Oh no! This is not the humility that God delights to see, but is a false, counterfeit humility, obnoxious in His sight. But to "draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith" (Heb 10:22), in lowly dependence upon His blood and righteousness; to accept of salvation as the gift of His grace; to believe the promise because He has spoken it; gratefully and humbly to acknowledge our calling, our adoption, and our acceptance; and to live in the holy,
transforming influence of this exalted state, giving to a Triune God all the praise and glory—this is the humility which is most pleasing to God, and is the true product of the Holy Ghost.
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NOVEMBER 14
"My son, give me thine heart."—Prov 23:26
The human heart is naturally idolatrous. Its affections once supremely centered in God, but now, disjoined from Him, they go in quest of other objects of attachment, and we love and worship the creature rather than the Creator. The circle which our affections traverse may not indeed be a large one; there are, perchance, but few to whom we fully surrender our heart. So limited may the circle be that one object alone shall attract, absorb, and concentrate in itself our entire and undivided love—that one object to us as a universe of beings and all others comparatively indifferent and insipid. Who cannot see that, in a case like this, the danger is imminent of transforming the heart, Christ's own sanctuary, into an idol's temple where the creature is loved, reverenced, and served more than He who gave it? But our God will cleanse us from all idolatry, and Christ will wean us from all our idols. The Lord is jealous of our love with a holy jealousy. Poor as our affection is, He asks its complete surrender.
The Bible nowhere intimates that He requires our love at the expense of all creature attachment. He created our affections, and He it is who provides for their proper and pleasant indulgence. There is not a single precept or command in the Scriptures that forbids their exercise, or that discourages their intensity. Husbands are exhorted to love their wives, "even as Christ also loved the church" (Eph 5:25). Parents are to cherish a similar affection toward their children, and children are bound to render back a love not less intense to their parents. And we are to love our neighbors as ourselves. Nor does the word of God furnish examples of Christian friendship less interesting and devoted. One of the choicest and tenderest blessings with which God can enrich us, next to Himself, is such a friend as Paul had in Epaphroditus, a "brother and companion in labour, and fellowsoldier" (Phil 2:25), or such an affectionate friendship as John, the loving disciple, cherished for his well-beloved Gaius, whom he loved in the truth and to whom, in the season of his sickness, he thus touchingly poured out his heart's affectionate sympathy: "Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth" (3 John 2). Count such a friend and such friendship among God's sweetest and holiest
bestowments. The blessings of which it may be to you the sanctifying channel are immense. The tender sympathy, the jealous watchfulness, the confidential repose, the faithful admonition, and above all, the intercessory prayer connected with Christian friendship may be placed in the inventory of our most inestimable and precious things.
It is not therefore the use, but the abuse, of our affections over which we have need to exercise the greatest vigilance—not their legitimate exercise, but their idolatrous tendency. It is not our love to the creature against which God contends, but it is in not allowing our love to Himself to subordinate all other love. We may love the creature, but we may not love the creature more than the Creator. When the Giver is lost sight of and forgotten in the gift, then comes the painful process of weaning. When the heart burns its incense before some human shrine, and as it ascends, the cloud veils from the eye the beauty and the excellence of Jesus, then comes the painful process of weaning. When the absorbing claims and the engrossing attentions of some loved one are placed in competition and are allowed to clash with the claims of God and the service due from us personally to His cause and truth, then comes the painful process of weaning. When creature devotion deadens our heart to the Lord, lessens
our interest in His cause, congeals our zeal and love and liberality, detaches us from the public means of grace, and withdraws us from the closet, the Bible, and the communion of saints, thus bringing leanness of soul and robbing God of His glory, then comes the painful process of weaning. Christ will be the first in our affections, God will be supreme in our service, and His kingdom and righteousness must take precedence of all other things.
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NOVEMBER 15
"In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace."—Eph 1:7
Let not the reader be satisfied to rest upon the mere surface of the truth that Christ has made atonement for sin. This may be believed, and yet the full blessedness, peace, and sanctification of it not enjoyed. And why? Because he does not fully enter into the experience of the truth. Shall we not say, too, that it is because his views of sin rest only on the surface of sin's exceeding sinfulness? Deep views of sin will always result in deep views of the Sacrifice for sin; inadequate knowledge of sin and inadequate knowledge of Christ will bring high views of self, low views of Christ. Be satisfied, then, not to rest upon the surface of
this wondrous truth. The completeness of Christ's atonement arises from the infinite dignity of His Person; His Godhead forms the basis of His perfect work. It guarantees, so to speak, the glorious result of His atonement. This gave perfection to His obedience and virtue to His atonement; this made the blood He shed efficacious in the pardon of sin, and the righteousness He wrought out complete in the justification of the soul. His entire work would have been wanting had it not been for His Godhead.
The pardon of a believer's sins is an entire pardon; it is the full pardon of all his sins. It would be no pardon to him if it were not an entire pardon. If it were but a partial blotting out of the thick cloud, a partial canceling of the bond, a forgiveness of some sins only, then the gospel would not be glad tidings to his soul. The law of God has brought him in guilty of an entire violation. The justice of God demands a satisfaction equal to the enormity of the sins committed and of the guilt incurred. The Holy Spirit has convinced him of his utter helplessness and his entire bankruptcy. What rapture would kindle in his bosom at the announcement of a partial atonement, of a half Savior, of a partial payment of the debt? Not one throb of joyous sensation would it produce. On the contrary, this very mockery of
his woe would but deepen the anguish of his spirit. But, go to the soul, weary and heavy laden with sin, mourning over its vileness, its helplessness, and proclaim the gospel. Tell him that the atonement which Jesus offered on Calvary was a full satisfaction for his sins. That all his sins were borne and blotted out in that awful moment. That the bond which divine justice held against the sinner was fully cancelled by the obedience and sufferings of Christ, and that, appeased and satisfied, God was ready to pardon. How beautiful will be the feet that convey to him tidings so transporting as these!
Are not these statements perfectly accordant with the declarations of God's own word? Let us ascertain: what was the ark symbolical of, alluded to by the apostle in the ninth chapter of his Epistle to the Hebrews, which contained the manna, Aaron's rod, and the tables of the covenant, over which stood the cherubims of glory, shadowing the mercy seat? What, but the entire covering of sin? For as the covering of the ark hid the law and testimony, so the Lord Jesus Christ hid the sins of His chosen, covenant people—not from the eye of God's omniscience, but from the eye of the law. They stand legally acquitted. So entire was the work of Jesus, so infinite and satisfactory His obedience, that the law of God pronounces them
acquitted and can never bring them into condemnation. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:1). "Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died" (Rom 8:34). How could the apostle, with any truth, have made a declaration so astounding and uttered a challenge so dauntless as this if the point we are now endeavoring to establish were not strictly true as we affirm it to be?
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NOVEMBER 16
"Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe."—Rom 3:22
The righteousness wrought out by the incarnation, obedience, sufferings, and death of Christ is a most glorious righteousness. It took in the whole law of God. It did not soften it or ask for a compromise of its claims. It took the law in its utmost strictness, and honored it. It gave all the law demanded and all it could demand. And what stamped this righteousness with a glory so great? What enabled the Redeemer to offer an obedience so perfect? What, but that He was God in our nature! The Lawgiver became the Law-fulfiller. The God became the Substitute and the Judge became the Surety. Behold, then, the justification of a believing sinner! He stands
accepted in the righteousness of Christ, with full and entire acceptance. What says the Holy Ghost? "In the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory" (Isa 45:25). "And by him [the Lord Jesus] all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13:39). "And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power"(Col 2:10). "Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious Church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish" (Eph 5:25-27). "He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him" (2 Cor 5:21).
Notice the expression, "made the righteousness of God"! It is thus named because the righteousness which Christ wrought out was a divine righteousness—not the righteousness of a created being, of an angel, or of a superior prophet, else it were blasphemy to call it "the righteousness of God." No; the righteousness in which you stand, if you are "accepted in the Beloved," is a more costly and glorious righteousness than Adam's, or the highest angel's in glory. It is "the righteousness
of God," the righteousness of the God-man, possessing all the infinite merit, and glory, and perfection of Deity. And still more incredible, the believer is made the righteousness of God in Christ. Beholding him in Christ, the Father can "rest in his love," and rejoice over him "with singing" (Zeph 3:17). Is it not then, we ask, a perfect, a complete justification? What can be more so? Do not the passages we have quoted prove it? Can any other meaning be given to them without divesting them of their beauty and obvious sense? Would it not be to turn from God's word, to dishonor and grieve the Spirit, and to rob the believer of a most influential motive to holiness if we were to take a less expanded view of this subject than that which we have taken? Most assuredly it would. Then let the Christian reader welcome this truth. If it is God's truth, and we humbly believe we have proved it to be so, it is not less his privilege than his duty to receive it.
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NOVEMBER 17
"To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved."—Eph 1:6
The holy influence which a believer is called to exert around him will be greatly augmented and powerfully felt by an abiding realization of his
full and entire acceptance in Christ. The child of God is "the salt of the earth" and "the light of the world," surrounded by moral decay and darkness (Matt 5:13-14). By his holy consistent example, he is to exert a counteracting influence. He is to be purity where there is corruption; he is to be light where there is darkness. And if his walk is consistent, if his life is holy, his example speaks, and speaks powerfully, to an ungodly world. Saints of God catch, as it were, the contagion of his sanctity. The worldling acknowledges the reality of the gospel he professes, and the bold skeptic falls back abashed, and feels "how awful goodness is!" What, then, will so elevate his own piety and increase the power of his influence as a realization of his justification by Christ? Oh, how this commends the religion of Jesus! Suppose a Christian parent is surrounded by a large circle of unconverted children. They look to him as to a living gospel; they look to him for an exemplification of the truth he believes. They expect to see its influence upon his principles, his temper, his affections, his whole conduct. What, then, must be their impression of the gospel, if they behold their parent always indulging in doubts as to his acceptance, yielding to unbelieving fears as to his calling? Instead of walking in the full assurance of faith, saying with the apostle, "I know
whom I have believed" (2 Tim 1:12), and instead of living in the holy liberty, peace, and comfort of acceptance, there is nothing but distrust, dread, and tormenting fear. How many a child has borne this testimony, "The doubts and fears of my parent have been my great stumbling block!" Oh, then, for the sake of those around you and for the sake of your children, your connections, your friends, and your family, realize your full, free, and entire acceptance in Christ.
Is it any marvel, then, that in speaking of His beloved and justified people, God employs in His word language like this: "Thou art all fair, my love; there is no spot in thee" (Song 4:7); "He hath not beheld iniquity in Jacob, neither hath he seen perverseness in Israel" (Num 23:21)? Carry out this thought. Had there been no iniquity in Jacob? Had there been no perverseness in Israel? Read their histories, and what do they develop but iniquity and perverseness of the most aggravated kind? And yet, when God says He saw no iniquity in Jacob and no perverseness in Israel, what does it set forth but the glorious work of the adorable Immanuel—the glory, the fitness, the perfection of that righteousness in which they stand "without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing" (Eph 5:27)? Vile and worthless, sinful and perverse in themselves, deeply conscious before God
of possessing not a claim upon His regard, but worthy only of His just displeasure, yet counted righteous in the righteousness of another, fully and freely justified by Christ. Is this doctrine startling to some? Is it considered too great a truth to be received by others? Any other gospel than this, we solemnly affirm, will never save the soul! The obedience, sufferings, and death of the God-man, applied to the repenting, believing sinner by an act of free and sovereign grace is the only plank on which the soul can safely rest. Let it attempt the passage across the cold river of death on any other, and it is gone. On this it may boldly venture, and on this it shall be safely and triumphantly carried into the quiet and peaceful haven of future and eternal blessedness.
We acknowledge the magnitude of this doctrine; yet it is not to be rejected because of its greatness. It may be profound, almost too deeply so for an angel's mind; the cherubim may veil their faces, overpowered with its glory, while yet with eager longings they desire to look into it. Still may the weakest saint of God receive it, live upon it, walk in it. It is a deep river, through which an elephant might swim, and which a lamb may ford.
NOVEMBER 18
"And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, The Lord is my God."—Zech 13:9
The believer often commences his spiritual journey with shallow and defective views of the perfect fitness and glory of the Redeemer's justifying righteousness. There is, we admit, a degree of self-renunciation, there is a reception of Christ, and there is some sweet and blessed enjoyment of His acceptance. Yet his views of himself, and of the supreme necessity, importance, and glory of Christ's finished work are nothing compared with his later experience of both. God will have the righteousness of His Son to be acknowledged and felt to be everything. It is a great, glorious, and completed work, and He will cause His saints to know it. It is His only method of saving sinners; the sinner that is saved shall acknowledge this, not merely in his judgment, but from a deep heartfelt experience of the truth, to the praise of the glory of His grace.
We say, then, it is in the successive stages of his experience that the believer sees the finished righteousness of Christ more distinctly, adores it
more profoundly, and grasps it more firmly. What is the school in which he learns his nothingness, his poverty, his utter destitution? The school of deep and sanctified affliction. In no other school is it learned, and under no other teacher but God. Here his high thoughts are brought low, and the Lord alone is exalted. Here he forms a just estimate of his attainments, his gifts, and his knowledge, and that which he thought to be so valuable he now finds to be worth nothing. Here his proud spirit is abased, his rebellious spirit tamed, his restless, feverish spirit soothed into passive quietude; and here, the deep humbling acknowledgment is made, "I am vile!" Thus he is led back to first principles. Thus the first step is retaken, and the first lesson is relearned. The believer, emptied entirely of self, of self-complacency, self-trust, and self-glorying, stands ready for the full Savior. The blessed and eternal Spirit opens to him, in this posture, the fitness, the fullness, the glory, the infinite grandeur of Christ's finished righteousness. The Spirit leads him to it afresh, puts it upon him anew, causes him to enter into it more fully, to rest upon it more entirely; breaks it up to the soul, and discloses its perfect fitness to his case.
And what a glory the believer sees in it! He saw it before, but not as he beholds it now. And
what a resting place he finds beneath the cross! He rested there before, but not as he rests now. Such views has he now of Christ—such preciousness, such beauty, such tenderness he sees in Immanuel—that a new world of beauty and of glory seems to have opened before his view. A new Savior and a new righteousness appear to have been brought to his soul. All this has been produced by the discipline of the covenant, the afflictions sent and sanctified by a good and covenant God and Father. Tried believers, murmur not at God's dispensations; repine not at His dealings. Has He seen fit to dash against you billow upon billow? Has He thought proper to place you in the furnace? Has He blasted the fair prospect, dried up the stream, called for the surrender of your Isaac? Oh, bless Him for the way He takes to empty you of self and fill you with His own love. This is His method of teaching you, schooling you, and preparing you for the inheritance of the saints in light. Will you not allow Him to select His own plan, to adopt His own mode of cure? You are in His hands; could you be in better? Are you now learning your own poverty, destitution, and helplessness, and is the blood and righteousness of Jesus more precious and glorious to the eye of your faith? Then praise Him for your afflictions, for all these cross
dispensations are now, at this moment, working together for your spiritual good.
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NOVEMBER 19
"Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things."—1 Cor 13:4-7
True Christian love will excite in the mind a holy jealousy for the Christian reputation of other believers. How sadly this is overlooked by many professors! What careless play with reputation, trifling with character, and unveiling to the eyes of others the weaknesses, infirmities, and the stumblings of which they have become aware, mark many in our day. If the Lord had dealt with us as we have thoughtlessly and uncharitably dealt with our fellow believers, what shame and confusion would cover us! We should blush to lift up our faces before men.
But the exercise of this divine love in the heart will constrain us to abstain from all envious, suspicious feelings, from all evil surmisings, from all wrong construing of motives, from all talebearing (the cause of so much evil in the Christian
church), from slander, from unkind insinuations, from going from house to house retelling evil, and making the imperfections, the errors, or the doings of others the theme of idle, sinful gossip, being busybodies in other men's matters. All this is utterly inconsistent with our high and holy calling. It is degrading, dishonoring, and lowering to our character as the children of God. It dims the luster of our piety. It impairs our moral influence in the world.
Ought not the character of a Christian professor to be as dear to me as my own? And ought I not as vigilantly to watch over it, as zealously to promote it, and as indignantly to vindicate it when unjustly aspersed or maliciously assailed as if I, and not he, were the sufferer? How can the reputation of a believer in Jesus be affected, and we not be affected? It is our common Lord who is wounded, it is our common salvation that is injured, it is our own family that is maligned. And our love to Jesus, His truth, and His people should caution us to be as jealous of the honor, as tender of the feelings, and as watchful of the character and reputation of each member of the Lord's family, be his denomination what it may, as of our own. "Who is weak," says the apostle, "and I am not weak? who is offended, and I burn not?" (2 Cor 11:29).
Oh, how graciously and how kindly does our God deal with His people! Laying His hand upon their many spots, He seems to say, "No eye but mine shall see them." Oh, let us in this particular be "followers of God, as dear children" (Eph 5:1). Thus shall we more clearly evidence to others, and be assured ourselves, that have "passed from death unto life" (1 John 3:14).
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NOVEMBER 20
"God, who quickeneth the dead."—Rom 4:17
The commencement of spiritual life is sudden. We are far from confining the Spirit to a certain prescribed order in this or any other part of His work. He is a Sovereign, and therefore works according to His own will. But there are some methods He more frequently adopts than others. We would not say that all conversion is a sudden work. There is a knowledge of sin, conviction of its guilt, repentance before God on account of it; these are frequently slow and gradual in their advance. But the first communication of divine light and life to the soul is always sudden—sudden and instantaneous as was the creation of natural light when "God said, Let there be light, and there was light" (Gen 1:3). It was but a word, and in an instant, chaos rolled away, and every object and scene in nature was bathed in light
and glory as suddenly as the communication of life to Lazarus when Jesus "cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth!" (John 11:43). It was but a word, and in an instant "he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with graveclothes" (John 11:44). So is it in the first communication of divine light and life to the soul. The eternal Spirit says, "Let there be light," and in a moment there is light. He speaks again, "Come forth," and in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, the dead are raised.
Striking illustrations of the suddenness of the Spirit's operation are afforded in the cases of Saul of Tarsus and of the thief upon the cross. How sudden was the communication of light and life to their souls! It was no long and previous process of spiritual illumination; it was the result of no lengthened chain of reasoning, no labored argumentation. In a moment, and under circumstances most unfavorable to the change (as we should think, certainly, at a period when the rebellion of the heart rose the most fiercely against God), "a light from heaven, above the brightness of the sun" (Acts 26:13) poured its transforming radiance into the mind of the enraged persecutor; and a voice, conveying life into the soul, reached the conscience of the dying thief. Both were translated from darkness into light, "in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye" (1 Cor 15:52).
How many who read this page may say, "Thus it was with me! God the Eternal Spirit arrested me when my heart's deep rebellion was most up in arms against Him. It was a sudden and a short work, but it was mighty and effectual. It was unexpected and rapid, but deep and thorough. In a moment, the hidden evil was brought to view, the deep and dark fountain broken up; all my iniquities passed before me, and all my secret sins seemed placed in the light of God's countenance. My soul sank down in deep mire; hell opened its mouth to receive me."
Overlook not this wise and gracious method of the blessed Spirit's operation in regeneration. It is instantaneous. The means may have been simple. Perhaps it was the loss of a friend, an alarming illness, a word of reproof or admonition dropped from a parent or a companion, the singing of a hymn, the hearing of a sermon, or some text of Scripture winged with power to the conscience. In the twinkling of an eye, the soul, "dead in trespasses and sins," was quickened and translated into "newness of life." Oh, blessed work of the blessed and Eternal Spirit! Mighty operation, inscrutable wisdom! What a change has now passed over the whole man! Overshadowed by the Holy Ghost, that which is begotten in the soul is the divine life—a holy, influential, never-dying
principle. Truly he is a new creature; "old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new" (2 Cor 5:17). For this change let it not be supposed that there is any previous preparation in the subject. There can be no preparation for light or life. What preparation was there in chaos? What preparation was there in the cold clay limbs of Lazarus? What in Paul? What in the dying thief? The work of regeneration is supremely the work of the Spirit. The means may be employed, and are to be employed in accordance with the divine purpose, yet are they not to be deified. They are but means, profiting nothing without the power of God the Holy Spirit. Regeneration is His work, and not man's.
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NOVEMBER 21
"Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life."—John 5:24
If the first implantation of the divine life in the soul is sudden, then the advance of that work is, in most cases, gradual. Let this be an encouragement to any who are writing hard and bitter things against themselves in consequence of their little progress. The growth of divine knowledge in the
soul is often slow, the work of much time and of protracted discipline. Look at the eleven disciples: what slow, tardy scholars were they, even though taught immediately from the lips of Jesus; and who teaches like Him? They drank their knowledge from the very Fountain. They received their light directly from the Sun itself. And yet, with all these superior advantages—the personal ministry, instructions, miracles, and example of our dear Lord—how slow of understanding were they to comprehend, and how slow of heart to believe all that He so laboriously, clearly, and patiently taught them! Yes, the advance of the soul in the divine life, its knowledge of sin, of the hidden evil, the heart's deep treachery and intricate windings, Satan's subtlety, the glory of the gospel, the preciousness of Christ, and its own interest in the great salvation, is not the work of a day, nor of a year, but of many days and years of deep plowing, of the long and often painful discipline of windy storm and tempest.
But this life in the soul is not less real, nor less divine, because its growth is slow and gradual. It may be small and feeble in its degree, yet, in its nature, it is the life that never dies. How many of the Lord's beloved ones, the children of godly parents and brought up in the ways of God, are at a loss in reviewing the map of their pilgrimage
to remember the starting point of their spiritual life. They well know that they left the city of destruction; that by a strong and a mighty arm they were brought out of Egypt; but so gently, so imperceptibly, so softly, and so gradually were they led, first a thought, then a desire, then a prayer, that they could no more discover when the first dawning of divine life took place in their soul, than they could tell the instant when natural light first broke upon chaos. Still, it is real. It is not imaginary that he has inherited an evil principle in the heart; it is not imaginary that grace has subdued that principle. It is not imaginary that he was once a child of darkness; it is not imaginary that he is now a child of light. He may mourn in secret over his little advance, his tardy progress, his weak faith, his small grace, his strong corruption, his many infirmities, and his turning aside like "a broken bow." Yet, he can say, "Though I am the 'chief of sinners' and the 'least of all saints,' though I see within so much to abase me, and without so much to mourn over, yet this 'one thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see' (John 9:25). I see that which I never saw before—a hatefulness in sin, and a beauty in holiness; I see a vileness and emptiness in myself, and a preciousness and fullness in Jesus." Forget not, then, dear reader, that feeble grace is yet real
grace. If it but hungers and thirsts, if it "touches but the hem," it shall be saved.
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NOVEMBER 22
"Leaning upon her Beloved."—Song 8:5
What more appropriate and soothing truth could we bring before you, suffering Christian, than this? You are sick; lean upon Jesus. His sick ones are peculiarly dear to His heart. You are dear to Him. In all your pains and anguish, fainting and lassitude, Jesus is with you; He created that frame, He remembers that it is but dust, and He bids you lean upon Him and leave your sickness and its issue entirely in His hands.
You are oppressed; lean upon Jesus. He will undertake your cause, and, committing it thus into His hands, He will bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your judgment as the noonday.
You are lonely; lean upon Jesus. Sweet will be the communion and close the fellowship which you may thus hold with Him, your heart burning within you while He talks with you by the way. Is the ascent steep and difficult? Lean upon your Beloved.
Is the path strait and narrow? Lean upon your Beloved. Do intricacies and perplexities and trials weave their network around your feet? Lean upon
your Beloved. Has death smitten down the strong arm and chilled the tender heart upon which you were wont to recline? Lean upon your Beloved.
Oh, lean upon Jesus in every strait, in every want, in every sorrow, in every temptation. Nothing is too insignificant, nothing too mean, to take to Christ. That you want Christ is enough to warrant you in coming to Christ. You need make no excuse for repairing to Him; no apology will He require for the frequency of your approach. He loves to have you quite near to Him, to hear your voice, and to feel the confidence of your faith and the pressure of your love. Always remember that there is a place in the heart of Christ sacred to you and which no one can fill but yourself, and from which none may dare exclude you.
And when you are dying, oh, lay your languishing head upon the bosom of your Beloved and fear not the foe, and dread not the passage; for His rod and His staff will comfort you. The beloved disciple leaned on Christ's bosom at supper and on that bosom the martyr Stephen laid his bleeding brow on in death. You, too, beloved, may repose, living or dying, soothed, succored, and sheltered by your Savior and your Lord.
NOVEMBER 23
"God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?"—Num 23:19
God has done the utmost which His infinite wisdom dictated to lay the most solid ground for confidence. He has made all the promises of the covenant of grace absolute and unconditional. Were faith simply to credit this, what "strong consolation" would flow into the soul!
Take, for example, that exceeding great and precious promise, "Call upon me in the day of trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me" (Ps 50:15). What a sparkling jewel, what a brilliant gem is this! How many a weeping eye has caught the luster and has forgotten its misery as waters that pass away! While others, perhaps, gazing intently upon it, have said, "This promise exactly suits my case, but is it for me? Is it for one so vile as I who by my own indiscretion and folly and sin have brought this trouble upon myself? May such an one call upon God, and be answered?" What is this unbelieving reasoning but to render this divine and most exhilarating promise, as to any practical influence upon your mind, of none effect? But the promise stands in God's word absolute and unconditional. There is not
one syllable in it upon which the most unworthy child of sorrow can reasonably find an objection. Are you in a "day of trouble"? God makes no exception as to how, by whom, or from whence your trouble came. It is enough that it is a time of trouble with you, that you are in sorrow, in difficulty, in trial. God says to you, "Call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee." Resign, then, your unbelief, embrace the promise, and behold Jesus showing Himself through its open lattice.
Take yet another glorious promise, "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out" (John 6:37). "This is just the promise that my poor, guilty, anxious heart wants," exclaims a trembling, sin-distressed soul; "but do I dare, with all my sin, wretchedness, and poverty, to take up my rest in Christ? May I, who have been so long an enemy against God, such a despiser of Christ, such a neglecter of my soul, and scoffer at its great salvation, approach with a trembling yet assured hope that Christ will receive me, save me, and not cast me out?" Yes, you may. The promise is absolute and unconditional, and, magnificent and precious as it is, it is yours. Christ says, "Him that cometh unto me I will in no wise cast out. Satan shall not persuade me, sin shall not prevail with me, my own heart shall not constrain
me, yea, nothing shall induce me, to cast out that poor sinner who comes to me, believes my word, falls upon my grace, and hides himself in my pierced bosom. I will in no wise cast him out."
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NOVEMBER 24
"Nevertheless I tell you the truth; it is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you."—John 16:7
There is no sorrow of the believing heart of which the Holy Spirit is ignorant, to which He is indifferent, which His sympathy does not embrace, and which His power cannot alleviate. The church in which He dwells, whose journey he guides, is a tried church. Chosen in the furnace of affliction, allied to a suffering Head, its course on earth is traced by tears and often by blood. It deeply needs a Comforter. And who can compute the individual sorrows which may crowd the path of a single traveler to his sorrowless home? What a world of trial, and how varied, may be comprised within the history of a single saint! But if sorrows abound, consolation much more abounds, since the Comforter of the church is the Holy Ghost. What a mighty provision, how infinite the largess, the God of all consolation has made in the covenant of grace for the sorrows
of His people, in the appointment of the Third Person of the blessed Trinity to this office! What an importance it attaches to our every sorrow; with what dignity it invests them, and with what sanctity it hallows them! If our heavenly Father, in His unerring wisdom and goodness, sees proper to send affliction, who would not welcome the message as a sacred and precious thing, thus to be soothed and sanctified? Yes, the Spirit leads the sorrowful to all comfort. He comforts by applying the promises, by leading to Christ, by bending the will in deep submission to God, and by unveiling to faith's farseeing eye the glories of a sorrowless, tearless, sinless world. Who can portray His perfection as a Comforter? With what promptness and tenderness He applies Himself to the soothing of each grief, how patiently He instructs the ignorant, how gently He leads the burdened, how skillfully He heals the wounded, how timely He meets the necessitous, how effectually He speaks to the mourner! When our heart is overwhelmed within us, through the depth and foam of the angry waters, He leads us to the Rock that is higher than we.
He leads to glory. There He matures the kingdom, perfects the building, and completes the temple He commenced and occupied on earth. No power shall oppose, no difficulty shall obstruct,
no contingency shall thwart the consummation of this His glorious purpose and design. Every soul graced by His presence, every heart touched by His love, every body sanctified as His temple, He will lead to heaven. Of that heaven, He is the pledge and the earnest. While Jesus is in heaven, preparing a place for His people, the Spirit is on earth, preparing His people for that place. The one is maturing glory for the church, the other is maturing the church for glory.
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NOVEMBER 25
"What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's."—1 Cor 6:19-20
As a temple of the Holy Spirit, yield yourself to His divine and gracious power. Bend your ear to His softest whisper, your will to His gentlest sway, and your heart to His holy and benign influence. In not hearkening to His voice and in not yielding to His promptings, we have been great losers. He has often incited to communion with God, and because the time was not seasonable or the place not convenient, you stifled His persuasive voice, resisted His proffered aid, and, thus slighted
and grieved, He has retired. Then, when you have risen to pray, God has covered Himself as with a cloud that your prayer could not pass through. Oh, seek to have an ear tuned to His softest accents, and a heart constrained to an instant compliance with His mildest dictates. The greatest blessing we possess is the possession of the Spirit.
And oh, to be Christ's! To be His gift, His purchase, His called saint, His lowly disciple—what an inestimable privilege! But how may we be quite sure that this privilege is ours? If we have the Spirit of Christ, we are in very deed Christians. It is the superscription of the King, the mark of the Shepherd, the Lord's stamp of Himself upon the heart. And how sanctifying this privilege! "They that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts" (Gal 5:24). "Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity" (2 Tim 2:19). If we are Christ's now, we shall be Christ's to all eternity. It is a union that cannot be dissolved. Every believer in Jesus is "sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance" (Eph 1:13-14). And as we have the earnest of the inheritance, we shall as assuredly possess the inheritance itself.
The Spirit of Christ is an active, benevolent Spirit. It bore the Savior, when He was in the flesh, from country to country, from city to city, from house to house, preaching His own gospel to lost man. He "went about doing good" (Acts 10:38). If we have the Spirit of Christ, we shall be prompted to this same Christian love and activity on behalf of those who possess not the gospel, or who, possessing it, slight and reject the mercy. The Spirit of Christ is essentially a missionary Spirit. It commenced its labor of love at Jerusalem, and from that center, worked its way with augmenting sympathy and widening sphere until it embraced the world as the field of its labor. Ah, we manifest so little of this Spirit; this ought to lead us to deep searching of heart, and stir us up to earnest prayer: "Lord, make me more earnest for the salvation of souls, for the advancement of Thy kingdom. Grant me this evidence of being Thine—the possession of Thy Spirit, constraining me to a more simple and unreserved consecration of my talents, my substance, my rank, my influence, my time, myself, to the establishment of Thy truth and the advancement of Thy cause, and thus to the wider diffusion of Thy glory in the earth."
NOVEMBER 26
"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead."—1 Pet 1:3
To be sensible of this amazing power in the soul is to be born again; to be raised from the grave of corruption; to live a heavenly, resurrection life on earth; to have the heart daily ascending in the sweet incense of love and prayer and praise, where its risen Treasure is. It possesses, too, a most comforting power. What else sustained the disciples in the early struggles of Christianity, amid the storms of persecution, which otherwise would have swept them from the earth? They felt that their Master was alive. They needed no external proof of the fact. They possessed in their souls God's witness. The truth authenticated itself. The three days of His entombment were to them days of sadness, desertion, and gloom. Their sun had set in darkness and in blood, and every ray of hope had vanished with it. All they loved or cared to live for had descended to the grave. They had now no arm to strengthen them in their weakness, no bosom to sympathize with them in sorrow, no eye to which they could unveil each hidden thought and struggling emotion. But the
resurrection of their Lord was the resurrection of all their buried joys. They now traveled to Him as to a living Savior, conscious of a power newly born within them, the power of their Lord's resurrection. "Then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord" (John 20:20).
But is this truth less vivifying and precious to us? Has it lost anything of its vitality to quicken, or its power to soothe? Oh, no! Truth is eternal and immutable. Years do not impair its strength; circumstances change not its character. The same truths which distilled as dew from the lips of Moses, awoke the seraphic lyre of David, winged the heaven-soaring spirit of Isaiah, inspired the manly eloquence of Paul, floated in visions of sublimity before the eye of John, and have fed, animated, and sanctified the people of God in all ages, guiding their counsels, soothing their sorrows, and animating their hopes, are still vital and potent in the checkered experiences of the saints, hastening to swell the cloud of witnesses to their divinity and their might. Of such is the doctrine of Christ's resurrection.
Oh, what consolation flows to the church of God from the truth of a living Savior—a Savior alive to know and to heal our sorrows, to inspire and sanctify our joys, to sympathize with and supply our need! Alive to every cloud that shades the
mind, to every cross that chafes the spirit, to every grief that saddens the heart, to every evil that threatens our safety or imperils our happiness! What power, too, do the promises of the gospel derive from this truth! When Jesus speaks by these promises, we feel that there is life and spirit in His word, for it is the spoken word of the living Savior. And when He invites us to Himself for rest, bids us look to His cross for peace, and asks us to deposit our burdens at His feet and drink the words that flow from His lips, we feel a living influence stealing over the soul, inspiring and soothing as that of which the trembling evangelist was conscious when the glorified Savior gently laid His right hand upon him, and said, "Fear not; I am the first and last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death" (Rev 1:17-18). Is Jesus alive? Then let everything else die; our life, with all its supports, consolations, and hopes, is secure in Him. "Because I live, ye shall live also" (John 14:19). A living spring is He. Seasons vary, circumstances change, feelings fluctuate, friendships cool, friends die, but Christ is ever the same. Oh, the blessedness of dealing with a risen, living Redeemer! We take our wants to Him; they are instantly supplied. We take our sins to Him; they
are immediately pardoned. We take our griefs to Him; they are in a moment assuaged.
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NOVEMBER 27
"Because the creature itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God."—Rom 8:21
They are already in possession of a liberty most costly and precious. Is it not true liberty to stand before God accepted in the Beloved? Is it not liberty to draw near to Him with all the confidence of a child reposing in the boundless affection of a loving father? Is it not liberty to travel day by day to Jesus, always finding Him an open door of the most exquisite sympathy, the most tender love, and the most overflowing grace? Is it, in a word, not real liberty to be able to lay faith's hand upon the everlasting covenant, and exclaim, "There therefore is now no condemnation" (Rom 8:1)? Oh, yes! This is the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free.
But the glorious liberty of the children of God is yet to come. Glorious it will be, because more it will be manifest and complete. Including all the elements of our present freedom, it will embrace others not yet enjoyed. We shall be emancipated from the body of sin and of death. Every fetter of corruption will be broken, and every tie
of sense will be dissolved. All sadness will be chased from our spirit, all sorrow from our heart, and all cloud from our mind. Delivered from all sin and freed from all suffering, we shall wander through the many mansions of our Father's house, tread the star-paved streets of the celestial city, repose beneath the sylvan bowers of the upper Paradise, and drink of the waters, clear as crystal, that flow from beneath the throne—our pure, and blissful, and eternal home—exulting in the "glorious liberty of the children of God" (Rom 8:21).
How striking and solemn is the contrast between the present and the future state of the believer and the unbeliever! Yours, too, unregenerate reader, is a state of vanity. But, alas, it is a most willing subjection, and the bondage of corruption which holds you is uncheered by one ray of hope of final deliverance. What a terrible and humiliating bondage—a willing slave to sin and Satan! All is vanity which you so eagerly pursue. "The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity" (Ps 94:11). Were it possible for you to realize all the schemes of wealth and distinction, pleasure and happiness, which now float in gorgeous visions before your fevered fancy, still would your heart utter its mournful and bitter complaint, "All is vanity and vexation of spirit" (Eccles 1:14). Oh, turn from these vain shadows
to Jesus, the substance of all true wealth, happiness, and honor. That fluttering heart will never find repose until it rests in Him. That craving soul will never be satisfied until it is satisfied with Christ. Cast yourself down then at His feet and, with the tears of penitence, reliance of faith, and expectation of hope, ask to be numbered among the adopted who shall before long be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
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NOVEMBER 28
"As many as were ordained to eternal life believed."—Acts 13:48
There can be nothing in the Bible adverse to the salvation of a sinner. The doctrine of predestination is a revealed doctrine of the Bible; therefore, predestination cannot be opposed to the salvation of the sinner. So far from this being true, we do not hesitate to affirm most strongly and emphatically that we know of no doctrine of God's Word more replete with encouragement to the awakened, sin-burdened, Christ-seeking soul than this. What stronger evidence can we have of our election of God than the Spirit's work in the heart? Are you really in earnest for the salvation of your soul? Do you feel the plague of sin? Are you sensible of the condemnation of the law? Do
you come under the denomination of the weary and heavy laden? If so, then the fact that you are a subject of the divine drawings, that you have a felt conviction of your sinfulness, and that you are looking wistfully for a place of refuge affords the strongest ground for believing that you are one of those whom God has predestinated to eternal life. The very work thus begun is the Spirit's first outline of the divine image upon your soul, that very image to which the saints are predestinated to be conformed.
But while we thus vindicate this doctrine from being contrary to the salvation of the anxious soul, we must with all distinctness and earnestness declare that in this stage of your Christian course you have primarily and mainly to do with another and a different doctrine. We refer to the doctrine of the atonement. Could you look into the book of the divine decrees and read your name inscribed upon its pages, it would not impart the joy and peace which one believing view of Christ crucified will convey. It is not essential to your salvation that you believe in election; but it is essential to your salvation that you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. In your case, as an individual debating the momentous question how a sinner may be justified before God, your first business is with Christ, and Christ exclusively. You are to
feel that you are a lost sinner, not that you are an elect saint. The doctrine that meets the present phase of your spiritual condition is not the doctrine of predestination, but the doctrine of an atoning Savior. The truth to which you are to give the first consideration and the most simple and unquestioning credence is that "Christ died for the ungodly" (Rom 5:6), that He came into the world to save sinners, that He came to call not the righteous, but sinners to repentance, that in all respects, in the great business of our salvation, He stands to us in the relation of a Savior while we stand before Him in the character of a sinner. Oh, let one object fix your eye, and one theme fill your mind: Christ and His salvation. Absorbed in the contemplation and study of these two points, you may safely defer all further inquiry to another and a more advanced stage of your Christian course.
Remember that the fact of your predestination and the certainty of your election can only be inferred from your conversion. We must hold you firmly to this truth. It is the subtle and fatal reasoning of Satan, a kind of atheistic fatalism, to argue, "If I am elected, I shall be saved, whether I am regenerated or not." The path to eternal woe is paved with arguments like this. Men have cajoled their souls with such vain excuses until
they have found themselves beyond the region of hope! But we must rise to the fountain by pursuing the stream. Conversion, not predestination, is the end of the chain we are to grasp. We must ascend from ourselves to God, and not descend from God to ourselves, in settling this great question. We must judge of God's objective purpose of love concerning us by His subjective work of grace within us. In conclusion, we earnestly entreat you to lay aside all fruitless speculations and to give yourself to prayer. Let reason bow to faith, and faith shut you up to Christ, and Christ be all in all to you. Beware that you come not short of true conversion—a changed heart and a renewed mind—so that you become a new creature in Christ Jesus. And if as a poor, lost sinner you repair to the Savior, all vile and guilty, unworthy and weak as you are, He will receive you and shelter you within the bosom that bled on the cross to provide an atonement and an asylum for the very chief of sinners.
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NOVEMBER 29
"But I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. For I neither received it of men, neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ."—Gal 1:11-12
The great and distinctive truth thus so broadly, emphatically, and impressively stated is the
divinity of the gospel, a truth of which the Church of God needs to be established in the firm and practical belief. The gospel is the master work of Jehovah, presenting the greatest display of His manifold wisdom, and the most costly exhibition of the riches of His grace. In constructing it, He would seem to have summoned to His aid all the resources of His own infinity. His fathomless mind, His boundless love, His illimitable grace, His infinite power, and His spotless holiness all contributed their glory and conspired to present it to the universe as the most consummate piece of divine workmanship. It carries with it its own evidence. The revelations it makes, the facts it records, the doctrines it propounds, and the effects is produces reveal it to be no "cunningly devised fable" of human invention and fraud, but what it truly is: the revelation of Jesus Christ, the "glorious gospel of the blessed God" (1 Tim 1:11). What but a heart of infinite love could have conceived the desire of saving sinners? And what but an infinite mind could have devised saving them in such a way—the incarnation, obedience, and death of His own beloved Son? Salvation from first to last is of the Lord. Here we occupy high vantage ground; our feet stand on an everlasting rock. We feel that we press to our heart that which is truth; we have staked our
souls upon that which is divine. That Deity is the basis on which we build, and the hope which the belief of the truth has inspired will never make ashamed.
Oh, how comforting, how sanctifying is the conviction that the Bible is God's Word, that the gospel is Christ's revelation, and that all that it declares is as true as Jehovah Himself is true! What a stable foundation for our souls is this! We live encircled by shadows. Our friends are shadows, our comforts, our defenses, our pursuits are shadows, and we ourselves are shadows passing away. But in the precious gospel we have substance; we have reality; we have that which remains with us when all other things disappear, leaving the soul desolate, the heart bleeding, and the spirit bowed in sorrow to the dust. It peoples our lonely way because it points us to a "cloud of witnesses" (Heb 12:1). It guides our perplexities because it is a lamp to our feet. It mitigates our grief, sanctifies our sorrow, heals our wounds, and dries our tears because it leads us to the love, tenderness, sympathy, and grace of Jesus. The gospel reveals Jesus and leads simply to Jesus; this makes it what it is: glad tidings of great joy to a poor, lost, ruined, and tried sinner.
NOVEMBER 30
"For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth."—Rom 1:16
To what but the divinity of its nature are we to attribute the miraculous success which has attended the propagation of the gospel? Systems of religious opinion have risen, flourished for a while, then languished and disappeared. But the gospel, the most ancient as it is the most sublime of all, has outlived all other systems. It has beheld the rise and the fall of many, and yet it remains. What religion has ever encountered the fierce and persevering opposition which Christianity has endured? Professed friends have endeavored to corrupt and betray it. Avowed enemies have sworn utterly to annihilate it. Kings and legislatures have sought to arrest its progress, and to banish it from the earth. The fires of persecution have consumed its sanctuaries and its preachers; and behold, it yet lives! The divinity within has kept it. He who dwelt in the bush has preserved it. Where are the men of deep learning and brilliant genius, of moving eloquence, caustic wit, and untiring energy who banded themselves together with a vow to exterminate Christ and Christianity? And where is the Savior, whom they sought to annihilate? Enthroned in glory, robed in majesty, and exalted
a Prince and a Savior; encircled, worshipped, and adored by countless myriads of holy beings. The crown of Deity is on His head, and the scepter of universal government in His hand, from whose tribunal they have passed, tried, sentenced, and condemned, while He yet lives, to guard His Church and crush His foes. And where is the gospel, which they thought to overthrow? Pursuing its widening way of mercy through the world; borne on the wings of every wind and on the crest of every billow to the remotest ends of the earth, destroying the idols of heathenism, supplanting superstition and idolatry with Christian sanctuaries and Christian churches, softening down the harshness of human barbarism, and turning the instruments of cruelty into implements of husbandry. Above all, and the grandest of all its results, it is proclaiming to the poorest, neediest, vilest of our race salvation—full, free salvation by Christ—the pardon of the greatest sins by His atoning blood, the covering of the greatest deformity and unworthiness by His justifying righteousness, and the opening of the kingdom of heaven to all that believe.
Thus is the glorious gospel now blessing the world. It goes and effaces the stains of human guilt; it gives ease to the burdened conscience, rest to the laboring spirit, the sweetest comfort
under the deepest sorrow; it dries the mourner's tear; it exchanges the "garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness" (Isa 61:3), and all because it speaks of Jesus. Oh, this gospel would not be glad tidings nor good news if it did not testify of Jesus the Savior. He that sees not Christ as the sum, the substance, the wisdom, the power of the gospel is blind to the real glory of the Word. He that has never tasted the love of Jesus is yet a stranger to the sweetness of the truth.
Yes, the gospel is divine! It is of God's own creation. He gave the Word, and great is the company of them that preach it. Infidelity may oppose, and infidels may scorn it; false professors may betray, and sworn enemies may assail it; yet it will survive, as it has done, the fiercest assaults of men and of devils. Like the burning bush it will outlive the flame, and like the rock of the ocean it will tower above the storm with God, who originated and who guards it, exclaiming to all their rage, "Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed" (Job 38:11).