Reading: Acts 3:1-21.
This
is the first recorded miracle in the history of the
church, and parabolically it embodies a good deal of what
we have been considering, and I am going to take it in
that parabolic form as an illustration of some of these
matters.
We
begin at the end, that is, so far as this man is
concerned, with what God is aiming at, what God is after,
what the result of the work of God in a life is. The man
leaps up, stands upon his feet, praises and glorifies
God, and goes in and goes on with the people of God. That
is very simple, but it represents a work that God would
do and which needs to be done in the case of so many.
What the Lord wants in the case of all of us is to have
us on our feet, standing upright, praising and glorifying
Him, and going in and going on with His people; a very
different story and a very different situation from what
was; no longer a liability but an asset, no longer one to
be carried every day, but one who now is at least taking
his or her own weight, and going on by the inward
momentum of the Spirit and power of God. That is what the
Lord wants with us all.
It
immediately resolves itself into a challenge, an
interrogation. We have each one now to ask ourselves
quite honestly and frankly: In relation to the things of
the Lord, am I a liability or an asset? Am I counting or
am I having to be accounted for? Am I a positive factor
or am I negative? Am I amongst those who have to be
carried all the time, needing to be borne up, borne along
and put where I am, or am I going on in the Lord on my
own feet, on top of my infirmities? Am I a responsible
one, or otherwise? Well, we must each one answer that
question before the Lord now, and see what the Lord would
have, what the Lord would bring about. He would have us
all in the place or condition of this man as we see him
at the end, leaping up, standing on his feet, praising
and glorifying God, going on and going in; and more than
that as we shall see presently: but that is a good
beginning. Are we there?
The Hindrance to Entering in
Well,
we must go back and take the man up at the point where we
first find him. He is carried and laid at the Beautiful
Gate every day. There are those who are going in; but he
does not go in, and he cannot go in. “So we see that
they could not enter in…” (Heb. 3:19). The man
could not enter in. Let that gateway to the house of God
beyond represent in our parable that life of rest in the
Lord, that entering-in life, that life of attaining unto
God’s purpose. “And we see that they could not
enter in.” This man could not enter in, but why
could he not? Was it the gate that kept him out? No. Even
if the gate had been closed, that was not the inevitable
hindrance, and it was a big gate. I understand that it
took ten men to open the Beautiful Gate, so massive was
it. But even so, if it had been closed, that was not the
obstacle.
Let that gate in the story and in
the parable as we are regarding it, represent the law,
that bond of Judaism which says: Thou shalt not, or, Thou
shalt, that forbidding of the law. But that is not the
obstacle now. Christ was made under the law, to fulfil
the law and put it out of the way. The law is no longer
an obstacle.
“Free
from the law, O happy condition!
Jesus has died, and THERE is remission.
Cursed by the law, and bruised by the fall,
Christ has redeemed us once for all.”
The
law is no hindrance now.
But
was it the man’s infirmities that kept him out? Let
his infirmities, all wrapped into one, represent his
sins. Was it his sins and his imperfections, his faults,
that hindered that entering into rest? Again no. Our
sins, our weaknesses, our imperfections, our
temperamental and constitutional difficulties, all the
infirmities of our fallen natures, these are not the
hindrances. The Lord Jesus has dealt with all sin and all
sins, and all our weaknesses and infirmities He has
borne. All that is dealt with. They are not the
hindrance. Oh, you may say, it is this sin and that sin
that keeps me out, or it is that weakness, this
imperfection; it is the way I am made, my temperament, my
constitution, my make-up; I am so different from others;
and all this is the thing that binds me in infirmity so
that I cannot! If you are saying that, whether as one who
has never known Christ or whether as a child of God still
needing to know the entering-in life, it is a great
mistake to put it down to sins or infirmities and say
that it is these things in our nature that keep us out.
No, no! That would be to deny the Cross of the Lord
Jesus. That would, in its outworking and in its logic,
make God very unjust, because it would work out like
this, that people who had better temperaments would stand
a better chance of getting in, and people who had a worse
make-up would be at the end of the queue. God is not like
that. We are not nearer or farther from Him because we
are better or worse in our natures. Not at all!
Entering in by Faith
What
was it that kept the man out? “We see that they
could not enter in because of unbelief.” Faith
destroys the mightiest gates of brass, faith removes the
mountains of sin and human weakness and failure. The
easily besetting sin which has to be laid aside is this
sin of unbelief, and it was at that very citadel that the
Holy Ghost, through these servants of God, directed His
blow. Infirmity in itself was nothing, the gates were
nothing, closed or open, but the man’s attitude and
response of heart to a challenge from God was everything.
He could have reacted antagonistically or cynically, or
with utter carelessness, and stayed where he was. But
there is some response, some reaction, which we must
interpret as the quickening of faith in his heart: and
you know and I know perfectly well that we shall stay
where we are, go on in our infirm, helpless state of
spiritual liability, until we come to this point where we
exercise, deliberately and definitely, faith in the Lord
Jesus. Everything waits for that. That is elementary.
We
have to come to that response of faith, and then mighty
gates, whatever those gates may be in our lives, keeping
us out, no longer constitute a hindrance. Infirmities in
ourselves, defects and weaknesses, faults and failings,
sins and depravities and everything, from inheritance to
what we have brought on ourselves, nothing is enough to
obstruct our way when once we have come to this point of
a deliberate and positive trust in the Lord Jesus.
“We see that they could not enter in because of
unbelief.” But the positive is that you can enter in
by faith.
Concentration upon a Definite
Issue
But
then something else was necessary with this man; not in
addition to his faith but as a part of it, as heading up
to it. Peter and John were going up to the temple and
this man saw them coming. I do not know what his look was
like, his gesture. We can only imagine, a sort of
wonderfully pathetic glancing hither and thither. And
Peter looked on him, and said: Look on us. There must
have been some reason for that. And he fastened his eyes
upon them, of course expecting to receive an alms. But
the effect was that they got what they needed and wanted
as a necessary factor in this man’s deliverance.
“Look on us”, and he fastened his eyes upon
them.
What,
in parabolic meaning, does that stand for? It means this:
you and I, if we are in any condition like this, needing
to be put on our feet, needing to be made a factor that
counts, needing to be delivered from this infirm state
spiritually, from this state of being a liability; if we
are in any need like that, we shall never get anywhere
until we have concentrated upon a definite issue. He was
expecting to receive an alms. What are you after? Do you
want pity, sympathy, to be made a fuss of? Do you want
that which is, after all, only going to leave you where
you were? Are you looking to be nursed, coddled? Is that
what you are after, an alms? Do you really want to get
out of that position? Do you mean business? Is it nice to
be one of those who are always being carried and nursed,
and secretly, down in the deceptive heart, do you really
like it, and want to be ministered to? Your infirm
condition, you like being there because it draws
attention to you, brings you into the sympathetic area.
Oh, these hearts of ours, how they play with spiritual
things for their own gratification!
He
expected to receive an alms. But Peter and John are
saying, Look here, we are going to face this issue right
out: look on us! We are going to concentrate in this
matter. The moment has come for this sort of thing either
to end or to be indefinitely confirmed!
May I
say to you, dear friends, if you are anywhere in this
realm at all, you will never get anywhere until you have
come with both eyes to look this thing straight in the
face, and say, It is going on no longer; I am going to
have this thing settled, I am going to bring this thing
to a head; God helping me, it is going to be finished. I
am going to play with this no longer, I am going to
minister to this no longer, I am going to allow this to
cripple me no longer, I am going to allow this to make me
a liability no longer; tonight I look this thing in the
face, God helping me, and it is going to be settled. So
far as I am concerned, not another day shall pass until I
have had this thing out to a conclusion with God!
Look
on us! That is only saying the same thing as we are
occupied with now, and which in Hebrews is put this way
“Give diligence to enter in” (Heb. 4:11). We
must deal with that want of downrightness with God which
allows things to drag on and to rob God of that glory
which ought to be there, and that testimony which is to
follow. We are now getting to it. Look on us!
I need
not say more. God help us if we are there, weakened, put
out, not counting, God help us to focus upon this for a
swift issue and to play no longer with a state like that
for our own pleasure, to get sympathy or anything like
that. Not an alms: no, it is not an alms we need; it is a
deliverance we need, not a ministry to our infirmity, but
a deliverance from it.
Look
on us! And he fastened his eyes upon them, and Peter
said, “Silver and gold have I none — and after
all, that is not what you want — such as I have,
give I thee.” There is something infinitely more
than the treasure of this world. Supposing we had it all
and still had our infirmity, what have we? “Such as
I have, give I thee. In the name of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth, rise up.”
The Object of Faith
That
is the object of faith. It is not that we have somehow to
conjure up something called faith. It is the object of
faith that is vital, and that is what we have been
saying, and as the letter to the Hebrews so forcibly sets
forth, even Jesus Christ, Who He is, what He is, the
place He occupies, and His capacity. It is all in Him.
The focal point of faith is Jesus Christ, and the value,
the virtue, the power of faith is derived from its
object, it is not in itself. It is not until you get the
right object of faith that faith is a potent thing. You
can have all sorts of imitation faiths and they do not
affect the work of God in a spiritual way. You can
have a psychological faith, but it does not affect your
Christian life. You can have a Christian Science faith,
and it may do something for your physical life, inasmuch
as the mind and the physical are related, but it does not
make you a spiritual factor in the house of God. To
become a positive spiritual factor in the house of God
means that there has to come a vital link between your
spirit and Jesus Christ, a living union by faith with
Jesus Christ, and it is that taking hold on Him in faith
that provides the channel, the vehicle, through which the
energy of God comes. The energy of God, the Holy Ghost,
comes along the line of Jesus Christ as the object: not
something that we call faith, which may, after all, be
something that we have worked up to make ourselves
believe. Oh no, what matters is the object of faith, the
Lord Himself. God works on the ground of His Son, and you
and I apprehend His Son, Jesus Christ, by faith. The Holy
Ghost seals that, everything is related to that.
The Outcome of Entering
in
“In
the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk”; and he
leapt. Simple in its terms, but very, very drastic and
very utter in its action. Immediately the man in himself
knew the glory of God. He, leaping up, praised and
glorified God. He had got it in his own heart, in his own
soul. He knew he was changed, he was in the good of
God’s rest.
Yes,
and then he went in and went on with the Lord’s
people. The corporate element comes in. Hebrews will
speak about Christ as a Son over God’s house,
“whose house are we” (Heb. 3:6); and so on. The
house has come into view and he is going with them into
the house. He is going to be something in the house with
the servants of God, he is going to be part of that
corporate body and a factor in it.
A Mighty Uprising of the Devil
Now
you will see how he is a factor, for two things
arise. Follow through to the next chapter and you will
see. First of all he is the occasion of a mighty uprising
of the devil; and that is something! Oh, a great storm
arises because of what has happened with this man. Things
become tremendously disturbed in the spiritual
realm; and that is how it will be, and that is how
it ought to be. We do not speak glibly or lightly, but
the fact is that you and I ought to be factors of
disturbance in the kingdom of Satan, and if we are really
in the good of a living spiritual experience, that is, if
we are really on our feet as accountable and responsible
people of God, not having to be borne and carried and
nursed and ministered to in our infirmities, but now on
our feet, going in and going on, then the enemy
recognizes that here is something to be taken account of,
and for such there is always a disturbance.
It was
so over Lazarus. When he was raised from the dead, you
know what a furore there was, how the rulers at once set
to work to destroy the Lord Jesus because of Lazarus,
because by reason of him many believed. So it is. I
wonder whether you and I really do represent a
disturbance in the underworld, or whether the enemy can
go on without feeling a bit disturbed so far as we are
concerned. Every time something like this happened in the
New Testament, you very soon find a big reaction from the
enemy. You see, when the Lord Jesus comes in in larger
measure, it means less measure for the enemy, less scope,
less territory for him. He is squeezed out. Are
you squeezing the enemy out? Am I squeezing the enemy
out? Am I narrowing his province? Do we count in this
way? Well, that is one thing that arose.
A Living Testimony
The
other thing was this, this man was a testimony which was
the answer to every argument. Seeing the man there in the
midst whole, they had to shut their mouths. There was no
argument. It is all argument if it is doctrine,
theory, teaching, interpretation of truth, but a living
witness — you cannot argue against that. Your mouth
is shut when you have a living person standing there
right in the good of things. Are we closing the mouths of
people? We shall not do it by the truth that we
hold, teach, interpret, but we can do it by what we are,
by being in possession of the goods. Are we that? Are you
that? Are you going to be that? A real answer to every
argument so that people say, Well, look here, it is not
the teaching they have taken on, the associations they
have made: no, no, look at them; you know what they were,
you know how little they counted, you know what cripples
they were spiritually, you know what liabilities they
were, you know how much they were without rest: but look
now; they have the goods, they are in the good of things,
they are counting, they mean something, and they are in
rest, they are in joy, they are in satisfaction, they
themselves are changed! What can you say to that? You
cannot say anything to that if you are going to be
honest.
Oh,
dear friends, we are not to go out to try and pass over
some teaching, some truth, to people. That will never
convince. You and I are to be here as those who in
themselves convince others because we embody His rest, we
embody His peace, we embody His strength, and we count
for something. We are responsible people, we are positive
factors, we are assets, the Lord is getting something by
reason of us. That is how it must be. Is it like that?
All this can be if we will go the way of this man, and
say, Yes, this has gone on long enough and it has to end,
and to end, so far as my giving diligence is concerned,
at once, and I do most truly by the grace of God take a
deliberate and definite faith attitude toward the Lord
Jesus for my complete deliverance and the setting of me
upon my feet for His glory, for His praise! I think there
will be an issue, and I think it will be — he,
leaping up, stood upon his feet, praising and glorifying
God. May it be so with every one of us.