As the
writer of this letter (to the "Hebrews")
approaches its conclusion; after repeatedly giving great
and terrible warnings as to the peril of failure to
apprehend the full purpose and meaning of God in Christ,
he gathers all up into a prophetic forecast which is
itself the inclusive warning.
"He
hath promised, saying, Yet once more will I make to
tremble not the earth only, but also the heaven. And
this, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of
those things that are shaken, as of things
that have been made, that those things which are not
shaken may remain" (12:26-27).
It is
necessary for us to be sure that this has still a future
application, and was not fulfilled in the destruction of
Jerusalem and the dispersion of the Jews which was
imminent when the letter was written. Undoubtedly it had
a partial fulfilment in that terrible event, but, as is
so often the case in prophecy, was there not a double
aspect, as there unquestionably was in two outstanding
instances in the New Testament? One is the case of our
Lord quoting Isaiah 61 at Nazareth, and stopping at
"the year of the Lord's favour," not going on
to "the day of vengeance of our God" (Luke
4:18-19). The other is the quotation from Joel on the Day
of Pentecost (Acts 2:16-21). This prophecy was obviously
not wholly fulfilled on that occasion, but only partially
so.
If we
look at the passage in Haggai (2:6,9) quoted in Hebrews,
we shall see ample reason for doubting its already
fulfilment.
"Yet
once, it is a little while, and I will shake the heavens,
and the earth, and the sea, and the dry land; and I will
shake all nations; and the precious things of
all nations shall come; and I will fill this house
with glory, saith the Lord of hosts....
The latter glory of this house shall be
greater than the former."
Not one
part of that prophecy has yet been fulfilled literally.
If the apostle employed that prophecy in relation to the destruction
of the Temple rather than to its filling with glory
and peace, there remains much to be desired both as to
Biblical usage, interpretation, and fulfilment. A
spiritual interpretation of the Day of Pentecost would
get nearer to the features - i.e., heaven and earth
shaken: the sea and dry land (the multitudes of mankind):
the nations; and the nations yielding treasures; the
house filled with glory, etc. But even so we are left
with the future aspect of the passage in Hebrews 12.
The sense of verse 28 is that we are in
process of receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken,
but this corresponds to verse 5 of chapter 2: -
"Not unto angels did He subject
the inhabited earth to come, whereof we are speaking."
The whole of this paragraph should be
carried over to "the kingdom which cannot be
shaken" together with "partners of a heavenly
calling" (3:1). It will then be seen that the
"once more," literally "only once,"
in its universal sense must yet lie ahead, and doubtless
in relation to the Lord's coming again.
The last verse of chapter 12 seems to
clinch this argument - "for our God is a consuming
fire," and surely it belongs to the events of which
Peter wrote:
"The day of the Lord... in the
which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and
the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and
the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned
up. Seeing that these things are thus all to be
dissolved..." (II Pet. 3:10-11).
Some of these phrases are very
intelligible to us, and we are quite sure that Peter knew
nothing about atomic bombs - "elements dissolved
with fervent heat"; but the Holy Spirit did, and
does! (It is well to read the whole of this chapter from
Peter.) Peter's words in his first letter (4:17) are also
very relevant to Hebrews 12:26, where he says that
"The time (is come) for judgment
to begin at the house of God."
Having, then, as we think, good ground for
believing that the great shaking still lies ahead, we are
able to say something with regard to its object, its
need, and its call.
The Object Of The Shaking
In the light of this entire letter,
and indeed, in the light of the entire New Testament
revelation, the one object by which everything is
ultimately tested and judged is Christ, as being the
constitution of everything in a spiritual way. God's one
inclusive purpose is to have everything constituted
according to Christ. This must be organic, the very
nature and essence of Christ. It cannot be by imitation,
duplication, or organization. It can only be by
conception, not observation. This kingdom "cometh
not with observation." Therefore it must be
spiritual. It must come from within by 'inbirth'. Thus,
the measure of Christ as the spiritual life and nature of
everything or anything working from within is the basis
and standard of all Divine judgments. It will not be
sound doctrine, extra truth, devoutness, zeal, many
works, etc., but just Christ Himself, known, lived, and
expressed, in the power and grace of the Eternal Spirit.
In a word, it will be a matter of our true spiritual life
as spiritual people in living and growing identification
with Christ by the Holy Spirit. God has reduced His whole
judgment to this. "He will judge the world by (or
in)... Jesus Christ," and this is not just official,
but spiritual - Christ is not only the Judge, but the
standard of judgment. This is why the Book of the
Revelation, which is a book of judgments, first of the
Church, and then of the nations, begins with a
full-length presentation of Christ the Living One. Then
it shows that judgment is not so much as to things, more
or less good or bad, but what is Christ or what is
inimical to Him constitutionally.
The Need For The Shaking
We have been at pains in our
earlier chapters to show that Christianity has become,
very largely, another Judaism, an outward system and a
historic tradition. But it has become more than this. In
its principles, methods, and means, it has largely become
conformed to this world or age. Were we wanting to deal
with the negative or defective aspect of things, it would
not be difficult to write whole chapters on the
weaknesses of present-time organized Christianity; but we
would rather use our time and space on the positive line.
Let us, however, appeal to our brethren in responsibility
to think again and seriously before the Lord as to the
true nature and origin of much that goes to make up the
means of propaganda and publicity of work for God. Let us
take account of such things as the prominence given to
human honours, glories, titles, reputations,
distinctions. That men have gained these or been given
them in various spheres of life - politics, philanthropy,
industry, adventure, war, sport, entertainment, science,
art, or education - may be quite all right in itself, but
that these things should be so largely used as the ground
of appeal may just imply that Christ is not sufficient as
standing on His own merits, but must be surrounded by
these natural embellishments (?). Must Christ be
recommended or His servants accepted because of some
human association of the word "great" in some
earthly connection?
Again, let us be very careful, for the
same purpose, of the encroachment of the entertainment
feature of sacred service. "Lovers of pleasure"
is an end-time characteristic, and the age is running
headlong thither. Is it necessary to go with the age in
order to attract? Is the Gospel dependent upon this
"makeup" for its effectiveness and appeal?
Once more: let us watch that we are not
carried away by the illusion of bigness. Many a once
powerful instrument of God - personal or collective - has
lost its spiritual value and impact when it has become
big or popular. There is a Satanic snare in bigness, and
we may by this illusion lose our very faculty for seeing
just where God is doing His deepest work, and how. Often,
God's truest work is hidden. It is becoming difficult, if
not impossible, for many servants of God to believe or
understand that anything of real account can be done
unless it is well known and in the public eye.
When David put the Ark upon a new cart and
things went just so far and then came to an ignominious
and tragic impasse, it was not due to a lack of
sincerity, devotion, zeal, energy, or wholeheartedness,
but because he had all unwittingly drawn up from his
subconsciousness an idea and method which had originated
with the Philistine diviners. Those diviners had once put
the Ark upon a new cart to send it back into Israel.
David had fled in an hour of weakness to dwell in the
land of the Philistines, and had been infected with the
methods and means of that world. When God made the breach
upon Uzzah that he died before the Lord it would have
been too hard and severe, in the light of the zeal for
the Lord, if there had not been some extra factor. That
factor was the hand of another spiritual system back of
"this present evil world" of which the diviners
were the representatives and servants, and whom God had
already plagued and cursed. (Read the story in I Samuel
5, 6, 27, II Samuel 6). There was no reason why Uzzah
should be spared and the Philistines destroyed if the
same factor obtained in both cases. No amount of zeal can
save us in the end if the principles are false. But note
how subtle it all was. There was not the remotest idea
that things were basically wrong. The idea of bringing up
the Ark (the Testimony) to its right and full place was
right and according to God's mind. The earnestness and
utterness left nothing to be desired. The motive and its
passion were wholly commendable. But somewhere, somehow,
Antichrist (in principle) was hidden in the constitution
of things: the energy of the flesh, the soul-life
actuated or taken charge of by that which was not the
Spirit of God. If the soul, which is the natural side of
man's being, is predominant, on any or all of its
sides - intellectual, emotional, or volitional - then the
door is wide open to deception; and deception, being what
it is, does not mean that there is no zeal for God, but
rather that it is zeal but not according to knowledge. It
is only as the child of God lives in and is governed by
the Holy Spirit through his renewed spirit - not firstly
his soul - that he will be made aware of "the
things that differ," even in his service for God.
David eventually was shown what the Holy Spirit had
indicated in the Scriptures as to God's principles of
service, and he found by tragic experience that spiritual
principles are more important than zeal and energy,
although these latter were no less when the true basis
was established. Satan is very subtle and will espouse
our zeal for God if by so doing he can eventually bring
shame and dishonour into God's testimony.
God sees through it, and would warn us of
it. The trouble so largely is that, as in David's case,
the drive and abandon associated with a great idea for
God just ride rough-shod over quiet waiting upon God and
enquiry of Him as to His mind concerning the means and
methods to be employed. The point at which disaster will
befall very much that is engaged in for God in all
sincerity is that which leaves no time for quiet
detachment, for unhurried waiting upon God. There may be
prayer, but it is prayer with a drive of work behind it,
instead of the other way round. The question is, Did you
get that method, that means, that programme in the secret
place with God, direct from Him? Have you put everything
back until all heat and hurry have been subjected to the
judgment of the Holy Spirit? Or are you just getting on
with it because it is for the Lord?
Do you think that judgment is upon men and
things as such? Was there not enough genuine devotion to
the Lord in David, Uzzah, and all the others to prevail
against that terrible breaking in of God? Would the Lord
not be slow to anger if that were all? Oh, why then this
severity of God? Why must judgment begin at the house of
God? It cannot be because of a greater or lesser degree
of Christian goodness or zeal. There must be something
more in it than that! Yes, there is, and we have touched
upon it. The "eyes of flame" (Revelation 1:14),
"the consuming fire," have beheld an
insinuation - in principle or element - of the great evil
one, who will deceive even to the point of
simulating Christ or "an angel of light," in
order that - sooner or later - the real Christ impact
shall be neutralized.
This is all so relevant to our
consideration in these chapters, and is undoubtedly
behind the terrible nature of the warnings in this
letter. We could never over-emphasize or exaggerate the
terrible consequences to Christians and Christian work of
failure to take sufficient account of the significance in
verse 12 of chapter 4 linked with verse 9 (last part) of
chapter 12.
But when all has been said both there and
here, will you stop, can you stop, to get a sure place in
the Spirit, or are you so involved, committed, driven,
that the "still small voice" of the Spirit has
no chance of being heard? It is in this whole realm of
things that the great shaking will have its first effect.
I was recently told in America on very good authority
that fifty per cent of the missionaries who go to the
mission field never return there after their first
furlough, they cannot stand up to it. If that proportion
were only half the truth it would be a startling - though
small - sample of what the great shaking will mean in the
matter of discovering how much there really is of Christ
back of all early enthusiasm and well-meaning intentions.
Not less zeal, devotion, and energy, but more depth,
spiritual measure, and Divine understanding lies behind
the appeal of this letter - "Let us go on to full
growth."
With that appeal we shall deal
particularly in our next chapter.