"But
arise, and stand upon thy feet: for to this end have I appeared
unto thee, to appoint thee a minister and a witness both of the
things wherein thou hast seen me, and of the things wherein I
will appear unto thee" (Acts 26:16).
"But the Lord said
unto him, Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear
my name before the Gentiles and kings, and the children of
Israel: for I will show him how many things he must suffer for my
name's sake." "...if so be I press on, if so be that I
may lay hold on that for which also I was laid hold on by Christ
Jesus" (Phil. 3:12).
It is not my intention to speak
at length on these passages, but to take out of them some things
that are implied or embodied in them as principles. They resolve
themselves into a matter of cause and effect. "For to
this end have I appeared unto thee..." "I will show him
how many things he must suffer for my name's sake" (Acts
9:15-16). "...that I may lay hold on that for which also I
was laid hold on by Christ Jesus." "...that for
which...": "...to this end..."
Sovereign
Purpose Governs Our Salvation
The first aspect of that is
clearly one of sovereign purpose. Purpose is the positive and
governing aspect of salvation. It is that unto which we are
saved. Of course, it would not be wholly right to say that that
from which we are saved is the negative aspect of salvation, but
it is the negative aspect compared with this other. It is not the
'from' but the 'unto' or the 'for' which is really the positive
thing in salvation. Stagnation had no place even in the unfallen
creation. God did not just make everything and put man in charge
and set fixed bounds to the possibilities of man and creation.
The potentialities were immense; and when Adam failed, he lost
not only what was, but also what could have been. It is said that
Adam was "a figure of him that was to come". (Rom.
5:14). Figures are always less than that which they
represent. Adam was intended for something more than he was.
Christ is that something more - infinitely more - and when Christ
redeemed, He not only redeemed what was before Adam sinned, but
also all that Adam never possessed or inherited but which was
intended for him. Purpose governed creation, and we know, as a
part of the very gospel itself, that the purpose of God was
missed by Adam, and is missed by the Adam race. Moreover, the whole
purpose of God is never possessed and entered into in
experience the moment we are born again.
I said that stagnation is no
feature of God's creation even when it is unfallen; but for any
to be born again, and thus to begin to know the good of
redemption, and then to fail to recognize that they are saved not
only from something, but unto something immense,
means that stagnation sets in and they are always dating
everything by the past; whereas those who have apprehended the
fact of purpose are always occupied with the future, with
something beyond.
Sovereign purpose, we have
said, is the positive and the governing factor of salvation. You
have heard that many times, but I do want to emphasize it again.
Perhaps you have not grasped it. There are still many Christians
who are just glad they are Christians: they know Christ as their
Saviour and they are seeking day by day to live as Christians:
but they are not conscious of any great, powerful, dominating
motive of sovereign purpose in their salvation. They are not
drawn on by an enlarging vision and apprehension of that
sovereign purpose. Those little statements which we noted
earlier, such as "...that for which I was
apprehended...", "...to this end have I appeared unto
thee", mean little or nothing to them. But to
us, as to Paul, the Lord would say, 'Not just to save you, not
just to deliver you from perdition, not just for your escape from
judgment have I appeared unto you, but I have a great revelation
to give you of that unto which I have saved you'. That is the
effect of His words to Paul, and they are true for us also, as
Paul makes clear in his letters. You need to be sure that you are
really gripped in your innermost being by such a consciousness,
by this sense of being apprehended by and for sovereign purpose,
so that it is dominating your life - something which eliminates
the element of time, so that you are not limited by the idea of
just living as good a Christian life as you can until you die.
This outbounds our life here, and we know it well.
That is all I want to say about
the first thing. But I want to be sure that you are really in the
grip and control of this that the early Christians felt so much
and which the Apostles (especially Paul) took such pains to bring
home to the Church. Sovereign purpose governs God's activities in
the life of every child of His, and that sense and fact of
purpose, as related to our salvation, is after all the main part
of our salvation, the positive aspect.
God's
Ways Determined by His Purpose
Then, of course, there follow
quite naturally the sovereign ways of God with us in relation to
His sovereign purpose. The only thing I will say now about that
is this, that God's ways with us will be, and must be, consistent
with His sovereign purpose. Here is where we need to be really
intelligent and alive. We must look to see how our ways
correspond to God's purpose under His sovereign control. It is a
part of our education, and of our heart gratification when we are
able to discern it, to observe how our experience and our history
tally with God's object and with the principles which govern His
purpose. From time to time it will be well for us if we just
stand still and say, 'Now, this is what is revealed as God's
purpose, and we are called according to His purpose. Does my
spiritual experience and history give me heart-assurance that God
is taking the only way by which that purpose can be fulfilled?'
What do we mean by that? Let us
cite a point or two that might illustrate it. Here we open up
something very vast, and we can only just stand and look at it
from the outside.
The
Purpose - The Expression of a Testimony
(a) Life in
the Midst of Death
"The testimony of
Jesus" is a phrase that sums up a very great deal in
the book of the Revelation. Indeed, it sums up the whole Bible.
Now supposing, for argument's sake, that the object of the
Church's calling is a testimony to Divine life. (It is no
supposition, though, but a reality. "In him was
life" (John 1:4): "I came that they may have life"
(John 10:10): that is the testimony of Jesus.) Supposing
then the testimony of Jesus is the testimony of Divine life: what
is necessary in order that our experience and history should
tally with Divine purpose? It is that we should have a setting in
which we are assailed continually by death. Life becomes a very
real thing when death is all around and very active. So, if the
purpose is the manifestation of Divine life, then those who are
called according to that purpose will have to have a history of
conflict with death. That is simple and obvious. If, therefore,
you and I have such a history and such an experience, are we to
stand back and say, 'Oh, this is all wrong! Would that we could
get out of this!'? We should rather say, 'This is in accordance
with the object in view, there is a consistency about God's ways
with us.'
The mystery of life is one of
the supreme features, if not the supreme feature, of the whole
record in Scripture. I am not attempting to deal with it
exhaustively here, but only to bring out the point that
immediately concerns us. What is the mystery of Christ? Many men
besides Jesus Christ were brought up in Nazareth. Stand them all
in a row. Can you discriminate between them other than by purely
natural features? No. And yet there is a difference between Jesus
and the rest. What is the difference? While outwardly He looks
like the rest, there is a mystery about Him, there is something
there, He is not the same. People tried to deal with Him as they
dealt with other men, but they found they were dealing with
someone unique, in whom there was something different. "The
mystery of Christ" (Eph. 3:4), who Christ really was!
The mystery of life. "Called
according to his purpose." Supposing then that
the Church is to be a manifestation of the life, a testimony to
Divine life, then the Church will be set all through its history
in scenes of death, with the forces of death raging against it.
(b) Light in
the Midst of Darkness
The same is true of light. "I
am the light of the world" (John 8:12). But
there was no glow about Him, no halo round His head, nothing
outward that said to men, 'This is the light of the world'. But
vital union with Him by the Spirit later meant that those in
union had a wonderful illumination in their own spirits. In that
way, not physically, they became luminaries for those who were
seeking the light. There was a mystery still about it. No one
could discern it except in a spiritual way. Supposing then the
calling is this - to manifest the light. Then we shall be placed
in darkness again and again for the testimony's sake.
"He is a chosen vessel
unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles and kings, and the
children of Israel: for I will show him how many things he must
suffer for my name's sake". He must suffer in order that
the Name may come out in all its glory. The cause of all is to be
found in the calling and election, and the effect of the calling
is to be seen in suffering, a setting that brings out the reality
of this calling. "...to this end..." Have you
yourself a sense of this? Then check up as you go along and see
if the ways of the Lord with you are not after all perfectly
consistent with the thing that He is after.
(c)
Heavenliness in the World
You say that a principle of the
Church's life is heavenliness, other-worldliness, detachment from
this world spiritually. Very well, the Church and the individuals
in it will often find themselves in a position where, if heaven
does not intervene for them, everything here is at an end, and
you will not have this world on your side with its favour and
applause. Will you begin to grumble and say you are having a hard
time? The truth is, your experience is consistent with the
principles of your calling.
It may be helpful to make a
suggestion. When you feel you must give up because the way is too
hard and too difficult, or you feel tempted to think that
everything is wrong and ought not to be like this, just ask the
question - 'After all, does not this way show God's perfect
consistency with His Divine principles and with the object in
view unto which He has chosen us?' And so often we have to say,
'After all, the consistency is patent; He could not do it in any
other way; this is the only way.'
First published in "A Witness and A
Testimony" magazine, Jan-Feb 1952, Vol 30-1