"And these all,
having had witness borne to them through their faith,
received not the promise, God having provided some better
thing concerning us, that apart from us they should not
be made perfect. Therefore let us also, seeing we are
compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, lay
aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily
beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is
set before us, looking unto Jesus the author and
perfecter of our faith" (Hebrews 11:39-12:2).
The Bible teaches us
that people of the Old Testament went through experiences
of which they never understood the full meaning. The real
meaning was hidden from their eyes. All that they knew
was that they were under the hand of God, and that there
was something more in their experiences of His dealings
with them than they knew.
The Bible also teaches
that that meaning, which was hidden from them, has been
revealed to us in this present dispensation. We have the
light on their experiences which they did not possess.
The things which happened to them, and the ways in which
they were led, had a spiritual meaning which waited for
our time for its unveiling, so that we know the meaning
of them while they did not. In the light which has now
come to us we are able to see the meaning of their lives
and to read the Old Testament in a new way.
So in our consideration
of the life of Abraham we are able to see that the events
in his life represent something for us. "These
all, having had witness borne to them through their
faith, received not the promise, God having provided (or
foreseen) some better thing concerning us, that apart
from us they should not be made complete." There
was something incomplete about their experience, and we
have got that something.
Thus we come back to
consider these steps in the life of Abraham, steps in a
spiritual pilgrimage which begins in the world and ends
in the heart of God. In our last meditation we began to
consider the third step, that is, oneness with God in the
heavenly nature of things, and we considered it from the
positive standpoint, how that God had done a deep thing
in Abraham which made it impossible for him to be
satisfied with anything in this world. As the writer of
the Letter to the Hebrews says: "They desire a
better country, that is, a heavenly" (Hebrews 11:16).
Now we are going to
look at this from what we may call the negative
standpoint, though that is only a way of speaking, for
there is nothing negative about God's dealings with His
people. What I mean is this: that this great reality of
the heavenly nature of things was made known to Abraham
by his mistakes, and this is one of the necessary methods
of God with us. God would not let us make mistakes if we
were different people from what we are, but He knows
quite well that most of His children will never learn
anything except by making mistakes. You may tell a little
child a hundred times that it will get burnt if it puts
its finger in the fire, but most children will not
believe that until they have tried it, and then they know
by experience what they cannot know by theory - they know
in life what they could not learn by doctrine.
Some years ago I went
to a great engineering factory, and there I saw them
melting steel. I watched them pouring the molten steel
into vessels, and we all had to stand well away. Even the
hot air round about was cold to that steel, so that as it
came out into the air it just flew out all over the
place. I said to one of the men who was pouring out this
steel: 'Do you know that it is said that if you put your
arm into cold water and then put it into that steel, you
would not feel it?' He replied: 'I have been doing this
for years, but if you like to try it you can. Theory or
no theory, I know all about molten steel, and I am not
engaging in any experiments.'
The Lord knows quite
well that you and I will never really learn unless we
make mistakes. We do not enjoy pointing out the mistakes
of great servants of God, but it is impressive that He
has had these things written in His Word, and the
Scripture says: "Whatsoever things were written
aforetime were written for our learning"
(Romans 15:4), and the mistakes are included in the
"things written aforetime". Thus they were
written for our learning.
Great as this man
Abraham was, he made three big mistakes in his life, and
we only take note of them in order that we may learn not
to make those mistakes.
The first one is
recorded in the twelfth chapter of the Book of Genesis.
Abraham had been commanded by God to leave his own
country and go to another country which God would show
him. He obeyed and went into the land of Canaan where he
lived for some time. Then there arose a famine in that
land, and that meant quite a serious crisis for Abraham.
Naturally the question would arise: 'Did God send me here
to let me starve to death? This looks like an absolute
contradiction on His part. All that He has commanded and
promised now seems to be a big question. I am in the
place where He has put me, and circumstances say that it
is impossible for a man to live here.' It certainly was a
big test of faith! We shall come to the explanation later
on, but it is here that Abraham made his first great
mistake. He took his journey down into Egypt. Now, it
must have been something that was very carefully thought
about. You will remember that later on Israel took that
journey in the opposite direction, and it says then that
it is eleven days' journey from Egypt just to the border
of Canaan, but Abraham was not just on the border. He was
right in the land, so that he had to contemplate an
eleven days' journey across the desert at least, and you
do not do that sort of thing without serious thought. I
only say that to indicate how serious this thing was.
Abraham went down into
Egypt, for he thought that that was the way to save his
life. But do you know, when we do things like that we
only - as we say - jump out of the frying-pan into the
fire!
On the journey
something came to Abraham's mind. He looked at his wife,
Sarah, and he said to her: 'Sarah, you know, you are a
very beautiful woman, and when you get down into Egypt
Pharaoh may take notice of you. You know, Sarah, you are
not only my wife; you are also my sister, so if any
questions arise about you when we are in Egypt, you just
say that you are my sister.'
Now there are two
things in that connection. Abraham was prepared to
compromise his own wife to save his own life, and he was
not only going down geographically, he was descending
from the high level of principle to the low level of
policy. When we sacrifice people for policy, we do not
get out of our difficulties: we make them worse. Let me
say to the young men and young women, as to everybody,
that it is never a safe thing to compromise on people. If
God has called you to Himself, He has called you on to
heavenly ground, and that ground is the ground of
heavenly principles. The peril of many a young man or
young woman is to compromise with this world in order to
gain some advantage, and to compromise is always a
half-truth. It is what we call 'a white lie'. It was
quite true that Sarah was Abraham's sister, but that was
only half the truth. So Abraham resorted to a half-truth
to gain some advantage, as he thought. We shall be tested
sooner or later on this thing - as to whether we will
compromise in order to gain some advantage in this world.
You can read what
happened. God plagued Pharaoh because of what he did over
Sarah, and Pharaoh said to Abraham: 'What is this you
have done? You have told me a lie.' Abraham brought
dishonour upon the name of the Lord before the world
because of compromise. Pharaoh sent Abraham away and he
had to take that long journey back to the place where he
had built his altar. The altar always represents the
Cross, and the Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ always
represents no compromise with this world. There is no
place for a lie in the Cross of the Lord Jesus! Let us
learn this lesson! To arrive at last in the heart of God
we have to stand very strongly, even if we die for it, on
the truth. We will come back to that again presently.
The second great
mistake that Abraham made was with Hagar, and Ishmael was
the result. You know your Bibles well enough to make it
unnecessary for me to tell the story. God was trying
Abraham's faith on the ground of patience. He had
promised Abraham a son by Sarah, but the years went on.
Abraham, ten years older than Sarah, was an old man, and
Sarah was getting an old woman, so the situation seemed
absolutely hopeless. As they were talking it over and
wondering how God's promise could ever be fulfilled,
Hagar passed by the opening in their tent, and an idea
came into Sarah's mind: 'It is impossible with me. Try it
with Hagar', and Abraham accepted the suggestion.
What does this say to
us? 'The situation seems to be impossible naturally. Let
us then try by the energy of the flesh to realize what
seems impossible in the spirit.' So Abraham descended
from the level of faith in God to the level of faith in
his own works. It was a case of trying to be spiritually
fruitful by fleshly methods. Thus Hagar was introduced.
Now there are two
things to note about this. Hagar was an Egyptian, and how
did they come to have an Egyptian in their service? When
did an Egyptian come into the family? Well, we cannot
answer that question with certainty, but we know that
Pharaoh did not send Abraham away empty-handed. That may
answer the question. But what does Egypt represent? I
have only to remind you of Israel in Egypt! The one word
which always described Egypt was 'bondage'. If we descend
to the level of the flesh to try and help God out, we
will only get into worse bondage; and there resulted the
terrible tragedy of Ishmael and Hagar. The Apostle Paul
makes a great deal of this thing in his Letter to the
Galatians, where he speaks of Hagar as the bondwoman and
says: "With freedom did Christ set us free:
stand fast therefore, and be not entangled again in a
yoke of bondage" (Galatians 5:1). So Abraham
learned the great lesson that we, being heavenly people,
must stand on heavenly ground. We must not come down on
to the ground of the flesh to try and help God out of
what we think is His difficulty.
Abraham had to learn
the lesson by failure, but did he learn it? I am terribly
sorry to have to say that he did not seem to have done so
very thoroughly, because some time afterward we find him
going down to the country of the Philistines and, strange
to say, he resorted to the same old subterfuge. Again, it
was exactly the same thing: 'Sarah, you say that you are
my sister.' You can hardly believe it, can you? How slow
we are to learn these lessons!
Well, he went to the
country of the Philistines and Abimelech just came out on
the same ground - he took Sarah from Abraham. How
merciful and faithful God is! That night He appeared to
Abimelech in a dream and said to him: 'Abimelech, you are
a dead man', and Abimelech explained to Him why he had
taken Sarah, as Abraham had said that she was his sister.
When Abimelech got up in the morning he called Abraham
and said: 'What is this that you have done? You have
lied to me and have brought me near to destruction.' The
details are almost exactly like the Egyptian occasion,
but not quite. These are not the Egyptians, but the
Philistines. All that you know about the Egyptians tells
you that they would never have anything to do with what
was of God. As with Pharaoh in the time of Moses, who
would fight God to the last moment, Egypt would never
have anything to do with divine things - but the
Philistines were always trying to get their hands on
divine things. They tried to get possession of the land.
They were always invading it, even until the days of
David. Their one ambition was to get hold of the ark of
the covenant, and when they did get it, they opened it to
have a look inside. These people were always very
interested in divine things, but do you remember the
description which was always applied to them? The "uncircumcised
Philistines" (Judges 14:3). They
represent uncrucified flesh trying to get hold of the
things of God, the people of the senses in relation to
the things of God. They are that which wants to 'see with
the natural eyes, hear with the natural ears and handle
with the natural hands', while their hearts have never
gone to the Cross to be circumcised.
Abraham went down to
the Philistines. What a descent from a heavenly level to
an earthly, from the spiritual to the natural! When a
servant of God does that, he always brings God into
dishonour.
I think Abraham did
learn his lesson this time, for we do not read again of
anything like that.
Do you see the way into
the heart of God? I said that I would give you an
explanation of the whole thing.
Do you not recognize
that God always puts His people on to supernatural
ground? The life of the child of God has to be a
supernatural thing altogether. It has to be a continuous
miracle. That is a very difficult position, but if you
look at God's dealings with His servants in the Bible you
will always see this: that He has put them on to a
supernatural ground. That means that only God Himself can
meet the situation. No one else can get us through. Our
own flesh and energy cannot do so, nor can our own
natural wisdom, as with Pharaoh and Abimilech.
Whether it was Abraham,
or Moses, or Elijah, or any other one, they were put on
to this ground where only God could see them through, and
He would not give His glory to another.
Now look at Hebrews
chapter twelve! All this great host of witnesses has been
collected together, having all come at last to the
victory, and they are represented as gathered in the
great grandstand of Heaven, as though they were looking
at us... "We are compassed about with so great a
cloud of witnesses". Go back to chapter eleven
and pick up each one singly. On the one side their
situation was an altogether impossible one naturally. On
the other side, therefore, every one of them is a miracle
of God. Their arrival in victory at the end of the race
is a supernatural thing, and their God is our God, and we
are called in that way. It is a difficult way and it does
not get easier as we go on, but God is able to make every
one of us a miracle of His grace.