“All things are of God”
It is a well known fact, that Satan, when he cannot entirely set aside any truth of God, seeks to pervert it; and' the most advanced saint has need to watch, and be prepared, for such perversion. Nay, so subtle is the nature of it that invariably the most effectual instrument, in the hand of Satan, is the one who hitherto has progressed furthest in truth; for the higher one has reached, and the more one has learned, the more extensive the injury he perpetrates, if he be perverted. The higher, and the larger the building, the greater the crash when it falls. A small one might be unnoticed, but a great one necessarily involves great damage.
In every day it has been according to the vigor in. which truth was presented, that there was opposition to it but the opposition most successful, and the one most difficult to counteract, has always been that which dome' within a shade of the truth. The greatest lie is that which is nearest to that truth which it seeks to supplant, and to be accepted instead of. And often the line of difference is so fine that to give a definition of it is difficult;' and it can only be determined by the eye set on God, and not on man; for it will be found that the perversion of the most dangerous and injurious order takes its rise from having the eye turned to man, and seeking to make the truth suit him, and not to conform man to the truth; so that the way to resolve this almost invisible line of difference is by the simple question, Is it God-ward Tam looking, or man-ward? 'When Satan turns Eve's eye to herself' and her own advantages, God gets no place in her mind; but on the contrary, His will is refused, and His nature denied. Cain thinks only of man, and what suits the creature as such, without any reference to what God, in His nature, may require of the creature now under judgment, because of sin.. Lot thinks of himself, and of what suits his own interests: he does not leave Canaan; but while remaining in it, he thinks of things entirely in relation to himself. God is not thought of; and thus, His object, and purpose, in calling Abram out of Mesopotamia, is entirely over. looked. This is a sample of the most dangerous and effectual order of opposition; and that to which the people of God so continually fall victims. Lot does not depart from the call of God; but while acceding to the letter of the truth, he thinks only of himself; and is eventually found in Sodom; his righteous soul vexed from day to day with their ungodly deeds. Jacob, in the same way, thinks only of his own interests and what suits himself' (and that, too, after he had been taught in the wrestling that God is supreme, and that man is set aside in His presence, as his halt ever after declared) and settles down at Shalem. He might say that as within the land, he was within the territory of God, the limits of divine call; but yet he was thinking only of what suited himself. God was not in his thoughts, but with reference to himself, his altar, El-Elohe-Israel, and hence, not only, like Lot, does he personally suffer, but he and his family become an offense instead of a testimony to the world. If God had been simply before his eyes, how differently would he have acted! It appears very small at the beginning; but with what grave, and singular consequences, is this, almost imperceptible departure, attended. Moses in another way, is an example of how the most earnest and devoted may be turned aside, by having self before the mind more than God. He in the zeal and freshness of his heart attempts to deliver his brethren by his own hand. He rests on his own strength, fails, and has to retire discomfited and helpless into the land of Midian. And forty years afterward he is as slow to stand.-for God, -where-he had-failed before, as he was, in the former instance, rash. Why? Because his eye was on the failing Moses again, and not on God, where it ought always to be set.
I need not multiply examples. For 490 years, even during David's time; Israel neglected the observance of the sabbatical year; which was the most distinct and blessed opportunity and call to them to declare their dependence on God; and how He was for them; for, though apparently God's kingdom, they, at the very refused to confess Him in ah act of the greatest moment and significance; and which more than anything would have marked them on the earth, as His people. What a testimony to all around for those three years, and to their own souls too, that all things were of God! If God had been before their eye, and not what suited themselves, how His favor, and blessing, would have enriched them! In one year they would have received from Him a supply for three years. They could have rested without care on the sabbatical year, and have said daily and hourly to themselves, in the joy, of their hearts, " all things are of God." The brightest glory of the kingdom; the chief brilliant of the crown, is surrendered thoughtlessly, almost imperceptibly, and without an expression of regret; just because man is thought of and not God. I do not speak of the gross evil into which the people of God fall, but of the indifference to which the most advanced are exposed, and into which they fall, while apparently on the right ground, and going on in the line of His counsels. I do not speak of Israel as idolaters, or as corrupted among the nations; but I would refer to such as the captivity in the days of Haggai, who had returned from Babylon; who had sought the Lord's glory on their return; but being hindered, had now contented themselves with being in the right place, and had no longer thought of the temple, and of God's things, but simply and entirely of their own. They are in fact as. " the slothful man, who will not roast what he took in hunting." They had surmounted all the difficulties; had braved everything, and had openly declared for God, according to His mind, in Jerusalem; but-now they went-away everyone to his own house, and the house of the Lord lay waste! The point I desire to impress is, that those who are most right, are liable to religious selfishness, their altar is El-Elohe-Israel; and that their self-occupation is more damaging than the grossness of the ignorant, or unbelieving. Now, our Lord's disciples, in His day, were examples of the snare of self-occupation and self-seeking, of which I speak, more than the Pharisees. The latter were open and avowed opposers, never accepting or assenting to the truth, while the disciples were openly and boldly on the right ground; but were continually misinterpreting the Lord, and His purposes, simply and solely because their eyes rested on man, and not on God. Who tells the Lord to send away the hungry multitude? The disciples-they, who of all others, ought not to obstruct His will, or check His grace. Who pray Him to send away the Syrophenician, " for she crieth after us"? Was it not they, who ought to have understood His mind, and not to have attempted to thwart it, in its finest purposes? Where young children were brought to Him that He might touch them, who rebuked those that brought them? The disciples, " And when Jesus saw it, He was much displeased." Who suggest to Him to call down fire on the Samaritans but the disciples? Peter, the most earnest and foremost of them, rebukes Him when He foretells His rejection and death; which subjected him to the severest reproof from the Lord. " Get thee behind me, Satan, thou savourest not the things which be of God, but the things which be of man." Do not all these instances pronounce to us, that being on the right ground and being nearest to the Lord, in zeal and affection, does not preserve from the self-thought, which one falls into, if the eye rests on man and not on God. I have not referred to every instance in which the disciples attempt to check, or compromise, the work of the Lord; but I have noticed enough to convince any true heart, that if the eye is turned to man, no knowledge, no zeal, or purpose, will preserve from false judgment, and false apprehension of the-Lord's mind.—No -amount -of enlightenment, or practical walk in the right path, will secure from perversion, if the eye is turned man-ward, instead of God-ward. Not only will a Mark return from Pamphylia, but a Barnabas will be carried away by the dissimulation of a Peter. " Of your own selves" (the elders), " shall men arise, speaking perverse things; to draw away disciples after them." Nothing can be more distinctly set before us in Scripture than the fact, that among the most advanced, and the most earnest, some have been turned aside, and have slipped from the true line, because, in a crisis, their eye considered for man, and not for God. While, on the other hand, when God simply controlled the vision of the soul, everything opened out according to His mind. And hence, in every time, there was a reaching forth, and a yearning, for that era of full blessing, when it shall literally be true-that -" all things are of God." And it is in this connection, that the Apostle uses those wondrous. words (2 Cor. 5:1414For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: (2 Corinthians 5:14)). He had said that "if one died for all, then were all dead. And that he died for all; that they which live should henceforth not live unto themselves, but to him who died for them, and rose again." And then, to make this more decided, and unequivocal, he adds, " though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more Therefore, if any man be in.Christ, he is a new creature Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself, by Jesus Christ." Failure in saints is always attributable in one way, or another, to the eye being turned to man, instead of to God; and there never can be any real strength or ability but as the eye rests simply on God.
But now, we are not struggling by faith outside the being, and he world, in which we are, as were the saints before the death of Christ; but by the Spirit of Christ, we are before God, on the ground that all is swept away. They (the saints of old) occupied a creation which had fallen from God, and which by faith they saw as, one day, to be set aside in resurrection. This was all faith could do before the death of Christ; but now we are on the ground of all things being new, all things of God." The understanding of the difference between the faith of the most advanced saint before the death of Christ, and what it is now, is of great moment and value, both for our blessing and testimony. We have seen that the great and unfailing balk to the saint is man; and that in every instance, where any servant of God walked with Him, it was in proportion as God, in His own purpose, was before his soul. Be it an Enoch translated; an Abraham ascending Mount Moriah; the children of Israel passing through the Red Sea; or Peter walking on the water; one and all are great only in proportion as man is overlooked, and God only, and entirely, before the soul. But in each of these cases there was no knowledge of the ground where faith now puts the soul. With each of them it set them before God, and all was pure blessing; but it could, at best, be but as expectant of the removal of all that which stood in the way. There was, by faith, a flight above and beyond the old creation, but there could have been no clear or distinct perception of the fact of its removal, for it was not as yet removed, which is the only true place for faith now; for " old things are passed away, and behold, all things are become new." Faith did carry a saint, before the death of Christ, unto God; but though it filled his soul with God, it could not give him a clear and positive assurance that old things had passed away, for they had not passed away; and faith, while connecting the soul with God, and blessing it in God, could not lead it to see and know, that there was an end to the flesh (even Christ in the flesh) until the fact was accomplished. And the knowledge of this fact is the simple, yet momentous, difference between the saint who has only the faith in God which those before the death of Christ had, and the faith which saints now are entitled to have. The faith proper to me now, asserts not only that I am before God, but that there is nothing remaining which is not judged in the cross of Christ, and therefore judicially passed out of existence before Him; so that, on this ground, man in no wise appears. " Old things are passed away." It is not that the eye rests-on God, stepping over the old creation; but it rests on God now, all the old things having passed away. There is nothing to cross, or to skip over; for all are removed, as judged in the cross; they have no recognized existence before God; and when I am in faith, I am entitled to see that no such thing exists; the ground is cleared; all things are of God.
I fear many in the present day fall back to the faith known to the saints before the death of Christ; instead of dwelling in that proper to them now; realized, I suppose, in its blessed extent, by Stephen only, when he saw his place in the glory with Jesus. It is impossible to explain fully the difference; but the spiritual will at once see how morally important and wide is the difference. In the one case, I must, as it were, close my eyes to all I am in, and by faith remove myself away from it, because I am in the standing of the first Adam which is at enmity with God, and hateful to Him (Rom. 7). The body of this death must depress me, and I necessarily have a conscience ever anxious and harassed, and seeking absolution in a satisfactory sacrifice; for there is no assurance, nor indeed could there be, of the judicial removal of it; and, consequently, if not removed, I am while in it, answerable for it according to God's claim on it; whereas I am by faith in Christ Jesus, not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, and entitled to see the flesh as entirely removed, judicially terminated before God. And if I return to it, I have not to seek a sacrifice to atone for the delinquency of that which is a recognized, responsible existence; but I have, because Christ is my advocate, to take in confession God's side against myself, and repudiate in toto that which, being judged and re-moved from God's eye in judgment, I have no right to return to, or acknowledge; and the more I am in His light, the more do I see, not only how blessed it would be to be borne over it, and at rest before Him, but that I may search for it in vain; for " old things are passed away; behold, all are become new and all things are of God. ' Oh how blessed! My true standing now is, the life which I live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." In the one case, I mourn over that which is unequal to its imposed responsibility; in the other, I denounce its intrusion with horror, because judged in the cross, and I return it, by the power of the spirit to the " burial " from which it had escaped.
Now, if this truth be clearly apprehended, it must produce very marked practical effects. Man, as man, would not be consulted or ministered to. Christ alone would be the guide, strength, and motive for everything. Now, as we have seen, there is no strength or rest, but as faith reaches above and apart from man; and this at every time, even when man was still standing on the ground of responsibility before God, and when there could be no escape from it. To be in a " dry and barren land, where no water is " was always the trial to faith. And the Lord says to His disciples, " Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation, for the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.' There was then a demand on the flesh. Though weak, its existence was owned as still responsible; and there was no escape from it. There must have been a very different exercise of soul then, when the flesh was required to please God (which, in the person of Jesus on earth, was truly fulfilled); and now, when we are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit. To understand clearly the consequences of being in the Spirit, and not in the flesh, is of great moment; for if there is confusion in the mind on this point, the conscience suffers accordingly. If I could realize ever so distinctly the goodness and love of God, as the disciples did in Christ (by Whom, while present, they were preserved from open evils, into which they; according to the weakness of nature, fell, when separated from Him), I still must feel myself bound (and the more I knew His grace, the more so), to make my flesh do its required duty to Him, and even if it did, my distress must be " Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death." Its very weakness, not to speak of its willfulness, would be unceasing trial to me, and this weakness the disciples betrayed the moment they were, even for a little while, separated from the Lord. They could not watch one hour. The moment He is betrayed by Judas, they all forsook Him and fled. The immense difference cannot but be plain, whether I am regarded by God, in a creature existence, which is entirely inadequate (or worse) to meet His will-one positively under judgment; or, that this existence, being judged in the cross of Christ, I can now enjoy every revelation of His love without the mortifying feeling that the more He shows me of Himself, the more I am convicted of the weakness and wretchedness of myself, as His creature, to walk before Him. The knowledge of His love and grace to me, a sinner, saving me eventually, would not in any measure relieve this exercise of conscience; nay, on the contrary, would aggravate it. What could more distress me than to be led to see God's love and mercy, for me, as it is in His heart, and yet to know that I am a creature before Him, never pleasing Him; and that as such a creature, I am under judgment, which indeed he had redeemed me from, yet that He required me to meet the duties which He had enjoined, and to act up to the law which he had given. In a word, though assured of my final redemption, because of the virtue of Christ's sacrifice, which in perfection did all that the offerings under the law proposed to do; yet that I was still in the flesh, and required of God, as now a partaker of this grace, to do exactly what those under the Jewish economy were enjoined to do, but failed to accomplish. If this were true, which many think, my conscience would be always in the seventh of Romans, and never rise to the happiness of even a saint, who had by faith, through the types and shadows, reached God. The nearer God comes to man, as in the case of Job, the more is he, however amiable, made to feel how entirely unfit in nature he is for His presence. There cannot (unintentionally done I admit) be devised a more effectual way for depressing and saddening a soul than to proclaim to it all the grace of God in Christ, in redemption, and then tell the man, that as man, he is bound to maintain the law as the duty of one so largely indebted to God. Why nothing can so aggravate my sense of misery as to show me all I have received because of my ruin in -the flesh, and then say that I am expected to live in the flesh, as if I were not ruined and helpless. It is surely singing songs to a heavy heart. It is, in a word, to declare to me, how gracious God is in redeeming me, a poor undone sinner, and telling me to live henceforth, because of this mercy, in the flesh which needed the mercy, as if it had never needed it;-that it is a duty I owe to my blessed Savior, to live now as if I had never required a Savior; and that the very grace shown me as a sinner and undone, makes it obligatory on me henceforth to act, as if I had not need of any Savior, because that I should now do and keep the law. The favor, though inconceivable, is counteracted by the obligation attached to it. What would be thought of the one who would pay all the debts of a bankrupt, but insist that, as an obligation, the bankrupt should resume his former business without capital, and never get into debt again, and thus show that his getting into bankruptcy could have been avoided by the exemplary manner in which he now gets on, though he had nothing but a clearance of debt in resuming his business. It is plain that with such a notion as this, there could be no clear or true, apprehension of how all things are of God. Everything of man in the flesh is ended judicially in the cross for God, and now I am through grace, not only freed from the burden of my sins, but I am a new creature in Christ Jesus. Old things have passed away, I am to live in Christ, and thus I am higher in moral life than ever the law required me to be.
It ought to be hardly necessary to go into this point; but the more one inquires into the condition of souls, the more will it be found that there is more or less a sense of obligation because of the grace conferred in Christ, that though I could not, before partaking of this grace, make my flesh please God, yet that now I can; and hence the greater the sense of the grace, the greater the distress of soul, because of the inability to answer to the obligation. Conceal it, cloak it, or call it what name you like, but if I am in the flesh, in the old man, I must, if I have any conscience, seek to make it answer to God's demand on man, and I cannot get rid of the sense of obligation without getting rid of the man to whom the obligation would attach. Hence, -I-should regard-sins in a very different way if I am still as a man under obligation; and if not, not that the enormity of sins could be lessened. Sins are sins whatever way they be dealt with; but let us see for a moment how the soul is before God. in His grace, if the flesh has no longer a recognized existence, and is therefore no longer under any obligation, but is to be regarded really as dead.
If the existence of the creature, which I am in by nature, is under judgment, and if judgment has been passed on it in the cross of Christ, and I by faith accept this judgment, surely I do not desire or expect it to be revived. If I, by faith, accept what Christ has accomplished for me, I am delivered from the judgment. If I do not, I refuse the only door of escape, and the judgment resting on me is not removed. The judgment for sin inflicted on man has been borne by the Son of God, but He has risen out of it, and as the risen one, is the author of eternal salvation. Having judicially terminated the existence of the man under judgment, and on the ground of full victory over death, He says that He draws all men unto Him. Every man is under judgment, but every one who looks to Him, the Risen Man, receives life from Him, just as he had received death from the first Adam. Everyone who does not, has the judgment resting on him, and if it be not removed, it abides on him (John 3:3636He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. (John 3:36)). Christ's death has ended man for God, and God no longer addresses him as capable of doing ought to please Him. The old man is crucified in the cross of His Son, and any one who walks in the first
Adam, practically denies the death of Christ, and still links himself with that which is under judgment, and that, in the presence of One, who has borne the judgment. The Gospel calls man to accept Christ as the One who bore it, and is therefore the only door of escape to him out of it; but if he disbelieves or does not find the mercy, the judgment on himself is not arrested; he has not participated in the benefit secured by Christ's death; he has not life eternal; but is lost eternally under judgment. Thus we see the fact of Christ's bearing the judgment on man, and judicially ending man before God, -does not of -itself-entail the-salvation-of every man without exception. It opens the way in righteousness for God to save every man; but on every one who does not receive life, through this open door for mercy, the wrath of God abides. God is quite free in righteousness to go forth, and bring every one into this blessing; but if man lingers in the place of judgment, he will find that the One who would have been his Savior is his Judge; and simply because he preferred his own life to the life that cometh from God. The believer accepts Christ, and finds life in Him, outside that life and being which is judged in the cross; and as he lives in this life, now his in Christ, he is consciously above and apart from all of that (man) which is judged in the cross, so that he seeks to live no longer unto himself, but unto Him who died for him, and rose again. As he enters into and understands the place of life and new creation in which he is in Christ Jesus, so the more fully does he see that he ought not any longer live to himself, but to Him. In a word, that living to himself is incompatible with the fact and the blessing in which he is set, namely, that he is dead, as the death of Christ for him proved; and that if he lives in that which was thus proved to be dead, he contravenes the necessity and value of Christ's death; for if he recognized the necessity and value of it, he could not dare live to that for which He died, for " he died that they which live should henceforth live not unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them and rose again." How could I live in that which He by dying proved to be dead, and prefer it too, to Him who died for me. The fact of grace is, that every man in Christ is a new creation. It is senseless, as well as defiant to Christ, to live to myself in that standing, which is not only counted dead by God, but which was judged in the cross. If I am alive in Christ, and outside of myself which is dead through His death, can 1 nullify and make nothing of His death by returning to myself, at one and the same time losing my own blessing, and despising His love and service? No. If I am true to that which is true, namely, that I myself am dead, which is proved, not merely by judgment having had its course-but because that-judgment having been borne by Christ, who died for me, I must live outside of that which is dead, and in Him who is my life, and in whom I am a new creation; for " old things are passed away, behold all things are become new, and all things are of God." If I go back to that which is dead, I am returning to the things which have passed away. I am in that flesh which cannot please God; I am reviving that which is not only weak, but which lusteth against the Spirit of God and is not " of God." And still more, I have despised the truth that I am outside of the old creation, because made a new creation in Christ. " Old things," and the very best things connected with the flesh as flesh, have passed away.
Hence, if I go back to the flesh and walk in it, I am placed in a very different position from the transgressor before the death of Christ. Such an one had to relieve his conscience by an offering, which never purged the conscience, because " the worshipper once purged has no more conscience of sin." But he was not purged-even though by faith, his soul rose up to the mercy of God, as did an Abel, an Abraham, or a David; he was still in that being, which was held responsible to God; yet never able to stand before God as required, for by mercy only could man be preserved from the judgment which rested on him.
As to the law, so long as the law was kept, the judgment was staved off; but the moment he departed from the law, not only was he exposed to the judgment lying on man, but also to penalties attached to the breach of the law. Hence, under the law, the saint before the death of Christ sought to keep the law, in order to stave off the judgment under which he lay; and therefore the law was a great boon to him as living on the earth, for if he had kept it, it would have saved him for the time from the penalty resting on all men. Hence, the sense of a transgression was only felt or known when it was committed; for it was only after committal that the law declared the act as one of transgression; so that, though the law condemned evil, it did not prevent it, but condemned it when it noticed it, only to exact a penalty for the breach-of it.
Now, with the knowledge of a full sacrifice in Christ, there is, in the present day, an effort to appease the conscience for a transgression committed after believing, in the thought, that if the 'transgressions are put away, one is saved from the judgment after death; thus where the gospel of salvation is apprehended, the effort of the conscience on practical failure is to assure the heart of final salvation, while approving of its exercise, as to present forgiveness. But this gives no real rest or power. If I, as a responsible being, sin, I need an atoning sacrifice to free me from my sin; but if I return to that man which was once responsible, but now is dead because judged in the cross of Christ, and sin thereby, I find that the way for me into the presence of God is by the priest and not by a sacrifice. The Priest before God, in all the efficacy of the sacrifice, assures me of my acceptance before God. I confess my sins; repudiate them, as utterly abhorrent in me, because He suffered for me. I judge myself, and find my link before God, in the advocate, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the source of, and link to, all blessing for me; and in Him only do I find my place of acceptance with God; and my place, as His child before Him. I do not seek to have a set-off for my transgressions in the repetition of the sacrifice: That set-off I have in; but it was by One who not only bore my sins in judgment, but in whom was crucified the old man, in and by which the sins were committed, so that I do not seek to relieve the old nature of a burden lying on it, but I now repudiate it, in all its working, as that which is already judged, which I ought not to touch, and which it is horrible to be connected with, because in the cross I see the gulf between my flesh and God. In the one case, I seek to obtain a righteous exemption for a fault committed, so that the failing thing might still remain; in the other, I acknowledge my sins, as that which I denounce, and as that in which I ought not to be. I have no standing to maintain in that which commits the sins; and hence I confess them not because the law, or any one else, condemns me; I condemn myself; I do not wait for exposure; I expose myself, because I now stand against myself, instead of for myself; and I am freed in my conscience through God's grace, according to the extent of my confession. If I have a standing to sustain, I wait until I am exposed, or found out; but now having none, I discover myself unto God, because I repudiate the flesh, and its works. I am the first to throw a stone at myself: my return to the flesh is darkness; and inconsistent with the place of light, in which I am set. I own my sin, and repudiate my apostasy, and my heart finds its assurance, and solace in doing this, because Jesus Christ holds all my interests in Himself, and is the Righteous One, and has been the propitiation for my sins, and for the whole world. Is there not then necessarily great practical effect, from seeing that I have not to recognize the standing of that which cannot please God; that I have no standing in the flesh, and that when I touch or tamper with it I am the first to expose and denounce myself as having returned to that which I have renounced? Surely there must be, for thus practically I begin to see' how all things are of God; and how, in order that all things should be of Him, everything of man, as to his first estate and condition, must have passed away. I then see, too, the force and necessity of the expression: "Though we have known Christ after the flesh, henceforth know we him no more." Nothing of the once order of the flesh remains. The flesh is an ended existence before Him, and the man now is of entirely another order: not an order in any way predicable, or to be determined or known by that which is judicially ended, but by the last Adam, the Lord from heaven. It is not that the first man has reached up to God, but the Son of God, who has taken flesh and blood and has borne the judgment in the first Adam, forms the new creature now, entirely in Himself and thus in the place and life in which He is Himself. It is not man exalted into heaven exactly; nor is it the Son of God come down to man. It is a new man, the Son made flesh, and ending in His death the man under judgment; but then rising out of the judgment, He is the beginning of a new race and order, which is no wise comprehensible to, or like, the first Adam as to nature, though like in bodily appearance, and as God made man in His own likeness and image. One word more in conclusion. If man, in his first standing is still the existing one before God, then God must require of him; and if he fails on another trial, then there. must be another sacrifice. The man must have been fully tried, and his total inability and depravity, under all trial proved and exposed. The truth is, that both have been done; there has been made full trial, and full exposure of his depravity; and the substitute has conic, and has ended in Himself through judgment, the standing of the first; old things have passed away, and there is no dealing with that man now from God, but with regard to the offer of mercy, which he now presents to him through Christ, risen out from among the dead. If old things have passed away, there ought to be no return to them; though the will of the flesh would ever seduce one into them; and this in every specious way. The humanizing of Christ, and the introduction of natural feelings into Christianity, allowing one's own feelings to influence one more than Christ's mind, are among the many devisings of the flesh to connect the soul with the old things passed away. If old things have not passed away, God cannot condemn man on the 'ground of refusing the light; He can condemn him for having been ever rebellious and self-willed; but if old things have passed away, God, on this ground, condemns man for not accepting the mercy which He freely and fully offers. Nay, " he that believeth not is condemned already;"
because he refuses to accept God's grace offered to him on clear ground-ground where there is nothing, no barrier, between him and God; nothing to bar his acceptance of it; no, nothing! The offer of mercy is on the very terms that every barrier, every old thing has passed away; and the condemnation necessarily is, not on account of disobedience, as in the day of the " old things;" but because man does not believe on the name of the only begotten Son of God. By that Son, God has cleared away all; and hence there is condemnation if I do not believe in Him who has effected-this wondrous work. Man adheres to the old things as if they were not put away, and refuses the Son of God, who now before God occupies the place of the old things, and hence the wrath of God abides on him. If old things have not passed away, we cannot say " Behold all things are become new."