“Philip went down to Samaria, ma preached Christ unto them.” (Acts 8) This brief and simple statement embodies in it a grand characteristic feature of Christianity — a feature which distinguishes it from every system of religion that now exists, or that ever was propounded in this world. Christianity is not a set of abstractions — a number of dogmas — a system of doctrines. It is, preeminently, a religion of living facts — of divine realities — a religion which finds its center in a divine Person, the Man Christ Jesus. He is the foundation of all christian doctrine. From His divine and glorious Person all truth radiates. He is the living fountain whence all the streams issue forth in fullness, power, and blessing. “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” Apart from Him all is death and darkness. There is not one atom of life, not one ray of light, in all this world, save what emanates from Him. A man may possess all the learning of the schools; he may bask in the most brilliant light that science can pour upon his understanding and his pathway; he may garnish his name with all the honors which his fellow mortals can heap upon him; but if there is the breadth of a hair between him and Jesus — if he is not in Christ and Christ in him — if he has not believed on the Name of the only begotten Son of God, he is involved in death and darkness. Christ is “the true light which lighteneth every man that cometh into the world;” and hence no man can, in a divine sense, be termed an enlightened man, save “a man in Christ.”
It is well to be clear as to this. It is needful to press it, in this day of man’s pride and pretension. Men are boasting of their light and intelligence — of the progress of civilization — of the research and discovery of the age in which our lot is cast — of the arts and sciences and what has been wrought and produced by their means. We do not want to touch these things. We are quite willing to let them stand for what they are really worth; but we are arrested by these words which fell from the Master’s lips, “I am the light of the world; he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” Here it is, “He that followeth me.” Life and light are only to be had in Jesus. If a man is not following Jesus, he is plunged in death and darkness, even though he were possessed of the most commanding genius, and enriched with all the stores of science and knowledge.
Doubtless, we shall be deemed narrow-minded, in thus writing. We shall, by very many, be regarded as men of very contracted views indeed — men of one idea, and even that one idea presented in a one-sided way. Well, be it so. We are men of one idea; and we heartily desire we were more so. But what is that one idea? Christ. He is God’s grand idea, blessed be His Name, for evermore. Christ is the sum and substance of all that is in the mind of God. He is the central object in heaven — the grand fact of eternity — the object of God’s affection — of angels’ homage — of saints’ worship — of devils’ dread — the alpha and the omega of the divine counsels—the keystone of the arch of revelation — the central sun of God’s universe.
All this being so, we need not marvel at Satan’s constant effort to keep souls from coining to Christ, and to draw them away from Him, after they have come to Him. He hates Christ, and will use anything and everything to hinder the heart in getting hold of Him. He will use cares or pleasures, poverty or riches, sickness or health, vice or morality, profanity or religion; in short, he cares not what it is, provided he can keep Jesus out of the heart.
On the other hand, the constant object of the Holy Ghost is to present Christ Himself to the soul. It is not something about Christ, doctrines respecting Him, or principles connected with Him merely; but His own very self, in living power and freshness. We cannot read a page of the New Testament without noticing this. The whole book, from the opening lines of Matthew, to the close of the Revelation, is simply a record of facts, as someone has truly said, respecting Jesus. It is not our purpose, just now, to follow out this record; to do so would be interesting beyond expression; but it would lead us away from our immediate thesis to which we must now, in the name of the Lord, and in dependence upon His Spirit, address ourselves. May it be unfolded and applied in the power of the Holy Ghost!
In studying scripture in connection with our subject, we shall find the Lord Jesus Christ presented in three ways, namely, as a test; as a victim; and as a model Each of these points contains in itself a volume of truth, and when we view them in their connection, they open to our souls a wide field of christian knowledge and experience. Let us, then, in the first place, consider what is meant when we speak of CHRIST AS A TEST.
In contemplating the life of the Lord Jesus, as a man, we have the perfect exhibition of what a man ought to be. We see in Him the two grand creature perfections, namely, obedience and dependence. Though God over all, the Almighty Creator and Sustainer of the wide universe — though He could say, “I clothe the heavens with blackness, and I make sackcloth their covering.” Yet so thoroughly and absolutely did He take the place of a man on this earth, that He could say, “the Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: he wakeneth morning by morning, He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned. The Lord God hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back.” (Isa. 1:3-53The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master's crib: but Israel doth not know, my people doth not consider. 4Ah sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children that are corrupters: they have forsaken the Lord, they have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger, they are gone away backward. 5Why should ye be stricken any more? ye will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. (Isaiah 1:3‑5).)
He never moved one step without divine authority. “When the devil tempted Him to work a miracle, in order to satisfy His hunger,” His reply was, “It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord.” He would readily work a miracle to feed others, but not to feed Himself. Again, when tempted to cast Himself from the pinnacle of the temple, He replied, “It is written, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.” He had no command from God to cast Himself down, and He could not act without it; to do so would be a tempting of Providence. So also, when tempted with the offer of all the kingdoms of this world, on condition of doing homage to Satan, His reply was, “It is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God. and him only shalt thou serve.”
In a word, the Man Christ Jesus, was perfectly obedient. Nothing could tempt Him to diverge the breadth of a hair from the narrow path of obedience. He was the obedient Man from first to last. It was quite the same to Him where He served, or what He did. He would only act by the authority of the divine word. He would take bread from God; He would come to His temple when sent of God, and He would wait for God’s time to receive the kingdoms of this world. His obedience was absolute and uninterrupted, from the manger to the cross, and in this He was well pleasing to God. It was creature perfection; and nothing in any wise different from this could be agreeable to God. If perfect obedience is grateful to God, then disobedience must be hateful. The life of Jesus, in this one feature of it, was a continual feast to the heart of God. His perfect obedience was continually sending up a cloud of the most fragrant incense to the throne of God.
Now, this is what a man ought to be. We have here a perfect test of man’s condition; and when we look at ourselves in the light of this one ray of Christ’s glory, we must see our entire departure from the true and only proper place of the creature. The light that shines from the character and ways of Jesus reveals, as nothing else could reveal, the moral darkness of our natural state. We are not obedient; we are willful; we do our own pleasure; we have cast off the authority of God; His word does not govern us. “The carnal mind is enmity against God; it is not subject to the law of God; neither indeed can be.” (Rom. 8)
It may be asked, “Did not the law make manifest the willfulness and enmity of our hearts?” No doubt; but who can fail to see the difference between a law demanding obedience, and the Son of God, as Man, exhibiting obedience? Well then, in so far as the life and ways of the blessed Lord Jesus Christ transcend in glory the entire legal system, and in so far as the Person of Christ transcends in glory and dignity the person of Moses, just so far does Christ, as a test of man’s condition, exceed, in moral power, the law of Moses; and the same holds good of every test that was ever applied, and every other standard that was ever set up. The Man Christ Jesus, viewed in the one point of perfect obedience, is an absolutely perfect test by which our natural state can be tried and made manifest.
But take another ray of Christ’s moral glory. He was as absolutely dependent upon God, as He was obedient to Him. He could say, “preserve me, Ο God, for in thee do I put my trust.” (Psalm 16) And again, “I was cast upon thee from the womb.” (Psalm 22) He never, for one moment, abandoned the attitude of entire dependence upon the living God. It is befitting the creature to be dependent upon God for everything. This the blessed Jesus ever was. He breathed the very atmosphere of dependence, all the way through from Bethlehem to Calvary. He was the only man that ever lived a life of uninterrupted dependence upon God, from first to last. Others have depended partially, He did it perfectly. Others have occasionally, or, it may be, mainly looked to God; He never looked anywhere else. He found all His springs; not some of them, or most of them, in God.
This, too, was most grateful to God. To have a man, on this earth, whose heart was never, for one single moment of time, out of the attitude of dependence, was ineffably precious to the Father, and hence, again and again, heaven opened, and the testimony came forth, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.”
But, if this feature in the perfect life of the Man, Christ Jesus, was infinitely agreeable to the mind of God, it also furnishes an infinitely powerful test of the natural state of man. We can here see, as we can see nowhere else, our apostasy from the creature’s only proper place — the place of dependence. True, the inspired historian informs us, in Gen. 3 that the first Adam fell from his original place of obedience and dependence. True, also, the law of Moses makes manifest that Adam’s descendants are, every one of them, in a condition of revolt and independence; but who can fail to see with what superior power all this is brought out by the life and ways of Jesus, in this world? In Him we see a man perfectly obedient and perfectly dependent, and that, too, in the midst of a scene of disobedience and independence, and in the face of every temptation to abandon the position which He occupied.
Thus, the life of Jesus, in this one particular point of perfect dependence, tests man’s condition, and proves his entire departure from God. Man, in his natural state, ever seeks to be independent of God. We need net go into any detailed proof of this. This one ray of light, emanating from the glory of Christ, and shining into man’s heart, lays bare every chamber thereof, and proves beyond all question — proves, in a way that naught else could prove, man’s departure from God, proves the haughty independence which marks our natural condition. The more intense the light which you bring to bear upon an object, the more perfectly you can see what it is. There is a vast difference between looking at a picture in the dim morning twilight, and examining it in broad daylight. Thus it is, exactly, in reference to our real state by nature. We may view it in the light of the law, in the light of conscience, in the light of the loftiest standard of morality known amongst men; and, so viewing it, we may see that it is not what it ought to be; but it is only when we view it in the full blaze of the moral glory of Christ that we can see it as it really is. It is one thing to say, “We have done those things which we ought not to have done, and left undone those things which we ought to have done;” and it is another thing altogether to see ourselves in that perfect light which makes everything manifest It is one thing to look at our ways in the light of law, conscience, or morality, and another thing to look at our nature, in the light of that all-powerful test, namely, the life of the Man Christ Jesus.
But we must proceed, and shall merely refer to one more feature in the character of Christ, and that is His perfect self-emptiness. He never once sought His own interest, in anything. His was a life of constant self-sacrifice. “The Son of Man has come to serve and to give.” These two words “serve” and “give” formed the motto of His life, and were written, in letters of blood, upon His cross. In His marvelous life, and in His mysterious death, He was the Servant and the Giver. He was ever ready to answer every form of human need. We see Him, at Sychar’s lonely well, opening the fountain of living water to a poor thirsty soul. We see Him, at the pool of Bethesda, imparting strength to a poor impotent cripple. We see Him, at the gate of Nain, drying the widow’s tears, and giving back to her bosom her only son.
All this and much more we see; but we never see Him looking after His own interests. No, never! We cannot too deeply ponder this fact in the life of Jesus; nor can we too jealously scrutinize ourselves in the light which this wondrous fact emits. If in the light of His perfect obedience, we can detect our terrible willfulness; if in the light of His absolute dependence, we can discern our pride and haughty independence; then surely, in the light of His self-emptiness and self-sacrifice, we may discover our gross selfishness, in its ten thousand forms, and as we discover it, we must loathe and abhor ourselves. Jesus never thought of Himself, in anything he ever said or did. He found His meat and His drink in doing the will of God, and in meeting the need of man.
What a test is here! How it proves us! How it makes manifest what is in us, by nature! How it sheds its bright light over man’s nature and man’s world, and rebukes both the one and the other! For what, after all, is the great root-principle of nature and of this world? Self. “Men will praise thee when thou doest well to thyself.” (Psalm 49) Self-interest is really the governing principle in the life of every unrenewed man, woman, and child, in this world. No doubt, nature may clothe itself in very amiable and attractive forms — it may assume a very generous and benevolent aspect — it can scatter as well as hoard; but of this we may rest assured, that the unregenerate man is wholly incapable of rising above self as an object; and in no way could this be made so thoroughly manifest — in no way could it be developed with such force and clearness — in no way could its vileness and hideousness be so fully detected and judged, as in the light of that per-feet test presented in the disinterested, self-sacrificing life of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. It is when that penetrating light shines upon us that we see ourselves in all our true native depravity and personal vileness.
The Lord Jesus came into this world, and lived a perfect life — perfect in thought, perfect in word, perfect in action; He perfectly glorified God, and not only so, but He perfectly tested man. He showed what God is, and He showed also what man ought to be — showed it not merely in His doctrine, but in His walk. Man was never so tested before, and, hence, the Lord Jesus could say, “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me, hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin; but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father.” John 15:22-2422If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin. 23He that hateth me hateth my Father also. 24If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both me and my Father. (John 15:22‑24).
Again, He says, “I judge no man; and yet if I judge, my judgment is true.” (John 8:1616And yet if I judge, my judgment is true: for I am not alone, but I and the Father that sent me. (John 8:16).) The object of His mission was not judgment but salvation, yet the effect of His life was judgment upon everyone with whom He came in contact. It was impossible for anyone to stand in the light of Christ’s moral glory, and not be judged in the very center and source of His being. When Peter saw himself in that light, he exclaimed, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man, Ο Lord.” Luke 5.
Such was the certain result of a man’s seeing himself in the presence of Christ. Not all the thunderings and lightnings of Mount Sinai — not all the denunciations of the legal system — not all the voices of the prophets could produce such an effect upon a sinner as one single ray of the moral glory of Christ darting into his soul. I may look at the law and feel I have not kept it, and own I deserve its curse; conscience may terrify me and tell me I deserve hell-fire because of my sins. All this is true: but oh! the very moment I see myself in the light of what Christ is, my whole moral being is laid bare — every root every fiber, every motive spring, every element, all the sources of thought, feeling, desire, affection, and imagination are exposed to view, and I abhor myself. It cannot possibly be otherwise. The whole book of God proves it. The history of all God’s people illustrates it. To adduce cases would fill a volume. True conviction is produced in the soul when the Holy Ghost lets in upon it the light of the glory of Christ. Law is a reality, conscience is a reality, and the Spirit of God may and does make use of the former to act on the latter; but it is only when I see myself in the light of what Christ is, that I get a just view of myself, and then I am led to exclaim, with Job, “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear; but now mine eye seeth thee, therefore I abhor myself”
Reader, have you ever seen yourself in this way? Have you ever really tested yourself by the perfect standard of the life of Christ? It may be you have been looking at your fellow man and comparing yourself with that imperfect standard, and trying yourself by that imperfect test. This will never do. Christ is the true standard — the perfect test — the divine touchstone. God cannot have anything different from Christ. You must be like Him — conformed to His image, ere you can find your place in the presence of God. Do you ask, “How can this ever be?” By knowing Christ as the Victim, and by being formed after Him as the Model. But these points must be unfolded, if the Lord will, in our next.
(To be continued, if the Lord will)