Philippians 2, 3.
THE Epistle to the Philippians gives us very little doctrine (doctrine being just alluded to in chapter 3); but it does give us, in a remarkable manner, the experience of Christian life in the power of the Holy Ghost.
It is full of blessing in that character: the life above seen down here in a man through the power of the Spirit of God. So much is this the case that the very word “sin” is not found in it.
When justification and righteousness are spoken of, it is not in contrast with sin, but in contrast with human and legal righteousness. The flesh was there. At the very time Paul wrote the epistle he had got the thorn in the flesh to prevent it acting; but it shows us one rising above the flesh and all hindrances, that Christ might be magnified in him. Whether to live or die, he did not know; he would have liked to be gone, but in love to the Church he says, Better for you to remain; and so, counting upon Christ and knowing it is better, he knows he will remain. He knows how to abound and how to suffer need; he is pressing towards the mark for the prize — it is the only thing he has to do. The graciousness of a Christian is in chapter 2, the energy in chapter 3, the absence of care in chapter 4, but it is all by the power of the Spirit of God. It is well for us to lay it to heart: we are the epistle of Christ known and read of all men — an epistle written not in stone, but in the fleshy tables of the heart. We are set as Christians to be letters of recommendation of Christ before the world. Yet it gives us the fullest and most blessed confidence towards God if we take that ground; for, if we are in the presence of the world for God, Christ is in the presence of God for us. His work has perfectly I settled that question, and He is every moment appearing in the presence of God for us.
We are loved as He is loved; in every way in which we can look at it, all is a fixed settled thing according to the counsels of God in grace; it is in a poor earthen vessel, but our relationship is settled: all that belonged to the old ma cleared away, and all that belongs to Christ, the new Man, our positive portion. Not only are our debts paid, but we are to be conformed to the image of His Son, and He has obtained for us the glory which is His own. “The glory which Thou gavest me I have given them.” He has given Himself on the cross to meet what we were, and He has obtained for us all that Hell has. This is the way Christ gives — not as the world. If the world gives, they have it not any longer; but Christ never gives in that way — never gives away, but brings us into all He has. If I light up one candle by another, I lose nothing of the first; and such is the way He gives. I speak of blessed principles. “My peace I give unto you.”... “That they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves.” “I have given unto them the words which Thou gavest Me.”...
“That the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them.” He became a man on purpose to bring us as men into the same glory as Himself. That relationship we are brought into already. “I go to My Father and to your Father, to My God and your God.” If I look at righteousness and holiness, I am as He is; if at the Son, I am before the Father as a son; and, as we have borne the image of the earthly, we shall bear the image of the heavenly.
The work that entitles us to that is absolutely and totally finished. The Spirit makes us first feel our need in order to our possessing it, but the work is finished.
In order to get our path clear, we must see where He has brought us. I cannot expect any one to behave as my child, if he is not my child; you must be in the place before you can have the conduct suited to that place, or be under the obligations which belong to it; and it is this last part I desire to look at a little. “You hath He reconciled,” not brought halfway: as to relationship, brought into Christ. Through the work of the cross He put away our sins, and, when He had done it, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. He finished the work which His Father gave Him to do; and in Hebrews the Spirit contrasts Christ’s work with that work of the priests which was never finished, so that they never sat down.
We are perfect as pertaining to the conscience. A blunder often made is confounding perfection as to our state with perfection as to our conscience. When once we have understood the work of Christ, we are perfect as regards the conscience. If I look up to God, I can have no thought of His ever imputing sin to me again, or I could not have peace with God; and this is so true that it is said, if this work was not perfectly done, Christ must suffer again. But He cannot drink that dreadful cup again, the very thought of which made Him sweat great drops of blood. If there is any sin still to be put away (I speak now of believers), Christ must suffer again, and this can never be. God has set Him at His right hand as having finished the work: “I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do; now, O Father, glorify Thou Me.” He will deal with His enemies, no doubt, when He rises up in judgment; but, as to believers, He is sitting down because He has no more to do. I am not speaking now, of course, of the daily grace He ministers to them. It is settled, and settled with this double aspect, that the purpose of God being to bring us into the same glory as His Son, the work of Christ not only cleared away our guilt, but obtained that glory for us.
(To be continued.)