9. M., Glasgow. “What is meant by blasphemy against the Holy Ghost?”
In Matt. 12 The Lord had, by the Spirit of God, cast out a demon. The wretched Pharisees blasphemously charged Him with doing this by the power of Beelzebub. He showed the absurdity of this wickedness, and then explains the solemn fact, that whilst sin against Him might be forgiven, as indeed it was—repentance and forgiveness beginning at Jerusalem—but to reject the testimony of the Holy Ghost, and speak against Him, to such there could be no forgiveness. Compare this with Luke 12:10. Christ has been rejected and murdered: pardon was to be proclaimed to the murderers. He is gone up to heaven, and the Holy Ghost has come down, and is on this earth. But there is no pardon, neither, now nor in the millennial age to come, to those who reject and speak, against the Holy Ghost, as they did blaspheme against Christ. How very little is it known that the Holy Ghost is on this earth!
In Matt. 24:40, 41, the Lord is, as you say, speaking of His coining in judgment on the quick as it were in the days of Noah; and, looked at from that point of view, one will be taken away by judgment as it was in the days of Noah, and the other left for the millennial earth. (Compare Luke 17:24-37; Zech. 13:8, 9; 14:1, 2, 5.) No doubt all this will come upon the world and upon the unbelieving Jews, as unexpectedly as the flood in the days of Noah. The center and scene of these judgments will be Jerusalem. The nations will be gathered there as the eagles gather from all sides to devour the carcass of a beast. Isa. 66:15, 19, show us that a remnant will escape. The Lord suddenly comes, to the joy and deliverance of that remnant.
The hopes of the church had not as yet been revealed. Still we must not forget that from Matt. 24:31 to 25:30 we have a break, or parenthesis, in which the Lord gives the most important instructions and warnings to the whole of professing Christendom during its entire history. He does not, however, name the church as such, but takes up corporate and individual responsibility.
The promise to believers, as you know, is quite another thing. (John 14:1, 2, &c.; 1 Thess. 4 Thess. 4) No doubt, in that sense, the separation of friends and families is a most solemn fact. If the Lord should come to take His own to be with Himself this day, who would be taken and who would be left behind of all we know? who would be taken to be forever with the Lord? May the Lord awaken every careless reader of these lines, and especially the careless members of christian households.
10. Τ. Florence.—The Parable of a penny a day.—Matt. 20:1-16—How little was this parable understood! “A penny a day.” And how little is it understood now! We must read it in connection with what goes before, and as meeting Jewish thought. The disciples were amazed at the young man who had every Jewish mark of the divine favor, and yet he went away, and the Lord had expressed the strange thought to them, that it was hard for the rich to be saved. They were exceedingly amazed, saying, “Who then can be saved?” Jesus pointed them to God: with Him all things are possible.
This is the occasion of Peter’s question: “Behold, we have forsaken all and followed thee: what shall we have therefore?” Now read the Lord’s reply—the reward shall be at the incoming time, in the regeneration. “Ye which have followed me” shall be thus rewarded, “and shall inherit everlasting life.” “But many that are first shall be last, and the last shall be first.” Connected with this follows the parable which sets forth the principle that it is not man’s labor, and work for God; but Gods goodness and grace to man. It is omitted in Mark and Luke. By comparing Mark 10:31, it is evident that it was told them as they were going in the way—He going up to Jerusalem to offer Himself the sacrifice for sins.
Spoken then to the Jews, He begins with the dealings of God with them. He took them from the rest of the world, and made an agreement with them, a righteous agreement: so much work, so much pay or reward. No grace, but righteousness, and God would keep His agreement. Each step after this is a step in grace— grace upon grace. At the third hour He found men in need in the market place, and He took, compassion and said, Go ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. They trusted His word and went. So of the sixth, and so of the ninth hour. All this was the goodness of the householder seeking the needy. They who believed his word, went into the vineyard. But when the eleventh hour came, it certainly looked too late to hope for any to take compassion on the unemployed. No man had hired them. They too are invited, and without any bargain, they trust his bare word—and they are not disappointed. There are four parts in the parable. These may answer to: first, the law, which if a man keep he shall live; secondly, the ministry of Christ; then, thirdly, the gospel by the Holy Ghost sent clown from heaven in the beginning of the history of the church; and now, fourthly, the present eleventh-hour testimony immediately before the coming of the Lord, of the riches of His grace, after centuries of dark rejection. Yes, it is an act of grace on God’s part in the last three cases. And the Jew who made his own bargain, as always, murmurs at the grace of God. In His vineyard, grace has shone out more and more. This is the theme of Jesus; but how little they understood Him! He was on the way to die for them—to take the lowest possible place. They were desiring to take the highest in the kingdom! Precious lesson! Everlasting life to all who have believed His word. To the Jew and to the Gentile, God is seen the Seeker of the needy.
11. J. W., Harwich. It is not for us to “define the difference between socialism and co-operative societies.” It is enough that God says to us in His word: “Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers,” &c. (2 Cor. 6:14) We understand any voluntary association with this world’s confederacies, to be yoking together with unbelievers. The believer is in Christ—in Canaan, so to speak—he is not an improver of Pharaoh’s Egypt, or of Satan’s world. As a social question, too, one must perceive these are the last days of intense selfishness, as long foretold. (2 Tim. 3:2.) “For men shall be lovers of their own selves,” &c. Class against class, seeking by cheapness and selfishness to prepare this doomed world for that social earthquake foretold in the word of God. (Rev. 6.) It is no use talking of our commonwealth being in heaven whilst our politics are in and of Satan’s world. Oh, to really come out and be separate from them, and to walk down here as heavenly men in possession there, so as to be delivered from all the wiles of Satan here. What should we think, if any one told us our Jesus belonged to a co-operative society when He was down here? Would it have become the Holy One of God? And He says, “I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.”
12. C. T., Grimsby. The Holy Ghost is dwelling here in Christendom. (See John 16:1-15.) He convicts the world. He. is here, though the world cannot receive Hi in. “Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost.” (Acts 7:51.) But the presence of the Lord, as explained to us in Matt. 18:20, is quite a different thing. How few there are truly gathered together to His name! Some gather on Establishment principles, some on Dissenting principles, and others on what they may call divine principles.
But all this may be far short of being gathered to the name of the living Lord, the Son of God, surely present where two or three are so gathered., Let us examine ourselves on this all-important matter. Do we believe He is present where we gather? Do we honor Him thus present? Or do we despise His holy presence? If a difficulty arise, do we look at that difficulty in the fear of the Lord, just as we should do if we saw Him in our very midst? How supreme the privilege to be in His presence, without a cloud or spot, in the full, unhindered intimacy of His infinite love; in the calmness of His perfect and everlasting peace, without a care, a burthen, or a wish! Ah. that is the true sabbath, of rest. And it is ours. May we enjoy it more and more forever.