Divine Love and Its Care
Charles Wesley
Table of Contents
Divine Love and Care: Part 1
What characterized the life of Jesus (I speak not of what He was as God and for God, and thus for man) was the sense of divine love and care. What He lived in, as His own personal blessedness, as man, was what God His Father was to Himself. It was the entire loss of this that gave its awful bitterness and unmingled woe to what He endured on the cross.
All that man could suffer in mind, soul and body from Satan and man combined was there to fill that bitter cup, but all this was as nothing in comparison with what He endured as forsaken of God. "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" gives us the heart of Jesus poured out in all its unfathomable agony. This was when made sin, and only then. What had enabled Him to bear every other kind of suffering, however deep, was then withdrawn, and He was left, as man, unsupported and without God, under sin with all its fearful consequences. What this was is known only to Himself, though we poor sinners reap its blessed results.
This forsaking, and His sense of it, characterized the death of Christ, just as the enjoyment of divine love and care characterized His life. Of the former we can know nothing, whilst as to the latter we might, and ought to, know nothing else. We have the life of Christ, or, as the apostle puts it for himself, "Christ liveth in me." We cannot, as believers, insist too strongly on this, blessed fact, that Christ, not Adam, is our life.
To know what the life in us really is we must look at that life outside ourselves; see it in Him who is it; in Jesus as He lived and walked on earth; see it as it unfolds itself before us in the Gospels, those lovely portraits of Jesus, the blessed Son of God, in the path of His humiliation. The peculiar charm of the Gospels is that they give us Jesus Himself in the daily circumstances of life in this world where we now are.
It has been well and truly observed that we go first, as poor sinners, to the Gospels to find a Savior; and then, as saints, to the epistles to learn all the blessedness He has brought us into; but we return to the Gospels to feed on Himself. Unspeakably blessed as it is to find a Savior, with all that sweet name comprehends; more blessed still, as it is, to enter into the enjoyment of our portion in Christ before God in heaven, that does not give satisfaction; for this we must turn back, so to speak, to Himself, and we get it by the knowledge of Himself, not so much in what He is for us, as in that which He Himself lived in, as the satisfying portion of His own soul-that divine love and care in which, as man and Son of the Father, He lived. He abode in His Father's love, He was ever "the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father," and it was as dwelling in the bosom He manifested God. Every word and way of Jesus was a revelation of the Father.
It is this revelation of God known in relationship as the Father, a revelation hidden from the wise and prudent, but revealed to babes, that Jesus has in mind when, in Matt. 11, as rejected by Israel, He says: "Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly of heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls." Though all our blessing, and especially our place as children of the Father, be founded on the cross, on His death, it is not peace of 'conscience, as flowing from His work for us, that He speaks of here, but of that rest and satisfaction of heart, which was the enjoyed portion of His own soul as a living man on earth, the object of the Father's love and care. It is in immediate connection with His previous statement "that no man knoweth the Son but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal him," that He makes this precious offer of rest to any who would learn of Him, in a scene where sin had not only entailed all its bitter present and eternal consequences on the children of Adam, but shut God out morally from His own creatures.
In these days of materialism and bold atheism, we more than ever need to have to do experimentally with the living God-the One in whom, whatever man's will may say, "we live, and move, and have our being." But this is only possible to us as we know, in living power, the Son, and learn, of Him who said, "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father, so he that eateth me shall live by me."
Men of science may try to live without God, and leave no place for Him in creation, may see in all His handiwork merely the working of unintelligent natural laws, and even in themselves merely "evolutions," "natural selection," and "the survival of the fittest;" we know we are "fearfully and wonderfully made " by the hand of the living God, and this God our Father, without whose hand not a sparrow falls to the ground, and who, in living action, clothes the lily and feeds the raven. We know a care more touching and detailed than a mother's, a care that numbers the very hairs of our head, and all this we have learned from the lips of Jesus.
There are two spheres, so to speak, in which faith works. In the one it has to say to what is visible, and in the other to what is invisible. It is remarkable that it is in connection with the former that it is so difficult to keep faith in lively exercise. The fact that what is seen appeals powerfully to sense, gives flesh a vantage ground, and the mind of the flesh, which is enmity to God, takes the lead and shuts faith back, or at least keeps it in abeyance. It is here, under the name of science, "falsely so called," that unbelief finds its field, and the enmity to God proper to the flesh declares itself in open and avowed infidelity. Into what is invisible the flesh, the natural man, cannot enter, and therefore ignores it altogether.
In Christ the exercise of faith in both these spheres was perfect. He never was affected or guided by sense. To Him nature, with all its visible objects, was simply His Father's hand, and He drew his life, as man, consciously from God, not as a product of natural laws, but as the direct and living operation of God. This is deeply and touchingly expressed when on the cross, where the support of that Hand was withdrawn, and where it was His perfectness to feel its absence in all its bitterness, He says: "But thou art he that took me out of the womb; thou didst make me hope when I was upon my mother's breast. I was cast upon thee from the womb; thou art my God from my mother's belly." (Psa. 22) Nowhere does the faith of Jesus shine out with such intensity as on the cross. "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?" is His answer to that forsaking. Himself forsaken of God, He forsakes not His God, but the more tenaciously clings to Him in spite of all. His faith was perfect as His obedience was absolute. The forsaking on the cross tested and gave the measure to both in the way in which, as under divine judgment bearing our sins, and thus making atonement, He owns God as His God, and vindicates His character in holiness as to His forsaking Him, Unheard in the hour of His deepest distress (a distress into which His obedience to God had brought Him) He says: "But thou art holy, Oh thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel."
No question in the mind of Jesus ever arose as to the righteousness of God's dealings with Him, though He knew there was no cause for them in Himself His faith gave God His proper place in all that on the cross He passed through, and God's answer to that faith was given Him in resurrection. He went through suffering and death, when it was divine judgment on man because of sins, in the perfect confidence of faith. A faith that, when every evidence of divine love and care would be withdrawn, could say: "Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell: neither wilt thou suffer thine holy one to see corruption. Thou wilt show me the path of life."
For the joy that was set before Him He "endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of God," and it is in the character of living only by faith up to and through the cross into resurrection that He is called "the author and finisher of faith." His present position of heavenly and eternal blessedness, as man, was thus reached through faith.
The divine glory of His Person is manifest all along this life of faith, but it never overlaps or clouds for a moment the reality of His humanity. "God manifest in flesh " is ever present to the divinely opened eye, but it is "the man Christ Jesus" that we see living and walking, and dying in faith. His divine glory was always itself, and there for man's blessing, but it never interfered with the reality of His manhood or enfeebled the faith by which He rested in the divine care and love of which He was the object.
These two things are beautifully set before our eyes in the scene on the lake of Gennesaret. Jesus "in the hinder part of the ship asleep on a pillow" is the sweetest and simplest expression of that faith by which He rested in His Father's love and care-His own precious portion; while His inquiry "where is your faith?" rebuked the absence of it in His disciples, as that which was the cause of all their disquietude and distress. Then His divine glory bursts forth in all its brightness, and yet touching grace for those whose faith was wanting, in those words of power to the angry winds and waves around, "Peace be still"-and "the wind ceased, and there was a great calm." "What manner of man is this?" reveals the ignorance, born of unbelief, that saw not."Emmanuel" in the lowly dependent Man in whose company they found themselves. The "manner of man" was Jesus, "asleep on the pillow," resting on divine love and care. It was the "manner" of God that spake a word, and "there was a great calm."
In His divine glory we can have no part, save to hide ourselves in it and find there all our blessedness, but the life of Jesus is our life, and the expression of it is simply a question of the faith that lives, as He lived, in the abiding enjoyment of divine love and care. C. W. (To be continued.)
Divine Love and Care: Part 2
In his unconverted condition, walking by sense and not by faith, man has no knowledge of this divine love and care. He lives, morally, outside God, "having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in" him. (Eph. 4:18.) We say, morally outside God, because actually it is "in him we live, and move, and have our being." (Acts 17:28.) It is the darkness and ignorance that is in man that shuts God out of his thoughts, and this was, in the incarnation of the Son of God, brought fully to light. "He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not; he came to his own, and his own received him not." (John 1:10,11.)
Out of this condition of moral death and alienation from God grace quickens us. “Born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:13); we " believe on his name," and receiving Christ personally, He gives us "the right to become the sons of God." We enter into the knowledge and enjoyment of divine love and care as having received Him on whom it abidingly rests.
The righteous ground of our thus coming under divine favor is the cross, but it is as in Christ Himself, the Son of God, we possess and enjoy it. On the footing of creation, in the first Adam, we are "children of wrath," and under death and judgment. On the ground of redemption, in the second Adam, we are children of God, and divine love and care is our only portion, and our enjoyment of it depends upon our walking as "He walked" in faith and obedience. Our standing in divine love and care is unchangeable, depending, as it does, solely on the grace of God, but our enjoyment varies with our state, and is regulated by the government of God.
One side of the truth is our receiving Christ, and thus having the right bestowed on us by Him to take the place of children. (John 1:12.) The other side is God receiving us, and our thus coming under His government as a Father. (Heb. 12:6.) Whilst standing firmly on salvation, and holding tightly that we are, once and for all, "children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." (Gal. 3:26), we are apt to forget "the exhortation that speaketh unto us as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth." (Heb. 12:5,6.)
Sovereign grace never sets aside human responsibility, and divine grace but opens the door to divine government. They are parallel lines that run concurrently, but that never coalesce or intercept one another. To be "without chastisement, whereof all are partakers," is to be " bastards and not sons”- it is to be under divine judgment as lost sinners. To be the subjects of chastisement is the proof given to us of God that we are His children, and thus the objects of His love and care; but we should ever remember, that to keep in the enjoyment of this divine favor, we must be "in subjection unto the Father of spirits."
In Jesus the enjoyment of divine love and care was perfect and uninterrupted, because His walk was perfect, and obedience was the principle upon which this enjoyment was dependent. He says, "As I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love." (John 15:10.) Nor was this obedience without that which put it to the proof, for we read, "though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered." (Heb. 5:8.) Consciously to His own soul, His walk, not His Person simply, as being Son of God, formed the ground of His Father's presence with Him, and this He declares to those that watched Him- "He that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone: for I do always those things that please him." (John 8:29.) Nor is the Father's own testimony lacking in proof of the ground on which this approval rested. Twice, once at the beginning, and once near the close of the earthly ministry of Jesus, does the Father's voice come from heaven saying: "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." (Matt. 3:17, and 17:5.)
True, as it is, that "the life of Jesus" is our life, and that the expression of it is simply a question of the faith that lives, as He lived, in the abiding enjoyment of divine love and care, unless the principle that governed His life, and in connection with which His faith was ever in exercise, is recognized and adopted, our enjoyment of the love and care, of which we are always the subjects, is impossible. We may speak of, and aim at, "bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body" (2 Cor. 4:10); but unless the will is broken, and there be in all things practical subjection to the word of God, and "bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ," that life will not be displayed, nor divine love and care enjoyed.
Peter speaks of our being "Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto [the] obedience and [the] sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ," adding, "Grace unto you and peace be multiplied." (1 Peter 1:2.) We are sanctified by the Spirit to obey as Christ obeyed, and the multiplication of grace and peace depends upon this obedience. The obedience of Jesus, or as we say, "a humbled Christ," is a sweet and holy thing for our souls to dwell upon. It is the manna of our wilderness life, that nourishes and keeps our souls with God in the simple sense of His favor. It is the fine flour of the meat offering, "a thing most holy of the offerings of the Lord made by fire” (Lev. 2:3), and of which none but the priests could eat.
The humanity of the Lord Jesus was perfectly natural and simple in its development. He grew up amid the relationships and circumstances of human life in a manner entirely like our own. Still there was a character to it that morally separated Him from those in the midst of whom He lived and moved. His life unfolded itself like a flower beneath the genial rays of the sun, its beauty and its sweetness, alike, attained without effort and without aim. We read: "And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him." (Luke 2:40.) As years went on, He but "increased in wisdom and in favor with God and man."
The secret of the life of Jesus lay within, deep hidden from the eyes of man. God was His Father, and beneath the fostering love and care of that Father He consciously grew, while one only motive gave its character to all He did and said, "In the volume of the book." It had been written of Him, "I delight to do thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my heart." (Psa. 40:7,8.) "Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business?" He says to His parents, and then passes down to Nazareth, and is "subject to them." His relationship to God, as His Father, and His absolute subjection to His will, did not take Him out of His human relationships and the duties that attached to them, but, on the contrary, it was in those relationships and duties He glorified His Father, and perfectly met His mind and will.
In the life of Jesus the spring of everything was absolutely divine, though the expression of it was perfectly human. It was in the humble home at Nazareth, beneath the parental roof and discipline of His father Joseph, yielding to the wishes and gentle control of His mother Mary, and working at His lowly task as a carpenter, that Jesus, the Son of God's love, and ever mindful of His "Father's business," lived for thirty years. It was here He tasted, in all its sweetness, that divine love and care of which we have been speaking. His subsequent public ministry and prophetic service made no change in the life of Jesus. His Father's will, as before, governed everything in Him, and His Father's love and care remained the same throughout. The storms of public life altered nothing as to this, they did but give occasion for His faith and obedience to display themselves in different ways. Through all He lived by His Father and for His Father.
This He expresses in words, when laying the basis of our blessing through and in Himself, in John 6: "As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me." We enter into and enjoy eternal life- the life of God, by feeding on Christ; and living, as He lived, His portion becomes ours. The depth and fullness of that portion, with its present and intelligent enjoyment, is the subject of His prayer and desire for us in John 17:25,26. "Oh, righteous Father," He says, "the world hath not known thee: but I have known thee, and these have known that thou hast sent me. And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." It is the constant and unceasing aim of the Lord's present ministry, by revealing the Father to us, whilst in all the circumstances of trial and sorrow in this world, to give us the knowledge and enjoyment of divine love and care as known to Himself when on earth. C. W.