If we look at death, the Prince of life has tasted death; if, at the power of Satan, Christ has broken and destroyed his power; if, at the wrath of God, He has borne it all—drunk the cup to the very dregs. “All Thy waves and Thy billows are gone over me.” “Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me with all Thy waves.”
But, further, He is the righteous inheritor of all the promises; as it is said, “All the promises of God in Him are yea, and in Him Amen,” and we, through grace, can add, “to the glory of God by us.”
How then did we come in.? As heirs together with Him, in Spirit united to Him—one with Him. Our standing before God is in Christ—the new Man, as having no more part in the flesh, though we have as yet to struggle against it. Death is abolished. Life and incorruptibility are brought to light by the gospel; and that, because the responsibility question has been settled in the death of Christ.
But it is “by faith.” How gracious this! how true of God! how blessed for us! By faith we receive all the promises in Christ. By faith we find everything done. It is only to believe. Faith produces all manner of fruit in us; there is wondrous power in it, but still it is only to believe: that is all. Just as though you had been deeply in debt, and some kind friend had paid the amount, and, when that was done, had sent you word. The person comes and tells you that your debts are paid, and you believe it. Now your believing produces joy and gladness, doubtless, in your heart; but, of course, it does not in any measure go to liquidate the debt. So as to salvation, the debt has been paid, Christ has finished the work, and the believing soul enters into all the blessed results (ver. 22). Faith is exercised upon that which has been already accomplished. “It is of faith, that it might be by grace, that the promise might be sure to all the seed.” Nothing redounds to the glory of the creature. It is a person simply depending upon the truth of God.
When the soul is made hopeless in itself (and this must always be the case when the conscience is really honest under the sense of responsibility), it turns to see what God is. The more the truth of God's requirements is known, the more wretched the soul becomes. The end of all is seen in that exclamation of the apostle, “O wretched man,” &c. I am a man, and therefore a wretched being, one having the curse resting upon me.
God, in the gospel, sees man wicked, miserable, rebellious, lost; but He sees him according to His infinite compassions. The Lord Jesus has begun altogether a new thing, not demanding what man is required to be before God, but accomplishing what God is towards man in grace. We find in Christ, it is true, and to perfection, what man is required to be before God; but more than that, what God is towards man. Grace came by Jesus Christ. So that the moment any person, let it be a convicted sinner, stood before Christ as what he was, he found Christ to be grace. If he came as what he was not, Christ laid him bare; but, if he came as what he was, then no matter what he was, a poor helpless sinner, a wretched adulteress, or the robber upon the cross (that was not the question—the question was, what was Christ? Who came not to judge, but to save), all was grace.
Having found Christ, we have found One Who has all the promises of God. And, since He took those promises as a consequence of what He had done in patting away sin, there can be no further question about sin before God. Our sins are necessarily left outside, because Christ Himself has borne them all; as it is said, “The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” He stood in our place, and took upon Himself our iniquity, and bore the judgment due to us. He went down into the grave, but rose again from the dead in the power of a new and endless life, and ascended up on high, even unto the Father's presence, as our representative. There He stands, and we stand there in Him; as He is before God, so are we, holy, unblameable, and unreproveable in His sight, partakers of His life, joint-heirs with Him of all the promises.
This, beloved friends, is our position before God; this our standing in Christ. There is an entirely new headship in the Last Adam. We are presented in a new character to God, such as man never had before—man without sin in the presence of God, the very pattern of God's mind and delight. We find difficulty, it may be, in apprehending it, because of the weakness of the flesh. The moment I look at myself, I have another man full of failure. But I stand there as having had sin forever put away. The knowledge of this gives peace; and we worship. Make sin what you please, let it take what form it may, you cannot mingle the state of man under law with the condition of the new, the heavenly, Man in the presence of God.
The Lord grant us to know what we are in His love. J. N. D.
(Concluded from page 92.)