All the blessedness of the saints flows into them immediately out of Jehovah, being nothing but the appropriation to themselves of His fullness by the Spirit. Thus the character of each is to be the counterpart of that of Jesus, and depends for its strength and energy, upon the simplicity of our faith in the character of God, as set forth in the work and person of Immanuel. The development in action of this inward character is regulated by the revealed will of God: but in order that the souls of His beloved may not be disturbed by the allowed contrariety in a world of evil, between His will and His purpose, the oracles of God open to us what, notwithstanding every effort of good and evil agencies, the ending of each section of time will be. Hope also is the power of salvation; the things hoped for being the very mold of character. These considerations sufficiently show the importance of a full entry into the termination of this dispensation. That apostasy and then judgment are fore-ordained to the present times of the Gentiles, we take to be acknowledged by those to whom we write.
1st.— “THE CAUSE.” As apostasy is the marring of a work of God, it is evil and like all evil, (which glorifies God by its essential contrariety to His own character,) its cause is Satan; Satan acting in the energy of his own principles of hatred and unholiness, yet in deed and in truth, under the restraint of the counsel of’ God. For as we are assured that of good, seen or unseen, there is but one primary cause—even God; so as certainly we do know that though the streams of evil may be innumerable, they all flow from the one fountain-head—that old serpent, the devil. Not that our minds are to rest even there, for though in contemplating the progress of that which is good, its source ends our search, and all benefit to be derived from after occupation with a subject must be found in the rest of admiration at the glorious character of our God, as found therein; yet the case is different with respect to evil. Having traced the course of any stream to its true and only head, we are not (blessed he God) left to rest in awe and disgust at the origin, but are called again to advance and forget the hideousness of sin in meditating upon the wondrous combination of love, power, and holiness, which has ever displayed itself even in connection with Satan, limiting the extent of power by a line not to be passed over, restraining his energy within prescribed bounds, and then turning his malice and evil working to the glory of Jesus, and the salvation of the saints. The one sole cause, however, of any departure from God, past, present, or future, is Satan.
2nd.— “OR THE MEANS.” One monitory word of the Lord will be the opening— “Whilst men slept,” The Lord’s husbandry when opened to the Gentiles, was one capable of bearing abundant fruit; He who held the office of chief husbandman, was not likely to fail either in understanding or ability. His object in bringing them in, to have a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. The seed also was good, both in character and quality: the soil well prepared, and the sunshine and dew of heaven not lacking to give confirmation to hope. Through what means then came the evil? Through the fellow laborers (1 Cor. 3:99For we are laborers together with God: ye are God's husbandry, ye are God's building. (1 Corinthians 3:9)) in the work, and through them alone. “Whilst men slept (as though there were DO fear of birds rooting up, thorns choking, or an adversary sowing tares amid the wheat,) an enemy came and did this.”
3rd.— “THE MODE.” “As the repose of the saints, as well as their strength, is found in the fullness. inherent in Christ Himself and not in any measure of grace put forth by His own hand out of Himself, there seems to be a needs be that every dispensation, save perhaps that in which His personal glory is seen, should fall away on its immediate establishment, and although it might be continued as the witness of God, would only stand in His forbearance. Thus the Israelites made a calf, or ever the law was given, and the Gentile Church knew its glory only whilst Jewish, i.e., under the immediate administration of the Apostles. Whereby the boundless expanse of God’s own character and glory, becomes the treasure and joy of each saint, instead of a limited measure of them embodied in the dispensation. A distinct analogy is declared by Paul, to exist between the conduct of the Jewish nation and that of the Gentile Church. (1 Cor. 10:66Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted. (1 Corinthians 10:6).) These things were our ensamples (or types of us τυποι ημων;) and ver.- 11, these things happened unto them for examples, (types) and they are written for our admonition. On this ground the Apostle distinctly warns, and that, standing at the outset of the coming departure from God and consequent judgment. Let the faithful trace out in the many particular evils to which he alludes, the more definite features of correspondence in character; we stand at the close, and shall content ourselves with noticing remarkable analogy. 1st.—In the conduct of the two histories; and 2ndly—in the principles of the two departures from God.
In the histories. After much pressure in vain from external adversaries, both, as is ever the case with that which is taken into ostensible connection with God, were betrayed from within. Coveting conformity to the glory of that which was seen around them, each asked a king. Thus provoking God to anger, they were chastened again and again, till through their want of repentance their respective temples were polluted, and Babylonish captivity established. At length a remnant, but oh! how wretched a remnant brought forth, after repentance, from under the cruel hand of the adversary. A second temple built, the great body of the nation still in captivity, and misery, and apostasy: the temple a boast indeed to the young and ignorant, but a lamentation and sorrow to those who by reason of age, could understand the former glory. The sudden blaze of heaven which burst forth in these times of reformation, seemed indeed the presage of better times and things; but the meteor blaze passed, and appeared to have been allowed, but to make men conscious of the character and presence of the prevailing darkness; and in termination, when tried by the testimony of Jesus, the alienation from God of the whole is shown, and a remnant left, “whose spirit is willing, but whose flesh is weak,” to follow their Lord through His rejection in the house of His friends. The gospel of Matthew presents Jesus as the touchstone of trial, and proof to the Jewish nation, and in a peculiar way demands our attentive study, as revealing what is proper for our present position. For whilst there is a striking resemblance between the modern high Churchman and the ancient Pharisees, the Evangelical and Sadducee, the Dissenter and the Herodian, we are called to be a people, leaving all, to follow the Lord whithersoever He goeth, and standing in conscious weakness indeed, by His principles and truth, in their now rapidly approaching open and last rejection by His professed people.
The gospel thus sets forth the alienation—1st—of the nation as a whole; 2ndly— of all the Religionists of the day; 3rdly —or the Instructors and Officers, Scribes and Lawyers, Elders, Priests, and High Priest; and lastly—of the people as persuaded by them. And this we say, with all confidence, that they who have not proved in their own persons, the very same among the professors of our day, either have not the spirit of life in Christ Jesus, or have the guilt of burying its light within their own bosoms. But enough, —we pass on, 2ndly, to the two apostasies, as corresponding.
The Headship of Jesus, as the glory of the Father upon earth, has been revealed in the three kingdoms of nature, of providence and of the spirit. The brightness of the day of the Son of God will consist in the simultaneous, manifest, and full tribute to Him from each and all of them. Foreshadowing that day, the revelations of His glory have as yet at no given time attempted to embrace more than one of these. In Adam according to the sovereignty of His own good pleasure, was displayed The glory of nature, though it all crumbled away through Satan, in the hand even of unfallen man, because not standing in God Himself. On the Israelitish nation He caused to shine the glory of providence; but it likewise failed of permanency, no flesh being able to stand, but the Spirit of the living God alone. And lastly, in the Gentile Church, were unveiled the glories of the Spirit; but, alas! where are even they, save as the broken fragments are seen yet abiding through the election of grace? For there is no stability or power of abiding in any creature apart from God, nor of the return of any creature to God, save by the indwelling of God Himself. That the revelation be of God’s own character—that the revealer of it should be the Son of God with power—that our apprehension of it should be in the Spirit of God—are indeed indispensable requisites; yet unless there be the indwelling of God also, all will fall short of blessing to ourselves, terminating in the proof of the creature’s weakness. It may be well to consider severally of the
A God of goodness. Man upright and uncorrupt.
A God of forbearance dispensing righteousness. Man fallen and unconscious of it.
A God of grace. Man fallen shown to be at enmity in the flesh and alienated.
The dominion of the earth.
Temporal and earthly. The exaltation of the nation above all around.
Spiritual and Eternal in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
Recognition of, and obedience to God as their King.
The whole power and strength of truth depends upon its being received in its native purity; so conscious is Satan of this, that he never fights save by truth—truth, however, either distorted or misapplied; whereby, to the unwary, he makes truth to be destruction. It was thus that he succeeded against Eve— “Ye shall be as Gods, knowing good and evil;” for God testified “He is become as one of us, knowing good and evil;” and it was thus that he was foiled in his attempts upon the second Adam in the wilderness, He being “The Truth” itself. Now what we maintain is, that both of the apostasies in question, originated in a departure from the truths of an existing, into those of a former dispensation. Instead therefore of discerning things that differ, and (whilst recognizing the truth and the application to Adam of that which was in nature) resting for guidance in duty on the things of the kingdom of providence, the Jews passed in thought into the former, and lost themselves through ignorance. So, likewise, has the Gentile Church made shipwreck, not by an intentional act of her own, but by want of discernment as to the difference of the standing of herself and Israel of old. The fall of the Jews whose glory was to have been in God as a God of providence, was by a blind cleaving to the things of NATURE; and we, whose call was to the glory of the Spirit alone, have fallen by a blind adherence to the things of PROVIDENCE. To enlarge upon this a little. In the kingdom of nature established by the goodness of God, in Adam, the necessary immutable law of the creatureship of man was — “thou shalt love the Lord thy God, with all thy heart, and all thy mind, and all thy strength, and thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.” When man made the truth of God to be a He, worshipping and serving the creature more than the creator, he did not alter the law of tribute and dependence of the creature towards the creator: the existing channels of communication he had indeed effectually closed, departing away from God, but the duties of the relationship remained in the nature of things just the same. God remained God still, the only fountain and center of blessedness; and His glory the certain end of every creature, either willingly, and so with enjoyment to themselves, or unwillingly (as in Satan) and so to their shame and anguish; man, at least, may rejoice that God remained God still; for, but for the proof of this in the gracious expulsion from Eden, he would have sealed irrecoverably his own doom in the eternal anguish of separation from God. The purpose of God however was answered; man’s power of standing in nature, and the possibility of God’s displaying His own glory in nature whilst standing out of Christ was disproved. The kingdom stood, but stood with a trophy erected upon it to mark the conquest and possession of Satan. Now man did not believe his own fall, and therefore when the time came for the manifestation of the fullness of the kingdom of providence, and God chose a nation to Himself to be their God, and their King, and to display the guardian power of His own love, these elements of nature were recognized though broken, (I might say as broken) in the law, which clearly was given that the offense might abound; not because they stood in the goodness of God, but with the express object of making them conscious that it was grace and undeserved mercy alone which could and did meet their necessities. But their thoughts were so monopolized with what should have been Adam’s care, that they forgot their God and King, revealing Himself as with a fostering band graciously waiting to do them good. And thus God was hindered displaying the glories of His providential care, because man stood as before in the flesh, and he again was proved a vessel, in himself, too weak to bear the divine glory.
The distinctive character of the present dispensation is the Spirit; for the secret of the whole kingdom is, that “the hour is come when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in Spirit and in truth: God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him, must worship Him in Spirit and in truth.” Accordingly Jesus not only declared before Pilate “my kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered to the Jews; but now is my kingdom not from hence;” but He withdrew from the multitude when they came and sought to take Him by force, to make Him a King; (i.e., invest Him as under the Theocracy, with temporal authority,) and refused to interfere when applied to concerning civil rights, on the ground, not that it was beneath His dignity, but, that the case fell not within the range of His jurisdiction, “Who made me a judge or a divider over you?” His kingdom had reference to the invisible world; its strength was the sanctions of the rewards and punishments of a future state, and without connection, direct or indirect, with the kingdoms of this world. Its establishment was on the day of Pentecost, and the outpouring, and subsequently the indwelling of the Spirit of God with power. Its only KING, Himself the Lord of glory sitting at the right hand of the Father, until His enemies are made His footstool; yet present by faith, through the Spirit in the Churches. Its TEMPLE not made of brick and mortar, or stone hewn from the earth; “for the saints are the household of God, who are built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets: Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone, in whom the building fitly framed together, groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.” (Eph. 2:1919Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; (Ephesians 2:19)) Its OFFICERS having their authority and power solely by, and in the Spirit; and all its GLORY spiritual, and hew transcendent that glory! For if there was a glory of that which was to be done away, as the ministration of death by Moses, how shall not the ministration of the Spirit be rather glorious? For if the ministration of condemnation be glory, much more doth the ministration of righteousness exceed in glory; for even that which, was made glorious, had no glory in this respect, by reason of the glory that excelleth. For if that which was done away, was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious. Now the Lord is that Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. “But we all with open face, beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” The example of that glory in us, as individuals, is set forth in the person of our Lord, (for the disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord,) according to the proportion of our faith, “the foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay His head;” and what it should be, among the saints collectively, in the Church at Jerusalem, “where the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul, neither said any of them that ought of the things which He possessed was His own, but they had all things in common, And with great power gave the Apostles witness of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all; neither was there any among them that lacked, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses, sold them, and brought the prices of the things that were sold, and laid them at the Apostles’ feet, and distribution was made unto every man according as he had need.”
The interference of Constantine (a king and a great one in that world in which Satan had been allowed to rear another and a second monument of victory over man, viz., in providence,) with the spiritual kingdom of our Lord Jesus, was no accidental unimportant circumstance, but the introduction of the very principle which has proved a root of bitterness, springing up and defiling many. It was like the forming of an opening in the embankment, which, though little, gives a course to those waters which, when the way is opened, have power in their very nature to destroy all they meet. In the kingdom of providence, whilst standing as the sphere of the manifestation of God, there was, from the first, always a manifestation of kingly power in the things of time: the sin of choosing a king was just that of putting a man like themselves in the place of God in His capacity of King. But the folly of the Gentiles has been greater, even the putting a man in the place of God, in His capacity of God. Then it was the substituting of an ordinance, inefficient and beggarly indeed, in a place of another, efficient and glorious; the power of both of which however was displayed in time; now it is the bringing in of an efficient ordinance of time, and out of a kingdom given as a whole to Satan, in the place of one efficient, of eternal things, and in the spiritual world of Christ’s present revelation. True, that though the sphere of manifestation is changed, and the power of the world passed as a whole into the hands of the prince of the power of the air, yet God so far now recognizes the duties of rulers (perhaps with the express object of rendering us without excuse) as to mention that they are for temporal punishment of all evil doers, and the temporal reward of them that do well.
The introduction of the principle having been made, its development was easy, and the progress in evil rapid. Worldliness and pride having dimmed the eye, so as to permit them to turn the kingdom of Jesus into a kingdom of this world, and to recognize a man as king in it, the next step was the assimilation of the form, &c., of worship. Buildings were reared with manifest reference to the model of the Jewish temple; and consecrated, as if to a peculiar (though altogether fancied) presence of God, each being called “the house of God:” the sabbath introduced in lieu of the Lord’s day; and an order of clergy formed after the ministry of the Mosaic economy; not according to the two classes of officers in the present, (elders or bishops, and deacons,) but according to the three of the former dispensation. The following extract from Collins’ Summary of Mosheim, will suffice on this subject. “The Christian doctors about the second century, were fortunate and artful enough to make the people believe that the Christian ministers had succeeded to the character, rights, and privileges, of the Jewish Priesthood: accordingly the bishops assumed to themselves a character similar to that of the High Priests; while the presbyters represented the Priests, and the deacons the Levites.” And what, we may ask, did the Romish Church do, but perfect the system? Surely a High Priest being established, there must be a sacrifice to offer; and an altar, and an absolution to pronounce; and vestments, and incense, &c. &c. Then comes the divine right of tithes, succession continued in the flesh, and periodical festivals, [all a loan from the Jewish ritual] as Easter for the Passover; Whitsuntide for Pentecost; &c.
Those things being granted, without question the law of Moses was rightly given a place; and then, having once forsaken the spiritual kingdom of Christ, where stood Jesus and the Spirit, for a kingdom of this world, it was as impossible to stop there, as for the millstone cast into the sea, to stay till it reaches the bottom; therefore man soon sunk down into the very dregs of Jewish apostasy, taking up with the law, and so getting a double condemnation. We do not hesitate to say that the guilt here referred to, applies to the whole Gentile Church; for though the Establishment and the sects dissenting from it, have filed off many of the more disgusting excrescences, not one has renewed God’s principle, through faith and repentance, turning from the evil of their way.
4—CHARACTERISTICS. The object of consideration is the Gentile Church. Let this be remembered; for if the thoughts of the party writing, be upon the Church as a whole, and the mind of those reading, upon individuals, misunderstanding will inevitably arise in treating upon the marks of apostasy, the essence of which differs according to its subject.
For the standing of the individual saint, is in the fullness, love, and glory found in God Himself; that of the Church as a whole cannot go beyond truth dispensed from and by God. Another, and a great difficulty seems to be, that the object at present proposed, is not the expression of private thought, but in love to bear, as extensively as may be, upon the hearts and minds of all those who love truth; thus making the consideration of apostasy a practical corrective to errant affections and thoughts wandering from God. To effect this we need accurate knowledge, not only of what actually is, but of what should be, as well as what measure of apprehension there is in others; which in recognized apostasy can never be supposed to exceed that which is connected with the very first principles of truth, for in apostasy of the Church, individual salvation alone is thought of. Let us compare then the Church as it is with the Church as it was in the times of the Apostles; endeavoring to detect the proofs and marks of departure from essential principles, as well as the introduction of others essentially opposed to them.
By the Gentile Church, we mean the corporate body, professedly the witness of God in the world, to whose care were committed the oracles of God; whose proper privilege was the indwelling of the Spirit, whereby it was made, in its component parts, in deed. and in truth, the body of Christ. Though time and space would not admit of our fully following up the idea in the present connection, we will state one thought in passing, that the existence and strength of all society, social or religious, is by and in God under some form or other; the character being dependent upon the truth or falsehood of the representation of God. Remove all that strength, even from the infidel faction against the Lord and His anointed, and but a mound of dust remains. Yet, alas how many a corporate body derives hourly strength from God, only to His dishonor. The same is true of individuals; for as no creature has existence but by God, so no strength but by receiving, often whilst denying, it out of His fullness. It is wonderful in this point of view, separating of course all the evil, which is only man’s, to contemplate acts of sin, the abuse of invested and sustained power. Look at the cross! Jesus not only originally nerved the arm which drives the nail, but it is His strength as sustainer which alone holds in existence the very life of him who thus rebels. And here is most clearly displayed, the greatness of the Church’s guilt, as well as the folly of her infidelity.
Let us proceed to examine the Church then, according to her bearings—And, 1st—the unsuitability of the descriptions given of the Church’s character in its original constitution, to anything now beheld, must have painfully struck the minds of most. Look to that most marked of all characteristics—love, as described. (Acts 4) Their hearts filled with the love of God, and their minds lost in the transcendent glory of the inheritance, whereunto all were brought, no longer did they seem able either to value the things of time, or to be subject to the spirit of separation, born and fostered in earthly possessions. “They had all things in common, and as many, as had lands, and houses, or possessions, sold them and brought the price, and laid it down at the Apostles’ feet.” Here was love, in practice so strong as to be incredible to the present generation, though indeed but a beggarly exhibition of the great things to which it pointed— “That all may be one, as thou Father art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me; and the glory which thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as we are one; I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me.” All the proof of wretched contrast among ourselves is found in the way in which men make this fruit of a glorious entrance into the essential character of God to be the result of mere accident, of time, circumstance, &c.
Again, 2nd.—Let us look at the Church herself in her rightful connection with God. She was to stand forth as His witness, translating into the language of man the fullness of that glory of the Father, which was displayed is the Son. For as the saint reads the Father only as set forth in the Son, so is the Church the proper witness to the world. In her it should see the light of His glory embodied in action, and where the principle in God might not be understood by the world, there in its own language, of felt, though unacknowledged need and necessity, the Church should present the truth. And the transcript of the features of His truth were perfect—love, faithfulness, holiness, stability, power and blessedness, were seen in her, as though in His essential beauty, He had looked into a still lake. Alas! the reflection is as uncertain now as when one looketh into the troubled sea; every feature may be reflected at one moment, all lost at the next; and when reflected, out of all proportion, without harmony, the whole therefore without beauty. If the character of a body is confessed by the lives and conduct of its parts, we need only advert to the great difficulty of Missionary labors to show this; for what is it, but the ungodly wicked lives of the Christians, “who (say the heathen) know how to drink, to swear, to He, better than ourselves, whose objects are more cruel, whose means of effecting those objects less scrupulous.”
3rdly.— The means and objects of the Church were purely spiritual and holy; the means, earnest wrestling prayer with God, followed by a mighty outpouring of the Spirit, so that no flesh could glory in His presence: (see Acts 1 and 4) and in that most wonderful of all sermons, chap. 2 the only means of such great results, was a simple testimony concerning Jesus of Nazareth, and the Spirit sent down from heaven. Two things, which if not now forgotten, are so added to, as that if any results were to follow, these could not alone be admired; but the fact is, that such is the weakness of man, that you may as well take away God, as add other plausible means where He is; faith will never trust Him where the object is mixed, neither indeed will He ever act where the glory can go to another. The objects of the present day are so innumerable, that it will be best just simply to state “the one” then known, in its singleness, if not in its character so unlike the ends proposed in our days. “The glory of the holy child Jesus.”
4thly.—As to Satan. Whilst holiness was inscribed upon it, it was the aim of all his fiery darts, and if penetrated by a chance splint, it had life to work it out, and throw off the foreign substance; now it is the world, a cavern where he rolls in his filthiness, marking it with sins equal to, yea, worse than heathenism. The temple has become a den of thieves, and where holiness was, there are taught bribery and corruption openly, and unreprovedly. The worst spots however are those which proceed from the very partial and limited sway of the Spirit and the truth among us; whereby, even to the upright mind, there are often apparent divisions of God against God, and Satan against Satan, for good is prostituted to evil, and evil is sanctified to good, and dilemmas hence ensuing to the saints. How few but have felt the difficulty of seeing God in two opposite places, or duties at once. How many a nominal minister, emerging from some system of darkness, has been puzzled, “God has opened this sphere to me, thither I must go;” but God’s Spirit will not allow me to compromise my conscience in such or such a signature, or such a sanction of the evil connected with the system alluded to. How many a child has been puzzled between “Children obey your parents in all things,” and “He that leaveth not father and mother for my name’s sake, cannot be my disciple.” Again, how frequently is the mind paralyzed between the fear of the spirit of insubordination, and independence, or self-will, and the sanction of evil, by continuing in connection with it. These, as what follows, are but solitary cases out of a number innumerable; corresponding in character, though differing in the measure of complexity; some being simple in grace, or in nature, or in providence; some trebly complicated, either horn of the dilemma, a knot gleaned from the three. He that is unacquainted with the power of such things among the children of God, is yet ignorant of Satan’s devices. The religious machinery of the day, which proposes, out of gold and silver, honor, rank, and respectability, with a few soft speeches from a platform, to effect God’s work, is a fair illustration of evil sanctified to good. The glory of this world (and none of the raw materials of this machinery is aught else, however spiritual the semblance in the manufactured articles may be,) the glory of this world and of time, I say, can have no possible bearing upon the work of God, save in hindrance; and what HAVE they produced? anything but conversion and communion of SAINTS. On the other hand, all the beauteous machinery of God’s Church is oft (as in the Established Church) turned against the Spirit; so that God’s order of Pastors, Teachers, &c. is actually made the means of shutting up the truth; whilst among the dissenting, power, as of wisdom, ministry, &c. is set to the highest bidder.
5thly.—In regarding the saints, we get fresh marks of the same apostasy; not only in the complete absence of a fair manifestation of truth collectively, nor in want of individual conformity of heart and mind, and outward practice to the Spirit of the gospel, but even in the trips and falls they experience; either they remain asleep in ignorance of judgment at the door, the bridegroom at hand, no lamps prepared, no oil ready; or, else if they have arisen to follow God, too oft they get wide of the Spirit, or truth, or conduct of the gospel. We may, if we please, blame others (it is an easy task) or in self-complacency profess to pity; but in fact, most of the evil which has befallen the honest-minded, is but the proof of the apostasy of the spectators. A righteous and proper position in ourselves would check, as well as enable us to meet and bear with evil in others. Oh the wretched confusion of everything among the saints! Few see more than some fragment of truth, which is then distorted out of all proportion; and often, in action, made a sign-post to positive evil. One, perhaps, gets some insight into the primitive glory of the Gentile Church, and its simplicity; nothing will suffice but to remove and reform everything. Another understands what the means should be, and then, because they cannot be so now, DOES NOTHING.
Lastly, as to the world or rather worldliness, for the Church is the world, how fearfully is it met under every guise, in love and sympathy, instead of simple clear condemnation. The light of reformation seems to have sufficed for little more than the manifestation of evil. Among the unreformed Churches, the darkness is pure and unmixed. It is a blessed thing, looking at all this, to see the verity of God and His faithfulness in preserving a remnant, and limiting the extent of the flowings of sin. Satan would fain have everything perpetually his own way: but he has no power over that which stands in Christ, only over that which is dispensed out of him; and even his progress in its destruction is but his advance, according to God’s check, to the time of his own overthrow. Burdened and pressed at every point by the evil of that which is thus gone from God, we cannot but rejoice in such an intimation of the nearness of Christ’s glory; as those who having watched the live long night, joy at the increase of cold and darkness immediately preceding daybreak. And besides this, the very deceivableness of sin and its mighty power, does but call out the faithfulness and love of Him who is our shepherd, so that we find a tenfold perception of the blessedness of His love and faithfulness thereby.