(1.) REST. This is not only the rest that follows upon the cessation of the struggle with indwelling sin, but also the positive rest which flows from the knowledge now enjoyed by the soul, of deliverance. Hence the first words of chapter 8 are, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.” This is not simply the assertion that the believer is freed from all condemnation, but rather the discovery that those who are in Christ Jesus are delivered from all possibility of it. Such is the blessed goal which the soul has now reached. Let us, then, examine a little into what is thus involved. There is now, then, the knowledge that the believer has been brought out of his old standing and condition, and set down in a new place before God in Christ — in Christ who is risen from the dead, and has passed into a new sphere beyond and on the other side of death, into which neither death nor condemnation can enter. Through death with Christ, as has been already shown, the believer is dissociated from the first man — from Adam; so that now, reckoning himself to be dead unto sin, he also counts himself as alive unto God in Christ Jesus. In the death of Christ God has judged, once for all, sin in the flesh — judged its root and branch; and the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus as risen out of death has made the believer free from the law of sin and death. Sin and death have to do only with those who are in the flesh; and since the believer is not in the flesh (vs. 9), but is in the Spirit, he has his standing where the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus prevails. Yes, —
“The Lord is risen: the Red Sea's judgment flood
Is passed, in Him who bought us with His blood.
The Lord is risen: we stand beyond the doom
Of all our sin, through Jesus' empty tomb.”
We stand, we repeat, in a new place — a place, because in Christ Jesus as risen, to which the flesh, and therefore condemnation, cannot have anything to say. As the blood of Christ cleansed us from our guilt, so in the death of Christ (for we were, in the grace of God, associated with Him in that death,) the flesh — sin — met its judgment and doom, and we now in Christ are therefore completely delivered, and as such, freed from all condemnation. We can now rest — rest in Him in whom we stand before God.
Together with this, the soul discovers another thing. What had been the cause of all its dissatisfaction and sorrow? Its own state and condition — the condition springing from the presence of sin within. Now, it learns that the question is, not what we are, but what Christ is. Is God satisfied with what Christ is? Then we may be satisfied too, for we, remember, are in Him, and what He is, and not what we are, marks our standing before God. In Christ, therefore, we answer to even God's own thoughts, so that He can rest in us with the same complacency as He rests in Christ. We are indeed accepted in the Beloved. Inasmuch, then, as every desire of God's heart is met, we have nothing left to desire; we are as perfect, as to our new standing, as God Himself can make us, and we have perfect rest. As to the flesh, we have learned that it could not be worse, and that it could not be better; as to our being in Christ, we have been taught that God Himself is satisfied with us, inasmuch as we are before Him, in all the perfection of what Christ is, as the glorified Man. It is not possible to desire more, and thus we enter upon the enjoyment of perfect rest —perfect rest in Christ; for just as we were enabled, through grace, to accept Christ as our substitute on the cross, we now rejoice to accept Him before God instead of ourselves. God's eye rests on Him, and ours rests on Him too, and thus in communion with the heart of God we find our true and unshaken rest.
Another blessed consequence at once follows. Ceasing from self-occupation (for, having trodden that weary path to our bitter sorrow and found out its vanity) we rejoice to be occupied alone with Christ. Since it is what He is that determines what I am before God, I delight to trace out His perfections and moral glories — to meditate upon every ray of the glory of God that shines out from His glorified face (2 Cor. 4); and in this blessed employment I am gradually transformed, even while here in this world, by the Spirit's power, into His likeness (2 Cor. 3:1818But 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. (2 Corinthians 3:18)). Lost in admiration of the One whose face, unlike that of Moses, is unveiled. I grow like Him —grow daily, while waiting for His return, until finally I shall be like Him, for I shall see Him as He is.
It is therefore Christ as the measure of my standing, Christ as the object of lily heart, and Christ as the One to whom I am to be conformed. What else can the soul need? Nay, I am abundantly satisfied, and I have perfect rest.
“Lord, 'tis enough — we ask no more;
Thy grace around us pours
Its rich and unexhausted store,
And all this grace is ours.”