Then there is something else that can spoil you too. And they work together, one on one side of the street and the other on the other. They seem to get along pretty well side by side. The other is ritualism.
Everything around us in Christendom today is tending to one of two climaxes. The head of the revived Roman Empire will be an absolute “no God” man, but he will act in close liaison with the woman, the “great whore” (Rev. 17:1), the eventual form of apostate Christianity. Part of the Christian world now is heading for the man — rationalism — and part toward the woman — ritualism! When the true church is taken out and all is left behind that is unreal, then you will find those two forces working together for a little while. And then, finally, in His governmental way, God uses the one to destroy the other, and then the Lord Himself destroys the infidel power. Everything around us today is moving toward the man or toward the woman — toward rationalism or toward ritualism. Which way do you want to move? Where do you want to be? Remember, according to Paul’s doctrine, there was to be a definite, clear-cut testimony rendered to the world by the church. The church was left in this scene as a testimony for our absent Lord. She is waiting for the return of her Lord. We are “partakers of the heavenly calling” (Heb. 3:1). How much does the church know about it? How far has the church departed from it? Yes, we are called to heaven, not to earth. “Consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus” (Heb. 3:1). Where is He? In heaven. The church was never put here as an institution belonging to earth. Eventually, the church is to be taken out of the world. In the meantime, the church is waiting for the Lord to summon us to glory. That is the testimony of the Word of God according to the truth Paul brings out.
If Satan cannot corrupt things through rationalism, he will corrupt them through ritualism. Anything that seeks to make your soul fit for God apart from the work of Christ is ritualism. Any least thing that is brought between your soul and the finished work of Christ is ritualism, and it will spoil you and rob you. But you know it comes in bit by bit. It is referred to in the end of this chapter: “Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, (Touch not; taste not; handle not; which all are to perish with the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men?” (vss. 20-22). In the Revised Version you will find that these are put in opposite order: “Handle not; taste not; touch not.” Now, this is not a question of temperance; anything like the liquor or tobacco question is not involved at all. It is a question of religious ritualism, and God is showing how man, rather than accept the completed work of Christ to which nothing can be added, that sets him perfect before Christ — rather than accept that, he introduces religious performances to perfect himself before God. He introduces them innocently, as one might say, and finally secures the sanction of some great ecclesiastical authority, and they become so solemnized that perhaps only one man in the world dares touch them with his finger, but at the same time it had led away from Christ — led away from His completeness — that fullness that we have in Christ. So men are robbed in their souls.
This morning some of us came together and we remembered the Lord Jesus in His death. Did you? If you did not, where were you? How often do you remember the Lord? He did not say, “As seldom as ye do it,” but, “As often as” you do it (1 Cor. 11:26). We came to do it in solemn, precious memory of Him, and we drank the cup in solemn memory of His blood shed for us. Why did we do it? Was it a means of making us acceptable to God? Was there merit in it? Did eating that bread and drinking that cup give us some kind of religious position or standing that we did not have before? Not the slightest! There was not one atom of virtue in it from that viewpoint. It was simply a question of doing what the blessed Lord asked us to do — almost the last thing He asked us to do. Yet is it not a fact that some Christians become so busy with their testimony—giving their testimony — so busy in the Lord’s work that they do not have time even to come aside and remember the Lord in His death?
I remember an interesting case of a sister in _____ , who was connected with a church there; perhaps that church would rank at the top among fundamentalists. They have thrown themselves into gospel work but disregard almost entirely the line of truth we have before us today. This sister became exercised as to taking her place at the Lord’s table. She went to the minister about it, and he discouraged her leaving, but she said she felt she must leave because she did not find in the _____ church some of the things she found in the Word of God. He asked her what were some of the things. “Well, I feel in my heart a desire to remember the Lord in His death, and I would like to do it with those who meet for that purpose, not as a denomination, not as some certain church, but meet in simplicity of faith to remember Christ.” His reply to her was, “You know, there are a few of us in this big church that feel that way too. We meet to remember the Lord each Lord’s Day except the Sunday the church has communion.” What an admission! Are there two standards? Two ways? Is God the author of confusion? Three Lord’s Days in the month they hold that semi-private memorial, but on the fourth Lord’s Day this is given up to meet as a denomination. Is that according to the truth and teaching of the Word of God? I do not say this to disparage any truth taught in that church; thousands of souls have been blessed there, no doubt, but that does not atone for the sad inconsistencies we have just called attention to. I do not discount the truth, but in the fear of God I am here to state we are not loyal to Christ if we compromise the truth — if we seek to hide some of it so as to become acceptable to the religious world.
In the next chapter, Paul says, “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above” (Col. 3:1). If you and I are seeking those things which are above, we are not going to be occupied with what man thinks. If the Apostle Paul cared for what man thought of him, he would never have written what he did in 1 Corinthians 4:9-13: “I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were appointed to death: for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men. We are fools for Christ’s sake, but ye are wise in Christ; we are weak, but ye are strong; ye are honorable, but we are despised. Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwelling-place; and labor, working with our own hands: being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it: being defamed, we entreat: we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day.”
Why did Paul have to suffer those things? That he might fill up that which was behind of the sufferings of Christ for His body’s sake. Friend, here this afternoon, how much have you really suffered for the sake of the church? How much have you paid of the price for treading the path of separation? If you and I are going to be obedient to the doctrine of Paul, it is going to isolate us from the great organized bodies of Christendom around us. The doctrine of Paul as to the church has been given up long ago. For it was substituted the fallacy of what they call the “church invisible” and the “church visible.” And so all of Paul’s doctrine as to the “church invisible” was given over to the keeping of the angels, as it were, while man took over the “visible church,” after his own pattern. What sad confusion he has made of it! You can see it everywhere.