Canaan first; then the Lessons of the Wilderness.
The people of God are a heavenly people—they are already “in the heavenlies in Christ,” as we have seen. We require no experience in learning this blessed truth—nothing but simple faith. We pass through many experiences before accepting the truth of being dead with Christ to our whole sinful state as children of Adam; the more so when experience contradicts God’s Word, and we find we are, if we look at ourselves, still alive. The evil nature is still ready to lend itself to everything contrary to God. But for faith, and for God, it is dead. The only thing which lives in us, in His sight, is that new nature which He has given us. The feeblest throb of it is fragrant before Him, because it is the exhibition of the life of Jesus, in whom was all His delight, in our mortal bodies.
We have thus been introduced into a life on the other side of death and judgment. The very life we have in Christ is a witness that our sins are all put away. Before He bestowed it upon us, He first bore the sins which He found in the way, as He passed down, in holy love, into the depths in which we lay— “dead in sins.” He then rose, leaving them all behind. He introduced us into a place on high with God—a fitting sphere for that life to grow and flourish.
He gives us the glory He has as a man: the possessions of all He will inherit. Then He looks for the works and fruits suited to that new condition which God had foreordained for us to walk in (Eph. 2:1010For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10)).
Thus, in this new place, having this new life, and being already set in possession of all things in Christ, we are not in Egypt; we did walk according to the course of this world; we are not in the wilderness; but we are in the heavenly places, which are our Canaan: “We are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit.” And here comes in the paradox of the Christian state. He looks on high and sees Christ in the glory, and is conscious that he is in Him. He looks below and he finds himself traversing a world under Satan’s power, in which there is not a breath that is not noxious to the new and heavenly life within. But having first begun in the glory, with the consciousness of His place there, he is in the race which leads to the attainment of the goal—the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus. He looks at himself, and he can say, “as having nothing.” He looks at Christ, and says, “yet possessing all things.”
Now, there is no place for learning the tender sympathy of Christ—the blessings of a Father’s love and patience and care as in the journey through. True, he must first have reached by faith the Canaan to which he has already come in Christ. Then he finds that this world is not the sphere in which God can bless him fully; but that there is no place where his own heart is more thoroughly learned, and the heart of Christ, as in the wilderness way.
In Deut. 8:2-52And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments, or no. 3And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. 4Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell, these forty years. 5Thou shalt also consider in thine heart, that, as a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee. (Deuteronomy 8:2‑5) we read— “And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thy heart, whether thou wouldest keep his commandments or no. And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna (which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know), that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live. Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, neither did thy foot swell these forty years. Thou shalt also consider in thine heart, that, as a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy God chasteneth thee.”
The wilderness is the place of education for our warfare in the land—the place where faith and patience are tried, and where the ultimate thought of God in the training is that obedience may be perfect, and our wills broken, by learning to live by every word of God.
The first stage in the wilderness journey gives a character to the whole. We find it in Ex. 15, just after the song went up to the Lord. The first thing we have to do is to give thanks unto the Father, “Which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins” (Col. 1:12-1412Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: 13Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son: 14In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins: (Colossians 1:12‑14)). This takes in the whole range of what God wrought from the night of the Passover, until the morning when the note of praise ascended to Him from the hearts of His redeemed people, on the shores of the Red Sea, in which the hosts of Pharaoh had sunk to the bottom as a stone; Then we need to be strengthened according to the power of His glory unto patience by the way.
The salt or hitter waters of death have delivered us, because they have been borne by Jesus. But now we must taste them because we have been delivered. We must find that death is in the scene. Tribulation is our portion in this world—but in Christ, peace. What, then, must we learn? That we are crucified with Him; that the cross, in which we can glory, when put into the trial, makes it sweet indeed. Take reproach—how bitter to endure; but let it be the reproach of Christ, and how different is the taste! Take the needed discipline of His hand in correcting that which is evil in us, or likely to spring up in our hearts—how hard to be borne, how hard to be continually humbled! Now if we were thoroughly humble we should not need to be humbled, but because we are not, we must be broken down. See the thorn given to Paul. He goes to the third heaven, where no one had ever been before and returned again but Paul, and now he must have his thorn. What trying work thus to be humbled before others, just because he had been in the heights! He did not need it there, but he did when he returned, and lest he should boast of having been there, he must have a thorn in his flesh. He prays thrice that it may depart from him. It was the bitter water to Paul. But no! The Lord knew better than Paul what was needed, and he must have the thorn. Very well, says Paul, “most gladly;” “I glory in it.” Ah, Paul, now you are at Elim! You have made an Elim of the trial, and you can sit under His shadow with great delight, and His fruit be sweet to your taste.
There are three sorts of tribulation or dealings of God in the way of discipline in the wilderness with us. First-Tribulation in which we may glory; for instance, suffering for Christ in this evil world. This is different from suffering with Christ. All Christians suffer with Him, because they possess life in Him, and that life must necessarily suffer in a scene which was all suffering to Him. If we suffer with Him we shall also reign with Him. But to some the suffering comes for faithfulness to Christ; it is also looked upon as a gift. “Unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake” (Phil. 1:2929For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake; (Philippians 1:29)). In this we can indeed make our boast. How far this goes beyond suffering for conscience’ sake! A man to suffer for it may be a loser, because he does his business conscientiously: perhaps his profits may not be as large as those who have no conscience in the matter. But the same man may have found the pathway of a rejected Christ in this evil world, have had grace to turn his feet into the track, and the result may be that he loses his business altogether. The mistake is in judging things merely as right and wrong by conscience. Conscience is never a guide. Paul followed his conscience, and persecuted Christ and wasted the Church of God. Following Christ is the only sure pathway, and it is a Christ whom the world has cast out, and whom God has set in glory. Can I have better treatment from the world than He had? “If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. Remember the word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater than his lord. If they have persecuted me they will also persecute you; if they have kept my saying, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do unto you for my name’s sake, because they know not him who sent me;” that is the Father (John 15:19, 2119If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you. (John 15:19)
21But all these things will they do unto you for my name's sake, because they know not him that sent me. (John 15:21)).
There is a second kind of suffering under which I must humble myself, and in which I cannot boast. I allude to the suffering of various kinds which comes under God’s righteous government, and from Him as a Father, for evil allowed and unjudged in our ways. The Father, without respect of persons, judgeth according to each one’s work, therefore we have to pass the time of our sojourning here (to which this judgment applies) in fear; there is no fear in heaven (1 Peter 1:1717And if ye call on the Father, who without respect of persons judgeth according to every man's work, pass the time of your sojourning here in fear: (1 Peter 1:17)). How much these retributive dealings of a Holy Father with us are forgotten!
Then there is another tender and merciful order of chastening or discipline, which is more what Paul also had to endure. It is a preventive discipline, because of a tendency to be puffed up. The Lord knows our hearts well; who knows them better? And His dealings are suited to the temperament of each, and to the tendency of each to get away from Christ, to which each is most liable. “He withdraweth not his eyes from the righteous;” His eyes are on them for their good, and the righteous should not withdraw their eyes from Him!
A striking fact comes out now. I mean when the Marah bitterness is approved of, as God’s true and loving yet firm dealing with us, the sorrow and bitterness become but the occasion for the next step; the cross sweetens the cup. It brings to mind that murmuring self has been dealt with on the cross, and when self is gone, then the bitterness that self tasted is gone with the self that tasted it. Then the soul is at Elim with its wells and palm trees, its refreshment and shelter. But I allude to something else which is not told us in Exodus—their return to the Red Sea again. How strange to go back to that through which they had just passed!
If we turn to Num. 33 we find the interesting itinerary of the journey, step by step, and stage by stage, marked and registered under God’s eye. From Pi-hahiroth to Marah, from Marah to Elim, and from Elim, with its fountains and palm trees, back again to the Red Sea? (vv. 8-10.) What do we learn from this? I believe a blessed lesson. We should be able to turn now, without a quiver in our hearts, and calmly survey that death by which we have been delivered—the death of Him who passed through its dark raging flood for us. We can contemplate it as that which silenced every foe; “The waters covered their enemies; there was not one of them left” (Psa. 106:1111And the waters covered their enemies: there was not one of them left. (Psalm 106:11)).