It is an immense thing to have a revelation of God. I do not mean merely a revelation from God, but a revelation of God Himself. God has given us both: revelations, again and again, revelations of the most varied character; revelations in the most suitable order; but, most of all, and specially with the view to this, the revelation of Himself, the revelation of Himself in this world.
For little as this world may be, compared with other parts of the creation of God, it is here that man is-here now; and this is a very solemn consideration for you and for me. It is here that we are put to the test as moral beings; here that we are lost or saved.
Men may speculate about other worlds, but no man has any real ground to say that God has ever revealed Himself except here, or indeed that there are others to whom He would reveal Himself as He has revealed Himself here. May I go farther, and venture to say this-He never revealed Himself anywhere as He has done here? It is here that He sent His Son; it is here that He sent Him to be a man (unspeakable witness of His grace towards man!), and, remember, when man was fallen. Not till then was there the very smallest word of it from God, but man was no sooner fallen than He speaks; and now the word that God spoke so long past is become a great substantial fact, that puts every heart, every conscience of every man, woman, and child, completely to the proof. Do I prefer sin to God? Do I prefer my selfishness, my misery, the darkness and guilt of sin, to God and His grace?
For when God did send His Son into the world, it was to deal with sin, it was to deal with Satan, it was to bring in what man could find nowhere, else, LIFE—eternal life! Life that could feel according to God, life that could have pleasure in the presence of God, life that could take delight in the will of God, life capable of knowing and enjoying God! And where was this found? Where is it? Is it in man's heart? in ordinances? Nowhere but in the Son of God! But (wondrous to see now) the Son of God a real man; certainly much more than a man, but a man. He was God from everlasting to everlasting, but He became a MAN. Assuredly He did not cease to be God; nor will He ever cease to be a man; and there it is that God has given in itself the most astonishing pledge and proof that He has no designs against man, nay, that He had the fullest love towards man.
Yet this was what man was so slow to credit. And why so? Most of all because he is a sinner. He has a bad conscience; he is afraid of God. And good reason he has to be afraid of God, as far as he is concerned; the best reason has he if there be none other than he. But there is. There is one man that is God-I will not say like God. He is never said to be “like God.” And I will tell you why. Because He is God. He is said to be the image of God. He has given me to see what God is. He has brought the very image of God before my heart, before me in this world. He is the image of the invisible God. But He is never called His likeness, for this were to deny His glory. He is God's very transcript. He is the true God and Eternal Life; and this is the One that God sent into the world to save, to save all that believe—not to be a judge, yet He will judge. Every man, as man, nay, every man absolutely, must give account—I do not say be judged. Every man as man must be judged, but every soul, every saint even, must give account of all that he has done in the body.
You observe that I have spoken of a difference in these two things, and there is one. It is not understood generally, but I will tell you what and why it is. It is because salvation is not understood! Thanks be to God, people do not lose salvation because they do not understand it. Wretched were it so, that is, if God only blessed according to their measure, but He blesses according to Christ. And is there any measure there? On the contrary, what a fullness, fullness infinite, according to Himself, according to all His grace and His truth.
Such is the Savior! Is He yours? Do you know Him? Tell me not that He cannot be known.
Are you a heathen, or a Jew? You, a Christian, to say that God cannot be known! What sort of Christianity is that? More guilty than Judaism or even heathenism. A heathen, just because he was a heathen, had not the knowledge of God. He had therefore gone after false gods, gods that were no gods. No wonder he should say God cannot be known; but even a Jew knew something about God, though he did not know God Himself. And you who take the place of being a “Christian,” even if it be on the slenderest confession, be it so! But what Christianity is based upon is this, that God has revealed Himself; yet you, you call yourself a “Christian,” and do not know Him! perishing, in the presence of the richest abundance! dying, although eternal life has come here in the person of the Savior!
It is for sinners, life has come; not for those who have life. Though I grant that all that can strengthen, all that can fill the heart, all that can guide and bless, is found in that same One who is “Eternal Life.” But I ask, For whom was He sent, and for what? Here we have it. “In this was manifested the love of God towards us; in that God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him.” And this is so true that no man can see the Son and believe in the Son, without having eternal life. So this very inspired writer says; and you must remember an inspired writer means one who gives the sure unfailing truth of God. It is impossible for God to lie, and this is the way He speaks in His word. Surely there is One who had the words of God when He was here. He is the Word of God. But the apostle says, “He that knoweth God, heareth us.” He could be known, then, The apostles were raised up, they were inspired, for the very purpose of communicating God's word.
“Heareth us.” One does not pretend to be above the apostles, or to do without the apostles, for we have their writings, but hears them. “He that is not of God heareth not us.” And do you hear not the apostles? When you say that God cannot be known, you certainly do not hear the apostles. You never learned that from them. On the contrary, you have learned it from men who speak as of the world, and the world hears them. I do not say they speak “for” the apostles, for they speak against their word, though they may call themselves, ever so much, their successors. And this is exactly the state in which Christendom now is. These high pretensions always go with denying the sure present knowledge of God by faith.
THAT WE MIGHT LIVE THROUGH HIM
But let us hear what he says who writes these divine words: “In this was manifested the love of God towards us, in that God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him.” This was His very object. There was no life here, nor could life be got through any other. It was not enough to point to the Son in heaven; that would not satisfy God. No, God sent His Son into the world that we might live through Him; and it is in this way that souls do live. He sets before us this One, and tells us who the Son of God is, even Jesus—undoubtedly the Son of man, but the Son of God, the only-begotten Son of the Father, yet God just as much as His Father. You are a man if you are the son of your father. In a still more glorious ineffable way was the only-begotten Son of God Son of the Father. And in this also it is that God triumphs, because man had only believed a lie, judging of God by Himself—the sure way to be lost. You cannot by searching find out God. The Son of God, “the only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him.” “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.” Thus the simplest believer knows the only true God; there is none he knows so well. He is known by my need, by my wants, in His own divine love and skill meeting me where I am and in spite of all that I am.
It is evident that, if the only-begotten Son was sent into the world that we might live through Him, there was no life without Him, for life does not mean mere existence. True, the soul is immortal, but the immortality of the soul does not hinder the soul from being lost. The soul is immortal; and, further, the body will be raised. Oh! it is an awful thought that the body will be raised to be bound to the guilty soul, that both soul and body should prove what it is to have despised God—to have hated Him—and to have proved it by despising the Son. It is not merely for his sins that man is lost, but because he refused this unspeakable love of God who sent His Son. He is too proud, too given up to selfishness; he does not want to give up his sins, above all, he will not be beholden to God; he would rather risk it.
There it is that the Spirit of grace works to touch the conscience of the sinner. Where does he turn then? To the very God he has wronged, avoided, dreaded, hated too. There is no surer proof of hatred than that you never care to see a person's face. Now you who have not the knowledge of God, is not this what you would like best—if you could only be sure you could always escape God; if you could go on as you like, and never face God, never have to give account of your sins? If you could go on with your pursuits, your pleasures, without being cast into hell, would you not like that? You are dead in sins!
But the Spirit of God, when He works, makes the truth quickening. I am a sinner. I am ashamed to think of my sins, ashamed to tell them to God. I feel I have been most guilty. Yet such an one turns by Christ to God. He confesses his guilt, cost what it may. If God were to cast him into hell on the confession of his guilt, it would be just, and man must justify God. He tells it all out to God. He must draw near—the consciously shameful, shameless, guilty soul—and pour out the confession of his sins into the ear of God. And what does God tell out to him? “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, in that God sent His only-begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him.”