By Rev. Ernest E. Grimwood.
“DO you see that house?” said my friend, as he drove me to his beautiful Berkshire home, enclosed by a sylvan garden lapped by Father Thames.
“Yes,” I replied, “what is there special about it?” “For years,” he added, “it was the home of a millionaire whose anxiety about his wealth became so persistent and pernicious that his wife put before him, at breakfast-time each morning, a gold sovereign. With this tangible insurance against dreaded penury he attained mental peace.”
So easy is it to be reputed of wealth while actually “wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.”
“Which thing is an allegory.” God has given us, through His Son, “durable riches,” “hidden wisdom,” fathomless love, abundant life; yet how often we clutch at some perishable bauble to insure against hunger or defeat! It is often so in the realm of grace. We carry off the crumb of a message from a meeting, but might have broken the loaf with Christ in the “inner chamber.” We “feel better” when a friend has prayed with us, but forget Christ’s unceasing intercession for us. We astutely agree to lay only a part of the proceeds of our land at the Apostle’s feet, forgetting that it is written, “All things are yours, for ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.”
It is fatal to spiritual life and work to write “some” when God writes “All.” Transjordania is a dangerous place to live in when God has given Palestine for your home.
The measuring reed of the angel is better than a foot rule for ascertaining the dimensions of the “exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe.” The tragedy of history is that man, who was created by God and for God and in His image, has been content to live in a far country and to perish with hunger. The divine plaint runs: “How often would I ... and ye would not!”
Perhaps we need to look again into some of God’s “Alls.” They are progressive, and lead us step by step from the condemned cell to the seventh heaven. We must carefully master each lesson before taking the next. One lesson missed or unmastered will prevent progress, or put us back altogether. As Pilgrim draws nearer the Celestial City, his difficulties and adversaries increase in number and subtlety.
1. There is the “All” of our Fallen State. — This is the first rung of the ladder set up upon earth by which we may ascend to the throne of heavenly grace. On it is inscribed: “All under sin,” “All gone out of the way,” “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” (Rom. 3:9,12, 239What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin; (Romans 3:9)
12They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. (Romans 3:12)
23For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23)). Have we put our foot there? Loose utterances by unregenerate philosophers, designed to explain away the universality of the Fall, do not alter the facts of human experience, nor reverse the divine Word― “the Scripture hath concluded all under sin” (Gal. 3:2222But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. (Galatians 3:22)). If we know ourselves as included in this awful “all,” we may, with trembling and fear, listen to the verdict of the “Judge of all the earth.”
2. There is the “All” of Sentence upon Sin. As there are no exceptions to the fallen state, there are no exceptions to the consequent judgment upon it. “Wherefore”— inevitably, invariably, inexorably— “death passed upon all men” (Rom. 5:1212Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned: (Romans 5:12)). As well might a child seek to stem the incoming tide by its spade, as modern savants to explain away the universality of divine judgment upon all who have broken the divine law. No disbelief, no natural kindness, no social prestige, no bribe, no religious observance, no hypocrisy, no angel in heaven nor demon in hell can alter by one hair’s breadth the final doom and death of the sinner except God intervene, and the soul, in wonder and praise, receives His Salvation.
3. There is the “All” of the Suffering, Servant.
With pitying love the Prince of peace,
Beheld our hapless grief;
He saw—and oh amazing Love—
He flew to our relief.
“He suffered; He bled; He died”— for whom? “He ... delivered Him up for us all” (Rom. 8:3232He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? (Romans 8:32)). “The boundaries of grace are coterminous with the frontiers of the realm of sin. “He died for all”— all the human race since Adam fell, all the race then living, and all the race as yet unborn. “They... shall declare... unto a people that shall be born, that He hath done this” (Psa. 22:3131They shall come, and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that he hath done this. (Psalm 22:31)). The history of human guilt culminates in the Cross.... The purposes of divine love are made intelligible at the Cross... all history turns upon the Cross, and is divided into two great hemispheres by the wondrous life that closed on the Cross.” It is true that not all men know, and that not all men respond; nevertheless the work of Calvary comprehended “all men,” “all nations,” “all people.”
4. There is the “All” of Sonship. “To as many as received Him, to them gave He the power (marg: privilege) to become the sons of God” (John 1:1212But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: (John 1:12)), teaching them by the Holy Spirit the mystic speech of sons, whereby they cry “Abba, Father.” Thus, united with the Son, they desire the “things of the Father,” and, like Him, love the Father, “with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength” (Mark 12:3333And to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices. (Mark 12:33)).
Such devotion to the will of the Father is not of their cultivating; it is the Father’s gift. They live because they love; they love that they may live. A son who loves his father concentrates all his affections and desires on the father’s interests. They are one. It involves no effort. It is a necessity of their relationship.
5. There is the “All” of Separation. One of the most beautiful phrases in the Acts of the Apostles is to be found in verse 22 of chapter 13, where, referring to David, God describes him as “a man... which shall fulfill all My will.” This, to many, is a hard saying. Yet it is the privilege and price of discipleship. God’s Mephibosheth’s are eager that the world’s Ziba’s should take all so long as they may behold the King enthroned in His glory after His long rejection. They count all things but dross that they may “win Christ and be found in Him.”
Then with a ripple and a radiance through nee
Rise, and be manifest, O Morning Star!
Flow on my soul, Thou Spirit, and renew me,
Fill with Thyself, and let the rest be far.
Separation from all to take the “All”; do we shrink from it?
It is the way the Master went;
Should not the servant tread it still?
6. There is the “All” of a Saintly Life. Human words suffer mutilation and mutation; divine words will outlive all other words, will never be added to nor taken from. So God’s word-pictures of a holy walk define His ideals for our manner of life. Here are some: —
“Laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings” (1 Peter 2:1,21Wherefore laying aside all malice, and all guile, and hypocrisies, and envies, and all evil speakings, 2As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby: (1 Peter 2:1‑2)).
This is intensely practical. One bit of malice or evil speaking, if indulged in, breaks the command to put it “all” away, and so dishonors our Lord. The robe of the ephod of the High Priest was made, “all of blue.” (Ex. 28:3131And thou shalt make the robe of the ephod all of blue. (Exodus 28:31)). Oh, may we, today, put on our beautiful garments, and “adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in ALL things”— “walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blameless.”
7. There is the “All” of Satisfaction. God’s will is our peace. There is nothing niggardly, meagre, nor restricted in God’s purposes for us. If He demands all, He equally gives us all. He takes in order that He may give. He empties us that He may fill us with “all joy and peace,” (Rom. 15:1313Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost. (Romans 15:13)). He makes you poor that you “being enriched in everything to all bountifulness” (2 Cor. 9:1111Being enriched in every thing to all bountifulness, which causeth through us thanksgiving to God. (2 Corinthians 9:11)) may prove in daily experience that “God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound in every good work.” (2 Cor. 9:88And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work: (2 Corinthians 9:8)).
This is the “life more abundant.” It emerges from death, it is purchased by His sufferings, it inheres in our sonship; it is “wholly the Lord’s,” expresses itself in holy living, and abounds in rich fruitage to God and man. All believers may have it; all desire it, but only those know it who confess— “All through Christ for the Glory of God”— all else is nothing.
With acknowledgements to THE CHRISTIAN.