The first impression, and the one to which we must hold most simply in coming to the study of Scripture is, that in them alone is God's mind and will revealed to us. Creation, to a certain extent, is a revelation of God; it sets forth the quality of His being, but it does not disclose His mind. Even with regard to our equals, their acts only can give us a clue to their minds; but of one much greater than ourselves, in nature as well as in power, we can know nothing whatever save as such an one is pleased to divulge His mind to us. This God, in His wondrous grace, has been pleased to do. Not only has
He communicated His mind to individuals now and again, but He has had it written out for us in connection with those whom He used for the time as witnesses of what He revealed.. Consequently, the Scriptures are for the most part a record of God's ways with men on the earth, and men in relation to God with respect to Himself as made known or revealed. So that as I read the Scriptures, I am in a certain sense. reading of myself, in the state of things in which the revelation has reached my fellow-men. I see how natural it is. Man becomes the medium to me by which the mind of God, as unfolded, is presented to me. I am reading in the Scriptures as it were, a history of myself under different phases. I am made to feel the exactitude of the nature of the characters there delineated to my own, and yet the wonderful thing to me is how man, so weak and frail in himself, as is so often seen in the divine record, should be so great at times through the power and mercy of God towards him.. The very fact of all, this lends a charm to the Scriptures, which, while it seems too simple, and a mere fragmentary history of man to the wise and learned, who always look for something mysterious and outside the mind of man generally, is full of beauty and power to the simple, as in the most touching and familiar way bringing down God's revelation of Himself to the general routine of man's daily life; as one reads it, one reads oneself in it, and always as one would have been in the circumstances given. The mind of God is communicated to me as I am in myself, learned or unlearned, and it is received and comprehended by me independently of my ignorance or knowledge of anything else.
We must, therefore, address ourselves to the study of the Scriptures, as the writings in which the mind of God in the most simple and familiar way is disclosed to us. God can bring down the greatest thing with Him, so close and near as to be at home with us, and yet all the time retaining in itself all its essential and unfathomable greatness.
Who can explain the commonest thing in creation, and yet it is near enough, and its uses palpable enough. Light or air for example, who can adequately explain them? and if not these, how the deep things of God?
But in this disclosure of God's mind to us, God must use His own words, for no words save His own, can rightly divulge and express to me the mind of one greater than myself. Even with men I have no full conception of their communications, but as I accept them verbatim, and this in proportion to the largeness of the subject on which they treat. The very words used are always important, and my receiving them verbatim is evidence of my acceptance of the full idea as expressed. How much more so with regard to any communication from God! If He will express His mind to me, He must use His own words, and I must accept them implicitly.
The Scriptures are divided commonly into two volumes, respectively called the Old and the New Testament. We may accept this division, and it will help us when we see the main difference between the two with reference to ourselves. The Old Testament is the history of God's ways and purposes towards man as man, in all his feebleness and frailty; maintaining His claim on him, and putting him under law, when man assumed to meet the claim, yet always making bare His hand and openly blessing, in the most distinct and remarkable way, any one who turned to Him and sought His help. In the New Testament you have pre-eminently how God brings man to Himself through His own Son, and by Him sets him above all the power and difficulty by which He could be assailed. This very briefly sketches the difference between the Old Testament and the New; but it is very important that the distinction should be clearly established in our minds; because from not understanding the distinction, simple as it is to state it, much confusion has arisen, and consequent inability to interpret the word of God. We must read ourselves as addressed all the way down. We must put ourselves in the place of our fellows through all the revelations from. God; and as we do, we shall come to apprehend how appropriate and perfect is the manner and scope of the whole.
Let us now examine for a little what will characterize a soul truly set on the study of the Scriptures in a divine way. For the sake of clearness, I shall divide the characteristics into five heads.
The first must surely be a readiness to receive what God communicates. " The Meek he will teach his way." If I am satisfied with my own thoughts and ideas, I cannot truly pay attention to God's. It is because I have discovered my ignorance, and therefore my incompetency or inability to see things in their true light, that I seek the Scriptures. But if I come to them as God's revelation of His mind to man, I must come without any preconceived ideas. I must allow God, who is infinitely above me, to reveal His mind to me (and He alone knows it), as He is pleased to do so. I must, in a sense, be passive. I am ignorant; I need to be instructed in the most momentous instructions ever vouchsafed to man; and hence it becomes me to take my true place as meek before Him, and therefore quite ready and waiting for Him to make His own impression on me in the natural force of the words He uses to instruct me. In fact, according to my meekness, freedom from preconception or opinions of my own of any kind, the more truly am I prepared and in a condition to receive the word of God. This is the first and most important characteristic; for it is only in proportion to the extent of it that there is any acquisition of God's mind in the study of the Scriptures. There is no real disposition to learn otherwise. There may be a desire to acquire the knowledge of passages of Scripture to support one's own views; but it is so simple and easily understood, that in dealing with One supremely above me I must be in complete readiness to receive His mind, and that I must not, in any measure, put my own on a level with His. For if I do, how could I expect Him to divulge His deep and peculiar counsels to one pre-occupied with thoughts of his own? We may rest assured that herein lies the solution of the question so often asked, " Why do not I get more out of the Scriptures?" It is because you do not come to them meek and unprepossessed and ready to receive just as the words of God would impart to you.
The next characteristic, I may describe as the retention of the word in the soul. This is the "good ground," the " honest and good heart," which, having heard the word, keeps it and brings forth fruit with patience. I must have been in a true disposition to hear the word, or I should not have heard it truly; but, besides this, I require to be intelligent as to the claims which God's truth has on me. I then not only hear it, but I understand it; and because I have purpose of heart to accord to all that God will say to me, the word will find in me a suited soil for itself. If I am in any position and would in any way prescribe a limit to the word, as to how far I must be subject to it, I am not prepared to receive from it; and thus souls are often hindered in the study of God's word. They do not come to it with an honest and true heart, in simple purpose to accord to everything there communicated. Where the heart makes any reservation, there is a barrier to the force and application to the word of God. It is possible to be quite sensible of one's ignorance, and in that sense truly desirous of learning and in the true disposition to learn, and yet not prepared to act on everything which the word of God might demand of me. Now if we are not prepared for this, we must necessarily be unprepared for the study of the Scriptures, because we, in effect, prescribe limits to where the truth must reach us; and, surely, it is plain to everyone, that can be no proper state for the study of the word of God.
Thirdly. I must study the Scripture not as a matter of ordinary concern, or as a casual thing, but with a daily increasing and deepening sense of the importance and value of the communications made to me there; that in very deed God's mind is there revealed to me; and what could be more important? I must, then, prize it; and as prize it, I seek for it as for hid treasure. " If thou criest after knowledge, and liftest up thy voice for understanding; if thou seekest her as silver, and searchest for her as for hid treasure, then shalt thou understand the fear of the Lord, and find the knowledge of God." " My son if thou wilt receive my words and hide my commandments with thee," &c. A valuable thing is not committed by the wise but to one who will value it; and therefore God never commits anything of His to anyone but in proportion as they value it. Whatever is most valuable ought to be most valued; and if you really value anything, you will be devoted in your pursuit of it, and use every endeavor to acquire it. Look at all the servants of God from Enoch down, and you will observe this. See Elijah forty days in Horeb, or Daniel three weeks without pleasant food, or Paul in prison at Rome, or John at Patmos, and we shall see that the divine communications were only made to those who, because of their interest therein, were entitled to receive them. Who would like to communicate what was precious to him unless it were valued? And will God communicate the counsel of His heart to one who is not entirely devoted to Him, and simply engrossed with acquiring what He values? Do we ever see any one acquire but in proportion as he proves his value of the mind of God by the devotedness of his application in the acquisition of it? In all labor there is profit, and especially so here. Even in ordinary learning, a man progresses only as he applies himself to it. But when we learn from God, we must remember that we are in mind carnally at enmity with Him, and therefore we require, I may say, a double application; one to keep the natural mind in subjection, and the other to receive and apprehend the mind of God communicated to us in His word.
Fourthly. There must be meditation—"meditate on these things, give thyself wholly to them." The more you meditate on anything, the more you deepen it in your mind, and place yourself under the control of it. The word " meditate" is used in the Old Testament Scriptures to express any deeply-engaging sentiment: a lion roaring after his prey, and a dove mourning sore. The deep continual occupation with the mind of God has not only the effect of deepening it, which is very important, but also, the more you keep before your mind (i.e., meditate on) the ways of God particularly or generally, the more will you find that you are acquiring development of the purpose of them; and what was at first simply a sentiment, has become by meditation a large subject with manifold ramifications and deductions. And you will observe that the man who has meditated much on a divine sentiment can develop it as one conversant with the scope and range of it; while another who has but caught the idea, has as yet acquired no history or sense of its power or quality, and therefore cannot invest it with any development. When a subject deeply engages you, it is before your mind day and night, and you give it size, if I may so say, while you find on one side that which is contrary to it; and then, as what engages you is divine, you make a front against the enemy, and when you find anything congenial, you appropriate it as belonging to your subject; so that in every way through meditation the subject is deepening in yourself, and acquiring strength and body by the continued and sustained engagement which it obtains from you; and thus in measure one becomes a " tree planted by the rivers of water, whose leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper."
The last characteristic that I shall notice is that where there is a free and simple readiness and heart to communicate for the good of others what has been acquired from the study of the Scriptures, there always according to the unalterable rule of God, the " liberal soul shall be made fat." He that watereth shall be watered himself. That which he bath given shall be repaid unto him again. " God loves the cheerful giver." It is in keeping with his own mind and if we do not lovingly and heartily impart the truth that has been committed to us, we cannot expect more from God, or have a heart to look to Him for it. We have not freely given that which we have freely received; and hence in the study of the Scriptures, as, in anything else, if we are not free and cordial in imparting it as. we have received it, there is a sensible check to one receiving more from God. Even when the study may be continued and laborious-where there is not a ready and cheerful sharing of the acquisition with others, it will be observed that the acquisitions are more of a critical intellectual character than of the living and intimate communications of one receiving from the heart of Christ, and ministering from the same. Nay, it will be observed that the ministry or expression. is indicative of the kind of intimacy and nearness which he lens had himself with.. the Lord; and hence, I can understand how, when there has been the most blessed and sustained ministry, the servant of Christ has said, that he never read Scripture for others save as he had read it first for himself. I believe it is of great importance to remember that now the Spirit of God first feeds our own souls with Christ, before we can truly impart of Him; and that it is in proportion as I have believed on Him and have derived from Him that there flow from me rivers of living water. In a word, that no one can impart beyond what he has received in his soul. I allow that there is a certain amount of interpretation of Scripture which many may receive, but the living ministry of the word I believe does not go beyond what one has received for oneself, possibly in its fullness and freshness at the very time of communicating it. Yet be is not a mere instrument. The ministry is more from a member of the body to the other members; and therefore living to all, and from a soul to souls. Hence there is advance in the intelligence of truth, as there is devotedness and zeal in sharing it according to the mind and purpose of Christ.
May we in these days of difficulty wait on Him with true meekness of heart and readiness to impart that we may be through the Scriptures thoroughly furnished unto every good work I Amen.