We have seen that being children of God by faith in Christ Jesus, we have been given the Spirit of the Son; that we are in Him a new creation, partakers of the divine nature, and that He is the rule and model of our life, because " the life we now live in the flesh, we live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us and gave himself for us."
Seeing all these wondrous blessings which flow to us from the grace which has called us into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, let us now dwell a little on our place before God, and the nature and character of our worship. Worship is the expression of a creature in any degree sensible of what his Creator is, and of how much he owes to Him. It is the sense the soul has for and towards one to whom it is inconceivably indebted, and to whom it is acceptable; that is to say, one to whom it can offer its expressions of satisfaction and acknowledgment The heart filled with the sense of what has been revealed to it of that one, gives expression to its returning homage and gratitude; this is worship. And when we are in fellowship with the Father and the Son, through the eternal life given to us through the Son of God, we are worshipping, and our joy is full.
This order of worship is proper to our relationship to the Father and Son, and to the place of nearness into which we are brought. It was not always thus. The idea of worship, it is true, was maintained in the Mosaic economy by rites and forms, which now are often not surpassed even by believers; but such was not worshipping in spirit and in truth; and, as the Lord explains to the woman of Samaria, the time was then come when " the true worshippers should worship the Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such to worship him." Forms and distance were at an end. Souls were now to worship the Father in spirit and in truth; sensibly and in full liberty to express to Him their sense of what He is to them, and in His own intrinsic value and perfection. Now this is not simply prayer, nor is it any other Christian virtue or service. It is the action of one brought nigh to God, and who knows Him as Father, but one to which the feeblest has title and can appropriate; for it is written, " I write unto you babes because ye have known the Father." I may know much truth, and many of my privileges as a Christian, and yet be in an unworshipping state. Why? Because I cannot worship God unless my soul is in the light and unembarrassed by anything which could disturb it, It is not only that I believe in the blood of Christ, but it is the consciousness of being happily before God, knowing Him as my Father; therefore I do not see how one who doubts his acceptance or his sonship, or who has in unpurged conscience, can worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for it is only in proportion as the soul realizes and enjoys the place which Christ has secured for it before God, that it can worship. " If we say we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth." If I am in the light, I not only have fellowship, but I am at ease in my conscience touching everything which could disturb it, because the blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth me from all sin.
Now, light has a twofold action; one is sensibly to relieve me from what is opposed to it-from darkness; the other to occupy me with what it can show me. The first of these actions of light must, as is evident, be known to the soul before the second can be entered on. I must, of course, be relieved from what is opposed to light, before I can be occupied with what light can disclose to me; and, therefore, I am not in the intelligence of worship until I am in the position where that intelligence can reach me. I must be relieved of every sense of barrier between me and the Father before I can worship the Father in spirit and in truth; and here it is that even pious, earnest souls fail to reach the climax of blessing. They are occupied in seeking relief from the clouds which intercept their knowledge of the Father rather than in worshipping Him in the full consciousness, that being relieved of everything which could debar them from Him, they are in the Eternal Life, and in fellowship with the Father through His Son Jesus Christ. I believe souls often mistake the first action of light for the second; but it is plain I am not worshipping the Father until I am in the second. The clouds, the opposers of light, must be completely dispersed ere my soul can undistractedly be occupied with the blessed object which it is the highest province of light to show me, so as to worship Him in spirit and in truth.
Let us look at this subject a little in St. John's Gospel. In John 3-7 we have the subject of life treated of. Eternal life as God's gift, now brought to us by the Son, is in these chapters set forth; but in chapters viii. and ix. the subject is light; and this same Blessed One, by whom the life flows, is also the " light of the world." Now in these two chapters, which must be read together and properly learned together, the Lord shows the two actions of light; first, in relieving the soul of everything from man which was legally against it; and secondly, in engaging it with light itself-with Himself. For He was " the light." The woman taken in sin in chapter viii. and the blind man in chapter ix. are both illustrative of this in different ways. The former is an example of my practical condition among men, as an exposed and legally-condemned sinner; the latter typifies what I am by nature before God; i.e., without sight-utterly blind. Christ as the light of the world deals with both. He does not condemn the one, and He gives sight to the other. The guilty soul under condemnation of the broken law is relieved of the burden of felt condemnation in the presence of Him who is the light, and this is the first part of the action of the grace of Christ known to a soul in relation to God. The mere fact of having life does not ensure this; it is only in the presence of Christ that the sense of condemnation is removed. The thief on the cross knew it fully. Peter knew it when in the sinking ship the Lord said unto him, " Fear not." It is the soul brought into clear, distinct acquaintance with the work of Christ for it, which His own word to it ratifies. He has borne the judgment of the guilty one, however wretched and self-condemned, in the agony of judicial death; and in the sense of this the soul can now say, " I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord;" and hence, there is " no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus." Light exposes myself; but it is also to me the light of life, and shows me how condemnation has been removed from me through our Lord Jesus Christ; and if I have not the sense of freedom from condemnation, however anxious I may be to obtain it, and even though having life, I am not worshipping the Father in Spirit and in truth. Wrapt up I may be, as many earnest souls are, in longing desires after this blessing and seeking to understand my true position before God; but though all this is very devotional, it is not worship. We have the same distinction as to life in chapters iii., iv. In chapter iii. eternal life is acquired on believing, as the serpent-bitten Israelite when he looked at the brazen serpent, lived. But in chapter iv. there is the felt possession of life. It is in him a " well of water, springing up into everlasting life." The soul realizes the sphere and range of eternal life; and consequently the Lord here introduces the subject of worship; for the result of such conscious possession must be worshipping the Father in spirit and in truth. In chapters viii., ix. the Lord is leading the soul consciously unto the apprehension of His grace, as we have seen. Eternal life, God's gift, had been set forth in the previous chapters. Light, which expresses the state and region in which I come to realize that gift is here treated of; and hence the Lord is the light of the world. These two chapters comprise the history of man's acceptance and rejection of the gift; the woman and the blind man on the one hand, and the Pharisees on the other. The condemned soul experiences the first action of light in the Lord's own presence, learning thereby from Him that there is no condemnation; not as the Pharisees who, while upholding righteousness, must needs quit that presence for fear of being convicted of sin; but remaining before Him, conscious of having no other refuge. She learns in principle that He can be just and yet the justifier of Him who believeth in Jesus. And before she had known this, before she had experienced this first action of light, could she have worshipped? Surely not: yet do we not see many who would not admit that they are under no condemnation, assume to worship. I would ask such, (not to distress or embarrass them, but to induce them to see the true place of the believer before God,) what they worship? We ought to desire to worship; for the Father seeketh such as worship in spirit and in truth to worship Him; but if I am occupied with myself and my own state, how can I assume that which is occupation, nay engrossment with God? Hence light first relieves me of what presses on my conscience, having shown me too its real nature and evil; for there is no concealment in light; all is manifested; but I am sensibly relieved of the burden by Him who bore it, and who, while He shows it to me, at the same moment relieves me from it. But until thus wholly relieved I cannot worship. If I would engage my attention with some fine scenery, and a fog intervenes, can I gaze on it until the fog is dispelled? I may feel much in anticipation as I see the fog rise, but until it does rise, I cannot enjoy the scene. The sun not only dispels the fog, but enables me to behold the scene. But it must dispel the fog first. Now this is in figure what Christ does for us; but this is not all. Chapter 9 teaches us more of His gracious ways with us as the light of the world-the light of our souls.
The first action of light is twofold. We have seen one part of it as exemplified in the condemned woman: the other part we shall find in the sightless man. Both these conditions are combined in the one needing Christ as the light. Not only must I be relieved of my burden, but I must be given light; and this, too, He furnishes me with. It is His power acting in me, and rendering me sensible of being in a new state. But I am not necessarily all at once occupied with what should be the real object of my newly-given sight. This man whose eyes were opened was not, although he " came seeing." Light had not effected its second action on him yet, or introduced him into the region of worship. So with many souls. Sight often occupies them at first with what they must do; as in the other case we have seen the soul was oppressed with the evil which it had done: and these two occupations are often found in the same person. One time occupied about his sin, unrelieved from the sense of condemnation; and at another making use of his newly-acquired sight to contend with Scribes and Pharisees, as did this man. That is to say, occupied with questions, entangled with the formularies and ordinances of the law, hampered by systematic religion-for all systematic religion is borrowed from the Jewish legal economy, without which there could be no pretense even to a divine sanction. Now this man could not be said to be worshipping while he was thus hampered and struggling under convictions as to the light itself. Conscious of the possession of sight, and the light no doubt gaining ground in his soul, and confirming him in its sure origin; still, as long as these questionings occupy him, and these forms hamper him, he is not a worshipping soul. But he is now to become one. Light is to complete its office with him. Cast out of the synagogue of carnal worship, outside all these questionings, the Lord of light draws near, and reveals Himself to him; and the immediate and inevitable consequence is, that he worships. And how? His soul, filled with the presence of the Blessed One from whom all his blessing came, and who had declared the Father, then and there he had fellowship with the Father and the Son, and his joy was full. Christ the light had not only dispelled the darkness, had not only given him sight, but had disclosed to him what was to be the absorbing object and occupation of his vision; and now, " in the light as he is in the light," he knew both fellowship and worship.
Such is the true and happy result of the wonderful action on the soul illustrated in these two chapters. (John 8, 9.) The clouds are all gone-the cloud of condemnation and of legalism; the question either as to what wrong I have done, or what right I must do. The light having cleared them all away, I am consciously occupied with and rejoicing in Him, who has effected so great a blessing for me; and this is my true place as a Christian, and where alone I can worship intelligently. I should not say that gleams of full light do not at times cheer souls who are still undelivered from the sense of condemnation, or who are more occupied with the acquisition of sight than with Christ from whom it comes; but, then, they have no intelligence in those gleams, or no abiding peace and joy in, their souls; and the fact of their having those momentary flashes only proves what I maintain, viz., that they are entitled to a distinct intelligence respecting their right to so much more through grace, in the steady and unchangeable light of Him who by Himself and in Himself enables the babe to know the Father, and thus constitutes it a worshipper. True worshippers are few, because souls continually mistake the devotional feeling or occupation about one's own spiritual state in some form or other for worship, as if such occupation were one and the same thing as occupation with God! When the prodigal was first brought into the Father's house, be saw how unfit he was personally for such a place, and he thought more of himself than of it or of the great owner of it. But when he gets completely at ease there, he forgets himself, and makes merry with his father. We form a very poor conception of our place with God, (for we are brought nigh unto him,) if we do not see that our worship must be in spirit and in truth; that is to say, we must be sensibly before Him in fellowship, without anything to hinder or intercept our engagement with Him. Many of us, I fear, are like the worshippers under the law: the best of them did everything for the sacrifice, but never could follow the priest into the holy place, much less into the holiest of all. We are occupied only with the sacrifice offered by Christ, but have not acknowledged its effects for us to God's glory. We have not felt and understood that we really and truly have passed through the rent veil (His broken body) into the holiest of all. Have our souls the sense of this? No lower sense belongs to the worshipping soul. There is no question of sin, or no question of what grace is in contrast to law; but all questions being answered, the soul is enraptured with the wondrous acceptance into which it is introduced, and true praise then flows out to God, and God is honored by such as we are. The Queen of Sheba exemplified this. Hard questions at first engaged her, but king Solomon solved all these, and relieved her of all personal anxieties, and she could then look around and fill her soul with the variety and magnificence of all his glory; and so filled was it, that there was no more spirit left in her, but to praise and extol him, and to give him the return of her heart for all she had found him to be. (1 Kings 10:1-101And when the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord, she came to prove him with hard questions. 2And she came to Jerusalem with a very great train, with camels that bare spices, and very much gold, and precious stones: and when she was come to Solomon, she communed with him of all that was in her heart. 3And Solomon told her all her questions: there was not any thing hid from the king, which he told her not. 4And when the queen of Sheba had seen all Solomon's wisdom, and the house that he had built, 5And the meat of his table, and the sitting of his servants, and the attendance of his ministers, and their apparel, and his cupbearers, and his ascent by which he went up unto the house of the Lord; there was no more spirit in her. 6And she said to the king, It was a true report that I heard in mine own land of thy acts and of thy wisdom. 7Howbeit I believed not the words, until I came, and mine eyes had seen it: and, behold, the half was not told me: thy wisdom and prosperity exceedeth the fame which I heard. 8Happy are thy men, happy are these thy servants, which stand continually before thee, and that hear thy wisdom. 9Blessed be the Lord thy God, which delighted in thee, to set thee on the throne of Israel: because the Lord loved Israel for ever, therefore made he thee king, to do judgment and justice. 10And she gave the king an hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices very great store, and precious stones: there came no more such abundance of spices as these which the queen of Sheba gave to king Solomon. (1 Kings 10:1‑10).)
Mary walking with our Lord to the tomb of Lazarus was not properly worshipping, for sorrow filled her heart; but when she broke the alahaster box and poured it on His head while He sat at meat, and filled the house with the odor of the ointment, she was worshipping, for He Himself alone occupied her soul; and all her expressions were with reference to Him, and in consonance with His mind, which is the sure fruit of worship.
I may add, that I believe the cause of all our ignorance of the Lord's mind is, not that we do not wish to know His mind, but that we are not in our true place-worshipping, and therefore cannot receive it or understand it. This state, normal for a Christian, and one professed to be attained to by every Christian, is the one most imperfectly known, and to the ignorance of which can be ascribed all our failure in doctrine and practice, as well as in peace and happiness. How could a man continue willful in doctrine or practice if he were worshipping the Father in spirit and in truth? The willful is not worshipping, however devotional. The unhappy or doubting one is not worshipping, however devoted. It was as a worshipper that Joshua must enter Canaan. (See Josh. 5:14,1514And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my lord unto his servant? 15And the captain of the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so. (Joshua 5:14‑15).) He had already been introduced into a circle of blessing at Gilgal, but the presence of the Lord commanding worship was the filling up of that circle. It is as a worshipper only that I can learn His mind. Nay, we may say from scripture history, that no soul ever learned the Lord's mind at the moment, but in worship; and therefore we see in the Revelation the natural happy expression of the soul fully conscious of its place and portion, and of the mind of the Mighty and Blessed One who accords it.
The Lord grant unto us better to know our place before Him in His grace to us; for when we do know it, and are sensibly in it, we must worship Him who has shed such mercy and favor on us.
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