I Rest My Weary Soul in Thee

But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ (Phil. 3:7).

When they buried the blind preacher, George Matheson, they lined his grave with red roses in memory of his love-life of sacrifice. And it was this man, so beautifully and significantly honored, who wrote,

O Love that wilt not let me go,
I rest my weary soul in Thee,
I give Thee back the life I owe,
That in thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

O Light that followest all my way,
I yield my flickering torch to Thee,
My heart restores its borrowed ray,
That in Thy sunshine's blaze its day
May brighter, fairer be.

O Joy that seekest me through pain,
I cannot close my heart to Thee,
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain,
That morn shalt tearless be.

O Cross that liftest up my head,
I dare not ask to fly from Thee,
I lay in dust life's glory dead,
And from the ground there blossoms red,
Life that shall endless be.

There is a legend of an artist who had found the secret of a wonderful red which no other artist could imitate. The secret of his color died with him. But after his death an old wound was discovered over his heart. This revealed the source of the matchless hue in his pictures.

The legend teaches that no great achievement can be made, no lofty attainment reached, nothing of much value to the world done, save at the cost of heart's blood.

~L. B. Cowman~

We Beheld His Glory # 25

Union with Christ in Life a Dominant Theme (continued)

Now chapter six carries on the same theme from another standpoint, and with a fresh and added factor. Thus you go on through the gospel right to the end, and you find step by step, and stage by state, it is a touching upon, or dealing with, this very subject, life triumphant over death. You will come to Lazarus before long; you will come to the Good Shepherd Who giveth His life for the sheep; another form of the Testimony. That the sheep might live, the Shepherd dies; and the fact that the sheep do live, is a testimony to victory over death in the Shepherd Who gives them life. And so you will see that this whole gospel, from one standpoint, is one continuous unveiling, disclosing, and developing of this great truth of life triumphant over death. We could easily pass on into Acts, where we should not have much difficulty in establishing our affirmation. The first few chapters of the book of Acts are little else than a Testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and the testifiers are the witnesses; that is, the testimony is in the witnesses. Then the letter to the Romans. We are familiar enough with the Roman letter to know, that when you pass from the first chapters, you are passing from the realm of death from which you emerge into the realm of life triumphant over death; through chapter six into chapter eight. So we go on. It is good for us to know what a solid mass of Scripture there is back of anything which we have presented as the Lord's will. I mean this: it is a tremendous thing for you, or for me, to say that the Lord desires to have a present and continuous testimony to life triumphant over death. That will be a challenge continually. What ground in Scripture have we got for that, to support us? What is there as a solid mass of rock under our feet to bear us up when we take such a position? Are we hanging a great declaration like that, with all that it involves, upon some unrelated, detached bit of the Word of God; or have we a sufficient foundation for such a position? That is why I have stayed to open out beyond the one chapter in relation to this. There is a tremendous amount of the Word of God to support that position, that the Lord desires in His Own there should be a present and continuous testimony to life triumphant over death.

The Law of Feeding Upon Christ

Now then, we come to break it up into some of its fragments. And that, of course, will mostly have to do with the law which governs this truth. There is the great truth, but it has a governing law; and in order to enjoy the testimony, to have the experience of life triumphant over death now and continuously, we must recognize the law, and be adjusted, and obedient thereto. What is the law? Simply, it is feeding upon Christ. What feeding upon Christ means, we will not deal with for a moment, but recognize the fact as it relates to the truth. You notice two things that come up in this chapter, one early, and one later. Verse 4: "Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand. Jesus therefore lifting up his eyes ..." Do you get the link of that "therefore"? You might say in reading the first word: "after these things Jesus went away to the other side ... a great multitude followed him, because they beheld the signs which he did ... and he went up into a mountain and sat with his disciples ... now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand." What has that to do with it? Why is that "Jesus therefore" put in there? There was something in the back of His mind, just as there was in Cana of Galilee when He said: "Mine hour is not yet come."  "Jesus therefore lifting up his eyes, and seeing that a great multitude cometh unto him, saith unto Philip. Whence are we to buy bread, that these may eat?" Do you notice the Passover comes up in relation to this; the Passover in the mind of the Lord is related to this, or rather, this is related to the Passover. There is a background to this feeding of the multitude; it is related to some spiritual truth. Hold that for a moment, the fact that the Passover comes up at the beginning of this. Move on to verse 31: "Our fathers ate the manna in the wilderness.... Jesus therefore said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, It was not Moses that gave you the bread out of heaven; but my Father giveth you the true bread out of heaven." You have the Passover introduced, and now you have Moses, the wilderness, and the manna brought in, all in the same connection. Then what is the link between those two things, and the main truth of life triumphant over death? Well, the Passover had a great deal to do with that. You are taken back into Egypt, back into the realm of death, back into the place where the destroyer is abroad, where death is rampant, and the eating of the Passover is life triumphant over death. It is found right at the commencement of their history; it fixed the date of their national constitution. They were constituted a nation by the Passover. "This is the beginning of months." So that their history, as the people of God, was based upon that which represented life triumphant over death, the feeding upon Christ, the appropriation of Christ as their life. Now later the wilderness comes into view, and what you have in the wilderness is death. There are no signs of life in a wilderness; no element of life in a wilderness; there is no resource for life there. The wilderness was - apart from God - the place of death. When they ceased to be obedient to the Lord, they died in the wilderness. Their cry was: Were there no graves in Egypt that thou hast brought us out to die in the wilderness? Oh, yes, it was a place of death! The manna was given, and it raised in them the testimony of life triumphant over death as a continuous thing. That feeding upon the manna constituted the continuous testimony in them to life triumphant over death.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 26 - "The Significance of a Changed Tense")

How Much Better is it to get Wisdom than Gold!

(Alexander Smellie, "The Hour of Silence")

"How much better is it to get wisdom than gold!" Proverbs 16:16

How much better--for wisdom buys what gold cannot procure. Wisdom--the mind which hearkens to God and theheart which yields to Him--brings me . . .
  His divine favor,
  His forgiving grace,
  His power to shield me,
  His guidance to lead me,
  His knowledge to inspire me,
  His glory to crown me!

Wisdom secures for me a wealth beside which the greatest treasures of the world are but dross!

Wisdom penetrates where gold cannot go. It carries pardon and peace into the deepest recesses of my spirit--while gold can do nothing but deck my body and my home. It gives me the strongest and the tenderest influence over others--while gold cannot dispel their griefs and answer their doubts. It lifts me into communion with the Most High God--and gold is powerless to lead me there, to that glorious country far beyond the stars!

Wisdom endures when gold is gone. This world's riches take to themselves wings and flee away--almost every day furnishes me with a new instance of how fleeting and perishable they are. But wisdom makes mine the possessions which never perish, which are never withdrawn, which through life and death and eternity, are certain to gladden my soul!

"Wisdom is supreme--so get wisdom!" Proverbs 4:7

We Beheld His Glory # 24

Life Triumphant Over Death

John 6

You will notice that the two main parts of the chapter are the feeding of the multitude, and the discourse of the Lord Himself as the Bread of Life.

In seeking to recognize the great truths and their laws as brought before us in the gospel by John, the truth which is at the heart of the sixth chapter, is the truth of life triumphant over death, as a present and continuous testimony. It is probable that you have not so read the chapter, and that may be a new thought for some; but I think, if I give you an indication from the content of the chapter, you will more readily recognize that that is what the chapter deals with.

Firstly let me point out that the word "life" occurs no fewer than eleven times in this chapter; in verses 27, 33, 35, 40, 47, 48, 51, 53, 54, 68. Then the word "live" occurs four times; the word "living" three times; "not die" occurs once, in verse 50; and "resurrection" is mentioned four times, in verses 39, 40, 44, 54. On the other hand the word "dead" occurs twice, 49, 58. When you recognize all that, you have a substantial reason to believe that life and death take an important place in the chapter, and you are on your way to realize what is here as the underlying truth, the truth of life triumphant over death. Indeed, that is a great New Testament truth, and as a present and continuous Testimony, it is revealed throughout the New Testament to be what the Lord desires.

Union with Christ in Life a Dominant Theme

When we commenced these meditations we saw that the two main themes of the whole gospel by John are the Person of  Christ, and union with Christ. This chapter is a very strong, very rich, very full unveiling of that twofold truth. The "I AM" of this chapter is very strong. Again and again we have "I AM" related to life. Then "Except ye" is connected with "I AM"; a relationship is found between the two. That carries with it this; that if this chapter represents Christ as relating to life, and the "Except ye" brings us into relationship with Him - union with Him in that particular sense - then the Testimony to life triumphant over death is the issue, the outcome of this chapter. That can be carried forward right through the New Testament, and you will call to mind much, if you make a fresh inquiry with this thought in mind. You will be tremendously impressed with how much there is bearing upon the Lord's desire, that there should be in His Own a present and continuous Testimony to life triumphant over death. I think it unnecessary, even if it wee possible in the space available, to carry you right through the whole of the New Testament teaching on the matter. Let us be reminded at this time that that is the Lord's will, that there should be in us, and in all of His Own, a present and continuous Testimony to life triumphant over death. It seems to me, that in a very large sense the gospel by John is occupied with that theme; it is viewed in this gospel from various standpoints, and seen to have various effects; but there is a main note, a thread, running through the whole gospel bearing upon the matter of life, and that is set over against certain conditions which speak of death, which represent features of death, forms of death.

We have said more than once that the first "sign" of the second chapter, the turning of the water into wine at the marriage of Cana in Galilee, was a comprehensive sign embodying the rest of the gospel, and the central note of that sign, that work, was and is, that of life triumphant over death. Contemplate that incident again and surely that is clear.

The next movement in chapter three brings in Nicodemus, and the serpent lifted up in the wilderness. The one, showing a state of death, under the curse resting upon the whole race; the other, the way out of death or over death, by new birth from above. New birth from above is surely, throughout the New Testament, the Testimony to life triumphant over death.

The next chapter, four, is again a presentation of death features and then the implanting of eternal life within.

Chapter five has the background of death under the Law; a living death, in bondage, weakness, impotence, and despair. The triumph comes, and newness of life, in Christ.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 25)

When I Am Weak, then Am I Strong

2 Corinthians 12:9

For my strength is made perfect in weakness.

 

 

A primary qualification for serving God with any amount of success, and for doing God's work well and triumphantly, is a sense of our own weakness. When God's warrior marches forth to battle, strong in his own might, when he boasts, "I know that I shall conquer, my own right arm and my conquering sword shall get unto me the victory," defeat is not far distant. God will not go forth with that man who marches in his own strength. He who reckoneth on victory thus has reckoned wrongly, for "it is not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts." They who go forth to fight, boasting of their prowess, shall return with their gay banners trailed in the dust, and their armour stained with disgrace. Those who serve God must serve Him in His own way, and in His strength, or He will never accept their service. That which man doth, unaided by divine strength, God can never own. The mere fruits of the earth He casteth away; He will only reap that corn, the seed of which was sown from heaven, watered by grace, and ripened by the sun of divine love. God will empty out all that thou hast before He will put His own into thee; He will first clean out thy granaries before He will fill them with the finest of the wheat. The river of God is full of water; but not one drop of it flows from earthly springs. God will have no strength used in His battles but the strength which He Himself imparts. Are you mourning over your own weakness? Take courage, for there must be a consciousness of weakness before the Lord will give thee victory. Your emptiness is but the preparation for your being filled, and your casting down is but the making ready for your lifting up.

"When I am weak then am I strong,

Grace is my shield and Christ my song."

~Charles Spurgeon~

We Beheld His Glory # 23

Walking in the Power of God (continued)

What a picture this is, not only of Israel but of all men without Christ. It is not a matter of sins, many or few. It is not a question of comparative moral strength, greater or lesser; but it is the issue of standing face t face with the perfection of God in the Christ. How can man at his best measure up to that, and give an answer wholly satisfactory to God? There is no man who can do it. Remembering that a breach in one point declares imperfection, and involves the individual, and the race, in the fact of sinfulness, we have to come to Paul's conclusion: "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." "There is none righteous, no, not one." But we cannot escape. We must all give an account before the judgment seat. What is our hope? Our hope is in Christ alone, and the grace of God in Jesus Christ. In his wonderful letter to the Galatians the apostle Paul opens up for us God's matchless grace in delivering us, through the death of Christ, and our death with Him, from the bondage of the law.

Now this man did not finish his history there. There was a glorious issue when the Lord Jesus came into his life. Whereas at the outset his bed was his master, at the end he was the master of his bed. Whereas in the beginning he was completely dependent upon others, and all his strength was outside of himself, in the end there was that within him which made it possible or him to stand upon his own feet, and, not only walk, but, as the Greek tense of the words shows, "keep on walking," or "be walking all the time."

So we see, then, that what is in view in the first place is deliverance from the bondage of the law, and from the hopeless impotence and weakness of all men by nature, when they stand confronted by the standard which God demands, and from which He will not excuse one single individual. That deliverance is found to be mainly along the line of grace, brought into experience by reason of a vital relationship with the Lord Jesus. But, while walking in the power of God is the object in view, what we have to see before we close is the law of this divine truth and blessing. What is the law of this walk in life and power? Well, our key verses bring us to that. The man in the story had tried many, many times to find in himself the energy by which he could get upon his feet and walk. That energy he had never found. Now, when the Lord Jesus comes on the scene, that man discovers that in Him (Christ) there is energy, and that energy flows out as the words are spoken - a literal fulfillment of another thing said by the Lord Jesus in this gospel: "...the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life." So that this man, unable to walk as out from himself, found himself able to rise up and walk by the energy which proceeded from Christ; and the simple law of his walk in the power of God is that of meeting everything as out from the Lord, and not from ourselves. This is the law of Christ's own life of moral and spiritual ascendency. Taking the place of man representatively, He said: "The Son can do nothing "out" from himself, but what he seeth the Father do..." He spoke of the words, and the works, as out from the Father, meeting every demand, carrying every liability. Thus His life was one of victory over all weakness and ineffectiveness.

But notice further, this all took place on the Sabbath day, and the Sabbath in this chapter signifies God's rest. God has come to the end of His works, and rests. As in every part of this gospel, Christ is the chief character in view, and this Sabbath points to Him and says: God has reached the end of His works in His Son, is satisfied and at rest. Christ is the sum total of all the works of the Father. Out of that fullness of God in Christ we, who have labored under the bondage of the law, may now walk in the rest of being set free by faith in Jesus Christ.

Now the life of the believer is one of learning continuously and progressively how to live as out from the Lord. We shall always be conscious of our own weakness. In ourselves we shall never be anything but weak and impotent, but we do not stay there. We see that in Christ all strength, all ability, all wisdom, all grace resides, but that it is in Him for us, and as we, refusing to accept our own state as the criterion and the final argument, by faith take hold of the Lord Jesus, and move out to meet our obligations as out from Him, we shall find that we are able to do what we have never been able to do before, though we may have tried many times. We shall learn now what the apostle meant when he said that the Lord had told him that His strength was made perfect in weakness. Do we feel crippled? Do we despair of ever being able to walk and serve to any good purpose? Have we tried and failed again and again? Let us learn the lesson of John 5. Nothing out from ourselves but everything, hitherto impossible, out from Christ.

Let us ask the Lord to show us how to live by faith in the Son o God. That life is a life of overcoming what has before been our bondage, our very tyranny. It is not something, it is the Lord Himself, and, reverting to the Esther link which may be somewhere in the background of this chapter, we shall know the wonderful joy of what is recorded in that little book as the issue of the divine intervention, "a good day!"

~. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 24 - "Life Triumphant Over Death")

Exercising Our Faith

You who bring good tidings to Zion, go up on a high mountain (Isa. 40:9).

Toys and trinkets are easily won, but the greatest things are greatly bought. The top-most place of power is always bought with blood. You may have the pinnacles if you have enough blood to pay. That is the conquest condition of the holy heights everywhere. The story of real heroisms is the story of sacrificial blood. The chiefest values in life and character are not blown across our way by vagrant winds. Great souls have great sorrows.

Great truths are dearly bought, the common truths,
Such as men give and take front day to day,
Come in the common walk of easy life,
Blown by the careless wind across our way.
Great truths are greatly won, not found by chance,
Nor wafted on the breath of summer dream;
But grasped in the great struggle of the soul,
Hard buffeting with adverse wind and stream.
But in the day of conflict, fear and grief,
When the strong hand of God, put forth in might,
Plows up the subsoil of the stagnant heart,
And brings the imprisoned truth seed to the light.
Wrung from the troubled spirit, in hard hours
Of weakness, solitude, perchance of pain,
Truth springs like harvest from the well-plowed field,
And the soul feels it has not wept in vain.

The capacity for knowing God enlarges as we are brought by Him into circumstances which oblige us to exercise faith; so, when difficulties beset our path let us thank God that He is taking trouble with us, and lean hard upon Him.

~L. B. Cowman~