AL 1:15-16{The twenty-second Psalm is an account of what the Lord went through for us.
There are two subjects in this Psalm: -one; that this blessed One bore all that was against us; the other, that He declared the Father. These two things, when you come to understand them, bring out distinctly the fact that He was the. Son of God. So much so, that Paul, after seeing Him, went into the synagogue and preached that Jesus-the Man-was the Son, of God. We have it " Christ" in our translation; but the right word is "'Jesus."
Now mark, for you may not at first see, why the Person who endured all that was against me, and the Person who declared the Father, must be_ the Son of God-that it proves it. First, there never was a man who knew the nature of my offense against God; and next there never was a man who knew the love in the heart of God to a sinner.
There never was any man but One who knew these two things; and He who knew them must necessarily be equal with God, in order to know how He felt as to 'each. A child does not know how I feel. People misunderstand the feelings of one another simply because they have not the
same order of intellect. You must have a mind equal to that of the person aggrieved, if you would understand how he feels about the grievance.
Tell me, have you ever Measured or understood the extent of your offense as it is seen by God? I will put it in the plainest language. How could you go about paying a debt that you did not know the amount of? None ever knew the. extent of your offense but one Man; and that' Man must have been the Son of God, or He could not have known it. Well, that Man comes to bear it. There were two things known to Him that were never known to any other man, and these two things prove that He was the Son. of God: no other man knew the amount of my debt but Himself; and no other man ever knew the heart of God, and understood the love that He bore to me, but He. He alone could declare that love, just as He alone knew the nature of my offense.
As we grow holy we know something about it, but the unholy know nothing about it at all; we have no sense of what a terrible thing sin is in the mind of God, but as we get near Him; none ever knew what sin was in the mind of God as the Son of God did, and He was the One to bear it. But, besides this, as I have said, no one knew the love that was in the Father's heart for the prodigal but Himself, and therefore He comes out Himself to tell us what it is.
This is what this Psalm recounts to us: sins borne, and then the love of the Father declared. The one is when all the enemies are strewn upon the battle field; He has encountered every foe, and laid them all prostrate; and then on that very battle-field; where they are all laid low, comes out this blessed, this unknown, eternal light; when there is not a foe left that He has not encountered, He brings into the scene the wonderful declaration of the Father's love to the poor wretched ones now rescued by His grace.
Paul speaks of it, as one in whom it was perfectly accomplished, when he says: " It pleased God to reveal His Son in me." But practically souls do not reach this-do not understand this new light, this new day, which in fact was called, and I doubt not significantly, " the first day of the week,", because on it the new Man comes in', and, when the new Man comes in, there must be a new day, which is what I want to show you.
The Lord descends from the Mount of transfiguration to die at Jerusalem. The soul never gets perfect deliverance, until it sees the Lord put Himself in this place where He says: " Father,, save me from this hour; but for this cause came I unto this hour."
Now I will show you the foes that He encountered for us. I do not think we bear along in our hearts sufficiently what Christ's path was for us down here. I do not mean merely to be looking at the story of it, or reading theoretically about His sufferings; I mean the entering into in our hearts what He actually went through for us, so that sin might come before us as " exceeding sinful."
I will go through the Psalm in detail. We may notice, that generally in a Psalm it is the greatest thing that begins or heads it. And I state according to my judgment, that a Psalm is always the record of what the soul. has gone through. When you write the Psalm you recount what you have gone through. So I find I cannot read a Psalm well till I am out of the thing it recounts, because it was written by one who had got out of it. When I am in the depths it is no use to read it; but, when I am out again,' then I can bear the recital of what I have been through, and then is my time to read it; I am exercised in the place I am in to see how I reached it.
Paul sees Christ in glory, but for three days afterward he neither eats nor drinks. He does not want to know that he has been there, but he looks back to see how he got there. He has to learn how Christ went down into judgment; how He bore death for him. It is the answer to what we get in the twelfth of Exodus. It is the lack of this that makes the conversions of the present day so weak in their character.
There are two things: there is the blood on the lintel; that is security I admit; but what is the eating the roast lamb with the bitter herbs? A person-says: I believe in the blood. And say: I do not question it a bit, but you have not got the sense in your soul of how Christ bore the judgment of your sins; you have not a sense of the consequences of sin; and consequently there is no coming out of Egypt. But I am not only delivered from the judgment; I am going out of the place where the judgment was.
Therefore Scripture says: " Eat' not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water." People speaking in a familiar way of the Lord Jesus Christ as " dear Jesus," and " the adorable Jesus", and such like, is eating it " raw." I do not touch the question of security, because the slightest faith in Christ brings security; but I say there is no depth in it, because they have not gone inside and eaten the " lamb roast with fire, and with bitter herbs;"—they have no sense of what Christ went through when He was made sin for us.
.There is so little known of confession. "With the mouth confession is made unto salvation." That is not merely going out and telling people; the meaning of confession is the heart having a sense of what it has found in another so as to be forced to acknowledge it; When Jonathan made a covenant with David that was confession. The woman coming into the Pharisee's house was for confession. She had heard of Him and believed in Him before, but she says: I must go and speak to Him; I must give up all for Him. And she comes in, and stands behind Him weeping, and anoints Him. That was confession; with the mouth owning Him. So did Jonathan. He first made a covenant with David, and then he " stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his. bow, and to his girdle." That was public. There must be the private and the public action, to show that I am indebted to Him for everything. It is a great lack to souls, their not practically accepting this. When your 'soul gets the sense that Christ bore the judgment in the place where you are, what must be the effect of it? Why, that you long to get out of the place.
In this Psa. 1 count seven distinct things that the Lord encountered for us, and I pray Him to show it out to us, that we may understand it, for it is holy ground that we are on whilst we look at that holy One going down into death. As He went through this world, He walked scatheless in the midst of all that was against Him enemies might rise mountains high before this, but not a single one could touch Him. But now His hour was come; every barrier was broken down, and the accumulated force of men and devils bore down upon that spotless One! And not that alone: He had to encounter the judgment of God. It is: "Father, save me from this hour!"
Has your soul ever gone in company with Him in this hour? If it has, if but for one moment, you will know something of the exceeding sinfulness of sin.
" My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" This is the first thing in the Psalm; not that it comes first chronologically; but that it is morally the greatest; it is first in its gravity. No one can understand what sin is but a holy person; who then could estimate it like the holy One of God? And, when He took the sinner's place, He bore the sinner's penalties. There was not a single penalty attached to disobedience which He had not fixed Himself; none knew so well what those penalties were as He, the lawgiver, who had fixed them. And He it was who bore what He Himself had fixed. He takes the sinner's place in judgment, and He says: " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" He gets the sense in His soul of the distance between the sinner and God, and darkness comes in. He felt it as none other could. Despair has something of this character, because it is the feeling of one who has had the light and has now lost it; and who says, I know what the light is, for I have rejoiced in it; but it is gone, and now. I am in despair until I get it again.
This is what He has borne. Have you got a sense of it? He has borne it, and the darkness is gone; the sinner's distance from God is gone in the One who has met it. Therefore the Lord can come forth and say: " Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him." When was this? Was it on the mount?-No. At the grave of Lazarus?-No. He was the Son of God there, not the Son of man. Where then was it? It was on the cross! He was not thinking of what it would cost Him, but of what was due to God, cost Him what it might. He says: I know the holiness of God; and I know the penalties of sin, but I will bear it all. '
Practically we have to learn this yin our own history; but I hope I shall be able to show you, that we have nothing to fear when we look up; but, if we look down, God says: I am going to take all that is here. That is the twelfth of Hebrews. " Our God is a consuming fire." If you do not shake yourself, as sure as God is in heaven, you will get a shaking some of these days, and lose your reward too: He says: You are come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, to the heavenly Jerusalem, &c. I have thrown it open to you up here; but, if you go down to the earth, you will get to a consuming fire; for I am going to shake terribly the earth.
That is the first thing; and I want your souls practically to understand it. There has, been a good deal said about being personally occupied with Christ, but you never will be occupied with the deliverer until you have got deliverance. How could Jonathan be occupied with David the deliverer before he saw the head 'of Goliath in t his hand, and knew that deliverance was wrought? Then David becomes his object.
Christ has, removed every single thing out of the way; there is now nothing to bar your access to God. He has removed sin, and the darkness of divine wrath, but there must be more than this. You cannot get into the twenty-third Psalm until you have learned the Lord in the twenty-second. How can you lie down in green pastures, unless you see first that He has removed everything out of the way which could come in to disturb you there? Praise comes out as I look at the One Ash° is triumphant; the song comes after the victory, when the Whole thing is accomplished, as in the fifteenth of Exodus " The Lord hath triumphed gloriously; the horse and his rider hath he thrown into the sea."
I would encourage your conscience and heart in this matter. Can you say: I see that the distance between myself and God is gone? That the darkness is over?—Yes,—And do you see the Person who did it?—Yes.—And you can be occupied with the One who did it all?
Now mark, you must keep another thing before your mind, and that is, that God Himself sent Him to remove the distance which man had brought in between God and himself. Man was responsible to remove the distance, but he could not, so God says: I will prove that there is love in my heart. " God commendeth his love towards us, in that, while we were yet 'sinners, Christ died for us." God commends His love. by the way He acts love, not by insisting that love is there. He proves that He loves. us; the very thing that was denied in the garden of Eden. You were bound to repair the -distance, and you could not do it; so now, says God, I will do it myself; I lay help upon One that is mighty.
This is what He teaches us in the parable of the prodigal son. You get three parables in the fifteenth of Lillie, all of them unfolded in the thief on the cross. The point to be established is, that God Himself acts: He sends the One who will perfectly meet His own mind, so that the work is perfectly done. I hear people say Christ has paid all their debts.-Yes, all that you know, I say; but what about what you do not know? Your conscience is clear, but I know where you will be presently: you will be in misery; you will find that it is not only what you know, but that sin is working in you; you will be in the seventh of Romans. You have not got hold in your soul of the fact that God Himself has provided the sacrifice that satisfies Himself. It is not only that I know that every one of my debts are paid. The thing that will stand, and that gives the soul real stability, is the fact that God is perfectly satisfied, because He has provided the One who satisfies Himself. And what am I to do 2-Why, to look at that One who satisfies Him.
I might tell you an incident of a man I met with in a train a short time ago. He was evidently dying, and I spoke to him of Christ. He answered me: " I knew Him before I fell sick, I am thankful to say; but still I am not perfectly happy, for sometimes a cloud comes between." I said: " But God satisfied Himself with the sacrifice He provided." " I thank you for that," he said; " I never thought of it before." His fade lighted up With joy; he saw it in a moment, and I trust he went away really happy. It gives immense strength to the soul seeing it. As a woman, to whom I had spoken the previous, day, said just before her death: " He is satisfied, and so am I.”
It is net 'the mere fact Of His paying my debts; but He has so met the mind of God, that He has entitled me to a most inconceivable inheritance. I have searched up and down in nature for an illustration of this, but I cannot find such a thing. The: One who discharged the debt did it according to the mind of God. I did not know what I owed Rim: One only knew, and He discharged it. Well then, 'rest in this!
That is the first point; and I have dwelt long upon it, because I do not think people are clear about it. God' never imputes sin to me any more. He has raised Christ from the dead to prove it. He never sees me " in the flesh " any more, though He sees me acting in it. But all the question of sin is settled, and it will never come between me and God any more. If I call in question my acceptance I am simply dishonoring Him; but the more I am concerned about my acceptability the more I honor Him. The heart does not get perfectly clear until it sees this.
Now I turn to the second point. The figure I use is this. The Lord is on the battle-field, and that to encounter not one Goliath but seven. I see Him meet them here in single combat. They are all coming down upon Him, all the enemies that could gather themselves against Him. I see Him encountering each of them, and, after overcoming each, eventually enter into death Himself " to destroy him that had the power of death, and to deliver them who `through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage." I find that, unless a person gets clear about the death of Christ, he is sure to be balked by one of these seven things. But I trust that every one in this room is clear as to the question of sin being entirely gone.
Next we find that He is the " reproach of men, and despised of the people." Now tell me, does this ever hinder you? Is that giant laid low?-Christ says: I bear all that, and take it out of the way.-These are the things that bear upon man here. He says: "I am a worm, and no man." He bears that too. He has met God; now he comes down to man. Are you clear of this? Are you superior to what man is? Are you not afraid of what man can do? Look at Stephen; you Will- see all that we find here worked out there. He says: I do not fear what man can do to me. He looks up and sees no fear as to God; he looks down and sees no fear as...to Satan, no fear as to man;- as to himself, no fear- of pain; he is superior to it, and shows it by being able to act for others-able to pray for his murderers. People say: I am sure I am going to heaven; but I say: Are you above the power of man here-above all that he can do?
He says: "I am a reproach of men, and despised of the people. All that see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head." That is what Christ was; and, if your heart does not get clear of it, you will be balked by it. In Stephen you find a -man who has got perfectly clear of all these things.. Everything is gone. There is not a particle of distance between him and God; he looks up and sees Min. Is he afraid of Satan.? Not a bit! Afraid' of the people? Not a bit! Afraid of pain? Not a bit!, Not a bit concerned about anything! He is the prince of heroes! If all the heroes in the world were put together they would never make such a hero as Stephen, because he is not only above all these things, but he can, act for others in them, and that too for those from whom he was suffering.
Now we come to the next." Many bulls have compassed me." Who are these? The Jews; I find the Lord surrounded with them. " Strong bulls of Bashan have beset me' round. They gaped upon me with their mouths, as a ravening and a roaring lion." That is what they were. He says: I have met them all and have laid them prostrate; the battle field is strewn with them. And, if you do not see the battle field strewn with them, as Jonathan saw the head of Goliath in David's hand, you will surely be balked by them some day. Now comes the next enemy, one that balks very many; that is bodily weakness, which is the fourth. Where was there ever weakness like His? "I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint." You have read of the Inquisition; you have read of the screw and such like instruments of torture; but where was there ever anything like this? " All my bones are out of joint." I speak not of sickness, but I have here One who was weaker than any other in this world ever was. Do you say: Have I sympathy from the Lord in my sickness and weakness?-I say: Yes, I have. I have the sympathy of One who was weaker than any other ever was. I have the sympathy of One who, whilst thus in weakness, encountered the judgment of God and bore it, and thus entitled me to an inconceivable inheritance besides the debt He discharged.
Do you think people are not balked by bodily weakness? I know nothing that balks like it. And why? It is because the body, instead of being the medium of what is going on within, becomes a positive burden. As the apostle says: " We that are in, this tabernacle do groan, being burdened." I ask you is this giant gone for you? Do you think it was not gone for Stephen? Do you think his bones did not loosen as they were battering him to pieces? Of course they did! And did he not feel it? How is this effected? It is that he was triumphant in the power of the blessed One who had laid low every foe that could come against us.
" My strength is dried up like a potsherd; and my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death." I can not get lower. I find this blessed One where? In the grip of this fearful antagonist. But He says: I will meet all; in single combat will I encounter all. I know what it is to meet the judgment of God, and now I will meet all that the malice of man can bring against me. I am brought down to the very dust.-Thus did He glorify God under the weight of it, and God has glorified Him.
And now He takes up another point. " Dogs have compassed me." That is the. Romans. We have spoken of the " bulls," which represent the religious magnates-the Jews now we get the " dogs "-the Gentiles. The Jews delivered Him over to the Romans. You cannot say that it was thus with Stephen, but with the Lord it was so; therefore I do not connect this part with Stephen.
" The assembly of the wicked have enclosed me: they pierced my hands and my feet. I may tell all my bones: they look and stare upon me. They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." Now, beloved friends, let me ask you (for it strikes me sometimes how desperately unfeeling the heart of man is), if I were to say: A friend of yours is dead; would not your heart feel it? But then if I were to say: He died for you? What then?-Surely I need not dwell on it.
And now we come to the sixth point. "Deliver my soul from the sword; my darling from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion's mouth." Here we get Satan. See what a place is the blessed Lord in for me! And then he says lastly: " Thou has heard me from the horns of the unicorns." That is generally supposed to be the pains of death.
He has gone through all that. And now let me say: That is my Savior; that is the One I belong to-the One who has done everything for me.
You say: I have got part of it. I tell you if you have not got all you have none. If you are weak in any one of these things you will be weak in every one of them. If you find a person who is hindered by bodily weakness; you will find he is hindered in all his enjoyment of God. The body of a thoroughly healthy person is really a help to him; but, when the body is not a help but a hindrance, it is like working against the stream in everything. Does ill health cast a cloud over you? and do you say: It is my weakness? I tell you, if your illness brings a cloud between you and God, you have not got a sense of real acceptance with God-you have never yet got the question of sin settled before Him. It is with you as with the woman of Sarepta: as soon as sorrow comes upon her she says: "Art thou come unto me to call my sin to remembrance?" I believe it is an immense point practically for the heart to get hold of. There are the foes. Are they all down, or not? They are all down. Even the pains of death are down; there is not a drop of water to be seen, as you get in the figure of Jordan. And also in the Red Sea: " The. Egyptians whom ye have seen to-day, ye shall see them again no more forever." " The depths covered them: they sank into the bottom as a stone." All these enemies are floored; and what comes out now?
Next: what Satan told you did not exist, He declares. I have borne the judgment on you for listening to Satan now I declare the Father's name to you-the love that is in the Father's heart. In the battle He was left alone He encountered all the foes unassisted; it was a single combat. But now He is heard; and, as He rises from the dead, He brings in a new life, and a new day; He is no longer alone; He says: " Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God."
The point of departure is the point of restoration. The point of departure was distrust of the heart of God. The point of restoration is, Christ says: I will show you the love that is in the heart of God; I know the love that is there.
This is what the heart has to find. It is not only that He has removed all that was against me, but that He acquaints me with the love which He only knows. So He says: " I have declared unto them thy name, that the love wherewith thou past loved me may be in them." "And (He adds) I will declare it."
It is to me most wonderful! I do not think I am able to convey the thought, but it seems to me that, having borne everything, and having come scatheless out of the conflict-this terrible conflict-He says: Having borne all this on account of the doubt you cast upon the love of God, my very first service is to acquaint you with the love that is in the Father's heart. I was the only One that ever knew it; but now I have many after my own type to whom to show what that love is.
This is what the prodigal finds; not only is he kissed and robed, but he is in the Father's house, and his own heart continually deepening in the love that has brought him into such a scene.
Well, it is no wonder that He adds the word: " In the midst of the congregation will I praise thee!" I do not believe praise can come out of the heart until then. Praise cannot come till after the victory. First the victory; next the communication of the love; and then: " In the midst of the congregation will I praise thee." Wonderful climax!
Now let me turn for a minute to the verse I read in Galatians: " When it pleased God to reveal his Son in me." Now mark, the moment I say Son, I intimate the Father. Lose the Son and you lose the Father; establish the Son and you establish the father. " When it pleased God to reveal his Son in me"-that is the point the Apostle was insisting upon-" that I might preach him among the Gentiles."
Just mark how it comes out, though I feel myself unequal to putting it before you. But, to me, the grandeur of the scene is this. Jesus comes in in glory, manifesting Himself to a poor sinner there fallen to the ground, who is powerless, who does not dare to move. What is his safety in such a place as that? Why, that Jesus is there! The entire doctrine comes out. Man gets no place. The same God who brought me into birth in connection with the first Adam now brings me into the new creation-comes in, and reveals His Son in me.
If Saul is there as man, he must die; for it is written: "There shall no man see me and live." Manoah said: " We shall surely die, because we have seen God." And what was the whole lesson in Exodus? Why, that they must not break through to gaze, and so perish. How then is it here?
The Lord Jesus walks into the scene, and Saul says to Him " Who art thou, Lord?" And the Lord says: " I am Jesus." How I wish I could convey the thought to you. It is just as if He said: I have done with man altogether there is now no other man but myself. And I can reveal myself to you, as the chief of sinners, just because there is no other man but myself. I ignore every man but myself. I ignore Saul of Tarsus.-Indeed if he had acknowledged him at all, it must have been to bring judgment down upon him.-But he says: I can come forth to you, the chief of sinners, because I no longer recognize you as a man in the flesh; but as your sins washed away in my blood, and your old. man crucified in my cross.
Have you got hold of the fact that He has brought in another Man? And that that Man can come in to the chief of sinners simply because He has cleared all out of the way, and now occupies the ground He has cleared? If you understand it-if you let your heart go out to it at all, you will see that it is the most wonderful thing. It is not that man is historically at an end, but that he is altogether gone. He is at an end with God. God says: " You are dead." He may see you active in the flesh; but that is not where He has put you, or where He recognizes you.
So Saul goes into the synagogue, and preaches that "Jesus is the Son of God." And he argues upon the same ground in Colossians: " Ye are complete in him." The Son of God. comes in ignoring the man that is here altogether, and, at the same time, occupying the ground that He clears. And must He not occupy the ground that He clears?-It is most wonderful!
Then I say: That will do; I am quite satisfied with this, and want nothing more.-No, says the apostle, it will not do to stop there. You have got to the point of what you are in Christ, but that is not all. Having brought you to the completeness of what you have in Him, now you must go on to the next thing.
I will explain the principle of it. Suppose a man emigrates with a number of companions.
When he gets to the new country, he burns the ship to make sure that there shall be no returning to the place they came from. This is literally the point in the second of Colossians. The apostle first states " ye are complete in him' " and now he says: You must turn round and burn the ship. You are circumcised with the circumcision of Christ; disposed of judicially on the cross, and now you are " buried with him in baptism." Your status is gone. Yet I am always a man, but according to Christ.
What I want you to get hold of is the fact that I have got another Man, who puts aside the old man altogether. " You are dead." But you are alive if you say " Touch not, taste not, handle not." I must have the ship burned. The body of the flesh is set aside in Christ, and in baptism I acknowledge that the first man is gone.
See what a place! What a difference to where I was! What man then are you going to live?- I am going to live the Man that is not here, among the men that are. I want to practically regulate my life by the Man that is there. Whenever I am in any difficulty about any single thing I say: What would that Christ do?
" Circumcised with the circumcision of Christ." That is what God did on the cross. And now I am " buried with him in baptism." Baptism has taken everything from me; I have no status; it has not brought me into anything, but it has cut me off from everything; the man is over-gone. And now I have reached another Man, and this Man is the Son of the Father. And I have to walk through this scene as that Man who has made my heart acquainted with the love that is in the Father's heart; I am to walk now, not as the man who is gone, but as the Man of God's counsels.
The Lord lead our hearts, beloved friends, to understand what a wonderful victory He has accomplished-all the enemies cleared out of the way. He has come in like the sun shining in his glory upon the battle field where the foes lie prostrate. Like the general who used to talk of " the sun " that rose in its splendor after the night of victory, so has our Sun shone out in His glory; He comes in saying: I have laid all low; I will declare the Father. And I say: I thank you. You have laid all low that was against me, and now I am taken up with you, and not with what you have cleared away.
What man is to be for me now?-The Man Christ Jesus! " The life which I now live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me, and gave himself for me."
(J. B. S.)