THE two properly go together. We can only truly make profession of that which we possess. There may be some of whom it could be said, that theirs is an empty or untrue profession. I speak of a religious profession, a mere form of piety, but the power thereof denied. Again, there are those who say that they make no profession, they would not be hypocrites. To such I would say, Why don’t you profess? Ought you not to profess the Lord Jesus Christ? Has He not said, “Whosoever shall confess (practically the same as profess) Me before men, him will I confess also before My Father which is in heaven”? And, remember, there is no middle ground between confession and denial (Matt. 10:32, 3332Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven. 33But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven. (Matthew 10:32‑33)). Why do you not confess Him? Surely He is worthy.
In the Epistle to the Hebrews we have this word “profession,” and twice those addressed are exhorted to hold it fast. Jesus Christ is there said to be the Apostle and High Priest of “our profession,” as Moses and Aaron were the apostle and the high priest of Israel’s profession. Now a profession that was not based upon realities would be a mere sham; but let us take the history of Israel; it has been recorded for our learning. Let us hear their own profession as they sang with Moses on the shores of the Red Sea― “Jehovah is my strength and song, and He is become my salvation.” What a profession! Was it not true? Yes, to the letter. Had He not sheltered them from the consequences of their own sins under a blood-sprinkled lintel, and made the waves and waters of the Red Sea a way of salvation from the power of the enemy? They were then in possession of the salvation of Jehovah. They were not in possession of Canaan yet, but they possessed the faithfulness of Jehovah, and the stability of all that He had promised. They might well utter their profession in a song of praise. There was more still; they possessed the unwearied care of Jehovah as morning by morning for forty years the manna fell for them and sustained them; they drank, too, of the rock that followed them; their garments waxed not old, nor did their foot swell. They might well profess; but, alas! Israel “forsook God which made him, and lightly esteemed the Rock of his salvation.”
In New Testament times, also, Paul spoke of the advantage of the Jew as possessing the “oracles of God” (see Rom. 3:1, 21What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision? 2Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. (Romans 3:1‑2), and 9:4): “To whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever, Amen.” For three and a half years Jesus the Son of God went about doing good in the midst of Israel. Reader! I want to show you what that nation had in their possession; and their profession of such blessings, did they continue to make it, would have been well founded, but with many FAITH never made those various blessings their very own, and profession died upon their lips, and murmuring and complaining took its place, and likewise rejection of Christ, in whom all their promises were Yea and Amen.
Now listen while the same apostle details some of our possessions as Gentiles who have been brought into the goodness of God. We were not born in heathen lands, nor among the guilty and unbelieving nation of Israel. We were born where the illumination of God and of His Gospel has shone, where the oracles of God―the good and gracious Word of God, not the book of the law or the tables of stone―are our birthright. We were born after the Lord Jesus Christ had finished His service on earth and taken His place on high, and consequently to us God’s giving is not upon earth now, but it is heavenly giving; and the Holy Ghost having a dwelling-place upon earth, professed Christians have come into companionship of the blessed Spirit of God; His powerful witness is more or less felt and owned. He is the witness of a perfect and accomplished salvation subsisting in Him who has sat down at the right hand of God, and of righteousness perfect and complete in the presence of God. He is the witness, too, in the Gospel of the grace of God of the heavenly grace presented to men in Jesus the Son of God. Look at the Spirit’s testimony in Scripture, and see how Jesus was always desirous that faith should appropriate His fullness.
Better never to have been born than that the light which through the Holy Spirit’s witness shines around you should be darkness in you. Faith in a Christian does not profess anything about himself; he has nothing to confess save his own guilty and lost condition by nature; he professes Jesus and His salvation―all there is reality.
“The ground of our profession
Is Jesus and His blood;
He gives us the possession
Of everlasting good.”
The claim of faith to the accomplished and preached salvation which is in Jesus is never disallowed. Claim it, dear reader, and profess what your faith takes into its own possession. Look diligently lest you fail of the grace of God when the light of it shines for you in the Son of God. T. H. R.