We must still linger a little over the deeply interesting and instructive scene in the sixteenth chapter of Matthew. It brings before us two great subjects, namely, “The church” and “The kingdom of heaven.” These things must never be confounded. As to the first, it is only to be found in the New Testament. Indeed, as has often been remarked, verse 18 of our chapter contains the very first direct allusion in the volume of God, to the subject of the church or assembly of Christ.
This, though familiar to many of our readers, may present a difficulty to others. Many Christians and christian teachers strongly maintain that the doctrine of the church is distinctly unfolded in Old Testament scripture. They consider that the saints of the Old Testament belonged to the church; in fact, that there is no difference whatever; all form one great family; all stand on one common ground; and that to represent the Lord’s people in New Testament times as in a higher position or endowed with higher privileges than Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, is the most complete delusion possible—a wild imagination of modern days, possessing not a shadow of scripture authority. It seems perfectly monstrous to such to assert that Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and Moses, did not belong to the church—were not members of the body of Christ—were not endowed with the selfsame privileges as believers now. Trained from their earliest days to believe that all God’s people, from the beginning to the end of time, stand on the same ground, are members of the one great family, bound up in the same bundle of life, and form one body, they find it impossible to admit of any difference. It seems to them the height of presumption on the part of Christians to assert that they are, in any respect, different from God’s beloved people of old—those blessed worthies of whom we read in Heb. 11 who lived a life of faith and personal devotedness, and who are now in heaven with their Lord.
But the all important question is, “What saith the scripture?” It can be of no possible use to set up our own thoughts, our own reasonings, our own conclusions, in opposition to the word of God. It is a very easy matter for men to reason, with great apparent force, point, and cleverness, about the absurdity and wild presumption of the notion that Christians are better and higher and more privileged than God’s people of old.
But this is not the proper way in which to approach this great subject. It is not a question of the difference personally between the Lord’s people at different periods. Were it so, where should we find, amongst the ranks of christian professors, any one to compare with an Abraham, a Joseph, a Moses, or a Daniel? Were it a question of simple faith, where could we find, in the entire history of the church, a finer example than the father of the faithful? Were it a question of personal holiness, where could we find a brighter illustration than Joseph? For intimate acquaintance with the ways of God and entrance into His mind, who could go beyond Moses? For unswerving devotedness to God and His truth, could we find a brighter example than the man who went down into the lions’ den rather than not pray toward Jerusalem?
However, let it be distinctly understood that it is not, by any means, a personal question, or a comparison of people; but simply of dispensational position. If this be clearly seen, it will, we doubt not, remove out of the way a great deal of the difficulty which many pious people seem to feel in reference to the truth of the church.
But, above and beyond all this, stands the question, What does scripture teach on the subject? If anyone had spoken to Abraham about being a member of the body of Christ, would he have understood it? Could that honored and beloved saint of God have had the most remote idea of being linked, by an indwelling Spirit, to a living Head in heaven? Utterly impossible. How could he be a member of a body which had no existence? And how could there be a body without a Head? And when do we first hear of the Head? When the Man Christ Jesus, having passed through death and the grave, ascended into the heavens, and took His seat at the right hand of the Majesty on high. Then, and not until then, did the Holy Ghost come down to form the body and link it, by His presence, to the glorified Head above.
This, however, is rather anticipating a line of argument which is yet to come before us. Let us here put another question to the reader. If anyone had spoken to Moses about a body composed of Jews and Gentiles—a body whose constituent parts had been drawn from among the seed of Abraham and the cursed race of the Canaanites, what would he have said? May we not safely assert that his whole moral being would have shrunk with horror from the thought? What! Jews and Canaanites—the seed of Abraham and uncircumcised Gentiles united in one body? Impossible for the lawgiver to take in such an idea. The fact is if there was one feature which, more strongly than another, marked the Jewish economy it was the rigid separation, by divine appointment, of Jew and Gentile. “Ye know,” says Simon Peter, “how that it is an unlawful thing for a man that is a Jew to keep company, or to come unto one of another nation.”
Such was the order of things under the Mosaic economy. It would have been a flagrant transgression on the part of a Jew to climb over that middle wall of partition which separated him from all the nations around; and hence the thought of a union between Jew and Gentile could not possibly have entered into any human mind; and the more faithful a man was to the existing order of things under the law, the more opposed he must have been to any such thought.
Now, in the face of all this, how can anyone seek to maintain that the truth of the church was known in Old Testament times; and that there is no difference whatever between the position of a Christian and that of an Old Testament believer? The fact is that even Simon Peter himself found it extremely difficult to take in the idea of admitting the Gentiles into the kingdom of heaven. Though he was entrusted with the keys of that kingdom, he was very reluctant indeed to use the key which was to admit the Gentiles. He had to be expressly taught by a heavenly vision, ere he was prepared to fulfill the commission with which he was charged by his Lord in Matt. 16.
No, reader, it is of no possible use to stand against the plain testimony of scripture. The truth of the church was not—could not be known, in Old Testament times. It was, as the inspired apostle tells us, “Hid in God”—hid in His eternal counsels—“not made known to the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel.” Eph. 3
We can only reach the great mystery of the church by walking over the ruins of the middle wall of partition. “Wherefore remember, that ye being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; that at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, ai without God in the world. But now, in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall (partition; having abolished in his flesh the enmity, the law of commandments in ordinances, for to make himself of twain one new man, making peace. And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby; and came and preached peace to you which were afar off, and to then that were nigh. For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.”
Thus, from all that has passed before us, the reader will, we trust, fully see why it is that our Lord in His word to Simon Peter, speaks of the church as a future thing. “Upon this rock, I will build my church.” He does not say, “I have been” or “I am building my church., Nothing of the kind. It could not be. It was still “hid in God.” The Messiah had to be cut off and have nothing—nothing, for the present, as regards Israel and the earth. He must be rejected, crucified, and slain, in order to lay the foundation of the church. It was utterly impossible that a single stone could be laid in this new, this wondrous building, until “the chief corner-stone” had passed through death and taken His place in the heavens. It was not in incarnation but in resurrection that our Lord Christ became Head of a body.
Now our apostle was not the least prepared for this. He did not understand one jot or tittle of it. That Messiah should set up a kingdom, in power and glory—that He should restore Israel to their destined pre-eminence in the earth—all this he could understand and appreciate—he was looking for it. But a suffering Messiah—a rejected, and crucified Christ—of this he could not hear, just then. “Be it far from thee, Lord; this shall not be unto thee.” These were the words which drew forth that withering rebuke with which we closed our last paper, “Get thee behind me, Satan; thou art an offense unto me; for thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.”
We may gather the gravity of his error from the severity of the rebuke. Peter had much to learn—much to go through, ere he could grasp the great truth which His Lord was putting before him. But he did grasp it, by the grace of God, and confess it, and teach it with power. He was led to see not only that Christ was the Son of the living God; but that He was a rejected stone, disallowed of men, but chosen of God and precious; and that all who, through grace, come to Him, must share His rejection on earth as well as His acceptance in heaven. They are perfectly identified with Him.
(To be continued, if the Lord will.)