'The saints' and 'the faithful' are not two sets of people, but one. The
Apostle starts, as it were, on the surface, and goes down; takes off the
uppermost layer and lets us see what is below it; begins with the
flowers or the fruit, and then carries us to the root. The saints are
saints because they are first of all faithful. 'Faithful' here, of
course, does not mean, as it usually does in our ordinary language,
'true' and 'trusty,' 'reliable' and 'keeping our word,' but it means
simply 'believing'; having faith, not in the sense of _fidelity_, but in
the sense of _trust_.
So, then, here is Paul's notion--and it is not only Paul's notion, it is
God's truth--that the only way by which a man ever comes to realise that
he belongs to God, and to yield himself in glad surrender to His uses,
and so to become pure and holy like Him whom He loves and aspires to, is
by humble faith in Jesus Christ. If you want to talk in theological
terminology, sanctification follows upon faith. It is when we believe
and trust in Jesus Christ that all the great motives begin to tell upon
life and heart, which deliver us from our selfishness, which bind us to
God, which make it a joy to do anything for His service, which kindle in
our hearts the flame of fructifying and consecrating and transforming
love. Faith, the simple reliance of a desperate and therefore trusting
heart upon Jesus Christ for all that it needs, is the foundation of the
loftiest elevation and attainment of the Christian character. We begin
down there that we may set the shining topstone of 'Holiness to the
Lord' upon the heaven-pointing summit of our lives.
Note how here Paul sets forth the object of our faith and the
blessedness of it. I do not think I am forcing too much meaning into his
words when I ask you to notice with what distinct emphasis and
intentional fulness he employs the double name of our Lord here to
describe the object upon which our faith fixes, 'Faithful in _Christ
Jesus_.' We must lay hold of the Manhood, and we must lay hold of the
office. We must rest our soul's salvation on Him as our brother, Jesus
who was incarnate in sinful flesh for us; and we must also rest it on
Him as God's anointed, who came in human flesh to fulfil the divine
loving-kindness and purposes, and in that flesh to die. A faith in a
Jesus who was not a Christ would not sanctify; a faith in a Christ who
is not Jesus would be impalpable and impotent. We must take the two
together, believing and feeling that we lay hold upon a loving Man, 'bone
of our bone and flesh of our flesh'; and also upon Him who in His very
humanity is the Messenger and Angel of God's covenant; the Christ for
whom the way has been being prepared from the beginning, and who has
come to fulfil all the purposes of the divine heart.
And notice, too, how there is suggested here also, the blessedness of
that faith, inasmuch as it is a faith _in_ Christ. The New Testament
speaks in diverse ways about the relation between the believing soul
and Jesus Christ. It sometimes speaks of faith as being _towards_ Him,
and that suggests the going out of a hand that, as it were, stretches
towards what it would lay hold of. It sometimes speaks of faith as being
_on_ Him, which suggests the idea of a building on its foundation, or a
hand leaning on a support. And it sometimes speaks, as here, of faith
being '_in_ Him,' which suggests the folded wings of the dove that has
found its nest, the repose of faith, the quiet rest in the Lord, and
'waiting patiently for Him.' Such trust so directed is the one condition
of such tranquillity. Then, again, note a Christian is all that he is
because he is 'in Christ.' That phrase 'in Him' is in some sense the
keynote of this Epistle to the Ephesians. If you will look over the
letter, and pick out all the connections in which the expression 'in
Him' occurs, I think you will be astonished to see how rich and full are
its uses, and how manifold the blessings of which it is the condition.
But the use which Paul makes of it here is just this--everything in our
Christian life depends upon our being rooted and grafted in Jesus. Dear
brethren, the main weakness, I believe, of what is called Evangelical
Christianity has been that it has not always kept true to the
proportionate prominence which the New Testament gives to the two
thoughts, 'Christ for us,' and 'Christ in us.' For one sermon that you
have heard which has dwelt earnestly and believingly on the thought of
the indwelling Christ and the Christian indwelling in Him, you have
heard a hundred about the Sacrifice on the Cross for sins, and the great
atonement that was made by it. Those of you, who have listened to me
from Sunday to Sunday, know that I am not to be charged with minimising
or neglecting that truth, but I want to lay upon all your hearts this
earnest conviction, that a gospel which throws into enormous prominence
'Christ for us,' and into very small prominence 'Christ in us,' is lame
of one foot, is lopsided, untrue to the symmetry and proportion of the
Gospel as it is revealed in the New Testament, and will never avail for
the nourishment and maturity of Christian souls. 'Christ for us' by all
means, and for evermore, but 'Christ _in_ us,' or else He will not be
'_for_ us.'
III. Lastly, a Christian may be a saint, and a believer, and in Christ
Jesus, though he is in Ephesus.
Many of you know that probably the words 'in Ephesus' are no part of the
original text of this epistle, which was apparently a circular letter,
in which the designation of the various churches to which it was sent
was left blank, to be filled in with the name of each little community
to which Paul's messenger from Rome carried it. The copy from which our
text was taken had probably been delivered at Ephesus; and, at any rate,
one of the copies would go there. What was Ephesus? Satan's very
headquarters and seat in Asia Minor, a focus of idolatry, superstition,
wealth, luxury springing from commerce, and moral corruption. 'Great is
Diana of the Ephesians.' The books of Ephesus were a synonym for magical
books. Many of us know how rotten to the core the society of that great
city was. And there, on the dunghill, was this little garden of fragrant
and flowering plants. They were 'saints in Christ Jesus,' though they
were 'saints in Ephesus.'
Never mind about surroundings. It is possible for us to keep ourselves
in the love of God, and in the fellowship of His Son wherever we are,
and whatever may lie around us. You and I have too to live in a big,
wicked city, and to work out our religion in a society honeycombed with
corruption, because of commerce and other influences. Do not let us
forget that these people whom Paul called 'saints' and 'faithful' had a
harder fight to wage than we have, with less to hearten and strengthen
them in it. Only remember if the 'saints in Ephesus' are to be 'in
Christ,' they need to keep themselves very straight up. The carbonic
acid gas is heavy and goes down to the bottom of the cave, and if a man
will walk bolt upright, he will keep his nostrils above it; but if he
stoops, he will get down into it. Walk straight up, with your head
erect, looking to the Master, and your respiratory organs will be above
the poison. If we are to _be_ in Christ when we are in Ephesus, we need
to keep ourselves separate and faithful, and to _keep ourselves_ in
Christ. If the diver comes out of the diving-bell he is drowned. If he
keeps inside its crystal walls he may be on the bottom of the ocean, but
he is dry and safe. Keep in the fortress by loyal faith, by humble
realisation of His presence, by continual effort, and 'nothing shall by
any means harm you,' but 'your lives shall be holy, being hid with
Christ in God.'
'ALL SPIRITUAL BLESSINGS'
'Blessed be God ... who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ.'--Eph. i. 3.
It is very characteristic of Paul's impetuous fervour and exuberant
faith that he begins this letter with a doxology, and plunges at once
into the very heart of his theme. Colder natures reach such heights by
slow degrees. He gains them at a bound, or rather, he dwells there
always. Put a pen into his hand, and it is like tapping a blast furnace;
and out rushes a fiery stream at white heat. But there is a great deal
more than fervour in the words. In the rush of his thoughts there is
depth and method. We come slowly after, and try by analysing and
meditation to recover some of the fervour and the fire of such
utterances as this.
Notice that buoyant, joyous, emphatic reiteration: 'Blessed,' 'blest,'
'blessings.' That is more than the fascination exercised over a man's
mind by a word; it covers very deep thoughts and goes very far into the
centre of the Christian life. God blesses us by gifts; we bless Him by
words. The aim of His act of blessing is to evoke in our hearts the love
that praises. We receive first, and then, moved by His mercies, we give.
Our highest response to His most precious gifts is that we shall 'take
the cup of salvation, and call upon the name of the Lord,' and in the
depth of thankful and recipient hearts shall say, 'Blessed be God who
hath blessed us.'
Now I think that I shall best bring out the deep meaning of these words
if I simply follow them as they lie before us. I do not wish to say
anything about our echo in blessing God. I wish to speak about the
original sweet sound, His blessing to us.
I. And I note, first of all, the character and the extent of these
blessings which are the constituents of the Christian life.
'All spiritual blessings,' says the Apostle. Now, I am not going to
weary you with mere exegetical remarks, but I do want to lay stress upon
this, that, when the Apostle speaks about 'spiritual blessings,' he does
not merely use that word 'spiritual' as defining the region in us in
which the blessings are given, though that is also implied; but rather
as pointing to the medium by which they are conferred. That is to say,
he calls them 'spiritual,' not because they are, unlike material and
outward blessings, gifts for the inner man, the true self, but because
they are imparted to the waiting spirit by that Divine Spirit who
communicates to men all the most precious things of God. They are
'spiritual' because the Holy Spirit is the medium of communication by
which they reach men's spirits.
And I may just pause for one moment--and it shall only be for a
moment--to point out to you how in-woven into the very texture of the
writer's thoughts, and all the more emphatic because quite incidental,
and needing to be looked for to be found, is here the evidence of his
believing that the name of God was God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
For it is the Father who is the Giver, the Son who is the Reservoir, the
Spirit who is the Communicator, of these spiritual gifts. And I do not
think that any man could have written these words of my text, the main
purpose of which is altogether different to setting forth the mystery of
the divine nature, unless he had believed in God the Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost.
But, apart altogether from that, let me remind you in one sentence of
how the gifts which thus come to men by that Divine Spirit derive their
characteristic quality from their very medium of communication. There
are many other blessings for which we have to say, 'Blessed be God'; for
all the gifts that come from 'the Father of Lights' are light, and
everything that the Fountain of sweetness bestows upon mankind is sweet,
but earthly blessings are but the shadow of blessing. They remain
without us, and they pass. And if they were all for which we had to
praise God, our praises had need to be often checked by sobs and tears,
and often very doubtful and questioning. If there were none other but
such, and if this poor life were all, then I do not think it would be
true that it is
'better to have loved and lost,
Than never to have loved at all.'
It is but a quavering voice of praise, with many a sob between, that
goes up to bless God for anything but spiritual blessings. Though it is
true that all which comes from the Father of Lights is light, the
sorrows and troubles that He sends have the light terribly muffled in
darkness, and it needs strong faith and insight to pierce through the
cloud to see the gleam of anything bright beneath. But when we turn to
this other region, and think of what comes to every poor, tremulous,
human heart, that likes to take it through that Divine Spirit--the
forgiveness of sins, the rectification of errors, the purification of
lusts and passions, the gleams of hope on the future, and the access
with confidence into the standing and place of children; oh, then surely
we can say, 'Blessed be God for spiritual blessings.'
But if the word which defines may thus seem to limit, the other word
which accompanies it sweeps away every limit; for it calls upon us to
bless God for _all_ spiritual blessings. That is to say, there is no gap
in His gift. It is rounded and complete and perfect. Whatever a man's
needs may require, whatever his hopes can dream, whatever his wishes can
stretch out towards, it is all here, compacted and complete. The
spiritual gifts are encyclopædiacal and all-sufficient. They are not
segments, but completed circles. When God gives He gives amply.
II. So much, then, for the first point; now, in the second place, note
the one divine act by which all these blessings have been bestowed.
'Blessed be God who _has_ given'; or, still more definitely, pointing to
some one specific moment and deed in which the benefaction was
completed, 'Blessed be God who gave.'
When? Well, ideally in the depths of His own eternal mind the gift was
complete or ever the recipients were created to receive it, and
historically the gift was complete in the act of redemption when He
spared not His Own Son, but gave Him up unto the death for us all. A man
may destine an estate for the benefit of some community which for
generations long may continue to enjoy its benefits, but the gift is
complete when he signs the deed that makes it over. Humphrey Chetham
gave the boys in his school to-day their education when, centuries ago,
he assigned his property to that beneficent purpose. So, away back in
the mists of Eternity the gift was completed, and the signature was put
to the deed when Jesus Christ was born, and the seal was added when
Jesus Christ died. 'Blessed be God who _hath_ given.'
So, then, we may not only draw the conclusion which the Apostle drew,
'how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?' but we can
draw an even grander one, 'Has He not with Him also freely given us all
things?' And we possess them all to-day if our hearts are resting on
Jesus Christ. The limit of the gift is only in ourselves. All has been
given, but the question remains how much has been taken.
Oh, Christian men and women, there is nothing that we require more than
to have what we have, to possess what is ours, to make our own what has
been bestowed. You sometimes hear of some beggar, or private soldier, or
farm labourer, who has come all at once into an estate that was his,
years before he knew anything about it. There is such a boundless wealth
belonging by right, and by the Giver's gift, to every Christian soul;
and yet, here are we, many of us, like the paupers who sometimes turn up
in workhouses, all in rags, and with deposit-receipts for £200 or £300
stitched into the rags, that they get no good out of. Here are we, with
all that wealth, paupers still. Be sure that you have what you have. Do
you remember the exhortation to a valiant effort in one of the stories
in the Old Testament--'Know ye that Ramoth-gilead is _ours_, and we take
it not?' And that is exactly what is true about hosts of professing
Christians who have not, in any real sense, the possession of what God
has given them. It is well to ask, for our desires are the measures of
our capacities. It is well to ask, but we very often ask when what is
wanted is not that we should get more, but that we should utilise what
we have. And we make mistakes therein, as if God needed to be besought
to give, when all the while it is we who need to be stirred up to grasp
and keep the things that are freely given to us of God.
III. In the next place, notice the one place where all these blessings
are kept.
'Blessed be God who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in
heavenly places.' 'In heavenly places.' Now that does not merely define
the region of origin, the locality where they originated or whence they
come. It does do that, but it does a great deal more. It does not
merely tell us, as we often are disposed to think that it does, that
'every good and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh
down'--though that is perfectly true, but it means much rather that in
order to get the gift we must go up. They are in the heavenly places,
and they cannot live anywhere else. They have been sticking shrubs in
tubs outside our public buildings this last week. How long will they
keep their leaves and their freshness? How soon will they need to be
shifted and taken back again to the sweeter air, where they can
flourish? God's spiritual gifts cannot grow in smoke and dirt and a
polluted atmosphere. And if a professing Christian man lives his life on
the low levels he will have very few of the heavenly gifts coming down
to him there. And that is the reason--_the_ reason above all
others--why, with such a large provision made for all possible
necessities and longings of all sorts, people who call themselves
Christians go up and down the world feeble and poor, and with little
enjoyment of their religion, and having verified scarcely anything of
the great promises which God has given them.
Brother, according to the old word with which the Mass used to begin,
'_Sursum corda_'--up with your hearts! The blessings are in the heavens,
and if we want them we must go where they are. It is not enough to drink
sparing draughts from the stream as it flows through the plain. Travel
up to the headwaters, where the great pure fountain is, that gushes out
abundant and inexhaustible. The gifts are heavenly, and there they
abide, and thither we must mount if we would possess them.
Now that this understanding of the words is correct I think is clearly
shown by a verse in the next chapter, where we find the very same
phrase employed. In this connection the Apostle says that 'God hath
raised us up together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.' That is to
say, the true ideal of the Christian life is that, even here and now, it
is a life of such intimate union and incorporation with Jesus Christ as
that where He is we are, and that even whilst we tabernacle upon earth
and move about amongst its illusions and changing scenes, in the depth
of our true being we may be fixed, and sit at rest with Christ where He
is.
Do not dismiss that as mere pulpit rhetoric. Do not say that it is
mystical and incomprehensible, and cannot be reduced into practice
amidst the distractions of daily life. Brethren, it is not so! Jesus
Christ Himself said about Himself that He came down from heaven, and
that though He did, even whilst He wore the likeness of the flesh, and
was one of us, He was 'the Son of Man which _is_ in Heaven,' when He lay
in the manger, when He worked at the carpenter's bench in Nazareth, when
He walked with weary feet those blessed acres, when He hung, for our
advantage, on the bitter Cross. And that was no incommunicable property
of His mysterious nature, but it was the typical example of what it is
possible for manhood to be. And you and I, if we are to possess in any
measure corresponding with the gift of Christ the spiritual blessing
which God bestows, must have our lives 'hid with Christ in God,' and sit
together with Him in the heavenly places.
IV. Lastly, note the one Person in whom all spiritual blessings are
enshrined.
'In the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.' You cannot separate between
Him and His gifts, neither in the way of getting Him without them, nor
in the way of getting them without Him. They are Himself, and in the
deepest analysis all spiritual blessings are reducible to one--viz. that
the Spirit of Jesus Christ Himself shall dwell with us.
Now, that union by which it is possible for poor, empty, sinful
creatures to be filled with His fulness, animated with His life,
strengthened with His omnipotence, and sanctified by His
indwelling--that union is the very kernel of this Epistle to the
Ephesians.
I dare say I have often drawn your attention to the singular emphasis
and repetition with which that phrase 'in Christ' occurs throughout the
letter. Just take the two or three instances of it that I gather as I
speak. In this first chapter we read, 'the faithful in Jesus Christ.'
Then comes our text, 'blessings in heavenly places in Christ.' Then, in
the very next verse, we read, 'chosen us in Him.' Then, a verse or two
after, we have 'accepted in the Beloved,' which is immediately followed
by, 'in whom we have redemption through His blood.' Then, again, 'that
He might gather together in one all things in Christ, in whom also we
have obtained the inheritance.' I need not make other quotations, but
throughout the letter every blessing that can gladden or sanctify the
human spirit is regarded by the Apostle as being stored and shrined in
Jesus Christ: inseparable from Him, and therefore to be found by us only
in union with Him.
And that is the point of all which I want to say--viz. that, inasmuch as
all spiritual blessings that a soul can need are hived in Him in whom is
all sweetness, the way, and the only way, to get them is that we, too,
should pass into Him and dwell in Jesus Christ. It is His own teaching:
'I am the Vine, ye are the branches. Abide in Me. Separate from Me ye
can do nothing,' and get nothing, and are nothing.
Oh, brethren! it is well that all our treasures should be in one place.
It is better that they should all be in One Person. And if only we will
lay our poor emptiness by the side of His fulness there will pass over
from that infinite abundance and sufficiency everything that we can
require.
We abide in Him by faith, by meditation, by love, by submission, by
practical obedience, and, if we are wise, the effort of our lives will
be to keep close to that Lord. As long as we keep touch with Him we have
all and abound. Break the connection by wandering away, in thought and
desire, by indulgence in sin, by letting earthly passions surge in and
separate us from Him--break the connection by rebellion, by making
ourselves our own ends and lords, and it is like switching off the
electricity. Everything falls dead. You cannot have Christ's blessing
unless you take Christ.
And so, dear brethren, 'abide in Me and I in you.' There is nothing else
that will make us blessed; there is nothing else that will meet all the
circumference of our necessities; there is nothing else that will quiet
our hearts, will sanctify our understandings. Christ is yours if 'ye are
Christ's.' 'Of His fulness _have_ all we received,' for it all became
ours when we became His, and Christian growth on earth and heaven is but
the unfolding of the folded graces that are contained in Him. We possess
the whole Christ, but eternity is needed to disclose all the
unsearchable riches of our inheritance in Him.
'ACCORDING TO'--I.
'According to the good pleasure of His will, ... According to the
riches of His grace.'--Eph. i. 5, 7.
That phrase, 'according to,' is one of the key-words of this profound
epistle, which occurs over and over again, like a refrain. I reckon
twelve instances of it in three chapters of the letter, and they all
introduce one or other of the two thoughts which appear in the two
fragments that I have taken for my text. They either point out how the
great blessings of Christ's mission have underlying them the divine
purpose, or they point out how the process of the Christian life in the
individual has for its source and measure the abundances, the wealth of
the grace and the power of God. So in both aspects the facts of earth
are traced up to, and declared to be, the outcome of the heavenly
depths, and that gives solemnity, grandeur, elevation, to this epistle
all its own. We are carried, as it were, away up into the recesses of
the mountains of God, and we look down upon the unruffled, mysterious,
deep lake, from which come the rivers that water all the plains beneath.
Now of these two types of reference to the divine will and the divine
wealth, I should like to gather together the instances, as they occur in
this letter, in so far as I can, in the course of a sermon, touching
them, it must be, very imperfectly. But I fear that it is impossible to
deal with both the phases of this 'according to,' in one discourse. So I
confine myself to that which is suggested by the first of our two texts,
in the hope that some other day we may be able to overtake the other. So
then, we have set before us here the Christian thought of the divine
will which underlies, and therefore is manifest by, the work of Jesus
Christ, in its whole sweep and breadth. And I just take up the various
instances in which this expression occurs in a great variety of forms,
but all retaining substantially the same meaning.
I. Note that that divine will which underlies and is operative in, and
therefore is certified to us by the whole work of Jesus Christ, in its
facts and its consequences, is a 'good pleasure.'
Now there are few thoughts which the history of the world has shown to
be more productive of iron and steel in the human character than that of
the sovereign will of God. That made Islam, and is the secret of its
power to-day, amidst its many corruptions. Because these wild desert
tribes were all stiffened, or I might say inflamed, by that profound
conviction, the sovereign will of God, they came down like a hammer upon
that corrupt so-called Christian Church, and swept it off the face of
the earth, as it deserved to be swept. And the same thought of the
sovereign will, of which we are but instruments--pawns on its
chessboard--made the grand seventeenth century Puritanism in England,
and its sister type of men and of religion in Holland. For this is a
historically proved thesis, that there is nothing which so contributes
to the formation, and valuation of, and the readiness to die for, civil
liberty, as the firm grasp of that thought of the divine sovereignty.
Just because a man realises that the will of God is supreme over all the
earth, he rebels against all forms of human despotism.
But with all the good that is in that great thought--and the
Christianity of this day sorely wants the strength that might be given
it by the exhibition of that steel medicine--it wants another, 'the
good pleasure of His will.' And that word, 'good pleasure,' does not
express, as I think, in Paul's usage of it, the simple notion of
sovereignty, but always the notion of a benevolent sovereignty. It is
'the good pleasure'--as it is put in another place by the same
Apostle--'of His goodness.' And that thought, let in upon the solemnity
and severity of the other one, is all that it needs in order to make the
man who grasps it not only a hero in conflict, and a patient martyr in
endurance, but a child in his Father's house, rejoicing in the love of
his Father everywhere and always.
Paul would have us believe that if we will take the work of Jesus Christ
in the facts of His life, and its results upon humanity, as our
horn-book and lesson, we shall draw from that some conceptions of the
great thing that underlies it, 'the good pleasure of His will.' We stand
in front of this complex universe, and some of us say: 'Law'; and some
of us say: 'A Lawgiver behind the law; a Person at the heart of all
things'; but unless we can say: 'And in the heart of the Person a will,
which is the expression of a steadfast, omnipotent love,' then the world
seems to me to be a place of unsolvable riddles and a torture-house.
There goes the great steam-roller along the road. Everybody can see that
it crushes down, and makes its own path. Who drives it? The steam in the
boiler, or is there a hand on the lever? And what drives the hand?
Christianity answers, and answers with unfaltering lip, rising clear
above contradictions apparent and difficulties real, 'The good pleasure
of His will,' and there men can rest.
Then there is another step. Another form in which this 'according to'
appears in this letter is, if we adopt the rendering, which I am
disposed to do in the present case, of the Authorised Version rather
than of the Revised, 'according to His good pleasure ... which He hath
purposed in Himself.' The Revised Version says, 'Which He hath purposed
in Him,' and that is a perfectly possible rendering. But to me the old
one is not only more eloquent, but more in accordance with the
connection. So I venture to accept it without further ado--'His good
pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself.'
That brings us into the presence of that same great thought, which in
another aspect is expressed in saying 'His name is Jehovah,' and in yet
another aspect is expressed in saying 'God is love,' viz. the thought
which sounds familiar, but which has in it depths of strength and
illumination and joy, if we rightly ponder it, that, to use human words,
the motive of the divine action is all found within the divine nature.
We love one another because we discern, or think we discern, lovable
qualities in the being on whom our love falls. God loves because He is
God. That great artesian fountain wells up from the depths, by its own
sweet impulse, and pours itself out; and 'the good pleasure of His
goodness' has no other explanation than that it is His nature and
property to be merciful. And so, dear brethren, we get clean past what
has sometimes been the misapprehension of good people, and has oftener
been the caricatured representation of Evangelical truth which its
enemies have put forth--that God was made to love and pity by reason of
the sacrifice of the Son, whereas the very opposite is the case. God
loves, therefore He sent His Son, 'that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish but have everlasting life,' and the notion of the
Cross of Christ as changing the divine heart is as far away from
Evangelical truth as it is from the natural conceptions that men form of
the divine nature. We shake hands with our so-called antagonists and
say, 'Yes! we believe as much as you do that God does not love us
because Christ died, but we believe what perhaps you do not, that Christ
died because God loves us, and would save us.' 'The good pleasure which
He hath purposed in Himself.'
Then, still further, there is another aspect of this same divine will
brought out in other parts of this letter, of which this is a specimen,
'Having made known unto us the mystery of His will, according to His
good pleasure which He hath purposed in Himself, that in the
dispensation of the fulness of the times He might gather together in one
all things in Christ,' which, being turned into more modern phraseology,
is just this--that the great aim of that divine sovereign will,
self-originated, full of loving-kindness to the world, is to manifest to
all men what God is, that all men may know Him for what He is, and
thereby be drawn back again, and grouped in peaceful unity round His
Son, Jesus Christ. That is the intention which is deepest in the divine
heart, the desire which God has most for every one of us. And when the
Old Testament tells us that the great motive of the divine action is for
'My own Name's sake,' that expression might be so regarded as to
disclose an ugly despot, who only wants to be reverenced by abject and
submissive subjects. But what it really means is this, that the divine
love which hovers over its poor, prodigal children because it _is_ love,
and, therefore, lovingly delights in a loving recognition and response,
desires most of all that all the wanderers should see the light, and
that every soul of man should be able to whisper, with loving heart, the
name, 'Abba! Father!' Is not that an uplifting thought as being the
dominant motive which puts in action the whole of the divine activity?
God created in order that He might fling His light upon creatures, who
should thereby be glad. And God has redeemed in order that in Jesus
Christ we might see Him, and, seeing Him, be at rest, and begin to grow
like Him. This is the aim, 'That they might know Thee, the only true God
... whom to know is eternal life.' And so self-communication and
self-revelation is the very central mystery of the will.
But that is not all. Another of the forms in which this phrase occurs
tells us that that great purpose, the eternal purpose which He purposed
in Christ Jesus our Lord, was that, 'Now unto the principalities and
powers in heavenly places might be known' by the Church 'the manifold
wisdom of God.' And so we get another thought, that that whole work of
redemption, operated by the Incarnation, and culminating in the
Crucifixion and Resurrection and Ascension of Jesus Christ, stands as
being the means by which other orders of creatures, besides ourselves,
learn to know 'the manifold wisdom of God.' According to the grand old
saying, at Creation the 'morning stars sang together for joy.' All
spiritual creatures, be they 'higher' or 'lower,' can only know God by
the observation of His acts.
''Twas great to speak a world from nought,
'Tis greater to redeem,'
and the same angelic lips that sang these praises on the morning of
Creation have learnt a new song that they sing; 'Glory and honour and
dominion and power be unto the Lamb that was slain.'
Thus to principalities and powers, a diviner height in the loftiness,
and a diviner depth in the condescension, and a diviner tenderness in
the love, and a diviner energy in the power, of the redeeming God have
been made known, and this is the thought of His eternal purpose. And
that brings me to another point which is involved in the words that I
have just quoted, which stand in connection with those that I have
previously referred to. The phrase 'eternal purpose' literally rendered
is, 'the purpose of the ages,' and that, no doubt, may mean 'eternal' in
the sense of running on through all the ages; or it may mean, perhaps,
that which we usually attach to the word 'eternal,' viz. unbeginning and
unending. I take the former meaning as the more probable one, that the
Apostle contemplates that great will of God which culminates in Jesus
Christ, as coming solemnly sweeping through all the epochs of time from
the beginning. In a deeper sense than the poet meant it, 'Through the
ages an increasing purpose runs,' and that binds the epochs of humanity
together--'the purpose of God in Christ Jesus.' The philosophy of
history lies there, and it is a true instinct that makes the cradle at
Bethlehem the pivot around which the world's chronology revolves. For
the deepest thing about all the ages on the further side of it is that
they are 'Before Christ,' and the formative fact for all the ages after
it is that they are _Anno Domini_.
And now the last thing that is suggested by yet another of these
eloquent expressions is deduced from another part of the same phrase.
The purpose of the ages is described as that which 'He purposed in
Christ Jesus our Lord.' Now the word 'purposed' literally is 'made.'
And it may be a question whether 'purposed' or 'accomplished' is the
special meaning to be attached to the general word 'made.' Either is
legitimate. I take it that what the Apostle means here is that the
purpose of God, which we have thus seen as sovereign, self-originated,
having for its great aim the communication to all His creatures of the
knowledge of Himself, and running through the ages, and binding them
into a unity, reaches its entire accomplishment in the Cradle, and the
Cross, and the Throne of Jesus Christ our Lord.
He fulfils the divine intention. There is that one life, and in that
life alone of humanity you have a character which is in entire sympathy
with the divine mind, which is in full possession of the divine truth,
which never diverges or deviates by a hair's-breadth from the divine
will, which is the complete and perfect exponent to man of the divine
heart and character; and that Christ is the fulfilment of all that God
desired in the depths of eternity, and the abysses of His being. Did He
will that men should know Him? Christ has declared Him. Did He will that
men should be drawn back to Him? Christ lifted on the Cross draws all
men unto Him. Was it 'according to the good pleasure of His goodness'
that we men should attain to the adoption of sons? By that Son we too
became sons. Was it the purpose of His will that we should obtain an
'inheritance'? We obtain it in Jesus Christ, 'being heirs of God, and
joint-heirs with Christ.' All that God willed to do is done. And when we
look, on the one hand, up to that infinite purpose, and on the other, to
the Cross, we hear from the dying lips, 'It is finished!' The purpose
of the ages is accomplished in Christ Jesus.
Is it accomplished with you? I have been speaking about the divine
counsel which is a 'good pleasure,' which runs through the whole history
of mankind. But it is a divine purpose that you can thwart as far as you
are concerned. 'How often would I have gathered ... and ye would not,'
and your 'would not' neutralises His 'would.' Do not stand in the way of
the steam-roller. You cannot stop it, but it can crush you. Do not have
Him say about you, 'In vain have I smitten, in vain have I loved.' Bow,
accept, recognise that all God's armoury is brought to bear upon each of
us in that great Cross and Passion, in that great Incarnation and human
life. And I beseech you, in your hearts, let the will of God be done
even as for a world it has been done by the sacrifice of Calvary.
'ACCORDING TO'--II.
'According to the riches of His grace.'--Eph. i. 7.
We have seen, in a previous sermon, that a characteristic note of this
letter is the frequent occurrence of that phrase 'according to.' I also
then pointed out that it was employed in two different directions. One
class of passages, with which I then tried to deal, used it to compare
the divine purpose in our salvation with the historical process of the
salvation. The type of that class of reference is found in a verse just
before my text, 'according to the good pleasure of His will.' There is a
second class of passages to which our text belongs, where the comparison
is not between the purpose and its realisation, but between the stores
of the divine riches and the experiences of the Christian life. The one
set of passages suggests the ground of our salvation in the deep purpose
of God; the other suggests the measure of the power which is working out
that salvation.
The instances of this second use of the phrase, besides the one in my
text, 'according to the riches of His grace,' are such as these:
'According to the riches of His glory'; 'According to the power that
worketh in us'; 'According to the measure of the gift of Christ';
'According to the energy of the might of His power, which He wrought in
Christ when He raised Him from the dead.'
Now it is clear that all these are varying forms of the same thing. They
vary in form, they are identical in substance. What a Jew calls a
'cubit' an Englishman calls a 'foot,' but the result is pretty nearly
the same. Shillings, marks, francs, are various standards; they all come
to substantially the same result. These varying measures of the divine
gift which is at work in man's salvation, have this in common, that they
all run out into God's immeasurable, unlimited power, boundless wealth.
And so, if we gather them together, and try to focus them in a few
words, they may help to widen our conceptions of what we ought to expect
from God, to bow us in contrition as to the small use that we have made
of it, and to open our desires wide, that they may be filled.
I only aspire, then, to deal with these four forms which I have already
suggested.