THE beginning of a New Year is a time when it is customary for people to reflect upon the past, and to look forward to the future. Sad to say, however, the disposition of the majority is generally to set aside reflection of a serious kind, and to give themselves up to carnal merriment in the sanguine expectation of much worldly prosperity during the days that are to come. We venture to hope that this way of spending the New Year may be largely restrained on the present occasion, in view of the many sad results of the terrible War which still rages. There are bound to be many sorrowful firesides throughout the country at the present moment. What a number of brave and choice young men have fallen on land and sea during the past twelve months! The blanks in hundreds of family circles are extremely sore and painful. We desire, in a very special manner, therefore, to express our most sincere sympathy with all our friends and readers who have suffered bereavement, and to commend them to Him who alone can effectually heal the broken in heart, and bind up their wounds.
- First.—A word to God’s children who are suffering. We know that, although those who fear the Most High have a source of consolation that others have not, they are none the less sensitive to the common trials of life. In fact, we believe they are more sensitive. The grace of God refines and intensifies all the natural and lawful emotions of the mind and heart. There are none like them who can rejoice with those who rejoice or weep with those who weep. Further, there are thoughts and feelings that pass through their souls in the time of trouble, of which others are ignorant. For one thing, they recognise the dealing of God in affliction and feel the weight of His hand, and although they should possess the assurance that it is the hand of a Father, yet such a hand laid on in chastisement is not the less painful to a loving child. Again, they are usually led to feel the weight of their sins in connection with trouble. Not that they
always regard each particular affliction as sent for some particular sin, though at times they justly make such an association in their minds. But it would seem to be the natural tendency of the exercised and conscientious Christian to proceed from his afflictions to his sins, knowing that sin is the original cause of all human misery. His question to the Most High is, “Why contendest thou with me?—Is there iniquity found in me that calls for such chastisement?” Then, should God’s people be in distress about the death of some friend concerning whose state as to eternity they stand in doubt, this adds another bitter ingredient to the cup. The people of the world, and superficial professors of religion, pass very lightly over such concerns as these. It is easy for them to say, “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace, but it is not so easy for those who desire to have a well-grounded hope.
Now, we would recommend all in whom “the root of matter” is, and who may be sorely tried, to study well the teaching of God’s Word, and to apply themselves with diligence at a throne of grace, seeking to obtain that spirit of filial submission and patience under trial which the Lord is able and willing to give. We must certainly conclude that in the divine treasury there is a balm for every wound which He makes in His holy providence, and that there is some poisonous element that must be purged out, if the divinely-provided remedy does not soothe and heal. Gracious souls must sometimes be satisfied with that which brought resignation into the heart of Abraham when no other comfort was to be found. “And shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” God is infinitely wise and just and good, and therefore cannot err in any of His ways. “All things shall work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose” (Romans viii. 28). “Whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom He receiveth” (Heb. xii. 6). “Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. iv. 17). We know that it is quite easy to quote passages of Scripture, and that it is another thing to get these passages with power upon the heart, but at the same time, these and such like precious words of truth are the only sources of divine and abiding consolation, and we must wait upon the Lord to obtain the spiritual healing they are designed to give. In answer to earnest cries, He can and does comfort and strengthen the souls of His needy people. “Trust in Him at all times.”
- Now, a few words to those who are unconcerned about their eternal salvation. Many such are coming under God’s afflicting rod at the present moment. The scourge of War is cutting away their near and dear ones to eternity, and they continue spiritually asleep. That is certainly a deplorable state of matters, whether they realise it or not. It is right that they should get and receive any natural sympathy and encouragement that may be lawfully extended to them. But if no more benefit is derived in the
trouble than that, the grand design of such trial is entirely lost. The all-important message which the visitation of death brings is, “Prepare to meet thy God.” We are moving on to eternity, and sooner or later each one must stand in the immediate presence of our Maker and Judge, and if we have not the right preparation, our eternal condemnation will be for ever sealed. Such is the plainest teaching of God’s Word, and we reject it at our peril. Would it not be the highest wisdom, therefore, at the beginning of a New Year, that unprepared persons should not spend their whole time in fruitless pining over losses that cannot be altered, but that they should begin without further delay to seek the Lord while He may be found and to call upon Him while he is near? Such cannot serve God in this present world, or enjoy Him in the world to come, without spiritual preparation. That preparation is nothing else and nothing less than a new heart and union to Christ, and these great and precious blessings are bestowed, “without money and without price” upon feeble lost sinners who ask at God’s throne of grace. “Ask, and it shall be given you.”
We are not warranted to expect that these blessings will drop upon us, apart from asking, seeking or believing. True, sometimes the Lord does manifest Himself in an unlooked for and sovereign way, when the sinner is not seeking Him—examples of this we have in Bible and subsequent times—but it is not a rule to go by. It is souls intensely earnest, realising the eternal issues that are at stake, “the violent,” who “take the kingdom of heaven by force.” Our sincere prayer is that the Lord would call forth many such during the year upon which we are entering. Widespread spiritual callousness and deadness at such a time as the present, is more dreadful than any outward calamity whatsoever. It gives the impression that the Lord has said, “Ephraim is joined to his idols; let him alone;” and that He has determined in all justice to let them sleep on till they awake in irrecoverable woe.
In conclusion, let us earnestly appeal to the young. It is trying to observe the lightness, and carelessness as to eternal things, that characterise many of them in this time of awful war and bloodshed, when thousands of their fellow-creatures in general and some of their friends in particular, are being slain on the fields of conflict. The Lord gives many encouragements to the young to seek Him. “Those that seek me early shall find me.” “Suffer, little children, to come unto me.” And these encouragements lay them under a solemn responsibility. May the Lord apply His truth with power! “Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light” (Ephes. v. 14).
AFFLICTIONS, like tempests, make us look to our tackling, patience; and to our anchor, hope; and to our helm, faith; and to our chart, the Word of God; and to our captain, Christ; whereas security, like a calm, makes us forget both our danger and our Deliverer.—Adams.
A Sermon.
BY THE REV. D. MACFARLANE.
Preached at Dingwall on 8th October, 1916.
“For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is of force after men are dead; otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.”—HEBREWS ix. 16, 17.
THE Apostle in this chapter speaks of the necessity of the death of Christ, and in this connection he speaks of the death of animals as sacrifices in the Old Testament dispensation, by which the death of Christ was typified. When Christ came in the fulness of time the types ceased, for there was no more need of these sacrifices, because by His death He satisfied justice, and secured all the blessings of salvation for His people.
In speaking from our text I shall call your attention to the following particulars:—
I.—The Testator;
II.—The Testament, or Will; and
III.—The Legatees, in whose favour the Testament was made.
I.—The Testator: Christ, the Son of God.—The Apostle here compares Christ to a man who made a will in favour of a certain person or persons. He is therefore called the Testator. The Apostle states that, as among men a testament or will is not of force till after the testator’s death, in like manner the goods that Christ bequeathed were not distributed to the legatees without the shedding of blood, and as believers under the Old Testament were made partakers of these blessings, there was, as the Apostle shows, typical blood shed and applied during that dispensation, till Christ came and gave His own blood to be shed. It was not on the ground of the typical blood that was shed that believers in the Old Testament time were saved, but on the ground of Christ’s death set forth in the type. They got salvation on credit of what Christ was to do. Christ promised to pay the debt contracted by His people, and the Father gave Him a long credit of four thousand years. We sometimes get food or other things on credit, perhaps for six months or a year, and then a demand is made for payment. We promise to pay when the due time comes, but although we would be honest people, we may not always be able to pay. But the Father knew that His Son was perfectly able to fulfil His promise, as He did when He offered up Himself a sacrifice to satisfy divine justice and to reconcile us to God. Believers now, under the New Testament dispensation, do not receive salvation on credit, for Christ paid the whole price by His death, and this was one of the good things that was to come (Heb. ix. 11).
II.—The Testament, or Will.—The testament is now sealed by the blood of Christ, and cannot be altered. A man during his lifetime may change his will, but after his death it cannot be changed by any one. There was a godly minister in Glasgow whose father was a landed proprietor, and made his will in favour of this minister, but at the time of “the Disruption” the son joined the Free Church, and his father was so displeased with him that he made up his mind to disinherit him. But before he could change the will, he died, and his son had the benefit of the will.
Christ having died, His will cannot be changed, although some try to change it. But if any alteration would be made, it was only the testator that had a right to alter it. This will is written out according to law, and is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, which may be seen and read by all to whom the Scriptures come. What is in the will? There is in it unsearchable riches—eternal life—in short, all the blessings that we need in order to be saved and to be made truly happy for ever. In particular, justification, adoption, and sanctification are part of the legacy left by Christ to His people. How great are the blessings contained in the will! Men leave to their friends, according to their means. Some may leave thousands of pounds; others, millions. But the riches that Christ left to His friends are, as already stated, unsearchable and also inexhaustible. Some may leave to their friends much riches, acquired by great labour, but the wealth that Christ left for His friends cost Him His humiliation unto death. He that was rich became poor, that we, who were poor indeed, through His poverty might become rich. Christ’s poverty is the only poverty that is meritorious. He made Himself so poor in acquiring the riches for others that He parted with His life. He cried on the Cross, “It is finished,” and gave up the ghost. Think of what it cost Him when you read of His agony in the garden, and bloody sweat, and His cry on the Cross, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
III.—The Legatees.—Who are they? Till they are effectually called, none knows them but God only. They are spoken of in Scripture as the “elect,” or those given by the Father to His Son in the everlasting covenant of grace. The legacy is intended for some of the human race, but not all. Though not all, they are many—even a great multitude “that no man can number, of all nations and kindreds and peoples and tongues.” That these might be brought in and made partakers of Christ and the benefits of His redemption, the Gospel is to be preached to all indiscriminately, to whom the joyful sound comes. Some may wonder that the Gospel is to be preached to every individual that comes to hear, seeing that it is only some that shall be saved. Our warrant for addressing the universal call of the Gospel to sinners is Christ’s precept and example. He commanded the Apostles to “preach the Gospel to every creature,” and He
Himself called on “all the ends of the earth” to look to Him to be saved. Some speak of another warrant, such as the all-sufficiency of Christ’s atonement to meet the lost condition of all sinners, but the warrant I mentioned appears to me to be the proper one. Although none but God only knows who are the legatees before their conversion, yet after their conversion they are made manifest to men as made partakers, to some extent, of the blessings of the will. Among men it is not the man that left the legacy that distributes it to those for whom it is intended, but another person. But as Christ is called “the Wonderful,” He is indeed wonderful in this respect, for although He died to secure the blessings of the will, He rose again to hand these blessings to “the heirs of salvation.”
The names of the legatees are in the will, and when the Spirit quickens them to life they are anxious to know if their names are in the will. At a time of persecution, when public preaching was forbidden, the Lord’s people had to gather in some secluded spot among the hills to worship God, and the enemies sent troopers to hunt and punish any that would be seen going to these meetings. There was a godly young woman who went to one of these meetings, and the troopers met her, who, suspecting that she was going to the place of worship, asked her where she was going. She answered: “My elder brother died and left a large legacy to his friends, and the will is to be read to-day, and I am going to see if my name is in the will.” As the troopers did not understand what she meant, they allowed her to pass on. Do you come to church when the Gospel is preached, like that woman, anxious to know if your name is in Christ’s will?
When Christ distributes the legacy, what does He give? He gives Himself, who is infinitely greater than the other parts of the blessings. He gives faith to receive Him. He gives peace with God and peace of conscience. He gives full and free pardon. He gives joy unspeakable and full of glory. He gives the Holy Spirit to impart all these blessings. In a sentence, He gives grace and glory. When a legacy is left by men it is given in shares to the legatees—more to some than to others. But Christ gives the whole to every believer. Each one has a whole Christ for himself or herself, and a whole heaven also. To use an illustration: every man in the world has benefit of a whole sun, and not part of it merely—a whole sun to warm him and a whole sun to enlighten him. So it shall be in heaven, and although there are degrees in glory, every one of the redeemed will have to say, “I have a whole heaven.” One on earth may say, “I have a whole sun for myself,” and another may say, “So have I, too.” In like manner it shall be in heaven.
Some men who were very poor and destitute in this world, became very rich by legacies; but Christ’s legatees were most poor of all. They were rich when God created them, but they lost all their wealth in a moment by sin, so that they were,
spiritually, very poor indeed. But Christ having bequeathed a large legacy to them, they are now richer than can be told in words. This legacy raised them from “the dust and the dunghill, and set them among princes, even the princes of His people.” As Christ is theirs, all blessings are theirs.
During their time on earth they are described in Scripture as poor, and often they have reason to say with the Psalmist, “I am poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me.” They are often poor in their own experience, but not in what they have a right to. This reminds me of a saying of the great Dr. Kennedy. He said, “The vessel of your rights is now as full as it shall be in glory, though the vessel of your case may be quite empty.” However, what they have a right to they shall be put in full possession of at the end.
Although the blessings of “the will” cost Christ so much, they are free to sinners, “without money and without price.” You cannot have the blessings without Christ Himself. Many would like to have the blessings who are unwilling to receive Christ in the offer of the Gospel. Dr. Duncan, when a professor, was an elder in Dr. Moody Stuart’s church, and one Sabbath Dr. Moody Stuart was preaching from the text, “Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters; and he that hath no money, come ye, buy and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk, without money and without price” (Isaiah lv. 1). The minister was comparing Christ to a merchant who was exhibiting his goods for sale, and inviting those present to buy. When the minister came down from the pulpit, Dr. Duncan said to him, “Do you know what I was thinking when you were preaching?” The minister said, “No; what was it?” Dr. Duncan said, “I was thinking that I would marry the Merchant, and then I would have Himself and His goods.” Dr. Duncan knew what he said. If you would have Christ’s goods you must marry Him, for you cannot have His goods apart from Himself. It is in union with Christ believers receive all the blessings of salvation. It is by vital union to the vine that the branch receives of the sap of that tree.
In this world it is in the means of grace that Christ gives a share of the blessings of “the will,” and the rest He will give in heaven. They will get the whole in right here, and the whole in possession in glory. If you expect, then, to get any of the blessings of “the will,” be diligent in the use of these means of grace, in private and in public, for they are the wells of salvation, out of which believers draw water with joy. The more they draw, the more they thirst for further draughts, till they reach the fountain-head in heaven, out of which they shall be drinking throughout all eternity without the sense of pain which accompanies thirst on earth. It is in this sense that it is written that they shall neither thirst nor hunger any more. “The Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and lead them to living fountains of waters.”
The means of grace on earth are rivers through which the water of life flows from the ocean above. Ah, to get a sight of Christ, so as to partake of the blessings which cost Him so much, in order to face eternity with holy boldness, “not reckoning the sufferings of the present time worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us” (Rom. viii. 18). Amen.