By REV. DONALD CAMPBELL, Edinburgh, retiring Moderator of
Synod, May, 1954.
“Then said Jesus unto them again, Peace be unto you: As my
Father hath sent me, even so send I you” (John xx. 21).
* Circumstances prevented Mr. Campbell preparing this sermon for the Magazine until recently.—Editor.
THESE words were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ to His disciples on the evening of the day on which He rose from the dead. Earlier in the day Mary Magdalene was sent to convey the glorious and joyful news of the resurrection to the disciples, who were at the time wondering how the mystery of the empty grave could be explained. Some of them, after being told by Mary that the body of Jesus was no longer there and that angels told them He had risen, visited the scene of these extraordinary events and were satisfied that the things related to them were true. Thereafter they returned to their room, and, while they were assembled there, the doors being shut for fear of the Jews, the Lord Himself appeared unto them saying, “Peace be unto you.” We do not wonder, though, after they recognised Him they were glad. The words of the text are partly a repetition of the first salutation (v. 19), and they concern certain aspects of the life of that Church of which Christ Himself is the Head and Saviour. It is to these particular aspects we wish to draw the attention of the Fathers and brethren. Let us therefore consider the text as—
- It is a description of the Christian Church.
- As it concerns the peace of that same Church.
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As it defines its mission in this world.
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In this description of the Christian Church we have before us the parties which first constituted that Church. The parties were Jesus and “the disciples.” There are some characteristics of this small body of men—a body endowed with such far reaching influence as its future history shows—which claim our attention (a) its perfection,
which is derived from the fact that every member of it was genuine. Genuine in the sense that each member was divinely called to this place of high honour and dignity. There was no impostor among them inasmuch as they were all effectually called and also called to be apostles of Jesus Christ. The Head of the body was there, and that after He was made “perfect through suffering.” He had by this time made atonement for the sins of His people. Being alive from the dead, His perfection was absolute, not even the sins of His people could be imputed to Him, for He had given satisfaction to Divine Justice for them. Christ was charged with blasphemy because He claimed to be the Son of God, but that charge is now refuted by the very fact that He is risen from the dead. “And declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness by the resurrection from the dead” (Rom. i. 4). Consequently, Christ had the right to bestow grace and apostleship on the disciples, and this He did on those whom He greeted with the salutation, “Peace be unto you.” To deny the Lord Jesus Christ His place as Head of the Church is a challenge to an authority Divinely bestowed upon Him and the futility of such a challenge may well be concluded from the Divine decree, “He must reign until all His enemies are made His footstool.” As the only Mediator between God and men, He is perfectly qualified for all the duties of this supremely high office. God has exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name, that to the name of Jesus every knee should bow and every tongue confess. The doctrine concerning the headship of Christ over His Church is a prominent doctrine of the Christian faith and one for which the Church contended uncompromisingly in Scotland as the history of the “Ten Years’ Conflict” shows. The other members of the Church who were there present with the Lord proved afterwards they were worthy of the trust placed in them “everyone in his own place.”
The second (b) characteristic of the Church as described here was the imperfection. Though perfect in one sense yet it was imperfect in another. This imperfection was mainly of an official and numerical kind, i.e. it concerned the filling of offices which the Lord had founded in the Church. We know for certain that on that occasion there were at least two vacant places. Judas Iscariot had gone to “his own place” and Thomas was absent from the company of the other apostles at the time. There were twelve apostles, and the Church in the Revelation is brought before us as governed by the twelve apostles of the Lamb. Also in Revelation there were twelve thrones corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel, and each throne occupied by an apostle, judging the twelve tribes. That advanced state of development we have here in the embryo. We have the twelve thrones but not twelve apostles. That this was deemed an imperfection is evident from the action of the apostles after the Lord ascended to the Father. They took steps immediately to fill the office which was rendered vacant by the departure of Judas. Here we see the Church of God emerging
in its Christian form from the Mosaic form bearing these two characteristics, perfection and imperfection: the perfection derived from the state of its membership, the imperfection from the number of its officers. These characteristics of the Church would seem to have been retained to the present day. “The harvest is great, the labourers are few.”
(c) Another feature of the Church’s form as described here is the smallness of its beginning. The efficiency, however, of the Church depends not on its size but on its nature. It is in the nature of the Church of Christ to grow until the whole world come under its influence and the forces necessary to that end were present in that body of men, headed by the God-Man, met somewhere in Jerusalem on the evening of the day He rose from the dead. All power in heaven and on earth was in the possession of their Head and He delegates to them powers which only fools would ignore. He endowed them with a spiritual armour which proved powerful to the pulling down of the devil’s kingdom however powerful and long established. The state of development which the Church of Christ is in is another proof of its capacity to overcome all forces opposed to its progress. The leaven leaveneth the whole. This process of development has characterised the Church of God in the world from its very beginning. It may well be understood from the first promise given in the Garden of Eden that God’s purpose of mercy towards many of the human race contained in it the Divine determination to destroy the kingdom of the devil. The foundation was laid in the promise, and from that day the edifice has been in course of erection. Under the Mosaic order the Church assumed a more formal aspect and was governed by the institutions then imposed by the decree of the God of Abraham. The Mosaic order was, nevertheless, symbolical and, therefore, not permanent though indispensable to the life and work of the Church while it had binding authority. This order was to continue until the coming of the Messiah. Then that which is symbolical must give place to that which is real. At the death of Jesus the veil of the temple was rent; an indication that the end of the ceremonial form of worship, as hitherto observed in the Church, had come to an end. Now the Church of God emerged, led by its Head and Saviour, from the old dispensation in its Christian character and endowed with powers which no man could bestow. The Lord breathed on them the Holy Ghost, saying, “Whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them, and whose soever sins ye retain they are retained unto them.” It is only when the Church acts in conformity with and in the spirit of the gospel that Christ acknowledges her authority, and to make her authority effective He must acknowledge it.
- We now consider the text as it concerns the peace of the Church. In considering this aspect of the Church’s life, let us notice who the author of this peace is. The author is the Lord Jesus Himself. On another occasion He said to the disciples, “My peace I leave with you.”
Not only is He the author of the peace but He is the peace Himself as Paul shows in his epistle to Eph. ii. 14-17. He reconciled unto God in one body by the cross “both,” that is Jews and Gentiles. While the abolishing of the enmity between Jews and Gentiles, as well as the bringing of the Gentiles into the fellowship of the Church of God is an important factor, the basic element in this peace of which Christ is the author and substance is the reconciling of men to God. He is not only the Prince of peace but the propitiation for the sins of the world. There is, therefore, no place for either Jew or Gentile who rejects Christ as the Mediator and Saviour. The history of the Jews since they rejected Jesus as the Messiah is an awful proof of this. Peace is through Him: “having peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The three constituent parts of this peace would seem to be (a) reconciliation between God and men; (b) the peace between the members of the Church; (c) peace between man and man, and this might be extended to embrace within its compass peace between nations. God promised Israel national peace—Lev. xxvi. 6: “And I will give peace in the land”; I Kings ii. 33: “Upon David . . . his seed . . . house and throne shall there be peace forever from the Lord.” “When a man’s ways please God He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him” (Prov. xvi. 7). In order to lay claim to these promises concerning peace one must believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing is more evident from the Word of God than that this peace is essential to the joy and comfort of the Church.
The Church of Christ is cosmopolitan, having within its membership Jews and Gentiles. This distinguishes it from the Church in Old Testament times. This fusion of races into one Church became possible after the middle wall of partition was removed, and it was removed by the death of Christ. The enmity between the Jews and the Gentiles was derived from the fact that the former had privileges over the latter, but now in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek . . . ye are all one in Christ Jesus. It is the aim of the enemy to deprive the Church of God of the peace which Christ has bestowed upon her. There are, therefore, two reasons why the Church should endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. The first is that this peace is essential to its public testimony. “Glory to God in the highest, peace and good will towards men” is the very essence of the Gospel, which the true Church of God is commissioned to preach. The second reason is that the enemy is determined to disturb the peace of the Church. This he attempts to do in many ways but particularly in his capacity as the accuser of the brethren. He would move one member of the Church against the other. Hence the duty devolving on the Church not only to accept the peace which the Lord bestows upon her but also by all lawful means to endeavour to preserve that peace. How can this be done? It can be done by every member performing his own proper function in the body of Christ. The Church is an organism in which every believer has his own peculiar place so that the peace of the Church of God depends on the behaviour of her individual members.
If a member overstep his province or neglect his duty within his own province, he disturbs the peace of the Church, and until proper order is restored forces are present in the Church of Christ which tend to disintegrate rather than bind up. Hence the duty of every member within the Church to maintain the peace, and this is done by every member paying due attention to those duties which God has enjoined upon him. The Word of God should be his guide in discharging all his duties, which may be divided into two classes: (a) immediate; (b) ultimate. The former include those towards the members immediately related to him, e.g. office-bearers in the Church of Christ have peculiar duties towards each other. The guiding principle should be “preferring one another in love,” each treating one another with becoming respect. For a member to despise another and deny him the place assigned to him by the Lord in His Church is wrong. Our ultimate duty is the glory of God, and He is glorified when we do our duty according to His holy word. By adhering to the Word of God in spirit and practice we guard ourselves against false peace. We must not be at peace with that which is contrary to the law of God. When we are against sin we establish the peace of the Church.
The enemy’s attack on the peace of the Church has more or less taken, in the course of her history, two forms (a) from without. Cain killed his brother Abel because his own work was evil and his brother’s good. Abel had peace with God through the blood of the Covenant, and he would have lived peaceably with his brother if he had been permitted. This form of attack was repeated in every generation of the human race but more especially since the days of the apostles. Since then there have been hosts of martyrs from all parts of Christendom. The more orthodox branches of the Church suffered most. In some generations many lost their lives in defence of the truth and others lost their property, while the reputation of others was violently attacked (Heb. xi.). The sufferings of the Reformers is an example of this form of attack, and so is the persecution of the Covenants in Scotland and the Puritans in England. The Church in our day has had little experience of this form of attack, but the enemies attack on the peace of the Church takes another form, and we have not been ignorant of Satan’s devices in this respect; (b) from within. Somehow the enemy finds his way as an angel of light into the Church, and once he is in it is not easy to cast him out. The presence of the enemy necessarily disturbs the peace of the Church of God. This he usually does by introducing, through his emissaries, something calculated to change the existing ecclesiastical order. The history of the Church of Christ furnished us with many examples of this form of attack. The concision in the Apostolic Church, Arianism in the early Christian Church, Papal supremacy and again the controversies in the Protestant Church are all examples of the damage Satan can do by waging war on the Church from within. We cannot depart from this aspect of the subject without drawing attention to the war waged within the
Church in Scotland between Episcopacy and Presbyterianism culminating in the establishment of Presbyterianism in the Scottish Kirk; again the struggle over the Headship of Christ over His own Church, which ended in the Disruption movement of 1843 and the long controversies in the Free Church, which terminated in the passing of the Declaratory Act and the Rev. Donald Macfarlane’s noble Protest in May, 1893, against that infamous Act. All these are indicative of the presence of evil forces being active within the Church, and it is worthy of note that these derived their power from without. When unscrupulous men failed to impose by what they alleged to be constitutional means, their views on the Church, they had recourse to unconstitutional means in the form of civil court orders. It is of paramount importance to bear in mind the fact that Christ’s peace to the Church is essential to her public testimony. “Her message is Glory to God in the Highest; peace and goodwill towards men.” A house divided against itself cannot stand. If, therefore, the Church has nothing better than cavilling and strife to offer she will assuredly fail in her effort to convert the world to Christ. When a man’s ways please God He will make even his enemies to be at peace with him. In their effort to please God the members of the Church of Christ must endeavour to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. This leads me to consider—
- The mission assigned to the Church of Christ in this world. In the text we are given two aspects of it (a) that to which it is compared; (b) the authority for it. It is compared to Christ’s own mission into this world. “As the Father hath sent me even so send I you.” This we find also in the 17th Chapter of John, v. 18: “As Thou hast sent me into the world even so have I also sent them into the world.” That He was sent by God into the world that the world by Him might be saved is the basis of the Christian faith, and that this would be the nature of His mission is evident from the Old Testament, e.g. Isaiah Ixi. v. 1: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me: because the Lord has anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek: he has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound,” and after He came into the world He was anointed by the Holy Spirit according as it was written of Him. The Apostles also received the Holy Ghost in order that they might be witnesses unto Him both in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost parts of the earth (Acts i. 8). A great preparation (as the verb used implies) preceded the coming into the world and this preparation was of a twofold nature—(a) as it concerned Himself in the matter of the preparing a body for Him; (b) as it concerned the Church in the matter of preparing her to receive Him. It should be noted, however, that the mission of Christ and the mission of the Church, though they have much in common, are not in every detail identical. As John Calvin said, “Christ did not send the Apostles to atone for sins and to procure justification as He was sent by the Father.” Accordingly He makes
no allusion in this passage to anything which is peculiar to Himself but only appoints ministers and pastors to govern His Church on this condition that He alone keeps possession of the power, while they may claim for themselves the ministry.
The Father sent Christ into the world that He might be the propitiation for the sins of His people, and He is now at the right hand of God, having obtained eternal redemption for us. Before Christ ascended to Heaven He commissioned His disciples to go and preach the Gospel to all people. The content of that Gospel is that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. From the following the Church derives authority for her mission “I send you.” He gave the Church apostles, prophets and evangelists for the work of the ministry. He gives both the men and the authority for the work of evangelising the world. It is, therefore, of paramount importance for the Church to be convinced that the men who labour in word and doctrine have been chosen by the Lord, and that the doctrine they preach is the doctrine of Christ our Saviour. Christ sent out apostles before His death to preach repentance and the coming of the kingdom of heaven, but after His resurrection He ordained these apostles to be His ambassadors, giving them grace and apostleship in order to establish the kingdom in this world, not only during their own lifetime but in all ages till the end of time. Though the apostles are no more in the world, the word of the Lord is, and this is the Word that is preached by the Gospel to all unto whom the same comes. The range of the Church’s mission is “all people,” and the effort that demands would be altogether beyond her to perform if the Lord would not help her. Because it is the will of God that the gospel of the Kingdom be preached to all nations and that He will call His own out of all these, the Church is not committed to a hopeless task in her endeavour to bring the Gospel to all people. May God hasten the time when all ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God. AMEN.