John Dick
Christ upholds the Church throughout all generations by bringing in a constant succession of members. The great promise of eternal life which He has made to His followers will be performed in another world; their interest in His salvation secures them against the sting of death, but not against death itself. Each in his order lies down in the grave when he has completed his term of obedience and trial in this life. We observe the havoc which is daily made among the ranks of His disciples when those who professed the truth and showed their sincerity by the steadfastness of their faith, and the devoted zeal with which they served Him, are removed one after another into the house of silence where there is no work, or wisdom, or device. Then we might be tempted to expect the most gloomy result and we naturally exclaim, “Help, Lord, for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men” (Ps 12:1).
But while the individuals perish, the race remains. Instead of the fathers, He takes the children. The places of those who have fallen are supplied by their own families, and more frequently by strangers. Thus several acts of His royal authority and power are exerted. Having received from His Father the gifts of the Spirit after His ascension, He bestows them on those whom He is pleased to qualify for preaching the gospel. This is the great means of gathering subjects into His kingdom of grace or, in the words of an apostle, “for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ” (Eph 4:12,13).
Roman Catholics and some Protestants boast of the regular succession of their clergy from the Apostles; but the latter must acknowledge that, as the Church of Rome was the medium of communication, it is a very corrupt channel in which power has been conveyed to them. We know that, in every age, men have been found who have willingly consecrated themselves to the work of the ministry, and their labours have been crowned with blessing. Notwithstanding the opposition which it may encounter, Christ preserves the gospel in a particular place till all the elect there are converted. And He sends it into any country where He has designs of mercy to accomplish, in spite of the efforts of men and devils to exclude it.
The power of the Roman Empire, which had conquered most of the then known world, could not hinder the propagation and triumph of the truth. And the 1Taken, with editing, from Dick’s Lectures on Theology, vol 3. He lived from 1764 to 1833.
obstacles to its entrance, or its progress, in India, China and Turkey, will give way when the time to favour those regions has come. The words of God about the temple are equally applicable to the opposition with which the spiritual kingdom of the Messiah has to contend: “Who art thou, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain: and he shall bring forth the headstone thereof with shoutings, crying, Grace, grace unto it” (Zec 4:7). He exerts a secret power upon the heart, which the strongest prejudices and the stubbornest habits of sin are not able to resist.
As the kingdom of Christ is not of this world, His servants do not fight for Him; and it is only in a figure of speech that the Church is represented as “terrible as an army with banners” (Song 6:4,10). Our religion forbids the use of external force in its propagation and defence, and leaves that to Antichrist, who has recourse to the sword in the absence of arguments, and terrifies into compliance those whom he has failed to persuade. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but they are not therefore ineffective. They are mighty through God to pull down the strongholds of sin, to cast down lofty imaginations, and to bring every thought into captivity to Christ” (2 Cor 10:4,5).
There is no one who may not become a subject of this kingdom, however remote he may now be from the character of a subject, however hostile his sentiments and feelings may be. He may undergo a change as sudden and wonderful as that of Paul, who, from being a persecutor, became an apostle and a preacher of the faith which once he destroyed” (Gal 1:23). The grace of our exalted Redeemer operates silently but surely; it always gains its end, and daily He adds to the Church such as shall be saved” (Acts 2:47). “All they that be fat upon earth shall eat and worship: all they that go down to the dust shall bow before Him; and none can keep alive his own soul. A seed shall serve Him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation. They shall come, and shall declare His righteousness unto a people that shall be born, that He hath done this” (Ps 22:29-31).
Gospel justification is a change of state and condition in the eye of the law and the Lawgiver, whereas gospel sanctification is a blessed conformity of heart and life to the law and will of the Lawgiver. The first is a relative change from being guilty to being righteous; the other is a real change from being filthy to being holy. By the one we are made near to God; by the other we are made like Him. By being justified, of aliens we are made children; by being sanctified, the enmity of the heart is slain and the sinner becomes not only a faithful, loyal subject, but a loving, beautiful child. Robert Bragge An humble soul . . . can never be good enough, it can never pray enough, nor hear enough, nor mourn enough, nor believe enough, nor love enough, nor fear enough, nor joy enough, nor repent enough, nor loathe sin enough, nor be humble enough.
Thomas Brooks