Lecture VI · The Saint's Life—Christ

THIS verse gives the ground for the apostle’s statement immediately preceding, ‘Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be by life or by death; by 4, for ‘to me to live is Christ ;’ by death, for ‘to me to die is gain.’ To the first part of the sentence I wish to draw your attention now.

It is plain, from the antithesis, that the meaning of ‘Zo Zve’ here is not, as often in Scripture, ‘to have spiritual life,’ considered simply by itself,—that life to which there comes no death, according to the great word of the Lord, ‘ Whosoever liveth and believeth in Me, shall never die.’ The word is to be taken in its ordinary sense of ‘ physical existence.’ But the physical life of the apostle, ‘the life which he lived in the flesh,’ as he elsewhere designates it, was interpenetrated by the higher life of love to God and rest in Him, and was thus made truly vital to the noblest ends. This is substantially what he means by saying, ‘To me to live is Christ, —the mode of expression, however, being such as to indicate, with the utmost terseness and point, that that higher life is only ‘in Christ.’ Whether we think of its source, or its nourishment, or its objects, we see everywhere the Saviour. ‘The apostle means that his supports, his joys, his aims in life, are all exhibited, all summed up, in the one word ‘Christ’ He means that, if we ask what is the spring of his happiness and of his patience, what is the secret of his abounding energy, what is the object of his supreme love, what is the purpose to which he devotes

his mental and bodily powers, that one word answers all the questions. That Paul intended his words to be taken with this fulness of significance, will not be doubted by any one acquainted with his history and writings. These supply a most ample commentary on his statement here ; and it seems to me that an interesting and satisfactory mode of expounding the passage will be to try to gather together the most prominent of the illustrations given in that great commentary. If intelligently and candidly gone into by us, an examination of what, with this most illustrious Christian, personal Christianity meant, is surely well fitted, through the influence of the Blessed Spirit, to be helpful to us in regard to our own religious life. Wh

en Paul said, ‘To me to live is Christ,’ he meant that for him to live was faith in Christ. He says, ‘ This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation ’—words evidently expressive of the deepest personal conviction—‘ that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.’ ‘God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ!’ ‘I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day.’ He felt himself to be a sinner, ‘the chief of sinners.’ He felt, and testified, that ‘the wages of sin is death.’ But he knew, and rested in the knowledge, that ‘the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.’ Recognising in Jesus a Saviour all-sufficient, strong with the strength of Godhead, tender with the sympathy of manhood; holding His invitations to be sincere, ‘If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink ;’ ‘Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest ;’ convinced that God’s honour is pledged to the certain, complete, everlasting salvation of all who believe in Jesus,—Paul renounced every other refuge, cast his burden on the Lord, and trusted absolutely in Him.

It was his resolution, too, humble but firm, to maintain this confidence. The pardoning, saving grace of God in Christ he

knew to be a rock on which he could stand safe amid the swelling waters of judgment; for whom the Lord loveth, He ‘loveth to the end.’ ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?’ is the apostle’s cry of holy exultation. ‘I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.’

Paul’s faith in Christ had regard to Him, not merely as a Saviour from the ‘wrath to come,’ but as a Helper and Deliverer in all circumstances now, for this also he saw to be included in His promises. He that did the greater would not leave the less undone. When the clouds of trouble overspread the sky, thick and dark,—when ‘the sea wrought and was tempestuous,’—the apostle, remembering that ‘ the government was upon His shoulder’ who once hung upon the cross for us, could entertain the fullest assurance that all was well, and could ‘hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.’ In the dreariness of desertion, at a time of utmost need, by earthly friends whom he had loved and confided in, he could still trust in the Lord,—still believe that ‘ /e is the same yesterday and to-day and for ever,’—still bear testimony, loud and clear, that none who look to Him are put to confusion. ‘At my first answer, no man stood with me, but all men forsook me: I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge. Notwithstanding, the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me, that by me the preaching might be fully known, and that all the Gentiles might hear ; and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion. And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto His heavenly kingdom ; to whom be glory for ever and ever.’ In times of bereavement by death, he was enabled to raise his weeping eyes and bleeding heart to Him who had compassion on the widow at Nain, and who wept at the grave of Lazarus. Believing that Jesus

died and rose again, he knew that ‘even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him.’ In personal illness ᾿ς and pain he was strengthened to be patient, nay, even to ‘ glory in his infirmities, that the power of Christ might rest upon him.’ And when the darkness of the valley of the shadow was already around him,—when the roar of the river was already sounding in his ear,—for even thus far his writings enable us to follow him, and see his religious experiences ;—sweet and clear, above the noise of the waters, was heard by him the voice of Jesus,

* Fear not, for I am with thee ; be not dismayed, for I am thy God: when thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee.’ ‘I am now ready to be offered,’ says the man of God,

‘and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight ; I have finished my course; I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.’

The apostle’s statement means further, that for him to live was love to Christ.

This springs immediately from faith in Him. We see Him by faith to be true God, the only worthy object of the supreme affection of His creatures,—and we cry, ‘Whom have we in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that we desire _ besides Thee.’ We see Him to be God revealing Himself in a dight of surpassing amiableness and mercy, ‘full of grace and truth ;’ for our sakes humbling Himself to a created nature, to a life of lowliness and hardship, to the endurance of association _ with sinners, and of the contradiction of sinners against Himself, to a death of pain and shame,—and believing this, we cannot choose but love Him, who ‘loved not His life unto the death’ for us, but ‘washed us from our sins in His own blood, and made us kings and priests unto God.’

How intense was Paul’s affection for the Saviour, is obvious to every reader of his history or writings. We cannot help seeing that the utterance of his heart, written legibly on all the ‘issues of life,’ is, ‘This is my Beloved, and this is my Friend.’ In his exquisitely beautiful prayer for his converts at Ephesus, we have the feelings of his own heart towards Jesus most vividly delineated: ‘ For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith ; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend, with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.’

From Paul’s love to Christ sprang of necessity love to Christians,—a feature of his character which strikes even the most cursory observer. All who were dear to Jesus were dear to him. To his eyes a halo of beauty and attractiveness shone around every believer, however poor or mean in the esteem of the world.

It was natural, too, for one who so loved the Saviour, that his desires should go out with strong yearning towards that day, as a supremely happy day, when he should see Him he loved no longer ‘as through a glass, darkly,’ but ‘face to face.’ To Paul this expectation was emphatically ‘that blessed hope.’

Again, the statement before us means that for Paul to live was fellowship with Christ.

God’s moral creatures can have true life, wisdom and energy _ and beauty of spirit, only through communion with Him. We feel instinctively that the very highest grandeur of character is at once intimated and explained, when we read of Enoch and of Noah, that they ‘walked with God.’ Jesus said to His disciples, ‘ He that hath My commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth Me; and I will love him, and will manifest Myself to him. Abide in Me, andI in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine, no more

can ye, except ye abide in Me.’ Here was the secret of Paul’s Spiritual power. He ‘abode in Christ.’ ‘I live,’ he says, ‘yet not I, but Christ liveth in me;’ ‘When I am weak, then am I strong,’ for ‘the Lord said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Christ’s life in the believer acts in accordance with the laws of our mental and moral constitution ; and thus it is in the measure in which we intelligently and lovingly commune with Him by the prayer of faith, that through Him we are wise and strong and happy. The frequency with which the expression ‘in Christ’ meets the readers of Paul’s writings, shows how vividly the . great apostle ever had before his heart Christ in His union to His saints, how real a thing this union was felt by him to be, and how influential. To those who do not love Christ,—to not a few, alas ! one cannot but fear, even of professing Christians, if they would define to themselves their feelings on the subject,—such words as Paul employs regarding fellowship with the Saviour, must seem unintelligible utterances of fanaticism. He speaks ina _ tongue which is strange to the men of the world,—the language of heaven. If there were a country where all the inhabitants _ were born blind, a visitor who should tell them of the beauties οὗ nature which the light revealed to him would be heard with derision. Even so, ‘the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him ; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.’ ‘The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him ;’ and they know what it is to enter by faith into the presence of their divine Father, to hear their Saviour’s voice, and to rejoice in the light of His countenance. Blessed, thrice blessed are they, my brethren, who know from personal experience that Paul’s most impassioned declarations on this head are but the words of truth and soberness. Blessed are their eyes,—for they see the Altogether Lovely.

Yet once more, the apostle’s words intimate that for him to e was devotion to the service of Christ.

The modes in which love shows itself vary, of necessity, according to the relation between him who loves and the object of his affection. Love to Christ, which, as we have seen, inevitably results from true faith in Him, finds its proper manifestation in obedience ; for in Him faith recognises the Supreme Lord.

‘If ye love Me,’ He Himself said to His disciples, ‘keep My commandments.’ His commandment is that His people be holy. His aim in giving Himself for us was, ‘that He might sanctify and cleanse the church with the washing of water by the word; that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not haying spot or wrinkle, or any such thing ; but that it should be holy and without blemish.’ In the Apostle Paul, accordingly, we see the most earnest and persistent effort after conformity of character to the will of God. Impelled by the mercies of God, he presented his whole life, in all its relations, as a sacrifice of thanksgiving, holy and acceptable, feeling this to be ‘ reasonable service. He strove prayerfully and vigilantly to be no longer

‘conformed to this world, but transformed by the renewing of his mind.’ Amid the profoundest humility and sense of remaining sin, he could yet truly say, ‘I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection:’ ‘ This one thing I do,—forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark, for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.’

While thus ardently longing and striving for advancement in personal holiness, he had an intense zeal also for the promotion of the kingdom of his Lord in the world. This indeed was to his contemporaries, and is to us in reading the record of his life, the most conspicuous feature of his character. His glowing love to his Saviour aroused in him a great love and pity for his fellow-men, for whom, as for himself, the Saviour died. A sublime passion for the salvation of souls possessed his heart, and gave form to his life; so that, devoting himself unrestingly to missionary labour, ‘from Jerusalem and round about unto Illyricum he fully preached the gospel of Christ.’

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rom the discharge of the commission which Christ had given him no temptation attracted him, no persecution daunted him. * Preaching Christ, warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that he might present every man perfect in Christ Jesus,’ he ‘approved himself in all things as a minister of God, in much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in dis-_ tresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings,—by pureness, by knowledge, by long-suffering, by kindness, by the Holy Ghost, by love unfeigned, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honour and dishonour, by evil report and good report.’ ‘I go bound in the Spirit unto Jerusalem,’ he said to the elders of Ephesus, ‘not knowing the things that shall befall me there, save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me; but none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.’ __ How single-minded and absolute this devotion ! 2

We have thus examined in some detail the character of the by Apostle Paul. Love to Christ, rooted in faith in Christ, _ nourished by fellowship with Christ, bore rich fruit of devotion + to the glory of Christ. This was what he meant by saying, _ *To me to live is Christ.’ And certainly, as the connection intimates, by such a life the grace and power of Christ were gloriously ‘ magnified.’

Such, in substance, Christian brethren, whatever variety there may be in form, is the life to which you and I are called. We have not Paul’s wonderful natural endowments ; but the grace which made him morally and spiritually the man he was, is offered to us as freely and abundantly as it was to him. Nothing but our own narrowness of heart prevents any of us from being able to say, out of as full an experience as the apostle, ‘I can do all things in Christ, who strengtheneth me.’

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All of us who are truly His, are in some degree living a life which in its main features resembles Paul’s ; for the faith that unites to Christ certainly awakens love to Him, leads into fellowship, impels:to service. Let it be the earnest prayer of us all, and the object of constant thoughtfulness and vigilance and effort, that our lives may be made ever moré and more truly sublime. Without Christ, in whom alone God is so known that the knowledge gives peace and impels to devotion, we have no adequate object of life. Without Him, our highest energies remain unexercised, our grandest capacities unsatisfied. Without Him, the thought and love and purpose of an immortal spring up and are exercised, with no conscious or ennobling bearing on immortality, but only to waste and perish. ‘To each one of us now He is, if we will,—if we will, He will be for ever to each,—the Eternal Truth, wherein thought can never find its limit ; the Uncreated Beauty, whereof affection can never tire; the Perfect Rule, whereunto each created will may perpetually conform itself, yet never exhaust its task,’ ἢ Dear friends, may God grant to every one of us to be able to say with growing fulness of significance, ‘To me to live is Christ !’

1 Dr, Liddon.