12. The question as to the old man

The question as to the old man This now leads us to the following point, the unsettled question of Isaiah 38:1-22. You may have thus been blessed. The doors opened. The Holy Spirit known and owned in the assembly. The immutable value of the precious blood known. Joy, and bowing, and worship in public. Gathered to take the Lord’s Supper as it is written. Testimony in the world. Abundance of fruits.

You may know the privileges and responsibilities of the porter — the parcel-carrier for Christ. You may have been preserved through long years of the siege of the city, within the exclusive walls. Great victories of faith and prayer. And yet there may be the unsettled question of Isaiah 38:1-22.

’In those days [days of such victories] was Hezekiah sick unto death’. We now come to the inner experiences of the soul — a soul that has not yet learnt the death of the flesh. What a sentence on the old man: ’Thou shalt die, and not live’. But Hezekiah prayed: ’I beseech thee, O Lord, remember how I have walked before thee in truth’. Very sorely did Job try this, but it would not do. Neither would it do for Hezekiah; no, there he lay, with his face to the wall; and he wept sore. The Lord is very pitiful. He heard those prayers, He saw those tears, and He granted a new term of life. He also assured him of full deliverance of the city, and He gave him a remarkable sign, that the Lord would do this thing which He had spoken. ’Behold, I will bring again the shadow of the degrees which is gone down in the sun-dial of Ahaz, ten degrees backward’.’He restoreth my soul’.’If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me’.

We speak of the sun rising, or going down; as to fact, it is the earth that has turned from the sun. So with our souls. Our constant tendency to depart from the Lord is like the diurnal motion of the earth. The Lord is ever the same, as we always find, when He restores our souls. Will you read Hezekiah’s own account of his experience in learning this unsettled question (vv. 9-20)? His heart almost sank in despair. Is it not very striking, after such public testimony for the Lord? He said: ’I shall not see the Lord, even the Lord in the land of the living’. Indeed, at such a time, such is the sense of the vileness of the flesh. And Satan now suggests the terrible thought, that afflictions prove that God is against us. Hezekiah said: ’He will cut me off with pining sickness; from day to night wilt thou make an end of me’. The dreadful working of unbelief. ’I reckoned till morning, that as a lion, so will he break all my bones’. Oh, what chattering, and what mourning! ’Mine eyes fail with looking upward: O Lord, I am oppressed, undertake for me’. Was it not just so with Job? ’I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes’. Is not this the very condition of a quickened soul under law? ’For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin’ (Romans 7:1-25). However earnest the desire of such a soul to keep the righteous requirements of the law, yet it has no power. ’For I know that in me (that is in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not’.

Hezekiah said: ’Behold, for peace, I had great bitterness’. Behold, reader; until the question of the old man is settled, for peace what bitterness of soul you have had. Yes, bitter herbs indeed. You love the Lord and you long for holiness; but, oh, the bitterness, the loathsome flesh. Did I not hear you saying: Surely I must be a hypocrite. What did that deep groan say: Shall I ever see the Lord? Are not all these afflictions a proof that He is against me? How I loathe, abhor myself! I am oppressed — undertake for me! Oh, wretched man that I am — no better, no better — who shall deliver me from the body of this death? This lesson must be learnt. And what is the answer? With Hezekiah it was: ’What shall I say? He hath both spoken unto me, and himself hath done it’. With Paul it is the eye turned from wretched self, the old man, to Christ, and then the joyful exclamation: ’I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord’.

What a deliverance, when we learn the answer to the unsettled question, as to the old man! He has both spoken Himself, and He has done it. Christ has been fully judged for us, made sin for us. In the likeness of sinful flesh, and by a sacrifice for sin, God has condemned sin in the flesh. Thus we accept the death of the old man, as crucified with Christ and buried with Him in death. Judicially there is the end of I.No longer I, but Christ. I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. He has spoken it — He has done it.

There is generally a little more sobbing at the funeral of the old I. ’I shall go softly all my years, in the bitterness of my soul’, said Hezekiah. No, not so, Hezekiah! Not so, deeply exercised soul! You will have higher thoughts. Sweetly now the Spirit whispers in the heart: ’But thou hast, in love to my soul, delivered it from the pit of corruption; for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back’.

Dear reader, it is true, quite true — rest in it. Oh, think of the love of God in delivering you from the pit of corruption. Had He left you to your wretched self — ah, the pit, the pit. Thanks be to God. Now a little further discovery for you. It is blessed to be brought to the foot of the cross — yes, to the very grave of Christ — dead and buried with Him. This is the answer to the old man: death, and the grave of Christ. But do not be too sure that that is all — that you are to remain there. No. ’For the grave cannot praise thee; death cannot celebrate thee; they that go down into the pit cannot hope for thy truth’. Is not this also most true? If Christ be only dead for us; and if we are only dead, and even buried with Him; all is in vain. ’If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins’ (1 Corinthians 15:17).

Hezekiah exclaimed: ’The living, the living,he shall praise thee, as I do this day’. Yes, we are not only dead with Thee, Lord Jesus, but risen in Thee. ’The living, the living, shall praise thee, as I do this day’. Thus, through the death of Christ, we have passed through death into life. Old things are passed away, all things new, and all of God. What a new creation!

It is not now bitterness of soul, and doubts, and misery. No, said Hezekiah: ’The Lord was ready to save me; therefore we will sing my songs all the days of our life in the house of the Lord’. Oh, that is far better; yes, let us sing His praise with adoring hearts.