2.03.04. Mighty to save
IV. MIGHTY TO SAVE.
"Who are kept by the power of God through faith.”— 1 Peter 1:5.
WHAT is done for the heirs while they are here in the body? They are kept Nothing more is needed here than to give a definition of the word and its meaning. There are various kinds of keeping. It concerns us to define exactly what kind is promised here. In the first place, it is a keeping within walls and gates. To this meaning the term is limited by the well-known usage of the original language. But even within these limits there are two kinds of keeping, very diverse in design and effect. Stone walls may close around you either for the purpose of keeping you in, or for the purpose of keeping your enemy out. The first is a prison, the second a fortress. In construction and appearance the two species of fastness are in many respects similar. In both cases the walls are high, the gates strong, and the guards trusty. But they differ in this — that the prison is constructed to prevent escape from within, the fortress to defy assault from without. In their design and effect they are direct and exact contraries. The one secures the bondage, the other the freedom, of its inmates. In both cases it is a keep, and in both the keep is strong: the one is strong to keep the enemy out, the other is strong to keep the prisoner in. In the Greek of the New Testament two completely distinct words are employed respectively to designate these two places of strength. Both terms alike signify to guard; but the one {(fivXaK-q) signifies a prison, the other ((tipovp-q) signifies a fort. The word employed here is not prison, but fort. It is a place strong to preserve liberty, not to take it away. From David downward, the godly in times of trouble have ever found and confessed that God is a strong tower, in which the righteous are safe. In times of persecution the name is best understood, and the thing most valued, when and where war rages, strongholds are desired and appreciated. In this life a Christian is safe; but his safety consists in the protection of a fort. He is neither the slave of a tyrant on the one hand, nor beyond the reach of assault on the other. He is no longer in the kingdom of darkness, but neither has he been admitted yet into the mansions of the Father’s house. He is in a middle region; and in all that region he is safe, but his safety cometh from the Lord.
Before he was converted, he did not get this keeping; and when he is glorified, he will no longer need it. Before he came over to God’s aide, he was not preserved from his enemies; after he is taken to God’s presence, there will no longer be any enemies to be defended from. But all through this middle passage, between Egypt and Canaan, he needs and gets his Redeemer to be a wall of fire round about him. This is the kind and measure of safe-conduct which the King bestows upon the pilgrim: “ I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.” This is precisely what the Mediator asks and the Father bestows.
Some, mistaking the fortress for a prison, refuse to enter it. They give a wide berth to all earnest personal religion, as a dungeon in which, if they should venture too near, they might possibly be immured for life. The enerfiy of souls, taking advantage of this terror, which is natural to the guilty, sends scouts all over the plain through which the pilgrims are marching, who falsely tell them that this stronghold which the King has built for their protection is a prison in which they will be cruelly shut up. If vice and unbelief slay their thousands, ten thousand fall under the false opinion that to come personally to Christ, though necessary for safety at the end of life, is to dwell in a prison through its course. Believe not this false testimony.
“Godliness is profitable unto all things, having the promise both of the life that now is and of that which is to come.”
Whereby are the heirs kept? By the power of Ood, Omnipotence is pledged on their behalf. But it is a different exercise of divine power from that which is exhibited in creation. It is specifically described in Php 4:7 : “ The peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” This is a most interesting and instructive definition.
It tells both that in God which he holds them with, and that in men which he holds them by. In him it is “ the peace of God “ that takes hold; in them, it is “ the heart and mind” that it seizes. God’s peace streaming forth through the Mediator, and wrapping itself round the heart and mind, — behold the specific exercise of divine power by which the heir is kept for his inheritance.
Through what means are believers kept? Through faith. The cause is God’s power; the manner, through our believing. Men are not kept from falling into sin precisely as the worlds are kept from falling away into unlighted space. Both effects are produced by the power of the same God; but there are diversities of operation. In the case of those coursing worlds, it is power on the one side and nothing on the other; it is simple omnipotence. With all their bulk and all their brightness, they lie like clods in the law of God. Worlds were made by God’s word; but man was made in his image. Renewed man, living and sensitive, feels his Creator’s hand around him, and responds by a reciprocating grasp. This feeble people have no strength, but they make their nest in the Rock of Ages. A believer is not like a god on the one hand, and not like a clod on the other. He does not save himself; but neither is he saved by mere omnipotence. He stands in the middle between these two. He is like a piece of matter in its weakness, but like God in having an intelligent will to choose and refuse. Equally with inanimate matter, he is indebted to divine power for his upholding; but unlike it, he knows his need, and gladly casts his burden on the Lord. God holds him up, and he trusts in God.
Take a glance at these two points now, in their union and relations. They are the two sides, the upper and the lower, of one salvation. The double seal is elsewhere exhibited with both its inscriptions in view: “ The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity “ (2 Timothy 2:19). He hath done all things well. He acts as becomes himself; and he exercises also the faculties which he has imparted to his creatures. Nothing unnecessary is introduced, and nothing is left undone. Both on the heavenward side and the earthward side salvation is secure. The strongest thing in heaven and the strongest thing on earth are entwined into each other to bear up a believer, that he may not in time of temptation drop away. The strongest thing in heaven is the power of God, and that on high holds fast a Christian; the strongest thing on earth, removing mountains if need be, and overcoming the world —the strongest thing on earth is man’s faith, and that below makes fast a Christian. If one of the least of these should begin to say, Oh! wretched man that I am, my faith is weak; some day the adversary will gain an advantage over me, and I shall let’ go my hold, — the reproof and encouragement are ready here. It is not by your faith that you are kept, but by God’s power. Behold, he that keeps Israel, he slumbers not nor sleeps. Again, if the subtle temptation is injected into his heart. If God keeps me by his power, I need not be at the trouble of keeping myself, — he will find in this text a scourge ready plaited to his hand wherewith he may drive the tempter out. My God, who keeps me, keeps me through my own faith. He gives me himself to lean on; but he expects me to lean on himself. If I in carelessness or presumption neglect to hold, I fall, and my perdition is my own deed. But in such a case the purpose to escape the trouble of holding, on the plea that omnipotence is enough, is already evidence that this soul has no part in the salvation of Christ. He is a God, not of the dead, but of the living.
If the soul lives, it will grasp its almighty Protectors arm; and if it does not grasp, the fact is evidence that it lives not yet. The mother holds her infant, when danger presses; but the infant, if it is living, also grasps the mother. If it is dead, it does not; and if it does not, it is dead. It is the mother’s hold of the infant, and not the infant’s hold of the mother, that really secures its safety; but if the infant cease to meet the mother, in time of danger, with an answering grasp, the mother will fling the child away — will hide the dead in the earth out of her sight.