"CHRISTIANITY is nothing if it be not supernatural." It is only where that is fully realised and acted on that the true Church can flourish. Let us try and understand what the word teaches us in connection with our study of the state of the Church.
It teaches us, first of all, that Christianity is a religion that came down from heaven and has still unceasingly to be received from there. It is ever dependent on the extent to which its believers yield themselves to the immediate operation of the Divine power. It points to God the Father and that unceasing action by which He works out everything according to the counsel of His will even to its minutest detail. He is the God Who worketh all in all. It points to Christ the Lord to Whom all power has been given that, just as He wrought His mighty works on earth, He may now live out and may live over again in His people the life that He lived on earth, and in the power of His resurrection do even greater works than He then did. It points to the Holy Spirit, proceeding unceasingly from the Father and the Son, and continuously working out in us God's plan according to the exceeding greatness of His power in us who believe.
Just as Israel was brought out of Egypt by a mighty hand and an outstretched arm amid great and mighty wonders, so now still the Church is upheld and guided by the omnipotent action of the Three-one God. And that not only in regard to the great events of her history or special interpositions in her experience, but in the care for every individual life, for all the work that is done from hour to hour by the feeblest of His servants. Christianity is nothing if it be not from the beginning to the end, through all and in all, the hidden but direct and mighty energy of the living God continuing and working out the great redemption which He accomplished in His Son. Beyond all that He has given in Creation and Providence, is that special exercise of the power of the Divine life in its infinite holiness which ever worketh in us that likeness to Himself which is pleasing in His sight.
The word teaches us more. We learn from it what the disposition and attitude ought to be of man towards God His Redeemer -- absolute and unceasing dependence. The more faith in the revelation of the supernatural, as we have it in God's Word, is brought into exercise, the more we shall learn that the first of our virtues is to be a deep fear of God, a holy reverence in the presence of His glory, a consciousness of our impotence under the sinful accursed state which marks everything that is of nature. Humility and a sense of nothingness is the posture that becomes us. Faith in what God can do, will do, is always doing, and is waiting to do still more abundantly, becomes the unceasing habit of the soul, as unbroken in its continuity as the breathing of our lungs. What at first appeared a difficulty becomes a deep joy, the spontaneous surrender of the heart to the mighty working of God and His life within us.
To some the supernatural may appear unnatural. It is simply because they have never understood how the supernatural may become in the true sense most natural. As natural and joyous as our breathing, can be the movements of our spiritual life when God is allowed to take perfect possession. But for this there is needed the consciousness of how little our natural mind or heart can take in this Divine working. We need to learn that to know what the Divine power can work in us is beyond the reach of human wisdom. As supernatural as is the redemption and its almighty action in our life, must be the revelation of that redemption. From beginning to end the work of grace is all, and always, and in all things, the presence of God working and dwelling in us.
The word teaches us still more. The more fully we yield ourselves to it, the clearer will be the discovery that all the defects in our Christian life and in the Church around us are owing to this one thing, that we have not taken our true place before this glorious God to work out in us what He has promised. In the Church the question is evermore coming up, What can be the reason that Christianity has so little true power and so little fulfils all the wonderful promises that it makes? Read all the discussions that are going on, notice carefully all the plans and efforts that are suggested for enabling the Church to exercise the power it ought to have, and to influence men, either the masses of nominal Christians, or the millions of the heathen, and you will everywhere find how the thoughts and plans centre in what man's wisdom can devise and his zeal and energy can accomplish. Everywhere there is the thought that if men will only keep up their courage and do their work faithfully, all must come right. How seldom the great truth is insisted on, or pressed home, that the Holy Spirit is our only power. An entire and absolute surrender to Him is our only hope. How seldom one hears from the leaders, to whom the Church looks for its guidance, the clear and unceasing summons: Brethren, pray. We must pray more; we must pray without ceasing; Prayer will bring blessing. The measure of prayer is the measure of power. Every deeper insight into what Christianity is, into what our daily life ought to be, into what the ministry is and needs, will all lead us to the one deep conviction: Christianity is nothing except it be supernatural. Our Christian life and work must be a failure, except as we live deeply rooted in the power of God's inspired Word, in the power of the Holy Spirit, and in the importunate prayer to which the promise of the Father will most surely be given.
All this brings us to the last lesson our word is going to teach us: There is no hope for the restoration of the Church, no hope of its being lifted up into the abundant life that there is in Christ, and so to be fitted in holiness and strength for the work that is so urgently calling, of making Christ known to every living creature, except in our return to God. Church of Christ! GIVE GOD HIS PLACE. And take your place of absolute dependence, of unbroken fellowship, of unceasing prayer, of living, confident faith, and see if He will not turn and bless us above all that we Can ask or think. "The one real lack to-day is a lack of spiritual life; the one great need, the realisation of the constant presence and power of the Holy Spirit." "Back to Divine wisdom, to the living power of Jesus Christ, back through prayer to the source of all power, must be our watchword."
How strange that what God meant to be an inconceivable privilege and honour, and the secret of all our strength for the work He has given us, absolute dependence upon Himself, -- just as His Son lived in it, and went to the grave to prove how surely God will work mightily for one that gives himself up wholly to His will, -- how strange that this should cost us such trouble to understand and believe! Let the thought teach us the impotence and the incapacity for spiritual things which is natural to us, and bring us in a new surrender to accept of the birthright that belongs to us as His children -- the power of a Divine life in Christ through the Spirit.
What we have seen of the state of the Church, as revealed in its neglect and indifference to Missions and its decline in membership, leads us to the inquiry as to the real cause and the true cure of the evil condition. It is all comprised in the one word. Let us hold it fast in our further study. We .are naturally so inclined to listen to anything that calls forth our activities, and so ready to undertake the fulfilment of Divine commands in our own strength, that unless we are very watchful we may be deceived into the putting our hope on what will turn out to be nothing but human devices. Supernatural! -- Give the word its full force. Let us cultivate with our whole heart such a sense of God's power going to work in us, such an attitude of dependence and prayer and waiting upon God, such a deep consciousness that God will work in us and the Church around us above what we can ask or think, that the deeper we enter into the grievous need of the Church and the world, the stronger may become the assurance that God is preparing us for deliverance. But remember the one condition, -- an habitual, unceasing, absolute dependence upon Him. He must do all. He will do all for them that wait on Him.
_________________
CHRISTIAN
|
