THE TRANSCENDENT TRUTHS which overwhelm our hearts and surcharge
our spirits are too wonderful for mortal minds to master. They may
easily lead us to extreme views and eccentric ideas, because
humanity is not accustomed to such high altitudes of thought. Like
an engine without a governor, it may whirl wildly, or a watch
without a balance wheel, it may run erratically, because it lacks
control. I have sometimes had to check myself from shooting off at
a tangent when probing the depths and soaring into the heights of
God's latest revelations.
But God has not left us without trustworthy checks for this
condition. His truth is always balanced. This is most marvelously
exhibited in Paul's latest epistles, especially Ephesians. If our
heads are floating in heaven in the first three chapters, yet our
feet are firmly fixed upon the earth in the last three. If we are
seated among the celestials by faith at the beginning, we are
standing in sandals among terrestrials in fact, at the end. Our
blessings are above, but our warfare is below. One does not
contradict the other. Both are true. One must not be divorced from
the other. Let us worship God for the first and walk before men in
the last.
I once supposed no one could possibly go so far as to insist
that we are actually, literally seated in the heavens, yet I have
been severely criticized for my unbelief, because I insisted that
we have members which are on the earth. But there is a tendency in
all of us to "believe" one passage of Scripture so passionately
that we bring it into collision with another. Those who most appreciate the fact
that we were chosen in Christ before the
disruption, are tempted to lay less stress upon prayer for those
who are seeking to make known the secret of the evangel to
unbelievers. I was saved from this only because I had such an
overpowering desire to make the evangel known after I had
rediscovered what it really was.
Incredible as it seems, the insistence on the grand and
glorious truths which come to us through Paul may actually subvert
the faith. We have just read of such a case. The writer insists
that fleshly believers cannot see that we were actually
resurrected with Christ. This, he says, is a fact, hence we will
never be raised and should not look for the Lord's coming, for we
are already seated with Him in heaven! The very same teaching
disturbed the saints in Paul's day. He condemned it unsparingly.
"From profane prattlings stand aloof, for they will be progressing
to more irreverence, and their word will eat as gangrene...who
swerve as to the truth, saying that the resurrection has already
occurred, and are subverting the faith of some" (2 Tim.2:15-18).
May the Lord preserve us from confusing figures with facts. In
spirit we already are with Him, but not in flesh. And this does
not make us fleshly, but spiritual.
May each one of us test our teaching by the rest of
revelation. The deportment of the second half of Ephesians is the
best balance for the doctrine of the first. The tendency to be
puffed up by the transcendence of the revelations can be largely
corrected by our failure to walk worthily as judged by the
corresponding exhortations. The temptation to think that we are
superior to other saints and a distinct body, is checked by the
exhortation to meekness and humility, endeavoring to keep the
unity of the spirit with the tie of peace. When I was among the
Brethren we considered ourselves high above all other saints, a
select company because of our knowledge, yet now, as I look back,
how little we really knew!
We certainly did not realize God's grace. May none who
read these lines lose their balance as we did!
