Christ's Absorption in His Father
“When ye have lifted up the Son of Man, then shall ye know that I am He, and that I do nothing of Myself; but as my Father hath taught Me, 1 speak these things.” — John viii. 28.
BELOVED friend of mine told me that on one occa-
WM sion he met an aged lady, a member of the Society
3//g? of Friends, who in her earlier life had known Stephen
Grellet; and he asked her if that notable evangelist
were as good and noble as he is depicted in his
14A biography. This was her reply: “We have many excellent Friends, but no Friend like Stephen Grellet; when he came into a room you felt that he brought God in with him.”
And is not this the distinguishing characteristic of some men, who are perhaps notable for nothing else? Of others we say, How splendid! How noble! How good! Of these we say, How much there is of God in such an one 1 That was a great saying of the Apostle, “They magnified God in me.” And we should not be content with anything less than the ideal set before us by our Lord: “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.”
And this was one of our Lord’s most striking characteristics. His whole being was absorbed in acquiring glory for his Father, and in pleasing Him. At the age of twelve He started to do his Father’s business. At the Jordan He submitted to baptism that He might fulfil his Father’s plan. At the well of Sychar He confessed that to do his Father’s will was both meat and drink. He called all those his kinsfolk who set themselves to 168 Otbriat’s Absorption in “Iis J^atljer.
do the will of his Father. The only witness He cared for was that which his Father bore to Him (v. 32; viii. 18). The name in which He came was the Father’s (v. 43). He professed that all the attraction wrought by Him upon men was due to his Father’s agency (vi. 44). He was sent by the Father; He lived by the Father; He could do nothing of Himself; the life He had was given, so also was the authority with which He executed judgment (v. 26, 27; vi. 57). He spoke only as the Father taught Him (viii. 28). He could dispense with all human help, because the Father never left Him alone (viii. 16, 29). To honour Him, to please Him, to work his works, to live in his love, to perform his commandments, to show good works from Him, to glorify his name, to divert the attention of men to Him — such was the passion of his life (viii. 29, 49; ix. 4; X. 17, 32; xii. 49, 50; xiii. 31). He ascribed both words and works to the indwelling of the Father (xiv. 10). He avowed his intention to answer prayer that the Father might be glorified (xiv. 13). And, as his hour approached when He must pass through death to glory, from the lowest of the one to the highest of the other. He only wished for glory that He might shed it back again on Him; “Father,” said He, “glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify Thee” (John xvii. i). And in the ages yet to be we are told that He will deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all (i Cor. XV. 24).
There is much for us to learn here. We choose for ourselves aims and ends too subsidiary, too low. The conversion of the unsayed, the building up of the Church, the extension of the kingdom of God, are in themselves worthy and glorious objects; but they are not the very highest. They do not include it, though it includes them; as the planet does not include the sun, but the sun it. Aim at the planet, you miss the sun; aim at the sun, and you include the planet. There is a purpose, foreshadowed in the life of Jesus, the sweep of which is so wide, the march of which is so majestic, the depth of which is so infinite, as to comprehend all other motives, and to be worthy of an endeavour which, though we approach towards it through infinite ages, must yet for ever be far “03f tto ilcputatiott.” 169
beyond us. And this is the intention, that God may be pleased and glorified and magnified in our bodies, whether by life or death (Phil. i. 20). There are three stops to this.
I. We must make ourselves of no reputation. — This is what our Master did. He carefully avoided needless publicity, and never courted notice. Indeed, He chose obscurity for Himself, that men might be compelled to ascribe the marvellous results, which were patent to all eyes, to God.
The leper was to tell no man (Matt. viii. 4); the blind men were straitly charged not to make Him known (ix. 30); whilst the paralyzed man was yet feeling the raptures of new-found health, Jesus stole away from the eyes of the crowd (John v. 13); when the people were about to make Him king. He escaped from them, and went away alone (vi. 15). His brethren were well aware of this trait in his character, and urged Him to abandon it; but, in spite of all, He went to the feast, not openly but as it were in secret (vii. 10). It was enough for Him to fall into the ground and die, and to accept any title of opprobrium with which his foes chose to brand Him (Matt. x. 25; Luke vii. 34).
It is a hard lesson; but one well worth our while to set ourselves to acquire. Let us, too, choose rather the shady than the sunny side of the street. Let us be content to be accounted nothing. Let us lay our reputation down beneath his feet, as of old they put their garments beneath the hoofs of the ass that bore Him. So only shall we cease to intercept from Christ any ray or glory which may accrue to Him to garner for his Father.
The last thing that some of us are willing to forego is our reputation. Not that it is wrong to be anxious to maintain our good name, so far as our doing so may adorn his holy Gospel; but that we are often anxious to maintain it as an end in itself, and altogether apart from the glory of Jesus, and the claims of entire surrender. It is not easy to look up into the face of the Master, and say, “If it be thy dear will, I am willing that my name should be cast out by men as evil, and my reputation trampled in the dust, whilst I am counted as the off-scouring of all things, despised and rejected of men.”
But it is men like these who, during their life, were accounted vile and worthless — men like Joseph Alleine, and John Bunyan, and Charles Simeon — who shine now with undimming beauty in the firmament; whilst their persecutors’ names have been written in the dust, or are preserved only in connection with the sufferings they inflicted on God’s saints.
II. We must take upon ourselves the form of the SERVANT. — The household slave who does the most menial service, and washes the feet of the guests, was the chosen type to which our Lord conformed Himself in the upper chamber on the eve preceding his death. Some are proud of their humility, and will stoop to lowly offices to excite admiration. But there was nothing affected here. The men that beheld the lowly deed felt that it was the natural outcome of the holy heart that throbbed in his breast.
It is probable that none of us can stoop to such a depth as He did. He that has ascended far above all heavens to reign could descend to lower depths than all beside to serve. Still it well becomes us to imitate this lowly office; a task, however, which will be impossible for us to fulfil unless we are so utterly absorbed in our devotion to God in Christ, that we come to feel no office too mean, no service too servile, no ministry too trifling, to render to Him or his. Service like this is a fruit which can only be plucked from trees which have been planted and are tended by the Spirit of God.
III. We must become obedient unto death. — Until our eyes are anointed with the eye-salve of the Holy Spirit, we have no conception of how full the New Testament is of exhortations to death. On three different occasions our Lord insisted on the necessity of a man losing his life. Frequently He spoke of his cross as inevitable for Himself and his disciples; whilst the Apostle of the Gentiles discovered that he must be ever bearing about in his body the dying of Jesus, and fining up that which was behind-hand of the sufferings of
he Lord.
It is a searching question for most of us, N’a7’e you died? Of course we died in the death of our Lord, so far as the purpose and intention of God are concerned; but have we, by the eternal Spirit, ever really and practically drunk of his cup, and been baptized with his baptism, had fellowship in his sufferings, and been made conformable unto his death? Death is no child’s-play. It is impossible not to be aware of it, when it has become the experience of the soul. There has to be a moment of choice, when one elects to take the hand of Jesus and step down with Him into the valley of the shadow; trembling as to the flesh, but glad in the inmost heart. We then yield to death our intellectual conceptions of truth, our warm and vivid emotions, our keen ambitions, our members that are upon the earth; not making ourselves die, but accepting death wrought in us by the life of the risen Jesus through the grace of the Holy Spirit; not vaunting our death, but dying, which is a very different matter; not inventing methods of self-crucifixion, but accepting the stem discipline of his cross in all the providential circumstances of our lot and according to his inworking. So only can we bring glory to God.
What a touching picture is that of the intercourse between John Tauler, the celebrated preacher, and the humble peasant, Nicolas, of Basle. “Know,” said the simple-hearted friend of God, “that you must needs walk in the path of which our Lord spake to the young man ; — you must take up your cross and follow our Lord Jesus Christ in utter sincerity, humility, and patience; you shall set before you the sufferings of our Lord, and contemplate your own life in the mirror of his. And so doing, without doubt, the eternal Prince will look down on you with the eye of his good pleasure, and will not leave his work undone in you, but will purge you still further as gold in the fire.” Is it to be wondered at that after two years of lonely converse with God in this attitude, Tauler entered on a ministry which has never ceased in bringing glory to God?
It is a great mystery, of which each one of us may say, “Not as though I had already attained, or were already perfect, but I follow after to apprehend.” May the Lord Jesus Himself teach us what this means, that, as we have been together in his death, we may be together in his resurrection, not only hereafter, but now; that having ventured, not merely to look into his grave, but to tarry there for three days and nights, we may pass through it and upwards into a life which shall be absorbed in no other aim than the glory of God, and shall bring forth abundant fruit to Him whose way is through the sea, and his path in the great waters, and whose footsteps are not known — save by those who dare to follow Him through the dark night, led by his hand down the shelving beach, whilst the waters stand on either side, and thunderstorms roll heavily above. This is the shortest passage to abundant life, and to glory to God in the highest