Chapter III: Part 3

Read through the eighteenth Psalm as the words of the Lord Jesus. It is an inspired description of the awful conflict of the powers of darkness against the Son of man, when he tasted death for every man. Have you ever wondered why there were not given to us in the four Gospels more intimate glimpses of the human heart-throbs of Jesus? Have you wished that you might enter somewhat into the meaning of Gethsemane, rather than to have him go into the garden alone? Read in the eighteenth and other Messianic Psalms the human heart-throbs of the Son of man.

“I love thee, O Jehovah, my strength.
Jehovah is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer;
My God, my rock, in whom I will take refuge;
My shield, and the horn of my salvation, my high tower.
I will call upon Jehovah, who is worthy to be praised;
So shall I be saved from mine enemies.
The cords of death compassed me,
And the floods of ungodliness made me afraid.
The cords of Sheol were round about me;
The snares of death came upon me.”

HIS Secret of Victory

Read on in the Psalm the description of this conflict with the supernatural powers of evil, and find in it the secret of our Lord’s victory over them. _He did not count upon any strength in himself. He looked to another._ He was a man, and if there was to be any strength in him for victory over that supernatural enemy, that strength must come from another. The secret of our Lord’s victory was just this: “I will put my trust in him.”

The Holy Spirit made no mistake in his selection of Old Testament passages when he wished to show that it behooved this Saviour of ours “in all things to be made like unto his brethren,” and that “in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted” (Heb. 2:17, 18).

Jesus lived the Victorious Life, not because he was God, but because he was perfect man; he lived as God planned that man should live. In a very true sense (though the statement would need certain qualification), our Lord took to himself no more advantage in the matter of winning victory over temptations than have we, his brethren.

Why He Emptied Himself

But _he_ was _God_. Yes, all the fulness of the Godhead was in him, or he could not have made atonement for the sins of his brethren. But remember that Christ Jesus emptied himself. This does not mean that he ceased in any sense to be God. But there was something that he had as God, in glory with the Father, that he did not have as the God-man living here on earth. He was rich up there; he was poor down here (2 Cor. 8:9). Of what did Jesus empty himself? He emptied himself of the glory that he had with the Father before the world was. The full meaning of that none of us can fathom. But here again there is a very practical application to our everyday living of this profound doctrine of the humiliation of our Lord:

He emptied himself of that which would have prevented him, in the days of his suffering on earth, from being a true Son of man.

Jesus voluntarily gave up that inherent power that was his as God, and lived his life as God intended that man should live his life, _in utter dependence on a power not his own_.

When man fell, his sin was a declaration of independence of God. He thus made impossible the living of a true man’s life, for an essential part of a man’s life is to live moment by moment in utter dependence on another, his Maker.

That is why our Lord constantly pointed _away from himself_. “The Son can do nothing of himself” (John 5:19). “I can of myself do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is righteous; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of him that sent me” (John 5:30). “I do nothing of myself, but as the Father taught me, I speak these things” (John 8:28). “The words that I say unto you I speak not from myself: but the Father abiding in me doeth his works” (John 14:10). Our Lord here speaks as the Son of man, not coming in his own name, or living in his own name, but in the name and by the power of Another dwelling within him.

The Son of Man’s Watchword

The secret of the Son of man, plainly written across the record of his earthly conflicts, is surrender and faith. “Not I, but the Father.” And “as the Father hath sent me, even so send I you” (John 20:21).

The Son of man’s watchword is, “I will put my trust in him.” Only man can say that. Glorified God cannot say that.

Whenever man says, “I will put my trust in Him,” and means it, all the omnipotence of the risen and indwelling Lord of resurrection life is available for him, and victory is certain.

SERVING WITH “THE MIND OF CHRIST”

“Truly he was the servant of all,” said a friend of J. Hudson Taylor’s as he concluded a narration of some incidents in the life of the great missionary in China. Hudson Taylor was like his Master. Only in so far as the service of any of us Christians is after the example of our Lord is it real service.

In the study of “How Jesus Lived the Victorious Life,” it was seen that Christ emptied himself in order that he might live as a man and open the way for his brethren to win the victory _in the same way that he won it_. Jesus lived down here as God intended a man should live――in utter, moment by moment, dependence upon Another, and in the last study it was pointed out that our Victory motto must be the motto that Jesus lived by: “I will put my trust in _Him_.” It is our purpose now to view this truth in particular relation to the service of a Christian, and to examine more closely the meaning of Christ’s “emptying” that we may know wherein he was our example in service.

It is not primarily the acts in the life of Jesus that furnish us our example in service. Many of the recorded activities of Christ, the things he did and the things he said, are by their very nature,――their uniqueness,――deeds and words that we cannot imitate. It is the mind of Christ we are to have. Then shall we have the secret of the spirit and the power of his service.

The great passage in the second chapter of Philippians on the humiliation of our Lord deals with profound mysteries of the eternal world, yet it touches in the most vital way the everyday life and service of the Christian. It concerns the sending of Christ Jesus out of Glory with the Father into the world of men and sin. How startling, then, that our Lord should take such a sublime event, which goes too deep for utterance, and bring it to our very doorsteps, when he says: “As the Father hath sent me into the world even so send I you into the world.”

“Have this mind in you which was also in Christ Jesus,” the Apostle enjoins. What is “this mind”? How are we to have it? Paul goes on to describe it: “Who, existing in the form of God, counted not the being on an equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of men; and being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, yea, the death of the cross” (Phil. 2:5-8).

The Mind of Satan

Something of the significance of this sublime passage and the verses that immediately follow, will be seen if we place beside it another picture which also concerns the mysteries of the eternal world and the throne of God. It is found in the fourteenth chapter of Isaiah: “How art thou fallen from heaven, O day star, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, that didst lay low the nations! And thou saidst in thy heart, I WILL ascend into heaven, I WILL exalt my throne above the stars of God; and I WILL sit upon the mount of congregation, in the uttermost parts of the north: I WILL ascend above the heights of the clouds; I WILL make myself like the Most High” (Isa. 14:12-14).

This is a portion of “a parable against the king of Babylon.” In it we have undoubtedly the picture of the great Adversary of the Lord Jesus Christ, Satan, the highest of created beings; here is a glimpse of his fall and the secret of it. So striking is the contrast that it is hard to escape the conviction that the Spirit intended this to be related to the passage in Philippians that tells of our Lord’s emptying. This contrast is one that runs from beginning to end through the Scriptures, which are, indeed, the record of the conflict between these two beings, the Son of God who became also the Son of man, and the “son of the morning,” who became the son of uttermost darkness.

Pride Incarnate and Humility Incarnate.

The Son of God was the Word, who was in the beginning with God, and was God. But though he possessed that equality he did not esteem it a thing to be grasped after, but he emptied himself of the glory that was his own. The other glorious being, exalted though he was among the hosts of God, was not in the form of God; he was but a creature of the Most High. But he essayed to grasp the equality that was not his: “I will make myself like the Most High.” Mark now the terrific climax in each of these descriptions. The Son of God in becoming the Son of man took step after step in his humiliation, lower and lower, until he touched the bottom in the cursed death of the cross: “becoming obedient unto death, yea, the death of the cross.” Then immediately follows this word: “Wherefore also God highly exalted him, and gave unto him the name which is above every name; that in the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Satan sought to climb higher and higher until his ambition reached after the Godhead: “I will make myself like the Most High.” Immediately follows this word: “Thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the uttermost parts of the pit.”

There is more in the passages, however, than these two tremendous contrasts of humiliation and attempted exaltation, and then of exaltation and uttermost destruction. Jesus told his followers that he was sending them into the world as the Father sent him. His great Adversary likewise sends men into the world to carry out the spirit of his ambition. So he came to our first parents in the garden, and the temptation was that they should imitate him in seeking to be like God. They fell before the temptation and the sin was, essentially, a declaration of independence of God. From that day on every sin, whether the sin of an unbeliever or the sin of a born-again Christian, has resulted because of this independence of God. The conflict of that eternal world has thus been projected into the world of men. The Son of God and the Prince of demons are contending for this world, and the principles underlying the conflict are clearly set forth in these passages that have been before us.

Satan’s Coming Man

This conflict is to have a climax. The sin of man will head up in the Man of Sin. This is he who shall come in the spirit and power of Satan, the false Messiah. Jesus forewarned of his coming, when he said: “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not: if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive” (John 5:43). The Isaiah passage describes not only the scene in heaven when Satan reached after the throne of God, but it foreshadows the Man of Sin on earth, “the son of perdition, he that opposeth and exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God, setting himself forth as God ... even he, whose coming is according to the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceit of unrighteousness for them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God sendeth them a working of error, that they should believe a lie” (2 Thess. 2:3, 4, 9-11).

Man’s Final Religion

The spirit of Satan, then, finds its climax in the worship of man, rather than the worship of God. Here is the heart of all sin. This is the central lie of Satan by which he deceives men. The final religion of man, before the coming of the Lord Jesus to earth again, will be the religion of humanity, the worship of man as the only deity. Paul brings all men who reject God’s revelation under this condemnation: “They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever.”

We have been speaking of the great conflict of the ages between Jesus and his Adversary, the conflict that underlies the raging of the nations to-day, as Satan works out his plan to put the creature in the place of the Creator, to send that one, inspired of Satan, who will come in his own name and who will be received because he comes as man. But this same conflict goes on in each individual life.

Every man, because God has given him free will, must make his choice as to which of these he will follow, the Son of man, or the Man of Sin. Even the Christian, who has made his choice, will find constantly before him the possibility of serving in the spirit of his Lord or in the spirit of Satan.

When the Christian is not serving after the example of the Lord Jesus, let him ponder this well,――that he is serving after the spirit of Satan. How startled must Peter have been when the Lord not only told him he savored of the things of men (the spirit of Satan), but actually addressed him as Satan, knowing that it was the great Adversary he was meeting again in one of his loved disciples. Very often is it true of Christians that “ye know not what spirit ye are of.” Is it too much to say that much of the service that is being offered to-day in the name of Christ, by followers of His, is mixed with the spirit of the evil one?

Testing Our Service

What is that spirit of the evil one? It is written large in the two words that stand out in that Isaiah passage: “I WILL.” Set these words against those other words: “Not my will, but thine.” Now let us set these words against our own Christian service and answer the question as to whether it is after the example of the Son of man. What is it to have the mind of Christ?

In three respects is there danger that our Christian service shall lack the mind of Christ. We may work zealously _in the energy of the flesh_. The old self-life is not reckoned dead, crucified with Christ. If we have the mind of Christ we must become conformed to his death, even as he was obedient unto the death of the cross. There are thousands of Christians who are doing good things but doing them in the energy of the flesh, without the Spirit of God. If we would have the mind of Christ we must have that old self-life crucified, for Christian service done in the flesh cannot please God.

Consecrated Christians who have really surrendered the old self-life may work zealously _in the energy of the soul_. There is the danger of forcing results that look good but are really not the product of the Spirit of God. Service after the example of Christ is done wholly by the power of Another. He said “not my will, but thine,” and was ready to hold to this when the following of the will of God seemed to mean failure. There is the danger that Christian workers to-day, lured by the example of the success of the children of the world in their undertakings, will go after the same sort of great, showy results in the eyes of men, in their spiritual matters. This is not after the mind of Christ, but partakes of that other mind which says “I WILL.” The mind of Christ will care for no results except those that are the product of the Spirit. And in securing these the eyes will not be upon results but upon the Master, to seek his will in every matter of service, leaving with him the results and the rewards.

Defilement of the Spirit

The third danger, most subtle of all, and pervading all, is pride, the exaltation of the human. And this is the temptation that Satan often successfully uses upon the spiritual Christian who has gotten beyond serving in the energy of the flesh or in the energy of the soul. We must cleanse ourselves of all defilement of flesh _and of spirit_. Serving “in lowliness of mind, each counting other better than himself,”――this is to have the mind of Christ. Serving in love that envieth not, that vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, that _seeketh not its own_,――this is to have the mind of Christ. It is at the other pole from pride.

How are we to have the mind of Christ? Not by looking at him as an example and trying to imitate him. There is real hopelessness in singing

Trying to walk in the steps of the Saviour,
Trying to follow our Saviour and King,
Shaping our lives by his blessed example....

For that is just what we cannot do――shape our lives by his example. When we are ready to stop “trying” to do this, and will yield ourselves that we may be conformed to his death, then our trying may be changed to trusting, we can “leave the miracle to him,” and returning to the beautiful hymn whose first verse makes a bad start, we can sing with new meaning the opening lines of the third verse:

Walking by faith in the steps of our Saviour,
Upward, still upward, we’ll follow our Guide.

THE SECOND COMING AND VICTORY

The next great event in God’s program for the redemption of the world is the coming again to the earth of the Lord Jesus Christ. The last chapter of the Old Testament points forward to his second coming. The last recorded words of the Lord Jesus are his words of promise, “Surely, I come quickly,” in the last chapter of the New Testament. The last recorded prayer of God’s people in the Word is the answer of their heart to this promise, “Even so come, Lord Jesus.”

The last word of the Old Testament is the word “curse,”――“lest I come and smite the earth with a curse.” The central word of the last verse in the New Testament is “grace.” He will come with the judgments of his curse and with the revelation of his grace.

Are You Ready for His Coming?

Among the many signs that seem to point to the nearness of his coming there is none more striking than the movement of the Spirit in separating the children of God from the things of the world and making them hungry for the things of eternity. There are many sad evidences of falling away, and of increasing worldliness on the part of large masses of professing Christians, but these make all the more notable that deep hunger for victory in Christ and conformity to his likeness which increasing numbers of Christians are sharing. Is this the work of the Spirit in making a little flock ready for his coming? Are _you_ ready?

The coming of Christ is the great incentive to holiness that is held before Christians in the New Testament. “Every one that hath this hope [the hope of his coming] set on him [set on Jesus] purifieth himself, even as he is pure” (1 John 3:3).

There are many motives by which the Lord lovingly urges us to seek complete victory in him. We long for a life of joy and peace that we do not have. We long to be rid of a life of struggle against “besetting sins.” Or we are eager to have power in service and get results for Christ that are largely absent in our experience. By this or that motive the Spirit leads us to an earnest seeking of God’s secret of the life of faith. But beyond all these motives is that supreme desire to be well pleasing to the Lord Jesus Christ, who loved us and gave himself for us. “And now, little children, abide in him; that, when he shall appear, we may have boldness, and not be ashamed before him at his coming” (1 John 2:28).

Boldness Before Him Then and Now

The one way to be ready for his coming, to have boldness and not to be ashamed, is to abide in him. “Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not” (1 John 3:6); to be cleansed from sin and to abide in that cleansing makes us ready for his coming. If we are not enjoying the Victorious Life, which is just another way of saying “abiding life,” we are not ready for his coming. And if we are not ready for his personal coming, we are not ready for his presence in our midst now. That which gives us boldness _then_ is what gives us boldness before his throne _now_ when we come to pray. “Beloved, if our heart condemn us not, we have boldness toward God: and whatsoever we ask we receive of him, because we keep his commandments and do the things that are pleasing in his sight ... and he that keepeth his commandments abideth in him, and he in him” (1 John 3:21, 22, 24).

If the coming of the Lord is in God’s Word linked so vitally with a life of personal holiness, it is essential that Christians should understand what the Spirit has revealed to us concerning the truth of his coming. It is only at our peril that we neglect it. It is not an accident that most of those who are rejoicing in the Victorious Life are or become deeply interested in the truths of the Word concerning Christ’s coming.

But how shall we know whether our view of his Second Coming is the Scriptural view?

Testing Our View of His Coming

There are two tests that will show with certainty to what extent our belief about Christ’s coming is a vital heart belief such as the Apostles had. The first test concerns more definitely our personal relation to his coming. Is the hope of his coming a real hope for you that makes it the incentive to be ready and makes it a real event to watch for with expectation, as for the return of a loved one?

The second test relates to the whole sweep of God’s purposes of redemption and the part that Christ’s Second Coming plays in them. A right understanding at this point will determine the general plan of activities of the Church of Christ and of the individual Christian in this present day of Grace. How essential then to know God’s thought on this subject, and how idle to suggest that this truth is not of practical bearing on present service. Both the spirit of service and the scope of service are involved, and these two tests show how intensely practical and necessary is the right view of his coming.

The first test has already been considered, and it is seen that the Victorious Life truth is vitally linked with the hope of his coming. The second test of our belief regarding his coming is even more fundamental, and again it will be seen to be closely tied up with the heart secret of the Victorious Life, and with the truth of regeneration as well.

It is a common thing to speak of the doctrine of Christ’s Second Coming as of greater or less relative importance than certain other doctrines; thus, it is pointed out that the Second Coming is mentioned more often in the New Testament than any other doctrine except that of the atonement. It leads to confusion thus to speak of the teachings of the Word as though they could be divided. While it is convenient to study the doctrines separately we miss a great truth if we fail to remember that all these teachings brought to us by the Word of God are connected one with the other and together form a complete unity.

The Second Coming Necessary to the Atonement

The doctrine of Christ’s Second Coming is not a teaching apart from the atonement, but is _necessary to the atonement_. That is, God’s plan of redemption for us cannot be completed apart from the coming of Christ and the events connected with that coming. His coming therefore is essential to salvation. Not that the understanding of the doctrine is essential to individual salvation. A sinner needs to know very little Scripture in order to be saved; when the Spirit has convicted him of sin a single sentence of Glad Tidings will suffice. But it requires the whole redemptive purposes of God to make that salvation possible. And those redemptive purposes include the appearing a second time of the God-man, our Lord Jesus Christ. The importance of our Lord’s Second Coming, then, is exactly parallel with the importance of his first coming and of his present ministry for the believer.

The Word of God presents salvation in a threefold aspect. There is the past, the present, and the future of salvation. “We were saved; we are being saved; we shall be saved.”

The Three “Appearings”

On every side these three aspects of salvation are emphasized in the Word. Attention has frequently been called to the three appearings mentioned in the ninth chapter of Hebrews: “_now to appear_ in the presence of God for us ... now once in the end of the world _hath he appeared_ to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself ... and unto them that look for him _shall he appear_ the second time without sin unto salvation” (Heb. 9:24, 26, 28).

In the three Shepherd Psalms the same truth is shadowed forth. The twenty-second Psalm points to the redemption accomplished on Calvary, and is the Psalm of crucifixion and resurrection; the twenty-third Psalm is a picture of the present resurrection life in Christ; and in the twenty-fourth Psalm we have the picture of the coming King. He is seen in these three Psalms as the Good Shepherd who laid down his life for the sheep; as the Great Shepherd who rose again from the dead, who makes us perfect “in every good thing to do his will, working in us that which is well-pleasing in his sight” (Heb. 13:20, 21); and as the Chief Shepherd who will appear to give the crown of glory to his faithful servants (1 Peter 5:4).

This threefold salvation is sometimes spoken of as justification, sanctification, and glorification: first, salvation from the penalty of sin; second, salvation from the power of sin; and third, salvation from the possibility of sin.

There are three fundamental errors by which Satan seeks to rob of its power this threefold Gospel, the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ in his past, present, and future work.

Discounting Christ’s Past Work

There is the teaching that we are saved from the death penalty of our sins by Christ plus our own effort. This error finds expression in many ways. One mistake, more common in the past generation than to-day, is to consider it presumptuous to be sure of salvation. Now if the work is wholly Christ’s it cannot be presumptuous to be certain that that work is complete and is satisfactory to the Father. Then there is the belief that salvation from death and hell depends on our holding on to Christ, and since we may fail and thus fall away, we are never entirely sure of salvation until death comes or until the Lord comes to claim us. These teachings present a subtle _mixture of works and grace_. If we are saved by grace, if redemption is entirely the work of Christ, then may we indeed have assurance of eternal salvation. In its extreme form this error is pure paganism, salvation by our own efforts. In its more refined and moderate form it keeps Christians from the glorious present assurance of their eternal safety in the Lord Jesus. The safeguard against all these errors is to remember that salvation from the penalty of sin is all of grace. And grace means, Jesus Christ did it all for me. If he did, the work is finished, the work is perfect, and we have a sure guarantee that the purposes of God will be carried out. No one can pluck the saved soul out of the Father’s hand.

Discounting His Present Work

Most Christians are clear on the truth that they are saved by grace. They make no effort of their own to add to the perfect atonement that Christ has made for their sins. But these same Christians when facing the present tense of salvation, the second part of the threefold Gospel, declare that here our own efforts are necessary. We must co-operate with God in fighting sin. We are justified by faith, but we are sanctified, gradually, by struggle. Their error is that they are _mixing works and grace_. God’s plan for present salvation from the power of sin is exactly the same as his plan for deliverance from the penalty of sin. It is all of grace.

The test of the truth of our view as to Christ’s Second Coming and the future tense of our salvation is as infallibly certain as the tests of the other aspects of salvation. For salvation is all of grace, and any view which makes salvation for the individual or for the universe a mixture of God’s work and man’s work, a mixture of God’s grace and man’s effort, is in error.

The Two Views of Our Lord’s Return

There are two views of our Lord’s coming. One is that the Church of Christ through the preaching of the Gospel and by co-operating with other agencies for righteousness, will Christianize the social order and bring in the period of righteousness which the Bible pictures as the Kingdom age. At the close of this period, the Lord Jesus will come to judge the world. This is called the post-millennial view, because the Kingdom age is known as the “millennium,” or the thousand years. The other view is that this thousand years of blessedness, or the Kingdom age, will not be inaugurated until Christ himself comes as King to set up the new order on earth. This is known as the pre-millennial view.

A well known Christian leader who has been very active in the preaching and working for “social regeneration,” gave a message on the task of the Church in the present world crisis, and the problem of the Church in making the world what it ought to be. He announced as his text, “And he that sitteth on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new” (Rev. 21:5). One who heard the message remarked that the speaker after announcing his text, “with two swift kicks kicked the text out of the auditorium, and did not allow it to enter again during his discourse.” For the opening sentence of his message was this: “Can we, the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, make things over?”

God’s Word does not say, “we, the followers of the Lord Jesus.” It says “I”; and the Son of God sitting on the throne of his glory is the speaker. The Word of God does not speak of making things over. It says, “Behold, I make all things _new_.”

Discounting Christ’s Future Work

Here is the fundamental error of the post-millennial view of the Lord’s coming: _it is a mixture of works and grace_.

God’s plan for establishing righteousness in the universe is exactly the same as his plan for establishing righteousness in the human heart. It is all of grace, not of works. The pre-millennial view means the Kingdom age by grace, as the Victorious Life means the Kingdom principles in the individual heart by grace.

Let each Christian earnestly face these two tests of his attitude toward the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Make the Blessed Hope a Vital Power!

If his hope of the coming of the Lord is not an incentive of vital and present power in his life, there is something wrong with his theory. If a Christian believes that it is not possible for the Lord to come for at least a thousand years, or until the period during which Satan is bound has run its course (whether a thousand literal years or not), can he honestly say that the blessed hope of the personal appearing of his Lord is a vital power in the life?

The second test of our view of his coming can apply also to every part of our salvation. Have we the blessed assurance of eternal salvation through the blood that gives us eagerness and power to lead others into the same assurance? Are we rejoicing in all the blessed “present tenses of salvation,” victory by grace through faith? Are we surrounded by his own light in these dark days because we know that the world’s problem is to be solved by grace, by God himself, so that we live “soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ”?

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE AND VICTORY

Christian Science offers a life of freedom from worry or anxiety. It proposes to give the secret of the smiling face in the midst of any sort of circumstances.

Christian Science offers complete freedom from the dominion of sin.

Christian Science offers to make faith a vital and all-pervading force in daily life.

Christian Science offers to give deliverance from the bondage of sickness.

It is not wise for Christians to attempt to meet Christian Science by ridicule and sarcasm. Christian Science is offering to supply exactly the things that the hearts of thousands of church members are craving. It is not strange that many should be investigating its claims. If the indication in a single Christian Science center is a fair criterion, there are thousands of church members daily looking into this supposed “new” teaching to see if they can find a faith with a vital reality in it.

These things that Christian Science claims to supply are just the things that are offered to every Christian through the sufficient grace of the Lord Jesus.

The Victorious Life in Christ is a life kept free from worry or anxiety. Its possessors have the secret of a constant, abiding joy that is independent of circumstances (Phil. 4:6, 7; John 15:11; 16:22).

The Victorious Life, which is just Christ himself in the believer, gives complete victory over sin, without struggle (Rom. 6:14; 1 Cor. 10:13; John 8:36).

The Victorious Life is the life of faith, walking in the Spirit, looking unto Jesus, enduring as seeing him who is invisible, counting the unseen things the eternal and real things (Col. 3:3; Gal. 2:20; John 15:7).

The Victorious Life is a life of prosperity for body as well as for spirit, for in Christ is the supply of every present need, for body, soul, and spirit (3 John 2; Ps. 103:3; Matt. 8:17; Rom. 8:11).

If the fulness of the blessing of the Gospel of Christ were faithfully preached there would be little prepared soil among church members for the springing up of the seeds of “Christian Science.” It is the Enemy who is sowing these seeds and the supreme sign of his subtle work is this apparent likeness to the true grain. What is the fundamental distinction between Christian Science and the Victorious Life in Christ, between God’s truth and Satan’s imitation of that truth?

Error’s Imitations of Truth

Christian Science says: “In nothing be anxious: there is nothing to be anxious about. All troubles are creations of the mind, results of wrong thinking, and the cure for them is to think them away.”

The Word of God says, “In nothing be anxious.” Not because there is nothing to be anxious about. There is. There is that which required the bloody sweat of the Son of God in Gethsemane. But the Word of God tells us that full provision has been made for those wrong things that may well cause anxiety. Back of the word of the Spirit in Philippians, “In nothing be anxious,” is God. Back of the Christian Science word is “mortal mind.”

Christian Science says, “Reckon yourselves dead unto sin: because sin has no real existence, and since it is a creation of the wrong thinking of mortal mind, the way to think it out of existence is to reckon yourself dead to it. As you reckon, as you believe, you are dead to sin, and for you it has no reality or existence.”

Faith Does Not Create Facts

The Word of God says, “Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin.” Not because sin does not exist. It does. Not because sin is not real. There is nothing more real in the universe. But Jesus Christ has met the full measure of the guilt and penalty and pollution of sin, and has completely conquered it. If we are crucified with him, buried with him and risen again with him, as every child of God is, then we are to reckon it true that we are dead unto sin: not because our thinking can change facts, but because God himself tells us to count on a great fact, something that he himself has accomplished; as we reckon that fact true our faith is laying hold of the benefits in present experience of that redemption which God has accomplished. _My faith does not make the fact true._ Faith gives me the benefit of a fact that is true whether I believe it or not. True faith is impossible without something real to rest upon. Satan’s counterfeit faith in Christian Science returns upon itself, endeavors to create facts by thinking them true.

Christian Science says that sickness and death are delusions of the mortal mind. It does not offer a scheme of healing disease but a philosophy to make clear that disease does not exist except as an error in the thinking of mortal mind. Clear away that error in thinking, and the effects of the so-called sickness will disappear.

The Word of God says, “The wages of sin is _death_”; and, “Himself took our infirmities, and bare our _sicknesses_.” Without entering here into the question of the use of remedies, or the limitations to the use of “the prayer of faith” which will heal the sick, let us remember that in Christ there is full provision for sin _and all its results_. He came to destroy the works of the devil. It is certainly God’s highest and first will that his children should be in health of body, not in sickness, if this result can be had without injuring his children in other ways. God’s permission of sickness and premature death among his devoted children must not be pointed to as an indication that it is not his first will that all his children should enjoy health of body. God would have all men to be saved, and has made full provision for their salvation: but not all are saved; God would have all his children abide continually in Christ and be kept from sinning, and he has made complete provision for this: but few are entering into their full privileges of victory; God would have his children free from disease, for he is the God who forgives all our iniquities and heals all our diseases, and in Christ he has made full and complete provision for this: but in his infinite love and wisdom he permits many of his children to continue in suffering of body for longer or shorter periods.

Christian Science Kills Faith

In this contrast between Christian Science and the Word of God it will be seen that the teachings of this “faith” cult make faith impossible. Satan always strikes at the center of things in his attacks on Christians and on the Word of God; so he takes away their faith and that which it rests upon. Again and again in personal interviews with those seeking victory, when the meaning of faith has been explained the answer has come, “Why, that would be just like Christian Science. I cannot make a thing true just by believing it.” With Christian Science, thinking a thing true makes it true, or rather, “thinking right” removes the error which has resulted only because the thinking has been wrong. But real faith rests always on facts. We believe, not in order to make a fact true, but because it is true.

So startling is the parallel between what Christian Science offers and what the Victorious Life in Christ guarantees, that a number who have read articles in _The Sunday School Times_ have written to ask if the Victorious Life teaching and Christian Science were not practically the same. In answer to these inquiries a brief Open Letter was published a few years ago pointing out the difference between Christian Science and “the Victorious Life.” The Open Letter closed with this sentence: “They differ from each other as do food and poison, noon-day and midnight, omnipotence and impotence, life and death, Heaven and hell, Christ and Satan.”

A Christian Science Leader’s Admission

A leading advocate of Christian Science called upon the Editor of _The Sunday School Times_ to protest against this article. The interesting thing about the interview with this cultured representative of Christian Science was his earnest effort to prove that he and his fellow Scientists believed just what Christians who were teaching the Victorious Life believed, and were aiming at the same kind of life. As each point was mentioned there was this apparent agreement, until――mark this――until the vicarious atonement through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ was mentioned. There he frankly confessed that they parted company; they do not accept any atonement for sin.

At a Victorious Life Conference a Christian Scientist girl was prevailed upon to attend a meeting where the subject was the meaning of faith in laying hold of God’s Word that “My grace is sufficient for thee,” and similar words of fact and promise. At the close of the meeting an opportunity was given for those who wished by rising to commit the whole matter of victory to God, trusting him to do it all by grace. To the astonishment of her friends, the Christian Scientist girl rose. She asked them, “Are you surprised that I stood? That is what I have believed all along.” She was accepting it all as good Christian Science. At the close of the period of question and discussion the speaker asked if there were those present who had never accepted the Lord Jesus as Saviour from sin, and did not know salvation through the shed blood of Jesus. At the mention of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, this young woman who had stood up to take a step of faith for victory, rose at once from her seat and left the room.

Here we come to the heart of Christian Science error: it denies the blood, the vicarious atonement for sin. And here is the secret of many unsatisfactory attempts on the part of Christians to live a life of victory. Earnestly seeking to claim the wonderful promises of God’s word, many have failed to understand the meaning of the blood of Christ and to share in experience his crucifixion death, that they might also know the resurrection victory.

A Masterpiece of Imitation Victory

Christian Science is the devil’s great masterpiece of imitation victory. It is the vain attempt to know the resurrection life without the crucifixion death. It is the attempted robbery of the life pictured in the twenty-third Psalm, the life of still waters and green pastures, the life in which all the needs of the sheep are met by an all-powerful and all-loving Shepherd. But while attempting to claim the twenty-third Psalm, the Christian Scientist blots out the twenty-second Psalm with its agony of Calvary and its resurrection victory. We must be one with the Lord Jesus in his death and burial before we can be one with him in resurrection life. The blood of the Lord Jesus must be kept always at the heart of the teaching and the experience of the Victorious Life. The reason for much disappointment in the living of the Victorious Life is because there is what may be called a Christian Science acceptance of the teaching without a real foundation being laid in the blood of the Lamb.

First of all, the foundation must be laid in a clear understanding of the meaning of the new birth. Those who have had experience in dealing with hungry Christians seeking the life of victory in Christ, have been amazed at the number of such earnest inquirers who have no clear conception of what it means to be born again, or to be saved by grace.

Can You Tell a Sinner Just How to Be Saved?

The following question has been put again and again to audiences consisting of Christian workers and Bible students: “How many here are sure you could tell an inquirer exactly what he must do to become a Christian and receive the new birth?” The result of this question is nothing less than startling. As many as half and two-thirds in these audiences have not raised their hands to indicate that they could explain the way of salvation. But if one cannot tell an inquirer how to be saved, neither can he tell why he himself is sure of salvation. And until one knows the word regarding the real meaning of sin and the atonement, there will be only disappointment in trying to get hold of the experience of victory in Christ.

The steps of salvation are perfectly simple. First, one must know that he is lost. Otherwise he cannot need a Saviour. To believe that the Lord Jesus Christ died in my place, I must believe that I am such a sinner as deserved death. “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). Joined with this is the word, “The wages of sin is death; but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23). I am saved by grace through faith (Eph. 2:8); faith is believing that all my sins were put on Jesus and he paid the penalty for them (Isa. 53:6); now I have been born again and am a child of God; and I know it not because I feel it, but because God’s Word says so (John 1:12; 1 John 5:9-13).

A clear understanding of the blood will save us from a superficial idea of sin and its awfulness. If the cross of Christ is ever in view we shall have God’s estimate of sin, and there will be a clear realization that it required the whole sacrifice of Calvary to accomplish the miracle of victory. In a testimony meeting at a Victorious Life conference a Christian was explaining that his chief difficulty had been with “those little troubles,” such as irritation, impatience, pride and such things. “You mean those devilish sins,” the leader of the meeting suggested. There is not likely to be that earnest, agonizing heart cry, “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death,” so long as we think of sin as little troubles to be overcome. All sin is devilish, and the Son of God is the only one who has won the victory over sin. Victory for us then begins with the cross of Christ, but it is possible only as we keep continually under that shed blood and appropriating His resurrection life. The whole sacrifice of Calvary is necessary to keep us free from the least of what we call the little sins.

Christian Science not only would rob a Christian of faith, it would rob him of the blessed hope. “The second appearing of Jesus is unquestionably the spiritual advent of the advancing idea of God in Christian Science,” says Mrs. Eddy. Hope points toward the future, and Christian Science has no place for future deliverance from evil and sin, except as the human race learns that these are errors of mortal mind.

It Takes Away Faith, Hope, Love

Christian Science would rob us of love. It is a startling fact that not a dollar is given by Scientists to preach the Gospel among those who have never heard the name of Jesus. They have no foreign missionary societies. A Christian who had spent fifteen years in work among the poor and degraded classes in New York City was rebuked by a Christian Scientist for suggesting that her faith was not the faith of the Bible; he asked her why it was that in his fifteen years’ experience, touching all phases of work for the relief of the destitute in body and spirit in New York, he had never come across a single Christian Scientist helping in the work. She had no answer. It is a religion without compassion.

Faith, hope, and love are linked together in a remarkable passage in Hebrews 10:19-25. Close to the word faith is mention of “the blood of Jesus”; not far from “hope” are the words “so much the more as ye see the day drawing nigh”; and in close conjunction with “love” is “good works.” Thus are these great foundation stones of the Christian Faith linked in the Word of God. All of them are denied, and are made impossible by Christian Science.

The antidote to Christian Science is the Word of God. But do they not found their belief on the Bible? No. The Bible is not necessary to Christian Science. Indeed, it is one of the great handicaps to the system. Not many Scientists are as honest, or as well informed, as the locomotive engineer who recently explained that Christian Scientists knew that the Bible was not true, and that men would gradually give it up; but it had such a hold on people that no religion could hope to have a hearing unless it professed to be founded on the Bible. When people get hold of the truth of Christian Science, they will see, he added, that the Bible is not needed and is false; the purpose of Christian Science is to lead people away from the error of the Bible. That is certainly the purpose of the real founder of Christian Science, whether or not it was in the mind of the woman he used to propagate the cult.

And the antidote to superficial views of the Victorious Life, which partake of these errors of Christian Science, is the Word of God. Feed on it, meditate on it _day and night_. So will the living Word continue to be your Life, guarding and keeping you in that victory which is Christ.

IS IT A “SECOND BLESSING”?

“Do you believe in the second blessing?”

“To be sure I do,” answered a Christian whose reply voices the judgment of many, “but I shouldn’t confine it to a second blessing. I believe in hundreds of blessings after conversion.”

Whatever may be our view of such a term as “the second blessing,” let us not lose the experience it describes by confusing these hundreds of blessings with that distinct change which comes in a life when the secret of complete victory is learned.

A noted Christian leader in England who was prejudiced against the teaching of a “higher life” was prevailed upon to hear a message on the subject. He approached the speaker, who was a friend of his, with this criticism: “That is all well enough, but you are preaching lop-sided truth. What we need is all-round truth.” “Yes,” was the reply, “but we are preaching to lop-sided Christians. When we get them into the center then we can give them all-round truth.”