Light Brings Salt
Volume 3, Issue 02 January 9, 2004
Iron Range Bible
Church
Dedicated to the Systematic Exposition of the Word of God
ATTENTION: ASCENSION!
by Miles
J. Stanford
This is
not a Polemic Paper, but rather a positive Position Paper having to do with our
positional liberty in Christ. It will set forth our access to the Father and
the Son for consistent fellowship and worship.
"That which we
have seen and heard declare we unto you, that ye also may have fellowship with us; and truly our
fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son, Jesus Christ." "God
is faithful, by whom we are called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ
our Lord"
(1 John 1:3; 1 Cor. 1:9).
"For we are
the circumcision, who worship God in the spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no
confidence in the flesh." "The hour cometh, and now is, when the true
worshipers shall
worship the Father in spirit and in truth; for the Father seeketh
such to worship Him. God is a Spirit; and they that worship Him must worship Him
in spirit and in truth" (Phil.
3:3; John
This
material is intended for those growing believers who know, at least
doctrinally, that they have positionally died unto sin, and the first Adam. Now
they are alive unto God in the glorified Last Adam, accepted in Him, complete
in Him, crucified and ascended with Him who is now their Christian Life.
"Reckon ye also
yourselves to have died indeed unto sin, but to be alive unto God in Jesus
Christ." "To the praise of the glory of His grace, through which He
hath made us accepted in
the Beloved." "And ye are complete in Him, who is the
Head of all principality and power" (Rom.
As the
Spirit of Christ ministers to us through the years, and we come to learn,
believe, and know the above truths about ourselves as new creations in Christ,
we are in the position to learn, believe, and know our position in Christ
above.
"And [God]
hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ
Jesus." "If ye then, be risen with Christ...set your affection on
things above, not on things on the earth. For ye have died, and your
life is hidden with Christ in God" (Eph. 2:6; Col. 3:1-3).
It is
from this viewpoint, upon this heavenly ground, from this position in Christ,
that we will consider some truths shared by one of the original Plymouth
Brethren, Mr. James Lampdon Harris (1793-1877). The
title of his book is Jewish Bondage and Christian Freedom, or Jewish and
Christian Worship Contrasted:
By way of contrast
we are shown in Hebrews that those who are in Christ are made positionally
perfect: "By one offering He hath perfected for ever them that are
[positionally] sanctified" (Heb.
Their worship,
therefore, was in "the spirit of bondage unto fear" (Rom.
Here we
have a key issue. Anything pertaining to the Blood of the Lord Jesus is a
crucial factor. Our position in t he Holiest of All, in Christ before the
Father, is procured by His shed Blood. Our rest in that heavenly position is
maintained by that Blood . All is positional There. Our condition,
no matter what its condition--even if sinless by moments--has nothing to do
with that.
"But now in
Christ Jesus ye who once were far off are made near by the Blood of Christ." "Having therefore, brethren, boldness
[liberty] to enter into the Holiest by the Blood of Jesus" (Eph.
By the
once-forever cleansing of the once-forever Christ-shed Blood on the Cross, we
can rest in the Father's presence.
"Giving thanks
unto the Father, who hath made us it to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." "The Blood of
Jesus Christ, His Son,
cleanseth us from all sin.... If we
confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse
us from all unrighteousness" (Col. 1:12; 1 John 1:7,9).
Having
"no conscience of sin" positionally before our Father is the basis
for having a pure conscience before Him in our condition.
All hinges upon our looking away
from the indwelling first Adam, and by faith in the Word counting ourselves as
new creations in Christ positioned at the right hand of the Father in heaven.
As another early Brethren put it:
The desire of many
is to connect the Lord Jesus with themselves on earth, instead of accepting
their true position in Him where He is. When I look at this place, He is not
here; and when I look at myself naturally I am not fit for Him There. How happy
then to know that I belong to the place and position where He is; and that
through grace I am made suited to Him in the light as He is in the light; so
that I set my mind and heart There, as the place and presence where my deepest
joys are realized.
Where
our position is concerned, all is based upon the finished work of the Cross.
No conscience can
be at ease before the Father where anything depends upon what the person
himself is doing or has to do. All must rest upon that which He has already
accomplished at
The worshipers have
been once and forever purged by His sacrifice once offered .
By the will of God they have been positionally sanctified by the offering of
the Body of Jesus Christ once for all. A living way has been opened for them
through the Blood of Jesus into the Holiest of All. The place of worship is as
much prepared for them to worship in by the Blood, as they by the same Blood
are prepared to worship in it..
John
Darby's heart-burden was expressed over a century ago. Think of what it would
be today:
It is the chief
burden for me as regards the Church that they are as persons outside; not
inside, entered through the rent veil, abiding in the light of the Father's
countenance and gazing upon His Beloved Son in His own divine perfectness with
the "eye" that the Holy Spirit
gives.
It is
not a matter of "conditioning" our condition for enablement to abide There, but rather abiding There where we are
Blood-positioned--from whence our condition is processed and developed. The
"eye of faith" that the Spirit of Christ gives to the abiding
believer is to be centered upon the Father and the Son.
"Where the
Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face
beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image
from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord." "This I say
then, Walk in [dependence upon] the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lust
of the flesh"
(2 Cor.
To walk
by the Spirit is to be centered in Christ in glory. The first-Adam life is not
to be overcome, but, as alive unto God in Christ, we are to count ourselves as
having died unto it. "I have been crucified with Christ" (Gal.
Are we not often
false to Him in this matter? Do we not often harbor the thought that something
yet remains to be done--either by ourselves or by Him in order to our drawing
nigh? Do we not often thus become occupied with the circumstances of worship
rather than the Object, the Substance, the Lord Jesus? Are we not often false
to Him in questioning our title to draw nigh, because we find distance in our
own hearts, as if it were the warmth of our affection, rather than the Blood of
Jesus which brought us nigh?
The Great High
Priest is abidingly in that place of worship; no ministration is wanting; He is
the minister of the Sanctuary and of the true Tabernacle, which the Lord
pitched, and not man. What then remains but for us to use our high privileges,
and to listen to the Word: "Let us
draw near" (Heb.
If we
are not yet established in the truth that we have died to sin, and are now
alive unto God in Christ Jesus, we will be unable to rest in Him as positioned
in the Holiest of All. And this is to be remembered and heeded when we are
leading another along--no rushing ahead, no skipping over the progression of
growth truth.
The Holiest of All
is alone open to those who have been once and forever purged. If our faith and
hope spring not from that within the veil, where is our steadfastness? Where is our peace and
rest? Where is our face-to-face fellowship with the Father and the Son? Everything short of that may be shaken--and will be
shaken. If therefore we know not accomplished righteousness in Christ, fitting
us now for the Holiest of All, the peace of our souls must be unsteady.
Our hope of resting
in our position is independent of ourselves--all hangs on the immutable
faithfulness of our Father--it is secured by the Blood of His Beloved Son, and it is already
made fast within the veil. Beware of mock humility, which is only the cover of
unbelief and self-dependence,
Look at yourself and you are hopeless; look at the Lord Jesus and know your sure hope. Let this check all wavering, and answer every doubt and
every difficulty. In spite of all feelings and appearances, hold fast the
profession of hope without wavering.
None of
the key truths and phases of our growth, such as our acceptance, our
completeness, our crucifixion, our reckoning, our ascended position in Him at
the Father's right hand, is an end in itself. It must be from position to
Person! The goal is that we may know
Him, that our fellowship and worship may be in the presence of the Father and
the Son.
Each
ongoing truth and development is predicated on the former, to the end that all
may be centered in the Lord Jesus Christ in glory. Many contemporary ministries
claim to include the positional truths, but their focus is upon self, or the
law, or the kingdom, or Satan and his demons.
How needful for us
in our resting in our position of worship in the Holiest of All to remember that we have died to self,
sin, Satan, law, and the world-- and that we are now alive unto the Father in
the Son. All that is contrary to this heavenly life has been set aside in the
death of the Cross. "For ye died, and your life is hidden with Christ in
God"
(Col. 3:3) And it is only as alive from the dead that
we rest in Him where He is.
Mr. J.B.
Stoney, another of the early Brethren, asked and
answered the plaintive question :
Why do saints enjoy
hearing of all that Christ is to us and at the same time are, apparently at
least, uninterested in all that He is in His own heavenly circle of things? Because they like Him to come to their side, but are not drawn to
His side.
And do we not see
that Christians regard the teaching and preaching with which God blesses them
far more highly than fellowship with and worship of Him? This is a sure consequence of not
remembering the Holiest of all--our position for a life of growth, service,
fellowship, and worship.
As for
the maturing Christian life, the Holy Spirit builds all upon the
rightly-divided truth, and that centered in the ascended and glorified Lord
Jesus Christ. The clearer the truths are seen, the simpler the faith.
Put yourself in the
place of a believing Hebrew on a solemn feast day in
Think further of
the contrast he must in his own soul have seen between the upper chamber, or
any other unpretentious locality, and the splendid temple. Must it not have
required much simple faith in the Lord Jesus, to meet together for worship with
a number as unaccredited as himself, without any visible priest to order their
worship, any sacrifice, any incense, any altar?
Would not the multitude keeping
holy-day give as it were the lie to the worship he had been engaged in, as if
it had been no worship at all? Surely there is great force in the words,
"not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some
is" (Heb.
The Lord
Jesus' death on the Cross and His ascension into Glory were not only to save us
from hell, but to bring us to Himself, and that even
now. "For our citizenship is in heaven" (Phil.
The Great High
Priest is alone suitable for those who have come to the Father through and in
Him. Into what an elevated position then has that one Sacrifice brought us! No
place under heaven is suitable for our worship. [He does not come here into our
midst; we are to rest in Him There for that, and all else.] Worship therefore should ever be from our position in the
ascended Lord Jesus Christ.
Every saint is
upheld by His intercession, even in his most thoughtless mood. Priesthood is
part of the work of grace--grace that provides for the putting away of every
sin, and aiding in every infirmity, and bearing our every waywardness, in order
that we may never be out of the presence of our Father.
His ministry on our
behalf is marked by the same grace now as when He was on earth. His
intercession is of the same grace; it is according to His own divine and
gracious estimate of our many and constant deeds. In our practical danger,
weakness, and foolishness, He knows the Father sees us--and He makes
intercession for us accordingly, maintaining us There
in His own fragrant perfection.
As
always, the great need today is to rightly divide the Word of truth, and to
allow Paul to establish us in our heavenly position in Christ. No Scripture
outside the Pauline Epistles and Hebrews was designed for that. We are not to
neglect any part of the Word, but not all has to do with
our heavenly position in Christ.
There was a worldly sanctuary; there is yet,
in the coming dispensation, to be a worldly sanctuary; but now there is none.
Existing systems are variously compounded of things proper to these three
periods. Some have drawn from the past, some from the future, some, it may be, mostly from the present; but all involves sad
confusion--the sin of mingling things heavenly and things earthly.
It is indeed
difficult to have to wind one's way through things so perplexing as the
religious systems of our own day (1860).
We have to avoid, on the one hand, systems more characterized by
anticipation of things future. We have to allow that such things were once
given by God, and that they will yet again be introduced by Him, while firmly contending
that they are positively opposed to His present workings.
If the order of a
worldly sanctuary is introduced, our worship must be degraded, and our souls
become lean. Such results must ensue if we take for our pattern the worldly
sanctuary, instead of by faith in the Word, and as led of the Spirit, entering
into that which is heavenly. There all is
done--there we have subject for thanksgiving and praise only.
If the
Word of truth is rightly divided (2 Tim.
Paul teaches us to
give "thanks unto the Father who hath made us meet for the inheritance of
the saints in light" (Col. 1:12) This shows the true position for
thanksgiving and praise to be what grace has accomplished for us in
Christ. But if this is not seen and
remembered, worship must become a burden rather than our highest privilege.
A few
more closing thoughts to provide further encouragement to rest in Him where He
is:
Two things that mark the
Christian in this world are fellowship with the Lord Jesus in His death here
where He died, and fellowship with Him in His life where He is now. If anyone
is truly in the first (2 Cor.
The moment we begin
to rest our peace on anything in ourselves, we lose it. And this is why so many
saints have not settled peace. Only by having it in the Father's own way can we
have peace--by not resting it on anything, even the Spirit's work within us,
but on what the Lord Jesus has done
wholly apart from us. Then we will have peace; conscious unworthiness, but yet
pence. The more we see the extent and nature of the evil that is within, as
Well as that without and around, the more we will find that what the Lord Jesus
is, and what He has done, is the only ground at all on which we can rest. --J.N. Darby
The heart that is
captivated by an object can never rest until it is with the one who has won it;
for satisfaction you must be where He is. Love really does not think of anyone
but its Object; and then, at rest about itself, it studies the mind and heart
of its Object.
--J.B.S.
I find that the
Lord Jesus loved me and gave Himself for me when I was in a most unattractive
state; but He makes me positionally suitable to Himself, and I am assured of
the permanency of His love and of my association with Him that my heart is free
to learn of Him. The more I am in His company, the more I acquire the tastes
and characteristics which answer to His heart and mind (2 Cor.
The work of the
Lord Jesus now is to occupy me with Himself. It is
clear that in spirit I am up There in all His beauty and acceptance, and now I
am to live down here, not as a comely and excellent man, but as the Lord Jesus
manifest in my body (2 Cor. 4:10). And He who
sustains me up There in all the brightness of His glory, is the same One who
has to do with me in all my weakness and need down here in this scene of
darkness and death.
--J.B.S.