The Root from which all Such Work must spring.
It is not all kinds of labour to which the promise is attached, for there is a great deal of labour that is altogether in vain. “Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it.” [60c] And the distinction is very clearly taught us here, for the work here spoken of is a labour “in the Lord.” It teaches how work is the consequence of union; that we do not do the work of the Lord in order that by doing it we may attain to union, but that the union comes first and the work of the Lord follows as its result. There will be no fruit on the branch if there is not first a union with the vine. There is no hope, therefore, of any man winning to himself a union with Christ by any amount of painstaking in work. If your heart is yearning for that union, you must accept it as a free gift because Christ Jesus, the Son of God, has redeemed you by His own most precious blood, and you must do so just as you are, without waiting for even one more effort in His service. You must be “in the Lord” before you can “labour in the Lord,” and that union must be the free gift of His unmerited grace. You must be created in Him unto good works before you will do anything for His glory. [61]
CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE IN THE CONFIRMATION OF FAITH
“Because Thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice.”—Psa. lxiii. 7.
I wish to speak on the important use of Christian experience in the confirmation of faith. I say in the confirmation of faith, for there is the widest possible difference between confirmation and commencement. Experience may confirm the faith when it already exists, but the faith must obviously be there before there can be any experience of its result.
At the outset of our Christian course we have nothing to do but throw ourselves absolutely in naked trust on the sure promises of the covenant of God, and rest exclusively on what He has done and promised. We have nothing then to do with our own history, our own feelings, or our own progress, it is Christ and Christ alone on whom the soul must rest for life. And so, if we look to the real foundation of faith, it must be to the last day of our pilgrimage. It is a fatal-moment for us if we are led to look away for a single moment from Him. But at the same time we must remember that we are not always at the beginning of our Christian life. One who has trusted the Lord Jesus Christ and walked with Him for many years is not in the same position as one who is to-day seeking Him for the first time. He has had the experience of the loving-kindness of the Lord. He has never found Him to fail in any of the anxieties of his life, and if he could trust many years ago when he had nothing but the bare promise, how much more may he trust the Saviour now when the truth of His word has been tried and tested in all the varied experiences of life?
The Lord Jesus Christ is described as “a sure foundation;” [63a] sure, because He is the foundation laid by God; sure, because of His own eternal Godhead; sure, therefore, as an object of simple trust before a person has had any experience of His grace. To the trembling sinner who has hitherto been a total stranger to Him, and has never known anything of His love, even to him He is a sure foundation, and though knowing Him only through the word, that trembling sinner may come to Him and trust. But according to that same verse He is also a tried foundation. He has been tried by the whole church of God for eighteen centuries and has never once been found to fail any one that has come to Him in faith. He has been tried by us who have known Him for the greater part of our lives, and we are not to ignore all He has done for us, but say, as St. John did, not merely that we have believed, but that “we have known and believed the love that God hath towards us.” [63b]
Now this is the principle of the text. The Psalm was written when David was in great trouble, having taken flight from Saul in the wilderness of Judah. He was there hidden in such caves as Adullam, and cut off from the sanctuary of God. But it is a very cheerful and thankful Psalm. He was not downhearted because of his troubles, but he had such an assurance of the loving-kindness of the Lord that his heart was full of praise. He could praise Him, and that with joyful lips, even in the wilderness. The reason was that he could trust Him, and though he was only a young man his trust had been confirmed by experience. He had been in difficulty almost the whole time since his call, but he had found a strong arm with him all the way, and therefore he said, “Because thou has been my help, therefore in the shadow of Thy wings will I rejoice.” In this verse there are two things to be observed—