The One Great Reality

by Louisa Clayton

ADDRESS II

GOD OUR FATHER

PORTION OF SCRIPTURE—Matthew vii 24-34.

In the chapter we have just read there is a great deal about our daily home life, and the word "Father" is mentioned twelve times, so it shows that God knows all about the everyday work. It is a grand thing when we find this out.

A poor woman in China was converted, and very soon the lady missionary who visited her noticed that now her house was very clean and tidy, and told her how glad she was to see it.

The woman smiled, and said in her own simple way, "You see my Father God and the Lord Jesus are constantly coming in and out, so I like to keep it nice." She realised the Presence of God.

"The eyes of the Lord are in every place." [Footnote: Prov. xv. 3.]
If we do not find God everywhere we practically end by finding
Him nowhere.

A busy Christian mother told me that she begins each day and lives all the day long saying in her heart, "In Thy Presence and by Thy Power." We must not only say it, but act upon it as a reality, and then it will be our daily experience to be in touch with God.

There was one word which was very precious to Christ and which was often on His lips, and that was "Father." You remember how He stood one day at the grave of His friend Lazarus. All the mourners were standing round Him. Lazarus had been dead four days. It seemed utterly impossible that he could be restored to life again. No one expected it.

What did Jesus do? "Jesus lifted up His eyes and said 'Father.'" [Footnote: St. John xi. 41.] Those eyes were still wet with tears, for a few verses before we read "Jesus wept." Then He lifted up His eyes and said "Father": that was enough. There is everything in that word. It just meant, "I have told Father all about it." He knows, He loves, He cares, and all things are possible with Him. There is no limit to His power and His love.

Then the command was given to those standing near—"Take ye away the stone." Was Christ going into the cave? No, the dead man was to come out. So we have first the wondrous name "Father," and then the loud cry, "Lazarus, come forth," and he that was dead came out of the cold grave', out of the region of death into the land of the living.

All through His life on earth our Lord always speaks to God as Father. One verse especially brings out the perfect intimacy, the perfect confidence, the perfect love between the Lord Jesus and the Father. Jesus says, "All things are delivered unto Me of My Father, and no man knoweth the Son but the Father; neither knoweth any man the Father save the Son and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him." [Footnote: St. Matt. xi 27.] The last words of this verse are very precious, for they show that not only has the Son perfect knowledge of the Father, but He reveals or makes known the Father so that you and I may know Him as our Father.

You remember Philip prayed, "Lord, show us the Father, that is what we want," [Footnote: St. John xiv. 8.] and Christ answered, "He who has seen Me has seen the Father." Yes, "He is the image of the invisible God." God said to Moses, "Thou canst not see My Face and live for there shall no man see me and live," [Footnote: Exod. xxxiii. 20.] and for hundreds of years no one saw God. Then came the wondrous gift and the wondrous revelation. God gave His only Begotten Son, and in Him we see the Father. Praise the Lord! the glorious light has come to us in our darkness. For "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." [Footnote: Cor. iv. 6.] The Apostle John says, "We beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."

"No man hath seen God at any time," [Footnote: St. John i. 18.] and before Christ came the verse stopped there; but after He came, then God was fully revealed; so the verse finishes with the words "the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him." Will you look up now, and say, "Lord, show me the Father," and He will reveal Him to you, because this is what He promises to do. Look at the last line of the 27th verse of Matthew xi. where Christ says, "He to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him," and without a pause He adds the wonderful invitation, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." It is to the weary and heavy laden that He reveals the Father. He invites them to share the fellowship He has with the Father, the peace and joy and rest of knowing the Father.

Why does He invite the weary ones to come to Him? because He felt in Himself such joy in this close fellowship with God, He wanted every one to have it too. He felt that His experience of what the Father was to Him was so rich, He longed for them to come and share it, "I will give you rest." It is as if He said, "I will give you the same rest I have when I am tired and hungry and thirsty; the same comfort that I have when I am misunderstood and reviled; the rest, the comfort, the peace I have in My Father."

We have the same assurance when the Holy Ghost says in St. Paul's letter to the Corinthians, "Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort." [Footnote: 2 Cor. i, 2, 3.]

How can you and I know what the Lord Jesus found in His Father's love? He has graciously made it known to us in the four Gospels. There the veil is drawn aside and we see how all through His life He was in close fellowship with the Father.

We can hear the very words which the Son spoke to His Father in the hour of deep agony: "O My Father, if it be possible let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless not as I will, but as Thou wilt." [Footnote: St. Matt. xxvi. 39.] The last words on His lips when He was dying on the Cross were, "Father, into Thy hands I commend My spirit." [Footnote: St. Luke xxiii. 46.] He said to His disciples the last night, "You will leave Me alone; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me." All through His life He spoke of His oneness with the Father and the joy of doing and finishing the work which He gave Him to do.

We too can have the sense of God's Presence in our souls at all times. A Christian woman who was suffering from neuralgia told me that one night when she could not sleep, a voice seemed to whisper softly to her, "Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him, for He knoweth our frame, He knows all about our poor bodies, for He made them," [Footnote: Ps. ciii. 13, 14.] and with those words of comfort in her mind she fell into a refreshing sleep.

If you will turn to the 6th chapter of St. Matthew again you will see in the 8th verse that our Heavenly Father knows about something else. "He knows what things we have need of before we ask Him."

The secret of what it is to have God as our Father, and the sweetness of it, comes out in these three homely questions, What shall we eat, what shall we drink, what shall we wear? And Christ says, [Footnote: St. Matt, vi. 31, 32.] Take no thought, that means, do not be anxious about these things, for your Heavenly Father knoweth that you have need of all these things. Yes, if He knows, that is enough, and then we have only to trust Him for all.

Do you find your faith failing sometimes? It is one thing to trust God when the wages are coming in regularly, and quite another thing to trust Him when times are bad. It is just then we learn to look less at our faith and more at God's Faithfulness.

A minister once gave a little bit of his experience about this. He said, "It is only as we really take God's promises and plant our feet upon them that we shall find faith abiding in times of testing. The last penny may be gone but GOD is there. I know this to be true.

"I have often said when preaching, 'It takes real faith in God to be able to put your head into an empty flour barrel and sing the doxology.' My wife had heard me say this, and one morning she called me to come into the kitchen. I said, 'What do you want me for?' She replied, 'I want you to come out here and sing.' I thought this queer, so I went to see what it all meant.

"In the middle of the kitchen was an empty flour barrel that she had just dusted out. 'Now, my dear,' she said, 'I have often heard you say one could put his head into an empty flour barrel and sing, "Praise God from Whom all blessings flow," if he believed what God says. Now here is your chance, practise what you preach.'

"There was the empty flour barrel staring at me with open mouth, and my purse was empty too. I looked for my faith, but could not find it; I looked for a way of escape, but could not find one, for my wife blocked the doorway with the dust brush covered with flour.

"I said, 'I will put my head in and sing on one condition.'

"'What's that?' asked my wife.

"'On condition that you will put your head in and sing too. You know you promised to share all my joys and sorrows.'

"She consented, so we put our heads in and sang the doxology, and we told our heavenly Father 'all about our need.' Yes, we had a good time, and when we got our heads out we were a good bit powdered up, which we took as a token that there was more flour to follow!

"Sure enough, though no one knew of our need, the next day a barrel of flour was sent. Where it came from or who sent it we never knew, but our heavenly Father knew that we had 'need of these things.'"

Does not this simple testimony teach us all a lesson? I wonder how many of us can say from our hearts—

Those who trust do not worry;
Those who worry do not trust.

Which are you doing, dear friends? Trusting or worrying? Count on God. He never fails, and He knows just what to do. The moment a difficulty comes, look up and say "Father," and at once the burden will roll off, He will undertake all for you.

I had an illustration of this one day when I was going across the Common. It was very windy, and two little girls lost their hats; they were quite at their wits' end, till they caught sight of their father in the distance, and at once they called to him, "Father, father." That was enough, in a minute he ran to help them.

I have often found great help in looking up again and again during the day and just saying "Father." Try it. You, fathers, often say to your children, "If you want me just call me." That is what our heavenly Father tells us to do.

To know God means not only to trust Him, but also to treat Him as a Father. If you will read the 6th chapter of St. Matthew carefully when you are at home, you will see that it gives the experience of the child of God with the Father for one whole day. It includes all that we need during the day:—food, clothing, forgiveness, victory over temptation, grace to do God's will, and grace in dealing with others.

This experience is so deep, so real, so entirely something between Father and child, that in this chapter we find the words "in secret" no less than six times. When the little child is looking up into a loving father's face and talking to him, it never thinks of those around. "In secret" means a sweet sense of His Presence in the soul and of close communion with Him. "I write unto you, little children, because you have known the Father." [Footnote: I St. John ii. 13.]

God is our Father, because He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ: this is one of the greatest treasures of Redeeming Grace. All the teaching about God as Father comes from the lips of Jesus, and it is in this way He reveals the Father to us; so if we would know Him, we must drink in His teaching and watch His life of communion with God. By His life He reveals to us the reality of the experience into which He calls us to enter. He also shows us the way. He not only says "Come to Me," but also Come through Me. "I am the Way: no man cometh unto the Father but by Me." [Footnote: St. John xiv. 6.] It was by dying for us He opened the Way. "God sent forth His Son to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons." "And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts crying, Abba, Father." [Footnote: Gal. iv. 6, 7] So we are not only received into God's family, but we have also all the privileges of sonship. We are made "heirs of God, joint heirs with Christ."

Perhaps you are thinking of your unworthiness; like the Prodigal Son you are ready to say "Father, I have sinned again and again, I am not worthy to be called Thy son." God knows just what you are and what you have been, and He Himself has asked the question, "How shall I put you among the children?" It is a question which none but the Lord would ever have thought of, and it would never have been answered if He Himself had not answered it. It is a wonderful answer: for He says, "Thou shalt call Me, My Father." [Footnote: Jer. iii. 19.] God Himself puts us sinners among His children, and no one else can do it, and He keeps us; for He says, "Thou shalt not turn away from Me." How does He do it? By creating a new life in us, we are "born again." The old nature is not improved, but a new heart is given. "A new heart also will I give you, and a new Spirit will I put within you." [Footnote: Ezek. xxxvi. 26.]

Can you say, "God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into my heart," and now I can call Him my Father? Being made the children of God by adoption and grace, let us enjoy the privileges which are secured to us; let us act as loving children should do.

Does it all seem too good to be true? Trust His Word, "As many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on His Name." [Footnote: St. John i. 12]

Some of you remember the joy which thrilled you when you first received Him as your Saviour, but perhaps it was not until afterwards that you realised the blessedness of your new position as sons of God.

The Holy Spirit leads us on step by step. First, He assures us that "there is no condemnation," then He sets us free from the bondage of sin and death. [Footnote: Rom. viii. i, 2.] All is changed now, we feel the confidence of a child who has free access to his father at all times. There are three things which mark the children of God, the spiritual mind, the spiritual walk, and the spiritual talk. "The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirits that we are the children of God." [Footnote: Rom. viii. 16.] We then call out with the consciousness of sonship, "Father, Father."

The witness of the Spirit was given to me soon after my conversion and thrilled me with joyful assurance. It came to me when a Christian doctor was telling his children about the way of salvation. He drew a line on the carpet with a stick and said, "On one side there is DEATH, on the other, LIFE," and I said to myself, "I know which side of the line I am on." So it was by means of this simple remark that I found out that I was really a child of God, and my heart began from that time to cling to God as my Father. Every day since then I have experienced the blessedness of trusting Him and knowing Him as my Father. Is this your happy portion? If not, why not?