LIFE THROUGH DEATH

After the passing and funeral of a dear brother in Christ, I was asked by his wife and family to come by the house. They asked me what sizes in clothing I wore and I told them. It turned out that I was the same size as the one who died. They then gave me some of his suits and clothes to take with me. When I arrived home and was trying on one of the suit coats, I was very appreciative of my gift and thinking about the one who once wore it. The thought came to my mind, “The way I received this coat was because of the death of another.” Then immediately another thought, “That’s the way you have received everything! That’s the way you live, through death!” This is true concerning my natural life. My food, my clothing, the house I live in, all come from the death of something, either plant, animal, etc. This is the case with all Adam’s fallen race. But it is far more the case with regard to my spiritual life! I live through the death of Another, the Lord Jesus Christ! Just like the “coats of skins” that God clothed Adam and Eve with after the fall. They pictured the coming Christ and Him crucified. The coat of righteousness I now am clothed with is the righteousness of God which He imputed to me through the death of Christ who was made sin for me. He suffered as the Just for the unjust that I might live unto God. Like the clothes of my dear brother, the death of Christ suited me and fitted me the sinner and also God in His infinite holiness and justice. Christ’s death for His people is the death of that Friend who demonstrates the greatest love in laying down His life for His friends. And just as the clothes I received were far better than the old ones I had, so is the righteousness of the Lord Jesus far better than the filthy rags of all my imagined self-righteousness. The clothes of my friend met a need that I had as I had just told my wife a day earlier that I needed a new suit. Christ in His sacrificial and substitutionary death for me met a need I had that was far greater than I could ever have imagined. So I put on my new suit, grateful to my friend, to his family and to God but even more grateful as I remembered that God in grace had clothed me with a perfect righteousness through the death of His Son. I have eternal life and Christ is my Life because “it is Christ that died! I am as the one God speaks of in Ezekiel 16:10-14: “I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers' skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk. I decked thee also with ornaments, and I put bracelets upon thy hands, and a chain on thy neck. And I put a jewel on thy forehead, and earrings in thine ears, and a beautiful crown upon thine head. Thus wast thou decked with gold and silver; and thy raiment was of fine linen, and silk, and broidered work;… and thou wast exceeding beautiful, and thou didst prosper into a kingdom. And thy renown went forth among the heathen for thy beauty: for it was perfect through my comeliness, which I had put upon thee, saith the Lord GOD.” So is every sinner Christ saves through His cross death!

Gary Shepard

"For the earth brings forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear." Mark 4:28

Faith, I believe, has in it always a measure of assurance. For what is assurance? It is merely the larger growth and fuller development of faith. The nature of assurance is much misunderstood. It is often considered something distinct from faith. This is not the case. It is merely faith in a fuller, larger development. The word "assurance" in the original has a very simple, yet beautiful meaning. It means literally "a full bearing;" and the word is applied sometimes to a large crop of corn or fruit, and sometimes to the tide coming in with a fuller wave. Now it is the same corn which grows in the fields, whether the crop be much or little; it is the same tide that comes up the river whether in a scanty or full flow. So it is with assurance and faith—it is the same faith, only increased, enlarged, bearing more abundant fruit, or flowing in a more abundant tide.

Assurance in Scripture is not confined to faith; there is "the full assurance of understanding" (Col 2:2), that is, a fuller measure and amount, a greater enlargement of understanding to know the truth of God. The understanding is the same; but there is a larger measure of it. So there is the full assurance of hope, that is, a hope strengthened and enlarged, bearing more fruit and flowing in a fuller tide. But it is the same hope; the same in kind, though larger in degree; a stronger anchor, and yet an anchor still (Heb 6:19). Similarly there is the full assurance of faith (Heb 10:22), that is, a larger, fuller measure of faith; a richer crop, a more abundant tide. Thus you have a measure of the assurance of faith if you have faith at all. In fact, if you have no assurance of the truth of these things, why do you follow after them? Why do you hang upon them, why do you hope in them, and why do you seek the power and experience of them in your soul? Have you not arrived at this point yet? "We have not followed cunningly devised fables; these things that I am following after are realities; these objects set before me are certainties."

I grant that you may be much exercised about your saving interest in them. Still, unless you know that they are certainties, why do you believe them? Why are you anxious to know your saving interest in them? Why do you sink in doubt and fear for lack of clearer evidences of a saving interest in them? And why do you spring up in peace and joy the moment that a little light from them beams upon your soul, and a little sweetness out of them drops into your heart? Because you know that these things are realities. So far then you have an assurance that they are certainties, and in due time, as God is pleased, you will have the assurance in your own breast, not only that they are certainties, but that you have them in your own sure and certain possession. Robert Hawker

OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS IN HEAVEN SITS

By faith we look to heaven’s throne,

And see our glorious dress.

There in the holy Son of God,

The Lord our Righteousness. (Repeat)

Let change what will, let come what may.

He ever sits the same.

And all who plead His blood alone,

Are called by that great Name. (Repeat)

Through falls and fears and every doubt,

Unchanging He abides.

Our Righteousness in heaven sits.

All hope in Him resides. (Repeat)

Accepted in God’s Son beloved.

By free grace justified.

And saved from all the wrath to come,

In Christ the Crucified. (Repeat)

Oh God be praised, and all ye saints,

Remember and recall.

The righteousness we call our own,

Is not our own at all! (Repeat)

Gary Shepard