THAT WE SHOULD BE CALLED THE SONS OF GOD...

This is perhaps, one of the greatest articles in the Signs of the Times on the life and experience of a believer - ed.

Newark, NJ.

Behold, what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us, that we should be called the Sons of God. One John 3.1.

Love is the purest, the most binding, the most intense, the most enduring, the most valuable position of our nature. So valuable is it that he who experiences it would rather part with the world than the object of his love, whether it be child or parent, brother, sister, friend, husband or wife. It fuses together the hearts of the family it makes of twain one. It knits together two souls as the souls of Jonathan and David.

Such is human love. I think it's good. But what manner of love is that which the Father has bestowed upon us, even that we should be called the Sons of God? If the human love bore such great length and breadth, such depth and height, and yet be finite. What manner of love is that which is infinite and divine? If the love of man is so great. How about the love of God? While in general, the child of God walks in the flesh remembering the love of God and his sonship to God, rather than seeing it. His moment of light succeeded by years of dimness and shadow, through which he walks by faith and not by sight. Yet there do some transient moments of realizing what he is in his relationship with God. Such as seeing within the range of his experience to the far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. Let us first inquire, who is he that has bestowed upon us this love, that we should be called the Sons of God? Who is God? The most prevalent notion is that God is a vastly extended man. This is what the serpent told EVE "You shall be as gods." And all Eve's descendants have appeared ever to believe and assert the same. Modern religion is, after all, but a different form of the ancient heathen mythology, which represented Jupiter, the chief of the gods, as a man. It is thus that men interpret the passage. God created man in his own image. In the image of God created he him. And the scriptures themselves assert that this notion is held by men. "You thought I was altogether as yourself." Psalms 1.21. That this is man's notion of God is confirmed by the existence of and belief in the doctrine of "human ability." If a man can do God's work, man is like God. The conclusion is logical and man can understand God's word, can will as God wills, by yielding to warnings and persuasions, can be his own free will to accept salvation. Men can be taught in schools by men; of God they could be God's fellow laborers and can form themselves into societies for the conversion of the world. But is God as a man? That he is not is already implied in the words which have been quoted. Namely, "You thought I was altogether as yourself." Psalms 1.21. That is, in this, you thought wrongly. I am not like you. Who then is God? Jesus tells us God is a spirit. John 4.24. But is not man also a spirit? Yes, but not in essence as God is. As oil and water differ in nature, so in essence are the spirit of man and the spirit of God. How do you know? Scripture says so. It says "The natural man receives not the things of the spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him. Neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." I Corinthians 2.14. We have here contrasted the natural man that is to complete man as he is born unto the world of natural parents. We have contrasted here the natural man and the Spirit of God, and it is asserted that the reason why the natural man cannot know the things of God's spirit is because they are not discerned naturally, but spiritually. If these things were natural, like man. Man, being natural, could discern them. But since they are spiritual like God's man, not being spiritual, cannot discern them. That is, man is natural and not spiritual. God is spiritual and not natural. In other words, God is not in essence like a man and so sings the believer's heart. He sees within himself nothing that is like God, nothing but that is earthly and sensual and devilish. He sees that his own highest moral goodness is unlike God's holiness, that the principle a virtue innate within him is unlike God's righteousness, and when he reads the words, "the way of God, have they not known," he applies them to himself. At the same time he sees that within him which is distinct from himself, and which he finds alluded to in the words, "he that is spiritual, judges all things, yet himself is judged of no man." I Corinthians 2.15. It is "Christ within him, the hope of glory." The believer is the only one who has been enabled to see that God is not like man. He is the only one on Earth who does not believe that he is like God. Is it a wonder that he should be pointed at as "peculiar?" How it separates him from all sects! How does it destroy his sympathy with those societies whose object it is to convert the world! How it loosens his tongue to assert of God what the whole world contradicts! He is the babe unto whom these things are revealed while they are hidden from the wise and prudent.

Now while God is a spirit. He is also the creator of all things. Revelation 4.11. And he omnipotently directs and controls all things and all the events. This is he of whom the Apostle writes, where he asserts that we are the sons of God. That is. God is our father. He is not then related to his child as he is related to his creations. With respect to the creations, he is the creator, while with respect to his children, he is the Father. He created the creations. He begat his sons. Let us then inquire what is a son of God. Evidently, he is one who is "born" John. 3. or "begotten" James 1.18 of God. Now the prevalent notion concerning the words "born again," and "born of water and the spirit" is that they imply a process and result which are best expressed by these words; that indeed these words are to a considerable extent figurative, while they by no means are taken as signifying what is actual. Thus the notion is that the "new birth," or "regeneration," as it is so commonly, but not scripturally called, consists of a change wrought in the natural soul of man, whereby the natural soul is rendered spiritual and like unto God; a transformation affected in the natural man, whereby he is made to know God; to sympathize with God and to love God. We do not think that the Scriptures sanction the notion. As we understand their teachings, they set forth a doctrine which is utterly opposed thereto, that indeed they teach that the words born again begotten are to be taken in their literal signification. How is this? In endeavoring to answer, let us remember that we are dealing with a "great mystery" and that since it is a mystery, the carnal mind which is with the believer still is ever wishing to reject it. Do you not believer, find within you, this disposition to cast aside the "mystery of godliness." Even while your spiritual experiences are over presenting facts that confirm it. But let us turn to Scripture for our confirmation of the hope that is within us. How then is this? We are not literally the sons of God as we are in ourselves. Leaving out the contradiction to the proposition that we are, which is involved in the statement that natural man is in essence unlike God - any being begetting only what is like himself. We have a direct refutation of the proposition in the words concerning Christ that he is the "only begotten of the Father." John 1.14. "The only begotten Son" John 1.18; 3.16, 18; I John 4.9. Christ then is the only Son of God. How then are we sons? As question after question arises, we are led to exclaim, how shall the mystery of the gospel be made known? and to feel like shrinking from all attempts to publish it, and to sit as a listener while the mouth of God sent-preachers, opened up of God to make it known.

We are sons because of the unity of life between us and Christ. This position and interpretation of passages of Scripture in John 17.23, we find, as uttered from the lips of Jesus, these words, "I in them, and you and me." Now as the Adamic life of an earthly father is in his son, so the life of God the Father is in his son, that is in Christ. Hence the words "you in me." This life is the eternal life spoken of in Scripture. It is the life of God himself, and God is eternal. "Now unto all whom the Father has given to the Son, to them hast the Son, given this eternal life, according to the words: "As you have given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as you have given him" John 17.2. How does he give them this eternal life? By being in them "I in them." Through Paul is the same thing said, "To whom God would make known what is the richest of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory" Colossians 1.27. And again, "when Christ our life shall appear" Colossians 3.4. John takes up the story "whosoever is born of God does not commit sin. For his seed, that is God's seed, that is Christ, the only begotten Son remains in him" I John 2.9. James sings the same new song "of his own will begat he us with the word that is Christ" John 11-14 of Truth." And Peter's voice intermingles with the strain singing. "Then we are partakers of the divine nature" II Peter 1.4 a child. Alone being partaker of a being's nature. This passage implies the same thing. We are sons den because of the unity of life which exists between us and Christ, the only begotten son of God. No change is wrought in our nature, but Christ is developed within us.

Let us, for a little space, look at some of the indications of this development in connection with the result, namely, a coming unto the Father. Jesus said to the inquiring disciples. "No man comes unto the Father but by me" John 14.6. Most of the saints can perhaps look back to a period in which, in common with the great world around them, they took it for granted that God was their Father. And felt doubtless that they were keeping God's commandments and were good in his sight, and that he was looking upon them complacently and was rewarding them for their goodness. With Paul it may be, "they called themselves of the stock of Israel, or pious or good parents of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, as touching the law, a Pharisee concerning zeal, persecuting the church, touching the righteousness which is by the law blameless" Philippians 3.5-6. In those days, there was left no need for Christ in coming to the Father. One, taking himself altogether as God, could come in his own self and at any time saying "our father who art in heaven." "He was alive without the law" Romans 7.9, but experience came which changed the aspect of God towards him from a Father to a Judge. He would awake, perhaps in the night, or it would come upon him in the broad light of day, in the midst of friends, and have a sense of sinfulness, a realization that he had transgressed the law of God, a feeling that he was under just condemnation, a disposition to cry to God for mercy, rather than to approach him as a good son would approach a loving parent. The experience goes away but comes again. It is deeper and stronger. And more abiding now. If I should die, I should go to hell, is his language. What shall I do? He attempts to do something. He strives to be good, but the more he strives, the worse he seems himself to be. He strives to call up from within himself something that will be good. In the sight of this his Judge, but discovers that "every imagination of the thought of his heart is only evil continually;" "The poison of asps is under his lips;" and that a proud, rebellious hostility to God his judge is working there. His mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. There is not yet discovered there anything that can be subject to the law of God, and all his strivings to produce from himself anything which is good in God's sight leads only to the thunder and wrath of Sinai. Where now is that self-complacent approach to God as his father? Displaced by a terror-stricken position before God as his judge. He cannot come to God as his father. He finds that it is impossible. No longer does he pray with himself, "God, I thank you that I am not as other men are." An array before God, his self-righteousness of honesty and benevolence, thinking himself so much better than the publican. But he is a very publican himself, standing afar off, and not lifting up so much as his eyes unto heaven, smiting upon his breast, and saying, "God be merciful to me a sinner." The law has come now and sin has revived, and he is dead. There is an end to seeking sonship to God himself. Self stands before God the tried, convicted, and condemned criminal. The punishment to be inflicted is not fatherly having for its object the welfare of the one punished, but it is judicial, having for its end the satisfying its justice. He cannot come to the father.

But this position as a criminal is not, after all, his real position. It is so seemingly only. None but a child of God is thus brought to see himself, and God was never anything but his Father. What God is now, he was and will be. God is the Eternal father. The reason why he cannot come to the Father, the loving, forgiving Father, is because he has not yet seen the Son. And no human power, no power short of the power of God, can ever enable him to see the Son and his worship in the Son. "No man can come to me except the father which has sent me draw him" John 6.44. And God does in his own time, draw him. "Because you are sons of God. God has sent forth the spirit of his son unto your heart crying ABBA, Father" Galatians 4.6. Through the Son only, is there access to the Father. First, because by him only is there atonement for sin. Second, because without him there is an utter ignorance of God. Asked the father. And third, because in Him only is their spiritual communion with the spiritual Father. And the child of God is in turn, or at once convinced of all this.

He was born again but was unconscious, babe. Consciousness, however, at length dawns. He begins to see that he delights in the law of God after the "inward man." While he sees another law in his members warring against the "law of his mind" and bringing him into captivity to the law of sin which is. His members. What is the inward man? He acquires. What is this law of my mind? It is something new to me. And how is it that I begin to feel myself forgiven, even while I'm thus brought into captivity to sin within me? At length, they'll come to him the words, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." He begins to see that the "inward man" is "Christ in him the hope of glory." An assurance of faith comes by which he realizes that he is the one spoken of as being under no condemnation because he is in Christ Jesus. He sees within himself a disposition to walk after the flesh, and a disposition to walk after the spirit, and yet to walk after the spirit consists in that desire Romans 7. 15, 16, 21; to do good, that is, to seek God which operates within him, even when brought into captivity to the law of sin which is in him. He then is the only one for whom there is no condemnation. What such a Sinner by nature, and dead as he? Yes, just such as he. Old things pass away and behold, all things have become new. Perhaps a flood of his glory pours in upon him. God! I never knew him before, but how glorious! Too glorious for a mortal tongue to tell. And I! I am the son of God! I am the son of God! God is my father! The cry of ABBA father is breathing within him. Now Christ is developing within him by whom he comes to the Father.

But how is it that there is for me no condemnation is his inquiry? And the work of chastisement becomes his study and continues to be his study all his days. How Christ was wounded for his transgressions and bruised for his iniquities, how with his stripes he is healed, how the Lord lay on him, the iniquity of us all, and how he bore our sins in his own body on the tree. How thus he is not under the law, that husband being dead, but under Grace being married unto another, even Christ. The demands of justice are satisfied before justice. He is as though he had not sinned. Christ has presented him unto himself without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, but wholly and without blemish. Ephesians 5.27. And says unto him "You are all fair, my love. There is no spot in you" Song of Solomon 4.7.

But while there is no condemnation, there is fatherly love. While there is no judicial penalty, there is paternal chastisement. "Whom the Lord loves, he chastises and scourges every son whom he receives. If you endure chastening God deals with you as sons; for what son is he whom the father Chastens not? But if you be without chastisement whereof all our partakers, then you are bastards and not sons" Hebrews 12.5-11. The old nature remains with the believer in all its unchanged enmity and high-handed rebellion against God. It struggles to dethrone the "new man," it's blasphemous questions and defiance of God's authority, its potent drawings after the things of the flesh, its insidious endeavors to give to the truth the appearance of error and to make seem hideous the Church of God. It's perpetual, even though unexpressed, transgression. All. All remain. Yay, sometimes carry the child far from the path of duty to his Father and keep him away; yes, and sometimes join him into idols, even as with Ephriam and with Solomon. Into what outer darkness then must the Father sometimes put his child; to that weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth! God give us the grace to appreciate the sweet privilege of duty unto him, and to come out and be separate, and thus to enjoy a realizing sense of what is meant by the words, "I will receive you, and you will be a Father unto you, and you shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty. II Corinthians 4.17, 18.

Does this realizing sense abide in clearness? Or is it not the experience of the disciples who accompanied the Lord while in the flesh, after all, in very large measure the experience of the child of God, even in the present day. Jesus was with them, and yet one said unto him that he "knew not the way to the Father." Nay, that he knew not even to where Jesus was going when he said he was going to his Father's house. And Phillip another of the disciples, said unto him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it suffices us" (John 13) just as though he had never seen the Father.

Losing sight of the Son as he is. Losing sight of the Father and the consciousness of deep black hell-deserving sin remaining. Are there not seasons in the experience of God's child when thoughts of condemnation and wrath fit through his mind or bind him down with sorrow? This may be a part of the "tribulation" that Jesus tells his disciples they will bear in the world. God sends it. Nor can the child of God deliver himself from it. It must be for his good, "for all things work together, for good to them who love God, to them, who are the called according to his purpose."

But whatever may be the believer's state of mind, his position before God remains the same. It is that of a son, loved of God, freed from all condemnation, the Spirit of God rests upon him. He it is who is included in the saying. "Behold, what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us. That we should be called the Sons of God."

William W. Tufts

February 15, 1864

Signs of the Times