God's Plan with Men

under the la

n of God by faith in Ch

t Jesus is the Christ is

of yourselves; it is the gift of God: not of works, lest

the Son hath everlas

veth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not com

this life is in his Son. He that hath t

), redeemed from under the law (Rom. 6:14), and adopted as a child of God (Gal. 4:4-7), has then and there everlasting life (John 5:24), a new life that is never, never to end; a life that will outlast the stars; a life that he will be consciously enjoying when all the stars shall have burnt out. And yet when such a life is offered as a gift ("I give unt

ot under the law (Rom. 6:14), is a child of God (Gal. 3:26), has been saved (Eph. 2:8, 9, 1911 Bible and R. V.), not will be saved, it would be strange that, after all, the believer should have only a promise for the beyond and no reality here and now. But G

e everlasting life, notice John 5:24, "Hath everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed [here and now] from death unto life." The Revised Version (the more exact translation) makes it much stronger,-"hath passed out of death into life." What life, if not eternal life? Before this plain, positive statement of God's word, the mere promise of eternal life theory cannot stand. But the fact that the believer on Christ really has now eternal life, is made plain by other Scriptures. "Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer; and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him."-1 John 3:15. Here we are shown that when one "hath eternal

ver perish."-John 10:28). It is a tremendous decision, and it may prove to be a fatal one, to turn away and not believe on Christ and have as a present possession eternal life. "Verily, ver

"in hope of eternal life," then we have not really eternal life as a present possession; that we cannot hope for what we already have. But Jesus said positively that the believer "hath passed out of death into life" (John 5:24, R. V.), and He contrasts the one who "hath eternal life" with those to whom He says, "Ye have no life in you." A man can have eternal life here, and at the same time hope for it beyond the grave. A man has his wife and children now, and hopes to have them next year; a man away from wife

y lost the promise and not really eternal life itself. But Jesus, foreseeing this class of professing Christians, said that they were never really redeemed, never really had eternal life: "Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out demons? and in thy name done many wonderful works? and then will I profess unto them,

lty; partly alive and partly dead; partly born of God and partly not. There are but two

hat it is liable to lead to presumptuous, wilful sinning. They think it much safer for men to believe that they have not really the eternal life itself as an actual present possession, but only the promise of it; and that by their sinning hereafter they may forfeit that promise and be lost. They think that this fear of being lost will act as a check, a safeguard, a restraining power. To the extent that it does, it produces service from the motive of fear of Hel

rt of hypocrites, and may lead to indifference and sin on the part of those who honestly think they are redeemed, saved, but who really ar

of God (Gal. 4:4-7), that he has here and now, as an actual possession, eternal life, and shall never perish

ases where hardened men and women, deep down in sin, have actually become new creatures by being redeemed and being born again. Many are now living, whose names could be given, who are widely known, who were once notorious in sin, and they are now willingly and gladly wearing out their lives in God's service,

rts an irresistible constraint; His responsibility means our emancipation; His death, our life; His bleeding wound, our healing. Whoever says, 'He bore our sins,' says substitution; and to say substitution is to say something which involves an immeasurable obligation to Christ, and has therefore in it

hey should forfeit the promise and not attain eternal life hereafter, they "live unto themselves." When men live because they already

of the believer is not that of one trembling at the judgment seat, or of one for whom everything remains somehow in a condition of suspense; it is that of one who has the assurance of a Divine love which has gone deeper than all his sins, and has taken on itself the responsibility of them, and the responsibility of delivering him from them."... "Take away the certainty of it and the New Testament temper expires. Joy in this certainty is not presumption; on the contrary, it is joy in the Lord, and such joy is the Christian's strength. It is the impulse and the hope of sanctification; and to deprecate it, and the assurance from which it springs, is no true evangelical humility, but a failure to believe in the infinite goodness of God who in Christ removes our sins from us as far as the east is from the west, and plants our life in His eternal reconciling love."... "An absolute justification is needed to give the sinner a start. He must have the certainty of 'no condemnation' of being, without reserve or drawback, right with God through God's gracious act in Christ, before he can begin to live the new life."... "It is not by denying the gospel outright, from the very beginning, that we are to guard against the possible abuse of it."... "To try to take some preliminary security from the sinner's future morality before you make the gospel available for him, is not only to strike at the root of assurance, it is to pay a very poor tribute to the power of the gospel. The truth is, morality is best guaranteed by Christ, and not by any precautions we can take before Christ gets a chance, or by any virtue that is in faith except as it unites the soul to Him."... "If it is our death that Christ died on the cross, there is in the cross the constraint of an infinite love; but if it is not

of the Plan of Salvation"). "Just in proportion as the soul feels its lost, guilty and dangerous condition, in the same proportion will it exercise love to the being who grants spiritual favor and salvation."... "It may be affirmed, without hesitancy, that it would be impossible for the human soul to exercise full

in my judgments, if they break my statutes and keep not my commandments, then will I visit their transgression with the rod and their iniquity with stripes. Nevertheless, my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail. My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips."-Ps. 89:27-34. Equally explicit is the New Testament: "Ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto sons. My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him; for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastening, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards and not sons. Furthermo

t by unfaithfulness, lose sight of another fact, that the unfaithful redeemed one will lose his reward. Let the reader turn back and read Chapter VI. The Scripture teaching is plain, "If any man's work abide which he has built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any m

he might redeem us from all iniquity."-Titus 2:13, 14). How can God, because He is just, let the redeemed man, if he is redeemed from all iniquity, be lost? "A young minister was in the habit of visiting an aged Scotch woman in his congregation who was familiarly called 'Old Nanny.' She was bed-ridden and rapidly approaching the end of her 'long and weary pilgrimage,' but she rested with undisturbed composure and full assurance of faith upon the finished work of Christ. One day he said to her, 'Now, Nanny, what if, after all your confidence in the Saviour and your watching and waiting, God should suffer your soul to be lost?' Raising herself on her elbow, and turning to him with a look of grief and pain, she laid her hand on the o

on through faith in his blood (Rom. 3:25), and then should let one be lost who had been redeemed from all iniquity (Titus 2:14), wou

Lord." "We are confident, I say, and well pleased rather to be absent from the body, and present with the Lord."-2 Cor. 5:6, 8. The same conscious life continues; it is eternal life. Again he makes it clear: "I am in a strait betwixt the two, having a desire to depart and to be with Christ, which is far better: nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful on your account."-Phil. 1:23, 24. The same conscious life continues, the eternal life. To depart and to be with Christ he says "is

hess. 4:14. Their bodies are asleep; their souls are "absent from the body and present with the Lord" (2 Cor. 5:8); but at the resurrection of their bodies, these "will God bring with him." Then, "at the resurrection of the just" (Luke 14:14) will "each ma