Jottings

by J. Miller | Category: Jottings | Jun 1953

Acts of obedience and disobedience have been the sources of rivers which flow on through time for many centuries, and in some cases throughout all time and into eternity. Think of the consequences of Adam's disobedience by which the many were made sinners! No mind, save that which is divine, can measure the depth of sorrow which has been, and will for ever be, the result of the entrance of sin into the human race by one act of disobedience. How effective is the contrast which Paul draws in Romans 5.12-21 between the disobedience of Adam and the obedience of Christ! The obedience of the Lord unto death opened the floodgates of divine grace to man, with all the joyous results to those who receive and know such grace, but the disobedience of Adam brought a flood of pain and shame and sorrow to the race of mankind which has affected every human being and every family thereof. Think of the sorrows in such illustrious human families as those of Jacob and David, both in the royal lineage of the coming King Messiah. In both are to be found cases of serious immoral conduct and murder. what fathers and mothers are free from cares and sorrows as they see the effects of the working of the flesh in their chil4ren? Advice and counsel are often cast aside and children so often go on in their self-chosen way, which in some cases ends disastrously.

Do not such evidences of the working of the flesh lead us to think of the many griefs caused to our heavenly Father by the flesh in His children? How often the Holy Spirit is grieved in us (Ephesians 4.30), as He was grieved by the children of Israel in the wilderness ! (Isaiah 63.10). when we think of the immoral members of the flesh in us-" fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and c6vetousness, the which is idolatry" (Colossians 3.5), we have every cause to be humble and lowly and to walk softly all our days, and to ask, as one has done, "why should the spirit of mortal be proud?" The mortification of such evil members is a task which will keep us engaged till we leave our houses of clay or such be changed into the glorious image of our Lord's likeness at His coming again, when this mortal will be swallowed up of life. Happy moment indeed!

What is true of Adam's disobedience is true of Cain's, the effects of the acts of both passed to their descendants. Though in Adam's descendants there were examples of obedience, and a line of obedient men of Adam's line is traced in Genesis 5. from Adam to Noah, men who live in times of gathering gloom in which the tide of lawlessness rose higher and higher, there were no such examples in the Cain line. In the brief history given of the Cain line in Genesis 4. there were ranchers, musicians and forgers of brass and iron. Industrialists enriched themselves, musicians charmed their audiences, and meat for all was provided by the cattle-breeders. Here was a world much like the present. In such an ancient world +here were also polygamy and murder, and there was no shame in the doing of either, but rather we have a boastful poetic effusion in justification of such evil deeds. Such men of the descendants of Cain multiplied and replenished the earth with a race of wicked men who refused to have God in their knowledge, who compelled God to end their miserable life on earth in the waters of Noah's flood. Over it all again we might write-" By one man's disobedience," for it all began by Cain disobeying God, whilst his brother Abel went on to obey God, to be martyred, and to head the list of the worthies of faith in Hebrews 11.

We look back to such long-past events and seek to gather some profitable lessons, and then quickly think of what must be the thoughts of the actors in such scenes, when they look back out of eternal ages to those days in which they lived on earth and to the wrong decision they made to follow a path of disobedience to God. What must be their thoughts? They alone can know!

In a world of disobedient men arises a man to whom all men who have been blessed with him shall be for ever indebted. This man, a giant of faith, is called "the faithful Abraham." His parents were idolaters. They lived in Ur of the Chaldees, beyond the great river Euphrates. Considerably over a thousand miles by the road he travelled separated him from the promised land. But the God of Glory had appeared to him and the world in which he lived became in consequence a changed place for him. He became like what his descendant said of himself at a latter date," I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision." The command of the God of Glory, that he should get out of his country, and from his kinsfolk and from his father's house, and come to a land which God would show him and give to his seed after him, did not fall on deaf ears. for when he was called he obeyed, and went out of Chaldea not knowing whither he went. God could never forget the pleasure that this act of faith gave to Him. Here was the beginning of a stream of blessing which flows through all time and all lands and empties itself far in the eternal ages. In its clean pellucid waters is Christ who gives life to every shore its waters touch. Shall we emphasize the words of Hebrews 11. 8 just alluded to-" when he was called, obeyed"? The calling of God is of vital importance, whether we view it in the gospel-call to the sinner to come to Christ (Matthew ii. 28), or whether it is that call to believers to come out and to be separate and touch no unclean thing (2 Corinthians 6.14-18), and on the ground of such separation God pledges Himself that He will receive them, which clearly is not the reception of the sinner, but the reception of the separated believer. Happy shall those believers be in time to come, who, having heard the call of God, have gone out as Abraham did. They will find it a path of many trials and difficulties as Abraham found God's way for him in that past day. But who that views the way of life aright would be without such trials and such difficulties? Saints in this life were never intended to be wrapped in cotton wool and put in an incubator. Life for the saint is to be one of daring and adventure, for he is passing through a country where most of its inhabitants are under the sway of a cruel and malevolent prince with whom he can never come to terms of peace. Here he will be attacked from many angles, but if he adheres to what was written long since in Psalm 91. 1

"He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High

Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty,"

he need fear no evil. He need not fear the snare of the fowler, or the noisome pestilence, nor yet the terror by night or the arrow by day. A thousand may fall at his side and ten thousand at his right hand, but the dangers of the way shall not come nigh him. Such was the way the Master went and should not His disciple follow it still?

The chosen and obedient line ran on through Isaac and Jacob; but think of such other branches as broke off from the main stem, such as Ishmael and Esau, the former as typical of all such as are dominated by the flesh and the latter of such believers as see little profit in spiritual things and who sell their birthright for a mess of pottage; for earthly and worldly things are but a mess of pottage after all. From these two, descended races of men in whom we see no glimmer of light or exercise in seeking after God. Indeed Esau's descendants were ever enemies of Israel and always sought to bring the testimony God raised in Jacob to an end. Let us consider well the word, "A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children's children" (Proverbs 13. 22, see also Ezra 9.12).

J. Miller | Jun 1953
Jottings