Ephesians 4:11-13.
1887 329 Salvation is of God. This was held out from the first. The judgment pronounced upon the serpent was in view of salvation. By sin came death, and the first appearance of death was murder. But if the first death was a murder, the first soul that left the earth went straight up to heaven. Sin and death were there in terrible power, but God's mercy was there too. Self-righteousness, and its concomitants, hatred and murder, on the one side, and on the other, faith, righteousness, and divine grace. If Satan gave such early proof of the power he had acquired over man, God at the same time showed how salvation could come in long before the head of the serpent would be crushed. And all God's dealings with men shows that salvation is His purpose, though the fulness was necessarily not declared till Christ came. Man's utter ruin must first be proved; then was the due time. God is now declared to be a Saviour God (see Epistles to Timothy and Titus): a name which has special reference to this present day, a day which began with the cross. He is saving, not judging. The world ignores this great fact, and is busy with its own purposes and plans, promising great things to itself, a millennium of its own making. Many of God's saints are occupied with its religious schemes and imagine they are promoting the happiness of the world, forgetting, and practically denying, that judgment already lies upon it. All christians of course know that the unbeliever is eternally lost; but this regards only the individual. The truth is that the world as a system is judged and doomed to destruction; and God is now calling out and separating from it the heirs of salvation, i.e., all who believe. Hence His name — God our Saviour.
Amid all the noise and bustle of men, the clashings of governments, the schemes of companies and of individuals, God is working quietly but certainly, and gathering souls for Himself out of every condition. Satan and men strive to hinder; but even as Jehovah has decreed that His anointed shall sit enthroned upon His holy bill of Zion, so also is it His purpose to have a redeemed people who are according to the same purpose called, justified, and glorified (Rom. 8:28-30). Let believers think of this and cease to be occupied with the advances of civilization and education, which are only a more refined way of committing sin, and very far from being a remedy (as some dream) for the evils of the world. On the contrary civilization and education bring their own special evils. Let us consider this one great and immense fact — God is saving souls.
To be delivered from the wrath to come, through infinite grace, is only a part of God's salvation. The salvation which we know is much more than being sheltered from the Judge by the blood sprinkled on the door-post, more even than the forgiveness of sins, though that is "according to the riches of His grace." Forgiveness is only the first step in the career of glory to which we are predestinated. A far higher aspect in glory is the being conformed to the image of His Son. And both the grace and the discipline of God are now in full activity in view of it. The inward man is renewed day by day; the Spirit's work in the soul is progressive, and so we grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. But one mighty word shall in an instant change these corruptible bodies into the likeness of Christ's body of glory; and so God's purpose concerning us will be accomplished.
It is now the daily renewal of the inward man, and for this not the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God, but moral means and instruments according to His will and wisdom.
"And He gave some apostles; and some prophets; and some evangelists; and some pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, unto the work of the ministry, unto the edifying of the body of Christ; till we all come, in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."
The greater gifts, apostles and prophets, have ceased. They were the foundations of the household of God, "Jesus Christ Himself being the chief corner stone" (Eph. 2:20). They were men inspired of God. The peculiar mark of an apostle was authority to act fully and finally in the church for Christ; as a prophet's was, revealing new truth, or applying the word already revealed to present facts and to events yet future. Paul was both, and also Peter and John. They stand foremost. In their writings both functions are manifest: authority, as when Paul wrote to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 5; 2 Cor. 2); new truth, as in his Epistles to the Thessalonians (1 Thess. 4, etc.) and in his other Epistles. So John in the Apocalypse. But if the foundation gifts are gone, others remain to carry on the building. Evangelists, pastors and teachers are the Lord's gifts, not to lay another foundation but to build upon that which is laid. "Other foundations can no man lay." God's purpose in providing these workers is for the perfecting of the saints individually, in ministerial work generally, and also that the body of Christ as a whole may be edified, till we all come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
Pastors may be the least prominent and most rare, certainly not the least efficient and valued of the servants of Christ, nor the least needed. The pastor is a quiet and unobtrusive gift, his labour is with the individual saint, rather than with the assembly. He is qualified to enter into the more private sorrows and trials of saints. That which makes him a true pastor — one of the "gifts" — is, that he is used of God to strengthen and administer comfort to the tried ones of the flock, and also to rebuke where needed. His is rather a secret work for the most part known only to the Lord, but which will have its public reward equally with the more prominent gifts.
Among teachers are greater differences than among pastors or evangelists. The whole word of God in its varied depths is their storehouse. Each according to his measure able to unfold and apply the word to the need of the assembly, building up in faith, confirming hope, and raising the moral and spiritual tone of the meeting. They who are thus used of God are truly His "gifts," and the proof is that saints are edified and instructed; the church is consolidated by their ministry. Some are able to give the prophetic word its due place in the minds and hearts of the children of God. But we must remember that the Epistles are designated "prophetic writings" (Rom. 16:26). In a subordinate sense these might be called prophets, not as foretelling, nor as being "foundations," but as helping believers to understand the drift and scope of the prophets, of the Old Testament as of the New. And the evidence of the Spirit's teaching in them will be that Christ is seen as the Object of all prophecy, His glory and exaltation the grand theme from first to last. Others teach in doctrine whether of the church and its calling and special hope, or of the first principles of our salvation. These last may be called teachers of the gospel; they are not necessarily evangelists. Nor is every talker in the meeting a teacher; the "gift" is known by the blessing which follows. So while there are some able to instruct in the higher truths (so to say) of revelation, there are others whose sphere is the unfolding of the simple gospel for the establishing of young converts, yea, sometimes also of old believers; and these are surely of not less, perhaps of more general, importance for assemblies — looking at their present condition — than those who soar higher in the region of revealed truth. But God suits His gifts according to the need of saints. He has one end in view, "Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ."
Now the teacher of the gospel differs from the evangelist whose special field of labour is in the world among the unsaved. He is a fisher of men; the teacher of the gospel is for the feeding of the babes in God's household; and these, though closely allied, are distinct gifts, having different spheres. It not infrequently happens that the gospel teacher mourns on account of the absence of conversions when he addresses sinners, and similarly the pure evangelist has not his usual freedom when his hearers are for the most part believers. But each "gift" is for a special work, to which he is appointed. Let then the teacher wait on his teaching (see Rom. 12:4-8), and the evangelist on his preaching. Rarely do we see both functions in the same servant. Paul was a "gift" in whom all these offices and qualities were combined; he was at once apostle, prophet, teacher, pastor, and evangelist, and most prominent and zealous in each.
What then are the marks by which the evangelist, as a distinct "gift," may be known? Not necessarily by accurate enunciations of doctrine. His intense zeal for souls that sometimes carries him beyond the ordinary limits of earnestness is not conducive to, though not incompatible with, doctrinal accuracy of expression. The love of God to a lost world, the certainty of salvation to them that believe, are his staple themes. And in urging faith on the lost, repentance is sometimes apparently lost sight of. But there is no true saving faith without repentance, Faith (so-called) without self-judgment is nothing more than the mere assent of the natural mind, not a Spirit-formed faith in the heart (see Rom. 10:8). When the sun of tribulation arises, this kind of human belief withers away. Sorrowful instances of such cases recur to the writer's mind, as doubtless also to the reader.
Another mark of the earnest evangelist is his fearlessness; boldness in speaking to every one, as well in the public street as in private. What think you of a zealous preacher accosting a man "of reputation" in the common thoroughfare with, "If you were to die to night, where would you spend eternity?" Certainly the world will, and does, resent such interference with its ease and pleasure. But while all servants are told to be diligent, and "instant in season and out of season," I doubt if such a case as is alluded to can find a warrant therein: especially when we have the example of Paul who spoke of full grace privately to them of reputation (Gal. 2:2) of course in the church. Yet who of us would forbid the preacher? What are social proprieties in view of eternity?
But not the burning zeal, not the ever readiness to speak, nor boldness, however great (and the Pentecostal church prayed for boldness for the Lord's servants, Acts 4:29), are the only, or even the essential, mark of the evangelist who is truly a "gift." A man may have all these, be abundant in labours, and have a real love for souls, and yet not a "gift." He who is, has souls for his hire, he is used for their conversion. He may be comparatively unready in speech, not over bold, not clear perhaps as to doctrine on many points (I do not refer to fundamental principles); but if men are brought to God through his preaching, he is a "gift" in the meaning of this scripture. God brings hundreds of men to hear him preach, and by the power of His own word gathers heirs from among them. In the judgment of men, yea, of saints, he may be accounted the weakest of preachers, but if God saves by his instrumentality, he is the one designated "evangelist" in the scriptural meaning of the word. There are preachers who are not evangelists.
The overflowing zeal which leads to a readiness to accredit the mere appearance of conversion, through his intense desire, unfits the evangelist in a measure to judge of the reality of conversions so as to bring souls into communion, and no one is more liable to be deceived than an evangelist in this. But receiving into fellowship is no part of the work of an evangelist, nor of any other "gift," nor of all the gifts combined. It is the assembly that must receive. It is the duty of the evangelist to bring those who have been converted to the church, that all, especially those best qualified, may judge, and that the assembly may receive into communion. The pastor, the teacher, and the evangelist, are of course part of the assembly, and have a voice as any other members. But the assembly, not the evangelist', receives. Not even an apostle would receive or put away apart from the church. The apostle may, with the authority he has received from the Lord, command the assembly to put away or receive; and if Paul referred both these acts to the church at Corinth (see 1 Cor. 5, 2 Cor. 2), much more should a simple evangelist now defer to the judgment of the church. The Corinthian assembly was in a low condition, but it is commanded to act. Paul speaks by direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit: we are bound no less. The ruin-state of the church does not enfeeble the duty.
This solemn responsibility which rests upon the assembly needs calm and spiritual discernment. How sorrowful if through haste one is brought in whom the Lord would not; nor less so when one whom the Lord would, is kept out through want of the power of discernment on the part of those who visit the newly converted! To visit such wisely is pastoral work, but not every visitor is a pastor. The one seeking fellowship may be so unintelligent as to appear very unsatisfactory; he feels the change wrought in his soul, but can only say he is happy; professes to know his sins are forgiven, but has not yet learnt how to express it to meet the approbation of his visitor. The true pastor can discern where there is reality, where the unintelligent and undiscerning visitor sees nothing but human feeling produced by sentimental preaching, and on the other hand is ready to accredit one who has nothing more than intellectual knowledge of the truth. This is the defect of those who assume the functions of pastor without being a "gift." These "visitors" cannot be ignored; but after due time given, unintelligent objections must not be allowed to overrule the voice of the spiritual and discerning.
These gifts are men of like passions, and the brightest has to watch lest the wily foe use the position of the "gift" against communion and singleness of eye in his service. The evangelist, for instance, may feel aggrieved if his converts are not received upon his own testimony. But this would be taking from the assembly what it is responsible for to the Lord. The evangelist may be sound in his judgment of any given case, and the assembly wrong: nevertheless he must bow to the assembly and not relax in diligent service. Let him spread the matter before the Lord, Who will, at the right moment, make all plain.
1887 346 The men that worked in the quarry and fashioned the stones for Solomon's temple, where there was no sound of hammer or of axe (1 Kings 6:7), did not place the stones in their position — that was the business of the builders. Both were necessary, but the quarry-men prepared the stones, and the builders carried on the building. Perhaps the preparedness of the stones is a figure of the saints when we all come "unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ," i.e., when we are with Him in glory. There will be no sound of hammer or of axe in heaven; all the shaping and fitting will have been done. But we can use the same figure for a present, though subordinate, application to the functions of the evangelist, and of the pastor and teacher.
A better than Solomon's temple is now rising, built with living stones; which "fitted together increases to a holy temple in the Lord … for a habitation of God in the Spirit." There are classes of workers, each with a separate function, but all in harmony, working together for one end, under the guiding power of the Holy Spirit. Evangelists are the Lord's quarry-men; as such they dig in the world's quarries, they preach the life-giving word. Faith comes by hearing, and quickened men receive salvation. The stones are ready for the builders. All are fitted together in the Spirit and the building increases.
"For the edifying of the body of Christ." The common idea of "edifying" is instruction of those within, and this is of equal importance to the Lord as the preaching of the gospel to the unsaved. When Peter was first called, the Lord said he would make him a fisher of men; when he was restored and had learnt the much needed lesson of his own weakness, the Lord gave him a higher character of work. He said, "Feed my sheep." But edification is a larger word than instruction. This excludes the evangelist; but he is a "gift" with others for the edifying of the body of Christ. The building up of the edifice of God is not only teaching for those within, but working for fresh souls to be brought — new material for the building. For how is the church to be added to if there be no evangelists?
"The unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God." Christ the Son of the living God is the object of faith, the one rock upon which the church is built. It is this knowledge which makes the unity of the faith. The "unity" and the "knowledge" go together. The possession of faith fits us for the knowledge, and again, the knowledge is the confirmation of faith; there is a reflex action, and each grows by the other. "I know Whom I have believed," says Paul. He had believed, and therefore he says, "I know;" and because he knew, he is able to say, "and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him against that day." That is, his knowledge led on to the fullest confidence. The faith and the knowledge, and also the knowledge and the confidence could not be more clearly and tersely given in their reciprocal relation. This knowledge is not a mere taking in of truth, it is a personal acquaintance with, or rather a knowledge of, the Person of the Son of God; and moreover knowing Him not only as Saviour, but as Son of God. The world will know Him as Judge and King, the Jew as Messiah; our special privilege is very far above their knowledge. To know Him as the Son of God takes in all His glories, and implies that we are able and fitted to understand what neither Israel nor the millennial saint can know. And we begin to have this knowledge while here, for the unity of the faith is bound up with this knowledge of the Son of God. Take any assembly, and where you discern among the saints any measure of this knowledge of the Son of God, there you may be assured is a proportionate measure of the unity of the faith.
All the errors that have troubled the saints of God, and marred His church, have had their root in the pretentious knowledge of the Son of God. Yea, the worst heterodoxies were always connected with a denial of some special glory of His person. It was so at the beginning, and was the occasion for the writing of John's Epistles. It has continued to the present day, and made its mark upon those who, after the first quarter of this present century, professed to have left the world-church and all its corruptions, and to have received grace to be separate from all their religious surroundings. The denial of His personal glory in this or that aspect cannot but divide the saints of God.
Sorrowful, shameful, as we feel this to be, we know it will — it must — cease. For the word says, "Till we all come." Shall we all come to this unity and knowledge before the Lord come? When He comes, the unity of the faith will be perfect; will our knowledge of the Son of God be perfect? Yea, we shall know, even as also we are known. We shall be, we are, capable of learning indefinitely. Of some now it is said, "Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth." He, Christ, the Son of God is the Truth; and we shall have it perfectly.
"To a perfect — full-grown-man." Each of us may take this as the goal to which we are, or should be, continually pressing forward. "That I may know Him," etc. Was the apostle's prayer for himself? Did he wish less for all saints? He looks forward to the time when we all come, and all together be the full-grown man. It is the church looked at in its several members, perfect unity of faith making them as one. Each and all together will be brought up to a certain standard, the stature of the fulness of Christ. The corporate union of the church with Christ, as members of the body with the Head is not the thought here. We have that in Eph. 1:23., "Which is His body, the fulness [the complement] of Him that filleth all in all." Here (Eph. 4:13) it is rather likeness (as in 1 John). Scripture does not speak of the corporate body in its union with Christ as being like Him. Likeness is said of distinct things; we could not say the body is like the head; but the word does say that the believer shall be like Christ. Each will bear the image of the heavenly, and have bodies like unto the body of His glory. The believer in his individuality will be like Him: it is the glory of each. The corporate church is His body, is part of Himself, both together the Christ (1 Cor. 12:12).
"To the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." This exceeds our thought; it is not a partial likeness, but complete. Here in this life through grace the Holy Spirit produces likenesses in some things, and would in all were we obedient to His leadings. Alas! in how many things we are unlike. In the circumstances of this present time where we should manifest the meekness, the lowliness, the patience, and the faith of Christ, for it is only now that we have opportunities for showing these, how much of the contraries suddenly and frequently break out! "When He was reviled, He reviled not again;" "in Whose mouth was no guile," Whose "meat was to do the will of the Father Who sent" Him. What cause we have for self-judgment! How very far short we come in following Him Who has not only saved us, but left us a pattern how we should walk!
With gladness we look on to the time when our likeness to Him shall be perfect. "The measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ." Can we add one word to this which would give a more complete idea of the perfection of the moral glory to which we all shall be brought, than those already given? The stature of the fulness of Christ! That is the goal in the mind of God for His church. There is nothing higher in glory possible for us. Again we say our minds fail to comprehend this fulness; not of course the fulness in Col. 1:19 and 2:9, where the fulness of the Godhead — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost — was pleased to dwell in the Man Christ Jesus, but His fulness as a perfect Man distinct from His Godhead, and apart from His glory as making atonement, a perfect and glorified Man, possessing every moral quality that can be the delight of God. He is the model before the mind of God to which we shall fully answer. We shall have a glory of position in the kingdom, kings and priests, reigning with Him over the world. The body too shall be glorified. But this glory — the stature of the fulness of Christ — is the moral glory of the soul, of the mind which is here renewed day by day; but there, when we have all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, is no need of renewal, for we shall have come up to the "measure," the standard of Christ, of His fulness. This glory is personal not merely something possessed, but what we are.
This is our salvation, or rather God's salvation for us. We know the first step toward this glory, the forgiveness of sins. But what heart could have conceived "so great salvation?" What fulness of meaning to the word "redemption," "riches of grace" leading on to a glory that never ends. Our pathway through this life leads right on to it. The road may be rough, or comparatively smooth, varied in a thousand ways as to earthly circumstances. But there is no variation whatever in this, that at least all the thousand ways converge on this one point — the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ. And every day brings us closer, and we are entitled to say, "Now is our salvation nearer than when we [first] believed."
The "gifts" are men, and members of the body of Christ in common with other saints. Angels are not fitted to be "gifts." For then the taught would be higher than the teachers. No such position and glory is before them as before us. The "gifts," as members of the body, receive blessings by their own labours. "He that watereth shall be watered." Yea, every point supplies (in its measure) that which ministers to the good of all. The "gifts" are exposed to danger in common with all the saints; and mere reason might have said, Let the teachers be beyond the reach of human passions and failures. But the grace of God was to be displayed in the teacher's victory, as in the weakest of the saints. The gifts to the church must be of the church; and neither the weakness nor the failures of the gifts can prevent the accomplishment of God's purpose in giving them. They share as members of the body in the blessings of which as "gifts" they are the media.
Two classes of workers remain, those who gather for the building — the evangelists; and those who watch over the already gathered. The word "some" distinguishes between the different classes: and why are not pastors and teachers distinguished in the same way? Because, in some cases they are in one person, in others they are together labouring within the church, they are a sub-division which cares specially for believers, while evangelists go outside into the world. Believers are viewed either as pilgrims journeying through a wilderness, and so needing care and oversight: "Shepherd My sheep," said the Lord to Peter (John 21:16); or, as being brought to the place where they not only find rest to their souls, but where they may enjoy and learn the truth as it is in Jesus (Eph. 4:21), and so need teachers. Not that the pastor or the teacher is rigidly limited respectively to these two aspects of the saints, but that God has given "gifts" to meet our need in both.
What a glorious destiny is ours, given in Romans (Rom. 8:29) as here; whether it be conformed to the image of His (God's) Son, or having come to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, the purpose of God is declared concerning us! Let us value the means or "gifts," let us praise the Giver, let us hasten the consummation.