p480 [To the same.] [From the French.] * * * I do not know if, in my "Études," I have sufficiently pointed out the structure of the Epistle to the Romans. At any rate, this point has very much developed in my mind. In chapter 1 I reach the close of the introduction at verse 17. Verse 18 begins the reasoning which proves the necessity of the gospel, by the sins, whether of Jews or Gentiles. From chapter 3:21 we have the answer of grace in the blood of Christ, to the sins committed, the explanation of the patience of God with regard to past sins, and the foundation of righteousness revealed in this present time. Then, in chapter 4, resurrection, as an accomplished fact, is added. In chapter 5:1-11 he shews all the blessings which flow from that which precedes; peace, favour, glory hereafter, joy in tribulation, joy in God Himself. This brings out the sovereign grace and love of God - a love which He has shed abroad in our hearts by His Spirit which He has given us.

A leading division of the epistle is found at the end of verse 11, chapter 5. Up to the end of this verse the apostle has spoken of sins, then of grace. Now he begins to speak of sin. Before, it was our offences; now it is a disobedience of one only: it is Adam (each no doubt having added his part) and Christ. Consequently, it is no longer Christ dead for our sins, but we dead in Christ, which puts an end to the nature and standing which we had by Adam. This is also why the apostle speaks of our death, and hardly goes beyond it. If he had spoken of our resurrection with Christ, he would have encroached on the doctrine of Colossians and Ephesians, and would have had to go on to union with Christ, which is not his subject here. His subject is - How am I, an individual sinner, justified before God? The answer is, Christ has died for our offences; there the fruits of the old man are blotted out: then, you are dead with Christ; that is, your old man gone (for faith).

Besides, chapter 6 replies to the objection, "Shall we continue in sin?" &c. How, says the apostle, shall we live in sin, if we are dead? You have part in death; certainly that is not to live. Union does not in anywise enter into this argument; only, if we are dead, we must live in some way or other; now that is unto God, through Jesus Christ. That was enough to shew the practical bearing of this doctrine. Union relates to our privileges; we are perfect in Christ, members of His body. The fact that we are in Christ is supposed in chapter 8:1, and affirmed in a practical manner in verse 9 of the same chapter, but there it is connected with deliverance. But the aim of the apostle in his reasoning is to shew that we have done with the flesh, and consequently with sin, and that we derive our life from elsewhere; so that justification is a doctrine of deliverance from sin, and not of liberty to sin.

In chapter 7 death is applied to our relations with the law. The end of the chapter presents to us the experience of a renewed soul, but (as to conscious position) still in the flesh, of which the law is the just rule, the law which, when we are renewed, is understood in its spirituality. The consequence of all this is developed in chapter 8, which shews us our position with God, the effect of our being in Christ; just as chapter 5:1-11 shews what God has been for us, sinners, and what, consequently, we have learned that He is in Himself. The end of chapter 8 sums up in triumph the consequences of these truths.

As to your question on the Psalms, you must not believe what they tell you. According to Mr. N.'s avowal (never mine), his views were found in the Psalms and not in the Gospels. My doctrine is exactly the opposite of Mr. N.'s. He taught that Christ was born in a state of distance from God, and could only meet God on the cross; but that, by His piety, He escaped many of the consequences of His position by birth. On the contrary, I believe that He was born, and lived up to the cross in the perfect favour of God; and that in grace He entered in spirit, into the sorrows and troubles of His people, and particularly at the end, when His hour was come. On the cross He did indeed drink the cup. But I have no idea that His sufferings are in question only in the Psalms; on examination, I even think that a far less number of the Psalms apply directly to Christ than is generally thought. The Psalms, viewed in their prophetic sense, depict the circumstances and afflictions of the remnant of Israel. That Christ, in spirit, took part in these sorrows of His people, I doubt not; but I say that very few Psalms are direct prophecies of what came upon Him; that some are, need not be said. But I believe that the New Testament shews us very clearly the relations of Christ with this people. No doubt the New Testament is not occupied with the remnant, as the Psalms, nor with the future of Israel, as the prophecies, because it treats generally of truths that are deeper, more important, and of another kind; but it puts these things very clearly in their place historically, and quotes the prophecies which relate to them. We see Jesus weeping over Jerusalem, announcing what was to happen, whether to the disciples in the midst of the nation, or to the nation itself. The Old Testament gives us the details as to Israel, and speaks more of the result, because that is the subject of which it treats; but the New Testament shews us exactly the place of these things relatively to Christianity, which is its subject, and it takes up, as far as is necessary, the subject of the Old. As to the sufferings of Christ, it gives historically and by quoting the passages that of which the Old Testament spoke; often it presents to us the feelings of Christ more intimately than the Psalms, and at other times cites these latter as explaining what had taken place. For my part, I take what I find in the Old Testament as having the same authority as the New. If the Old Testament says, "In all their afflictions he was afflicted," the New gives us to hear Jesus Himself saying with tears, "How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and ye would not."

I can easily understand that many Christians do not rightly seize what concerns the remnant of Israel nor the interest which the Lord has in them; and that does not trouble me; but when one expounds the Psalms, one must expound them according to their true sense, and I judge, this gives a far deeper perception of the patient grace of Jesus. Still, I think it important it should remain a means of edification, and not a subject of dispute; otherwise, Christ loses His savour for the heart, or at least the heart loses the sweet fragrance of His grace. If it be said that these sufferings (which I do not admit) are not found in the New Testament, but in the Old, it is clear then that, in explaining the Old, we must speak of them. But the Lord speaks of His position such as Zechariah 13 depicts it, and consequently of the state of the remnant.

The New Testament has not in general the remnant for its subject, but Christ the Saviour, and Christianity; but it also treats of the first of these subjects in its place. Luke 1, 2 are almost entirely occupied with the remnant, historically and prophetically. Matthew 10 only applies to this subject, and comprehends the whole time up to the end, to the exclusion of the Gentiles and Samaritans. It is the same thing, under another form, in chapter 11.

It is said that Christ suffered only in expiation, or through sympathy. Do you think He suffered nothing when He denounced the scribes who hindered poor souls from receiving Him? Read Matthew 23: did not His heart suffer? "He suffered being tempted," is a cardinal truth of the word. When He asked His disciples to watch with Him, He was not yet drinking the cup, but His sweat was, as it were, great drops of blood. That was not sympathy: He sought it, but found none. It is a very serious thing to deny the sufferings of the Son of man. There was sympathy at the tomb of Lazarus; but in approaching death, and always, more or less, He suffered - in love, in grace no doubt, but really; assuredly not on account of what was in Him, or of His own relationships with the Father, "but it became him for whom are all things and by whom are all things, to make the captain of our salvation perfect through sufferings."

I earnestly entreat you not to make these things a subject of controversy; it is a subject, rather, for adoration: to contend about these points, mars and tends to destroy all holy affections. When I see Paul express himself as he has done at the commencement of Romans 9 shall I say that Christ, whose Spirit urged the apostle to these sentiments, remained Himself indifferent to the unbelief of the beloved people? He died for the nation; it is clear that that was expiatory, but it is a proof that He loved it as a nation. The sufferings of Christ are a subject of great importance, and the New Testament, as well as the Old, shews that Israel was, in a special way, the object of affections which caused Him to suffer. Now, His sympathy was with the sorrows of humanity, but He felt, as He expressed it, the iniquity which (but for the sovereign grace of God) put an end to all the hopes of Israel and to the enjoyment by the beloved people of all the promises. When He said, "It cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jerusalem," and calls it the city "which killest the prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee;" did He say it with callous indifference? That was not expiatory; and He could not have sympathy with the iniquity which did it. These words only reproduce with a more touching affection, and a heart from which all selfishness and self-interest were absent, the expression of the Psalm [102:14]: "Thy servants take pleasure in her stones."

No doubt, one may present these things badly. The affections of the Saviour are too delicate a subject to be handled roughly, without falsifying or, so to speak, wounding them; but that any should deny them, is to me distressing.

The Messiah was cut off, and all the hopes of the beloved people were lost with Him - to be recovered, no doubt; now I do not believe that Christ has not suffered on this account. …

Boston, February 17th, 1867.

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