Heavenly Geometry
DELIVERED ON SUNDAY MORNING, AUGUST 19, 1866,
BY C. H. SPURGEON, AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON.
"That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be
strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may
dwell in your hearts by faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in
love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth,
and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ,
which passes knowledge, that you might be filled with all the fullness
of God." Ephesians 3:16-19.
THIS Divine measurement is an art of the most desirable kind, as
appears from its being the object of most earnest Apostolic prayers.
Paul was not content to travail in birth for souls and to become their
spiritual parent–but he afterwards exercised the functions of a
nursing father, tenderly caring for the souls to whom he had been
blessed–and desiring to see them growing up in the faith to the
ripeness of spiritual maturity. He was parent, nurse, and tutor–in
fact he became all things, as far as lay within his power–to his
spiritual children.
Paul's wise tenderness leads us to an assured confidence that the
blessing to pray for, which he suspended his writing of so important an
Epistle, must have been of the very highest value. "For this cause I
bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." He felt that it
was desirable to the very last degree that the saints should not only
know themselves to be the objects of Divine favor, but should be well
acquainted with its sublime qualities and perfections which he here
compares to a fourfold measurement.
In this measurement may you and I be skilled. If we know nothing of
mathematics, may we be well-tutored scholars in this spiritual geometry
and be able to comprehend the breadths and lengths of Jesus' precious
love. It may be well at the outset to call your attention to the
previous education which the Apostle desires for the saints as a
preliminary to their measurement of Divine love. Then the measurement
itself which he desires them to practice. And lastly, the practical
results which would be sure to follow from their being able to
comprehend the love of Christ Jesus our Lord.
I. Like a wise and enlightened teacher, Paul desires for the saints
that they should receive THAT PREVIOUS EDUCATION WHICH IS NECESSARY
BEFORE THEY WILL BE ABLE TO ENTER UPON SUCH A SCIENCE AS THE
MEASUREMENT OF CHRIST'S LOVE. When lads go to school they are not at
first put to study algebra, nor are they sent out to make a
trigonometrical survey of a county. The schoolmaster knows that they
must have a rudimentary knowledge of arithmetic, or else to teach them
algebra would be a waste of time, and that they must have some
acquaintance with common geometry, or it would be absurd to instruct
them in surveying.
He therefore begins with the elementary information, and when they have
learned simpler matters they are ready for the more difficult studies.
They climb the steps of the door of science and then they are
introduced to her temple. The Apostle Paul does not propose that the
new convert should at once be able to measure the breadth and length
and depth and height of the love of Christ! He knows that this is not
within the range of his infant mind, for the new-born spirit has a time
of growth to go through before it can enter into the deep things of
God. We must learn our alphabet at the dame's school of repentance and
faith, and study the syntax of Christian holiness at the grammar school
of experience before we can enter the university of full assurance and
obtain a fellowship among those who comprehend the science of Christ
Crucified in its highest degree.
It is not for the mere babe to compute distances or to fathom
depths–this is work for men! The child will think as a child and
understand as a child until instruction and years have developed his
powers and fitted him for more sublime and manly thought. If you will
kindly refer to the text you will see what this previous education is
which the Apostle desired for the saints. It is very fully described in
three parts. First, He desired that their spiritual faculties might be
strengthened, for he prays that they might be "strengthened with might
by the Spirit in the inner man." He does not so much intend that they
may be strengthened in their mental faculties as in their spiritual
capacities, to which he refers by the term, "inner man."
The schoolmaster knows that the boy's mind must be strengthened, that
his understanding must be exercised, his discernment must be developed,
and his memory must be rendered capacious before he may enter upon
superior studies. And the Apostle knows that our spiritual faculties
must undergo the same kind of development. Our faith, for instance,
must be unwavering. Our love must become fervent. Our hope must be
bright. Our joy must be increased, and then, but not till then, we
shall be able to comprehend the length and breadth of Divine love. We
are to be strengthened in the inner man by the Spirit of God–and who
can strengthen as He strengthens? When the Divine Omnipotence pours its
renewing energy into our poor fainting weakness, then we grow strong,
indeed!
When the Divine Intelligence enlightens our pitiful ignorance, then we
grow truly wise. When the Divine Infinity enlarges and expands our
narrow capacities to receive the Truth of God, then are we blessedly
elevated to otherwise unattainable points of blissful knowledge. Oh the
blessedness of being strengthened of the Holy Spirit! How spiritually
strong do we become when He infuses His might into us! But the Spirit
of God works by means, and therefore we may expect to have our
spiritual faculties strengthened by the study of the Word, by communion
with Christ, by listening to the earnest exhortations of our Brethren,
by experience, by prayer, and by all other hallowed exertions which
Divine Grace has ordained to be the channels of communication between
the heirs of the kingdom and the Comforter who abides with them
forever.
Our strength to learn with must come from God the Holy Spirit. I
suppose the expression, "strengthened with might," is meant to refer to
an eminent measure of strength. The Christian man will get to Heaven
should he have only strength as a grain of mustard seed. Through many
difficulties the work of faith, though almost water-logged, will be
tugged into the harbor, for Christ is on board and secures her safety!
But it is not desirable that we should thus struggle into eternal life.
It is far more to be hoped that our young faculties may come to healthy
and vigorous manhood so that, to return to our former metaphor, our
vessel–staunch and in good trim, with her sails well filled, and her
flags flying right gallantly, having overcome every storm–may have an
abundant entrance into the desired haven.
Brethren, I trust you are not among those who think it quite enough to
be barely alive unto God. I trust that you wish to be not only babes in
the family, but young men and fathers in the household, and that you
aspire to be strengthened by the Holy Spirit with might that you may
become powerful men–men able to enter into the soul and marrow of
Divine things, and to discern between things that differ. I would have
you not mere milk-fed infants, but men able to crack the nuts of the
Gospel and to digest the strong meat, because by reason of years you
have had all your senses exercised.
Why should we forever be obliged to lay again the foundations? Why not
press onward and upward in heavenly attainments as men do in human
learning? Why must our heads always wear the dunce's cap and our backs
smart with the fool's rod? The Holy Spirit works in us to this very end
that we may be no more mere children, but well-taught men of God! Oh
grieve Him not, but be willing to be taught! This was the object of the
Apostle's prayers and of our loving anxieties. Remember, Beloved, that
none of you will be able to comprehend the measurement of the love of
Christ unless first of all the Holy Spirit, our Instructor, shall have
baptized your spiritual powers with His sacred influences. Then you
will be strengthened with might in that refined and newly created part
of your being which is called the inner man, because it is your truest,
most precious, most secret, most vital, most essential self.
A second part of this preliminary education is mentioned by our Apostle
in the next sentence–"That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith."
He desires that the Object of study may be evermore before them. A good
tutor not only wishes his scholar may have a disciplined mind able to
grapple with the subject, but he endeavors to keep the subject always
before him. In order to attain to any proficiency in a science, the
mind must be abstracted from all other thoughts and continually
exercised with the chosen theme. You will never find a man preeminent
in astronomy unless astronomy has become the lord of his mind and holds
a sway over his mind even in his dreams. The anatomist must be bound to
nerves, and bones, and blood vessels–as the galley slave is bound to
the oar–or he will never master his subject.
The botanist must be enamored of every flower, and wedded to every
plant, or the fields will utterly baffle him. "Through desire, a man
having separated himself, seeks and intermeddles with all wisdom."
Solomon knew what he wrote when he said, "separated himself," for
without separation or abstraction there can be no progress. Now, the
Apostle desires that we who are Believers, our faculties being
strengthened, may have the Person of Jesus constantly before us to
inflame our love, and so increase our knowledge. See how near he would
have Jesus be! "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith." You
cannot get a subject closer to you than to have it on the inner side of
the eyes–that is to say, in the heart itself.
The astronomer cannot always see the stars because they are far away,
and outside of him. But our Star shines in the Heaven of our hearts
ever more. The botanist must find his flowers in their seasons, but our
Plant of renown blooms in our souls all the year round! We carry the
instruments of our saintly art, and the Object of our devout
contemplation within ourselves! As a scholar carries in his pocket a
small edition of his favorite classic, so do we carry Christ in our
hearts. What if I say we bear about with us a heart edition of the
Libra Crucis, the Book of the Cross? Renewed hearts need no other
library than themselves, for Jesus, in our inmost spirits, is library
enough! If we knew more fully by experience the meaning of, "Christ in
you the hope of glory," our Heaven-taught affections, which are the
best part of our inner man, might be continually exercised upon the
Person, the work, and the love of our dear Redeemer. "That Christ may
dwell in your hearts."
Brothers and Sisters, it will be to small profit that we shall talk to
you about the breadth, and length, and depth, and height of the love of
Christ unless there is in your soul a devout longing ambition to set
the Lord Jesus always before you, as the frequent, if not the constant
Subject of your meditation! No progress to any extent is to be made in
the school of the Cross unless you separate yourself and give yourself
wholly to this. It must be the one great business of your life, to know
Him and the power of His Resurrection. I would to God that we were all
entered as diligent scholars in Jesus' college–students of Corpus
Christi, or the Body of Christ–resolved to attain unto a good degree
in the learning of the Cross, a learning which angels desire to
understand!
But to do this the heart must be full of Jesus, welling up with His
love, flaming with it, overrunning with it! And therefore the Apostle
prays, "that Christ may dwell in your hearts." Observe the words, "that
He may dwell"–not that He may call upon you sometimes, as a casual
visitor enters into a house and tarries for a night–but that He may
dwell. That Christ may take up His abode in your hearts. That the Lord
Jesus may become the Lord and tenant of your inmost being, never more
to go out, but to dwell there, world without end. Observe, too, the
words that He may dwell in your hearts–that best room of the house of
manhood–not in your thoughts alone, but in your affections! Not merely
have Him in your minds, but have Him in your loves.
Paul wants you to have a love to Christ of a most abiding character.
Not a love that flames up under an earnest sermon and then dies out
into the darkness of a few embers, but a constant flame–the abiding of
Jesus' love in your hearts, both day and night–like the flame upon the
altar which never went out. This cannot be accomplished except by
faith. Faith must be strong, or love will not be fervent. The root of
the flower must be healthy or we cannot expect the bloom to be sweet.
Faith is the lily's root, and love is the lily's bloom. Now Jesus
cannot be in your heart's love except you have a firm hold of Him by
your heart's faith. Therefore Paul prays that you may always trust
Christ, that you may always love Him. Thus, Brethren, the Lord Jesus,
being constantly brought under your heart's attention, you are likely
to be able to comprehend the measurement of His love which would
otherwise be impossible for you to do.
The Apostle prays further that they may have practical exercise in the
art of holy love–"that you, being rooted and grounded in love." Every
experienced tutor knows that it is greatly helpful to the student to
exercise him in his chosen pursuit upon some lower and inferior branch
of it, so as to lead him gradually to the higher points of it. If, for
instance, he means him to understand the surveying of estates, he bids
him measure a field containing an acre or two. If he means him to map
out a country, he sets him first to make a plan of a neighboring field
or a farm.
The Apostle acts upon the same method. "That you, being rooted and
grounded in love, may be able to comprehend the breadth and length of
the love of Christ." Having the love of Jesus in you–possessed with
love to Christ–you will be practiced in the exercise of love and so
will understand the love which filled the Savior. You will learn to do
business upon the greater waters of the Redeemer's infinite love to His
people as you sail upon the stream of your love to Him. Two expressions
are used–"rooted," like a living tree which lays hold upon the soil
twists itself round the rocks, and cannot be upturned. "Grounded," like
a building which has been settled, as a whole, and will never show any
cracks or flaws in the future through failures in the foundation.
The Apostle wishes us to be rooted and grounded in love, a vital union
being established between our souls and Jesus, so that we love Him
because He first loved us. And also a fiducial union, or a union of
trust by which we rest upon Jesus as the stones of a wall are settled
upon the foundation. He would have us, by love and by faith, to be knit
to Christ, and to be firm, and fast, and fixed, and immovable in our
loving attachment to Him. My dear Brothers and Sisters, you cannot know
Christ's love to you, to any great extent, except you thus love Him.
You must love, or you cannot comprehend love. A man who has never felt
benevolence towards his fellow creatures–and there are some such
monsters–sneers and laughs at those who can give their money to the
poor or to the sick. He thinks such persons fools at least, if not
absolutely mad.
"Ah," said one, "I know how to make money," and then he added
significantly, clenching his fist, "and I know what some people do not
know–I know how to take care of it, too." There are some benevolent
people who do not know how to take care of it in that sense, but they
know how to do good with it! And such people will never be comprehended
by the mean money-grubbing wretch who pollutes the earth he lives upon.
As though he were a very Solomon, and benevolent men were idiots, he
mutters conceitedly, "Well, I cannot understand it. It is stupidity to
give away your hard-earned money." Of course it is to him! He cannot
comprehend it, and so the love of Jesus Christ cannot be comprehended
by a man who does not love.
If you have no love to souls, you will not understand why Jesus wept
over Jerusalem. It will puzzle you mightily! You will look to Matthew
Henry, and Scott, and Gill, and be more puzzled still. But if you love
the souls of men you will find no difficulty in the passage at all, for
you will weep over sinners, too. If you do not love the saints, you
will wonder how Jesus can love them. But when you have once felt an
unselfish Christ-like love to your fellow men, the riddle will be
answered. He who circumnavigated the world began by sailing upon brooks
and mill ponds. And he who would measure the breadths and lengths of
Jesus' love must feel his own soul filled with affection for his Lord.
Paul would have us, then, with developed faculties–with the Subject in
our hearts, and with an exercise of love on our part–prepared to enter
upon the science. My Brethren, when I consider what a science it
is–the science of the love of Christ–the most masterly of all
knowledge, too deep for the archangel's intellect, the wonder of all
the hosts of Heaven! When I consider that the greatest human minds have
confessed themselves to be altogether lost in the contemplation, and
have had to say, "Oh the depths! Oh the depths!" I do not wonder at all
that the Apostle, instead of praying for us that we might immediately
enter upon the study of it, first prays that we may be gratified to
learn it. As some sciences, if taught to an illiterate man would be
only taught in their letter, and could not be learned in their spirit
for want of capacity to receive them, so the love of Jesus Christ in
its length, and breadth, and depth, and height–if it could be taught
in the letter of it to an untrained Believer–would be, in a great
measure, lost upon him.
He would not be deriving true knowledge from it. He would observe the
letter, but the inward spirit he would not be able to understand.
Beloved, if you are to win the precious attainment of the knowledge of
Christ's love in its depth and breadth, you must pray that God would
strengthen your spiritual powers. You must plead that Jesus may abide
in your souls and that your love to Him may become vigorous and
all-absorbing! For only then can you drink deeply into the unutterable
and infinite love of Jesus!
II. We now come to consider more closely the SCIENCE OF HEAVENLY
MEASUREMENT ITSELF. According to the text we have a solid body to deal
with, for we are to measure its breadth and length, and depth, and
height. This cubical measurement–for it lies foursquare, like the new
Jerusalem–proves the reality of the body to be measured.
Alas, to a great many religious people the love of Jesus is not a solid
substantial thing at all–it is a beautiful fiction, a sentimental
belief, a formal theory–but to Paul it was a real, substantial,
measurable fact. He had considered it this way, and that way, and the
other way. And it was evidently real to him, whatever it might be to
others. No one knows the love of Christ at all if he does not know it
to be real, and no one has felt it in his soul at all unless it becomes
so real as to constrain him and move him into actual activity.
We have a word which we sometimes use in a sense which I believe is not
correct according to the dictionary. I mean the word "realize." That
word has been forced into the language of Christian experience, and can
never be forced out again. We must realize, or make real to our hearts
the love of Christ. That is just what I think the Apostle did–he made
real to himself the love of his Master and Lord. It was not to him a
surface theory, which might have breadth, but could not have depth–or
a mere narrow statement with length, but no breadth! It was a thing as
firm and solid as anything in the world.
It is true the love of Jesus is not material and earthly so as to be
seen and handled, but it is even more substantial than if it were a
thing to be seen, for the things which are seen are temporal, and the
things which are not seen are eternal. To the carnal man the visible is
real, and the invisible a mere dream. But to the spiritual man things
are reversed–the visible is the shadow and the invisible the
substance! May you be such men, dear Friends, all of you! The Apostle
desires that when the love of Christ becomes to us a solid reality we
may have close communion with it. You may measure the breadth and
length of a thing at a great distance, but you cannot very well measure
its depth without drawing near to it.
What a holy familiarity with Jesus do the words imply when we come to
measurements of all kinds! What condescension is this which allows the
sacred heart to be fathomed like a sea, and to be measured as a field!
Shall the Infinite thus bow itself to man? Shall man refuse to commune
with such condescending love? Should it not be our deep desire to
obtain and to retain the most intimate acquaintance with the
thrice-blessed love of Jesus, so as not only to measure it in one form,
but in all forms? That in every way in which the love of Christ may be
regarded, from above or from below, we may be well acquainted with it.
We should know the inmost secrets of the Redeemer's love! Its doings
and sacrifices which are the apparent part of it–its breadth, its
counsels and its plans. Its depth–the secret part of it. Its
length–its endurance and patience. Its height–its triumphs and
glories. We would know all that is knowable, for when we know all that
has been learned by mortals, there is still something that is beyond
our view, and hence the Apostle adds, "to know the love of Christ,
which passes knowledge."
Let me come to the very words of our text, and point out to you their
order. The first object of the Christian's knowledge should be the
breadth of the Savior's love. I know a certain school of Christians who
have need to study this point, for they have a very narrow idea of the
Lord's loving kindness. They cannot be brought by any means to conceive
of it as being broad–to them it is no wider than a razor's edge. They
conceive of Divine love as a very narrow stream. They have never seen
it to be a mighty, flowing, abounding, and rejoicing river such as it
really is. The breadth of Christ's love, dear Friends, we are told in
Scripture, is such that it extends to all ranks and races of
mankind–not to the Jew only, but also to the Gentile.
The love of Jesus Christ does not surround our favored island alone,
but like the ocean, it washes every shore. The love of Jesus Christ has
been extended to kings upon their thrones, but with equal and more
frequent bounty to the slaves in their dungeons. In some respects the
love of Jesus comes to every man, for there is not a man or woman born
who does not owe something to the benevolence of God through the love
of Jesus. The respite which keeps the sinner out of Hell is no doubt
the result of that love which said, "Spare it yet a little longer, till
I dig about it and fertilize it, and if it brings forth fruit, well."
Beloved, the benevolent love of Jesus is more extended than the lines
of His electing love, for we hear Him saying, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
which kills the Prophets, and stones them that are sent unto you; how
often would I have gathered your children together as a hen does gather
her brood under her wings, and you would not." That is not the love
which beams resplendently upon His chosen, but it is true love for all
that–pitying and benevolent love which revealed itself in honest tears
of grief. I would not have you omit this view of the subject when you
are measuring its breadth, although we still feel that in its utmost
depth and fullness that love flows only to His people.
Beloved, consider the breadth of special love. We are very apt to
conceive the number of God's elect to be but few. Who told us that?
When the Savior was asked, "Lord, are there few that shall be saved?"
He never answered that question, but He said, "Strive to enter into the
strait gate," as though He had said, "Whether there are many or not,
you strive to the utmost to enter in." I hope that the multitude of the
chosen will far exceed the number of the lost. It has always seemed to
me that if in all things Christ will have the pre-eminence, He will not
suffer the powers of darkness to drag away the major part of the human
race.
On the contrary, a multitude that no man can number–so many as the
stars in Heaven for multitude, and like the sands upon the seashore are
innumerable–shall be the fruit of His suffering which shall make Him
to see of the travail of His soul and to be satisfied. It is well to
have as broad ideas of the love of Christ as Scripture will permit us,
and there I trust we shall be content to stay. But, Brethren, we get
the best idea of the breadth of Christ's love when we behold it flowing
to our lost and guilty selves! I never thought it so broad a stream
till I found that it reached to me, even to me! I feared that I was far
away from its blessed margin, but the river swelled and overflowed its
banks until at last it washed me, even me!
How broad it must have been to have reached to some here present who
had wandered into the plains of sin, and had followed after their own
wanton devices, and yet the breadth of the river embraced even them.
You may measure the breadth of it by the sins which it covers. When a
river is overflowing, you tell how broad it must be by the little
hillocks and the treetops, which you can see in it. You may see how
broad is the love of Christ, that it reaches to such offenses as
these–it reaches to theft, to drunkenness, to blasphemy, to
fornication, to adultery, to murder. The Savior's measurement of it is
this, "All manner of sin and of blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men."
There is a boundry. It stops at one sin which is unto death, but of
that we know nothing and I trust we never may! With that one exception,
broad as sin is, so broad is this mighty love of Christ which covers it
all. Do you not think, however, that we, most of us, fail to see the
breadth of Christ's love in matters of Providence? You know what is
meant by the breadth of a man's mind, the breadth of his thoughts when
he can consider a great many subjects at once–when he has the ability
to accomplish many designs and many purposes with one stroke. Now, the
breadth of the Savior's love is just this–there is no part of His
people's interests which He does not consider. And there is nothing
which concerns their welfare which is not important to Him.
Not merely does He think of you, Believer, as an immortal being, but as
a mortal being, too. Do not deny it or doubt it–the very hairs of your
head are all numbered! There is nothing that concerns His elect that is
unimportant to our Lord. "The steps of a good man are ordered by the
Lord, and He delights in his way." It were a sad thing for us if this
river of love did not cover all our concerns, for what mischief might
be worked for us in that part of our business which did not come under
our gracious Lord's inspection. Oh, Believer, rest assured that the
heart of Jesus concerns itself about your meaner affairs! Your buying
and selling He cares for. Your counter and counting-house, your ships
and your carts and your horses, and your barley, and your wheat, and
your hay, and your straw–your children, your little ones, and
everything which concerns you concerns Him, also.
The breadth of His tender love is such that you may go to Him in all
matters–for in all your afflictions He is afflicted–and like as a
father pities his children, so does He pity you. This invites us to
look at the breadth of the Savior's love under a still greater aspect.
All the concerns of all His saints that have ever lived or ever shall
live, are all borne upon the broad bosom of the Son of God! Oh what a
heart His is, that does not merely comprehend the persons of His
people, but comprehends the diverge and innumerable concerns of all
those persons! Alexander, it is said, knew the names of his soldiers,
but Alexander could not think of every soldier in every tent, and of
all the business of every soldier. But this the love of Christ does–He
thinks of all the cares and all the troubles and all the joys present
and to come of every blood-bought one.
Now see, dear Friend, if you can measure the breadth of the love of
Christ! You have a task before you which you will not yet accomplish,
and if you could, there would still remain another breadth, namely,
that breadth measured by the gifts which He brings. Think of what He
has brought you! He has brought you justification! Yes, adoption,
sanctification, eternal life! The riches of His goodness are
unsearchable. You shall never be able to tell them out or even conceive
them. Oh the breadth of the love of Christ! And yet you see this is
merely a beginning because the breadth and measurement is but surface
work. This is for you youngsters to think about, but yet I wish some of
the elder Christians would, too.
Some of them seem to be so taken up with the height and length that
they deny the breadth, and you would think from hearing them preach
that Christ came into the world to save half-a-dozen, and that they
were five of them–at least that nobody else could go to Heaven except
such as they were who swore by their Shibboleth and agreed in every jot
and tittle with their creed. Away with their narrowness! There will be
more in Heaven than we expect to see there by a long way–and there
will be some there with whom we had very little comfortable fellowship
on earth–who had fellowship with Christ, and who are therefore taken
to dwell with Him forever.
The next object of study is the length of Christ's love. It has been
well observed that if Christ had thought upon His people for ten
minutes it would have been a wonderful condescension. In fact it would
have been a thing to sing of in Heaven that Christ Jesus did once think
upon us, because we are not worthy of a minute of God's thoughts. Now
just try, if you can, to grasp the thought. He has thought upon His
people as long as He has existed! Is it not eternal love, and what is
longer than that? "I have loved you with an everlasting love." As long,
then, with Deity itself is the love of Deity towards its chosen ones!
God did love us in His Son long before the world began. If an angel
were to start from today with the design of finding out when God's love
began, he would doubtless fly on till he lingered at the Cross. "Here,"
he would say, "here is the fountain, here is the source of it all." But
he would be reminded that, "God so loved the world that He gave His
only begotten Son." Then there was a love before the giving of His Son.
He would fly onward till he paused at Isaiah's day and heard of God's
love in the prophecy that the Son of man should bear the iniquity of
His people. He would say, "Surely it begins here!" But saints would
remind him of yet older words of comfort, and he would fly on till he
stopped outside of the garden of Eden and heard the Lord say, "The Seed
of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head."
"Surely," he would say, "it began here." But divinely instructed he
would go back yet further, even to the eternal councils where first of
all salvation was planned and contrived in the cabinets of Wisdom
before the world was. He would have to go back, back, back, till
creation had vanished–till there remained not a shred of existence
except the absolute self-existent Deity–and then in the Eternal Mind
he would see thoughts of love toward a people to be formed for Himself.
This knowledge of the length of love does not always come to Christians
early in their history. Some of my dear Brethren know the breadth of
Christ's love right well, but they seem as if they never would learn
its length.
Some of our Arminian friends know a great deal about the breadth of it,
and can preach very sweetly upon it, too. And I thank God they can, for
they are the means of bringing in many converts who might not be
brought in if it were not for their broad preaching. Yes, dear Brothers
and Sisters, it may be as broad as you like, but it must be long, too.
You must not preach a love that begins when you begin, but a love which
is before you–a causeless love which is the cause and not the effect
of your love–a love which knows no beginning, but is ancient as the
throne of Deity.
This love is not only without beginning but it is without pause. There
is never a moment when Jesus ceases to love His people. The love of
Jesus knows nothing of suspended animation. There are some rivers in
Australia which lose themselves, and for miles along their bed you find
nothing but dry stones at certain seasons of the year. It is never so
with the love of Christ–it is long, and without a break from beginning
to end–it is a chain without a single broken or feeble link. The love
of Jesus possesses an eternal existence in which there is not a single
intermission, nor even a sign of failure or hint of an end. Here let us
rejoice without trembling. "Having loved His own which were in the
world, He loved them to the end."
We lean our heads upon this pillow and we sleep right sweetly
there–"He which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the
day of Jesus Christ." "For the gifts and calling of God are without
repentance." "He said, I am God, I change not, therefore you sons of
Jacob are not consumed." "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and
forever." "For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be
conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born
among many brethren. Moreover whom He did predestinate, them He also
called; and whom He called, them He also justified; and whom He
justified, them He also glorified." There are no ifs and buts in this
circle of Divine Grace! All is as certain as the Throne of God. Our
conquering Captain shall bring many sons to Glory, and His shall be the
praise.
Dear Friends, we studiously consider the length of this love of Christ,
but I am persuaded, study it as we may, we shall never completely grasp
it. It is so long that your old age cannot wear it out. So long that
your continual tribulations cannot exhaust it. Your successive
temptations shall not drain it dry–like eternity itself it knows no
bounds.
My time has fled and I am only in the middle of my subject! Therefore
the rest of the discourse must be in brief hints and hurried sentences.
The depth of the love of Jesus! Consider it as stooping to look upon
such an insignificant creature as man! View the depth of that love in
receiving such sinful creatures into His embrace! What a depth is seen
when the Lord Jesus Christ selects some guilty wretch who has openly
broken the laws of his country and subjected himself to punishment from
his fellowmen, and yet the Lord Jesus freely pardons him when he
repents of sin, and receives Him into his heart's love!
The depth of this river of love is best seen, however, in the fact that
Jesus became a Man. Deity became Incarnate! The Lord of angels slept
upon a woman's breast! Nor is this all. Being a Man, He bears our
sorrows, goes through the world weary, and poor, and patient. A Man of
Sorrows, and acquainted with grief. Nor is this all–He bears our sins.
The iniquities of His people, like a huge load, are laid upon His
shoulders, and He stands as their Substitute. Even yet it is not
enough, for He bears our punishment, and on the bloody tree He bows His
head, and is obedient even unto death. Hell's waves rolled over Him.
The eternal wrath of God spent itself upon His blessed head! He was
made lower than the angels, but He stooped lower still, till He called
himself a worm and no man!
Oh the depth of the agony of Jesus smarting for sin! O Sinner! You
cannot have gone too deep for Christ's love to reach you. O Backslider!
You cannot have sinned too foully for forgiveness! You who have gone
beyond conception in sin–you who have practiced the foulest and most
devilish of sins–the depth of Christ's love is still deeper, and He is
able to save even to the uttermost!
Think next of the height of the Master's love. You see it is put last,
as the highest point of learning. There are some who have advanced as
far as to understand somewhat of the depths who do not know the full
dignity and glory of an heir of Heaven, and have felt but little of the
power of His ascension. Why, the love of Jesus, even in this present
life, is a height unspeakable, for has it not lifted us up to become
sons of God? "And if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint
heirs with Christ." It has given us an earnest of the inheritance! It
has made us anticipate the hour when we shall dwell with the angels of
light! It tells us that our conversation is in Heaven, and that our
life is hid with Christ in God!
Yet, Brethren, the height of this love will be best seen in a future
state. You shall be borne up to dwell with Christ in the clouds when
the world is in a blaze, and when the judgment is passed you shall be
carried by angels' wings up to the seventh Heaven where God dwells! Oh
the breadth, the length, the depth, the height! To sum up what we have
said in four words–for breadth the love of Jesus is immensity, for
length it is eternity, for depth it is immeasurability–and for height
it is infinity. O Christian, may the Holy Spirit instruct you in these
great things!
III. Lastly, two or three words. If it shall be our privilege to study
this science and to master it, it will still be over and above us, for
it passes all knowledge. But there will flow the following PRACTICAL
RESULTS. We shall be filled with all the fullness of God. Brethren, do
try and get hold of this marvelous expression when you are alone in
meditation. Set it before you as a great mystery to be dived into.
"Filled with all the fullness of God." What can it mean?
Is it to have God within you? God dwelling in your inmost spirit? It is
this, but more! "Filled with God"–to hold as much of God as your
nature can hold–what a thought! "Filled with God," even this is not
all. "Filled with the fullness of God." The fullness of His love and
Grace, and power, and holiness can come to dwell in you! But this,
even, is not all that the verse speaks of! It is written, "filled with
all the fullness of God." What a transcendent expression! Here we have
not only an indwelling God, but that God in the utmost fullness of His
Godhead filling and overflowing the whole soul with His fullness!
I cannot help borrowing an illustration from a friend who took up a
bottle by the seashore, filled it full of seawater, corked it down, and
then threw it into the sea. "Now," he said, "there it is, there is the
sea in the bottle, and there is the bottle in the sea." It is full to
fullness, and then, in a still greater fullness. There is my soul with
God in it, and my soul in God! The fullness of God in me as much as I
can hold, and then myself in the fullness of God. The illustration
gives one as much of the text as one knows how to convey–ourselves
swallowed up in the all-absorbing abyss of the love of God– and that
same love of God flowing into all the parts and powers of our soul till
we are as full of God as man can hold! Then shall we show that love in
our lives, in our prayers, in our preaching, in everything that we do.
We shall manifest not only that we have been with Jesus, but that we
have Jesus dwelling in us, filling us right full with His loving,
sanctifying, elevating Presence.
Beloved, if we shall reach the point indicated in the text, we shall
then begin to imitate the love of God in its four aspects. I am sure if
we shall ever learn the breadth of Christ's love our love will grow
broad–we shall no longer confine our love to our own church–but shall
care for all the churches of God. We shall feel an affection not only
for Christians of our own name, but to Christians of all names. Then
our love will gain length also. We shall love Christ so that we cannot
leave off loving Him. We shall persevere in love, we shall abide in His
love as He abides in it. We shall constantly have the flame of our love
going up to Heaven.
And then our love will acquire depth. We shall be humbled on account of
our own sinfulness. We shall sink lower and lower in our own esteem,
and our love will become deeper and more grounded as it descends more
fully into the core of our nature. And then love will climb the
heights. We shall forget the world and the cares of it. We shall become
Christians who lie no longer among the pots, but who have received the
wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold.
We shall attain to such a height in our love, that we shall scale the
mountaintops of the promises, and with our foreheads bathed in the
sunlight shall look down upon the world that still lies in darkness,
and rejoice that we are made heirs of light!
Our love mounting to Heaven shall there be in its height as we appear
before the Great White Throne and cast our crowns with many a song
before Him who loved us with a breadth, and length, and depth, and
height of love that even in Heaven shall surpass all measurement. God
bless you, dear Friends, with this love, for Christ's sake. Amen.