It begins with the time when the foundations of the earth were laid, when God spoke, and it was, when "God saw every thing that He had made, and, behold, it was very good;" (Genesis 1:31) and, "The morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy." (Job 38:7)
That was the wedding song, celebrating the union of God and His creation; for since the world to come will be only the restoration of the world that was, it could be said as truly then as ever that: "Your Maker is your husband; ... the God of the whole earth shall He be called." (Isaiah 54:5)
As the woman was taken from the man, to be his wife, it was but the continuation of God's order, that His spouse should be the entire new creation which proceeded from Him. The earth and its inhabitants were joined to the Lord.
"I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy; for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ." (2 Corinthians 11:2-3)
This shows us plainly that Eve was created the bride of the Lord. But it was not Eve alone, but all men in her; for when God made man, He made him male and female, and called their name man. (Romans 1:20) In Adam all the generations of mankind were created.
The creation is the manifestation of the love of God. In it He gave His life; for it is His offspring; and His life is love.
"The Lord appeared of old unto me, saying, I have loved you with an everlasting love." (Jeremiah 31:3)
In everything that He has made, His everlasting power and Divinity--His own Being--are clearly seen. (Romans 1:20) Man in Eden, with the delight of God in him, and his land married, formed the perfect picture of the bliss of true love.
The Marriage Covenant Broken
But into this Eden the tempter came. By his subtlety he seduced man from his allegiance to his Lord. He did this by instilling doubts into their mind. Doubt is the death of love, and as soon as the first pair began to doubt God's love, the bond of union was broken. By his artful wiles, the tempter succeeded in beguiling them away from their Maker and rightful Husband, and inducing them to yield themselves wholly to him. Here was the first adultery, which has bred a host of evils. It "brought Death into the World, and all our woe, with loss of Eden."[1]
"You adulteresses! know you not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be the friend of the world is the enemy of God." (James 4:4)
"Every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust has conceived, it brings forth sin: and sin, when it is finished brings forth death." (James 1:14-15)
That in the first sin man committed adultery, is evident from this: It was the attraction of the world that led them astray, for in the yielding to the temptation that was presented, we see the power of "the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life," (1 John 2:16) which constitute the world. The pride of life was appealed to in the words, "You shall be like God; and when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat." (Genesis 3:5-6)
Thus they became wholly joined to the world, which is adultery. The former perfect union between Adam and his Maker, wherein they were "one flesh,"--for the Word was made flesh in the beginning when man was created,--was completely broken, and a new union with Satan and sin was entered into. Then men began to walk "according to the course this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience." (Ephesians 2:2)
God's Faithful Love
Then began the long career of marital infidelity. But God did not break His covenant, which is everlasting, nor did He cast off the unfaithful bride.
"If we believe not, yet He abides faithful; He cannot deny himself." (2 Timothy 2:13)
The faithful one had left His house; but instead of saying, "Let her go; she went of her own free will, and can come back when she gets ready," or, worse still, "She has rejected me, and I will have nothing more to do with her," He came to seek the erring one, and to beg her to come back. There is nothing more humiliating than for a man to beg for reconciliation with one who has willfully turned away from him, despising his love, and publicly putting him to shame; yet that is just what the Lord did. Read the 3rd chapter of Jeremiah, and the whole of the book of Hosea. He says: "Return you backsliding Israel, says the Lord; and I will not cause my anger to fall upon you; for I am merciful, says the Lord, and I will not keep anger for ever. Only acknowledge your iniquity, that you have transgressed against the Lord your God, and have scattered your ways to the strangers under every green tree, and you have not obeyed my voice, says the Lord. Turn, O backsliding children, says the Lord; for I am married unto you; and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion." (Jeremiah 3:12)
Dying Broken-Hearted for Love
But the love of God is not merely in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. He gave the utmost proof of His everlasting love that could possibly be given: "He gave himself for us." (Titus 2:14)
Life for Him was not worth living without the loved one, and so in His effort to reclaim her He humbled himself to death, even the death of the cross.
"He came unto His own, and they that were His own received Him not." (John 1:11)
They would not believe in His protestation of love, and they laughed Him to scorn. He was made the sport of the drunkards, and they that sat in the gate mocked Him. The very worst indignity was heaped upon Him, and spitting in the face was added to blows. Even this did not shake "the love of Christ which passes knowledge," (Ephesians 3:19) but it broke His heart, and He died literally broken-hearted, for love of those who were all unworthy of love. In those blows and in that spitting we all had a part, for "All we like sheep have gone astray." (Isaiah 53:6)
When He was "despised and rejected of men," (Isaiah 53:3) and "hid not His face from shame and spitting," (Isaiah 50:6) we denied Him, and "hid as it were our faces from Him." (Isaiah 53:3)
And it was for us, for love of us, that "[He] endured the cross." (Hebrews 12:2)
Drawn by the Power of Love
And He is not dead in vain.
"I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." (John 12:32)
"I have loved you with an everlasting love: therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn you." (Jeremiah 31:3)
That exhibition of love has broken down the enmity, the middle wall of partition that we had built between us and Him, and as we gaze upon His cross, we say, "Love so amazing, so Divine shall have my life, my soul, my all,"[2] and we give ourselves to Him, even as He gave himself to us.
The Marriage Forbidden
But behold! There is an obstacle in the way. Just as, ravished by His love, we say, "Lord, I am yours," forth steps "the old man," "the body of sin" and says, "I forbid the banns;[3] this marriage cannot take place."
And why not, pray?
"For the reason that this woman is my wife; I am married to her, and I can bring the law to witness to the fact."
"Know you not that the law has dominion over a man as long as he lives? For the woman which has a husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he lives... So then if, while her husband lives, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress." (Romans 7:1-3)
What a complicated case! The woman (we ourselves) is already an adulteress, because she is living in unlawful union with the lust of the flesh; and she cannot go back to her lawful husband as long as the old man of sin lives; because the law will not allow any such double union. What shall be done?
Death the Only Way of Escape
There is only one way out of the difficulty, and that method is so drastic that it looks like the end of everything. It is nothing else than death. The woman is a criminal, and worthy of death; for death is still the punishment of adultery. If we could only get rid of this seducer, whose presence is now hateful, since he is seen to be nothing but a death's head, we could be married to Him whom our soul loves.
Ah, but that is not so easy a matter. Marriage means the union of two, so that they become "one flesh," and just that intimate relation we sustain to the body of sin. Every fiber of our being is linked to sin, and sin is our own lord and master. Our wound is incurable; the disease is in the blood. So close and vital is the union between us and the body of death that it cannot be broken except by death. We are inseparably joined together until death us do part. When the body of sin dies,--the unlawful husband,--we must die too.
Well, why not? We must die anyhow, for we are but united to a body of death. Its embraces have infected us with the poison of death, and the fruit of the union is death. The question is, "Shall we wait until we are forced to die, against our will? or shall we, like our rightful Lord, lay down our life voluntarily, that we may take it again?"
We choose the latter. Since we are united to death, and our life is nothing else but a living death, why not die at once? Let the separation from sin be effected, even though it wrench every nerve and fiber of our being, and drain our heart's blood. We choose rather to die with Him whose love is life, than to live with him whose love is hatred, sin, and death.
United in Death
"Know you not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death?" (Romans 6:3)
But death in Christ does not end all; for He laid down His life only to take it again.
"Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection. Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. ... Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him." (Romans 6:4-6,8)
The Seducer Destroyed
But what about the old man of sin? Ah, Christ is not the minister of sin. He loves us well enough to die for us, and since His love is life, it delivers us from death, and raises us up, that we may live with Him; but do not for a moment think that He who does this to win us back to our rightful union with Him, will do the same for our seducer, who must necessarily die when we do, since He is bound up with our flesh. No; we were crucified with Christ, and buried with Him, "that the body of sin might be destroyed." (Romans 6:6)
It will never again have a resurrection without our consent--never as long as we abide in Christ; "For he that is dead is freed from sin." (Romans 6:7)
Dead to the Law
"Wherefore, my brethren, you also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that you should be married to another, even to Him that is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God." (Romans 7:4)
Mind, it does not say that the law is dead; far from it; it is the law that has put us to death as criminals.
"I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God." (Galatians 2:19)
A dead law could not put anybody to death. It was the law that gave me the knowledge of my sinful condition, "for by the law is the knowledge of sin." (Romans 3:20)
By I knew that I was living in adultery, and therefore doomed to death. I consented unto the law, that it is good, and delivered myself up, to receive the death penalty. But I died with Christ, and not alone, so that I have a resurrection in Him.
"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." (Galatians 2:20)
The person who committed the sin is dead, and another has taken his place, and therefore I am "delivered from the law," (Romans 7:6) inasmuch as I am dead to that wherein I was held, namely, sin. The same law which before condemned me as an adulteress, now witnesses to my lawful union with Christ. It reckons me, the sinner, a dead man; and as long as I reckon myself likewise to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God, and yield myself unto God, as one that is alive from the dead, it will not condemn me, for: "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death." (Romans 8:1-2)
Alive Unto God
Being now married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead, we "bring forth fruit unto God." (Romans 7:4)
The fruit is unto holiness, and "the end everlasting life." (Romans 5:22)
Now we are in harmony with God, and so in harmony with all His perfect creation. His law--His life--fills us, and directs our movements. We are one with Him, and He is the head of the body. The love that drew us holds us. The cords of love drew us to Him, and we are bound to Him by the ties that bound Him to the cross. His goodness brought us to repentance, and the contemplation of it keeps us faithful.
Yea, we are kept by His faith.
"The life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." (Galatians 2:20)
Think of it!
"If we believe not, He abides faithful: He cannot deny himself." (2 Timothy 2:13)
He was faithful in all our wandering from Him.
"In Him is no sin." (1 John 3:5)
Now being one with Him, we live not by anything that pertains to ourselves, but by Him.
"Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. And all things are of God, who has reconciled us unto himself by Jesus Christ." (2 Corinthians 5:17-18)
So we live by His faith, and therefore as long as we abide in Him, we are as secure from sin as He himself.
The New Creation
The new creation has begun, even while we are in this tabernacle, for "the life of Jesus is made manifest in our mortal flesh." (2 Corinthians 4:11)
"They that are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you." (Romans 8:8-9)
Since "all things are become new," we experience the joy, the blessedness, and the power of the world to come. The Spirit is the first-fruits of our inheritance. We are thenceforth to live (not merely is it our duty so to live, but the grace and strength thereto are given to us) as we shall continue to live in the new earth.
The only difference between the condition now and in the future world is this: Then we shall live perfect lives, free from sin, having no temptations, no sinful flesh, nothing to contend with; whereas now we live the selfsame life in spite of all these difficulties. We live in the flesh as though the flesh were dead and buried, and we had already received the resurrection body. This glorious freedom is possible only by our death with Him who is the resurrection and the life. But it is possible: "He that says he abides in Him, ought himself also so to walk, even as He walked." (1 John 2:6)
Do you say that this is a hard saying? Oh say not so; it is a glorious saying. It is the good and joyful news of salvation. It is the proclamation of emancipation from the bondage of corruption, and the deliverance into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. How can it be hard to live that life of righteousness, when it is no more I, but Christ, that lives in me? What marvelous love, and what a transforming power it has! It changes us into the Divine image. And it is "stronger than death," (Song 8:6) since it has conquered death. Our union with Christ was effected in death. It was at the worst state that sin and Satan can reduce men to, that we were united to Him in love; therefore: "I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Romans 8:38-39)
Have you this persuasion?--Present Truth, September 20, 1900--Genesis 1:31.
E.J. Waggoner
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