“Spiritual Growth, Part 21” by Romans
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sy21vd6jSps
We are continuing in our Series, Spiritual Growth. This is our Twentieth-first Installment. We have seen over the previous weeks various components that contribute to our Spiritual Growth. God calls on us to add some components to our lives, and, as we have also seen, there are things that we need to put away.
First, David wrote in Psalms 24:3-5: “Who shall ascend into the hill of the LORD? or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart; who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully. He shall receive the blessing from the LORD, and righteousness from the God of his salvation.”
The Life Application Bible tells us: "This refers to all lies, especially those told under oath. How greatly God values honesty! Dishonesty comes easily, especially when complete truthfulness could cost us something, make us uncomfortable, or put us in an unfavorable light.
Dishonest communication hinders relationships. Without honesty, a relationship with God is impossible. If we lie to others, we will begin to deceive ourselves. God cannot hear us or speak to us if we are building a wall of self-deception."
Of this, Matthew Henry writes, “Psalms 24:3-6: From this world, and the fulness thereof, the psalmist's meditations rise, of a sudden to the great things of another world, the foundation of which is not on the seas, nor on the floods. The things of this world God has given to the children of men and we are much indebted to his providence for them; but they will not make a portion for us.
And therefore, I. Here is an enquiry after better things, Psalm_24:3. This earth is God's footstool; but, if we had ever so much of it, we must be here but a while, must shortly go hence, and Who then shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? Who shall go to heaven hereafter, and, as an earnest of that, shall have communion with God in holy ordinances now? A soul that knows and considers its own nature, origin, and immortality, when it has viewed the earth and the fulness thereof, will sit down unsatisfied;
there is not found among all the creatures a help meet for man, and therefore it will think of ascending towards God, towards heaven, will ask, “What shall I do to rise to that high place, that hill, where the Lord dwells and manifests himself, that I may be acquainted with him, and to abide in that happy holy place where he meets his people and makes them holy and happy?
What shall I do that I may be of those whom God owns for his peculiar people and who are his in another manner than the earth is his and its fulness?” This question is much the same with that, Psalm_15:1. The hill of Zion on which the temple was built
typified the church, both visible and invisible.”
At this point, I am going to interrupt this commentary, and explore the cross-reference in Psalm 15. This is a short 5 verses Psalm of David that reads, “LORD, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? who shall dwell in thy holy hill? 2 He that walketh uprightly, and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart. 3 He that backbiteth not with his tongue, nor doeth evil to his neighbour, nor taketh up a reproach against his neighbour. 4 In whose eyes a vile person is contemned; but he honoureth them that fear the LORD. He that sweareth to his own hurt, and changeth not. 5 He that putteth not out his money to usury, nor taketh reward against the innocent. He that doeth these things shall never be moved.”
Of these verses, the Expositor's Bible says, “THE ideal worshipper of Jehovah is painted in this psalm in a few broad outlines. Zion is holy because God’s "tent" is there. This is the only hint of date given by the psalm; and all that can be said is that if that consecration of Thy hill was recent, the poet would naturally ponder all the more deeply the question of who were fit to dwell in the new solemnities of the abode of Jehovah.
The tone of the psalm, then, accords with the circumstances of the time when David brought the ark to Jerusalem; but more than this cannot be affirmed. Much more important are its two main points: the conception of the guests of Jehovah and the statement of the ethical qualifications of these.
As to structure, the psalm is simple. It has first, the general question and answer in two verses of two clauses each (Psalm_15:1-2). Then the general description of the guest of God is expanded in three verses of three clauses each, the last of which closes with an assurance of stability, which varies and heightens the idea of dwelling in the tent of Jehovah. It is no mere poetic apostrophe with which the psalmist’s question is prefaced.
He does thereby consult the Master of the house as to the terms on which He extends hospitality, which terms it is His right to prescribe. He brings to his own view and to his readers all that lies in the name of Jehovah, the covenant name, and all that is meant by "holiness," and thence draws the answer to his question, which is none the less Jehovah’s answer because it springs in the psalmist’s heart and is spoken by his lips.
The character of the God determines the character of the worshipper. The roots of ethics are in religion. The Old Testament ideal of the righteous man flows from its revelation of the righteous God. Not men’s own fancies, but insight gained by communion with God and docile inquiry of Him, will reliably tell what manner of men they are who can abide in His light.
The thought, expressed so forcibly in the question of the psalm, that men may be God’s guests, is a very deep and tender one, common to a considerable number of psalms. (Psalm_15:5, Psalm_27:4; Psalm_84:5, etc.) The word translated "abide" in the A.V and "sojourn" in the R.V originally implied a transient residence as a stranger, but when applied to men’s relations to God, it does not always preserve the idea of transiency (see, for instance, Psalm_61:4 : "I will dwell in Thy tent forever"); and the idea of protection is the most prominent.
Psalm_15:2 sums the qualifications of Jehovah’s guest in one comprehensive demand, that he should walk uprightly, and then analyses that requirement into the two of righteous deeds and truthful speech. The verbs are in the participial form, which emphasises the notion of habitual action.
The general answer is expanded in the three following verses, which each contain three clauses, and take up the two points of Psalm_15:2 in inverted order, although perhaps not with absolute accuracy of arrangement. The participial construction is in them changed for finite verbs. Psalm_15:2 sketches the figure in outline, and the rest of the psalm adds clause on clause of description as if the man stood before the psalmist’s vision. Habits are described as acts.
The first outstanding characteristic of this ideal is that it deals entirely with duties to men, and the second is that it is almost wholly negative. Moral qualities of the most obvious kind and such as can be tested in daily life and are cultivated by rigid abstinence from prevailing evils and not any recondite and impalpable refinements of conduct, still less any peculiar emotions of souls raised high above the dusty levels of common life are the qualifications for dwelling, a guarded guest, in that great pavilion.
Such a stress laid on homely duties, which the universal conscience recognises, is characteristic of the ethics of the Old Testament as a whole and of the Psalter in particular, and is exemplified in the lives of its saints and heroes. They "come eating and drinking," sharing in domestic joys and civic duties; and however high their aspirations and vows may soar, they have always their feet firmly planted on the ground and, laying the smallest duties on themselves, "tread life’s common road in cheerful godliness."
The Christian answer to the psalmist’s question goes deeper than his, but is fatally incomplete unless it include his and lay the same stress on duties to men which all acknowledge, as that does. Lofty emotions, raptures of communion, aspirations which bring their own fulfilment, and all the experiences of the devout soul, which are sometimes apt to be divorced from plain morality, need the ballast of the psalmist’s homely answer to the great question.
There is something in a religion of emotion not wholly favourable to the practice of ordinary duties; and many men, good after a fashion, seem to have their spiritual nature divided into watertight and uncommunicating compartments, in one of which they keep their religion, and in the other their morality.
The stringent assertion that these two are inseparable was the great peculiarity of Judaism as compared with the old world religions, from which, as from the heathenism of today, the conception that religion had anything to do with conduct was absent. But it is not only heathenism that needs the reminder.
True, the ideal drawn here is not the full Christian one. How can I attain to these qualifications? is a second interrogation, raised by the response to the first, and for its answer we have to turn to Jesus. The Psalm, like the law which inspired it, is mainly negative, deals mainly with acts, and has no light to show how its requirements may be won.
But it yet stands as an unantiquated statement of what a man must be who dwells in the secret place of the Most High. How he may become such a one we must learn from Him who both teaches us the way, and gives us the power, to become such as God will shelter in the safe recesses of His pavilion.
The triplets of Psalm_15:3 probably all refer to sins of the tongue. The good man has no slander on his tongue: he does not harm his companion (by word) nor heap reproach on his neighbour. These things are the staple of much common talk. What a quantity of brilliant wit and polished sarcasm would perish if this rule were observed! How dull many sparkling circles would become, and how many columns of newspapers and pages of books would be obliterated, if the censor’s pencil struck out all that infringed it!
Psalm_15:4 adds as characteristic of a righteous man that in his estimate of character he gives each his own, and judges men by no other standard than their moral worth. The reprobate may be a millionaire or a prince, but his due is contempt; the devout man may be a pauper or one of narrow culture, but his due is respect, and he gets it.
"A terrible sagacity {or, discernment} informs" the good man’s heart; and he who is, in his own in most desires, walking uprightly will not be seduced into adulation of a popular idol who is a bad man, nor turned from reverence for lowly goodness. The world will be a paradise when the churl is no more called bountiful...
The psalmist’s last word goes beyond his question in the clear recognition that such a character as he has outlined not only, dwells in Jehovah’s tent, but will stand unmoved, though all the world should rock. He does not see how far onward that "forever" may stretch, but of this he is sure: that righteousness is the one stable thing in the universe, and there may have shone before him the hope that it was possible to travel on beyond the horizon that bounds this life.
"I shall be a guest in Jehovah’s tent forever," says the other psalm already quoted: "He shall never be moved," says this one. Both find their fulfilment in the great words of the Apostle who taught a completer ideal of love to men, because he had dwelt close by the perfect revelation of God’s love: 'The world passeth away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.'”
Let's return to Matthew Henry's original commentary: “When the people attended the ark to its holy place David puts them in mind that these were but patterns of heavenly things, and therefore that by them they should be led to consider the heavenly things themselves. II. An answer to this enquiry, in which we have, 1. The properties of God's peculiar people, who shall have communion with him in grace and glory.
(1.) They are such as keep themselves from all the gross acts of sin. They have clean hands; not spotted with the pollutions of the world and the flesh. None that were ceremonially unclean might enter into the mountain of the temple, which signified that cleanness of conversation which is required in all those that have fellowship with God. The hands lifted up in prayer must be pure hands, no blot of unjust gain cleaving to them, nor any thing else that defiles the man and is offensive to the holy God.
(2.) They are such as make conscience of being really (that is, of being inwardly) as good as they seem to be outwardly. They have pure hearts. We make nothing of our religion if we do not make heart-work of it. It is not enough that our hands be clean before men, but we must also wash our hearts from wickedness, and not allow ourselves in any secret heart-impurities, which are open before the eye of God.
Yet in vain do those pretend to have pure and good hearts whose hands are defiled with the acts of sin. That is a pure heart which is sincere and without guile in covenanting with God, which is carefully guarded, that the wicked one, the unclean spirit, touch it not, which is purified by faith, and conformed to the image and will of God; see Matthew 5:8.
(3.) They are such as do not set their affections upon the things of this world, do not lift up their souls unto vanity, whose hearts are not carried out inordinately towards the wealth of this world, the praise of men, or the delights of sense, who do not choose these things for their portion, nor reach forth after them, because they believe them to be vanity, uncertain and unsatisfying.
(4.) They are such as deal honestly both with God and man. In their covenant with God, and their contracts with men, they have not sworn deceitfully, nor broken their promises, violated their engagements, nor taken any false oath. Those that have no regard to the obligations of truth or the honour of God's name are unfit for a place in God's holy hill.
(5.) They are a praying people (Psalm_24:6): This is the generation of those that seek him. In every age there is a remnant of such as these, men of this character, who are accounted to the Lord for a generation, Psalm_22:30. And they are such as seek God, that seek thy face, O Jacob!
[1.] They join themselves to God, to seek him, not only in earnest prayer, but in serious endeavours to obtain his favour and keep themselves in his love. Having made it the summit of their happiness, they make it the summit of their ambition to be accepted of him, and therefore take care and pains to approve themselves to him. It is to the hill of the Lord that we must ascend, and, the way being up-hill, we have need to put forth ourselves to the utmost, as those that seek diligently.
[2.] They join themselves to the people of God, to seek God with them. Being brought into communion with God, they come into communion of saints; conforming to the patterns of the saints that have gone before (so some understand this), they seek God's face, as Jacob (so some), who was therefore surnamed Israel, because he wrestled with God and prevailed, sought him and found him;
and, associating with the saints of their own day, they shall court the favour of God's church (Revelation 3:9), shall be glad of an acquaintance with God's people (Zechariah_8:23), shall incorporate themselves with them, and, when they subscribe with their hands to the Lord, shall call themselves by the name of Jacob, Isaiah_44:5.
As soon as ever Paul was converted he joined himself to the disciples, Acts_9:26. They shall seek God's face in Jacob (so some), that is, in the assemblies of his people. Thy face, O God of Jacob! so our margin supplies it, and makes it easy. As all believers are the spiritual seed of Abraham, so all that strive in prayer are the spiritual seed of Jacob, to whom God never said, Seek you me in vain.
2. The privileges of God's peculiar people, Psalm_24:5. They shall be made truly and for ever happy. (1.) They shall be blessed: they shall receive the blessing from the Lord, all the fruits and gifts of God's favour, according to his promise; and those whom God blesses are blessed indeed, for it is his prerogative to command the blessing.
(2.) They shall be justified and sanctified. These are the spiritual blessings in heavenly things which they shall receive, even righteousness, the very thing they hunger and thirst after, Matthew 5:6. Righteousness is blessedness, and it is from God only that we must expect it, for we have no righteousness of our own. They shall receive the reward of their righteousness (so some), the crown of righteousness which the righteous Judge shall give, 2 Timothy_4:8.
(3.) They shall be saved; for God himself will be the God of their salvation. Note, Where God gives righteousness he certainly designs salvation. Those that are made meet for heaven shall be brought safely to heaven, and then they will find what they have been seeking, to their endless satisfaction.”
In the New Testament, this foundational aspect of our Spiritual Growth of having a pure heart is one which Jesus spoke of in the Beatitudes of the Sermon of the Mount where He said in: Matthew 5:8: “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.”
Of this Albert Barnes writes, “Blessed are the pure in heart - That is, whose minds, motives, and principles are pure; who seek not only to have the external actions correct, but who desire to be holy in heart, and who are so. Man looks on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart.
They shall see God - There is a sense in which all will see God, Revelation 1:7. That is, they will behold him as a Judge, not as a Friend. In this place it is spoken of as a special favor. So also in Revelation 22:4, “And they shall see his face.” To see the face of one, or to be in the presence of any one, were terms among the Jews expressive of great favor.
It was regarded as a high honor to be in the presence of kings and princes, and to be permitted to see them, Proverbs 22:29, “He shall stand before kings.” See also 2 Kings 25:19, “Those that stood in the king’s presence;” in the Hebrew, those that saw the face of the king; that is, who were his favorites and friends. So here, to see God, means to be his friends and favorites, and to dwell with him in his kingdom.
To this, Adam Clarke adds, “Matthew 5:8: Pure in heart - In opposition to the Pharisees, who affected outward purity, while their hearts were full of corruption and defilement. A principal part of the Jewish religion consisted in outward washings and cleansings: on this ground they expected to see God, to enjoy eternal glory:
but Christ here shows that a purification of the heart, from all vile affections and desires, is essentially requisite in order to enter into the kingdom of God. He whose soul is not delivered from all sin, through the blood of the covenant, can have no Scriptural hope of ever being with God.
There is a remarkable illustration of this passage, quoted by Mr. Wakefield from Origen, Contra Cels. lib. vi. “God has no body, and therefore is invisible: but men of contemplation can discern him with the heart and understanding. But A Defiled Heart
Cannot See God: but He Must Be Pure Who Wishes to Enjoy a Proper View of a Pure Being.”
Shall see God - This is a Hebraism, which signifies, possess God, enjoy his felicity: as seeing a thing, was used among the
Hebrews for possessing it. See Psalm 16:10. Thou wilt not suffer thy Holy One to see corruption, i.e. he shall not be corrupted.
So John 3:3: Except a man be born again, he cannot See the kingdom of God, i.e. he cannot enjoy it. So John 3:16. He that believeth not the Son, shall not See life, i. e shall not be put in possession of eternal glory.”
Lastly, tonight, where having a pure heart is concerned, let's look at 1 Peter 1:22: “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:”
Of this, Alexander MacLaren writes, “1 Peter 1:22: PURIFYING THE SOUL: I. Soul purity is in, or by, obedience. Now, of course, ‘the truth’—truth with the definite article—is the sum of the contents of the Revelation of God in Jesus Christ, His life, His death, His Glory. For to Peter, as to us He should be, Jesus Christ was Truth Incarnate. ‘In Him were hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.’ The first thought that is suggested to me from this expression—obedience to the truth—is that the revelation of God in Jesus Christ is, as its ultimate intention, meant to be obeyed...
Why, in this very letter, in reference to the very parts of Christ’s work, on which faith is wont to rest for salvation,—the death on the Cross to which we say that we trust, and which we are so accustomed to exalt as a unique and inimitable work that cannot be reproduced and needs no repetition, world without end —
Peter has no hesitation in saying that Christ was our ‘Pattern,’ and that, even when He went to the Cross, He died ‘leaving us an example that we should follow in His steps.’ So, brethren, the truth needs to be known and believed: the truth needs not only to be believed but to be trusted in; the truth needs not only to be believed and to be trusted in, but to be obeyed.
As I have said, the language in the original here implies that there was a given definite moment in the past when these dispersed strangers obeyed, and, by obeying the truth, purified their souls. What was that moment? Some people would say the moment when the rite of baptism was administered. I would say the moment when they bowed themselves in joyful acceptance of the great Word and put out a firm hand of faith to grasp Jesus Christ. That is obedience.
For, in the very act of thus trusting, there is self-surrender, is there not? Does not a man depart from himself and bow himself humbly before his Saviour when he puts his trust in Him? Is not the very essence of obedience, not the mere external act, but the melting of the will to flow in such directions as His master-impulse may guide it?
Thus, faith in its depth is obedience; and the moment when a man believes, in the deepest sense of the word, that moment, in the deepest realities of his spirit, he becomes obedient to the will and to the love of his Saviour Lord, Who is the Truth as He is the Way and the Life.
We find, not only in this Epistle, but throughout the Epistles, that the two words ‘disobedience’ and ‘unbelief,’ are used as equivalents. We read, for instance, of those that ‘stumble at the word, being disobedient,’ and the like. So, then, faith is obedience in its depth, and, if our faith has any vitality in it, it carries in it the essence of all submission.
But then, further, my text implies that the faith which is, in its depth, obedience, in its practical issues will produce the practical obedience which the text enjoins. It is no mere piece of theological {illusion} which counts that faith is righteousness. But, just as all sin comes from selfishness, so, and therefore, all righteousness will flow from giving up self, from decentralising, as it were, our souls from their old centre, self, and taking a new centre, God in Christ.
Thus the germ of all practical obedience lies in vital faith. Faith is obedience, and faith produces obedience. Does my faith produce obedience? If it does not, it is not faith. Then, with regard to this first part of my subject, comes the final thought that practical obedience works inwards as well as outwards, and purifies the soul which renders it.
People generally turn that round the other way, and, instead of saying that to do right helps to make a man right within, they say ‘make the tree good, and its fruit good’—first the pure soul, and then the practical obedience. Both statements are true. We have here II. Purifying through the Spirit. Here there is put first the human element: ‘Ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth,’ and secondly the Divine element; ‘through the Spirit.’ The human part is put in the foreground, and God’s part comes in, I was going to say, subordinately, as a condition.
The reverse is the case in the other text, which runs: ‘Kept in the power of God through faith’—where the Divine element is in the foreground, as being the true cause, and the human dwindles to being merely a condition—’Kept by’ (or in) ‘the power of God through faith.’ Both views are true...
When the purpose is to stimulate to action, man’s part is put in the foreground and God’s part secondarily. When the purpose is to stimulate to confidence, God’s part is put in the foreground and the man’s is secondary. The two interlock, and neither is sufficient without the other.
The true Agent of all purifying is that Divine Spirit. I have said that the moment of true trust is the moment of initial obedience, and of the beginning of purity. And it is so because, in that moment of initial faith, there enters into the heart the communicated Divine life of the Spirit, which thenceforward is lodged there, except it be quenched by the man’s negligence or sin.
Thence, from that germ implanted in the moment of faith, the germ of a new life, there issue forth to ultimate dominion in the spirit, the powers of that Divine Spirit which make for righteousness and transform the character. Thus, the true cause and origin of all Christian nobility and purity of character and conduct lies in that which enters the heart at the moment that the heart is opened for the coming of the Lord.
But, on the other hand, this Divine Spirit, the Source of all purity, will not purify the soul without the man’s efforts. ‘Ye have purified your souls.’ You need the Spirit indeed. But you are not mere passive recipients. You are to be active co-operators. In this region, too, we are ‘labourers together with God.’
We cannot of ourselves do the work, for the very powers with which we do it, or try to do it, are themselves in need of cleansing. And for a man to try to purify the soul by his own effort alone is to play the part of the... house-wife who would seek to wipe a dish clean with a dirty cloth.
You need the Divine Spirit to work in you, and you need to use, by your own effort, the Divine Spirit that does work in you. He is as ‘rushing, mighty wind’; but, unless the sails are set and the helm gripped, the wind will pass the boat and leave it motionless.
Lastly, we have here – III. Purifying ... unto ... love. The Apostle was speaking to men of very diverse nationalities … Greek and barbarian, bond and free, male and female, had come together in amity. The ‘love of the brethren’ was the creation of Christianity, and was the outstanding fact which, more than any other, amazed the beholders in these early days. God be thanked! there are signs in our generation of a closer drawing together of Christian people than many past ages, alas, have seen.
So then we have to school ourselves into greater conformity to the likeness of our Master, to conquer selfishness, and to purify our souls, or else all this talk about Christian unity is no better than sounding brass, and more discordant than tinkling cymbals. Let us learn the lesson. ‘The unfeigned love of the brethren’ is not such an easy thing as some people fancy, and it is not to be attained at all on the road by which some people would seek it. Cleanse yourselves, and you will flow together.
Here, then, we have Peter’s conception of a pure soul and a pure life. It is a stately building, based deep on the broad foundation of the truth as it is in Jesus; its walls rising, but not without our effort, being builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit, and having as the shining apex of its heaven-pointing spire ‘unfeigned love to the brethren.’ The measure of our obedience is the measure of our purity.
The measure of our purity is the measure of our brotherly love. But that love, though it is the very aim and natural issue of purity, still will not be realised without effort on our part. Therefore my text, after its exhibition of the process and issues of the purifying which began with faith, glides into the exhortation: ‘See that ye love one another with a pure heart’—a heart purified by obedience—and that ‘fervently.’”
This concludes this evening's Discussion, "Spiritual Growth, Part 21.”
This Discussion was originally presented “live” on June 14th, 2023.
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