Christian's Secret of a Happy Life - Chapter 9

Chapter 9

GROWTH

When the believer has been brought to the point of entire surrender and perfecttrust, and finds himself dwelling and walking in a life of happy communion andperfect peace, the question naturally arises, "Is this the end?" I answeremphatically "No, it is only the beginning."

     And yet this is so little understood, thatone of the greatest objections made against the advocates of this life offaith, is, that they do not believe in growth in grace. They are supposed toteach that the soul arrives at a state of perfection beyond which there is noadvance, and that all the exhortations in the Scripture which point towardsgrowth and development are rendered void by this teaching.

     As exactly the opposite of this is true, I havethought it important next to consider this subject carefully, that I may, ifpossible, fully answer such objections, and may also show what is thescriptural place to grow in, and how the soul is to grow.

     The text which is most frequently quoted is 2Pet, 3:18, "But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and SaviourJesus Christ." Now this text exactly expresses what we believe to be God's willfor us, and what also we believe He has made it possible for us to experience.We accept, in their very fullest meaning, all the commands and promisesconcerning our being no more children, and our growing up into Christ in allthings, until we come unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature ofthe fulness of Christ. We rejoice that we need not continue always to be babes,needing milk; but that we may, by reason of use and development become such ashave need of strong meat, skilful in the word of righteousness, and able todiscern both good and evil. And none would grieve more than we at the thoughtof any finality in the Christian life beyond which there could be noadvance.

     But then we believe in a growing that does reallyproduce maturity, and in a development that, as a fact, does bring forth ripefruit. We expect to reach the aim set before us, and if we do not, we feel surethere must be some fault in our growing. No parent would be satisfied with thegrowth of his child, if, day after day, and year after year, it remained thesame helpless babe it was in the first months of its life; and no farmer wouldfeel comfortable under such growing of his grain as should stop short at theblade, and never produce the ear, nor the full corn in the ear. Growth, to bereal, must be progressive, and the days and weeks and months must see adevelopment and increase of maturity in the thing growing. But is this the casewith a large part of that which is called growth in grace? Does not the veryChristian who is the most strenuous in his longings and in his efforts afterit, too often find that at the end of the year he is not as far on in hisChristian experience as at the beginning, and that his zeal, and hisdevotedness, and his separation from the world are not as whole-souled orcomplete as when his Christian life first began?

     I was once urging upon a company of Christiansthe privileges and rest of an immediate and definite step into the land ofpromise, when a lady of great intelligence interrupted me, with what sheevidently felt to be a complete rebuttal of all I had been saying, exclaiming,"Ah! but, my dear friend, I believe in growing in grace." "How long have youbeen growing?" I asked. "About twenty-five years," was her answer. "And howmuch more unworldly and devoted to the Lord are you now than when you beganyour Christian life?" I continued. "Alas!" was the answer, "I fear I am notnearly so much so"; and with this answer her eyes were opened to see that atall events her way of growing had not been successful, but quite thereverse.

     The trouble with her, and every other such case,is simply this, they are trying to grow into grace, instead of in it. They arelike a rosebush which the gardener should plant in the hard, stony path, with aview to its growing into the flower-bed, and which would of course dwindle andwither in consequence, instead of flourishing and maturing. The children ofIsrael wandering in the wilderness are a perfect picture of this sort ofgrowing. They were travelling about for forty years, taking many weary steps,and finding but little rest from their wanderings, and yet, at the end of itall, were no nearer the promised land than they were at the beginning. Whenthey started on their wanderings at Kadesh Barnea, they were at the borders ofthe land, and a few steps would have taken them into it.

     When they ended their wanderings in the plains ofMoab, they were also at its borders; only with this great difference, that nowthere was a river to cross, which at first there would not have been. All theirwanderings and fightings in the wilderness had not put them in possession ofone inch of the promised land. In order to get possession of this land it wasnecessary first to be in it; and in order to grow in grace, it is necessaryfirst to be planted in grace. But when once in the land, their conquest wasvery rapid; and when once planted in grace, the growth of the soul in one monthwill exceed that of years in any other soil. For grace is a most fruitful soil,and the plants that grow therein are plants of a marvellous growth. They aretended by a Divine Husbandman, and are warmed by the Sun of Righteousness, andwatered by the dew from Heaven. Surely it is no wonder that they bring forthfruit, "some an hundred-fold, some sixty-fold, some thity-fold."

     But, it will be asked, what is meant by growingin grace? It is difficult to answer this question because so few people haveany conception of what the grace of God really is. To say that it is free,unmerited favor, only expresses a little of its meaning. It is the wondrous,boundless love of God, poured out upon us without stint or measure, notaccording to our deserving, but according to His infinite heart of love, whichpasseth knowledge, so unfathomable are its heights and depths. I sometimesthink we give a totally different meaning to the word "love" when it isassociated with God, from that we so well understand in its human application.But if ever human love was tender and self-sacrificing and devoted; if ever itcould bear and forbear; if ever it could suffer gladly for its loved ones; ifever it was willing to pour itself out in a lavish abandonment for the comfortor pleasure of its objects, -- then infinitely more is Divine love tender andself-sacrificing and devoted, and glad to bear and forbear, and to suffer, andto lavish its best of gifts and blessings upon the objects of its love. Puttogether all the tenderest love you know of, dear reader, the deepest you haveever felt, and the strongest that has ever been poured out upon you, and heapupon it all the love of all the loving human hearts in the world, and thenmultiply it by infinity, and you will begin perhaps to have some faint glimpsesof what the love of God in Christ Jesus is. And this is grace. And to beplanted in grace is to live in the very heart of this love, to be enveloped byit, to be steeped in it, to revel in it, to know nothing else but love only andlove always, to grow day by day in the knowledge of it, and in faith in it, tointrust everything to its care, and to have no shadow of a doubt but that itwill surely order all things well.

     To grow in grace is opposed to allself-dependence, to all self-effort, to all legality of every kind. It is toput our growing, as well as everything else, into the hands of the Lord, andleave it with Him. It is to be so satisfied with our Husbandman, and with Hisskill and wisdom, that not a question will cross our minds as to His modes oftreatment or His plan of cultivation. It is to grow as the lilies grow, or asthe babes grow, without a care and without anxiety; to grow by the power of aninward life principle that cannot help but grow; to grow because we live andtherefore must grow; to grow because He who has planted us has planted agrowing thing, and has made us to grow.

     Surely this is what our Lord meant when He said"Consider the lilies, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: andyet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like oneof these." Or, when He says again, "Which of you by taking thought can add onecubit unto his stature?" There is no effort in the growing of a child or of alily. They do not toil nor spin, they do not stretch nor strain, they do notmake any effort of any kind to grow; they are not conscious even that they aregrowing; but by an inward life principle, and through the nurturing care ofGod's providence, and the fostering of caretaker or gardener, by the heat ofthe sun and the falling of the rain, they grow and grow.

     And the result is sure. Even Solomon, our Lordsays, in all his glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Solomon's array costmuch toiling and spinning, and gold and silver in abundance, but the lily'sarray costs none of these. And though we may toil and spin to make forourselves beautiful spiritual garments, and may strain and stretch in ourefforts after spiritual growth, we shall accomplish nothing; for no man bytaking thought can add one cubit to his stature; and no array of ours can everequal the beautiful dress with which the great Husbandman clothes the plantsthat grow in His garden of grace and under His fostering care.

     If I could but make each one of my readersrealize how utterly helpless we are in this matter of growing, I am convinced alarge part of the strain would be taken out of many lives at once. Imagine achild possessed of the monomania that he would not grow unless he made somepersonal effort after it, and who should insist upon a combination of rope andpulleys whereby to stretch himself up to the desired height. He might, it istrue, spend his days and years in a weary strain, but after all there would beno change in the inexorable fact, "No man by taking thought can add one cubitunto his stature"; and his years of labor would be only wasted, if they did notreally hinder the longed-for end.

     Imagine a lily trying to clothe itself inbeautiful colors and graceful lines, stretching its leaves and stems to makethem grow, and seeking to manage the clouds and the sunshine, that its needsmight be all judiciously supplied!

     And yet in these two pictures we have, Iconceive, only too true a picture of what many Christians are trying to do;who, knowing they ought to grow, and feeling within them an instinct that longsfor growth, yet think to accomplish it by toiling, and spinning, andstretching, and straining, and pass their lives in such a round of self-effortas is a weariness to contemplate.

     Grow, dear friends, but grow, I beseech you, inGod's way, which is the only effectual way. See to it that you are planted ingrace, and then let the Divine Husbandman cultivate you in His own way and byHis own means. Put yourselves out in the sunshine of His presence, and let thedew of heaven come down upon you, and see what will come of it. Leaves andflowers and fruit must surely come in their season, for your Husbandman is askilful one, and He never fails in His harvesting. Only see to it that youinterpose no hindrance to the shining of the Sun of Righteousness or thefalling of the dew from Heaven. A very thin covering may serve to keep off theheat or the moisture, and the plant may wither even in their midst; and theslightest barrier between your soul and Christ may cause you to dwindle andfade as a plant in a cellar or under a bushel. Keep the sky clear. Open wideevery avenue of your being to receive the blessed influences our DivineHusbandman may bring to bear upon you. Bask in the sunshine of His love. Drinkin of the waters of His goodness. Keep your face up-turned to Him. Look, andyour soul shall live.

     You need make no efforts to grow; but let yourefforts instead be all concentrated on this, that you abide in the Vine. TheHusbandman who has the care of the vine, will care for its branches also, andwill so prune and purge and water and tend them that they will grow and bringforth fruit, and their fruit shall remain; and, like the lily, they shall findthemselves arrayed in apparel so glorious that that of Solomon will be asnothing to it.

     What if you seem to yourselves to be planted atthis moment in a desert soil where nothing can grow! Put yourself absolutelyinto the hands of the great Husbandman, and He will at once make that desertblossom as the rose, and will cause springs and fountains of water to start upout of its sandy wastes; for the promise is sure, that the man who trusts inthe Lord "shall be as a tree planted by the waters, and that spreadeth out herroots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh, but her leaf shall begreen; and shall not be careful in the year of drought, neither shall ceasefrom yielding fruit." It is the great prerogative of our Divine Husbandman thatHe is able to turn any soil, whatever it may be like, into the soil of grace,the moment we put our growing into His hands. He does not need to transplant usinto a different field, but right where we are, with just the circumstancesthat surround us, He makes His sun to shine and His dew to fall upon us, andtransforms the very things that were before our greatest hindrances into thechiefest and most blessed means of our growth. I care not what thecircumstances may be, His wonder-working power can accomplish this. And we musttrust Him with it all. Surely He is a Husbandman we can trust. And if He sendsstorms, or winds, or rains, or sunshine, all must be accepted at His hands withthe most unwavering confidence that He who has undertaken to cultivate us, andto bring us to maturity, knows the very best way of accomplishing His end, andregulates the elements, which are all at His disposal, expressly with a view toour most rapid growth.

     Let me entreat of you, then, to give up all yourefforts after growing, and simply to let yourselves grow. Leave it all to theHusbandman, whose care it is, and who alone is able to manage it. Nodifficulties in your case can baffle Him. No dwarfing of your growth in yearsthat are past, no apparent dryness of your inward springs of life, nocrookedness or deformity in any of your past development, can in the least marthe perfect work that He will accomplish, if you will only put yourselvesabsolutely into His hands, and let Him have His own way with you. His owngracious promise to His backsliding children assures you of this. "I will healtheir backslidings," He says: "I will love them freely, for mine anger isturned away from him. I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall grow as thelily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His branches shall spread, and hisbeauty shall be as the olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon. They that dwellunder His shadow shall return; they shall revive as the corn, and grow as thevine; the scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon." And again He says,"Be not afraid, for the pastures of the wilderness do spring, for the treebeareth her fruit, the fig-tree and the vine do yield their strength. And thefloors shall be full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow with wine and oil.And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten; and ye shalleat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God, whohath dealt wondrously with you; and my people shall never be ashamed."

     Oh! that you could but know just what your Lordmeant when He said, "Consider the lilies, how they grow; for they toil not,neither do they spin." Surely these words give us a picture of a life and of agrowth far different from the ordinary life and growth of Christians; a life ofrest, and a growth without effort; and yet a life and a growth crowned withglorious results. And to every soul that will thus become a lily in the gardenof the Lord, and will grow as the lilies grow, the same glorious array will besurely given as is given them; and they will know the fulfilment of thatwonderful mystical passage concerning their Beloved, that "He feedeth among thelilies."

     This is the sort of growth in grace in which wewho have entered into the life of full trust believe: a growth which brings thedesired results, which blossoms out into flower and fruit, and becomes a treeplanted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season;whose leaf also does not wither, and who prospers in whatsoever he doeth. Andwe rejoice to know that there are growing up now in the Lord's heritage manysuch plants, who, as the lilies behold the face of the sun and grow thereby,are, by beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, being changed into thesame image from glory to glory, even as by the spirit of the Lord.

     Should you ask such, how it is that they grow sorapidly and with such success, their answer would be that they are notconcerned about their growing, and are hardly conscious that they do grow; thattheir Lord has told them to abide in Him, and has promised that if they do thusabide, they shall certainly bring forth much fruit; and that they are concernedonly about the abiding, which is their part, and leave the cultivating and thegrowing and the training and pruning to their good Husbandman, who alone isable to manage these things or bring them about. You will find that such soulsare not engaged in watching self, but in looking unto Jesus. They do not toilnor spin for their spiritual garments, but leave themselves in the hands of theLord to be arrayed as it may please Him. Self-effort and self-dependence are atan end with them. Their interest in self is gone, transferred over into thehands of another. Self has become really nothing, and Christ alone is all inall to such as these. And the blessed result is, that not even Solomon, in allhis glory, was arrayed like these shall be.

     Let us look at this subject practically. We allknow that growing is not a thing of effort, but is the result of an inwardlife, a principle of growth. All the stretching and pulling in the world couldnot make a dead oak grow. But a live oak grows without stretching. It is plain,therefore, that the essential thing is to get within you the growing life, andthen you cannot help but grow. And this life is the life hid with Christ inGod, the wonderful divine life of an indwelling Holy Ghost. Be filled withthis, dear believer, and, whether you are conscious of it or not, you mustgrow, you cannot help growing. Do not trouble about your growing, but see to itthat you have the growing life. Abide in the Vine. Let the life from Him flowthrough all your spiritual veins. Interpose no barrier to His mightylife-giving power, working in you all the good pleasure of His will. Yieldyourself up utterly to His sweet control. Put your growing into His hands, ascompletely as you have put all your other affairs. Suffer Him to manage it asHe will. Do not concern yourself about it, nor even think of it. Trust Himabsolutely, and always. Accept each moment's dispensation as it comes to you,from His dear hands, as being the needed sunshine or dew for that moment'sgrowth. Say a continual "Yes" to your Father's will.

     Heretofore you have perhaps tried, as so many do,to be both the lily and the gardener, both the vineyard and the husbandman. Youhave taken upon your shoulders the burdens and responsibilities that belongonly to the Divine Husbandman, and which He alone is able to bear. Henceforthconsent to take your rightful place and to be only what you really are. Say toyourself, If I am the garden only, and not the gardener, if I am the vine only,and not the husbandman, it is surely essential to my right growth and wellbeing that I should keep the place and act the part of the garden, and shouldnot usurp the gardener's place, nor try to act the gardener's part.

     Do not seek then to choose your own soil, nor thelaying out of your borders; do not plant your own seeds, nor dig about, norprune, nor watch over your own vines. Be content with what the DivineHusbandman arranges for you, and with the care He gives. Let Him choose thesort of plants and fruits He sees best to cultivate, and grow a potato asgladly as a rose, if such be His will, and homely everyday virtues as willinglyas exalted fervors. Be satisfied with the seasons He sends, with the sunshineand rain He gives, with the rapidity or slowness of your growth, in short, withall His dealings and processes, no matter how little we may comprehend them.

     There is infinite repose in this. As the violerests in its little nook, receiving contentedly its daily portion satisfied tolet rains fall, and suns rise, and the earth to whirl, without one anxiouspang, so must we repose in the present as God gives it to us, acceptingcontentedly our daily portion, and with no anxiety as to all that may bewhirling around us, in His great creative and redemptive plan.