(Continued from page 136.)

There are a few ill-advised expressions and several misunderstood passages of Scripture in Mr. McC.'s books it may be well to take notice of. On page 45 of "The Threefold Secret,"speaking of the Holy Spirit as dwelling in the body of the believer, he calls Him " a joint-tenant with the flesh."On page 46, he says, "Yet every believer thus co-indwelt by the flesh and the Spirit."Now I do not desire to make a man an offender for a word. I am sure he means right. I think it is plain all he intends is, that notwithstanding the fact that the Spirit is in the believer, the flesh is still in him too. But if he means right, one may ask, why take notice of a mere slip of the tongue, or of simply an ill-chosen term ?Well, there is danger of the truth being obscured in the minds of young believers, and of their adopting expressions which it is better they should learn to avoid. Now the terms "joint-tenant" and "co-indwelt" really imply fellowship. The thought of Scripture is not that they are there with common rights and interests. They are there as opponents. They are not dwelling together in a joint possession. They antagonize each other. The terms joint-tenant and co-indwelt should be avoided, as liable to hinder clearness in the perception of the truth.

Mr. McC. does not see the distinction between unity and union, between being one with Christ and united to Christ. I will quote a few statements from " The Threefold Secret":

" Do yon forget that His indwelling does not depend upon your emotions, but upon your union with Christ, which has been long since accomplished by God through your faith in Him?" (page 28).

"In Him is life, and the instant we are united to Him by faith we must receive the Spirit" (page 29).

"Now the indwelling of the Holy Ghost depends upon our union with Christ, through faith" (page 60).

"When we see that His indwelling depends upon an unchangeable fact-our eternal union with Christ by faith" (page 61). "He has received the Holy Spirit through union with Christ" (page 88).

"It is by virtue of our union with Christ, then, that we have received the gift of the Holy Ghost" (page 104).

"A man in Christ has the Spirit in virtue of his union" (page 105).

Uniformly and constantly is the confusion between unity and union to be found in these writings. One with Christ and united to Christ are, in his mind, one and the same thing. Is it so in Scripture? First, let us look at the account of Rebekah in Gen. 24:In verse 4 we read, "But thou shalt go unto my country, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son Isaac."We look at Isaac here as typifying Christ. A woman is to be found to be united to Isaac. She must be of his kindred. She must be one of his family, a woman of those who have a community of life and nature with himself. No woman not of his blood, not of his family, will do to be united to him. In John 17:our Lord says (verse 21), " That they all may be one :as Thou, Father, art in Me, and I in Thee, that they also may be one in Us." This oneness is a family unity. It is the unity of kindred. Before there can be union with Christ there must be unity with Him. In this verse our Lord is not speaking of union, but of oneness, or unity. It is what belongs to the family of Christ, the family of God. The blessing belongs to every child of faith. All who believe through the word of the disciples (see verse 20) share in this blessed kinship. Unity of life, of nature, of kinship with Christ, is by faith. But is this the same thing as union with Christ? Is it the same thing as being united to Him ?Let us see. In Rom. 7:we read of some of the family of faith who, before the death and resurrection of Christ, had been united to the law, but who now, by the body of Christ, are dead to that to which they had been united, 1:e., the law (see verse 4).Being thus dead to what heretofore they had been united to, it is now possible to unite them to another, to the risen Lord Jesus Christ. By faith they had kinship with Christ already-a kinship which others who believed the coming testimony-the revelations of Christianity-would also have. But now, Christ having died for them, and thus freed them from their union to the law, they receive union to Christ risen. We are not told here when this union to Christ is accomplished, or how or by what means it is effected. To learn this we must look elsewhere. In i Cor. 6:, our bodies being indwelt by the Spirit, we are viewed as "joined unto the Lord." Here we have union, and see that, instead of the in dwelling of the Spirit depending on union, union depends on the indwelling of the Spirit. Instead of receiving " the Spirit through union with Christ," it is through the Spirit indwelling us we have union with Christ. Again, in chap. 12:13, we read, "By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body."Here we have the union of the members. The members being joined to each other, they are one body. Again it is by the Spirit. Union is always by the Spirit. Unity, oneness with Christ, is by faith. Union, whether it be union with Christ, or the union of the members, is by the indwelling of the Spirit. In Scripture these different things are never confused.

On page 27 of "The Threefold Secret," 2 Cor. 13:5 is quoted, from the Revised Version. "Try your own selves whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Or know ye not as to your own selves that Jesus Christ is in you, unless indeed ye be reprobate ?" His comments are:

"How clear this last passage is upon the points named ! Note the simple conditions again :'Try your own selves, whether ye be in the faith.' That is, 'Are you believers? Are you simply trusting the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation ? If so, know ye not as to YOUR OWN selves that Jesus Christ is in YOU? Unless, indeed, when you examine yourselves, you find that you are reprobate, that is, not standing the test, not trusting Christ, but something else.'"

We will quote this passage in its proper connection, simply leaving out the parenthetical part, beginning with verse 3 :" Since ye seek a proof of Christ speaking in me, . . . examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith." Have you the truth from God ? They thought they had. Well, then, Who was the divinely chosen instrument of the communication of this truth from God to you ? It was the apostle. If they had the truth then,-the "faith " God had "delivered to the saints,"-they possessed the " proof " of his being an apostle ; " of Christ speaking in " him. Unless the faith they held was a false faith, then they were bound to acknowledge that he was an apostle. If they were reprobate, if what they held as truth was not a revelation of Jesus Christ to their souls, so that they had no inward knowledge of Him, no enjoyment of Him, no real sense of what He is, then they lacked the proof they, or at least some of them, were seeking for. If the truth they held was really from God, and, laying hold of their souls by the power of the Spirit, gave them an in-ward apprehension of Christ, the apostle was the divinely authorized communicator of that truth to them.

Beloved reader, this passage applies to us with all the force it had with the Corinthians. Unless we are reprobates, unless what we profess as truth never came from God, unless what we hold as the truth is a " cunningly devised " fable, God has spoken to us. If Christ is apprehended in our souls, if the truth that has been given to us has revealed Him to us and given us to enjoy Him inwardly, then we have heard the voice of Christ. We know what has been His voice to us. It is "the apostles' doctrine"-the doctrine they were the authorized communicators of. C. Crain

(To be concluded in our next issue.)