The Altar, The House, the Name (continued)
The Incorruptibility of the Blood
The next related factor in the Blood as the Life is its incorruptibility and indestructibility. These elements go together and are one. What is incorruptible is indestructible. This is a life over which death has no power. Death has been met in the power of this life. hades has been entered and plundered in the power of this life. satan and his entire kingdom have had their might exhausted by the power of this life. He Who was and is this Life, now lives for evermore, as the Testimony to the universal triumph of His own Blood over every force that has stood in the way of God's end.
By this imperishable life He has perfected salvation. Nothing of old was ever perfect, because the mediators constantly changed by death; death breaking in all the time meant no completeness. But this High Priest perfects for ever, because He lives after the power of an endless, "indissoluble", life. Therefore He is able to save to the uttermost, i.e., the ultimate and final end (Hebrews 7:16, 23-25).
By this imperishable life He has bound His own to Himself. They share this life by new birth, and they will never die. Death is not cessation of being; it is something spiritual. Life triumphant over death is spiritual, and means ascendancy over sin, self, satan, death. In other words, it is power and victory.
By this indestructible life the Lord Jesus has inaugurated a ministry and a work which will persist to its ultimate consummation, in spite of every force of earth and hell which may be hurled against it. Mighty empires and powerful hierarchies have been brought to ruin in setting themselves against that which He said He would build. "The gates [counsels] of hades" have not prevailed, intensely as they have striven.
It is a blessed thing to be in and a part of that work which shall abide for ever. For a man's work to go to pieces when he is withdrawn is no compliment to him. It only means that it was man's work, not God's. Like kingdoms, men rise and wane. Are we seeking to make a name for ourselves? This is very short-sighted, at best. The testimony to which God is reacting relates to a work which stands and persists when every destructive force has spent itself. This testimony, and such a work, are in virtue of the Blood of the Lord Jesus.
There are all kinds of alarms today because of rapid and drastic changes. Historic creeds are being treated as mere scraps of paper, and that by leading ecclesiastical representatives. Institutions and traditions are rapidly losing their hold and influence. Organized Christianity is markedly on the wane. The maintenance of the religious system is demanding all the resource, acumen, wit, ingenuity and even cunning of men. There never were so many "attractions", schemes, popularizing methods, etc., to keep up the "church" (?). Even in fairly evangelical quarters the appeals for help are so numerous that it is becoming - as someone has said - a matter of not being able to afford to go to church.
All this and much more speaks of failure and defeat, but the Lord will have that in the earth which is His triumph. To "contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered unto the saints" (Jude 3) is something more than to contend for orthodoxy of doctrine; to champion an evangelical creed; to be a "fundamentalist". It is to recognize and fervently seek to secure for God that upon which His own heart is set: namely, a people of the Altar, the Cross, the Blood. A people who have been crucified with Christ in spiritual reality and apprehension, and whose life is an abiding testimony to Calvary's victory over all Christ's foes, within and without, and from whom there flows to the ends of the earth the stream of Divine, holy, mighty, energizing and indestructible life.
~T. Austin-Sparks~
(continued with # 24 - (The Testimony of the Blood continued)
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