Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3030
“As you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.” Colossians 2:6.
THOUGH the shepherd cares for the lambs and carries them in his arms, he does not cease his care when they become sheep. But, as long as they shall need to be tended, so long will he watch over them. Hence it is that our Apostle, though always quick of eye after newborn souls and abundantly anxious to bring sinners to a knowledge of the Truth of God as it is in Jesus, is equally in a conflict of soul for the spiritual healthfulness of those who have been born-again. Our text contains one of those loving admonitions. It is addressed, not to the ungodly, not to those who are strangers to our Lord and Master, but to those who have “received Christ Jesus the Lord.” Longing for their spiritual good and anxious that they should be established in the faith, he admonishes them thus, “As you have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him.”
In endeavoring, by God’s help, to speak upon this subject, we shall have three points. There is here, first, a fact stated concerning Believers—they have “received Christ Jesus the Lord.” Then there is an exhortation, or a counsel, offered to such—“walk in Him.” Besides which we have a model held up for our imitation. How are we to walk in Him? Why, just in the same way as we at first received Him! Let our first coming to Christ be to us the mirror of how we shall walk in Him all our days.
I. All true Christians are here described in the text as HAVING RECEIVED CHRIST JESUS THE LORD.
The first point to which I would particularly direct your attention is the personality of this reception. Believers have, it is true, received Christ’s words. They prize every precept, they value every Doctrine, but this is not all. They have received Christ Himself. While they have received Christ’s ordinances and are not slow to walk in obedience to the things which He has commanded, they do not stay here. They have received Christ Himself—His Person, His Godhead and His Humanity. They have “received Christ Jesus the Lord.” And, mark you, there is a very great distinction here—and also a great mystery. A great distinction, I say, for there are some who do, I think, wholly believe the doctrines which Christ has taught, and are profoundly orthodox, full of an earnest controversial spirit for the faith once delivered to the saints and yet, for all that, they do not seem to have received Him, the very Christ of God! And, truly, there are many who have received both Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, yet, despite what any may say, we believe that they have not received Christ, but are still as great strangers to Him as though they had only passed through the rites common to mankind, or the rites in which heathens indulge! There is a vast difference between the outward reception of the Doctrine, or the ordinance, and the inward reception of Christ.
We also said that herein is a mystery—such a mystery that only he who has received Christ can understand. The preacher cannot tell you what it is to receive Christ. Human language is not adapted to convey to the mind this deep enigma, this matchless secret. We know what it is, for “truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son, Jesus Christ.” We can describe it in such a measure that our friends who have also received Christ will know that we understand the mystery—but to the carnal mind it will always remain a puzzle how Christ can be “in us the hope of glory”—how we can eat His flesh and drink His blood. They run away to some carnal interpretation and suppose that the bread is turned into flesh at the Eucharist or that the wine is transformed into blood. That is carnal talk and this they talk because they know not what is the mystery of this receiving Christ and this walking in Christ.
This much, however, we may affirm. The Believer has received Christ into his knowledge. He knows Him to be God and to be Man. He knows Him to be set forth of the Father as the Redeemer, but, he also knows Him by a personal acquaintance. His eyes have not seen Him and yet he has looked to Him and has, by faith, seen the King in His beauty! His hands have not handled Him and yet there has been a secret touch by which the virtue has come out of Christ and has flowed into him! He has never sat down at a Communion Table when Christ has been physically present and yet full often he could say, “He brought me to the banqueting house and His banner over me was love.” He has talked with me as a man talks with his friend and the strongest sense that can be attached to that sweet word, “communion,” is tame in reference to the Believer’s connection with the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ! And in that sense of knowing Him, intimately knowing Him, the Believer has received Christ!
Not only has he received Christ into his cognizance, but into his understanding. He understands, with all saints, the love of Jesus in its height, depth, length and breadth. He has so seen Christ as to understand of Him that He was before all time as the Ancient of Days and then had His delights with the sons of men in the great Covenant decree of electing love. He understands how He became made flesh with us—married to us—when He came on earth, the Son of Mary, “bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh.” He knows by experience what is the meaning of the Atonement. He can understand how Justice is satisfied and Grace magnified. Without confounding or making mistakes, he knows how God was always gracious and full of love and yet how Christ Jesus came that the love of God might be shed abroad in our hearts and we were reconciled unto God by His death. Hence the Christian does not read of Christ as though He were a mere historical personage, nor of His work as a great mystery which he cannot comprehend, but he has received Christ into his understanding!