Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3147
“When the LORD shall build up Zion, He shall appear in His Glory.” Psalm 102:16.
THE Lord Himself must “build up Zion,” or it will never be built up. He first planned it. He is the Architect of His own Church. He dug the foundations, i.e., has supplied the great Cornerstone. He, by His own power, creates each living stone, polishes it and fits it into its place. He cements the whole structure and as He first sketched the plan, so will He complete it in every iota to the praise and the glory of His wisdom, His Grace and His love. It shall be said of Zion, when all her walls are built and all her palaces completed—and when all her happy inhabitants have their mouths filled with song as they walk in white—“The Lord has built it, from the foundation even to the topstone.” I remember seeing, close by the side of the Alps, a house which had upon its front, words to this effect, “This house was built entirely by the skill, wealth and industry of its inhabitants.” It struck me as not being a very modest thing to put in front of one’s house for, after all, the structure was not very marvelous . But when we look at the glorious architecture of the Church of God, it is no mean part of its luster that it may fittingly bear such an inscription as this, “This House was built entirely by the wisdom, the munificence and the power of the Infinite Jehovah.”
I. But while the text reminds us of this Truth which I hope we never can forget, it also brings to our minds three or four other Truths of God. And the first point of our discourse shall be ZION BUILT UP.
I suppose we shall all consider that one essential to the building up of Zion would be practical conversion. It is of small avail for a man to say he is building up a church where the power of the Holy Spirit is not seen in calling sinners out of darkness into marvelous light. There may be periods in which conversions are few, but if instead of their being exceptional, this should come to be the rule in one’s ministry, there would be grave cause to suspect that God was not working within the minister—certainly not in the sense of building up the Church. We find not infrequently, in Holy Scripture, that the fathers of households are called, “builders,” and that the term, “the building of a house,” is constantly used in respect to the birth and training up of a family. Now, in the great Christian family, our converts are the newborn children and a family is not built up for God except with these sons and daughters who are like stones polished after the similitude of a palace. We little know the blessing which young converts bring to us. They quicken the pulse of old Christians, they strengthen and confirm the faith of those who have long been walking in the Truth and they do, as it were, infuse new blood into the fellowship of the saints. They come to us as God’s message from on high. They are tokens for good and whereas we might have thought, perhaps, that the triumphs of the Cross were confined to the heroic age when the Spirit of God was poured out in Pentecostal measure, yet as we see our sons and daughters converted and the great miracle of regeneration still being performed, we take heart and are of good courage to go on in the work of the Lord! Conversions we must have, for there is no building up of Zion without them!
And then a public confession of faithmust follow conversion. Though the invisible Church of God is built up by conversions, the outward Church is only built up as men and women associate together in the holy society which we call “the Church.” It is the duty of every Christian—no, it is the instinct of his spiritual life—to avow the faith which he has received! And avowing it, he finds himself associated with others who have made the same profession and he assists them in holy labor. When he is strong, he ministers of his strength to the weak. And when he is, himself, weak, he borrows strength from those who, just then, may happen to be strong in the faith. Where were our Christian institutions if Church fellowship were broken up? Plainly, if it is right for one Christian to remain out of Church fellowship, it is right for all! And then, if there were no Churches, there would be no institutions—and where would the Gospel, itself, be? I would not lay too much stress on the Church of God, but I venture to ask you, is it not written that she is “the pillar and
ground of the Truth?” If, then, I withhold my confession of faith and my personal communion with the visible Church, I to that extent weaken the pillar and ground of the faith. We need confessions of faith as well as conversions.
By a Church being thus formed in order to its being built up, something more is needed. We cannot build without union. A house is not a load of bricks, neither is the Church a mere conglomeration of human beings. A house must have its doors, its windows, its foundations, its rafters and its ceiling. So a Church must be organized—it must have its distinct offices and officers, it must have its departments of labor—and proper men must be found, according to Christ’s own appointment, to preside over those departments.