3 Let nothing be done through strife or vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem other better than themselves.

Mere logomachy should never be made a basis of accusation.‭ ‬Where the thing intended is wrong,‭ ‬it is,‭ ‬of course,‭ ‬a different case.

TC 10/1896

Christ is our great exemplar.

Let us not minimise his value as such by wrong reasoning. He, it is true, was divine, whilst we are only human, but this enhances rather than weakens his worth to us as an example. We are not required to reach Christ's standard of perfection. We are simply asked to keep our model before us and to strive to copy it.

Are we all doing this? Let us try to be Christlike—our shortcomings then will never condemn us. Let us never discourage any on account of their apparently slow progress. Rather let us praise and encourage where progress, however small, is being made.

In following Christ, some make much more headway than others. All have not the same ability, and we know not each other's weaknesses and drawbacks. The reasonable rule for us in our ignorance to observe is to esteem others as deserving of more credit than ourselves.

This does not mean that we shall make light of wrongdoing, or call evil things other than by their right names. Drunkenness is drunkenness, and theft is theft, and scandal mongering is scandal mongering, and, should occasion require, it is not wrong to so describe these things.

What we have to avoid is pluming ourselves upon conduct which has been the result of small effort, and frowning upon others, who, though apparently less successful, have reached their measure of uprightness by ten times our effort.

Bro AT Jannaway

The Christadelphian, Jan 1906

They who withhold honour where it is due; or who cannot join in the merited approval of others; or who cannot recognise indebtedness where it exists; or who account their own inferior minds to be equal or superior to manifest pre-eminence; such are envious, selfish, and despicable.

Bro Shuttleworth

The Christadelphian, July 1873

6 Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God:

In What Sense was Christ Equal with God?

... to tell us that Christ who "thought it not robbery to be equal with God," "made himself of no reputation," is to give us a strong argument in favour of our own abasement, who are nothing.

...The ordinary translation is about as good a rendering into English as need be desired; and unquestionably gives the idea of the original. The only question is, in what sense did Christ "think it not a robbery to be equal with God." This is answered in John 5:18,

"He said that God was his Father, making himself equal with God."

When Christ's origin in the Spirit is realised, his equality with God in the New Testament sense is not difficult to perceive. The son of any high personage possesses a certain equality with his father, which is appreciated by those in a lower sphere whom he may visit, notwithstanding that his father is higher in rank than he.

In this way, Jesus, begotten of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: and the lesson of Paul's words lies here, that if Jesus, so high in station as to rank as the equal to God, was so humble as to make himself of no reputation, we have a great example of humility, and ought to

"let this mind be in us which was also in Christ Jesus."

The Christadelphian, Mar 1872

8 And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

He had a right to life, for he had never forfeited it by the transgression of law

But, though Adam was "made in the image and after the likeness" of the "Holy Ones," the similitude has been so greatly marred, that his posterity present but a faint representation of either. The almost uncontrolled and continuous operation of "the law of sin and death" (Rom. 7:23), styled by philosophers "the law of nature," which is an indwelling and inseparable constituent of our present economy, has exceedingly deformed the image, and effaced the likeness of God, which man originally presented.

It required, therefore, the appearance of a New Man, in whom the image and likeness should re-appear, as in the beginning. This was "the man Christ Jesus," whom Paul styles as the last Adam." He is "the Image of the invisible God" (Col. 1:15) (eikwn pou qeou the effulgent mirror of the glory, and exact likeness of His person" (Heb. 1:3) (apaugasma thV doxhv, kai carakthr thv upovasews autou).

Hence, in another place, Paul says, He was "in the form of God" (Phil. 2:6,7,8), (en morjh qeou) and also "made in the likeness of men, and in the form of a man." Being thus the image and likeness of the invisible God, as well as of man, who was created in the image and likeness of the Elohim, He made Himself equal with God in claiming God for his father (John 5:18), though born of "sinful flesh."

Though thus highly related in paternity, image, and character, He was yet "made a little lower than the angels;" for He appeared not in the higher nature of Elohim, but in the inferior nature of the seed of Abraham (Heb. 2:16). This was the first stage of His manifestation, as the present is of the saints who are His brethren. But He is the appointed "Heir of all things, on account of whom" (di on), "the dispensations were re-arranged (kathrtisqai tonV aiwnas) by the word of God, to the end that the things seen exist not from things apparent" (Heb. 1:2; 11:3).

But, says the apostle, "we do not yet see all things put under Him: but we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that by the grace of God he should taste death for every man" (Heb. 2:8-9). Having been thus laid low, and for this gracious purpose, He is no longer "lower than the angels." He is equal to them in body; and made so much superior to them in rank, dignity, honour, and glory," as He hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they" (Heb. 1:4).

Elpis Israel 1.2.

9 Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name:

"In his name" is here an all-important phrase, for apart from this great name, there is no repentance nor remission of sins for Jew or Gentile. "There is salvation in no other; for," continues the Spirit in Peter, "there is none other Name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved" (Acts iv. 12); and again, he said, "to Him give all the prophets testimony, that whosoever believeth into him, shall receive remission of sins THROUGH HIS NAME" (x. 43).

The Name is expressive of a personal existence "among men." In its first sojourn here, though it was the Deity's Name, it was a name of no reputation; it was without rule, being the name of a servant, of a humiliated, oppressed, and afflicted man, absolutely obedient to the will of the Deity, even unto the death of the cross.

Eureka 2.3.4.

12 Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

The choice is not yet made

If none but good fish came into the net, if none but faithful men and women responded to the call, things would be too sweet and smooth among believers. There would be no trial of the patience which shews itself in the perseverance in duty under bitter circumstances.

However, be that as it may, there is first a preliminary and indiscriminate call. It is something to have been included in that. By the gospel, Peter said, God visited the Gentiles, to take out from amongst them a people for his name.

We have heard that gospel, we have fallen in love with that gospel, with all the hopes and promises it presents to our mind; and, yielding obedience to it, we have become the subjects of the preliminary "taking out."

We have now to accomplish the other point referred to by Peter when he says "Be diligent to make your calling and election sure." This is the time for diligence; it is not a state of things in which we can congratulate ourselves upon being safe. There is nobody safe; that is to say, nobody can say that they are saved until the day of selection come, and they have been selected.

They cannot judge themselves. Some people imagine that when they have believed the gospel and been baptised, they have done all—that they have secured the prize. They have not secured the prize at all; they have but entered the lists for the competition to secure it. The attainment of it is contingent upon faithful stewardship; upon how we act in the position in which the gospel has placed us.

Christ comes forth to look at the company gathered as guests for the wedding, and makes his selection from amongst them upon the principle of faithfulness. So that instead of a person sitting down with folded arms the moment they come to believe the truth, they ought to realise increased incentive to diligence; for only those who are diligent will make their calling and election sure.

Sunday Morning 34 - TC 02/1872

13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

There is God's side of the question.‭ ‬He has made man for His own pleasure,‭ ‬and He derives this pleasure chiefly from their independent and voluntary appreciation of Him.‭ ‬Is He to be cheated out of His pleasure‭?

Men think of God as too high to be considered as capable of deriving pleasure from human submission‭; ‬God is certainly too high for us to begin to conceive,‭ ‬but it is not for us to use this fact as a reason for denying what He has revealed.‭ ‬We can go further than that,‭ ‬and say that what He has revealed is inevitable from what we can see Him to be.‭ ‬God is the perfection of mentality‭; ‬human mentality is but a faint resemblance to His,‭ ‬impressed on clay,‭ ‬as we might say.‭

Now,‭ ‬we know from our human experience of mentality,‭ ‬that the capacity for pleasure is in the ratio of the development of mentality.‭ ‬Has a man a small and low mind‭? ‬he has but poor capacity for mental enjoyment.‭ ‬Has a man a capacious and sensitive mentality‭? ‬His pleasures are keen and ecstatic,‭ ‬and his pains the same.‭ ‬If this be true of mere brain substance on earth,‭ ‬it is not easy to realise that it should be true of spirit substance in heaven.‭

Does it not enable us to understand why God should be pleased with holiness in man,‭ ‬and pained at the opposite state‭? ‬He has formed man for His own pleasure,‭ ‬and finds it in man's love and praise and obedience‭; ‬and He is displeased and pained when the creature He has formed for His praise,‭ ‬turns his back upon God who made him,‭ ‬and thinks only of his own pleasure in other things that God has made,‭ ‬in doing which man can rob God,‭ ‬although such a thing in the abstract looks impossible.

On both heads therefore,‭ ‬the wisdom of God's way in requiring man to seek after Him is supreme.‭ ‬If He did not make His knowledge and service imperative with man,‭ ‬men would become an abortion in creation.‭ ‬The longer we live,‭ ‬the more strongly do we see the reasonableness of all the things which God has commanded in the Scriptures of truth.‭

The gospel is a summons to know Him,‭ ‬to give heed to Him,‭ ‬to obey Him,‭ ‬to love and honour Him.‭ ‬It is not merely the announcement of good things to come,‭ ‬it is not merely an offer of salvation in the sense of benefaction‭; ‬it is not merely a promise that all our troubles will end,‭ ‬and that unspeakable good will come.‭ ‬It is all that,‭ ‬for‭ "‬no good thing will God withhold from those who fear Him,‭" ‬but primarily it is a command to repent and to submit to God,‭ ‬and to conform to His will,‭ ‬to become His servants,‭ ‬to glorify His name,‭ ‬to please Him by intelligent and fervent praise.‭

‭Bro Roberts - Exhort 278

15 That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world;

In the present state, the believers, who are constitutionally in the Christ-Ephod, and therefore citizens of the Foursquare Polity which decorates it, are Urim, and addressed as such by Paul in Phil. ii. 15, in the words, "in a crooked and perverse generation, ye, the sons of the Deity, shine as lights," or Urim, "in the world:" and in Eph. v. 8, "ye were formerly darkness, but now light in the Lord; walk as children of light." Being in the Lord, they are the lights and precious stones of his breastplate -- the Urim and Thummim of his Ephod.

They became such by the law and the testimony dwelling in them richly. This gives them their polish, and enables them to "shine as lights."

Eureka 7.6.

Shine as lights in the world

The knowledge of the truth only opens the door.

We cannot be saved before that. There is no hope for us at all apart from the Gospel; but the Gospel only gives us the start. It all depends how we walk after that. What ought the assembly of Christ to be but a representation, on a small scale, of what is to be made politically dominant when Christ comes, and when God's will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven?

We are called unto that kingdom, and, therefore, as an assembly of those who are called unto the kingdom, we ought to exemplify those characteristics that will appertain to it in the day of its manifestation.

All the purity of individual thought and action which will prevail then in the world; all rejoicing in the truth, and making our boast in God that will then be the universal law; all that loving of men and serving of God that will prevail, ought to be incipiently visible in our assembly.

We ought to be the kingdom of God in miniature; in fact, all the saints are: there is no doubt about that, though there may be a doubt as to who are the saints. Therefore, let us walk in the light of the word. Do not heed what is said on the right hand or or on the left. Avail yourself of good company, if you can get it, but take care you do not get injured where you expected to be benefited.

Remember that most of those by whom you are surrounded have but recently emerged from the world with all its ignorance, disobedience, stupidity, and carnality, and that you are not to be despondent and lose heart because other people may not exemplify the truth.

If others do not, you try, at least; save yourself from this untoward generation. It is just as untoward as the generation of Peter, and it is only by the means offered by Peter, in the name of Christ, that we have any hope at all.

Bro Roberts - Holiness

Testimony and invitation

àNo one buys a thing of any value without paying a good price for it. Justification, leading to salvation, is the most precious thing upon earth. Therefore you pay a heavy price for it towards man, though as regards God, it is cheap, "without money and without price." It demands the sacrifice of what is sweet to all men; the friendship of the world. No man can be a friend of the world and the friend of God at the same time. There is only one way in which a man professing the Truth can be a friend of the world, and that is by hiding what he is.

...What does Christ say about hiding the Truth?

"Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid."

This is Christ's cue for us. This is the position for his servants to take. There must be no mistaking you-what you are, where your affections are, what you are living for.

..."Whosoever shall confess me before men, him will I confess before my Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven."

Seasons 2.8.

16 Holding forth the word of life; that I may rejoice in the day of Christ, that I have not run in vain, neither laboured in vain.

The‭ "‬right to preach or lecture" is a universal right. It is the simple right to speak your mind. It is a right exercised by every human being upon earth in some shape or other. It is a right that becomes a duty under the commands, "Let him that heareth say, come" (Rev. xxii. 17). "Let your light shine before men" (Matt. v. 14-16). "Hold forth the word of life" (Phill. ii. 16). "Contend earnestly for the faith" (Jude, verse 3).

What a confused state a man's mind must be in who wants‭ "‬authority" before he feels at liberty to tell his neighbour the "glad tidings of great joy" that sounded out from Judea to the ends of the earth 1,800 years ago.

Yet if he really want it,‭ ‬he has it in God's own words:

‭ "‬He that hath my word, let him speak it faithfully."

This is commission from God himself,‭ ‬which only requires that a man have the word in his head and heart. As a rule where this is the case, there is no waiting for "authority." Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

All seek their own, and so will I

Oh listen not for a moment to such promptings of the flesh. "Brave the battle, fight the fight, welcome waits the victory gained." On all sides, it is "grab, grab, grab," but follow things to their issue, and what comes of the grab, grab, grab? Death, death, death.

"Be thou faithful unto death."

What are you afraid of? Of coming to poverty? Is it the first time the servants of God have been poor and needy men, and has not God promised to be with us, even as we pass through the fire and water of affliction?

Are you afraid of affliction? How in that case do you hope to find place when all affliction is past, among those whom John saw in Patmos, who were described to him as those who had come out of great tribulation?

Is it unpopularity and disgrace that you are afraid of? Have you considered that Jesus whom we seek to follow was "despised and rejected of men?" How can you hope to be exalted with him if you do not share his preliminary dishonour?

Is it death you fear? Have you never heard of "the souls of them that were slain for the Word of God and for the testimony which they held…who loved not their lives to the death?" Are you or are you not of those who would "rejoice to be counted worthy to suffer shame for his name?" If so, you cannot greatly dread the prospect of death indirectly through obedience in non-persecuting times like ours.

Let us put away all these illusions and depressions which belong merely to the unenlightened mind of the flesh. Let us bravely and thoroughly accept the position to which God calls us-however humiliating and painful-even if it is meanwhile to ruin and death.

Let us burn our boats. The sacrifice is not nearly so difficult when we frankly accept it in all its issues. It is only when we try to serve God and mammon that we find the task too hard. Christ says it cannot be done, and you may be sure his word will work out truly in your experience. Choose mammon, or choose God, but do not mix the services.

Could enlightened reason hesitate in the choice?

...He is faithful who hath promised. Cast not away your confidence which hath great recompence of reward. For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come and will not tarry; and who shall tell the joy that shall be the portion of those to whom he will say,

"Thou hast been faithful in a few things, be thou ruler over many things, enter into the joy of thy Lord."

Seasons 2.83