home       articles       newsletter       materials       reviews        audios        blog

[Previous entry: 04/09/2007: Volume 92 - The Heavenly Vision    by Milt Rodriguez] [Main Index] [Next entry: 08/12/2007: Volume 94 - The Seamless Robe Part II    by T. Austin-Sparks]

06/10/2007: Volume 93 - The Seamless Robe - Part I    T. Austin-Sparks

The Seamless Robe - Part I "They part My garments among them, and upon My vesture do they cast lots." Psalm 22:18 (A.R.V.). "The soldiers therefore, when they had crucified Jesus, took His garments and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also the coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. They said therefore one to another, "Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be:" that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, 'They parted My garments among them, And upon My vesture did they cast lots. "   John 19:23-24. Read: Ezekiel 43:1-12. The Man Created As we dwell upon that seamless robe, and see how it was under the very careful sovereign preservation and protection of God, it is difficult to fail to see that the robe speaks in a typical way of the humanity of the Lord Jesus, of that which the Son of God assumed as His garment. What has the Son of God come to wear? He has taken the garment of humanity. He took upon Him the form of a Man. He was found in fashion as a Man. This is signified in the vesture. The vesture, in a word, then, speaks of His humanity. This robe is presented to us as something complete, whole, a perfect unity; of one piece, woven from the top throughout. That is God's conception of man. That is the Man conceived in the mind of God. That humanity is the product of the counsels of God from eternity; man, in himself personally, individually, and corporately a complete whole, a perfect unity, of one piece, woven from the top throughout. Such is man as produced by the hand of God, as the result of that Divine activity, God's weaving, shall we say. The humanity of the man, Adam, was a figure of Him that was to come. Before there was any complicity with the adversary, Satan; before there was any disobedience through unbelief, man was in his own being and nature a unity, a harmony, an accord, a whole. The man created was not a discord, not a tangle, a contradiction, a divided being. He was a figure of Him that was to come; a unity, of one piece. Yet only a figure. The Man Ruined What is the nature of the ruin? It is as of a one-piece garment rent and torn to shreds. If you have a one piece garment torn, you know quite well that you cannot make that good. If you have a two piece, a three piece, a four piece, you know that the part where the tear takes place can be removed and replaced. But when it is a one piece thing, it is ruined when it is torn. You can patch it, but you have not restored it to its original perfection. You can sew it up, but you have not made it as it was. There have been many efforts to sew up torn humanity, to patch it up; but the patch always reveals the damage, the sewing up always betrays that something has happened, and before long, under given strain the thing breaks again. The Lord Jesus says, "No man putteth a piece of new cloth into an old garment...; the rent is only made worse." No, this humanity once torn is ruined, and there is no hope but in a new garment, because of its essential oneness before God. I ask you, Is it not true that man is anything but a unity in himself, a oneness, a harmony, a perfect whole? We know ourselves, that we are torn and rent, as it were, into many fragments, contradictory elements. Is not Romans 7 the great unveiling of the dividedness of man? Even when he is brought under Divine law, that dividedness is brought all the more to light. "For that which I do I know not; for not what I would, that do I practice; but what I hate, that I do." Here I am, straining in one direction and going in the opposite. I am a division. I am a contradiction. I am not one piece. I desire right, but against my desire I do wrong, and in spite of all my purposing I do it. I am not one. A river always flows in one direction, in one way, but not so human nature. It is sadly otherwise with our nature now. We are not flowing all one way. Even when perhaps the greater part seems to be working harmoniously to one end, there is always a reactionary "something" in us, a kick back. It needs no stressing that we are anything but a unity. No, the garment has been rent. Even our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. Man's humanity now is in rags at its best. Man is ruined, torn, disrupted. The New Man Pre-figured It is not necessary to do more than to point out that in the Old Testament there is a pre figuring of the new man. In those men who came into a living relationship with God in the Old Testament, you find pre figured the spiritual and moral threads of the new man; the threads being woven typically into the form of the new man. It may be the faith of an Abraham, the meekness of a Moses, the worship of a David, the truth of an Elijah, the life of an Elisha, and so on. These are all threads in typical men, being woven into the One Perfect Man, the garment of a renewed humanity. All of them are to be found in the new Man when He comes. He takes up all those moral elements, all those spiritual features: they are woven from the top throughout in His humanity. See the wonder of His faith, the beauty of His humility, His meekness. See the devoutness of His worship, His honouring of God, His Father. See the zeal for truth which burns with a blazing heat more than that of Elijah. See Him as the life, the power of life triumphant over death, as in an Elisha; and so on. These are all the threads of His humanity, and all this is pre figured in the Old Testament. The New Man Provided No longer is it now the figure, but the Man Himself. His humanity is not the humanity of fallen Adam, but a perfect humanity. There is all the difference between God creating Adam and God providing Jesus Christ. But we will not stay for the moment with the comparison or contrast between Adam and Christ. We point out that the new Man is provided, and in this new Man you cannot detect any join; you cannot trace any place where two things have been sewn together. He is not in parts, He is whole. Oh, the wonderful completeness, perfection, balance, wholeness, harmony of His humanity. He can be angry, with a burning anger, without ever losing His balance and allowing fleshly heat to come in; but, being angry, He can at the same time be full of love. He can turn from one thing to another, and on the surface these things may seem to be altogether at variance, and yet in Him they are so perfectly poised that you are no longer sensible of any contradiction in His Presence. We could stay a long time with the perfect balance of His humanity, the oneness of His nature. He is not a patchwork; He is not so many parts joined together; He is a perfect whole. He is of one piece, woven from the top throughout. The New Man Tested The new Man provided! Ah, yes, but tested! This humanity, like the garment, is subjected to the test. All the strain is loosed upon it. Its power for taking moral strain is tested. Every one of those threads in the garment is put to the test. Meekness? Cast Thyself down from the pinnacle of the Temple! What would such an act have been? A proud boast! And men would have said, You are a wonderful Man; we will follow you! No, to have yielded would have been to have forsaken meekness. "Behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass's colt" (John 12:15). But that meekness was oft times put to the test. On another occasion the multitude would take Him by force and make Him King, and He escaped through the midst of them. Then it is given us to see His devotion to His Father, that devotion which is the essence of worship, the fear of the Lord, that utter abandonment to God. That was the great characteristic of David's life. Whatever were the faults of David, you cannot get away from the true worshipfulness of his being toward God. The sublime touches in the darkest hours of David's life are those. Even when he has sinned in numbering Israel, and God visits his sin with terrible judgement, he goes down before God and says, "Lo, I have sinned, and I have done perversely; but these sheep, what have they done? let Thine hand, I pray Thee, be against me, and against my father's house" (2 Sam. 24:17). What fear of the Lord! What reverence for God! What a falling down before God in utterness of surrender and yieldedness! That was the spirit of David's life. And the perfection of that spirit, that devotion to His Father in the life of the Lord Jesus was put to severe tests. "If Thou be the Son!" Right at the end, when men come and take Him with swords and staves, Son of God as He was, He tells them that if He should ask His Father He would send twelve legions of angels; but that devotion to His Father must mean that the angels must stay where they are. We might dwell upon all the moral features of Christ, and see how they were tested, tried under strain. This fabric underwent a very severe test in every thread. The New Man Proved Tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin! Not only without sinning in the act, but without sin is this Man. Sin is a deeper thing than sinning. He was not only tried, but proved. The New Man Perfected How? Through suffering. This is the word of the Lord. He was never anything but perfect! But I quote Scripture: "Made perfect through sufferings" (Heb. 2:10). That is said of Him. We need not stop to argue the doctrine. To quote the Scripture is enough. He was sinless: He was perfect; and yet He was perfected. If you cannot understand the seeming contradiction look again. It is only another way of saying that He was perfected through the strain placed upon the fabric. A sapling may have no vices in it. It may be a perfect tree as a sapling. But show me that sapling grown to the full tree in a few years' time, and I will say, It is perfected through sufferings; not that those sufferings bore witness to any vice, but its perfections were being brought out to perfection through the storm, the stress, the strain. It is a matter of the measure of perfection, not so much of kind. The Man Installed "I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing on the right hand of God" (Acts 7:56). "Inasmuch as He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man Whom He hath ordained..." (Acts 17:31). The Man is eventually coming again to be the instrument of the judgement of this world in righteousness. God shall judge the thoughts of men by Jesus Christ: "He gave Him authority to execute judgement, because He is the Son of Man" (John 5:27). It is into the hands of the Son of Man that God has given all authority in heaven and in earth. Thank God that there is a Man in the glory. Thank God for all that means for you and for me in our need of a perfected humanity. He is installed there as God's standard, and the earnest of our full conformity to the image of God's Son is that He has given us His Spirit. We have the earnest of that. "When He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2). What is the earnest, the guarantee, the title deed? The Spirit of Christ now dwelling within those who have been born anew, born of the Spirit! Part II coming! Written by T. Austin-Sparks

Copyright © 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007    The Rebuilders    All rights reserved