Then a last question, and I will leave this point. Is there a life in thee? Is Christ the life of thy spirit? If you tell me you have nothing more in you than what nature gave you, then you are in nature’s death. There is a supernatural life which is imparted by the Holy Ghost. Hence, we read in Scripture that believers are one with Christ as the members are one with the head. They are one in living union; if you cut away the head, the whole dies. Ay, and mark you, the head dies too. So Christ is one with us if we be really his; because he lives we shall live also; if we die Christ dies, and if Christ lives we live; and since he ever liveth to make intercession for us, our eternal life is sure. But, oh, we must have this life. “Except a man eat my flesh,” saith he, “and drink my blood, there is no life in him,” as if there could not be spiritual life till Christ himself were there, and Christ not there without becoming life to our souls.

II. I now turn very briefly to our second point. The text tells us we are “ACCEPTED IN THE BELOVED.”

To be brief, and yet explicit, let me notice that I think the acceptance here meant, includes first of all, justification before God. We stand on our trial. When we stand in Christ we are acquitted; while standing in ourselves the only verdict must be condemnation. The term “acceptance,” in the Greek, means more than that. It signifies that we are the objects of divine complacency. When God looked upon the world of old, he said it was “very good:” and when the Lord looketh upon his people in Christ, he saith the same. But, methinks if there could be anything better than very good, he would say his people in Christ were better than the work of his own hands, since they wear not a created righteousness, but the righteousness of the Creator, Jesus Christ himself. They are, then, accepted by his justice, and they are viewed with complacency by his holiness. But this is not all. When it is written, “Accepted in the beloved,” it means that those accepted are the objects of the divine delight. Friends, whenever I get to this thought, (and many a time in this house of prayer I have got to it) I always feel inclined to sit down and let you think it over, for it is such an extravaganza of divine grace that we, worms, mortals, sinners, should be the objects of divine love. When princes wed with beggars the world marvels; but when God sets his affections upon sinful men and women in Christ, oh, this is the wonder of wonders! Even the angels might desire to look into it. I do believe that when we have been in heaven ten thousand years, this will still be a subject of rapture and surprise, that ever He should have found anything in us in which he could take delight! To pity us, to show mercy to us, that I can understand; but to love us!--the big heart of God to love a creeping thing like man! the infinite soul of the Most High to pour itself out on such a mean, worthless creature as man! the everlasting God who filleth all in all, to concentrate as it were, the powers of his Spirit and set the whole upon a creature that his own hands hath made!--a creature that had revolted and rebelled, and at the best is worthless still! Oh! sing of this, ye spirits before the throne; we cannot speak of it today as we would.

All this is “in the beloved.” We are not accepted anyhow else but “in the beloved.” Let me show you that this is the best way in the world to he accepted. Each of us know it is the only way; but even if there were another, it is the best way. Suppose we could be accepted in ourselves. Adam was while he was obedient- he was accepted in his own works. Ay; but how soon he fell! and then his acceptance fell too. He stood on his own feet, and therefore he soon fell to the ground. Suppose you and I had kept the law up till now. I think I hear you say, “Oh, I wish I had! I wish I could come before God as a perfectly righteous man.” O soul! thou wouldst not be half so safe as thou art now in Christ. But if I had no sin, yet I would ask that I might be in Christ, for I might have sin some day, and then down would go the goodly structure. For that which is built upon a fallible creature is built upon the sand; and if the structure had hitherto been without one rotten timber, yet, since the basis is the will of man--and that might change--damnation might shortly overtake us. After all, we had done better, surely, to stand in Christ, who cannot fall. Now, I know some professors, who seem to me to stand in their own experience, to be accepted in their own experience. At least, that is their apprehension. Just now they had such visits from Christ’s faith, such gleams of his love; and now they think God accepts them, for they feel so high, so heavenly-minded, so drawn above the earth! I have seen these same persons next day feel their souls cleave to the earth, and they have said, “Now, I am not accepted.” O that these beloved ones would but know that God never did accept them in their experience he accepted them IN CHRIST! And he never can reject them till he rejects them in Christ, which cannot be, since he cannot reject Christ. I would that they would see that their “ups” make them no higher before God, and their “downs” make them no lower-that all their high joys do not exalt them, and all their low despondencies do not really depress them in their Father’s sight, but that they stand accepted in one who never alters, in one who is always the beloved of God, always perfect, always complete, always without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing. Blessed faith, that walks above experience! Joyous trust that in the darkest nights still sings of heaven’s unclouded noon, and in the midst of blackness and vileness consciously felt, still boasts of pardon bought with blood, of righteousness complete and without flaw!

The Arminians say our being accepted before God, if I understand it aright, is also an acceptance in our graces. This is the English of their doctrine of falling away. While a man walks worthily, God accepts him; if he walks sinfully, then God accepts him no more. Those of you who like this way of being accepted, may choose it; for my part, I feel there is nothing can ever satisfy the craving of my spirit but an acceptance which lies utterly and wholly out of me, and only and entirely in Christ Jesus. Why, brethren, we should be accepted one day and non-accepted the next; nay, more, we might be accepted one minute and non-accepted the next. If it lay in anything whatever in our walk, or in our work, we should be in the covenant and out of the covenant fifty times a day. But I suppose the Arminians have a difference between sin and sin. Surely, they must have the old Romish distinction between venial and mortal sin; for if sin puts a man out of Christ, I wonder when he is in, since we are sinning day by day. Perhaps there is a certain quantity of sin required to do it; then that is only the old Romish dogma revived; some sins, mortal on the Arminian theory, so as to put a man out of grace, and other sins venial, so that they can keep in grace and sin too. I glory in my God that I know--

“Once in Christ in Christ for ever,
Nothing from his love can sever.”

If my good works had put me into Christ, then my bad works might turn me out of him; but since he put me in when I was a sinner, vile and worthless, he will never take me out, though I am a sinner vile and worthless still.

“Unchangeable his will,
Though dark may be my frame;
His loving, heart is still
Eternally the same:
My soul through many changes goes,
His love no variation knows.”

Now, Christian, I want thee this morning, to rejoice in this: thou art accepted “in the beloved.” Thou lookest within, and thou sayest, “There is nothing acceptable here!” Man, look at Christ, and see if there is not everything acceptable there. Thy frame depresses thee, but look thou to Jesus and hear him cry, “It is finished!” Will not that death-note re-assure thee? Thy sins trouble thee; but remember they were laid upon the scape-goat’s head of old, and they no more exist, for he has cast thy sins behind his back, and thrown them into the depths of the sea.

“In thy surety thou art free! His dear blood was shed for thee!
With thy Savior’s garments on, holy as the Holy One.”

Whilst thou hast still to bear groans, and doubts, and fears; to fight with corruption, and to wrestle with temptation, thou art still accepted in the beloved. Never accepted in thyself; never anything but a condemned sinner in thyself; never anything but accursed both of God, and of’ the law out of Jesus. But in Christ never accursed, in Christ never condemned, for he that believeth in him is not condemned, and he that believeth not is condemned already, because he believeth not on the Son of God. “Accepted in the beloved!” This sentence seems to me to be such a mouthful; it is a dainty all your own. Let it lie in your mouth like a wafer made with honey. “Accepted in the beloved!” How I pity you who cannot say this. How I rejoice with you who can? You have troubles, you say: what are your troubles? You are accepted in the beloved. You tell me you have to fight with flesh and blood: what of that, so long as you are accepted in the beloved? But you are so poor, you say, and you have to go home to a miserable meal to-day: but then, how rich you are, you are accepted in the beloved. The devil is tempting you: never mind, he cannot destroy you, for you are accepted in the beloved. Even the glorified souls are not more accepted than we are. They are only accepted in heaven in the beloved, and so are we. I have often thought that if the children of God could fall from grace on earth, they could certainly fall from glory in heaven. What is there that keeps them holy in heaven? Is it their own will.

If so, the heavenly saints may become hellish fiends. Brethren, it is Christ that keeps them; they are in Christ, therefore they cannot fall: so are we in Christ, therefore shall we never fail nor fall away, but unto the end shall we endure.

III. Now, one minute upon the last point; that is, DIVINE OPERATIONS.

“He hath made us accepted in the beloved.”

Do not you see, beloved, the whole way through, it is all of God and not of man. It was Christ who at first put us in his heart to be accepted there. It was the Father who put us in his book according to the good pleasure of his own will to be accepted there. It was Christ that took us into his hand, according to his suretyship engagement, that we might be accepted there. It is Christ that took us into his loins, begetting us again unto a lively hope that we might be accepted there. And it is grace that has united us the person of Christ that we may stand accepted there. You see it is all of God from first to last. Jonah learned sound divinity when he went into the whale’s belly, for he said, “Salvation is of the Lord.” And before the throne of God in heaven they always sing sound theology, for a part of the song is, “Salvation unto God and unto the Lamb.” Not of man, neither by man; not of the will of man, nor blood, nor birth; but according to the counsel of him that worketh all things according to the good pleasure of his will. Sinner! does that suit you? You that are not in Christ in your own experience, does that suit you? It ought to do so. If you had to put yourself into Christ you could not do it. Men and women, if God asked anything of you to qualify you for Christ, you could not do it. But he asks nothing of you whatever. His mercy comes to you, not when you have made yourselves alive, but while you are yet dead. It comes to you, not merely when you seek it, but it first seeks you and makes you seek it.

“No sinner can be beforehand with thee;
Thy grace is most sovereign, most rich, and most free.”

This is the good point about it, that it is most free. And this is the gospel I am sent to preach to you this morning:--“He that believeth on the Lord Jesus Christ hath everlasting life.”

Sinner, if thou trust in Christ this morning, that act of faith shall be a point of union between thee and Christ, and thou shalt be in him vitally. Trust Christ, then, soul. “Well,” you say, “I have nothing; I have no reason to be satisfied, for I have no good works; but here evidently is a plan of salvation that does not want anything from me. I accept it.” Say in thy heart this morning, “If the Lord had asked any doings, or willings, or feelings of me in order that I might be in Christ, such a lost soul as I am, I could do none of these things; but when he tells me to believe in Christ, my soul perceives that he is able to save, and I know Christ is willing, and therefore I will trust him this day.” Soul, if thou hast done this, thou art in Christ, thou art accepted in the beloved this morning. There may be a man that came in here a drunkard or a thief, that may yet go out of this place accepted in the beloved. There may have come in here a woman of evil name, but if she believe in Christ she shall go out accepted in the beloved. She came in here in her own conscience condemned, she shall go out justified if she believe in Christ. If thou canst see Christ die and trust him, and if thou canst see Christ risen and trust him; if thou canst see him pleading and can trust him, then thou art one with him--God hath made thee accepted in the beloved. Oh, precious salvation that comes all the way to where you are. Let you be where you may, so long as you are not in torments and not in hell, this salvation comes to your door. God give thee grace to lay hold of it now, or the rather that it may lay hold of thee: and do thou say,

“I do believe,
I will believe
That Jesus died for me,
That on the cross he shed his blood
From sin to set me free.”

And if thou believest in him, thy eternal life is sure, because thou art one in him, and “accepted in the beloved.”