Daily Fellowship with Christ in Grace
In one of my favorite portions of John Owen’s classic Communion with God, Owen explains how a believer should hold daily communion with Jesus in the grace He purchased to make us accepted by God. He urges believers “to make an actual exchange with the Lord Jesus as to their sins and His righteousness” every day. In the rest of this blog, I offer a slight abridgment (with a bit of updated and smoothed-out language) of Owen teaching us how.¹
First, believers must continually keep alive upon their hearts a sense of the guilt and evil of sin; even then when they are under some comfortable persuasions of their personal acceptance with God… It is the daily exercise of the saints of God, to consider the great provocation that is in sin: their sins, the sin of their nature and lives; to render themselves vile in their own hearts and thoughts on that account… “My sin is ever before me,” says David. They set sin before them, not to terrify and frighten their souls with it, but that a due sense of the evil of it may be kept alive upon their hearts.
Believers gather up in their thoughts the sins for which they have not made a particular reckoning with God in Christ; or if they have begun so to do, yet they have not made clear work of it, nor brought the matter to a clear and comfortable place… This the saints do: they gather up their sins, lay them in the balance of the law, see and consider their weight and what they deserve, and then they make this exchange I speak of with Jesus Christ. That is, they seriously consider—and by faith conquer—all objections to the contrary, that Jesus Christ, by the will and appointment of the Father, really has undergone the punishment that was due to those sins… He has as certainly and really answered the justice of God for them, as much as could be done if the sinner himself should at that instant be cast into hell for them.
Believers hearken to the voice of Christ calling them to him with their burden: “Come unto me, all you that are weary and heavy laden. Come with your burdens. Come, you poor soul, with your guilt of sin.” Why? To do what? “Why, this is mine,” says Christ. “This agreement I made with my Father, that I should come, and take your sins, and bear them away; they were my lot. Give me your burden; give me all your sins. You know not what to do with them; I know how to dispose of them well enough, so that God shall be glorified, and your soul delivered.”
Here, believers lay down their sins at the cross of Christ, upon his shoulders. This is faith’s great and bold venture upon the grace, faithfulness, and truth of God, to stand by the cross and say, “Ah! He is bruised for my sins, and wounded for my transgressions, and the chastisement of my peace is upon him. He is thus made sin for me. Here I give up my sins to him that is able to bear them, to undergo them. He requires it of my hands, that I should be content that he should undertake them, and to that I heartily consent.”
This is every day’s work; I know not how any peace can be maintained with God without it. If it be the work of souls to receive Christ as made sin for us, then we must receive him as one that takes our sins upon him. Not as though he died any more or suffered any more, but… faith now makes that present which was accomplished and past many generations ago. This it is to know Christ crucified.
Having thus by faith given up their sins to Christ, and by faith seen God laying them all on him, believers draw near and take from him that righteousness which he has wrought for them, so fulfilling the whole of the apostle’s words in 2 Cor. 5:21, “He was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.” They consider him presenting himself and his righteousness to be their righteousness before God; they take it, and accept it, and complete this blessed bartering and exchange of faith. Anger, curse, wrath, death, the guilt of sin, he took it all and takes it all away. With him we leave whatever of this nature belongs to us, and from him we receive love, life, righteousness, and peace.
Objection: but it may be said, “Surely this course of procedure can never be acceptable to Jesus Christ! What, shall we daily come to him with our filth, our guilt, our sins? May he not, will he not, bid us keep them to ourselves? They are our own. Shall we be always giving sins, and taking righteousness?”
Answer: there is not anything that Jesus Christ is more delighted with, than that his saints should always hold communion with him in this business of giving our sins and receiving his righteousness.
For, first, this exceedingly honors him, and gives him the glory that is his due. Many, indeed, cry “Lord, Lord,” and make mention of him, but honor him not at all. How so? They take his saving work out of his hands, and ascribe it to other things: their own repentance or their own duties that they suppose will bear their iniquities. They do not say so, but they do so. The exchange they make, if they make any, it is with themselves. All their bartering about sin is in and with their own souls.
The work that Christ came to do in the world was to “bear our iniquities” and lay down his life a ransom for our sins. The cup he had to drink was filled with our sins, the punishment due to them. What greater dishonor, then, can be done to the Lord Jesus, than to ascribe this work to anything else, to think to get rid of our sins by any other way or means? Herein, then, I say, is Christ honored indeed, when we go to him with our sins by faith, and say unto him, “Lord, this is your work; this is that for which you came into the world; this is what you have undertaken to do. You call for my burden, which is too heavy for me to bear; take it, blessed Redeemer. You offer your righteousness; that is my portion.” Then is Christ honored; then is the glory of mediation ascribed to him, when we walk with him in this communion.
Second, this giving and receiving exceedingly endears the souls of the saints to him, and constrains them to put a worthy valuation upon him, his love, his righteousness, and grace. When they find and have the daily use of it, then they do so. Who would not love him? “I have been with the Lord Jesus,” may the poor soul say: “I have left my sins, my burden, with him; and he has given me his righteousness, wherewith I am going with boldness to God. I was dead, and am alive; for he died for me: I was cursed, and am blessed; for he was made a curse for me: I was troubled, but have peace; for the chastisement of my peace was upon him. I knew not what to do, nor where to cause my sorrow to go; by him have I received joy unspeakable and glorious. If I do not love him, delight in him, obey him, live to him, die for him, I am worse than the devils in hell.”
Now the great aim of Christ in the world is to have a high place and esteem in the hearts of his people; to have in their hearts, as he has in himself, the pre-eminence in all things, not to be jostled up and down among other things, but to be all, and in all. Thus the saints of God are prepared to esteem him, when they are engaging themselves in this communion with him…
Christian, why don’t you see if Owen is right? Make this every day’s work and see if your peace is maintained like never before; see if your love for Christ is maintained or increased as never before. Give Christ the honor and work that is His, by holding communion with Him in this grace He has purchased for us!
¹ I am using and adapting the free online version of Owen’s work found at https://www.ccel.org/ccel/o/owen/communion/cache/communion.pdf. If you want the unabridged and full-text original, see pages 186-190 of that pdf.