Hyperspirituality and the Use of Means - Glenn Conjurske
Hyperspirituality and the Use of Means
One of the common manifestations of hyperspirituality is its slighting or condemning of means, as though they were an illegitimate substitute for the true work of God, or as though the use of means were indicative of a lack of trust in God. The unspiritual use whatever means come to hand, and trust in those means, as though there were no God. The hyperspiritual stand at the opposite extreme, trusting in God alone, looking to God alone, as though the means which he has created are in some way derogatory to his own glory. The spiritual stand upon the middle ground of truth, using all the means which God has given, thanking God for them, trusting in their efficacy to accomplish those things for which God has designed them, and trusting God all the while, knowing full well that he may thwart the workings of the most efficacious of means, or accomplish his purposes without any means at all, should he see fit. “The race is not” always “to the swift, nor the battle” necessarily “to the strong, neither yet bread” inevitably “to the wise, nor yet riches” invariably “to men of understanding, nor yet favour” certainly “to men of skill, but time and chance happeneth to them all.” (Eccl. 9:11). And beside time and chance, there is a God in heaven, who may overrule the most efficacious of means at his pleasure. Yet ordinarily the race is to the swift, the battle ordinarily to the strong, and so forth. Men may therefore use means with confidence, and usually find success in them.
Trusting in Means and God
“There is no king saved by the multitude of an host: a mighty man is not delivered by much strength. An horse is a vain thing for safety: neither shall he deliver any by his great strength. Behold, the eye of the LORD is upon them that fear him, …to deliver their soul from death.” (Ps. 33:16-19). Thus are men dissuaded from a vain confidence in means, without God, but surely this is no warrant to refuse the use of such means, nor to decline to trust them under God. The same Bible which warns us not to trust in the strength of the horse tells us in Proverbs 14:4, “Where no oxen are, the crib is clean: but much increase is by the strength of the ox.” That is, where the means are absent, the end is not gained. “The crib is clean”—clean empty, that is. There is no grain in it. But where the means are used, there is much increase—for the means which God has created are actually effectual for the purposes for which they are made. The strength of the ox actually produces much increase.
David would not trust Saul’s armor, for he had not tried it, yet that could make no manner of difference, if his trust was wholly in the Lord, irrespective of the means. He did trust his sling and stones, for he had tried them. He trusted in the means themselves, and therefore could brook no jagged stones, but went to the brook for smooth ones, such as would fly straight, and so were actually suited to the matter in hand. And he must have five of them, to be well furnished with means, in case several of his stones should fail of their mark—yet his confidence all the while was in the Lord. He did not trust the means without the Lord, nor the Lord without the means.
The Use of Means by the Ungodly
The unspiritual and the ungodly use means, and trust in them, as though there were no Creator, and such a use of means is generally effective for the purposes for which they are employed, for God has created the powers and properties which lie in the means, and those means are therefore effectual for the ends which those powers will naturally secure. Fire is actually hot, and will actually burn, whether we believe in its Creator or not. Wind will blow away the chaff, whether we acknowledge God or not. Mint or chamomile tea will actually relieve a stomach ache, in the godly or the ungodly, and with or without prayer. “Iron” actually “sharpeneth iron” (Prov. 27:17), if properly applied, whether we trust its Creator or not. In the natural course of things, wood will always burn when subjected to heat enough, burning wood will surely heat an oven, and a heated oven will without fail bake a potato. Yea, some have learned that iron is a better conductor of heat than a potato is, and so have discovered that their potato will bake so much the faster with a spike poked through it. This is wisdom. It is wisdom to understand the various powers and properties which reside in those things which God has created, so as to know how to employ them to accomplish our ends. And of course it is wisdom to use those means, and the most consummate folly to think to accomplish our ends without them. It is to just such wisdom that Christ refers when he says, in Luke 16:8, that “the children of this world are wiser in their own kind than the children of light.” The children of this world know how to employ proper means to accomplish their ends—in their own sphere.
Spiritual Wisdom in the Use of Means
But by this the Lord plainly implies that there is another sphere—a higher sphere—which belongs to the children of light, and he plainly implies that means are to be used there also, that means will be found to be effectual there also, and that there is a wisdom which finds out those means and uses them. Here lies spiritual wisdom. Some of that wisdom is spelled out for us explicitly in the Bible. As “Iron sharpeneth iron,” when properly applied—for it will dull it in a hurry otherwise, as they all know who have ever cut a nail with a newly sharpened saw—“so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.” “A soft answer turneth away wrath.” “By long forbearing is a prince persuaded, and a soft tongue breaketh the bone.” All this is wisdom, explicitly spelled out to us in the Bible.
But there is much more which is not taught us so explicitly. It lies as gold, buried deep in the mountain. It must be dug out, by study, by experience, and by meditation—dug out of the stores of both Scripture and nature. It consists of understanding what means to employ to gain our ends, in a higher sphere than baking potatoes. Solomon employed such wisdom when he proposed to divide the harlot’s infant. He understood the mother’s heart, which is the creation of God, and he knew that heart to be the same in all women, even in harlots. And the means which he employed proved quite effectual for the accomplishment of his end.
The Danger of Hyperspirituality
But here hyperspirituality steps in, possessed by the mistaken notion that in using the means which God has created, we somehow dishonor the God who created them. God must be all. We must trust wholly and solely to him. To use means is unbelief. “God is my physician.” To use medicine is to distrust and dishonor him. “The Lord is my shepherd.” To look to a man for counsel or instruction, to follow the leading of a man, is to dishonor the Lord.
And hyperspirituality can almost always quote Scripture for its wayward notions—and quote it too in such a manner as to make true faith and spirituality appear to be the most carnal unbelief. According to its own nature, hyperspirituality presses its own favorite scriptures in an extreme or absolute sense, which sets aside means, and nature, and Scripture, and common sense, and in the most pious manner conceivable makes God to be all in all! This is telling. This is taking. This upsets the equilibrium of simple souls. The Bible says, “ye need not that any man teach you.” Fie then upon pastors, teachers, books, and sermons. “Ye need not” such fleshly means—”need not that any man teach you,” at any time, for any reason, for “the same anointing teacheth you of all things.” Thus do the extreme notions of the hyperspiritual press certain scriptures to an unwarranted and unwholesome extreme—and how pious! how full of faith does all this appear!—but it is always as much at the expense of other scriptures, as it is at the expense of common sense.
The Pride Behind Hyperspirituality
“The Lord is my shepherd,” say these hyperspiritual souls, and what do I want with a man to lead me? But the plain fact remains that God has given men to be shepherds, and to refuse to follow the shepherds which the Lord has given is to dishonor the Lord who gave them.
And here it will be proper to point out that hyperspirituality is almost always riddled with pride. It is not faith which exalts one scripture at the expense of another. It is not faith which claims that it needs no shepherd to follow, but precisely pride. It is faith in self, not faith in God. Faith in God would gladly receive the gifts which he has given. If the Lord has given gifts to men, and if among those gifts are shepherds and teachers, then faith will receive those gifts with gratitude, and make the most of them. It is pride which thinks to do without them, and while it appears to honor the Lord, by making him all in all, it in fact dishonors the Giver by slighting his gifts. On this plan Abraham might have said, What need have I of the womb of Sarah, when I have the promise of God? And we might all say, What need to plow and plant, when God promises to feed us?
Hyperspirituality in Practice
But hyperspirituality comes in varying degrees. In its more extreme forms it will dispense with spiritual means, and put the direct supernatural or miraculous working of God in the place of all the means which he has ordained. Such are they that will not preach the gospel, or invite men to come to Christ, lest they take the work out of the hands of God. Such are they who will make no endeavor to convict men of their sins, since that is the work of the Holy Spirit, or labor for revival, since that is the work of God, and must be sovereignly bestowed. Calvinism is often at fault here.
But surely not Calvinism alone. It is not Calvinists only who decline the use of human ministries—such as pastors and books and sermons—in order that they make the Lord alone their pastor and teacher. Nor Calvinists alone who decline to hearken to human reason—or carnal reason, as they are pleased to call it—in order to maintain their own folly and superstition, under the pious names of faith or spiritual intuition. Some will think to preach without study—and indeed, to teach without knowing anything—expecting the Spirit of God to fill their mouths when they open them. Some will even reject prayer, or prayer for certain things. The Bible says (they will tell us), that “your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things,” and what have we to do with the carnal reason which would have us inform the Almighty of what he knows better than we do? Thus do they press to the most unwarranted extremes every scripture which exalts the divine and the supernatural over the human and the natural.
Hyperspirituality and Natural Means
Such is the way of the extreme form of hyperspirituality, which refuses the use of spiritual means, in order to pay an ill-advised honor to God himself. But there is a milder—and more common—form, which sets aside natural means, in order to replace them with spiritual. Some refuse to use physicians or medicines, but must treat all their diseases by prayer and faith. It is in the realm of faith that hyperspirituality goes most often astray, thinking to obtain all by faith which ought to be gained by labor and by the use of means. Various doctrines of faith, as well as “faith movements” and “faith missions,” have been much at fault here. A B. Simpson writes, “Faith by its very nature is always weakened by a mixture of man’s works. If it has a human twig to lean on it will lean harder on it than on God’s mightiest words. It must therefore have God only.
“To combine the omnipotence of Jesus with a dose of mercury, is like trying to go upstairs by the elevator and the stairs at the same moment or harnessing an ox with a locomotive.” He might have added, like combining “a little wine for thy stomach’s sake” with the power of Almighty God.
Hudson Taylor’s Hyperspiritual Tendencies
Hudson Taylor, the founder of the China Inland Mission—a “faith mission,” so called—had strong hyperspiritual tendencies, which manifested themselves in various ways. Such, for example, was his belief that it was somehow beneath proper spiritual experience to thirst for his wife after she had died, for the Lord had said, “he that believeth on me shall never thirst.” Thus does hyperspirituality strive—and Hudson Taylor did not find this easy—to quell and squelch the human and the natural. In so doing, however, it elevates itself to a plane of spirituality more spiritual than that of Christ, who wept at the tomb of Lazarus.
Conclusion
Thus did Hudson Taylor press his favorite text to an extreme which must impugn the spirituality of Christ himself. On this text he wrote, “’If any man thirst, let him come unto ME and drink.’ Who does not thirst? Who has not mind-thirsts or heart-thirsts, soul-thirsts or body-thirsts? Well, no matter which, or whether I have them all—’Come unto me and’ remain thirsty? Ah no! ‘Come unto me and drink.'”
This of course looks very pious, as hyperspiritual notions always do, but hyperspirituality is as actually shallow as it is apparently pious. It so far sets aside common sense as to be really foolish. Pious it may sound, but it is not true that drinking of Christ will satisfy any “body-thirst.” We must have physical water for that, and we must have the creatures and gifts of God to satisfy many other thirsts as well. It is not true that drinking of Christ will satisfy every “heart-thirst” or “soul-thirst.” If this were so, God would never have said, “It is not good that man should be alone,” nor would he ever have created Eve. It was perfectly legitimate, because perfectly natural, that Hudson Taylor should thirst for his wife. Yet we turn the page in this most hyperspiritual of books, and see him pressing again his favorite text to its absolute extremity, thus denying either the rightness or the reality of everything human and natural. “’To know that “shall” means shall, that “never” means never, and that “thirst” means any unsatisfied need,’ Mr. Taylor often said in later years, ‘may be one of the greatest revelations God ever made to our souls.’
This of course looks very pious, but this is hyperspirituality taken to an extreme. It’s shallow and untrue. We must recognize the role of both spiritual and natural means, and understand that God has given us both to work together in His will.