© 2018

ISBN 978-1-5136-2787-8

The Cross: The Touchstone Of FaithAuthor: Jessie Penn-LewisTranslator: Michael Shiqiao ChangPublisher: The Heavenly Visions Publisher, LLC Richmond, TX Tel: (281) 676-5201 E-mail: mchang8108@gmail.comDesigner: Yan WangEdition: First Edition, April, 2018

Copyright © 2018 The Heavenly Visions Publisher, LLC All Rights Reserved

ISBN: 978-1-5136-2787-8

4 A Word From The Translator

A WORD FROM THE TRANSLATOR

There has been a burden to translate unabridgedly into Chi-nese some of the best books on the Cross for those who whole-heartedly seek after the heart of the Lord and follow Him to the uttermost at any cost. By the grace of the Lord, after the publica-tions of Brother T. Austin-Sparks’ “God’s Reactions To Man’s De-fections”, “The Centrality And Universality Of The Cross”, and “The Cross And The Way Of Life”, here is the translation of Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis’ book, “The Cross: The Touchstone Of Faith”.

Mrs. Jessie Penn-Lewis quoted in her book, “Soul And Spirit“ from Brother G.H. Pember that “…intellect is not mere-ly fallible, but the most dangerous of all gifts, unless it be guided by the Spirit of God.” In practice, our natural “SELF” is the

God has prescribed the Cross of Christ as the only way to His Eternal Purpose. In the Death of Christ on the Cross, God has not only judged the Devil himself, his kingdom and all his pow-

-sions and the lusts thereof” (Gal 5:24). In the Christian experi-ence, by the discipline of the Holy Spirit, God engineers for “all things work together” (Rom 8:28) to apply the Cross of Christ in us and make it our own crosses in practice that we may learn to deny ourselves and carry our own crosses to follow the Lord Je-sus Christ (Mat 16:24). This is “for good” to us “who are called according to His purpose” (Rom 8:28), that is, for us to “be con-

Spirit” (Eph 5:18), be worthy of His Son for Him to bring “many

In this translation, the translator strived to be truthful to the original text without editorial abridgements. While improvements were made, the transliteration may appear rough to some. With the insertion of the English original alongside the Chinese transla-tion, readers may reference the original text for optimal reading.

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6 A Word From The Translator

The quoted Chinese Bible verses are primarily from the Chinese Union Version. However, some are directly translated into Chinese from the author’s English texts (mostly the Autho-rized Version) to fully express the author’s original meaning.

For emphasis, the author uses words or phrases in italics, CAPITALIZATION or in BOTH. As such, the translator has also used special Chinese fonts accordingly. For some unclear

added in square brackets to make the references clear and cer-tain. Besides, if “it” refers to the Church, the Chinese translation is rendered as “she”.

The translator is fully grateful to Sister Yan Wang for her whole-hearted work on designing the cover; Jun Zhou, Xiangan Liu, Zitao Cheng, Teng Yang and Liang Li et al. brothers for their diligent proofreading. The Translator is very grateful to

-cult places. The translator is also very thankful to all saints who have offered prayers, encouragements, and help. The translator

and full support in the translation and publication of this book.We truly appreciate God for His “good and acceptable and

perfect will” toward us (Rom 12:2). May the Lord complete His glorious work in the readers’ life through these messages to the glory of the Heavenly Father and the Lord Christ Jesus!

The Translator Houston, TexasApril 2018

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8 Table Of Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Word from The Translator……………………………..............41. THE BLOOD OF HIS CROSS………………………...............12

The Precious Blood of Christ……………………….......242. THE “CROSS” AND THE “BLOOD”……………….................28

What Is the Difference?...................................................28(1) The Victory Of The Cross…………….............30(2) Various Aspects Of The Cross…………...........30(3) The “Blood” Does Not Cleanse The “Flesh”....30(4) The Normal Position Of The Believer……......32(5) The “Blood” Does Not Shelter The “Flesh”.....34(6) When The “Blood” Cleanses……………….....34

(8) How To “Reckon” On The Fact Of The Cross..36(9) The Holy Spirit’s Witness To Calvary...............36

“All That Calvary Means”……………………...............38The Cross of Calvary…………………………...............40

3. THE “SELF-LIFE” UNVEILED…………………....................44The Flesh……………………………………………......44

The child of God may be “yet carnal.”…………....46The More Subtle Works of the Flesh……………….......48God’s Way of Deliverance……………………………...50

God’s way of deliverance is throughthe death of Christ…………………………............50It is the work of the Holy Spirit to applythe deliverance of the Cross…………………….....52The practical and continual attitude tothe “self-life.”...........................................................52

The Life in the Spirit……………………………………54“Being Made Conformable”…………………………....54

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………………………...…...…….……........................51. ..…………………..………………..13

……..................252. ..................................................29

..................29………..................................31

……..............................31………..............31

………..............................33………..............35………..............35

………..................37……......37

…………..............37…………..............................................39

……..................413. ……………………..........45

…………..................................................................45

…………..........................................45…………......................................45

…………..............................47…………......47

…………..............................49…………..................................................51

…………..........51

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….........….53…………..............................................55

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10 Table Of Contents

4. THE CROSS AND OUR “WEAKNESSES”…………………......58(1) The Cross and Sickness…………………………….60

.68(6) The Holy Spirit and Our Weaknesses……………....70(7) Our Weaknesses Are a Test of Others……………....72Gleanings From The Greek Lexicon…………………....74Fresh Light on James 5:14-15…………………………..76

5. THE CROSS AND OUR FACTIONS OR BE OF THE SAME MIND.....78The Source of “Faction”…………………………….........82“Revelations” That Divide………………………….........86The “Mind” That Was in Christ!........................................88

6. Two Aspects of the Cross…………………………….......98

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4. ……….................................59………….....................................61

……….....................63………….........................65

………….............................67………….............................69………….............................71

………….................73………….............................................75

5:14-15 ………….................................775. ……………………..............79

………….............................................83………….............................87

………….................................896. …………………….........................99

12 Chapter 1 The Blood Of His Cross

Chapter 1 The Blood Of His Cross

“The Church of God, which He purchased with His own blood” (Acts 20:28).

One of the scarcely realized results of the thought currents moving in the world to-day is the effect they are having upon the professing Church of Christ; for the most part unknown to itself, and even upon many in the church who are true believers in the Gospel of Calvary.

The Apostle Paul speaks of “winds” of “doctrine”, thus in-dicating that there are aerial movements of doctrinal thought which have an effect upon souls caught by them, as though they were children carried by a nurse – any nurse (Gr.)! “Children, tossed to and fro, and blown round by every shifting current of teaching” is Conybeare’s rendering of Ephesians 4:14. The word translated “wind” in the A.V. refers to air in motion, or a stream of air. How few preachers and teachers to-day realize the existence of such a “stream”, and the danger of being caught in it. Many think they have arrived at the doctrine they hold by careful deliberation and study, oblivious of the revelation-fact that the “prince of the power of the air”, who originates and governs these aerial movements of thought, blinds the minds of the unbelieving, whilst allowing his victims to think they are free men.

It is easy to recognize the Satanic source of these doctrinal thought-currents by words which are objected to, or dropped out of use, as “out-of-date for the people of to-day”. One primary key-word is the blood of Christ in connection with the way of salvation. For some years there has been a growing shrinking from the use of this word, until there is almost open revolt at present among those who desire to be up-to-date preachers, or, on the part of some who know the Gospel truth, there is a silence on the theme without deliberate purpose, or suspicion of the in-

(satanic “air-currents”) upon the mind. To-day the stream of modern thought as “air-currents” is

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14 Chapter 1 The Blood Of His Cross

running strong, and it needs clear vision and a divine enduement of power to withstand its pressure.

The question is, Can we minimize, or eliminate, the mes-sage of the Gospel, as set forth in the language of the Bible on the sacred theme of the blood of the Cross, without co-working with the prince of the power of the air, and causing the eternal ruin of multitudes of human beings? Is there a "Gospel" apart from the blood of the Cross, or a true statement of the Gospel possible with the message of the blood omitted? Can preachers of the Gospel yield to the doctrinal air-currents of to-day, and substitute the word "life" (the blood is the life) for the word "blood," without compromising with the "spirit of the age," and “bowing down to Baal” – its Prince?

With these questions in mind let us go to the Word of God,

and 34, and reverently read the words of the Apostle, as he de-scribes what he saw as he stood by the Cross of the Lord Jesus. We are told that when the soldiers found Him dead, one of them with a spear pierced His side, and there came out “blood and water.” It is noteworthy that although John had seen many mar-vellous miracles wrought by the God-Man before His death, it is not until he saw this one, that he is moved to exclaim in aston-ishment and awe, “he that saw it bare record,” and “he knoweth that he saith true” (v. 35). What was it that was so astonishing in what had occurred, that John departs from his usual self-ef-

What did the Apostle see? Blood and water breaking out from the side of a dead man. Was this “natural” or was it one of the miracles of the passion and death of the God-Man which lift His death altogether out of the realm of the ordinary, showing that He died neither as a “martyr” nor an “example,” but as God-Incarnate expiating the sin of a fallen race, and providing out of His own out-poured blood, a “fountain” for the cleansing of the guilt and power of the sins of millions of sinful human beings?

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16 Chapter 1 The Blood Of His Cross

But let us go back a little in the sacred story, and see how marvellous was the redemptive work of the God-Man in the “shedding of blood” for the remission of sins, and how it was only possible by the power of the Eternal Spirit for Him as "very man of very man" thus to offer Himself without spot to God. Reading the type in Leviticus in the light of the anti-type of the Gospels, how true were the words written of the High Priest, "He shall

the burnt-offering” (Leviticus 1:6), and how marvellous the pen-portrait of Isaiah when he wrote 400 years before the Lamb of Calvary died at Golgotha, that He was “wounded,” “bruised,” “stricken,” and His visage and His form so marred from “the form of man...that His appearance was not that of a son of man.”1

provided Lamb, and see how full and entire was the shedding of blood for the remission of the sins of the world. First there was

1. THE SWEAT OF BLOOD in Gethsemane (Luke 22-24). Luke, who was a physician, alone records this part of the anguish in Gethsemane. The God-Man could “feel the fatal distension of

-ing,” as “great drops of bloody perspiration fell to the ground” – all indicating “rupture of the heart caused by mental agony.” But He must not die in Gethsemane. With His heart at the point of rupture He cried to the Father (Hebrews 5: 7), and “there ap-peared unto Him an angel strengthening Him” (Luke 22:43),

went forward in the path of the blood shedding.2. THE SCOURGING in the Hall of Pilate (Matthew 27:16).

Here the leathern thongs of the scourge, each armed with an angular bony hook or sharp sided cube, cut deeper and deeper into His sacred form, penetrating almost to the marrow, until His whole back appears an enormous wound. And then:

3. THE CROWN OF THORNS (Matthew 27:29, 30) is placed

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upon His brow, and beaten down upon the head, until the veins give forth the sacred stream, and His visage is marred so that His appearance is not as son of man. Then it is written, “They

4. HIS PIERCED HANDS AND FEET (Luke 23:33; John 20:25), out of which broke forth again the outpoured blood, every part of

the type ["the priest] shall the burnt-offering” (Leviticus 1:6).

A Christian physician points out in connection with this

alone – that of Gethsemane – to end the life of the strongest man, how the Godhead of Him who was God Incarnate in human guise, shone out again and again in manifestation of Deity, e.g. (1) The “I am” of Jehovah-Jesus when the mob that came to take Him “went backward and fell to the ground” (John 18: 6), until He voluntarily permitted them to bind Him and lead Him away. (2) The physical miracle on the Cross when at the ninth hour of His hanging there, He cried with a loud voice (Matthew 27:46), for after great loss of blood, with tongue, mouth, and throat dried (Psalm 22:15; Psalm 69:3) it is usually impossible to articulate words. (3) The majesty and full consciousness of Deity when He deliberately bowed His head, and “dismissed His Spirit” (Mat-thew 27:50, ) with the cry, “Accomplished.”

The rupture of the heart was at last allowed to take its course. It had been, we may reverently say, held back until the blood-shedding was carried out to the full. “It is the blood that maketh atonement for the soul” (Leviticus 17:11). It had now been poured out to the uttermost in the midst of shame (Psalm 69:7) and horror (Psalm 55:5) unparalleled, but with outshin-ings of Deity which made the path of unspeakable shame aglow with the glory of a conqueror.

Here we reach the point of the miracle, the very recording

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of which awakens the apostle’s outburst of emphatic declaration of what he saw true. What did he see?

The expiatory blood-shedding was over. The Victim-Victor hung lifeless on the tree, when to John’s amazement, as the sol-dier’s spear struck deep into the heart, there came forth blood and water. A Christian physician writes concerning this miracle,

quantity, and is of a different consistency and character to wa-ter. Others say it was serum derived from the blood, but serum only becomes separated from the blood when it is clotting. The Scripture says ‘blood and water,’ not clot and serum....” There was also another thing that John saw, the wonderment of which only physicians would recognize. “In a human body,” writes the aforesaid Christian physician, “if a clean cut wound, as with a sharp double-edged spear, be made before death, there occurs immediately a gaping wound. The living muscles being always on the stretch, directly they are severed, retract and leave an open space. But a wound made in a body after death leaves no gaping wounddo not retract…” Yet the Lord said to Thomas after He was risen again” reach hither thy hand and thrust it into My side; and be not faithless but believing...” (see John 20:20, 25, 27, 28).

“Blood and water” from the pierced side. Have we not here the fountain opened of which the deepest taught saints have sung, and into which the deepest dyed sinners have plunged in myriads, since the Tragedy-Victory of Golgotha? How can this message be translated into “modern terms” with the same mean-ing, and certain of the same witness of the Holy Ghost, which

know that there is naught between him and a Holy God?No, it remains true:

Drawn from Immanuel’s veins,

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Lose all their guilty stains.”Since the outshinings of Deity accompanied the tragic

death as the propitiation for the sins of the whole world (1 John language conveying the mes-

sage of the expiatory death, must be understood as it is used in heaven by those who see Calvary as God sees it, and not accord-ing to the carnal mind of the fallen creation.

“I beheld, and lo a great multitude...clothed with white robes…And one said...What are these...and whence came they? And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said These are they which...have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb...” (Revelation 7:9-14).

The out-poured blood of the Son of God is here described as a “fountain” into which myriads of sin-stained spirits have plunged, and been made clean. The “water” which accompanied the blood, out of the “riven side” of the Lamb of God, in the language of heaven depicts the “river of water of life proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb” (Revelation 22:1). For the Cross on Golgotha was that throne on earth, when God incarnate hung upon it, and the throne in heaven has in its midst for all eternity a “Lamb as it had been slain” (Revelation 5:6).

But the expiatory death on Calvary meant more than pro-pitiation for the sins of the world. It had a representative mean-ing which Christ Himself revealed to the Apostle Paul, after He had ascended to the glory. The Gospel which Paul preached was not the result of his Jewish upbringing, as may be seen by the fact that the bitterest opponents to his message were his Jewish compatriots.

The gospel of the “blood” was a revelation-fact made known to Paul by the very One Who had shed His blood at Golgotha. It was He, too, Who revealed to Paul (Galatians 1:11-12) that in all He had gone through, He had suffered as the representative of the fallen race, “made sin” to suffer to the depths the penalty of sin. And even more, , to carry to the

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Cross the sinner as well as his sins. (See Romans 6:1-14.)While, therefore, we sing with grateful hearts, “Blessed be

the fountain of blood, to a world of sinners revealed,” and recog-nize that we need perpetually to remain under the power of that cleansing stream, let us remember also that the sacred fountain of blood was not opened to cleanse, or to shelter the fallen creation.

Here comes in the message of the Apostle Paul repeated by him again and again. The God-Man died upon a Cross. He shed

-ner for whom He died so the sinner himself died on that Cross

with his Substitute. Therefore the Apostle reiterates “Ye died” (Colossians 3:3, 5), “all died” (2 Corinthians 5:14), “we who died” (Romans 6:2), “Now ye have died” (Romans 7:6). “They that are Christ’s ” (Galatians 5:24), and having died with their Saviour, pass with Him into a new world to walk in newness of life.

The “blood and water,” therefore, which the awestruck Apostle saw as he stood by the Cross of Jesus, has a twofold meaning of death and life for all for whom He died. Death with

life” in life-giving power so that out of the redeemed one should

THE PRECIOUS BLOOD OF CHRIST(I) THE OUTPOURED BLOOD

1. As Propitiation (Romans 3:25)2. As Redemption (1 Peter 1:19; Ephesians 1:7)3. As a “purchase” price (Acts 20:28)4. As the ground of peace (Colossians 1:20)5.

guiltless (Romans 5:9)(II) THE BLOOD WITHIN THE VEIL

1. He entered through the blood (See Hebrews 9:7; 9:25) (Hebrews 9:12)

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26 Chapter 1 The Blood Of His Cross

2. Believers have access by the blood (Hebrews 10:19)3. Believers are “made nigh by the blood of Christ”

(Ephesians 2:13)(III) THE BLOOD APPLIED TO THE BELIEVER

1. The type of “sprinkling” for remission of sin (See also Hebrews 12:22-24) (Hebrews 9:18-23)

2. The blood to the conscience (See also Hebrews 10:22) (Hebrews 9:14)

3. The blood “sanctifying” or setting apart for God (He-brews 13:12)

4. The blood of the covenant the ground of God’s work in the soul (Hebrews 13:20, 21)

5. “…Loosed us from our sins in His blood…” (Revela-tion 1:5 [R.V.]m.)

(IV) THE CONDITION FOR THE PERPETUAL APPLICATION OF

THE BLOOD

“If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fel-lowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin...” (1 John 1:7)(V) THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB SHED AND APPLIED BY THE

SPIRIT OF GOD, THE WEAPON OF VICTORY OVER SATAN

“They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.” (Revelation 12:11)

“Precious blood, by this we conquer

Sin and Satan overcomingBy its might.”

(Hymns of Consecration and Faith)

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2. 10:22 9:14

3. 13:12

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12:11