AVID WALK was born, December 9, 1833, in Reading, a suburban village of Cincinnati. In early life he united with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and, in his nineteenth year, was licensed by that body to preach, and entered upon the work of the ministry. He continued his ministerial labors in the Methodist Church for nearly nine years, but, having read and reflected much on his church relations, and being convinced that his religious position was not in harmony with the Word of God, he resigned his pastoral charge, withdrew from the Methodist Church, and was immersed--all the same day--in Cincinnati, January 3, 1862, by BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. He claims to be more indebted to Brother FRANKLIN for his present position than to any other man, and remembers, with the liveliest gratitude, the many expressions of kindness received from him.

      Soon after his immersion, Brother WALK began to labor in the general field, and spent about three years traveling and preaching in some dozen States, reaching from Central Pennsylvania to beyond the Mississippi River; and, as an evidence of the amount of work done by him while thus engaged, it may be stated that he traveled, in one year, seven thousand miles, and preached three hundred and ninety-five sermons, besides the other labors that naturally devolve on an evangelist. During the three years spent in this way, he was instrumental in doing great good in many places: the weak churches were strengthened, while a considerable number of sinners were turned to the Lord.

      Since he ceased to travel as an evangelist, he has been, and is now, pastor of the Christian Church in Paris, Kentucky, where his labors have been greatly blessed. He has been there not quite three years, and, during that time, the Church has more than doubled its membership, and has become one of the most active and influential churches in Kentucky.

      Brother WALK is full six feet high, has perfect health, great physical strength and powers of endurance, dark hair and eyes, and all the features of the face are strongly marked. As a speaker, he is logical, pointed, and forcible. He states his points well, and presents his arguments in a clear [411] light. You can scarcely fail to understand him. He has had three public discussions, in which he is said to have been very successful.

      Though not a graduate of any college, his scholarship is, nevertheless, quite respectable. His literary attainments are very considerable, and his appreciation of the beautiful in composition both active and discriminating. He has written some for the periodicals of the brotherhood, in which he has shown that he can wield a ready and forcible pen. Every thing that he says and writes clearly marks him as an original, vigorous thinker--one who is not satisfied with a view of the surface of things. He is a diligent student, and prepares his discourses with great care. He never goes into the pulpit without first having well matured the subject upon which he is to speak.

      While he has been a successful evangelist, he has shown more fitness for pastoral work. He takes special delight in this kind of labor, and has certainly shown himself "a workman that needeth not to be ashamed." As a pastor, his success is largely owing to his constant attention to the wants of the flock. He is industrious and vigilant, and to these necessary qualifications of a successful pastor, he adds good administrative talents; hence, if he does not win the affections of the people so readily as some men by heart-power, he compels respect by will-power and the force of an example of devotion to his work. [412]

      "The law of the Spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, hath made me free from the law of sin and death."--ROM. viii: 2.

AW and government are necessary conditions of man's existence. Man is naturally a subject of law. Whether he will or not, he is compelled to yield to its imperious behests. This is true, both of his moral and physical constitution. If man refuses to yield to the law of physical necessity, he will die physically; and, failing to obey the law of his moral nature, he will die morally. Man, then, must ever be viewed as the subject of law; for, when God made him, he placed him under its dominion.

      As to his physical nature, a constant supply of nutritious food is the law of its existence; and, as it respects his moral nature, perfect obedience to the will of his Creator is the law of its existence. Nor is it legitimate to raise the purely speculative question why it is so. For all practical purposes, it is sufficient for us to know that it is so. God, who made man, ordained that it should be so. It is impossible to conceive what our condition would have been under any other circumstances than those in which it has pleased God to place us. I am here. I did not bring myself here. I am subject to law. I did not [413] make the law. Be the law good or bad, I can not change it. Crediting revelation, I conclude that God made me. I am distinctly conscious that I did not make myself. Nay, I know that I did not make myself. But I exist; therefore, I believe that God caused me to exist. Now, he who made me chose that I should be the subject of law, he chose that I should be amenable to the authority of moral and physical government. At least, I know myself to be subject to such dual government. But it is no part of my present purpose to consider the question of physical law, and I must not, therefore, suffer myself to be betrayed into that which is irrelevant. Thus far, I have referred to it simply for the sake of illustration; simply to show that, from the very nature and constitution of his being, man is a subject of law. The range of my present discourse, therefore, will not include any question of physical law as bearing upon man's present existence. But the two laws of which I propose to speak are, first, THE LAW OF DEATH; and secondly, THE LAW OF LIFE. In the text, these laws are contrasted. The one ministers death, the other life.

      When God made man, he placed him under a specific law. For the violation of that law, the penalty was death. Hence, it is called the law of death. The laws of death and life were originally symbolized by two trees which grew in the Garden of Eden. The one was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; and this tree stands decidedly in the foreground of the picture. Observe, it was not the tree of good and evil, but the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. It only remains to be mentioned that the other was the tree of life.

      All we know of these two trees is, that if a man partook of the fruit of the one, he immediately became [414] cognizant of the quality of moral actions; that is, he immediately became conscious of a difference in moral actions. He at once perceived that some actions are good, and some bad. Had man not eaten the fruit of this tree, he would not have known that such difference existed; therefore, to him all actions would be alike. Being ignorant of this difference, he would not have been, as he otherwise became, obnoxious to the penalty of the law.

      The extent of our knowledge concerning the other tree is, that if a man partook of its fruit, he would live forever, independent of either moral or physical considerations. That is, whether his moral nature were good or bad, if he ate the fruit of this tree, the effect would be to render him immortal. The one tree, then, symbolizes the principle of death; the other, the principle of life.

      Now, according to the laws governing here, respectively, the moment that man partook of the fruit of either tree, that moment he experienced the blessing or the curse inherent in that act. If of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, death; if of the tree of life, life.

      I can not be obnoxious to the penalties of a moral law of whose existence I am unconscious. I will not, hence, groan; because, in such a case, I will not be burdened with a knowledge of the penalties of a law which I have unconsciously violated, and to whose penalties I do not know myself to be obnoxious. Consequently, though Adam was susceptible of death, yet, as he did not know it, his perfect happiness and tranquillity would remain unimpaired. It was not till this knowledge formed a part of his own experience, that he became wretched and unhappy.

      Now, this is precisely the condition of all his descendants before they arrive at the years of accountability. [415] They are free from any moral exercises concerning the stupendous interests of life and death, for the simple reason that they are unconscious of any laws regulating those questions. True, all the posterity of Adam die; but this is exactly the penalty which they have inherited in consequence of the disobedience of their federal head.

      Death was to Adam the remote, and not the direct consequence of sin. Had he gained access to the tree of life, he would have lived in spite of his sin. Sin could not, of itself, kill the body. It could, and did, poison the fountain of spiritual life, and kill the moral nature of our first parents; but after this, it could do no more. When, therefore, I speak of death as the consequence of sin, I mean that it is the remote, and not the direct consequence. If one man could live forever in a state of sin, so could every other man under the same circumstances. It is folly, then, to inquire what kind of death God meant Adam should die in consequence of his disobedience, for there was but one death that such a cause could produce, namely, the death of the soul. And, while physical death is set down as the remote consequence of Adam's sin, it by no means follows that all who die physically are, by inheritance, sinners. Adam became mortal only because God withheld from him the means of perpetuating his life, and not because he sinned. This mortality we have inherited. An immortality of physical existence was the precise thing we lost in our illustrious progenitor; and an immortality of bliss, as it respects the whole man, is what we gain in Christ. The certainty of physical death to all his descendants is the one necessary consequence of Adam's transgression, and that, too, independent of all moral considerations; and the certainty of a resurrection from this death, also [416] independent of all moral considerations, is the one thing which we gain in Christ.

      As for the rest, Adam could sin, and we can sin; nor can I see any difference between his condition and ours, as it respects this question. Paul says, that "as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." The fact and the promise are alike unlimited in their application. Here is the truth in few words: Independent of our own volitions, and irrespective of moral considerations, we die because Adam died, and on precisely the same terms we will all be made alive in Christ.

      All men will gain through Christ that which they lost in Adam. In Adam they all, independent of their own volitions, lost life; and through Christ they all, independent of their own volitions, find the life thus lost. If they lost spiritual life in Adam, they will find it in Christ; and if they lost physical life in Adam, they will find it in Christ. In short, whatever man lost in Adam, independent of his own volitions, he will, in like manner, find in Christ.

      If you assume the orthodox hypothesis, that we all died spiritually in Adam--that we are sinners because Adam sinned--then I will assume the apostolic hypothesis, that the precise thing which we lost in Adam, we will find in Christ. If all die spiritually in Adam, all will live spiritually in Christ; and if all die physically in Adam, all will be made alive physically through Christ. Till man sins, he is just such a being, morally, as Adam was before he sinned. Sin is the transgression of the law: but where there is no law, there is no transgression, and hence, of course, no knowledge of sin. Unconscious infants are not amenable to moral law; they are not cognizant of its existence; they can not infract it; they are not, therefore, obnoxious to its penalties. But they lose the animal life [417] in Adam without volition; they find it in Christ without volition: they are, hence, fully reinstated in all that they lost.

      We must not be guilty of the error of confounding animal life with spiritual life, and, as a consequence, physical law with spiritual law. Man comes into a state where certain moral and physical forces are in operation. The moral he can control, the physical he can not. As a result of these uncontrollable forces, he suffers certain inconveniences, and finally death. But, for these inconveniences and death, ample and satisfying restitution is made. The child, grown to the years of what is called moral accountability, can control and shape his spiritual interests. He may make the best or worst of men. But, no matter how virtuous or vicious he may now be, he can not control the physical forces that doom him to decay and death. Therefore, Paul observes: "Until the law" (that is, until the law was written out by Moses) "sin was in the world; but sin is not imputed" (is not charged) "where there is no law." Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned after the similitude (in the likeness, in the same manner that Adam sinned; i. e., by violating a known law) of Adam's transgression."

      This law was not published; did not become a part of the world's code--or, rather, did not become the code--for twenty-five hundred years after Adam sinned; but all this time people continued to die who had not sinned as he did. They found themselves, whether they knew the reason why or not, obnoxious to the penalty of a law that had been enacted when man was created--a law coeval with his existence--but a law that had not yet been published.

      After the long lapse of two thousand five hundred years, God commissioned Moses to write out that law in all its [418] details, that the people themselves might be placed in possession of THE REASONS WHY they were subjected to suffering and death, and why they were unable, in any degree, to control the evil circumstances by which they were surrounded.

      Now, after this law was set forth in all its minutiæ, and its binding force and obligations in all the departments of life fully pointed out, what results followed? Was their condition improved? Not at all. Why, then, was the law given? What good purpose could it subserve? To these questions, I desire to return a specific answer. It is this: In this law, they had a full development of all that was typified by that tree whose fruit opened Adam's eyes, and enabled him to see the difference between good and evil. That was all. The law showed them their lost and ruined condition; but it was powerless to put forth its arm and save them. The law, then, when published, stood to the people in precisely the same relation that the tree, after the transgression, stood to Adam. It showed them their sins, but provided no remedy. Or, in other words, the law did for the people what the eating of the fruit did for Adam--it showed them the difference between good and evil. Without the law, entering, as it did, into all the ramifications, and affecting, as it did, all the relations of life, they could never have known what sin was. The law itself was not sin, though it is called the law of sin. It was not death, though called the law of death.

      As the tree, of whose fruit Adam partook, is not called the tree of good or evil, but the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, so this law, while it is neither sin nor death, brings to our minds a knowledge of sin and death. For this reason, primarily, the law was given. But, in addition to this primary reason, and intimately connected with [419] it, the law had in view an ulterior object. Without the knowledge of sin, which it was the primary object of the law to impart, the ulterior object of the law would never be gained. In brief, without being able to see the exceeding sinfulness of sin, without a plain demonstration of our utter inability to keep the law under which we are placed, we never will accept the mediation of the Lord Jesus Christ. The law, then, did not introduce sin; it only discovered it. The law simply unveiled sin, and showed us the putrid carcass to which we were chained, without, by any possibility, being able to extricate ourselves. It now proposes, having showed us our sins, to take us by the hand and lead us to him who has power to redeem us from their thralldom.

      A beam of light, admitted into a room, shows us thousands of motes. But these motes were not introduced by the light; they were in the room previously, only there was not sufficient light to make them manifest. Thus, the law showed man his depravity--showed him how all flesh had corrupted itself before God. Sin was in the world; but, without the law, men could not see it. Hence, Paul says: "I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died."

      Unless a man is first killed by the law, he will not seek to be made alive in Christ. The law, then, was given, first, to show us our sins--to slay us; and, secondly, to lead us to Christ. "Therefore," says Paul, "the law was our pedagogue to bring us to Christ." The reasoning of this apostle enables us to see still further the practical operations of the law. "We know that the law is spiritual." It takes cognizance of the spiritual nature; it sits in judgment upon spiritual actions; it appertains to the spirit. "But I am carnal, sold under sin." I am the slave of [420] sin. The law is so pure and holy; it points out so many tempers, actions, affections, as sinful, that I would not else have known to be such, that by it I am bound, enslaved, and slain. "For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing." How careful he is to use the limiting clause, "in my flesh!" Why did he not decry against the sins which his soul had inherited from Adam? Because the assumption would have been false. Sin is an act; and Paul knew that an act of the body, or a volition of the mind, could not be transmitted or inherited. Paul knew that, like Adam, he became a sinner when he sinned. "O wretched man that I am! Who shall deliver me from this dead body? I thank God that I shall be delivered through Jesus Christ our Lord." "There is, therefore, now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." Why is there now no condemnation? Because "the law of the Spirit of life IN Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." Here we reach the second law--the law of life. We talk about the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, till we forget that there was another tree in the Garden--the tree of life. The first is the prototype of the law; the second, of the Gospel. The law of sin and death was the development of the one; the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus is the development of the other. The fruit of the one kills; the fruit of the other gives life, and its leaves are for the healing of the nations.

      Let us reverently look at this tree of life. Adam's posterity, as we have seen, without any volition of their own, were subjected to a law that ministered sin and death. The name of this law is justice. But, that God might be just while he justifies, he enacts another law. The name [421] of this law is mercy. The provisions of the former are all just; of the latter, all merciful. Through the latter the righteousness of the former is fulfilled in those whom else it had slain. The law of mercy dishonors not, but rather magnifies the law of justice. Thus justice and mercy hold the scales of Divine government in equipoise.

      Much time has been wasted in a mere logomachy as to what God meant by death. "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." This confusion might be avoided, and the exact truth elicited, by considering the terms of the law, and noting just what was done when it was violated. In imagination we will place ourselves in the Garden. We hear the law from the lips of God, and we will suppose that we know the meaning of every word, with a single exception. That exception is the word death. We never heard this word before, and to us it conveys no meaning. We understand the prohibition, but as to the punishment threatened--if, indeed, we can understand it as punishment at all--we know nothing. Upon this latter we have the serpent's comment; but, in his view, it is something to be coveted rather than shunned. With intense anxiety we wait the issue. Presently we see the man take the fruit and eat it. He does the very thing that God commanded he should not do. A clearer instance of disobedience the world can not furnish. An issue was never more fairly made. Let it now be settled that God meant what he said, and performed what he threatened. Whatever he does, then, in the premises, will be his meaning of death. What, now, does God do? Does he inflict death upon Adam in the common acceptation of the word? He does not; for Adam lived more than nine hundred years after this day. What, then, I again inquire, does God do? He drives the man from his presence, and hides his face from him. This, [422] then, is God's meaning of death. And this is death. Nay, this is hell! A deep and impassable gulf has been made between God and man. That gulf must be bridged, or man is lost to all eternity. And now, as God whispers one word of hope to his fallen child, he summons a cohort of cherubim to guard the way of the tree of life. And there those cherubim stood for four thousand years. And for four thousand years no mortal had access to that tree. Not till the weight of the law's dread penalty fell upon the head of the Beloved did those watchful spirits take their flight, and leave the way to the tree of life open to all the world. Adam was driven forth from the presence of the Lord. He bore in his heart a deep sense of his sin, and the consequent condemnation. Now, when a man hears the law, understands the law, and then knowingly violates it, he becomes from that moment, obnoxious to its penalty. In that moment of sin he dies; dies just as Adam died. But, unlike Adam, no shining ranks of cherubim interpose between the sinner of to-day and the tree of life. Thanks be to God for the unspeakable gift!

      I sum up, then, as follows: The moral law of God, under which we are all placed, requires true holiness and perfect obedience. But man, in his fallen condition, can not meet these requirements. What, then, is to be done? At this precise point, the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus stretches forth its omnipotent arm. This law, or, to speak more strictly, the dispensation of which this is the law, presents a Sacrifice who evaded not a jot or point of the law that had been dishonored. He kept that law perfectly, that he might become the Savior of man, who could not keep it. And as man never would, in this world, be able to keep it, Christ made provision for his escape from its penalties, whether he came to Him as a [423] believing, penitent alien, or as one of His own erring children. And now Christ, our righteousness, through the system of pardon, presents man with a new and living way, through the rent vail of his flesh. That law killed our sacrifice--who suffered without help from God, or angels, or men--just as it would have killed us all but for his mediation.

      Our gain and our victory consist, then, in this glorious fact: that Jesus Christ, our Sacrifice, although he suffered the full penalty of the law, finally triumphed over the grave. And now, having risen from the dead, and being clothed with all authority in heaven and on earth, he declares, with immense significance: "I am the WAY, the TRUTH, and the LIFE. No man cometh to the Father (from whom he had, by transgression, been driven) except through me." Let man, now, attempt to gain access to God through any other medium, and the sharp edge of flaming swords, wielded by the strong arm of warrior angels, will descend upon his head. Just as certain as God's throne is immutable, that man who refuses to submit to the authority of his Son, is lost forever. True, man has naturally no more moral ability now than formerly. He is, of himself, as incapable of rendering perfect obedience to God now as at any former period of his history. Does God, therefore, require less of man now than formerly? Has he relaxed the rigor of that law under which he originally placed him? Is God less holy, or does he demand less holiness now than in ancient times? Not at all. To all these queries I respond, not at all. The difference--the sole difference--consists in this fact: God has accepted the obedience of Christ, has accepted the offering which he made of himself, that man, through the obedience of faith, may be made righteous in Christ Jesus.

      The government has, for the time being, passed into [424] the hands of the Son; but while there is a change in government, there is no change as it respects moral obligations to God; unless, indeed, these latter have been heightened. Because man is absolved from the slavish observance of the law of commandments contained in ordinances--Christ having taken them out of the way, nailing them to his cross--it by no means follows that he is not now under law. There is a vast difference between legal righteousness and the righteousness which is by faith. A man, to be legally righteous, must be absolutely guiltless in thought, word, and deed: but this no man ever was. Nor in the meantime, as has been intimated, has God lowered the tone of his moral law. This is impossible, for that law is nothing less than a transcript of his own Divine perfections. But now the Lord Jesus Christ, who knew no sin, comes into the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself; and whoever is washed in his blood is, in the sight of a pure and holy God, held to be righteous. Through the mediation of God's dear Son, the righteousness of his law is FULFILLED IN US: and this is done only through obedience to the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. This is the law which absolves, or makes us free from, the law of sin and death; and this is the law under which we are now placed. It was first proclaimed by him who alone had authority to fix upon the terms of man's salvation; by him who alone had the right to say what he would accept of man now, in lieu of the perfect obedience and true holiness required of him then. This law, as it respects the alien, is set forth in the following words: "He that believes, and is immersed, shall be saved;" that is, pardoned. This, then, is the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. You will observe that it is not the law alone, not the Spirit alone, but the law of the Spirit of life; and that only as it is IN Christ [425] Jesus. It, then, derives its sole efficacy from the blood of Jesus. But what is the precise thing which obedience to this law--for all men can obey the law of pardon--does for us? Does it make us actually, literally, free from liability to sin, and from spiritual imperfection; or does it simply free us from all our sins that are past, with the promise of grace to help us in time to come? Do we never again sin after we yield obedience to this law? The apostle does not say so. What, then, under Christ, is our exact moral status? I judge it to be that of holiness through pardon, and not through perfect obedience to the moral law of God. Never in this world will we be free from the liability to sin. What, therefore, do we gain? We gain the pardon of our sins through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and absolution from the law of sin and death. We no longer groan under a law that contented itself with showing us our depravity, while it was unable to save us from the curse of sin; a law under which we could be neither legally nor spiritually holy; for, on the one hand, man could not render perfect obedience to that law; and, on the other, Jesus Christ had not yet appeared to put away sin. While the law now, as then, shows us our sins--indeed, while it magnifies sin--it, at the same time, shows us how we may obtain remission. But are we made free from death? Do not men still die? Yes, men still die. What, then, is gained? We are now made free from the law of death. That law promised only death. There was no life in it. This law not only denounces the judgments of God against all unrighteousness, but with this denunciation IT PROMISES LIFE through the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. Consequently, the fear of death is gone. I have to die, but I do not fear death. Why do I not fear death? Because the Savior has broken its power and [426] extracted its sting. We are not, then, made free from liability to sin; nor are we made free from death; but we are made free from the law--from the dominion--of them both. Let me fully illustrate my meaning: You murder a man, and thereby violate a law, the penalty of which is death. As you are led forth to die, executive clemency interposes and pardons you. But are you not a murderer still? The governor's pardon will not enable you to bring back the dead. Could you do this, you would not need pardon; you would be legally acquitted: there would be no law to execute you. But the executive can not free you from the fact of murder, for there lies the lifeless victim of your hate. He can only pardon you--release you--from the law of murder. Mercy triumphs over justice. In all other respects, the governor leaves you as he found you. You can not make restitution. An ocean of tears will not wash out the stains of the blood which you have shed; time will not fade out the damning evidence of your guilt; an eternity of penitence will not call back the life which you have taken. There is but one hope for you; that hope lies in pardon, and pardon is just what you receive. Though guilty, you are henceforth treated as though you were not guilty. The application is easy. As a sinner, I am placed under a law which I have violated every hour of my responsible life. The penalty of this law is death: "The soul that sinneth, it shall die." Now, what shall be done to atone for past infractions of this law, though I should be able to keep it in the future? It still clamors for my blood. Pardon is what I want, and pardon--as it respects my past sins--is the one thing which the Savior promises me on the sole condition of my becoming obedient to his will. The moment that I, from the heart, yield my will to his will, and submit myself to his authority, I am [427] pardoned. That moment I am released from the power of the law of sin and death, and am freely accepted in the Beloved. Having pardoned me, he now lives and reigns to make intercession for me. But I am weak, and the motions of sin are still in my body; therefore, I shall need constantly to bathe my soul in the fountain of Divine mercy, until the conflict with sin is ended, and my ransomed spirit shall rest in the paradise of God. [428]

[TLP 411-428]