What is the character of testimony we have to bear in the present day?
There are certain principles which are alike as connected with testimony in all ages. There has been a testimony of God, and for God, from the beginning. Out of the ruins of the fall there were things that God would take up, and bring out a testimony for Himself. Then arises the question, Who can bear testimony for God but God Himself? And those who are witnesses for Him are those who have learned that "all flesh is grass." There is a certain word that is peculiarly dear to God -- SON -- the only-begotten of the Father. In Ephesians the Son is connected with the Father's house and the Father's bosom. That Son is to have a certain place which He would share with poor sinners saved by grace.
Look at the Son rejected on earth by Jews and Gentiles; and God saying, "They will not have Him on earth, but I will give Him a place at my right hand, and then I will send down the Spirit by which they can call me Abba, Father." Think of that! I am set here, not to be saved, but to be a witness of the Father's love to me in Christ. Seeing how Christ can say, "Abba, Father," I can say, "Abba, Father." God leaves you down here to show what a son of the Father is, what the Father's heart is, what the Son of the Father is! If I am but to be a witness of the Father's love to me in Christ, seeing how Christ can say, "Abba, Father," I can say, "Abba, Father." God leaves you down here to show what a son of the Father is, what the Father's heart is, what the Son of the Father is. If I am not that, I am short of the mark. Testimony for Christ does not consist in separating from this bit of worldliness and that, but in manifesting the spirit of sons. If I am here as a witness, it is clear that the relationship has existed before. Your starting-point is, that you are inside the house. You are children, those whom the Lord Jesus can call brethren. Directly I begin with that (perfect liberty indeed), I say, Who is sufficient for these things? I have my sonship made known to myself, and every step of the way must be in that spirit of sonship by the direct operation of the Spirit of God Himself. What we have to seek after, what to separate from, what the difficulties of the path, and what the joys, are four points to be considered in connection with this testimony for God. The Lord Jesus was separate from sinners purely and perfectly for God. When God is acting in us, who have bodies of sin and death, all the things around we find against us, therefore we are in conflict.
Testimony or witness is merely what we show out. What we have to show out is, that we have a birthright, and onward to heaven in our path God has to put down the little world SELF, which is making itself comfortable with things around and shutting out God. The testimony for the present day, then, is specially one of sonship; and another thing to be remembered is, that testimony must always be a real thing, because a witness is that which God is showing now in grace what we shall have eternally. We have to show the reality of this life which is in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The breaking down we get here as saved ones is all connected with that. To walk in simplicity as a child with a father my will. must be refused. (Phil. 2: 13-15.) For me to live is Christ; Paul was a dead man, bearing a living Christ. (Eph. 4: 10.) It has been often remarked that a saint rejoices in the value of the blood at the beginning of his career, then he goes on to learn other truths, and the blood is less prominent in his thoughts; but as he nears the end the blood is again the uppermost in his mind, and it is said this shows that the leading truth with which be begins is the one with which he ends, and other truths are spoken of disparagingly. But I believe it is in a different way the blood is looked at in the beginning and at the end of a saint's career. It is my value of the blood at first, it is God's value of the blood at the end, so that there is acquisition of new truth in this case about the blood. G. V. W.
Christian Friend, vol. 8, 1881, p. 127.
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At Oxford he met John Nelson Darby and Benjamin Wills Newton. Dissatisfied with the established church, Wigram and his friends left the Anglican church and helped establish non-denominational assemblies which became known as the Plymouth Brethren.
Wigram had a keen interest in the original Hebrew and Greek texts of the Bible, which was of great interest to the emerging Brethren assemblies. In 1839, after years of work and financial investment, he published The Englishman's Greek and English Concordance to the New Testament, followed in 1843 by The Englishman's Hebrew and Chaldee Concordance to the Old Testament.
With Wigram's help, Darby became the most influential personality within the Brethren movement. Wigram is often referred to as being Darby's lieutenant as he firmly supported Darby during moments of crisis. He also helped Darby fend off accusations of heresy, also in regards to the sufferings of Christ, in articles written in 1858 and 1866, which some considered were very similar to Newton's errors two decades earlier.
George Vicesimus Wigram was converted whilst a subaltern officer in the army, and in 1826 entered at Queen's College, Oxford, with the view of taking orders. As an undergraduate he came into contact with Mr. Jarratt of the same college, and with Messrs. James L. Harris and Benjamin Wills Newton, both of Exeter College, who were all destined to take part in the ecclesiastical movement with which Wigram's name is also prominently connected. This connection was strengthened from about the year 1830, when these friends, all Devonians, were associated in the formation of a company of Christians at Plymouth, who separated from the organised churches, and were gathered to the Name alone of Jesus, in view of bearing a testimony to the unity of the church, and to its direction by the Holy Spirit alone, whilst awaiting the second coming of the Lord.
Wigram was active in the initiation of a like testimony in London, where by the year 1838 a considerable number of gatherings were formed on the model of that at Plymouth.
In 1856 he produced a new hymn book, "Hymns for the Poor of the Flock," which for some twenty-five years remained the staple of praise in the meetings with which he was associated. Ten years after the first appearance of the hymn book edited by him he stood by J. N. Darby once again at a critical juncture, when the question of the doctrine maintained by the latter on the sufferings of Christ some further dissension occurred, though the teaching was vindicated. During the rest of his life he paid visits to the West Indies, New Zealand, etc., where his ministry seems to have been much appreciated. He passed away in 1879.