John Nelson Darby wrote:
"The existence of ministry is consequent on the nature of the present dispensation; and, in saying this, we ascend very high to discover its source; for the nature of this dispensation is nothing less than the sovereign grace of God, the activity of His love.
The position and the character which distinguish the servants of God, are always, and necessarily, in unison with the priciples of the relation which exists between God and men. When God only recognised certain families, the head of the family was its priest and prophet. We find examples of this in Abraham, Noah, and the other patriarchs. But this principle acquires a more general and important application, when a whole dispensation is in question; as in the case of Judaism and Christianity. The ways of God, and the principlers of His dealings with sinners, are here unfolded with many more details for the conscience, and more distinctness and splendour as to the accomplishment and the revelation of grace.
Observe, accordingly, the marked distinction between these two dispensations. In Judaism, under mount Sinai, where the law was given and those ordinances established which regulated the intercourse between the people and God, we have a people already formed and recognised as such before God; a people whom God had already brought to Himself (Exod.19); whose existence and whose rights depended on their being the children of Abraham, of Isaac, of Jacob, and who, with few exceptions, were perpetuated by natural descent. In a word, they already existed as a people, when God entered into the covenant relationship with them; for it pleased God to try if man, so privileged and put in posession of every possible advantage for the maintenance of his position, could stand before Him.
The work and principle of Christianity are altogether different. Christianity supposes that the trial, to which God has subjected him by means of the law, has only served to prove more plainly how impossible it is for man, whatever his advantages and privileges to stand before Him. But this having been proved, Christianity presents to us God in His grace, visiting this ruined race. He beholds the Gentiles sunk in ignorance and idolatry, and degraded by the most revolting crimes; He finds the Jews still more culpable, having been unfaithful to higher privileges; and He exhibits both Jew and Gentile as the terrible proof that human nature is fallen and corrupt, and that in the flesh good does not dwell. In Christianity God sees man wicked, miserable, rebellious, lost; but He sees him according to His infinite compassions; He only notices the wretchedness of man to bear witness to him of His own pity. He beholds and comes to call men by Jesus; that they may enjoy in Him, and through Him, deliverance and salvation, with His favour and His blessing!
The consequence of the Jewish nation was very simple: a law, to direct the conduct of a people already existing as such before God; and a priesthood, to maintain the relations which existed between the people and their God- relations which were not of a character to enable them to draw nigh to Him without meditation. The question was not, how to seek and call those without; but to order the intercorse with God of a people already recognised as such.
As we have already seen, Christianity has an entirely different character. It considers mankind as universally lost, proves them in reality to be so, and seeks, through the power of a new life, worshippers in spirit and in truth. In like manner does it introduce the worshippers themselves into the presence of God, who there reveals Himself as their Father- a Father who has sought and saved them. And this is done, not by means of an intermediate priestly class who represent the worshippers because of the inability of the latter to approach a terrible and imperfectly known God; but it introduces them in full ocnfidence to a God known and loved, because He loved them, sought, and washed them from all their sins, that they might be before Him without fear.
The consequence of this marked difference between the relations in which Jews and Christians stand as towards God is, that the Jews had a priesthood (and not a ministry) which acted outwards, that is, outside the people; while Christianity has a ministry which finds its exercise in the active revelation of what God is- whether within the church or without- there being no intermediate priesthood between God and His people, save the Great High Priest Himself. The Christian priesthood is composed of all true Christians, who equally enjoy the right of entering into the holy places by the new and living way which has been consecrated for them- a priesthood, moreover, whose relations are essentially heavenly. Ministry, then, is essential to Christianity; which is the activity of the love of God in delivering souls from ruin and from sin, and in drawing them to Himself.
On earth, then, as regards the relations between God and man, a priesthood was the distinguishing characteristic of the Jewish dispensation; ministry of the Christian: because priesthood maintained the Jews in their relations with God; and because by ministry Christianity seeks in this world worshippers of the Father. I say on earth, for, in truth, when we consider the portion of the Christian in its highest point if view, namely in that which has relation to heaven, Christianity has its 'kings and priests'- that is to say, all saints. The worship of God is not ministry; it is the expression of the heart of the children before their Father in heaven, and of priests before their God; in the intimacy of the presence of Him who in His own love, has rent the veil, which His justice had opposed to the sinner; and has rent it by a stroke which has disarmed justice, and left her nothing but the happy task of clothing with the best robe those to whom before all entrance had been denied.
To suppose, then, the necessity of a priestly order is to deny the efficacy of the work of Christ, which has procured for us the privilege of our presenting ourselves before God; it is in fact, though not in words, to deny Christianity, in its application to the conscience, and to the justication of the sinner; it is to overthrow all those relations which God has established that He might glorify Himself and place man in peace and blessedness. On the other hand, God acting in Christianity according to the active energy of His love towards sinners, Christian ministry becomes the expression of this activity. It has its source in the power of this love; whether it be in calling souls, or in nourishing those who are called and whom Jesus loves.
It is thus presented to us by Paul, as one of those things which characterise the gospel of the grace of God."
Taken from On Ministry in Collected Writings, vol.1, p.206-209
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