Now the order and progress of the Savior's journey of old, back to the glory which He had with the Father before the world was, and also of His return and entrance into that glory which is still reserved for Him, may be somewhat traced in scripture. And what paths are these to trace!
In passing from the grave to His glory, having broken the bands of death because it was not possible that He should be holden in it, He stayed for a while on this earth, which of old He had given to the children of men. Here He spake with those who were His for forty days, concerning the kingdom of God; showing pledges to them of His constant faithful love, and showing not only that He Who was dead was alive again, but that He was going to glory; the same gracious Master Whose love in the days of His sojourn with them, had been ever so present to comfort and keep them.
In passing upward from them to His seat higher than all heavens, we may trace Him spoiling principalities and powers, the spiritual wickedness in the heavenly places, leading captivity captive, making show of them openly, triumphing over them (it may be in the sight of the elect angels), as the serpent's mighty bruiser, Who had come down to the earth, the house of the strong man, and as the stronger than he, had bound him and spoiled his goods. Then, having accomplished His way back to the highest heavens, He was received of the Father and seated at His own right hand in token of the Father's infinite complacency in Him, and, for His sake, in the saints, for whom He had thus humbled Himself and fought and conquered. “Sit thou on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool,” was the welcome with which He was then received. Sweet consolation for Him Who had heard the cry from earth, “We will not have this man to reign over us.” The fullness of joy awaited Him there, though here He was crucified. “In thy presence is fullness of joy,” said the Lord anticipating His ascension to the Father.
The season of His return, from this His seat on high, awaits the Father's pleasure, Who has put this in His own power, for the Son has subjected Himself according to the counsels of grace for us; He receives a kingdom and then returns. The present prince of the air, the spiritual wickedness that is now in the heavenly places, ruling the darkness of this world, is to be displaced. Michael and his angels are to fight against the dragon and his angels. Jesus is to descend from “On high” into these lower heavens, and by Michael to prevail, till the great dragon, that old serpent called the Devil and Satan, is cast into the earth, and his angels with him, and no place be found for them any more in heaven (Rev. 12:7-9).
The dragon, thus cast out of heaven, comes down with great wrath to the inhabitants of the earth and sea, his persecution being directed especially against Israel, who will then be brought into expectation of their Messiah as heir of David's throne; and thus consequently be witness to Him as heir of the world against the dragon the usurper of it, and the kings of the earth his champions. The dragon's title to the earth is already disproved, as indeed the Lord's right to everything from the grave of death to the throne of the Highest in heaven, has been blessedly manifested by His passing through all these, rising in the execution of Ills mighty work as the descended and ascended One; but He the rightful heir has not actually assumed His right; and thus the usurper has still power, and throne, and great authority to confer, which he will do until He comes Whose all power is.
And come He will with “ten thousands of His saints,” to smite the kings of the earth, to show Himself as the mighty God, the Kinsman-Redeemer, Who shall deliver the inheritance of the family of God, and fix it in their possession forever.
His action, as the Goel or Redeemer, as appears, will be conducted in the wrath of the Lamb, against the Antichrist and his company, who have despised His grace as the Lamb of God presented to them for the taking away of sin; and in the wrath of the Son (Who as being Son should have been acknowledged to be Heir also) against the kings and judges of the earth who refused to do righteously as for Him, King of kings and Lord of lords, but held themselves as the ministers of iniquity and champions of the usurper (Rev. 6:16., Psa. 11, 12.). The citizens of this world sent after the departing Lord the cry, “We will not have this man to reign over us;” that cry has been echoed through their ranks ever since, and will be kept up until it is answered in righteous wrath. “These mine enemies that would not that I should reign over them, bring hither and slay them before me” (Luke 19:27). “O my God, make them like a wheel, as the stubble before the wind; as the fire burneth a wood, and as the flame setteth the mountains on fire, so persecute them with thy tempest, and make them afraid with Thy storm; fill their faces with shame, that they may seek Thy name, O Lord; let them be confounded and troubled forever; yea let them be put to shame and perish; that men may know that Thou, Whose name alone is Jehovah, art Most High over all the earth” (Psa. 83:13-18). How terrible that such language as this should be righteously taken up on the lips of those who are now beseeching the powers of the earth to be reconciled to this blessed Son! “Be wise now therefore, O ye kings; be instructed, ye judges of the earth, serve the Lord with fear and rejoice with trembling; kiss the Son lest He be angry and ye perish from the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him” (2:10-12). But if the counsel of the Lord be now set at naught, the coming calamity will be laughed at. Blessed, blessed Lord, write all Thy word with Thine own living Spirit on the fleshy tables of our hearts, that we may not in our weakness only speak of these things, but in His power have our life in them, and according to them! It is then that the Lord will awake as out of sleep (Psa. 10:12; 44:23); then will He, to Whom vengeance belongeth, show Himself (Psa. 94:1). He Whose right hand (the emblem of His power) is now folded in His bosom, will then pluck it thence to use it (Psa. 74:10, 11); to use it as the true David for the clearing of the promised inheritance of all the enemies of God and His people; and then for the sitting down as the true Solomon, in the fullness and peace of His kingly honors; His sun rising on the earth as a morning without clouds (2 Sam. 23:4); His light enlightening the Gentiles, and being the glory of His people Israel; the first dominion, the kingdom brought to the daughter of Jerusalem, but the people of the nations flowing into it—the Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, being then called the God of the whole earth (Isa. 54:1-5; Psa. 72:8-11; Mic. 4:1-8).
This shall be the gathering of “every family on earth,” the full display of the kingdom, when the will of God shall be done on earth as it is done in heaven, when the days of heaven shall be upon the earth (Deut. 11:21); all bowing their knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and every tongue confessing that the once rejected Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father (Phil. 2:11).
This order of gathering, first every family in heaven, and then every family on earth, is, as I apprehend, represented in several scriptures, as in Rom. 11, already alluded to, “The fullness of the Gentiles,” preceding the salvation of “all Israel.” I will, however, in addition, only notice the twelfth chapter of John, which very fully and graciously gives us to look at this order of Christ's procedure in taking the heaven and the earth, and gathering His families there.
When the chapter opens, our blessed Lord's paschal sufferings were approaching very slowly. He was on His way to Jerusalem as the place out of which a prophet could not perish. He first reaches Bethany, which lay outside the city, and is there refreshed: and the scene represents us with a lively figure of the Lord in the bosom of His church, as we may draw from the following considerations—
1.—This house in Bethany exhibited a sample of faith in Him as dead and alive again. The anointing His feet, by the loving worshipping Mary, was in token of her faith in His burial and all its blessed wondrous fruit. It expressed her faith in Him as the Holy One of God, Whose body should not see corruption, but that He, the Jesus, Who was about to be crucified, should be anointed, and glorified, and consecrated to a royal priesthood; for this was signified by the ceremonial oil of the law, whose mystical virtues her pot of spikenard would fain rival and set forth. And such is the faith of the church now. She stands as believing in Him Who raised up Jesus from the dead (Rom. 4:24); Who wrought His mighty power in Christ when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenlies, far above all principality, and power, and dominion (Eph. 1:20); in God Who has exalted Jesus, obedient unto death, and given Him a name, at which every knee in heaven, and earth, and under the earth, should bow (Phil. 2:8-10).
His resurrection-power in the person of Lazarus. “You hath He quickened,” is the word to every member of the church, “who were dead in trespasses and sins.” “If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His.” “But if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.” And Lazarus, the witness of Christ's resurrection-power is, in this house of blessing, seen seated with the Lord, in token of that full fellowship which the saints are to have with Him, when they sit at His table with Him in His kingdom (Matt. 26:29).
3. This house in Bethany was the place into which the Lord retired. when He was rejected by Israel (see Matt. 21:17; Mark 11:11-19); as the church is the place of His presence, the witness of His grace and power, while Israel remains in unbelief and separation from Him. “Bind up the testimony, seal the law among My disciples, and I will wait upon the Lord that hideth His face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for Him” (Isa. 8:16, 17; see also Deut. 32:20; Isa. 65:1, 2).
Thus are we given to trace, in this happy household at Bethany, the sure resemblance of the church of God; which the Lord by His Spirit is now gathering, and which is, when brought to its fullness, to constitute the family of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ in heaven.
After giving a view of our Lord in the midst of this beloved household, our next chapter presents Him entering into the royal city as Son of David. On this occasion He is attended with crowds of His willing people, triumphantly bidding Him welcome as the King of Israel. All this was illustrative of that day, when, after the fullness of the Gentiles is come in, or the church is perfected in all its members, this same Jesus shall come to Zion, “and all Israel shall be saved “; when He, for whom as Head His body is now preparing, shall as King of Israel gather His willing people around Him, and reign Himself over the earth the Heir of all its glory.
And when the Lord has thus taken His throne in Jerusalem, the destined center of the whole earth, “the city of the great King,” He will speedily receive the heathen for His inheritance, and the utmost parts of the earth for His possession; for the Holy One of Israel shall be called the God of the whole earth (Isa. 54:5). The one Lord shall be King over the whole earth (Zech. 14:9). To the Shiloh of Judah shall then be the gathering of the peoples (Gen. 49:10); and the kingdom of the world shall become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ (Rev. 11:15). And so, as this chapter proceeds, we have a sample of this gathering to Shiloh; for, after His royal entry into Jerusalem, we see our blessed Jesus receiving the willing homage of the Gentiles, who came to worship there, in pledge as: it were of that day when every one shall go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles (Zech. 14:16; Isa. 66:23): and, when many peoples and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of Hosts at Jerusalem” (Zech. 8:22).
Then shall every family on earth be collected under the same blessed One as is the Head of every family in heaven, and the promised “greater things” shall then be seen, the union and yet distinctness of heaven and earth, “the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man” (John 1:51).
Thus does this chapter give us a view of the order in which the gatherings of the Lord's households are, as I believe scripture teaches us, to be conducted: the church brought to her fullness, and seated with the Lord at His table in His kingdom; Israel saved—their Kinsman-Redeemer, their Royal Deliverer in their midst, and on His throne in Zion; and then the uttermost parts of the earth taken into possession, and made the worshippers of Him Who is “the desire of all nations” (Hag. 2:7). When these scenes had thus passed in review before Him, the blessed Jesus was wrapt into vision of the day of His glory. “The hour is come,” says He, “that the Son of Man should be glorified” (John 12:23). We shall not however here follow (though of deep and affecting interest to the soul that adheres to Him in love and desire) the course of His thoughts in the, verses that follow. Only we will observe, that He at once recognized the necessity of His previous sufferings; for thus had the prophets testified beforehand, “The sufferings of Christ and the glories that should follow” (1 Peter 1:11).
I have been tracing the principle upon which every family of God is to be formed, and the order in which the several branches of it are to be gathered. I would now close with presenting a few hints from scripture of the connection and intercourse that is to be known between every family in heaven and every family on earth, all acknowledging, as they will, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And we have many distinct intimations of the character of intercourse which may then be enjoyed between the glorified saints, “the children of the resurrection,” and the subject people of the earth.
Our Lord Himself had fellowship of a very peculiar character with His disciples after He had risen from the dead. He did not dwell among them as one of themselves, as He had done before He suffered: their lodging and their repast was not His, as they had been; but He went in and out among them as it pleased Him or the Father (Acts 10:40, ἔδωκεν αὐτὸν ἐμφανῆ γενέσθαι) and, though just the same Master as before, full of the graciousness of First-born among many brethren, yet was He, to their sense, and indeed, in another form. His body had passed through its change; it was flesh and bones (Luke 24:39), instinct with spirit and not with blood (1 Cor. 10 v. 44); but consistent with His glory. He appeared at pleasure in different forms to His elect; as of old while predestinatively assuming His risen body, He had appeared to Abraham, Jacob, Joshua, and Others (see Luke 24:15; John 20:5-15) And I believe He did then show Himself after His resurrection, in order, among other purposes, to give us to know something of that manner of intercourse that shall pass between the glorified saints, and the restored and sanctified families of man upon the earth.
A passing glimpse we have of the same thing in the bodies of many of the saints arising, after the Lord had risen, and coming out of the graves, and going into the holy city and appearing to many (Matt. 27:53). We have also, as I judge, a gracious sample of this fellowship given to us, at the time when Israel was first brought into covenant with Jehovah, while the blood of sprinkling was still warm and fresh upon them, and before they had done any despite to the mercy of their God, but had rather said, “All that the Lord hath said, will we do and be obedient.” Moses with his train went up to the Lord, “and they saw the God of Israel; and there was under His feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of heaven in clearness.” Moses alone came near, alone goes into the Mount, but the elders were eye-witnesses of the Majesty of Israel—they stand undismayed in the sight, though not, like Moses, in the midst, of the cloud of glory— “they saw God, and did eat and drink” (Ex. 24); thus shewing the distinction of being in the glory, and outside of it, and yet in some sort in fellowship together.
So, in the holy mount, we have a very sweet exhibition of the same intercourse, and Moses is seen in the same place of glory. The Lord is there with His raised and changed saints Moses and Elias in glory; and His disciples, still as inhabiters of the earth in their bodies of flesh and blood, are brought into nearest view of that glory. The holy Jerusalem having the glory of God, with the Lamb the light thereof, is there, as it were, shown to us; its pearly gates are opened before us, and the nations are seen as walking in the light of it (Rev. 21:24). The disciples were not in the heavens; for as one of them says, the “voice which came from heaven we heard” (2 Peter 1:18); but though they did not enter with Moses and Elias into the cloud of the excellent glory (see Luke 9:34, Gr.), yet they saw it and have spoken of it (2 Peter 1:17). They have testified to us that they have been “eye-witnesses of His Majesty “; as hereafter in the kingdom, the remnant that is saved shall go “to the isles afar off,” saith Jehovah-Jesus, “that have not heard My fame, neither have seen My glory; and they shall declare My glory among the Gentiles” (Isa. 66:19). And this distinction of being in the glory, and of only standing in the presence of it, appears to be given to us by the apostle, as the several callings of the church and of Israel (see 2 Cor. 3:12-18). He there anticipates the day when Israel shall turn to the Lord, and the veil shall be taken away; when they shall be able to look on the glory without dismay—that glory into the image of which by the Spirit, the church, like Moses, was to be changed (Phil. 3:21).
In the day when Israel, the unfaithful, is betrothed to the Lord forever, and her land is married, the harmony of all the parts of the redeemed system of the heavens and the earth (having Jehovah in the highest, and beneath, the whole creation which now groans and travels in pain, brought into the liberty of the glory of God's sons), is exhibited by the prophet Hosea, “And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground; and I will break the bow, and the sword, and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely: and I will betroth thee unto me forever; yea I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness and judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies. I will even betroth thee unto me in faithfulness; and thou shalt know the Lord; and it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth, and the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jezreel” (Hos. 2:18-22).
So, Jacob's vision of the ladder, whose foot was set upon the earth, and the top of which reached into heaven, also gives us another image of the same fellowship. The heavens were seen, as it were, shining in their brightness, high above the earth on which the patriarch was resting, but all the while the angels of God were traveling up and down the ladder. So shall the saints, the children of the resurrection, who shall be “as the angels,” and shall become sharers of the Son's throne, pass and repass throughout the regions which acknowledge Him the heir of all things; and what less shall the earth then be, than “The gate of heaven?” (Gen. 28:17.)
And I will here further observe, as so taught by the word of God, that when heaven is thus opened upon the earth, hell will be shut; for He Who prevails to take the keys of heaven, and claim it as His throne, and to open it to all believers, Who prevails to take the key of the house of David, and in like manner to claim the earth for His footstool, and to gather His ransomed tribes and worshipping nations there, will likewise prevail to take the key of the bottomless pit and there bind and shut up the dragon. And is it not sweet in the midst of present distraction, to think on the concord of the whole acknowledged creation when thus the offense is taken away when nothing shall hurt or destroy in all God's holy mountain, when “there shall be one Lord and His name One?”
The vision of the glory, which Ezekiel had, appears specially to mark out this harmony throughout all the reign or the government of the Son of Man in His day: the hosts of heaven in their glories, the movements upon earth in their multiplied complexity still obedient to the same Spirit, under the scepter of Him Who will then exercise, as now He has title to, “all power in heaven and in earth” (Ezek. 1). So this harmony is as the temple, which with its holy and most holy place—one for the ark, the other for the footstool of our God (1 Chron. 28:2)—was still one temple. As when Isaiah saw the Lord, He was seated within the veil, but His train filled the temple; the body of the glory in that day shall be in heaven, but its presence shall be known and felt on earth. And oh! what gladness for man then, when, like Jacob, he shall walk on the earth in the blessed consciousness that it is none other than “the gate of heaven!” —the whole earth an extended Bethel!— “The house of God.”
Thus it is said, that it is in the manifestation of the sons of God creation shall rejoice: the heavens, where the sons are set, shall shine unhinderedly upon the earth; and the creation, as it were, consciously repose in the light thereof. For all things shall be gathered into one; and though still they be things on earth and things in heaven, yet the earth shall, as it were, touch the skirtings of the heavens, as now, at times, we know not whether it be the clouds of heaven, or the high lands of the earth, that we see in the distant shadowy prospect. Paradise with its tree of life shall be restored, without access for the Serpent; and no tree of knowledge shall be there to put man to proof of his subjection to God; but, instead of it, the priesthood of the King shall be there, witnessing to his subjection in the continued offering of praise to our God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are on the sea, and all that are in them, shall be heard saying, “Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, forever and ever!” “They shall speak,” O Jehovah-Jesus, “of the glory of Thy kingdom, and talk of Thy power.” “O Lord, our Lord,” shall Israel and the nations sing, “how excellent is Thy name in all the earth, Who hast set Thy glory above the heavens,” and the heavens shall shout, “Hallelujah.” J. G. B.
(Concluded from page 26.)