WE get here the power the Christian has, and also, dimly, the hope of the believer; though the Lord has set this hope more clearly in the 14th chapter.
In chapter 16 we have a thorough breach in the world with respect to Christians; just the place we are in. We have to go through the world without.
Our tendency is to walk by sight; it was so with the Hebrews.
We have given up all for Christ, and practically have not got Him yet.
All we have in this world is all that Abraham had, all that Christ had―a sepulcher―and it is enough; consequently, where is our position? If faith is not in exercise there is nothing to hinder the power of evil going on; we have to live a life of faith in that which we do not see; not seeing at all the thing which we value, but the very opposite. If the world cannot have you with it, it will be against you. Wherever the conscience of the world is blamed they will not like it; they will either have no conscience, or else be offended.
There are two things which characterize our present position here in contradistinction with that of the Old Testament saints―the presence of the Holy Ghost, and the hope of the Lord’s coming.
The turning point in the world’s history was the rejection of the Son of God; it was the close of all God’s dealings with the world. When He next deals with the world, it will be in judgment.
The prince of this world was the name that Satan got by the Cross. The world under its prince rejected the Lord, and we are called on by Him now to pass through it; and that which characterizes us is that we have received the Comforter. God dwells in the saints, and it is thus He is known. Where there is faith there is a divine certainty.
If the world is convicted of sin, I cannot look for righteousness in it. The place in which righteousness is in Christ.
We are called upon by God to go through this world with the sense that we are in a judged system. We get the things of the Father in contrast with the world, the things of the Son in contrast with the devil, and the Spirit in contrast with the flesh.
We shall see Him again is our only hope in a world with which we have no link or connection. As regards God’s dealings with it, He still for a little while deals with it in grace. All trial of man is over, and judgment follows.
There is nothing true but faith; all else is a lie.
When we see Christ we shall be astonished at, the way we have walked with the world; at the little nonentities that have occupied our thoughts. What faith knows is the only true thing.
We lost everything in this world by mistrusting God, and trusting Satan; now we are called upon by God to trust Him for everything.
The believer may fall in the wilderness, but cannot get back into Egypt, as the Red Sea has closed behind, and prevents his passage back.