The apostle Paul unfolded to the Galatians the nature and result of the “Fullness of the time.” Their state in returning to the immature era of bondage demanded that they should know, not only that God had sent His Son, but that He by purchase had brought liberty for the believer, with the privilege of present sonship, and heirship of the future inheritance. This rich blessing is declared to be the common ground of grace, open to Jew and Gentile apart from all former questions of law, circumcision, etc. Beyond this the Galatians are not carried; whereas in Ephesians there is that which is altogether special and heavenly. There the full truth and character of the divine family, and the nature of the church as God's habitation and the body of Christ, are fully brought out according to the counsels of God in Christ. He, the Son, Who when on earth revealed the Father, came no less to do all His blessed will. This He did perfectly, crowned with the blessed fact of having vindicated at Calvary's cross every attribute of the divine nature and majesty in presence of and by sin. Therefore, it is written of Him respecting that moment: “Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him.” Such a work could have but the immediate result of Christ exalted on high in the highest heaven. There He was placed as the glorified Man, the head and center of all God's purpose and action, which is the basis and spring of the Epistle, giving out God's counsels of present and future blessing.
Thus the believer has only to take the attitude of David, when he went in and sat before the Lord, worshipping at the extent and fullness of blessing which passed before him. It is the action of God in the known estimate of His beloved Son and His work; and the blessing must follow in full character with it. Therefore here it is the question of what is being done, and will be done for Christ and those in Him. It is no wonder, therefore, that the “fullness of times” should be found in Ephesians, seeing that it refers to the setting of Christ as head over all things; in established exaltation and glory, with an unbounded sphere both in the heavens and on the earth. Such being the revealed truth, those so deeply concerned may well learn, before entering into a measure of detail as to the coming event, what is said of such as are then fully and intimately associated with the destined head and heir of all things. If the Epistle to the Galatians establishes life, and relationship in holy liberty in Christ for believers, that of Ephesians blessedly starts with the fact that the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ has blessed them with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. This therefore precedes the naming of the persons as to their life and relationship of children. Choice, as to a nature of holiness, without possibility of blame before God, then, children before the Father, or unto Himself, according to His own delight and pleasure: language of love and purpose, worthy of Him who utters it, nevertheless found only here, and not in the Galatians where the Father's good pleasure is omitted, and the point of sonship and heirship is finally reached, consequent upon the Son having been sent in “the fullness of the time” to buy us out.
Now that the time has come to tell forth what God is doing, and will do for Christ, those blessed, and in holy relationship, are stated to be brought into favor in the Beloved. Thus, their eternal interest and heavenly blessings may well be wrapped up in His, seeing too that it is all to the praise and glory of His grace. Redemption also, even the forgiveness of sins, is said to be according to the richness of His grace, riches providing for the depths of misery into which their sins had plunged them. Yea, it is added, “Wherein He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence.” This divine goodness meets human badness gloriously, in Christ and in the cross, for the believer. All the good in life, relationship, and blessing is everlastingly established in Him, and no less redemption by His blood giving present full forgiveness, setting free those once in their sins, so as to enter into God's wondrous purpose concerning Christ His beloved Son. This purpose was ever in His mind. Scripture everywhere, either in type or promise, sets forth that Christ the second Man and the last. Adam was, and is, the great purpose of God; but the revelation of it was reserved until the Son had come. Indeed, not till after He had died, was raised from the dead, and ascended, did God make known the mystery of His will respecting Him by the Holy Spirit sent down from heaven. God's hidden purpose being now revealed, it behooves us with unshod feet to listen to what this precious secret embraces in Christ the God-appointed center. Is it not Christ and His church, that spiritual Eve formed out of the womb of death to be His body, companion, and bride? If God has set the Second Man on high, it is, as the same chapter states, to be the head over all things to the church which is His body and fullness.
The secret now revealed therefore is, that Christ has a body on earth, new, heavenly, formed for Himself, which, when completed, will be His “fullness” to share His exalted position as head over all things. Infinite wisdom, and most marvelous fact!—that those brought into favor in the Beloved (formerly hell-deserving sinners) should be destined to such a place of union with Christ by the Holy Ghost; and ere long the body be completed according to eternal purpose, fitted to share the coming blessedness of Christ’s rule over all things, both above and below! If the apostle to the Galatian believers speaks of the heirs being sons in liberty, here he speaks of the mystery of God's will connected with His good pleasure and purpose in Himself. The divine side is now unfolded as to how He is acting, and will act, in, by, and for His well-beloved Son. He will, therefore, “gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth, in Him.” This promised purpose awaits “the fullness of times.”
Having seen that now is the time, when the body is formed for Christ its Head, and the co-heirs are being gathered out of the world to share the coming glory, it may be well to see from scripture, what the times now are, in contrast to what they will be. When it is understood that the position of Christ decides and defines that of His people, it is important to be clear that whilst He is accepted, and exalted by God at His right hand, He is rejected by Jew and Gentile. Therefore the world as a system is at issue with the heavens, Christ being earth's rejected one but heaven's accepted one. Jesus sitting at the right hand of God, until His enemies are made His footstool, marks this time or hour of rejection, yet will it soon have run its course in due season.
In Luke 21, the time of Jerusalem being trodden down of the Gentiles is stated, although the limit or end is also given “Until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” The world-power that began with Nebuchadnezzar, the first divinely appointed empire under the God of heaven, is still responsible, even though its responsibility was sealed for judgment when Pilate gave up Jesus to be crucified. It was also the time when Israel is cut off, and blinded through unbelief, which will continue until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in. (see Rom. 11) The world being condemned for having crucified the Son of God, those that are Christ's are called to share the rejection of Him for whom they are left in it. It is therefore the time of suffering, both for the name of Christ, and for righteousness sake, a time which must continue until the “fullness of times” comes, when God will introduce and establish His Son as Sovereign Lord and Ruler. Since the cross and rejection of Christ, the great enemy and deceiver has had the solemn title of the “god of this world” ruling in the hour of night-time, his grand object being to blind the minds of unbelievers, lest the light of the gospel of the glory should shine upon them and they should be saved.
Further, creation's state is spoken of in Romans 8 as one of universal groaning; pain, sorrow, suffering, death being the abiding marks, with blight upon the whole scene, declaring that the heavens and the earth are far from being one, as will be the case when the lower scene will be filled with the glory of Him who sits in the heavens. For this the world waits, according to promise and prophecy, when the sure mercies of David will be made good, by Him who is both David's root and offspring; then will appear the striking contrast to what exists now.
In seeing from scripture how this new and glorious state will be brought about, when the fullness of times shall come, it raises a solemn warning to those living in and for the world, without Christ. Deceived by Satan, as to the pending judgment of the world, together with that which outwardly professes Christ's name, the cry of peace and safety, with the mere form of godliness without the power, will only add to the awfulness of it in its surprising reality. Both 1 Thess. 5 and 2 Thess. 2 with many other scriptures plainly declare what is coming, all being connected with the stated fact, both in Old and New Testament, that judgment is to close the times of the Gentiles, Israel's unbelief, and the apostate professing church. Rev. 18 records the solemn and sudden fall of religious Babylon and chapter 19 gives that of the nations. The smiting of Nebuchadnezzar's image in Dan. 2, and the smiting of the earth in righteous judgment given in Isa. 11, also declare what awaits the earth before the blessed time of Christ's universal glory. In this way, and not by the precious gospel now preached, will the earth be cleansed, so as to make way for the gathering together in one all things in Christ. Indeed it is the blessed God Himself who will effect it for His worthy and only beloved Son by judgment.
If Psa. 110 made known the present seated position of Christ as the Royal Priest before the enemies are overthrown for His rule, Psa. 2 likewise declares what Jehovah will blessedly do for His Son, as it is written, “Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Zion.” Moreover, His only begotten Son shall receive “the heathen for His inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for His possession.” Psa. 8 alike declares that the Son of Man is to have universal dominion, when all things shall be under His feet. Who this Son of Man is Heb. 2 plainly answers, while much of it awaits its fulfillment, even though He is on high, “crowned with glory and honor.” The King having His throne on the holy hill of Zion is clearly future, and Psa. 48 sweetly declares the result, when Jerusalem, now trodden down by the nations, shall be declared, as it shall become, the city of God, having there the mountain of holiness— “Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is Mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.” As Son of Man, His name (now despised and rejected) will be excellent in all the earth, in harmony with what it now is in heaven. Then according to Dan. 7 will the combined title and glory of Christ as Ancient of Days, and Son of Man be fulfilled (as already stated of Him in Rev. 1), when the last existing power of the Gentile image in the form of a powerful and terrible beast will be overthrown, and the rejected Jesus will receive His rights. Universal dominion and glory will lie His, and all peoples, nations, and languages shall serve Him, who is God's alone center for the earthly rule in connection with the heavens, and the world-kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ will have come.
The full results of David's song then will be realized, “Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad; let the sea roar, and the fullness thereof. Let the field be joyful, and all that is therein: then shall all the trees of the wood rejoice” (Psa. 96). The true David's feet will have touched the very Mount of Olives where He once stood as the rejected One; when, in the place of weeping over the city guilty of His death, living waters will, in that day, flow out of Jerusalem, and the blessed truth be established, “And the Lord shall be King over all the earth: in that day there shall be one Lord, and His Name one” (Zech. 14:9). What a glorious contrast to the present groaning creation, with a world, and professing church, ripening for the pronounced judgment! Notwithstanding their boast of advance in outward power and greatness, yet, if tested by the person and work of Christ and the unchanging truth of God, they are “wanting” in a fuller sense than Israel, or Belshazzar of old. Thank God, despite of what exists below, faith can turn upward and know that Christ the center of all God's purposes is already in heaven, having, as Eph. 1 states, been made to sit at God's right hand. There, as the exalted Man He is “Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but in that which is to come.” The age to come therefore, when the “fullness of times” shall have arrived, will make manifest the glorious exaltation and universal dominion of Christ. But the church of God in given grace and privilege is called to enter, even now, into God's purpose about the administration of all things above and below, rejoicing too in the already existing truth, as stated in another place concerning Him, “Who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God, angels, authorities, and powers being made subject to Him” (1 Peter 3:32).
Thus, where and what Christ is, together with the approaching future, as to the varied glories, may well create, in the hearts of His loved people, a deepening desire for God's purpose to be made good, so that. the heavens and the earth, now separated, may be brought together, under the universal rule of God's beloved Son, Israel's Messiah, and the Son of Man, in the establishment of righteousness, peace, and blessing. Moreover, as co-heirs and companions in the coming inheritance and kingdom, may the true and properly heavenly hope possess and govern those who are called to await the gathering together on the cloud to meet Him in the air, and so be with Him, and like Him, forever. G. G.
(Continued from page 167.)