How divinely precious for the heart of the simplest saint of God, to be enabled through His Word to rise to know His mind! We learn that He who alone is the Blesser delights in blessing, not only refreshing us with His love, but bringing us by Christ’s blood without a spot and in perfect peace into His presence, the holiest of all. How wonderful to know the results of the cross, not only in the blotting out of all our sins, so hateful in the sight of God, but in the positive efficacy of the sacrifice which fits the believer for heaven as truly as it has glorified God about sin.
In Christ, God found His highest delight and expressed it over and over again. But sin was not judged till the scene of His own Son made sin on Calvary’s cross, at which the earth quaked and the rocks rent and the very sun shrouded itself in darkness. It was indeed the long-looked-for hour that stands alone in all time, yea, eternity, when the atoning work of Christ was accomplished, never again to be repeated.
God Glorified
God was herein glorified even as to sin, and He gave the immediate pledge of His entire satisfaction, in rending the veil of the temple from the top to the bottom. By the cross, any and every soul that believes His testimony to the work of His beloved Son is called to see the blood on and before the mercy-seat. By His blood, peace is made and we are fit to enter His holy presence, in the full rest of God’s estimate of eternal redemption. To faith, not only sin and death but His judgment were met in Christ’s death, and the glorious triumphs which crowned the ascended Lamb were given and made known to us. Thus, by grace we can now take up the language of the hymn and sing,
We triumph in Thy triumphs, Lord;
Thy joys our deepest joys afford;
They taste of love divine.
The Gospel Goes Out
The gospel goes out to every creature under heaven proclaiming God’s righteousness to all, and upon all that believe. But how unutterably solemn also is the cross for this Christ-rejecting world, already judged and only awaiting the day of its execution. Then will be the day of the Lord, when everything will give place to the One who alone is worthy, alone able to rule with equity and govern in righteousness to the glory of God the Father.
In answer to the cross, all things in heaven and in earth will be reconciled to God, and the universe will be suited to Him and the redeemed above and below. “Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.” This and much more we, through grace, already know in Christ’s work for God’s glory and our souls. It is only as we keep this blessed hope and the appearing of the glory before our hearts in communion with Himself that we can rise above the seductions of this present evil age and the trying circumstances of the wilderness through which we pass, so as to bring glory to Christ’s peerless name. “If . . . we suffer with Him . . . we may be also glorified together.”
E. P., The Bible Treasury, 19:63 r