His Riches Our Riches

A Gospel Message by Arno C. Gaebelein

"Dr. Arno C. Gaebelein, the founder of Our Hope magazine, and one of the original editors of the Scofield Reference Bible, was known for his fidelity to the Scriptures and his profound knowledge of the prophetic Word. He was an able expositor of the Bible."

E. Schuyler English

PREFACE

Mr. Gaebelein wrote many books and tracts but spoke of "His Riches-Our Riches," as having come into being in a very special way.

He said: I could not possibly mention all the smaller booklets which I have written and which have been circulated in many editions, but one I cannot pass by "His Riches-Our Riches."

It was during a severe attack of illness, when, weak in body, I preached in Florida on 2 Cor. 8:9.1 had to hold on to the pulpit for fear of falling over. But, as so many times before in the ministry, once more I found out the blessed truth, "My strength is made perfect in weakness."

The Lord stood by me and gave such a great blessing to my own soul, that I was melted to tears and over the audience was swept a wave of blessing. I felt therefore that the message must be enlarged and written out.

Thus "His Riches-Our Riches" came into existence.

For more than 60 years, "His Riches Our Riches" has been widely used of God and has been a rich blessing to many.

It has been translated into more than 20 different languages worldwide.

The Lord's return is imminent when He will take His Church into unhindered liberty and fullest enjoyment of their heavenly riches.

A dear friend who had dug deeply into God's Word and A. C. Gaebelein's ministry, knowing its spiritual and practical benefit, passed on an original of "His Riches Our Riches" to us with the suggestion CBR include it in the reprint series.

This edition is therefore dedicated to that brother.

John A. Short

for

Dean N. Ayoub

A brother beloved and a faithful witness to the power of the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." Rom. 1:16

INTRODUCTION

This little book touches the heart of the whole Gospel.

In its first part, it renders an adoring tribute to the essential Deity of Jesus Christ Who is rich with Divine glory.

In the second section, it follows Him in His humiliation, and portrays that mystery of vicarious suffering for which the Cross is the perpetual signal and symbol.

In the third section, we are led up to those Ephesian heights, from which we survey the ultimate destiny of His Redeemed Saints.

This book is eminently adapted to assist in the salvation of sinners and to feed saints.

We prayerfully commend it to the loving favor of our God and Father, as it goes forth on its solemn mission, persuaded that it will not return to the sender void.

Arthur T. Pierson

"For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." 2 Cor. 8:9

These beautiful words, which we find written in connection with Christian giving, contain the blessed Gospel in a most precious fullness. Like the great heart of the Gospel in John 3:16, it is so very simple and yet so very profound that its depths have yet to be fathomed.

The Holy Spirit through the prophet Isaiah, when announcing the birth of the Savior and the gift of the Son Isa. 9:6, gives as one of His names "Wonderful."

Even so He is.

He is wonderful in His Person and His Work.

He is wonderful in all He has done, in what He is doing and in all He will yet do.

His words, His acts, His Love, His Grace, His mercy, yes, all are wonderful.

Three wonderful facts are found in 2 Cor. 8:9.

Each fact becomes more wonderful than the previous one.

THE LORD JESUS CHRIST WAS RICH

"For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." 2 Cor. 8:9

This statement leads us back into eternity past. The Riches of which this Word speaks are His eternal Riches. He ever subsisted in the form of God as the only Begotten of the Father, absolutely one with Him. One with the Father before the world existed, "He was rich." Who is able to penetrate the mysteries of eternity? The wisdom of man, his reasoning and imaginations are all folly in the presence of such a stupendous statement. As we turn to God's revelation we receive glimpses of that which "eye has not seen, nor ear heard" as we listen to what God in His Word has to say of the riches of the Son of His Love.

"No man knoweth who the Son is, but the Father." Luke 10:22 Thus He spake Himself. But it is also blessedly true that "God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God." 1 Cor. 2:10

What then do the Scriptures say about the eternal Riches of Christ, Who is our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ?

The Word of God tells us that the Son of God was immeasurably rich in eternity in at least three great ways.

Eternal Riches

He was rich in Possessions, rich in Love and rich in Glory. We learn from Bible revelation that His eternal Riches consisted of these, but how little we know of what they actually included! When at last Grace has brought us safely to the Father's house, and we behold His Glory; when we shall know as we are known, then the knowledge of His Riches we shall fully enjoy. And yet, that which is now made known in the holy Scriptures about His Riches, is sufficient to fill our hearts with present wonder and our lips with praise.

Rich in Possessions.

Our conception of the riches in His possession is limited. If we fill the hands of a child full of glittering coins, that little one may look upon them and consider them as great riches. The great ones of the earth count themselves rich when they can add millions to millions, houses to houses and land to land. If the whole world were to belong at some time to one person and that one had possession of all the gold and silver, all the precious pearls and every costly stone, all the treasures of art, even all the treasures yet hidden in the mountains and hills of the earth, how rich that person would be. It would be impossible to calculate the riches of such a one, yet in comparison with Christ Who was incomparably rich, that person would still be but a poverty-stricken beggar.

What does it mean, He was rich in possessions? Let the Scripture give the answer. For by Him were all things created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by Him, and for Him. "Colossians 1:16

In these Words we find a description of the

Riches of the Son of God.

All things belong to Him, for He created them; all things were created by Him and for Him. He is the Creator of all things, and because He is, they belong to Him, they are His and they consist by Him. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein." Psa. 241 None other than Jehovah, the One Who ever was in the bosom of the Father, He it is Who speaks in another Psalm: "Every beast of the forest is Mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field are Mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is Mine, and the fullness thereof "Psa. 50:10-13

Again He says through one of His prophets, "The silver is mine, and the gold is mine."Hag. 2:8

And then the great sea with its fearful and mysterious depths: of the sea with its mighty waves it is written, "The sea is His, and He made it." Psa. 95:5

How great are His possessions; for this earth He created with all its wonders and beauties and they all belong to Him.

But His riches are greater still. He created the things that are in the heavens. What a wonderful world it must be which is above! Well did the holy spokesperson cry out through the Spirit of God, "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth His handiwork" Psa. 191 But what are these things that are in heaven? What are these stars and suns? The human eye can obtain but a few glimpses of that wonderful creation. There are stars and planets hundreds and thousands of times larger than our earth.The sun is over a million times larger than our planet. It is a marvelous, incomprehensible ocean of fire. And yet the star Sirius has, it has been calculated, a force of light equal to over 140 suns like ours. Stars there are at such a wonderful distance from our planet that light, though traveling at 180,000 miles a second, ten million and eight hundred thousand miles a minute, or six hundred and forty-eight million miles an hour, takes several thousand years to reach our earth. There are great mysteries hid in the impenetrable depths of the universe, which no telescope can reach.

We can only wonder and exclaim, "How great is God's creation."

And in the heavens are the innumerable angels; their number is "ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands."Rev. 5:11 And all this, He, Who is the image of God, created and by right of creation they are all His; all belongs to Him. How rich He was in all eternity!

Rich in Love.

God did not become Love, but God is Love and has always been Love. Love needs an object. The object of the Love of God in all eternity was the One, Who is called "the Son of His Love." In that remarkable passage in the Book of Proverbs, which can only refer to this One, we read how it is declared, "I was daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him." Prov. 8:30 In the fourth Gospel, the Gospel of John, in which the Holy Spirit portrays the Lord as the Son of God, we learn of that great eternal Love-relation between the Father and the Son. Here in the first chapter, we read that "the Word was with God," and that He is "the only begotten Son, in the bosom of the Father." John 10:1, 18

And as we listen to His own precious words as they come from His lips in His high priestly prayer, we hear Christ speak of that eternal Love He enjoyed with the Father, a Love without beginning.

"Thou lovest Me before the foundation of the world." John 17:24 What words these are Who dares to add to them or attempt to destroy that Love? One hears almost the solemn caution of old given by the Lord. "Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place where thou standest is holy." All attempts to fully describe that Love or to illustrate it must fail. What that Love was in all eternity, what Riches of Love He enjoyed in the bosom of the Father, what delight was His, no Saint has ever fully comprehended. It is enough to know that before the world was, He is "the Son of His love," in the bosom of the Father enjoying the Riches of His Love.

Rich in Glory.

Love puts Glory upon the beloved object. The Father's Love and the Father's Glory was all His in eternity.

Again we must turn to His own words to learn His eternal glory. When He uttered that marvelous prayer in the presence of the Father, He made the following request, "And now, O Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." John 17:5 How simple and definite this statement is. He had a glory with the Father before the world was; He is the effulgence of the Father's glory. Heb. 13 But who can tell what that glory really was? What human eye could fully gaze upon that glory? Seers of old had visions of the Glory of the Lord. They saw the heavens opened and received faint glimpses of the glory of the Lord.

Whose actual glory was it they beheld?

A passage in the Gospel of John gives us the answer. "These things said Esaias, when he saw His glory, and spoke of Him." John 12:41 The prophet Isaiah saw the Lord and beheld His glory, and the New Testament tells us that it was the glory of the only begotten, the Son of God. What a glorious place it must have been where He was in all eternity, which, while on earth, He called, the Father's house. John 14:3 What scenes of joy and praise, when the morning stars spoke together and the sons of God, the holy angels, clapped their hands for joy. And He was the center of that Glory. To fully understand it all, we must wait till we enter that place above, when we, with all His redeemed people are with Him,. He will then show us fully His Glory.

We dare not add another word to that which we have written. Scripture gives us no other description of His eternal Riches, than these three Riches in possessions; all are His; Riches in Love; and Riches in Glory.

What a theme to meditate upon.

What joy in believing in Him "Who was rich."

Full enjoyment of the blessed Gospel is an impossibility unless we have a consideration of his eternal Riches before us.

HE BECAME POOR FOR OUR SAKES.

"For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." 2 Cor. 8:9

If we have wondered at His eternal Riches, how much greater must be our amazement that such a One, whose Riches are incomprehensible, became poor. Indeed it is more wonderful that He became poor and furthermore that He became poor for our sakes.

"Your sakes." This precious Gospel text before us enlarges and expands and opens up the gracious, unfathomable depths of God's Love. We shall find that He, Who was so rich, became so poor in that He was stripped of all He had. And it was for us, reader. It was for my sake and for your sake. Can we ever hear enough of it? Do we ever get tired of hearing that which is, the old, but ever new, the blessed account of His Love? There are too many who seem to have gotten beyond the facts of the precious Gospel."We want something deeper than the Gospel," some said to this writer some short time ago. It did not take us long to find out that they had never actually fully tasted nor received even the basics of the sweetness of "the old, old story of Jesus and His Love."The one who knows the gospel and lives in fellowship with the Father and the Son can never hear it enough. The more we hear, the more we realize its preciousness and its marvelous depths. It is not possible to get beyond the Gospel of the grace of God. "Amazing Grace," it is in every way!

But let us look at this more wonderful fact, that, "He became poor for your sakes."

What does it mean? The Holy Spirit in the epistle to the Philippians gives us more of the wonderful fact of the path of Him, Who came from Glory to this dark, sin-cursed earth.

Let us first of all read His words.

"Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." Phil. 2:6-8

First of all we mention His incarnation. He made Himself of no reputation. He was made in the likeness of men, fashioned as a man. The Mighty Creator, Who in the hour of creation had formed the body of man from the dust of the earth, took upon Himself that same form and entered the world He had called into existence. He did not empty Himself of His Deity; He came as Jehovah manifest in the flesh.

We read the holy, blessed facts of His entrance into the world in the Gospel of Luke. The angel Gabriel said to Mary after he had announced the coming birth of the Savior, "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore also that Holy Thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." Luke 1:35

And then He was born. On the bosom of Mary rests He Who ever was in the bosom of the Father. In that simple village, Bethlehem, He begins His earthly life as a little babe.

"And she brought forth her Firstborn Son, and wrapped Him in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn." Luke 2:7 What a poverty it was, the poverty of incarnation! For He Who created all, Who has all, Whose glorious place was with the Father before the world was, for Him there was no room and His first resting place was a cattle manger.

And yet this poverty in incarnation is far from being the fullest meaning of His poverty. All the poverty of the incarnation could not give peace and rest to the conscience of a guilty sinner.There is a deeper poverty of Him Who was rich than the poverty of incarnation.

It has not pleased the Holy Spirit to give us a detailed record of the Blessed One as He grew up to manhood. There is just one occasion recorded at the close of the second chapter in the Gospel of Luke, when He spoke that significant word, "How is it that ye have sought Me? Wist ye not that I must be about My Father's business?" Luke 2:49 What consciousness of His Personality and His Work these words reveal.

And then we read, "He went down with them, and came to Nazareth and was subject unto them." Nazareth was a poor little place with a poor reputation. There He went to that place Nazareth, He Whose fellowship had been from everlasting with the Father.

Had the Holy Spirit given us the story of those years in Nazareth we would read, no doubt, a record of very simple living, of toil and perhaps even want. In the Gospel of Mark we hear Him mentioned as "the carpenter." He Who later declared in the presence of the Jews in the Gospel of John "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work, "John 5:17 He worked patiently, and toiled on for years with His own hands. And yet those years of toil and poverty in Nazareth do not make known the full extent of His poverty. Were He to still labor today and toil upon the earth and live here in deepest poverty, all this would not save a single soul from death, nor give a single sinner acceptance with God.

How poor He was we also read as recorded in the Gospels. He had no where to lay His head. "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head." Matt. 8:20; Luke 9:58 Such was His own clear utterance; for there was often no resting place for that blessed head.

He hungered and came to a fig tree and found nothing there. His disciples, who had followed Him, were also hungry and plucked the ears of corn on the Sabbath day. Women, the weaker vessel, ministered unto Him, and gave to Him of Whom, it is said, "The silver and gold is mine and the cattle upon a thousand hills." Great as this social poverty was, it is still not that greatest poverty, into which He went, for our sake. He became infinitely poorer than all of this earthly poverty.

As He walked in humiliation upon the earth in the likeness of man, though poor outwardly, poor in Nazareth, poor among His own, He was nevertheless rich. He always enjoyed the riches of the Father's Love. As a boy He spoke of "My Father."The Father's smile was upon Him. God could do nothing else but love Him Who had left the Father's bosom and become man. There was never a moment in that holy spotless life when the Father's presence and the Father's Love were absent. How precious it must have been for Him, in all the poverty that He had taken upon Himself, to still enjoy the presence and fellowship of Him, with Whom He was and is One.

And so, as He walked among His own, the Father was with Him. The Riches of Love He always possessed. The Father opened the heavens above Him and said, "This is My beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased." Matt. 3:17 This took place at the beginning of His ministry when He came out of the water at Jordan. The same voice spoke on the holy mountain at His transfiguration, when His wonderful Glory shone forth. During the nights He spent in the desert, when upon the mountains alone, He enjoyed always loving fellowship with the Father. When He was in the desert, tempted by the devil, walking among the wild beasts, the loving arms of His Father were always about Him.

The fullest meaning, however, of this more wonderful fact that He became poor for our sake, and your sake, can only be fully learned in one place, and that place is at the Cross of Calvary.

In the record of what transpired at the cross, we learn the deepest poverty of Him Who was rich. There we begin to apprehend what it cost God to bring us to Himself.

Who is able to fully understand His poverty at the Cross? Jeremiah amidst the ruins of his beloved Jerusalem broke out in the most pathetic lament, "Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord has afflicted me in the day of His fierce anger." Lam. 1:12 But what was Jeremiah's sorrow and suffering in comparison with the sorrow of the Man of Sorrows? He alone could fully say, "Behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow." The sufferings of the blessed Son of God 1 Peter 1:11 had all been minutely predicted by His own Spirit throughout the Old Testament. His sufferings were foreshadowed in the sufferings of the Old Testament saints such as Abel, Isaac, Joseph, Job, David, Daniel and others. When He came into the world, He fulfilled all those foreshadowings as He suffered the shame and poverty of the cross. Who can measure the agony of that moment at the cross through which this holy One must pass?

The so-called old "masters," the great artists who sketched Jesus, have pictured from their imagination the crucifixion scene. Those paintings may be works of art from a human standpoint, but spiritually considered, they are mostly miserable productions, and some almost blasphemies.

"There they crucified Him," is all the Holy Spirit tells us of the awful act itself. What must it have been when He was delivered into the hands of men, when He Who was everlastingly clothed with the Father's Glory, when He was stripped and cruelly nailed to that cross, bleeding with His face marred, carrying upon His blessed head the crown of thorns. None can fully describe this scene. He is lifted up on that awful cross, a spectacle for human and supernatural beings. There He hung, forsaken by His own, forsaken and alone in the hours of His suffering.

And yet if we were to stop at this and say that we have descended into the deepest place of the poverty of Him Who was rich, we would still miss the mark. Though the suffering, the shame, the sorrows and the agony were so very great (and they cannot be adequately measured,) yet they do not give us the fullest meaning of His poverty.

There is a poverty still deeper than the physical sufferings and shame on the cross. We must consider this poverty in connection with what He suffered, when He was in the garden of Gethsemane.

"And when He was at the place, He said unto them, pray that ye enter not into temptation. And He was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast, and kneeled down, and prayed, Saying, Father, if Thou be willing, to remove this cup from Me: nevertheless not My will, but Thine, be done. And there appeared an angel unto Him from heaven, strengthening Him. And being in agony He prayed more earnestly: and His sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground." Luke 22:40-44

Why all this agony? Did He shrink from the physical suffering of the cross and its shame? He certainly did not draw back from it in selfish fear, because for the joy set before Him, He was set to endure the cross and despise the shame of it.

He knew deepest poverty, and experienced the lowest depths into which He was to descend, that He was to drink the bitter cup to the last drop. On account of this, He was in such an agony. What then was the deepest poverty of the Rich One, the Creator, the mighty and glorious Jehovah?

"Now from the sixth hour(midday) there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour(3 o'clock). And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" Matt. 27:45-46

In that darkness that enshrouded Him, He, whose garment is Glory before the foundation of the world; in that solemn, fearful cry that came from His lips from out of that darkness, we come face to face with the deepest poverty of Him Who was rich.

Here we see Him stripped of all. The Riches of Love, the Riches of Glory were all gone. No longer is there above Him the Father's smiling face, but in its place, a holy and righteous God Whose hand smites the Sufferer on the cross. That Love which He had always enjoyed as the Only Begotten, and which was His delight as He walked the earth, is now removed and replaced with the fearful wrath of God. Stripped of all, smitten of God, He who knew no sin was made sin for us. "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" He cries, when forsaken on the cross.

It is the only time the Lord Jesus addressed the Father as "My God." But what does this mean? What did it mean for God to place His hand of judgment upon that beloved One Who was ever His delight, Who pleased Him? What must it have been for the Lamb of God to taste that awful separation, to be forsaken of Him with Whom He was ever in fellowship? Shall we ever know the depth of His suffering? Shall we ever know in all eternity what it cost to pay the price to redeem us? We shall never know "the suffering of death" through which the Lamb of God had to pass, stripped of all His Riches, when He was alone, forsaken on that Cross.

Think now of it, "for your sakes He became poor." For you, reader, He came into the world, for you He went to that cross, for you He drank that bitter cup, for you He was forsaken of God.

Well may we sing:

O Christ, what burdens bowed Thy head!

Our load was laid on Thee;

Thou stoodest in the sinner's stead -

Bear'st all my ill for me.

A victim led, Thy blood was shed;

Now there's no load for me.

Death and the curse were in our cup -

O Christ,'twas full for Thee!

But Thou host drained the last dark drop,

'Tis empty now for me.

That bitter cup, love drank it up;

Left but the love for me.

The tempest's awful voice was heard;

O Christ, it broke on Thee;

Thy open bosom was my ward;

It braved the storm for me.

Thy form was scarred, Thy visage marred;

Now cloudless peace for me.

Jehovah lifted up His rod -

O Christ, it woke 'gainst Thee!

Thy blood the flaming blade must slake,

Thy heart its sheath must be;

All for my sake my peace to make,

Now sleeps that sword for me.

The Holy One did hide His face;

O Christ, 'twas hid from Thee!

Dumb darkness wrapt Thy soul a space,

The darkness due to me.

But now that face of radiant grace

Shines forth in light on me.

For me, Lord Jesus, Thou host died,

And I have died in Thee;

Thou art risen: my bands are all untied;

And now Thou liv'st in me.

The Father's face of radiant grace

Shines forth in light on me.

-Ann Ross Cousin, BHB

Who are we, that He should for us enter into such depths of poverty and be forsaken by God?

Who were these Corinthians to whom these words were written? "for your sakes He became poor."The First Epistle written to them states; "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the Kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the Kingdom of God. And such were some of you; but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the Name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God." 1 Cor. 6:9-11

What an awful record this is! Yet such as these Corinthians were, the Son of God came down to become poor, even to the poverty of the Cross. "What an awful record," Some may say, and add, as is done so often, "Such a sinful record and depth I have never fallen." This is the language of the self-righteous Pharisee, the nominal Christian; those superior in their own eyes, who in their despisement of others, say, "God, I thank Thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess."Luke 18:9-12

Is this my language? Is this your confession? If so, how little we know of ourselves and how little we have tasted of the sweetness of the precious gospel of God's Grace.

It is related that the late Bishop Brooks, having preached in the Massachusetts penitentiary, was struck dumb as he saw the long lines of men clad in the uniform of shame, shamble, lock stepped, to their places in the chapel. He said, 'How can I preach to these men? What do I know of thieves, murderers and forgers? I have done none of these things. Between them and myself is a chasm; hell deep, which I can neither pass over to get to them, nor may they understand me.' But then at that moment God showed him his own natural heart. Down through the layers of Puritan tradition, through the moral habits inherited from generations of God-fearing ancestors, the revealing ray of light shot through and lifted up the understanding. "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Jer. 17:9

That man of God saw there the possibility of every crime represented in the long rows of furtive-eyed, criminal humanity before him, as his possibility also, and then he preached to them as a saved sinful man to sinful men."

Listen to the description of your own heart, the same natural heart of all men, as given by our blessed Savior, "Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witnesses, blasphemies." Matt. 15:19

All these evil things are in our hearts. There is a murderer there and a fornicator, a thief and a robber. The Grace of God may have kept the practice of it back from its fullest manifestation, but it is there. How true it was when Rowland Hill cried out when he saw a murderer with the rope around his neck led to the gallows; he called out, "There goes Rowland Hill, if it were not for the Grace of God." Such are we, vile, corrupt sinners; enemies of God.

Again let us point you to the Word of God, and what God has to say of us all, "There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Their throat is an open Sepulcher; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood: Destruction and misery are in their ways: And the way of peace have they not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes... all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." Rom. 3:11-18, 23

This is what we are by nature. God Himself tells us this, for He alone knows the depths of our degradation, our vileness, our sinfulness, our enmity and ungodliness. And yet knowing this, He gave the best He could give. He gave up, the Son of His Love.

Please listen! He put His hand upon Christ in that awful poverty of the cross and smote Him in our place. How wonderful, such wonderful love! It passes knowledge.

"For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. BUT GOD commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."Rom. 5:6-8

Will you just now bow your head and heart in the Presence of God and believe the record. Take your place humbly before God as a lost, guilty sinner. You have not done good; you cannot do good until reconciled to God. Unsaved reader, acknowledge yourself a sinner before God and believe the Son of God.

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life." John 3:16

What greater proof could God give of His love than the one He has given, by putting His beloved Son representatively in the place of the vilest sinner? He spared not His beloved Son in order that He be able to spare the sinner, who believes the Son.

He became poor for our sakes, for your sake. Do you believe it? Will you accept Him as your Savior and Lord?

And we who have believed and know Him, and that He died for us, may confess with the great apostle "Who loved me and gave Himself for me." We confess we need a greater impression of that mighty Love that went to the cross and into such poverty for the ungodly. We should consider every unsaved one, the lowest, the most miserable, the most unlovable, from a human standpoint, as those for whom the Son of God gave up His eternal Riches to become so abjectly poor.

Look at the masses we see in the great cities.

How often we see them stumbling along or actually in the depth of the gutter.There they are covered with the filth of the street and the world. Gaze upon that miserable one, that homeless tramp as one for whom the Son of God cried when upon the cross, "My God, My God why host Thou forsaken Me?" "Christ died for the ungodly."

His precious life blood was shed as the cost and price to redeem. He tasted that awful death: separation, for the ungodly.

How can we ever adequately love and care for that poor, miserable sinner, that homeless outcast, whom God so loved, and for whom God gave His Son and for whom Christ died? We cannot unless we have Christ and eternal life ourselves.

We are debtors to God and His grace. May God therefore fill our hearts with that same burning love that He has for poor lost sinners, that we may yearn, even agonize, for the salvation of those for whom Christ became so utterly poor.

BY HIS POVERTY WE ARE MADE RICH.

"For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich." 2 Cor. 8:9

What a most wonderful theme we have here for our contemplation.

The great, the deep, the unfathomable poverty of the Son of God on the cross has procured us riches, incredible riches.

How great these riches must be, riches that have been won for poor lost sinners, for whom Christ died, but who now believe Him and His Word.

We shall find indeed that while the Riches of Christ that He had with the Father before the world are wonderful, the fact that such a One became so poor brings something greatly wonderful before our hearts, and that is the most wonderful of all: Riches that God has given us in Christ. This is the fullness of the blessed Gospel, a fullness that is so little preached and less believed today. Some emphasize in Gospel preaching the fact of the forgiveness of sins and, how the believing sinner is freely justified from all things.

A great blessing this is indeed, to know sins forgiven and put away forever. That blessedness David knew when he wrote the Thirty-second Psalm.

"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile."Psa. 32:1-2

But forgiveness is but a part of God's blessed salvation. Others make prominent the impartation of the new life, eternal life; the certainty of salvation and deliverance from the wrath to come.

All these and other precious fruits are part of the blessed result of the finished work of the Son of God. There is, however, a higher revelation of what the believing sinner saved by Grace has become in Christ. This fullest blessing is ours in Him as our beautiful text reveals. It is that we have become wonderfully rich through Him.

And what are these riches that belong to us on account of the wonderful poverty of the Lord Jesus Christ?

Have we ever considered that these Riches are actually ours in the Lord Jesus Christ? How rich are we in Him?

We are saved by Grace, through faith, by the poverty of our Lord Jesus Christ when He was forsaken on that cross. And now, we are as rich as He is in yonder Glory!

This is a great assertion and it is a wonderful claim, yet it is fully true, true forever and ever, even for the countless ages of a never-ending eternity.

Let us now ascertain as to how rich He is, Who was our Substitute on the cross of Calvary.

Where Is He Now?

The tomb could not hold Him; He could not see corruption. The Father raised Him from the dead and after He showed Himself alive after His passion, He was received up into Glory.

What a scene it must have been in heaven when He came again into the presence of the Father.

He had passed through the heavens, upon that cloud, which took Him out of sight of the gazing disciples, and He was ushered into the presence of God's throne; that glorious Throne, the great center of the universe. How full of wonder the angelic hosts must have been as He returned to the Father. They knew Him there in heaven before He took upon Himself the form of man. They had gazed upon Him when He was down on the earth. They were with Him in the desert during His journeys; with Him in His toil and service. He might have commanded a legion of angels in that hour when the power of darkness came upon Him. How they must have watched Him as He hung upon that cross. They were present when the resurrection morn dawned and they gave the disciples that good and glorious news that He would come again in like manner.

What must it have been to the Father, our loving God and Father, the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ, when His beloved Son returned to Him?

He had given Him up. He smote Him on that cross as He stood in the sinner's place, but now the Son arrives back to the Father and appears in His presence in the form of a Man, the glorified Man. A human being with a body of glory, but still a body of flesh and bones, and He comes into the presence of the throne of God, for He is Son of God raised from among the dead; the Head of a new creation. How unspeakably grand and glorious it must have been when He came thus to the Father.

He advanced to that Throne and the Father welcomed Him.

"Sit on My right hand until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool.""Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchisedec." Heb. 1:13; 5:6 And surely amid the shouts and praises of the heavenly hosts, He sat down.

Where is He now? He is back there with the Father, He is in the Father's presence as the glorified Man.

Did God do even more in that great welcome to Him, the One with the body in which the nail prints were still seen?

Yes, He did!

God appointed Him heir of all things.

God made Him heir of all creation. He gave into the hands of that glorified Man the entire universe. All power in heaven and on earth He gave to the Son of His Love.

How rich is He then?

All creation belongs to Him. He is the rightful Lord over all.

And what else does this One possess?

The Father's Love.

The Love of God is centered upon Him once more.That eternal Love that He ever knew and enjoyed before, the riches of that Love, are now His once more.

How greatly God must love Him, that lovely One, Who did His will, Who exalted God's eternal righteousness and made known God's love to a lost and guilty world of sinners.

Is there more that He has received when He ascended upon high?

We look again and exclaim: "But we see Jesus, Who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor."Heb. 2.9

There Is Glory Upon Him.

The Father put Glory upon the Lord Jesus Christ. And what a Glory it must be! Who can give full account of His Glory? Who can describe the Glory which He has now and will have manifested in the day of His power when He comes again as Lord of lords and King of kings?

But now reader, pause.

He was rich in eternity in these three things —

in Possessions, for all belonged to Him;

in Love; the Only begotten of the Father;

in Glory, the Glory of God.

These three—Possessions, Love and Glory—He had given up, laid aside. In that dark hour as He hung naked, alone, forsaken on the cross, He was stripped of all. But now in resurrection, we see Him, the risen Son of God back with the Father. All power is given Him and He is the heir of all things. The Father's Love is upon Him and that Glory enshrouds Him once more. He has again exactly the same riches that He had before the world was, but with this difference only, He is now the Man in the Glory.

Just as rich as He is, the glorified One, so also is the vilest sinner who has now believed on Him; who is washed in the precious blood of the Lamb.

His eternal Riches, are your Riches, child of God they are yours upon believing Him and they are yours forever.

Open eye and heart wide to receive fullest knowledge of the measure of the Love and Grace of God in Jesus Christ.

This One saw a world of ruined men and women who were rebels and enemies of God. He was not taken by surprise when mankind fell. He knew it all in that past eternity. He had made provision for the sin of His much loved creation. Here was that lovely One Who always dwelt in The Father's bosom, and by Whom and for Whom all things were called into existence. God purposed to have others with Him as sons with that One Only Son. These vile rebels and enemies are to be taken out of the power of darkness and placed alongside that Only Son, to share His inheritance, share the Father's Love, and His Glory for all eternity.

How could He accomplish all this?

He gave up His Son! He let Him depart into that dark world. He let Him go and even sent Him forth.

He then smote Him, as we have seen, upon the cross. He then raised Him up as victor over death and the grave, and took Him into His presence again, seating Him at His own right hand in the Heavenlies. And in Him God has accomplished His wonderful purpose to have sons in that Son, as sharers in His Riches.

Could any other have ever conceived such a plan?

Could all the wisdom of this world ever discover such a scheme? The Only begotten of the Father, The Rich One, Who created all things was made a little lower than the angels and now He is made so much better than the angels, obtaining by inheritance a more excellent Name than they. Heb. 1:4 And all this was done for us lost sinners that we might become sons with Him and share that place which He has in highest Glory.

As rich as He is in the Father's presence, so also are you, believers, for such is the wealth of every saved, believing child of God.

"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God and joint heirs With Christ."Rom. 8:16, 17

Sonship and Heirship are inseparably connected. We are Heirs of God because as believers we are sons. Our inheritance is nothing less than the inheritance of Him Who is the First begotten from the dead. God appointed Him the heir of all things and we are joint heirs and fellow heirs of Christ. Can there be anything plainer than that?

God told Abraham to walk through the land He had promised to him and to his seed. We can readily imagine what joy the father of the faithful had as he walked through that goodly land with its green pastures, springs of water, rivers and lakes. How his eyes must have delighted to gaze upon the beautiful mountains. Yet he did not actually possess it all then, but in faith he truly enjoyed it all.

Our God and Father does not ask us to walk through a land here in this world. He tells us of much more than that. He has given all to the Son of His Love; the whole earth belongs to Him actually the whole universe; and because it belongs to Him it belongs to us. Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens above with its wonderful mysteries, its countless heavenly bodies, its unfathomable space, its solar systems beyond the reach of the most powerful telescope. It all belongs to Him. He holds it in His blessed hands and it belongs also to us. It is your inheritance. With Him we shall be in the possession and enjoyment of the heavens and the earth. What it all will be, and how great our riches are, who can fully tell? There never will be reached in all eternity a time when we shall come to the end of our riches in Him, with Whom we shall dwell for the eternal ages.

God the Father desires that you now enjoy

by faith your riches.

What are all the possessions we may strive to obtain and keep on this earth? We may call them "riches," but what are they in comparison with our riches as sons of God? These thing here are but "bubbles" and "baubles," simple miserable toys of time that before long must all be left behind.

Child of God, look beyond. In wealth or poverty, in abundance or in want, every day remember your eternal, your abiding riches in the Lord Jesus Christ. Rejoice in faith and triumph in it over all earthly conditions and circumstances as being Heirs of God.

The Riches of Love.

And now He fully enjoys as before the Love of the Father. And the love wherewith He is loved of the Father is the love with which we are also loved. We are the sharers of the same love. This is why believers are addressed in the New Testament as "Beloved of God." We need to listen only to His high priestly prayer in John 17 to realize that this is so. He tells the Father all about Himself and His redemption work, and all about His own, who have been given to Him by the Father.

It is a wonderful thing that all the great facts of our salvation, our standing before God, our present responsibilities and privileges, our future glory, are all revealed by Him, the Author and Finisher of the faith, in this prayer. This prayer with its blessed depths may be called the germ of all the subsequent unfoldings of the Gospel of Grace. All the great salvation truths and revelations in the great Pauline epistles, are herein foretold. These teachings in the 17th chapter of John may be grouped around seven words: Salvation; Manifestation; Representation; Identification; Sanctification; Preservation and Glorification.

Here we hear Him say to the Father: "That the world may know that Thou host sent Me, and host loved them, as Thou host loved Me."John 17:23

And again: "That the love wherewith Thou hast loved Me may be in them, and I in them."

John 17:26

It is truly so that the love wherewith the Father loves the Son, is the love wherewith He loves each who belong to Christ, and who by believing, are saved. God is Love and how He loves! It was love that gave the Only Begotten and the object in view was that He might be able to have us poor sinners saved, justified, sanctified as children of God, sharing that eternal love.

Take hold of it in faith, Beloved of God; in Christ Jesus, where Grace has put you, there is for you from God the Father nothing but love. In all reverence we say God can do nothing but love those who are His children by faith in Jesus Christ.

Learn to consider all, even the darkest and strangest conditions and experiences, in light of His love. Nothing, nothing at all can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

By nature and by practice, far,

How very far from God!

Yet now by grace brought nigh to Him,

Through faith in Jesus' blood.

So near, so very near to God,

I cannot nearer be;

For in the person of His Son,

lam as near as He.

So dear, so very dear to God,

More dear I cannot be;

The love wherewith He loves the Son,

Such is His love to me.

-Catesby Paget

The Greatness of His Glory

And what about the Glory? How great the glory He has revealed. It belongs to us in Him and with Him. We but need to remind ourselves of another utterance in His prayer. How good of Him that He spoke all these words before He left the world. His disciples heard Him utter these words, and from them all may learn His love and the believer's glorious destiny.

And we, in reading the 17th chapter of John, can hear Him still praying. The word that tells us of Glory: "And the Glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them...""Father, I will that they also, whom Thou host given Me, be with Me where I am; that they may behold My Glory, which Thou host given Me." John 17:22, 24

Is this not sufficient? We shall share His glory. We shall forever be with Him! Our bodies of humiliation will be fashioned like unto His glorious body. We shall see Him as He is and shall be like Him. Our glorious destiny is to be conformed to the image of God's Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. At last glorified with Him, God will show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us through Christ Jesus.

What a Glory that will be forever with the Lord Who loved us and gave Himself for us.

And soon that Glory will be upon us. The Lord is at hand. The blessed moment for which He has waited upon the Father's throne to have us all with Him, and for which generation after generation have waited, is very nigh, even at the door. Soon we shall hear the voice of the Bridegroom calling His beloved Bride to come away, to come into His presence and then we shall fully and completely share His Riches.

And is it so! I shall be like Thy Son, Is this the grace which He for us has won? Father of glory! (thought beyond all thought!) In glory to His own blest likeness brought!

Oh, Jesus, Lord, who loved me like to Thee? Fruit of Thy work, with Thee, too, there to see Thy glory, Lord, while endless ages roll, The saints the prize and travail of Thy soul.

Yet it must be; Thy love had not its rest Were Thy redeemed not with Thee fully blest; That love that gives not as the world, but shares All it possesses with its loved co-heirs.

Nor We alone; Thy loved ones all, complete In glory round Thee there with joy shall meet, All like Thee, for Thy glory like Thee, Lord, Object supreme of all, by all adored.

J. N. Darby How poor and weak our comprehension. How dull the mind, how slow of heart to believe all and to enjoy all the promises of God.

How often we go about cast down, disappointed, because of earthly conditions, of things temporal, things that have not turned out to our comfort. Perhaps we too have been murmuring and complaining. However, if our hearts are fixed constantly upon the Christ of God, upon the wonderful Riches that are His in Glory, which now also belong to us, there would be no room for care or complaining, impatience or distress. All would be praise and thanksgiving.

It is this in which the Father delights. He loves to hear the voice and praise of those who were once afar off and are now brought nigh, giving thanks in that precious, adorable Name. He loves to see His blood-bought people rejoicing in His Son.

Old Testament Riches

A mother in Israel came to praise God. Her prayer had been answered. And as she poured out her heart, the Spirit of God opens her vision. In holy joy she cries out: "He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory: for the pillars of the earth are the Lord's, and He has set the world upon them." 1 Sam. 2:8

A great conception this was and yet it still does not express fully our glorious inheritance, our riches in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Poor beggars upon a dunghill we are by nature, but that blessed One came down into our misery and took us from the dunghill to where He is; into His Riches, to His Glory to share His Throne.

How little our hearts enter into it all. And yet our God desires us to enter by faith into these wonderful thoughts of love towards us in Christ.

More than anything else, the true conception of our Riches in Christ, which we shall before long share with Him in Glory, will keep us in the place of separation unto Him and teach us to walk worthy of the Lord. With such Riches in view and such a destiny, how holy our lives will become. As these Riches are before our souls, we shall be satisfied to walk in His path, the path of humility and suffering, satisfied to be nothing here and willing to share His reproach. How simple it then becomes to take the lowest place, and with joy, welcome all that humbles us. For His sake, Who gave up all, we can become constrained by His mighty love and know the joy set before us. As joint heirs we shall be more and more willing to endure the cross and despise the shame. As we consider His Glory, His Riches and our place in Him now, we know that soon with Him we shall enjoy fully His Riches and Glory forever.

But not only are we to share all this with Him in the future, but even while here on earth, as saved ones who have passed from death unto life, we await Him and his Glory as those who are rich even now. At the close of that lovely Epistle to the Philippians we read: "But my God shall supply all your need according to His Riches in Glory in Christ Jesus." Phil. 4:19

And in the beginning of Ephesians we read: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Heavenly places in Christ." Eph. 13 In Colossians we hear that in Him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily and that we are complete in Him.

Let us also remember that precious word that we find on the summit heights of the epistle to the Romans: "He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things 7

Rom. 8:32

All we need in spiritual blessing, strength and power, all and everything, we have in Him Who paid so fully at the cross. He Who became so poor that we might be so rich.

How dreadful if we, inheriting such riches, with every spiritual blessing now at our disposal and a Lord Who is ready to fill us with the very fullness of Himself, shame on us if we do not use these riches, if we neglect so great salvation. Let us not be guilty of it. Many of God's people need by faith to live upon their freely given riches in Christ.

Israel failed with their covenant and earthly land and did not take possession of it. We also fail in not entering into the riches that are ours. If Israel had gone in and possessed the whole land, they would have come to an end of inheriting the land for there was a limit to the boundaries of the land.

It is far different with the riches we have in Christ. We can never exhaust them for they are, like Himself, infinite.

We are children now, but when He comes we shall be full-grown sons. What a revelation we shall have then as to His Riches our Riches! What a Glory it will be when He has His completed church with Him and His full inheritance in the Saints. What a Glory when He comes as the Firstborn bringing the many sons with Him to glory. We shall share His Throne. We shall reign with Him over the earth and have control with Him over the works of His hand. And then shall roll on the mighty song of praise so feebly uttered now here below by the few: "Unto Him that loveth us, and has washed us from our sins in His own blood and made us kings and priests unto God His Father; to Him be Glory and Dominion forever and ever. Amen." Rev. 1:5-6

Let us turn more to the Word of Prophecy. We read in the Old Testament and in our New Testament prophetic Scriptures, and the book of the Revelation that He received from God, and gave to us concerning His coming glories. These things do not concern Him alone, but concern us as His joint heirs also.

Rich Salvation

And now, are you, reader, yourself saved? Do you belong to the Lord Jesus Christ?

Do you know this marvelous Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who, for your sakes became poor that you might be rich?

If you are not a Christian, not yet saved, still a stranger to that Grace, what hinders you from accepting Him now? Let me tell you that God "wants" you, and that God more than "wants" you, He loved you. It was for you He gave His beloved Son; for you He forsook Him on the cross. Could He do anything more than that?

And now the good news is that the Lord Jesus Christ has accomplished all for you and God invites you to "come." He tells you that all is ready; He wants to welcome you home. God wants you to come out of all your poverty and your want, out of your sin and guilt, shame and confusion into the Riches of His own Son.

Can you, will you, doubt this? I am persuaded you cannot. It is so clear, so simple. Do not doubt that God does actually want the lowest and the vilest in order that He may give them the Riches of Himself.

Do you ask the conditions? There are none. God does not ask you to do anything, for He has done it all. All He asks is that you come just as you are, as a poor sinner and that you accept the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior by trusting Him, by casting yourself upon Him.

Are you willing to do it now?

Just as lam, without one plea

But that Thy blood was shed for me,

And Thou bidst me come to Thee,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Just as I am, and waiting not

To rid my soul of one dark blot,

To Thee, whose blood can cleanse each spot,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Just as I am, though tossed about

With many a conflict, many a doubt,

Fightings within, and foes without,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Just as I am, poor, wretched, blind;

Sight, riches, healing of the mind,

Yea, all I need in Thee to find,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Just as I am, Thou wilt receive,

Wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve;

Because Thy promise I believe,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Just as l am, Thy love unknown,

Has broken every barrier down;

Now to be Thine, yea, Thine alone,

O Lamb of God, I come!

Charlotte Elliot, BHB

Will you accept God's riches?

The gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."He that believeth on the Son hath eternal life." All God asks is that you accept the Riches, which the Son of His love purchased for guilty sinners on the cross.

Is this too good to be true, as some always say? If you say this and add a single thing to it, trying to do your own share by good works, even works of repentance, then you shut yourself out from God's Grace. Believe it. Christ died for the ungodly; He died for you.

Nothing else will make you safe for eternity. God's salvation makes you safe! And should you reject God's offer of free salvation; what then?

It is almost impossible for the writer of these words to believe that anyone would reject such an offer, such riches, such love. And yet it is sadly true; thousands turn their back upon Him, Who died for them.

God grant that not one who reads these lines will reject the Lord Jesus Christ.

Reader, if you should reject Christ and go on in unbelief, in self-righteous religiousness, what then? You live on in the poverty, misery, discontent, unrest of the natural man. You could have eternal rest, peace, joy, happiness and contentment in the Lord Jesus.

You chose the unbelief and discontent but is that all? What about eternity? All pass into eternity having rejected that which God did for them. Deliberately some say, No to God and instead of the eternal Riches, they choose eternal poverty, eternal wrath and eternal shame. They are lost, no salvation; they never know what it is to be "safe," eternally secure!

It is surely not necessary to enlarge upon these solemn facts of an eternity of misery. Such it must be for everyone who dies rejecting God's offer of salvation. God's righteousness demands it.

Once more we repeat the text: "For ye know the Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor that by His poverty we might be rich." 2 Cor. 8:9

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."John 3:16

A. C. Gaebelein

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