It is impossible to tell out in human language the full blessedness of having the holy Scriptures. But what is most striking in it is the revelation it gives us of God, so that we now know Him not only as Creator, and one who is kind to the unthankful and the unholy in providing for His creatures (for “His tender mercies are over all His work;”), but we also know Him in the exceeding riches of His grace as a Savior-God, in and through our Lord Jesus Christ. Having received “the words of God,” and “the Spirit of God,” we know that we are brought to God, and are “in the light as He is in the light.” Precious grace! It is not merely that we have title to glory through the blood of the cross, but we are brought to God who is “light” and “love” in Christ, who is our Life, Righteousness, and Peace.
Before the death of Christ, God was not so revealed. Till Jesus the Son of God came, God was hid behind a veil, and little known except by His acts; then Christ revealed the Father, and made Himself known as the Son, and on leaving, promised to send the Holy Spirit to abide with us forever. “No man hath seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.” The Son, the effulgence of His glory, has fully manifested God in flesh. We have the Father so perfectly represented in the Son, that He could say, “If ye had known Me, ye should have known My Father also.... he that hath seen Me hath seen the Father”; and He declares that His rejecters were guilty, and had no cloak for their sin, because as He said, Ye have “both seen and hated both Me and My Father” (John 1:18; 14:7,9; 15:24).
Though God had been so far made known in Old Testament times, that He visited Adam and Abraham, and dwelt among His redeemed earthly people; yet it was not till the Savior’s baptism that God, in the plurality of Persons – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – was made known. The Spirit came down as a dove, and abode on the spotless One, and the voice from heaven, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased,” manifested also the personal glories of the Father and the Son. From that time the unfathomable blessedness of knowing God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – one God – abounds in Holy Scripture; and the believing knowledge of redemption, through grace, according to divine counsel and eternal purpose, has brought us into conscious relationship with God as our Father, with the Son as our eternal life, and the Spirit given to guide us into all the truth, to strengthen us with might in the inner man, and also as the anointing, seal, and earnest of our inheritance.
It is because the Scriptures give us God’s revelation of Himself and of His mind and will. and so constantly testify of Christ, that by the teaching and ministry of the Holy Spirit, they are the food of our souls. And here observe, it is not our own thoughts about Scripture, or our reasonings about it, or opinions of it, or deductions from it, but what God says. “It is written,” was the word so often uttered by our adorable Savior and His apostles; and we may be assured that we can only “resist” Satan by being “steadfast in the faith.” And what is this, but believingly holding and using Scripture as the Word of God? How else could we be steadfast in the faith?
Again, we see the untold blessedness of the Scriptures in giving us divine intelligence as to ourselves, our state, our path, our circumstances, and everything around us, as to Jews, Gentiles, and church of God. They open up to us the past, present, and future; things heavenly and earthly, things temporal and eternal,. the two Adams and all in connection with them as heads of races; and the curtain is so drawn now and then, that the Spirit-led soul can survey the coming glories and their felicity, and also solemnly contemplate the infernal regions of unending misery and punishment.
In the Old Testament, we have the sons of Israel, a people God called out to Himself; also the Gentiles, with promise that God’s blessing should even reach out to them – that in Christ, the Seed, all nations should be blessed. But the church, the body of Christ, was not revealed there. The prophets went from “the sufferings of Christ” to “the glories which should follow,” and entirely passed over the marvelous work of forming and removing the church to her destined heavenly glory, before the Lord comes out in blessing to His ancient people, and judgment of the quick and the dead at His appearing and kingdom. Typical intimations and shadows there were now and then of Christ and the church as in Adam and Eve, Isaac and Rebecca, Joseph and Asenath, Moses and his wife; but the assembly as “the body of Christ” on earth, united to Christ the Head in heaven, and formed into one body by the gift of the Holy Spirit, was not revealed till Paul was called by divine grace. Ephesians 3 plainly shows this, and that the mystery of the church was “hid in God,” “not made known,” “kept secret since the world began.” (See also Rom. 16:25-26; for “scriptures of the prophets” read “prophetic scriptures.”)
Believers are now, by the Holy Spirit, in union with Christ ascended; for “by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.” “He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.” All this most blessed workmanship of the Holy Spirit, His present ministry through gifts bestowed by Christ ascended, all the affection and care of Christ for His assembly, and the perfection of the Father’s love to His children, loving them as He loved His Son, are richly and blessedly brought to us through the apostolic writings, and especially by those of Paul, who was emphatically a minister of the church or assembly (Col. 1:23). This, therefore, gives them a sacred charm to the believer, and through faith they necessarily produce a walk of separation and devotedness to the Lord.
(To be Continued).