I READ these verses from the Psalm itself, though we shall look at several passages of Scripture in connection with them this evening, please God; but it is really these words that I have it on my heart to speak of a little.
There are three remarkable passages in the New Testament in which they are alluded to: 1 Cor. 15; Eph. 1; and Heb. 2 But we shall find, in looking at them, that these passages bring out three distinct points in the one great truth that is presented to us.
I suppose I need hardly state what that truth is. We all know that the " Man " alluded to here is the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us mark well those words: " MAN," and " the SON of man." Of Him it is said: " Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet."
Before looking into these Scriptures in detail, it would be well to say a word as to their general connection with each other, and as to that which distinguishes each from the other.
Hebrews occupies us with the person of the Son of man in the place of glory at God's right hand-the place in which God has set Him. It is the fact of this glorious Person being in this place that is presented to us; and a quantity of truths are unfolded as spiritual deductions from this great fact, revealing the blessings that flow from thence to those whom He is "not ashamed to call brethren."
In Corinthians also we find what results to us from the place of glory in which Christ now is; but here, the Spirit more especially insists on the particular truth that we shall be AS HE IS: " As we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." This side of the truth is not developed in the Epistle to the Hebrews. That we shall be with Him there is, but how we shall be is not.
In Corinthians, the glory of Christ is connected with the hope that is formed in the hearts of those who are waiting down here for Him-the hope of His coming. It runs through the whole epistle. In the very first chapter, when the apostle is considering what characterized the saints, he speaks of them as " waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." Some might complain of the apostle stating that there were matters about which he ought to give an account; but he says, Well, I have a good conscience, though this is not what justifies me; the Lord is the One who judges me. "Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the heart: and then shall every man have praise of God!" Beautiful words! They show what the heart of God is set on! The apostle has no thought of being judged for wrong doing; he knew what Christ had suffered; and though he speaks elsewhere of judging oneself, yet in the consciousness of living for Christ, and walking with a single eye, he could say he knew of nothing against himself; his heart condemned him not; he had confidence towards God. Yet he turns from this blessing to what is brighter still, and looks on with unmingled joy to the day of the Lord's coming; then, embracing others too in the full results of Christ's work as seen in the glory, he says, "Then shall every man have praise of God."
Again, if it is a question of the gathering together of the saints here on earth as members of the one body, with the precious privilege of showing forth His death, it is "till he come." So too, when speaking of the power of death over the bodies of the saints, and of that fundamental truth of the gospel, the resurrection, the Spirit establishes our hearts in God's " order "-" Christ the firstfruits, afterward they that are Christ's at His coming." In whatever way the saints are looked at, whether it is their individual calling and service, their corporate gathering, or the hope of their hearts as to the future, everything connected with them is stamped with this hope: " till the Lord come." To that moment is also reserved the judgment of the one who loves not the Lord Jesus Christ: " Let him be anathema maranatha," maranatha meaning the coming of the Lord; so that it is a curse in and for that day when He shall be manifested. I just mention these things to skew how they are brought out in connection with the Lord's coming in this epistle, whilst in Ephesians, where we also find the Psalm quoted, the Lord's coming is not mentioned at all.
In Ephesians, however, we get the highest point. The MAN in glory is always the same, but here the Spirit shews us the heart of the One who is in that place, and what He is occupied with, so that we may have part with Him, and be occupied with the very things with which He is occupied.
The opening statement of the epistle is: " Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world." The Spirit, the earnest of our inheritance, anticipates the moment when we shall be with Christ where He is. We are blessed in Christ Jesus already, in the heavenly places; and that is where our hearts are to be; there is where we find the door open, so to say, into the heart of the Lord Jesus Christ, that the saint's heart may be formed after its divine model.
But let us go back to the first Scripture we noticed in connection with the Psalm, the one in Hebrews, where we find the verses I read are quoted at length. I begin with verse 5, "For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak." It might be well to remark in passing, that this expression, "world to come," was a term familiar to Jewish ears. There are two or three words used for it in Scripture, but the general thought is the same everywhere. For the Jews there were two worlds, or ages: the age of the law, and the age of the Messiah. The "present age " was the one when the law was in force; the other was " the age to come," that is, of the Messiah-the age to which God looked forward in all the promises that He made to the fathers, and to which all the prophecies converge. Now this " age to come" is not put into subjection to angels, the other one was; and in it there was no approaching God: " The way into the holiest was not made manifest." God shrouded Himself in angelic manifestations. Moses and the people of Israel heard His voice at mount Sinai, when the law was given to them " by the disposition of angels," and the people " entreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more."
But the age to come is not put under the angels at all. Whom is it put under then? The apostle quotes prophecy in answer: " Thou host put all things in subjection under his feet" Whose feet? Messiah's evidently. But there is something more than this in it, beloved friends; it is as MAN. We read: " What is man that thou art mindful of him or the son of man that thou visitest him r God has taken up man, and put all things under him! This " age to come" is put into subjection to man in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. " Thou host put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put under him "-it is not yet the day of the manifestation of His glory-"but we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor." We see Jesus, as Man, the Son of man, in that place " at the right hand of the Majesty on high." And the angels are the servants of those who are made heirs of salvation.
Now, before we go on further, I must turn back to say a few words on chapter 1. Before ever the Spirit of God opens out the character and personal glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, as the exalted Man, He takes care to shew us who He is. He is the SON OF GOD. And here we are struck by the fact that there are not merely things stated of Him that are true of a divine person; but that these things are not true of any but of a divine person. For instance, we often find the Psalm quoted which states that God has said to Him, " Sit thou on my right hand;" but the way in which it is referred to here is quite remarkable; we read, not that " He is set down," but that " He sat down." Now what would be said of a person who sat himself down on Queen Victoria's throne? though she might indeed say to the lowest of her subjects, " Sit down there," and then he would be in duty bound to obey her. The Lord Jesus Christ seating Himself on the throne of God shows that He is God. He takes the place in His own right, as He had in His own power laid down His life and accomplished redemption: " When he had by himself purged our sins," it is said.
Again: " God hath in these last days spoken unto us in [his] Son." It is God that has spoken; but it is God speaking as the Son. Time forbids our going through the whole chapter now; but I just refer to it to skew that, while there is a real Man in the glory, that real man is God. As in the opening chapters of John's Gospel we read: "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God."
Then, further on, " And the word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
Having premised this, we come to the great fact that is set before us in the second chapter, that the One who has all authority in the age to come is a Man, and that Man, the Lord Jesus Christ. It is most simple, but you will find that this truth is the turning-point of Christianity. The Man in whom God is going to head up everything, that MAN is in His own appointed place now; and those who have part with Him, have part with what God has given to Him now.
Our hearts are slow to lay hold of this. Naturally we understand better what refers to this earth, and enters into the domain of temporal blessing and deliverances. We are like the disciples who asked the Lord after His resurrection, " Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?" It was quite natural for them, as Jews, more or less instructed in the prophecies, and having their hopes built upon promised earthly blessings, to want to know this. But He answered: " It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power; but ye shall receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me." Something better than the restoring of the kingdom to Israel was to be their present portion. The Lord, who had associated them with Himself in His service on earth, here gives them this blessed title: "My witnesses." He was there with them in His body of glory, risen from the dead, on the point of going up to His Father, whence He would send down the Holy Ghost to unite them to Himself in the glory, and be in them the divine power of realizing and enjoying the position and relationship of which He was personally the expression-Son of God and Son of man. " I ascend to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." Every redeemed soul now is divinely linked up with the Person of the Son in that place. It is the christian position, and as thus expressed, is seen to be wholly heavenly in its nature, as in its final results.
We find there are four reasons given for the Lord having been so humbled as to become a Man upon earth: for, to go up as such, He must necessarily have come down: as He said to Nicodemus, "No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven." " The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us." As such He was made "a little lower than the angels." Why? First, because " it became him, for whom are all things, and by whom all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings." It was what became GOD. The very first word in the Epistle to the Hebrews gives us the key which opens up the whole subject, and enables us to understand it all: " GOD... has spoken," has spoken in (His) Son. It is not here a question of what you are wanting, or I am wanting; it is not what meets the need of our souls here, although surely it does meet it infinitely; but it is what GOD has done for His own glory; it is what God has ever had before Him in connection with His own dear Son. It became HIM " in bringing many sons unto glory." It was God's purpose to have a family in glory.
What, then, is that family to be? This is the next question. God is far above all heavens; He looks down upon angels, upon creation, upon all the living beings in this world, and He says: I must have a family in heaven; I want sons. He passes by the angels. He looks down lower, and sees man under the power of sin and Satan, living in corruption, going on to hell, and He says, I will take my family from among them. They are all defiled, all in ruin, all living in sin; this is their state. But God promised " eternal life" in Christ Jesus before ever the world was, and the Lord Jesus says, " Lo, I come to do thy will, O God." He receives the body prepared, so that He may come down to earth, and die to put away sin, and sanctify those whom God gives to Him. He accomplishes the whole work according to the counsels and glory of God. He gives Himself, lays down His life, to sanctify to God these wicked sinners, to make them sons of God, and to bring this adopted family up into the glory that God has prepared for them. It is God's own purpose, and God's own doing. How it sets aside all our thoughts, all our purposes! God is carrying out His purpose, His thought, and He does it all by His Son! Oh, it is a wonderful revelation He has made to us!
Then we see how He does it: " It became him... in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings." Except these sufferings had been accomplished, He never could have been a Captain of salvation for them. He might have come down into this world as a passing stranger, and gone up again, in His own perfect holiness and divine right, to that place in the glory. He had often done it before. But He never could have taken sons up with Him, unless He had gone through death for them. To be the " captain of their salvation," He must be " perfected through sufferings."
" For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified, are all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren." Here we find the family, the " brethren." And when is this made good? It is after the "sufferings." Before His atoning work was done, He was entirely alone, as He said: " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." After His sufferings unto death, He can say, " Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father and your Father; and to my God and your God." He can accomplish the word of Psa. 22 " I will declare thy name unto my brethren; in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee." He carries out God's own purpose with reference to all those whom He has chosen. The Scriptures quoted from the Old Testament in proof of it are in Psa. 22 Psa. 18; and Isa. 8 They develop the blessed position He has brought us into. I do not go into them now at all, for it would take us too long, but pass on to verse 14, where we find the second reason for the Lord Jesus having been so humbled as to become a Man.
" Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood." What children? It is these children in God's purpose. He takes His place in grace among them, becoming like them, sin apart. " He also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and deliver them who, through fear of death, were all their lifetime subject to bondage." He sees them there under Satan's power, under the power of death, subject to it, and He comes down into the place they were in, to deliver them out of it, and bring them up to God. This is the second reason. And then we read: " Verily, he taketh not hold of angels, but of the seed of Abraham he taketh hold." It is not man universally that constitutes this family; it is of faith, that it might be by grace; the " children " are the seed of " faithful Abraham."
The third reason we find in verse 17, " Wherefore in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people." He has come down here, He has humbled Himself thus, that He might take away the sins of His people. If their sins were not taken away, the family that God was going to have in glory would have been unholy; that could not be. On the day of atonement the high priest took the blood of the sacrifice, and sprinkled it in the holy place on and before the mercy-seat, and made atonement for all the congregation of Israel, that they might be " clean from all their sins before the Lord." In like manner the Lord Jesus Christ has " made atonement for the sins of the people," and thus," having by himself purged our sins, has sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high."
The fourth reason is: "For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succor them that are tempted." That is, He is a faithful High Priest, ministering to His people all along the way, so that there is the fullest provision possible made for their arriving according to God's thoughts in the place that He has provided for them.
And in chapter 3. the Spirit still keeps before us this same blessed point: " Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to him, that appointed him." GOD is the starting-point of all the blessing; God, by whom and for whom are all things; God, according to whose will all the work is accomplished; God, who has put all things under the feet of the Son of man; and God, who appointed Him, and to whom He is faithful.
Now let us look for a moment at the place to which Christ has gone. He is not said to be " in heaven " merely; that is not enough. People have a careless way of talking of "getting to heaven," as if their highest hopes only attained to creeping in unperceived at the door. The Spirit sets quite another thought before us. We read in the end of the fourth chapter: " Seeing then that we have a great High Priest, that is passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God." It is " through," not merely " into." So also in chapter vii.: " made higher than the heavens." He has gone up " far above all heavens." There, at the right hand of the Majesty on high, He has sat down; that highest place is now filled by a MAN. And that "Man" is there, the divine expression before God of what the family that God is going to have there is to be. There He sits on the right hand of God, and makes known to us His glory.
For every believer here in this world, all sin is gone. The Lord Jesus Christ has gone up in spotless divine righteousness; the question of sin settled forever; and therefore every one who looks to Him gets the sense that sin is gone: " Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." But not only this; there is for the believer the divine certainty of going to the glory where Christ is. He who is there, is there as our " forerunner," as we read in chapter 6. " Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil; whither the forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus, made an high priest forever after the order of Melchisedec." The word " forerunner " supposes there are those who run after. The fact is plainly stated that the One who is there, is there as the " forerunner." And therefore we have got this hope as the anchor of the soul; " within the veil," too, the nearest, the most intimate, place in which the presence of God is known, as shown forth in the tabernacle. In that place Christ is, and He is the anchor of the soul of every believer.
Every captain knows the relief his heart finds on coming into port, when, his voyage over and his care at an end, he drops the anchor, and can go to sleep in peace. No storm can now endanger his vessel, or drive her out to sea; the anchor is dropped inside the harbor. And where is our anchor dropped? In the port for which we are bound; dropped and fixed there before ever we have started on our voyage! No earthly voyage can illustrate this blessing. Christ, having accomplished all the work, has sat down on the throne of God, and the Christian not only knows he is going there, but he has the certainty of arriving where Christ is. Christ has set him on his way. He, who has passed through the heavens, is sitting as Man at God's right hand; He who was here as a Man, and who can enter into all our sorrows, all our feelings that are not sinful, all our trials here; for He went through them all, sin apart; and now is actually in the place to which He is bringing us. So the word says, " Consider him... who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God."
There is just one point left, about which a soul might be anxious, and that is as to how the journey is to be accomplished-how we are to get where Christ is. But we read in chapter 9.: " As it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time, without sin, unto salvation." There are three points brought before us in this Epistle: in chapter 2. we " see Jesus;" in chapter 9. we " look for Him;" and in chapter 12. we " look to Jesus." Now these three things sum up the divine power that God gives us to walk through this world in a way worthy of Him. Then courage and patience are stimulated by the assurance that " Yet a very little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry." The epistle is an epistle of hope; the hope of getting to the glory where the Lord Jesus Christ is; of getting there through the trials and difficulties which we all have to meet with on the way. But if we want to know how long they will last, it is "yet a little while;" and we " have need of patience," until what time? "Until the Lord come." We are going on to glory; that is the way we are looked at all through this epistle; we are going on, like the Israelites, to the rest; and He is going to shorten the journey on His side, by coming to meet us. And when He comes for us, He will not enter into the question of sin at all, for He has done that already: " He appeared once in the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." He " was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him, shall he appear the second time, without sin, unto salvation." And what, then, is this salvation? It is certainly not the salvation of souls, for He did the work that has accomplished that before He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. But it is God's purpose to have many sons in glory, and having saved them, He is bringing them through this world of difficulties and trials, until He gets them there. And while we are going through, we have to " look off unto Jesus, the beginner and finisher of faith," who is now " set down at the right hand of the throne of God." We look to Him who is in that place, and consequently we have courage to go on until we get to Him.
I turn now to 1 Cor. 15, though I do not desire to enter into it much; but it is well to have before us the general principles found in it, in connection with our subject.
We begin at verse 20: " Now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept." Here we find Christ again presented as a Man; He is spoken of as the " firstfruits." Let us inquire what this expression means.
The children of Israel in the time of harvest brought the firstfruits to the priest, in the presence of God. This act proclaimed a double truth: first that there was a harvest, and that it was there ready to be reaped; and secondly, it gave the priest a specimen of what the harvest was. And so we find it in the Epistle to the Corinthians. The harvest is there, just ready to be reaped in God's thought, " every man in his own order; Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming." This is the divine order. But the firstfruits has gone up. Is not that beautiful? When we look at Christ in His own place, up there on the throne of God, we see that a Man in glory is the expression, in the presence of God, of what every one of His redeemed will be. So that we find in His person up there, not only the divine certainty of our getting there, because He is the " firstfruits," but also the expression of what we shall be when we get there.
Supposing a man in Israel brought, as his offering of firstfruits, wheat or olives, or figs or bunches of grapes, the priest could say to him: You have a beautiful harvest of wheat or olives, or figs or grapes. The firstfruits expressed what the harvest was. And so now, Christ is the firstfruits, He has gone up to God as the divine expression of everything that God is going to take up there in the time of the ingathering: " afterward they that are Christ's at his coming."
And how long have we got to wait for it? The very expression " firstfruits" precludes the thought of any time at all. When the Israelite brought them, the harvest was just upon the point of being reaped. And so it is. Christ has gone into that place as the firstfruits, the earnest of the harvest that is ready; He has become there the anchor of our souls, and He is coming again to fetch His people home. And therefore what becomes us is surely to be waiting for Him; as it is said in Luke 12 " Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning, and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their Lord." The one thing that is needed to put a crown upon the lives of the saints in this world, is that they should be like unto men who wait for their Lord.
" For he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." And then we get this passage quoted again: " For he hath put all things under his feet." I do not enter into all this blessed and beautiful side of the truth; it would carry us away from our subject now. The point is, as in Hebrews, that everything is subjected to Christ. But we find that He will use His power of subjecting all things in changing the body of our humiliation into the likeness of His own glorious body (Phil. 3), so that when we shall be with Him where He is, we shall be like Him. Then in verse 45 we read: " It is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam a quickening spirit. Howbeit that was not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; and afterward that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second Man, the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." We shall bear it. It is God's own purpose which must have its accomplishment.
We are waiting for this; we know that when He comes, He will conform us to His likeness.
Thus we see how inseparably this truth is connected with the coming of the Lord as a formative power in the heart of the believer. You cannot have a sense of the Lord Jesus being in this place in glory, without your heart being formed into waiting for Him to come to take you to be with Him there. The coming of the Lord characterizes this Epistle to the Corinthians, as we have already seen.
Just one word more, however, upon the subject before we leave it; I mean as to the way in which the Lord's coming is presented to us. You will not find it presented as putting an end to all the troubles and trials of this world. You often hear people say: "Things are very bad, and sorrowful, and trying, hut the Lord will soon come and put an end to it all." This is not the way it is put before us in Scripture. I find, on the contrary, that the man who is really waiting for the Lord from heaven will say: I accept all the suffering, all the sorrow, all the trial here as from the Lord; I do not seek to be " unclothed," I do not wish to escape from it, all I want is to be acceptable to Him in it. If I do not get sorrow here of some kind or other, I am not in the place of a son at all; for we are told that by the suffering we go through here, God is working out His own purposes for us, and giving us the immense privilege of finding out in practice what was the path in which the Lord Jesus Christ walked when He was here on earth. I suppose that if there is one thing we shall esteem precious when we see the Lord Jesus in glory, it will be to have been a little while in the world in which He suffered, and through which He walked as the Man of sorrows. But I need scarcely say that, to do this, we must walk with Him.
Wonderful indeed is this subject, too extensive for us to go into now; but let us remember that the Spirit is not satisfied with our looking for Christ from heaven merely as relief; it is not to be only a future thing with us; He would have us, until He has brought us home to the glory where Christ is, occupied with those things which occupy Christ, and in communion with Him in the place in which He has already set us in Himself.
For this we turn lastly to the Ephesians, where we find the Spirit putting before us " the mighty power of God which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all." (Eph. 1:19-2319And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, 20Which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, 21Far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: 22And hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church, 23Which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all. (Ephesians 1:19‑23).)
What a presentation of the church of God! How wonderful the very way in which it is introduced! We have first Christ, the Man in glory brought before us, raised from the dead, and set at God's own right hand by the working of His mighty power;-this glorious "Man" set far above all principality and power, and every name that is named, all things being put under His feet. And then, as established Head over everything, He is seen as Head of the church, which is " His body; the fullness of him that filleth all in all "! And now He nourishes and cherishes it, and the day is coming when He will " present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; holy and without blemish.... For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it even as the Lord the church: for we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones."
Who can tell it, beloved friends? We have here presented to us the activities of Christ's heart as a world of wondrous occupation for the Lord's people here on earth, so that our hearts may be set upon it, because His heart is set upon it, and so that we may be really walking on in company with Christ in the path into which the Spirit has brought us.
But it is really impossible for us to grasp this side of the truth until we have taken hold of the other two. Unless I know the Lord Jesus Christ as the One who, having purged my sins, has sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high, and is now for me a merciful and faithful High Priest to meet every need on the way up to glory; unless I am really looking for Him as the One whose glorious image I am. to bear, I have no divine capacity for entering into that which is unfolded to us in the Epistle to the Ephesians. For here it is a question of the heart's affections. It is said, even in ordinary things, that " people cannot command their affections;" and cases are not rare in which we see the affections stronger than the will. But in spiritual things, blessed be God, the Holy Ghost, who leads the saints, sheds abroad in their hearts the lore of God. All is divine. If I have Christ in my heart, I must go on to the glories into which the Holy Ghost would lead me, " where Christ sitteth." I must take hold of this glorious hope that is before me, the hope of soon being with Him in the place where He is, the hope of seeing redemption completed in glory. We cannot see it now, but the day is coming when every child of God will be like the Lord Jesus Christ; the day is coming when God will change poor vile man, he who has been the slave of Satan, into the image of His own Son.
And what is Christ doing meanwhile? He is occupied with His church, with gathering it Out of the world, with nourishing it and cherishing it. Where can we find it? The Lord knows where His members are, and all that is needed for us is to be in the current of His thoughts, that we may find them out, and enter into His thoughts about them. And we need this more than ever now; for it is a day in which Satan is seeking to take from us all truth connected with it. He will leave us with what people call " fundamental truth," but nothing more. Surely every true heart must own as " fundamental " what Christ is, and what is revealed about Him. It is not my salvation, as is generally understood; it is not anything that is of me; it is what is of GOD, as we see in the Epistle to the Hebrews.
Getting hold of Christ's thoughts as to His church, is the one thing that will keep our souls in order, no matter what comes up. And truth connected with the church is that which Satan is always trying to take away from the saints; not in a bald way, for they would not stand that, but by so deceiving them as to what is truth, that the true thing just escapes their grasp.
We need to lay hold really of the place in which the Holy Spirit has set us, in Christ, who is seated in the heavenlies, and to be occupied with what Christ is there. The Lord will give us the needed courage as we walk through this world, with all its difficulties, and trials, and sorrows. He assures us that we shall have trouble as we pass through it, but the day is coming which will more than make up for it all. When Christ shall be manifested in His glory, and in His Father's glory, and the glory of the holy angels, we shall be manifested with Him, and meanwhile our blessing and our happiness is to be going on with Him in the scene where He was rejected, and had not where to lay His head, keeping the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
(W. J. L.)