No. 2.
“Ye are complete in Him.”― Col. 2:10
To the true believer Christ is everything, and Christ is enough. The heart, when in communion with Him, finds perfect satisfaction―perfect rest. “Ye are complete in Him.” I do not give this as the primary sense of the passage, but I use it to express my thought. I have all that I need in Him. So many excellencies congregate in Him, that when I see Him―when I feel Him with me―when I hold communion with Him―I have all my heart can wish. My mind, my spirit, my affections,—all are satisfied in Christ. He is my “wisdom.” (1 Corinthians 1:30.) In myself I am a fool. The effort of my mind to search out God is vain. (Job 11:7.) So high, so infinite, so far past finding out is He in all His thoughts and ways (Romans 11:33), that I―a worm, a child of yesterday―can only ask Him for instruction, and not even this aright without His aid. But Jesus is my wisdom. Jesus keeps me near His feet. Though but a babe (Matthew 11:25), He condescends to teach me, unfolding by His Spirit, through His word, those precious things which He alone reveals, and only those who love Him care to know―those precious things which are connected with himself and all His wondrous paths in grace and glory. Little do I know indeed, but He is “wisdom” to me. He who “was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was” (Proverbs 8:23-31), is pleased to teach, and I am pleased to learn what He imparts—just so much and no more as He from day to day assigns me for my lesson. Slow and dull am I to learn, but He is patient, giving line upon line, and precept upon precept, here a little, and there a little, as He sees that I can bear it. (John 16:12.) Gentle, meek, and lowly, is His character (Matthew 11:29), and all His methods of instruction correspond with it. None teacheth like Him (Job 36:22)―none so kindly, so effectually. How blessed, then, the privilege of being taught of Him, in whom dwelleth all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Colossians 2:3)―who is “pure and peaceable” (James 3:17), gentle and easy to be intreated (Luke 24:29), full of mercy and good fruits―who is ready to “teach sinners in the way” (Psalms 25:8), to make them “wise unto salvation” (2 Timothy 3:15) through faith which is in Him!
I am complete in Him for “righteousness;” for God has made Him “righteousness” to me, I have nothing of my own but sin. Lost and ruined in myself, I find in Him a perfectness which satisfies the eye of God, and in His grace He puts that perfectness on me―imputes it to me freely (Romans 4:22-25), without money and without price (Isaiah 55:1)―covers me from head to foot therewith (Isaiah 61:10), and makes me perfect in it. (Ezek. 16:14.) Thus of Him my righteousness is now provided. (Isaiah 54:17.) Thus, in this respect, I am “complete in Him.”
“Sanctification” also is He made to me of God. In Him I am “separated” from this present evil world. (Galatians 1:4.) Its principles, its maxima, and its ways are nothing now to me. I find no pleasure in them. The joy His presence gives has weaned me from the things of this world. Not by ascetic rules, or Pharisaic pride, am I apart, but by “His presence.” “Wherein shall it be known,” said one, “that I and thy people have found favor in thy sight? Is it not in that thou goest with us?” So shall we be separated. (Exodus 33:16.) Thus it was in olden time with Moses―thus is it with believers now. “His presence” separates from evil. He is sanctification. Companionship with Him is joy sufficient. We are “complete in Him.”
He too is our “redemption.” From the power of darkness―from the slavery of sin―from guilt and fear―from woe eternal, ―His precious death hath freed us. “In Him we have redemption through His blood, ―the forgiveness of sins.” (Ephesians 1:7.) His Cross has been our ransom―His resurrection is its proof. In spirit we are risen with Him, through the faith which He has given. We wait, indeed, for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body; wait for Him to change it and fashion it like unto His glorious body. This is our blessed hope. We wait for Him yet a little while. Conformity to the Son of God (Romans 8:29), to the image of the heavenly (1 Corinthians 15:49), is that we wish for. God will accomplish it in us. Through eternal ages the church of the firstborn shall be to the praise of His glory; and to each believer now, as to the saints collectively, it may be said, the glory of Jesus, the blessed Christ of God, being in view—ye, each and all of you, are complete in Him.