BEGINNINGS OF COMPREHENSION.

As the mental eyes and ears of the believer begin to take in the fulness of God’s provision for his creatures, his former fears begin to subside; and he begins to get a realizing sense of the goodness and love of God, as never before. But still, he will have queries.

He will want to know when this day of which the Apostle speaks will begin; – the day of the world’s judgment, or trial in righteousness, under favorable conditions.

He will want to know why it did not begin immediately after our Lord’s death and resurrection, – if it waited for and was dependent upon his atoning work.

This will be the proper opportunity for opening before the eyes of his understanding another department of our heavenly Father’s gracious plan; – showing him what is so clearly set forth in the Scriptures; viz., that the Father has purposed an elect and select Church to be as a Bride joined to Christ, her Lord and Redeemer and Bridegroom; – as a special illustration of divine mercy and goodness, sharing his glory, honor and immortality; – “changed” to the divine nature in the first resurrection.

He now will begin to understand faintly what the Apostle meant when he declared, “Eye hath not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared [in reservation] for them that love him; but God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit.” (1 Cor 2:9,10)

He will begin to appreciate the fact that when we enter the Lord’s family and become members of the household of faith, we are only on the threshold, of knowledge and appreciation, and have need of progress and growth. He will begin to understand the force of the Apostle’s words when he said, speaking to Christians, and not to worldly people, “I bow my knees unto the Father…that he would grant you… that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height; and to know the love of Christ.” (Eph 3:14-19) As again he says, “I cease not to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers, that the…Father of glory may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints.” – Eph 1:16-18

It requires time for heart and head so to expand as to take in a glimpse of such a wonderful blessing as this which God has provided for the “elect.” But whoever gets even a faint glimpse of the greatness of God’s favor toward the Church, will not be surprised that in the divine plan so liberal an allowance as nearly nineteen centuries was made for the calling and chastisement and perfecting of the saints for the great and glorious work to which they, as joint-heirs with Messiah, are called. Neither will they think strange, the fiery trials which try all of these whom the Lord our God calls, and accepts as probationary members of the elect Kingdom class.

They will perceive, readily enough, that if it was expedient, yea, necessary, that our Lord Jesus, with all of his experience in the heavenly courts, must “learn obedience by the things which he suffered,” and prove his loyalty to the Father by faithfulness even unto death, much more must his followers – whose previous history was that of sinners – be tried and thoroughly tested in respect to their loyalty to the Lord.

From this standpoint, the experiences of Christians take on a totally new meaning; and those who have made consecration of themselves to the Lord realize that they are running for a mark, and for a prize; – no longer are their steps so unsteady, no longer are their hearts so faint and so careless, no longer do the world’s baubles prove so enticing and ensnaring.

God is thus working in them through the Word of his grace, through its exceeding great and precious promises. Through these he works in them to will to be faithful to him; and then to do; – conform their lives to the requirements of his Word. The same truth becomes also a power, a strength of God, in them, enabling them more and more to do those things which they should – the things pleasing in God’s sight.

In this view, all is clear and plain; not only do we see that God permits evil in the world that the world may learn certain lessons of bitter experience, as to the natural rewards of evil doing, but we see also a ministry of evil in respect to the saints – in their testing and polishing and refining; making them ready, and proving them worthy, as overcomers, to inherit the wonderful things which God has in reservation for the faithful. This will be, to the intelligent believer, a full explanation of why God has not yet undertaken the blessing of the world; – of why the promises, made through the prophets, of a coming time when the knowledge of the Lord will fill the earth, and the curse be rolled away, have not yet been fulfilled. They can see that it is the rolling away of this curse, the wiping away of all tears, the bringing of blessings to mankind, that is the very work for which God has commissioned his glorified Son, and for joint-heirship in which he is selecting the Bride, the Lamb’s wife.

From such a vantage point of view, the most sluggish intellect will catch wonderful and refreshing glimpses of glory and blessing that are to follow, as soon as the present “ministry of evil” shall have accomplished its work. Looking into the future they begin to realize something of the lengths and breadths and heights and depths of the divine plan, and they will be ready to exclaim,

“Oh, if God’s plan is so great that it has required such a broad foundation, such great preparation, in the person of our Lord, and in the persons of his people who will be joint-heirs with him in the Kingdom, how very great must be the blessing that shall be ministered to the world through these, when the appointed time shall come!”

At first, the thoughts of the blessing coming to the poor groaning creation, and of the glories coming to the faithful and loyal and suffering saints, will overwhelm your auditor; and he can see and think of nothing else, for a while, then the stupendous grace of God manifested in this wonderful plan of human salvation. But, by and by, he will begin to think of himself, and what part he is privileged to have under the divine arrangement; and, as he sees a possibility of joint-heirship with the Lord amongst the faithful overcomers, he will find that all the exceeding great and precious promises of God’s Word, and the new hopes inspired thereby, will be an energy and a power in his soul which he never before knew; – a purifying energy, a sanctifying power. “He that hath this hope in him purifies himself, even as he is pure.” Instinctively he will begin to heed the Apostle’s exhortation, to “lay aside every weight, and the sin that doth so easily beset us; and to run with patience the race that is set before us in the Gospel.” – Heb 12:1.

Soon after, various exhortations of the Word will have a new and a deeper meaning to him. As for instance, when he reads the Apostle’s exhortation, “Let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and of the spirit, perfecting holiness in the reverence of the Lord” (2 Cor 7:1), his words, his thoughts, his actions, his clothing, his personal appearance, will all come under inspection from a new standpoint; – he is no longer a condemned sinner, but a justified and sanctified son of God; – his representative; – his ambassador. It will be a new thought to him, to some extent, that cleansing the flesh is a part of the sanctifying work; and that a cleansing of the spirit or mind or thoughts or intentions, is equally necessary, – in order to the attainment of a condition of heart pleasing and acceptable to the Lord. And although he will never attain the perfection in the flesh, because of inherited blemishes, he will, nevertheless, assuredly make considerable progress in this direction; and not to see some progress should be a cause of disappointment, and should lead to self-examination at the mercy-seat. (Heb 4:16) He will hear, moreover, the Apostle Peter’s exhortation to the same class, saying, “Add to your faith virtue [fortitude]; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge self-control; and to self-control patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. …For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” – 2 Pet 1: 5,8-11. (R3168)