Him and to share His marvelous inheritance as His co-heirs. That
glorious vision is the evidence of our coming glory, when we shall
be transformed into His image that He might be the firstborn among
many brethren. As we gaze in the Spirit on Him who is crowned with
glory and honor we can see ourselves.
And as the age darkens, as the Laodicean state becomes more
prevalent, temptations and snares increase, the enemy's powers and
activities more marked, we need to open our eyes and hearts wider,
to take in the vision of our blessed head in Glory. Only in this way
can we be kept in these evil days. The only way of spiritual
progress, spiritual enjoyment, spiritual worship is to "behold as in
a glass the glory of the Lord," and beholding that glorious vision
we "are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by
the Spirit of the Lord" (2 Cor. vii:18).
This glorious vision will keep us in the place of separation. It
will make us heavenly-minded and produce in our lives the practical
results of the cross of Christ "crucified unto the world and the
world crucified unto me." Why do real Christians, who know the truth
and even know and speak of His Second Coming go along with the world
and delight in its ways? It is because the heart is departed from
Christ and has lost sight of the blessed and glorious vision. Years
ago a saint of God, who is now present with the Lord, made the
following statement:
"It sometimes happens that Christians have got so far away from
Christ in heart, that they become engrossed in the affairs of this
life, and some can even visit and enjoy the poor empty, tinselled
shows of this world's vanity. What could be more lamentable? They
forget that _death's stamp_ is deeply graven on everything this side
of resurrection. But such actions clearly prove that the heart must
have been away from Christ for some time."
Reader! if this means you return unto thy rest. Arise now and seek
His face and behold your Saviour, who was made a little lower than
the angels crowned with glory and honor.
May all our hearts, dear children of God, cry out with him, who knew
Him so well, the prisoner of the Lord "That I may know _Him_, and
the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings,
being made conformable unto His death" (Phil. iii:10). Soon we shall
know Him and all His glory.
I see a Man at God's right hand,
Upon the throne of God,
And there in seven-fold light I see
The seven-fold sprinkled blood;
I look upon that glorious Man,
On that blood-sprinkled throne;
I know that He sits there for me,
The glory is my own.
The heart of God flows forth in love,
A deep eternal stream;
Through that beloved Son it flows
To me as unto Him.
And, looking on His face, I know--
Weak, worthless, though I be--
How deep, how measureless, how sweet,
That love of God to me.
My Brethren.
OUR Lord Jesus Christ calls those for whom He died and who have
believed on Him "_My Brethren_." What a word it is! The Brethren of
the Man in Glory! Brethren of Him who is at the right hand of God,
the upholder and heir of all things! Pause for a moment, dear
reader. Let your heart lay hold anew of this wonderful message of
God's Grace; Brethren of the Lord Jesus Christ! What depths of love
and grace these words contain! What heights of glory they promise to
us, who were bought by His own precious blood! His Brethren now; His
Brethren forever. One with Him, one with His Father and His God.
Sharers of His life, sharers of His Spirit, sharers of His glory and
His inheritance. Blessed, glorious truth, He calls us His Brethren.
It is in the twenty-second Psalm where we find this truth revealed
prophetically for the first time. That Psalm begins, as we have seen
before, with the utterance of the deepest distress. It closes with
the shout of victory and of triumph. He who was forsaken of God on
the cross, the blessed sin bearer, has received glory. In the midst
of the congregation, His redeemed people, He praises God, who has
delivered Him and who gave Him Glory. In God's own time, in the
coming day of His visible manifestation, all the ends of the world
shall remember and turn unto the Lord, and all the kindreds of the
nations shall worship before Him. Then the Kingdom will be the
Lord's.
He who suffered on the cross was heard "from the horns of the
unicorn" (Ps. xxii:21). Resurrection was the answer from God; the
power of God raised Him from the dead. At once, after the great work
had been accomplished, there follows the triumphant declaration of
Him whose voice had cried so bitterly in death, "I will declare Thy
Name unto my brethren; in the midst of the congregation will I
praise Thee." And blessed was the fulfilment on that day of joy,
when the tomb was empty and He had come forth, the risen Christ. To
Mary Magdalene He said on that glorious resurrection morning, "But
go and tell _my brethren_, and say unto them, I ascend unto my
Father and your Father, and to my God and your God" (John xx:17).
What joy must then have filled His loving heart. From His gracious
lips there bursts forth a message such as He never gave to His own
before His resurrection.
The great work on the cross had been accomplished, sin had been put
away by the sacrifice of Himself. The Only Begotten of the Father,
God's holy Son, one with God, became Man; then passing through
death, in which He fully glorified God, God raised Him from the
dead. And now He gives the blessed results of His own work for those
who believe on Him. He has brought us into the same relationship
with His Father and His God, which He Himself holds, as the Man
Christ Jesus, raised from the dead. His Father, the Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, is our Father; His God is our God. And again we
pause as we write this. Let our hearts repeat it: "My Father, your
Father; my God, your God." He has brought us into fellowship with
His Father; He has brought us to God and the place He has with the
Father and with God, is the place God's fathomless Grace has given
to us. How little our hearts take it in! How little reality we
possess of all this! And yet He wants us to enjoy it as He enjoys
the fulness of joy in His Father's and His God's own presence. May
the Holy Spirit work in us unhindered, that through His power we may
lay hold in faith of this mighty truth and have it as a _practical
power_ in our daily lives. My Father, your Father; my God, your God
and Christ, who loved me and gave Himself for me, Christ, who loveth
us, is with His Father and His God. In such relationship, brought to
the Father and to God through the Lord Jesus Christ and kept there
by His own Grace and Power, how happy we should be.
And because we possess now in virtue of Christ's work this blessed
relationship, He owns us joyfully as His brethren. Hebrews ii:11-12
puts this more fully before our hearts: "For both He that
sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one; for which
cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren. Saying, I will
declare Thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I
sing praise unto Thee." The Lord Jesus Christ is He that sanctifieth
and they that are sanctified by His great work and are in Him, are
believing sinners, reconciled to God by His blood. Both He that
sanctifieth and we are all of One and this One is God, the Father.
Therefore He is not ashamed to call them brethren. It is true we
possess this relationship with the Man in Glory, the Lord Jesus
Christ, because we are born of God. We have eternal life, His own
life, and that makes us One with Him. But this is not the truth in
view here. It is the truth that He has identified Himself with us
and through His death and resurrection we are identified with Him.
And what it means "in the midst of the church will I sing praises
unto Thee" we shall not follow at this time.
But let us keep it before our hearts a little while longer. The Lord
of Glory calls us "My Brethren." He who is there in the Father's
house, in the Father's presence and on the Father's throne is not
ashamed to call us brethren. He knows all about us. He knows all the
depths of sin in which we are by nature; that by nature we were
enemies by wicked works and children of wrath, but He took it all
upon Himself and has taken it out of the way and now He looks upon
us and all who have accepted Him by personal faith as being one with
Him and one with His Father; therefore He is not ashamed to call us
brethren. What a comfort it should be to our hearts! What joy it
should create in our souls! He Himself received from God, His
heart's desire and the request of His lips (Ps. xxi:2). And all His
desire and request was in our behalf, that He might bring us, His
many sons, to glory. And now He rejoices in us, for we are His
inheritance. He wants us to rejoice in Him and with Him in an
unspeakable joy and full of glory. Our souls entering into all this
and rejoicing with Him in His salvation, enjoying the comfort of it;
this honors Him and honors God.
It should end the discouragement and unbelief from which we so often
suffer. Though we are weak and erring, imperfect in all our ways,
yet He is not ashamed to call us brethren. Such a fellowship and
relation into which we are brought once and, for all by the Son of
God, should, if accepted in faith, dispel any doubt about ourselves
and free us from all gloom and discouragement. Alas! how dull we are
not to enter fully into the joy and comfort Grace has bestowed upon
us!
And then think of the dignity and honor which is ours. Sons of God
with Him; Heirs of God with Him; one with Him, perfectly identified
with the blessed One in God's presence. Therefore He is not ashamed
to call us brethren. To walk worthy of the Lord is our calling; and
worthy of the Lord we shall walk if we have the great fact of our
fellowship with the Son of God as a reality before our souls. It is
a sad state to speak theoretically of our position in Christ, to
know all this with our intellects and not to manifest it in our
lives and show forth the excellencies of Him, who has called us from
darkness into his marvellous light.
He is not ashamed to call us brethren. It should strengthen the love
for the brethren. Love one another. The weakest, the most imperfect
believer, that one who appears to us so unlovable and so ignorant,
is nevertheless owned by him. Just let us remember in looking upon
all believers, that he is not ashamed to call them brethren, that no
matter where they belong, what their knowledge in the Scriptures
might be, they belong to Christ, and are equally beloved of God. How
we need it in a day when Satan goes about dividing the people of
God. Love for the brethren, a deep, real heart love, will possess us
as our hearts feed upon the fact of our oneness with him and with
His Father and His God.
He is not ashamed to call them brethren. It will be an incentive to
witness for Him. Dishonored as He is, it falls upon us to honor Him
by our personal witness. While in the Father's presence He sings and
is the leader of the praises of His people, we must sing of Him here
and utter His praise on earth. He is not ashamed of us; _how could
we ever be ashamed of Him?_ What an honor to speak His worth, to
tell out, though in feeble way, His glory and exalt His name. And
yet we must beware of an unscriptural familiarity with Him, which
the Holy Spirit does not sanction in the Scriptures. We must not
address Him, as it is so often done, as "my brother," or other
sentimental terms, which our pen is reluctant to repeat. In all this
we must not forget His dignity and glory. While He thus identified
Himself with us and is not ashamed to call us brethren, He is
nevertheless the holy Son of God, the Lord of all. As such we must
adore and worship Him. Some blessed day we shall be just like Him.
We are predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that
He might be the first born among many brethren (Rom. viii:29). That
will be in the glorious day when we shall meet Him face to face. "We
know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall
see Him as He is" (John iii:2). What it all will mean? What day of
joy and triumph for Him, when He stands as the leader of all whom
the Father has given unto Him, when all according to His prayer will
be the sharers of His Glory. Then He will be glorified in His saints
for they will bear His image and reflect His glory. What a destiny!
Like Him and with Him. And this future of perfect conformity to the
Lord Jesus Christ and possession of the wonderful inheritance,
which, in its riches we cannot grasp now with out finite minds, is
rapidly approaching. How soon it may burst upon us!
Oh, friends, beloved in the Lord! Do we all enjoy this now in faith?
Is it so that the Lord Jesus Christ becomes daily more real and
precious to us? Do we live in the power of all this?
The Patience of Christ.
"BUT the Lord direct your hearts into the Love of God and into the
_Patience of Christ_" (2 Thess. iii:5). With these words Paul
exhorted the Thessalonian believers. They had many trials and
difficulties. They suffered persecutions and were troubled. False
alarms had affected their patience of hope in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The inspired exhortation puts before their hearts the Patience of
Christ. Comfort and joy, encouragement and peace, would surely come
to their hearts and strengthen them, if they remembered and entered
into the Patience of Christ.
And who can describe or speak fully and worthily of the Patience of
our blessed Lord! It includes so much. All His moral Glory and
Divine perfections are concealed and revealed in this Word. The word
patience has a wide meaning. It means more than we generally express
by it. Submission, endurance in meekness, waiting in faith,
quietness, contentment, composure, forebearance, suffering in
calmness, calmness in suffering; all and more is contained in the
one word, Patience. And such patience in all its fulness and
perfection the Son of God exhibited in His earthly life. Whenever we
look in the Gospels, we behold this calm, quiet, restful patience.
His whole life here on earth is but a continued record of patience.
In patience His childhood was spent, and when in His twelfth year
the Glory of His Deity flashed forth we read "He went down with
them, and came to Nazareth, and was subject unto them." In patience,
He whose mighty power had called the universe in existence, toiled
on, content in Nazareth, submissive to the Father, till after many
years the day would come, when the work He had come to do should be
begun and finished. To describe that Patience during His public
ministry from Nazareth, where He had been brought up, to Golgotha,
would necessitate a close scrutiny of every step of the way, every
act and every utterance which came from His holy lips. What
discoveries of His Grace and moral Glory we make, if under the
guidance of His Spirit we meditate on His life here below. Humility
and submission under God, patient waiting on Him, utter absence of
all haste, perfect calmness of soul and every other characteristic
of perfect patience, we can trace constantly in that wonderful life.
What patience is revealed in the forty days in the wilderness, when
He hungered and was with the wild beasts (Mark i:13). When Satan
tempted Him and asked for stones to be made bread, He exhibited
still His patience. In His service, that marvellous service rendered
by the perfect servant, no ambitiousness or ostentatiousness can
ever be discovered. He pleased not Himself but Him who sent Him. He
was constantly going about doing the Father's will. His kindness and
love were rewarded by rejection and insults, yet no complaint or
murmur ever came from His lips. He was always trusting in God,
perfectly calm, perfectly satisfied.
And how His patience shines out in dealing with men. What patience
He had with His disciples and how He bore with them in love. They
were slow learners. What patience and tenderness in his conversation
with her, whom He had sought, the woman at Samaria's well. And
greatest above all His patience in suffering. He endured the cross.
When He was reviled, He reviled not again; when He suffered, He
threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judgeth
righteously. (1 Pet. ii:23). He was oppressed, and He was afflicted,
yet He opened not His mouth; He was brought as a lamb to the
slaughter, and as a sheep before his shearers is dumb, so He opened
not His mouth. All the buffetings, shame, dishonors, griefs, pains
and sorrows He patiently endured. Oh! the patience of Christ, who
for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame!
And into this patience of Christ our hearts are to be directed. It
is to be the object of our contemplation and to be followed by us,
who belong to Him. The patience of Christ must be manifested in our
lives. For even hereunto were ye called, because Christ also
suffered for us, leaving us an example, that ye should follow His
steps. His humility, submissiveness, contentment, calmness, patience
in endurance, in doing and suffering the will of God, must be
reproduced in our lives. But how little we know of it in reality.
Impatience is the leading characteristic of the closing days of this
present evil age. It is alas! but too prominently seen among God's
people who are influenced by the present day currents. How little
true waiting on the Lord and for the Lord is practiced! How much
reaching out after the things which are but for a moment and which
will soon perish! In consequence there is but little enjoyment of
that which is the glorious and eternal portion of the Saints of God.
How great the haste and hurry of present day life! How little
quietness and contentment! In suffering and loss, murmurings,
fault-finding and words of forced resignation are more frequently heard
than joyful songs of praise. Unrest instead of rest, discontent
instead of contentment, anxiety instead of simple trust, self
exaltation instead of self abnegation, ambitiousness instead of
lowliness of mind are found on all sides among those who name the
name of Christ and who carry His Life in their hearts. And why? Your
heart, dear reader, is so often out of touch with Christ. You lose
sight of Him. His Spirit is grieved and in consequence there is
failure and the impatience of the flesh. Return, oh my soul, unto
thy rest! Direct, O Lord, our hearts into the Patience of Christ.
The Patience of Christ. He is still the patient Christ. Rejected by
the world He has taken His place upon the Father's throne. There He
waits until His enemies are made His footstool. Long ago, in our
human reckoning, He entered there. Long ago the Father said to Him,
"Ask of Me and I will give Thee the heathen for thine inheritance,
and the uttermost part of the earth for Thy possession" (Ps. ii:8).
Up to now He has not yet asked the Father. When He asks it will mean
judgment for this world. In infinite patience He has waited and
waited in the presence of God. And all this time He has carried on
His work as the Priest and Advocate of His people who live on earth.
With what tenderness and patience He has dealt with all who lived in
the past centuries. His mighty power kept them and now they are at
home with Him. The same patience He manifests towards us. How often
we have failed Him and walked in the flesh instead of walking in the
Spirit. We came to Him and confessed and then we found Him so loving
towards us. But ere long we failed again and in His loving patience
His arms were again around us. And thus a hundred times. He changeth
not. He is the same loving, patient Lord towards His own in Glory as
He was on earth. "He shall not be discouraged," the prophet
declared. Even so His Patience knows no discouragement.
In all the dishonor done to His holy, worthy Name, He endures
patiently. He is silent to all what is done by His enemies. The
Patience of Christ. May the Lord grant us His Patience. John said to
himself, "I am your brother and companion in tribulation and in the
kingdom and _patience_ of Jesus Christ" (Rev. i:9). To that kingdom
and Patience of Jesus Christ of which John speaks of belonging we
belong. The martyrs belonged to it. Afflictions, persecutions and
sufferings were their part. They are ours. In humility, in
endurance, unflinching courage, in the patience of Christ, let us
suffer with Him, share His reproach until His Glory is revealed.
He Shall Not Keep Silent.
THE heavens have long been silent. It is one of the leading
characteristics of this present age, the closed, the silent heavens.
But they will not be silent forever. "Our God shall come and shall
not keep silence" (Ps. i:3). In His divine Patience the Lord has
been at the right hand of God for nearly two thousand years. He will
not occupy that place forever. It is not His permanent station to be
upon the Father's throne. He has the promise of His own throne,
which He as the King-Priest must occupy. Nearly two thousand years
have gone since He passed through the heavens and during that time
He has been rejected by the world. Every possible dishonor, insult
and shame has been heaped upon His holy head through the
instrumentality of the enemy, the devil. Never before has the
rejection of the Man in Glory been so pronounced, so radical, so
blasphemous as now. Those who love the Lord Jesus Christ are
constantly seized by an unspeakable grief on account of these awful
denials of the Christ of God and an horror as well. And still He
patiently waits. But He will not always wait. His Patience will some
day be exhausted. He will pray His unprayed prayer in Glory and ask
of the Father the nations and the uttermost parts of the earth. The
Father will then send the Firstborn back to this earth. When He
comes in visible Glory to this earth it will mean the day of
vengeance. The vengeance of God will fall upon His enemies. All the
Christ rejecters, the wicked men and women who received not the love
of the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness, the enemies of
the cross of Christ, though they lived amiable lives (one of Satan's
pet phrases), will meet Him not as the patient lamb, but the Judge,
the lion of the tribe of Judah. What will it be when His Patience is
ended? What will it be when the kingdom and the Patience of Jesus
Christ give way to the kingdom and Glory of Jesus Christ? Rapidly
the day is nearing when the Lord Jesus Christ will be completely
rejected. As long as the true church is still here this complete
rejection is an impossibility. But the church will some day leave
this earth. Then conditions are ripe for the complete rejection of
the Christ and the reception of Antichrist who will then appear. And
when the beast is worshipped (Rev. xiii) and the world defies God
and His anointed as never before, when the nations of apostate
Christendom stand in battle array (Rev. xix:19), then He will come
as the King whose patience is ended and claim His Kingdom. What will
it mean when His Patience is ended? Who can describe it? What
judgments will fall then upon a wicked world and be meted out upon
the enemies of Christ? The day of vengeance is rapidly approaching.
It is the day of vengeance for the world. It is the day of the Glory
of Christ. It is the day of the Glory of the Saints. It is the day
of your Glory as a believer.
Let us suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. Let
us be patient as long as He is patient. "Be ye also patient;
establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.
Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned;
behold the Judge standeth before the door" (James v:8, 9).
In His Patience pray for the unsaved. Preach the Gospel, give out
the Gospel, send the Gospel, give for the Gospel, live the Gospel. A
little while longer and His patience will end.
Trusting in the Lord thy God,
Onward go.
Holding fast His faithful word,
Onward go.
Not denying His worthy name,
Though it brings reproach and shame,
Spreading still His wondrous fame,
Onward go.
Has He said the end is near?
Onward go.
Serving Him with holy fear,
Onward go.
Christ thy portion, Christ thy stay--
Heavenly bread upon the way,
Leading on to glorious day--
Onward go.
The Love of Christ.