MATURING FOR GLORY

J. G. Chalmers

Job 5: 26; Matthew 13: 30 (last clause)

I believe that the Lord Jesus has a voice for us in each death that takes place. As exercised in relation to the death of our sister what has impressed itself on me is the word of the Lord Jesus in John 15: 8, “In this is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit”, and I feel He would use this occasion to stimulate the desire in each of our hearts that, for the rest of our time, our lives might be more fruitful for God. Our sister has “come to the grave in a ripe age”, not only in old age, but in a “ripe age”, and that suggests maturity, spiritual maturity. Those of us who have had the privilege of being near our sister in recent years have witnessed the maturing of the work of God so that she was ready, waiting, and willing just to go to be with Christ. Christ was her all. We also saw a manifestation of the spirit of Christ, as our brother has said, and that in two outstanding features. One was patience, reminding us of the patience of Jesus, the patience of the Christ as He awaits His heavenly bride. The other was her capacity for suffering; what she suffered no one knew but herself and the Lord Jesus. This reminded us of the unique capacity of Jesus for suffering, for He took on sufferings that no creature could take on, sufferings for sin, the atoning sufferings—

‘None could follow there, blest Saviour,

When Thou didst for sins atone’.

But her ‘season’ has come, as it says here, “As a shock of corn is brought in in its season”—a very homely touch; not a stalk of corn, not a sheaf of corn, but a shock of corn, which means a number of sheaves and suggests a life that has been fruitful for God. We can say that of our sister, that her life has yielded much for God; but nothing is lost, it is brought in, the Lord has brought it in, garnered it, and it is safely housed. It but awaits the body of glory.

Well, dear brethren, she is gone and we are left and I desire that our lives henceforth might be more and more fruitful for God. The Lord Jesus says in John 15: 5, “He that abides in me, and I in him, he bears much fruit”. May the sorrow of this occasion lead our hearts more to Christ; may we be to Him (Romans 7: 4); may we abide in Him, and be held constantly in our affections in relation to Christ, so that He may have the supreme place in our hearts and minds in view of our bearing more fruit for God. This is the divine intent, for the day is coming soon when the wheat will be brought together into His granary. The “shock” has gone before, the fulness of the harvest will soon be here, the wheat harvest, the Lord Jesus coming to take His assembly. Every vestige of His work from Pentecost to the rapture, the wheat, will be brought together into His granary. It is “his wheat”, as it says in Matthew 3: 12; it is what corresponds to Himself. He was the lonely grain of wheat, as we sing, ‘O how precious was that lonely Corn of Wheat’ which fell into the ground and died, but His death has been so productive, so fruitful for God! What a harvest!

We can think of the living saints, but there are far more in their graves, myriads of saints in their graves. What a sowing there has been in “that field”, as it says in verse 44 of this chapter. He “buys that field”—the earth is His on the basis of purchase. Men think of it as theirs, but it belongs to Christ, and He is using it at the present time as a burying place for His saints; the dead saints are being sown in faith. The trees are there too—it says that in Genesis 23 where Abraham buys the field and the cave that was in it and the trees in all its borders; that could suggest the living saints. The dead saints would be in the cave of Machpelah awaiting resurrection. Christ’s resurrection being the assurance that they will be raised. Oh that moment is soon to come! The saints are maturing for glory.

This chapter in Matthew shows that the world is maturing for judgment; the tares are something sown which is like the real thing, but the sons of the evil one are maturing for judgment. The saints are maturing for glory and very soon the Lord will give the assembling shout and bring the wheat together, every blood-bought saint brought together and taken into His granary to be safely housed for eternity. In the meantime, beloved brethren, I desire that more of the ‘wheat’ may be seen with us, more correspondence to Christ. In this scene, where evil is developing fast, may we be marked off as persons who are more like Jesus and thus yielding more and more for the pleasure of the heart of God. May it be so for His name’s sake.