THE TUNNEL

THE TUNNEL

Is it not striking how the Lord leads one through death, in spirit, as Abraham, in offering up Isaac, and Jacob in the supposed death of Joseph, and yet the reality of it did not occur in either case? To enter into and accept the loss of what is most precious to one, and then be left here with the feeling ‘I can do without it, because of what Christ is to me’ is very blessed. I could not have learned the worth of Christ to me, and how He can fill the heart without the loss of the natural, but often in His mercy, when I have thus learned the value of Himself, the other is restored to me.

Oh, how little one is prepared for the tunnel! It is remarkable the way the Lord disciplines each, as a rule (when it is for deepening), after one has accepted the truth, which, if lived in, would enable one to be superior to the ^[p. 74] suffering, and thus prove the value of the truth. I remark that every saint is passed practically into the tunnel as soon as his heart is set on following the Lord, on being for Him here, during His rejection, a thought very little in the mind of His people as a ruling one. To do good and to be safe comprise all Christianity, even in the minds of many of the enlightened. To be like Christ here, which is John 17, is not considered as great as serving Him. John 15 is service, but it is His interests, not man’s primarily, though man be the gainer, or the subject of it.

What a blessed testimony is ours, to ‘live Christ’. Does not the heart delight in loving the One who has so loved us.

How various are the ways by which each one is taught death. Abraham learns it in surrendering his son, Jacob in losing his son, supposing him to be slain by wild beasts, after he had lost Rachel by death.