JOHN'S MINISTRY

JOHN’S MINISTRY

I have been much interested in seeing that in John’s gospel, though the Lord’s grace is made known to me on the earth (that is to the man on the earth), every part of His grace is outside the man on the earth, and outside the earth where the man is. It is all from Himself, and ^[p. 98] heavenly. Take the new position of the sheep in chapter 10. Every supply comes from Himself, although the sheep are on the earth. Take John 14, the ministry begins with our place in the Father’s house and concludes with Christ’s peace.

It is marvellous to see a man on the earth receiving everything from a Man in heaven. “As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly” (1 Corinthians 15: 48). He was ever while here, the Son of man which is in heaven. John brings everything from heaven to us on the earth. Paul conducts us from earth to heaven. Which is the most heavenly?

May you have great festivity in things that eye has not seen. Everything by the Spirit of God is from Christ and leads to Him. He does not merely come down to me from Christ, but He leads me up to Him. In the Spirit I am over Jordan, even though I may not have accepted that my only place is at the other side and not at this side. Like Stephen, we are led over first, and then we learn death here. We may enjoy a truth a long time before it masters us. Surely Paul was not mastered by the truth of 2 Corinthians 13, until he was cut off from everything earthly in the prison at Rome, where he wrote the Epistle to the Ephesians.