CHRIST'S GLORY KNOWN IN OUR HEARTS
CHRIST’S GLORY KNOWN IN OUR HEARTS
2 Peter 1: 16 - 21; 2 Peter 3: 8 - 18
CAC I was thinking, in suggesting these scriptures, of the great spiritual reality of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ being known in our hearts at the present moment, so that all that is yet future, a matter of prospect actually, really governs us.
Ques Do you mean the present glory and majesty as Peter describes it?
CAC Yes. One would gather that the day dawned for the three when they were on the holy mount; they got a glimpse of it beforehand. What the three disciples got on the holy mount is what God would have us to have. They got a special and private view of the kingdom as centred in the Lord Jesus Christ, and it is our privilege at the present time to have what we may speak of as a private view. We are taken apart from the world and set on a spiritual elevation. It is the privilege of the saints at the present time to be on a spiritual elevation from which we get immediate vision of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in our affections we anticipate what is future.
Ques Do you mean the whole outlook of the saints, or only certain moments of privilege?
CAC I meant the whole outlook, because it is not a question of special moments of privilege, but a definite point being reached, as Peter says, “Until the day dawn and the morning star arise in your hearts”. The proper privilege of the saints is that the day has dawned and the morning star has arisen in their affections.
Ques Does it mean that the day has begun already?
CAC I thought so; that was what “our beloved brother Paul” said: we are “sons of light”, and we are “of the day”
([p. 305] 1 Thessalonians 5: 5, 8).
Rem Though the kingdom had not come publicly it had come for the three.
CAC Yes. If you put together the three narratives in the gospels you will find that in Matthew it is the kingdom in prospect, the Son of man coming in His kingdom; it has not actually come yet. In Mark it is the kingdom in power; that seems to lie in purity, for attention is called to the whiteness of His garments. In Luke it is the kingdom in pattern; all the features that would be seen in His saints as in the kingdom are patterned in the Son of God. One feels what an extraordinary favour from God it is to be abstracted from all the influences of the present time and world, to be brought apart and initiated into this wondrous reality, so that we get in a spiritual way immediate vision of the glory, as J.N.D. says in his note (f) to this passage. This belongs to people who are on the holy mount. We get allusions in the Psalms to the hill of God’s holiness; no doubt there is a moral force in it. We read too about the mountain of Jehovah’s house (Isaiah 2: 2); there is a moral elevation, and we are all conscious when we come under the influence of these precious realities that the world and its atmosphere are far beneath us.
Ques Is it available at any time for us that we should be morally superior to things here, not simply when we are together in assembly?
CAC Yes, it marks the saints that they are sons of light. The power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ was a great reality to Peter, and he writes his epistle in order that it might be a great reality to us. Peter reminds us of the unretentiveness of our minds: we may let things slip, even things which we have known and tasted the preciousness of, there is always a tendency that they may get dim and enfeebled, and Peter uses diligence to put us in mind of these things. A great part of the ministry of the present time is not to tell us something new but to put us in the spiritual [p. 306] freshness of what we have known.
Ques What is mount Mizar in Psalm 42: 6?
CAC That is the little hill; it is more the place we take in this world. As conscious of the dignity we possess, and the spiritual elevation we have with God, we can be content to take an obscure place, content with mount Mizar in this world. The Lord was in great obscurity in this world; He was cast aside as worthless. The more we are in the light of His majesty and the glory and honour which rest on Him with the Father, the more thankfully we shall be in the shade of His rejection here.
Rem The Lord spoke of His decease when He came down from the holy mount.
CAC Yes, and Moses and Elias were speaking with Him of His exodus; they quite understood the necessity for His going out. We find in Luke that as He prayed the fashion of His countenance became different; that is the practical working out of the kingdom as patterned in Him. That is the way we are brought into correspondence with God’s world; we shall be changed as we pray. Moses and Elias were not speaking of His death in its atoning character; it was not that side of things that occupied them, but that He was going out from this present world, going out from that city which should have been, and was truly, the city of the great King. He was going out from the best and most glorious spot on earth, of which glorious things were spoken, and leaving all of earth behind. That gives character to the kingdom in its present aspect.
Ques Is there any link with the fact that Peter in mentioning this had in view his own going out?
CAC I think that Peter had in view the perpetuating of things in the saints; he was going out himself, he was shortly to put off his tabernacle. Peter as a vessel of testimony was going out of the scene but he provides for the perpetuating here of what he had seen and heard; he leaves this epistle to put us in mind so that we may cherish in our hearts what he [p. 307] cherished in his heart. He would have the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ to be a great reality to us as it was to him. We have the same faith as Peter; he writes to people “that have received like precious faith with us through the righteousness of our God” (2 Peter 1: 1). How wonderful that the righteousness of God, His faithfulness, has made it necessary that He should give to us the same kind of precious faith that He gave to the apostles.
One is filled with holy wonder to think of the grace that has removed us in any measure from this world of darkness and brought us to where we can see the effulgence of God in a Man. There are no speculations in our hearts as to God, no questionings, no misgivings, no uncertainties; we have seen and contemplated the effulgence of God in a Man; any right thought we have of God we get by seeing His effulgence in that blessed Man. In the kingdom the effulgence of God will shine out in a Man; that is the glory of the kingdom. And in that same Man is found every moral quality that is suitable to God. “His raiment white and effulgent”. It speaks of the complete satisfaction of every desire of the heart of God in a Man. As we contemplate that, and as the Spirit brings the glory and preciousness of it to our affections, it must separate us morally from this present world so that we become in our affections an unworldly and heavenly-minded people.
There are two things. His majesty is connected with what they saw, “Having been eyewitnesses of his majesty”. We need to cherish a great thought of the majesty of the Lord Jesus Christ. We are brought near to a majestic Person; He is majestic in divine and moral glory. Nothing will subdue our spirits and deliver us from the working of our own wills like being brought into the presence of all that is majestic in that Person. The sense of His majesty should profoundly affect us. Then there is His honour and glory. The Spirit distinguishes between His majestic character and His honour and glory. His majesty is connected with what they saw,
[p. 308] and His honour and glory with what they heard: they heard the voice from the excellent glory which saluted Him as the beloved Son.
Rem One needs an education for these things; Peter speaks of adding to our faith; his list begins with faith and ends with love.
CAC Yes, the early part of the chapter is most important as showing that we are furnished with all things that relate to life and godliness; divine power has furnished us through the knowledge of God. If I am weak on any point I must learn to know God better, if there is a defect in me I must learn to know God better. What a claim on divine attention we should have if we went to God about all our exercises and difficulties with a sense that the solution and answer to all would be found in an increased knowledge of Himself. I believe we should get answers to our exercises and needs much sooner if we started with the conviction that everything is furnished for us and lies in the knowledge of God. If we get to know God better we shall be furnished at every point. Our faith has to be furnished with all the beautiful qualities referred to; faith needs them if it is to be carried triumphantly through into the kingdom.
The prophetic word is very good as a candle in a dark place; it is of the greatest value to us and would fill us with precious thoughts of the kingdom. But many people today have the prophetic word; there are many diligent students of Scripture putting together the prophetic facts and glories of the kingdom revealed in the prophets; but the great thing is to have it in our affections through the day dawning and the morning star arising in our hearts. I believe that is as the Spirit gives Christ place in our affections.
‘The Spirit brings Thy glory nigh,
To those who for Thee wait’. (81:2)
I understand that to be the day dawning and the morning star arising in the heart. The Spirit can actively bring the [p. 309] glory of that Person into my affections so that it transforms me and governs me, and I am put into correspondence with what is future. We have to ask ourselves, Am I in correspondence with that Person, and with all that He will bring in? There is a great tendency with us to adapt ourselves to what is around us, but as Christians we have to learn to adapt ourselves to what is future, to that coming world which is going to be lit up with the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Rem Moses says “Make me now to know thy way” (Exodus 33: 13).
CAC He got his answer. Moses prayed two prayers, the first, “Make me now to know thy way” — how was God going to reach His end? God’s purposes were there in the way of promise, but there was a naughty, rebellious people, and Moses says, ‘How wilt Thou deal with a question like this? Show me now Thy way’. God showed him His way typically by putting him in a cleft of the rock and covering him with His hand, and then He passed by and revealed His glory. It was as much as to say, ‘That is My way, Moses; there is a place by Me where I am going to put man out of sight completely, and I will be known in all My glory there’ — that was the death of Christ.
Rem Elijah went into a cave on Horeb.
CAC Yes, my impression is that the prophet went back to the very place in the cleft of the rock, where God put Moses out of sight. We all have to learn to go to Horeb and get into the cleft of that rock where all man’s pretensions and sufficiency are put out of sight, and we see the glory of God.
Ques What about Moses’ second prayer, “Let me ... see thy glory”?
CAC The answer to that prayer is in the tabernacle in which God presented the whole universe of accomplished glory in type. The whole vast scene of His glory was pictured in the tabernacle; but then surely Moses got a blessed view of the glory when he stood on the holy mount.
[p. 310] Rem Moses had to wait a long time for the answer to his prayer.
CAC We have to reckon on time with God. One was thinking of all this in connection with its present effect. If the day has dawned and the morning star has arisen in our hearts by the power of the Spirit, what a complete detachment it will effect from the whole present system of things! It will connect our desires, our happiness, our expectations and aspirations with that unseen system of glory of which the Lord Jesus is the Sun and Centre. It will give us to understand how to value the moment that remains in a new way. Peter says that the long-suffering of the Lord is salvation (2 Peter 3: 15), and in verse 9, “The Lord does not delay his promise ... but is longsuffering towards you”. I have read that as towards man but it is longsuffering towards you.
Ques Why do you think it is “you”?
CAC Do you not think that we ought to consider the fact that the Lord not yet having come there is an opportunity for us to judge every single thing in our lives and hearts and associations that is unsuitable for the coming world of glory? The Lord has not come, up to this moment, so that we might have the opportunity to judge and clear ourselves from every element unsuitable for the world of His glory. If we have been ever so unfaithful, and if we have allowed ever so many earthly, worldly and fleshly things to govern us, we have a moment yet in which we can repent as to it, so that we may be ready with shouts of triumph to pass into the day.
Ques Is Peter not writing to saints?
CAC Yes, I believe it is repentance on the part of saints. Are we going on with anything that we are not happy about? The more we get into the light of the kingdom, the more active our consciences will become and the more sensitive our hearts will be to condemn us as to what is unsuitable. If we never did anything we were not perfectly happy about, it would keep us divinely right. The secret of all unsuitability [p. 311] is that we do things we are not happy about, and we keep on doing them until we cease to be troubled, because we do not regard those tender sensibilities which utter their voice over and over again. There is a peculiar solemnity about it. The Lord calls us now to repent and judge every single thing in our moral being, our associations and ways that is unsuitable to the scene of His glory. We must learn to reckon with the Lord; one day with the Lord is as a thousand years.
Rem The scripture refers to Lot; he was told to get to the mountain lest he perish.
CAC Yes; I think we had better get to the mountain or else we may perish; that is, we may perish as regards any true testimony. What a solemn thing to miss the privilege of such a moment as this! I would like to reckon with the Lord, one day with the Lord is as a thousand years. I should like every single day of my life to be as a thousand years, to have the same kind of value with God as will fill the millennium. It is not a question of the length of time; we might only have another day to live, but we can fill that day with characteristics that belong to the thousand years; we can be morally according to the thousand years. The Lord would have things reckoned that way with every one of us. I feel more and more the extraordinary privilege that attaches to the few moments that are left to us in this present time. None of us may be left here more than a few moments longer; an extraordinary value attaches to the little time left; we shall never have it again.
Rem You cannot be always on the holy mountain.
CAC Peter was not always there, but what was there was always in Peter’s heart — that is just the difference. We can move about every day in business and domestic duties and the Lord’s service with the morning star, not in the sky but in our hearts. It is a powerful force that governs us at all times so that we are not assimilated to the present course of things. We too readily take colour from what is around us, but I feel an intense desire to be assimilated to the world of [p. 312] glory, to be in conformity with that so that every day in my history the Lord might take account of as having the character of the thousand years. It would be good for us to think what a full value can attach even to one day.
Rem Peter speaks of “such a voice being uttered to him by the excellent glory”.
CAC What could be more affecting than the tones of that voice in which the Father expressed His own ineffable delight in His beloved Son! The effect of hearing that voice would be that we should hear the beloved Son; we should open the ears of our hearts to His instruction and teaching.
We shall then come more and more under the influence of Christ. Paul says to the Ephesians, “Ye have not thus learnt the Christ, if ye have heard him”; he assumes that the saints have heard the voice of Christ and been instructed in Him.
Peter reminds us at the end of his epistle that a thousand years with the Lord are as one day. That is, even the thousand years of millennial reign will have time limits, but what God has before Him is eternity. Peter finishes his epistle by speaking of the day of eternity; he goes beyond the glory of the kingdom and carries our thoughts to eternity. We are to be governed morally even now by what belongs to eternity, to the day of God.
Ques How can we hasten that day?
CAC I think that as the saints are marked by holy conversation and godliness, and as they wait for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwells righteousness, and as they move on the line of being without spot and blameless, they come into accord not only with the kingdom but with what is eternal. God is going to have an eternal scene where everything is right. What a wonderful scene it will be! It is not altogether all right in the kingdom, because we find decline there. I think that the exercises of the people of God on earth in the kingdom as they take account of the declining character of things will make them long for what is eternal when everything will be in perfect correspondence with the [p. 313] will of God, everything divinely and eternally right. Our privilege is not only to be in accord with the kingdom, but to be in accord with what is eternally right, eternally pleasing to God, so that He can rest in His love. What a blessed thing for us to move about in this world carrying the impress in our affections, spirits, demeanour and ways of the coming glory and of what is eternal. If we had that before us the influences of time would not leave much mark on us.
Ques Would the cloud be the shekinah glory of God?
CAC It says, they entered into the cloud. It was the cloud of divine glory, and the wonderful thing is that God is going to display His glory in His people. He dwells in the praises of His people now. There is a circle where God is praised in His nature, His attributes, His ways, His purposes and His counsels, and indeed in the fruition of His love. God is glorified in the praises of His people; He dwells there. The praises of the saints are, in a certain sense, the cloud of glory now. “Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me” (Psalm 50: 23). When the city comes down out of heaven, having the glory of God, it will be composed of holy myriads of persons, every one of whom will have taken up in affection and praise some part of the divine glory so that the whole city will be luminous with divine glory. But it has been acquired here and now under divine teaching.
Ques Is it the same glory as in John 17: 22, “The glory which thou hast given me I have given them”?
CAC That I understand to be the place of sonship. The Lord goes on to speak of the saints being loved as He was; He was loved in the relationship of Son. We must take verses 22 and 23 together. Correspondence with the glory involves suffering now; it must be mount Mizar now! We have to be small today, but what are we suffering for? If we have suffered because we were governed by His glory in the face of Jesus Christ, what a righteous thing it will be for God to clothe us with His glory in that day! He will be justified in doing it.
[p. 314] I am sure if we were rightly affected by the precious realities that have come before us, there would be more suffering now. We should be less ambitious, we should not be wanting to improve our position in this world, but we should take a course in present circumstances which would probably involve loss in this world. We should not be governed by worldly advantages or better positions which might seem attractive, but we should be governed by the light of another system. What a divine favour to be permitted to suffer here and now, and to have the Spirit of glory and of God resting on us!