THE THREEFOLD EXPERIENCE OF THE RISEN ONE
THE THREEFOLD EXPERIENCE OF THE RISEN ONE
The retrospect of the past year cannot be without reflections of a deep and varied character, because the mercy of God has been gradually leading you nearer to Himself, and further from man’s things and ways. It has been one of the most peculiar mercy to you. There is a period in each of our histories where the reality of our life in Christ is tested and proved by the death and darkness to which we are subjected, some in one way, and some in another, some only on their death-beds. But when the Lord would lead any one into His own path here, He leads him through the tunnel, or the valley of the shadow of death, in order that he may continue here in a new way.
[p. 292] The past year is one ever to be remembered by you. In the hour of trial you have tasted of His life, which outlives the dissolution of everything here, imparting to you such a sense of its virtue that you, like Noah, enter anew on the earth; or, like Lazarus, you have been down to the sides of the grave, and you have come forth with this new and wonderful experience: “The Lord ... bringeth down to the grave, and bringeth up” (1 Samuel 2: 6). This is the first experience. But there have been three: first, you have proved the power and tenderness of His hand on your behalf; the second follows, and is conveyed in the words of our Lord, “Loose him, and let him go” (John 11: 44). Lazarus must be in the full, unfettered vigour of his position. He had experienced the favour of the Lord in bringing him up from the grave; now he must be freed from everything belonging to the grave which would hinder his full enjoyment of the favour; even as the tiny bird not only bursts the shell, and breathes freely, but ere long receives feathers and wings, to reach the shelter that suits it, or to escape the danger that threatens it - soaring in an elevation above everything of man.
Your third experience is fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, just as Lazarus “was one of them that sat at the table with him” (John 12: 2). In this fellowship, aware of, and partaker of His elevation, the most wondrous experience ever vouchsafed to the soul here, He imparts to me the virtues of His own position - ascended into glory. Oh, the favour when the Lord takes pains with us to lead us experimentally into this fellowship, which is His own calling for us; and where only, with enraptured eye and satisfied heart, we can share in the things of the Lord Jesus Christ.
May you be deepened in this threefold experience, and may the Lord enrich your heart with the sense of His full perpetual love.