HEALING AND POWER

HEALING AND POWER

I have been presenting the healing of the palsied man as a pattern, first of the forgiveness of sins and then of the new divine power to rise above your natural proclivities. Freed from your old state, and by the Spirit of God introduced into quite a new one, how very magnificent it is! I think there is great loss in the way the gospel is often limited to the first, and that the second is not as much insisted on as the first is.

There are two great parts in the gospel: one, that Christ has wrought salvation - by faith you see it done; and the second, that you are ever acquiring a fuller apprehension and consequently a deeper enjoyment of your great gain in Him. Jonathan, when he saw the head of Goliath in David’s hand, knew that all the pressure had gone; but now he has to know David in order to apprehend all that he has acquired through David. This is endless, “the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge” (Ephesians 3: 19). Many stop at the first and thus lose the second, whereas if the second were better known the gain from the first would be more deeply apprehended. There is a great difference in the effect on you by knowing the Lord’s work and service for you, and in knowing something of His love to you personally. If you know the christian’s standing and resources, the next thought is his exercises and conflict; there is no progress without exercise, “exercise thyself ... unto godliness” (1 Timothy 4: 7). I hope John’s writings will be more read and pondered over. It is a wonderful revelation! I am struck with the great fact that everything God gives us is in the new order as of Christ and beyond all human conception. The Lord bless you and lead you to find in His presence more than you can get anywhere else.

May you be there in such “adoring fervour”, knowing so well the genuine thing, that you will be proof against the counterfeit!