READINGS ON EPHESIANS (2)
READINGS ON EPHESIANS (2)
GR You made a remark in Chicago, that in most of Paul’s epistles the way in which Christ is presented is the key to each epistle. Does that hold true with regard to Ephesians?
FER I have no doubt that the light in which Christ is presented in Ephesians gives its character to the epistle. He fills all in all. He has “ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things”. So you get in the prayer in chapter 3, “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”.
GR Would you say that the great thought in Ephesians is the opening up of the counsels of God connected with Christ?
FER Yes. But it is that the church may be here in testimony; the Spirit of God has in view that there should be here a living testimony to God, that what came out in Christ should come out in the church.
JP So it is, “Be ye therefore imitators of God”.
FER It is all on that principle.
GR I was going to say if God gives light it is that it might shine out and not be simply for our enjoyment.
FER Quite so. It is for testimony.
JA Do the words, “quickened us together with Christ”, point to that?
FER All is in view of that. There are three points that come out in the second chapter, the first is salvation, the second is unity, and third is that God is dwelling.
The saints are brought into salvation, that is the first point, and is seen in the early part of the chapter. Then, in connection with that comes in the thought of unity, and, at the same time, [p. 180] God is dwelling here.
WM You mean unity in the new man.
FER Yes, through Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. “Ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God”. And Jew and gentile are builded together for an habitation of God by the Spirit. You cannot get the blessing until you get unity, and you cannot get unity without salvation. I do not know whether all would quite apprehend this.
JT I do not think all do.
JP It is very evident from Psalm 133 that unity comes, and then blessing.
FER I think the psalm helps. In verses 13 to 18 of the previous psalm it says, “The Lord hath chosen Zion; he hath desired it for his habitation”. We have the thought of habitation. Then it says, “I will also clothe her priests with salvation: and her saints shall shout aloud for joy”. Then you get in Psalm 133, “Behold, how good and pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! ... for there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore”. I think you can see the line.
JP We could not have unity without salvation.
FER No. The thought of God dwelling comes in, and then clothing Zion’s priests with salvation. David had prayed that her priests might be clothed with righteousness, but God says, “I will also clothe her priests with salvation”. So in Ephesians 2, “by grace ye are saved”, and then unity, “to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace; And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby”. The point is Jew and gentile are one, gentiles are fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God. Then it is you can realise the thought of God dwelling. “There the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore”. The blessing is consequent on Jew and gentile being built together for an habitation of God by the Spirit. That is the line.
GR Would you say in chapter 1 we have the scope [p. 181] of His counsel, whereas in chapter 2 it is what He is effecting now?
FER I think so. Chapter 2 is the testimony.
GWH So I suppose you reach a higher point in the first chapter.
FER God has made known to us the mystery of His will to head up in one all things in Christ. Then you get the bearing and application of that in the present time in the second chapter. That is salvation has come to pass in a very distinct way, “by grace ye are saved”. Stress is laid on that; and then you get the thought of unity, and of God dwelling, Jew and gentile builded together for an habitation of God by the Spirit. That is, Psalm 132 and Psalm 133 are in a sense fulfilled. The Psalms close with that.
JT What corresponds with the blessing in Ephesians 2?
FER I think it is in God dwelling here by the Spirit. When God dwells here by the Spirit the blessing is commanded. Everything depends on God dwelling, so the exhortation following on that in the beginning of chapter 4, is to all lowliness and meekness, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Because God is dwelling you have the blessing brought in.
JP It gives the church a wonderful place at the present time.
FER It is all on the principle that we have had so much before us, that everything which comes out in the epistle to the Ephesians is anticipative.
JP And it still further confirms what you have often said, that before God brings anything to pass there is always a testimony, and so before there is the accomplishment of these wonderful counsels literally, there is the testimony in the church.
FER Yes, what comes out in the second chapter is that the church has been taken to heaven in order to fulfil the will of God down here. You are taken to heaven in order that you may understand salvation [p. 182] here.
JT It is a little peculiar to me that you should get salvation in being taken up into heaven.
FER I do not think you are fully in salvation until you are taken out of the scene. Salvation, as I understand it in Scripture, comes out in three connections. I think it is first in regard of enemies, then in regard of association, and then in regard of place.
JT That is very good. You connect place with heavenly places in this way.
FER I take the type of the children of Israel. They were first saved from enemies, “saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us”. They were saved out of the hand of Pharaoh; then the next thing was in regard of association.
JT Where is that in the types?
FER In connection with Balaam. And the third thing was to be saved from place. The two and half tribes never came fully into salvation because they did not accept the place the other side of Jordan.
JT But you said saved from place, then that involves another place.
FER Saved from earth.
GR Would you say just as we come under heavenly things we are saved from earthly things?
FER But you are saved from place, that is more than things.
WM So in Ephesians we anticipate the coming of the Lord.
JSA And so in Philippians, “Who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself”.
JT So you say the two and half tribes were not saved from place.
FER They were saved from enemies and associations, but not from place.
JP Whether we understand it or not, we are bound to own it is plain in [p. 183] the chapter.
FER You cannot have your eyes open without seeing it. Plenty of people are saved from enemies, but they are not saved from association. They keep up family links, etc., and there are plenty saved from associations that settle down to a pleasant life here on earth with everything around them agreeable. They are not saved from place. What place had Christ? He had not where to lay His head.
WM You find they are willing to engage in the conflict if an emergency arises.
FER And then they go back again to their possessions.
WLP That is practical, being saved from the place in that way.
FER It is inconceivable having a place here; we know Christ had not one.
WLP Of necessity we have to have a place here.
FER I would like food and raiment and shelter for my head.
Rem And a good house to dwell in.
FER I would like the house well enough without the garden.
JMD Why do you object to the garden?
FER Because the garden is the millennium.
JMD Is not that a good thing to have?
FER It is too early.
JP I see a good thing is to have salvation.
FER I like the thought of the house because a house may be a scene of beautiful moral order, and that is pleasant under the eye of God, but you may have a house which is not a scene of beautiful order; and a garden most beautifully laid out, and that cannot be according to the mind of God. Because the order of the garden cannot compensate for the disorder of the house.
JP I was going to say it is almost like having an ox and an ass hitched up together.
FER I think you catch what I mean. What makes a house is not the mere building, and the arrangement of [p. 184] the rooms and furniture. What makes a house is the order, that is, moral order.
JP That is what God appreciated in Abraham’s house.
FER I think so, the wife subject to the husband and the children subject to the parents. That is agreeable in the eye of God. That is the kind of order to present, but if you attempt to compensate for the disorder in the house by the order of the garden, that will not do.
JT Abraham had no garden, but he had the house; David had the garden, not the house.
WLP Why do you object to the garden?
FER Because there is no moral order in the garden. What a christian has to look to is moral order.
JP It is like the wisdom of a godly woman.
WM You mean the household, not the building.
FER Yes, speaking morally, a man does not dwell in a house made of bricks and mortar or stone and timber. The house in which a man dwells is his family. I dwell in my house, but my house is my family; it is there I dwell. The mere building is a matter of very little consideration. In a world like this where there is no place for Christ, I do not think you want to be reigning in the way of the world. I think you want to think about the absent One, and not to imitate the world’s order, what is agreeable in the eye of the world. I think that is a mistake, and I have not seen the people who do it prosper very much spiritually.
WM I suppose people generally change to a bigger house and better grounds.
FER If people were wise, they would lay themselves out for spiritual prosperity. I think they sacrifice spiritual prosperity for material prosperity, but it is not wise.
JT I remember you saying that people do not cater to their own happiness.
FER They lay themselves out too much for material good and prosperity and never have spiritual prosperity.
[p. 185] I have no doubt whatever that what tends to real happiness is spiritual prosperity.
Rem The gain that John wished that Gaius should have.
WLP Would not the test be whether one’s heart was in any of these things?
FER But I expect if the heart were not in any of these things people would to a large extent be very simple. I think the Lord would not deny us any reasonable comfort down here, and it is a great thing to enjoy God’s mercies; we had that in 1 Timothy. We do not want asceticism, we get the injunction to the rich that God has given us all things richly to enjoy. But they have to be enjoyed not on the line of the world, but according to God, “That they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute, willing to communicate”. It is all that kind of grace that the Spirit of God enjoins. The Spirit of God is bent on our real enjoyment. People sometimes get all they wish in connection with the world; and there is an excitement in connection with getting it, but when they have it they do not enjoy it much. They would enjoy things better if they listened to the admonitions of Scripture, that is, to enjoy according to what is really God’s way.
JT The other extreme to what we have been speaking of would be to become a monk or a nun. Piety would correct that.
FER It is a very poor thing not to enjoy God’s mercies, but the point is what is the real enjoyment of them. I think the Spirit of God marks that out.
JT You mean in 1 Timothy?
FER Yes.
WM Do you mean that the moral danger might be in having things in the way of proprietary possession?
FER That is the dangerous thing for most of us; but to get back, it was the question of salvation which brought this up; we spoke of three points of salvation. The first from enemies and the hand of those that hate us, the next from association, and the [p. 186] third from place.
JT It is quite clear to me.
FER For instance, in Luke 2, it is salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all that hate us. That is clear enough, and, “who has delivered us from the authority of darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love: in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins”. Evidently, there is deliverance from enemies. Then the next comes out in Titus, “he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Spirit”. That is salvation from association.
JP It is what was spoken of the other day in Plainfield, the christian circle, where the love of Christ pervades everything.
FER And in that way you escape from the world, from association. Then the third is, having put you in heavenly places in Christ; he says, “by grace ye are saved”.
JT That is a kind of explanation of what goes before.
FER I think so. When the people got into the land, in a sense they were saved.
JT It was grace that put them into the land.
FER Quite so.
WM So it is salvation as connected with place that we have in this chapter.
FER I think so.
GWH But it presupposes salvation from the other two things.
FER Yes.
JMD What do you mean by salvation from place?
FER It involves this, that you have another place. I am not saved out of one place until I have another place, but if I have another place I am saved from the place in which I was.
Rem A man that is saved in the threefold sense is a man that is ready to go to the Lord, to die or to meet Him in the air.
FER But the secret of it is, you have your place in God’s world. That is what people want to get. If I have my place in God’s world, I am saved out of my place in this world. People cling to their place in this world tenaciously, especially if they have means. The effect of means is to attach people to this world, but the antidote to it is not to take away the means but to give them the light of their place in God’s world. Then it is you are prepared to surrender your place in this world.
JT And your place in God’s world is indicated here.
FER Quite so. He hath “made us sit”, not stand. It is your place. He has given you a seat there; that is your place in God’s world.
YL You find salvation in its threefold character in the christian circle.
FER That is more the second step. The third step is in the apprehension by divine teaching of our place in God’s world.
WM What connection would there be in our place in God’s world and that set forth in 1 John 4, where we dwell in the love of God?
FER That is more a question to my mind of light, not of place. I think you want a place.
JP Because in 1 John 4, we are viewed in our pathway through this world.
FER Yes, the day of judgement, not heavenly places, comes in there. I think people want a place. The Lord said, “I go to prepare a place for you”. I do not think people will be prepared to surrender one place until they have another, but if you have that place you will be prepared to surrender this place. You will find many among us in each stage. You will find many, undoubtedly, delivered from the fear of enemies. “Delivered us from the authority of darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love”, but I doubt whether they have all reached the second step. They are detained by associations, family links, and friends. But if they have escaped that, I can understand some detained by the place they have here.
JP [p. 188] This is the largest presentation of salvation I have ever heard of.
FER But do you not think it is true?
JP I do, indeed.
FER When Israel were delivered from their enemies, they were drawn into idolatrous associations by keeping up worldly links. That is where the Corinthians, too, were. The danger was association. It is what brought them more or less into the acknowledgement of the god of this world. But even when Israel had escaped association some came short of the fulness of God’s salvation.
JP It is perfectly plain to me.
FER It is as true as anything can be that if you want to get salvation in the fullest sense you must accept the change of place; that is, in the apprehension of the place which God has given to you in His world.
WCR Did you not say in Indianapolis, the higher up a man gets in this world the nearer he is to the god of this world?
FER It was not my saying, it was that of an old brother.
YL What are the enemies?
FER I should think Satan. “Who has delivered us from the authority of darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love”. It is a very real thing to be delivered from the authority of darkness.
GR I was going to say, if these three things were true of us, it is not simply a question of our going to heaven to be with the Lord, but of being witnesses here.
FER That comes out in this chapter in what is extremely important in the ways of God, and that is unity. Unity means that the will of God has place. All discord and disunion is because of other wills working, and if the will of God has place then you get unity. Hence unity is a testimony to the will of God having place.
JT There had been at least two wills, that is, a gentile will and [p. 189] Jewish will.
FER Unity can only be brought about by the surrender of every human will. If you have twelve men you have twelve wills, and until all those twelve wills are gone, and those twelve men are governed by one will, you cannot have unity.
WM I think you said the twelve patriarchs were brought into unity in the presence of Joseph, type of the risen Christ.
FER I think they were, and what is spoken of in Psalm 133 undoubtedly has strictly reference to the twelve tribes.
Ques Is that the force of the Lord’s expression, that they may be one?
FER Yes.
JSA Do yon think it would be going too far to think there might be some expression of unity in the three persons of the Godhead?
FER I think it is the unity of the Father and the Son in the Spirit.
JT That is, when it says, “God is one”, it is not simply it is one Being, but it is unity.
FER So, “I and the Father are one”, and everything will have to be according to that, now that God is revealed. Everything will have to be brought into unity. The very first testimony that God gave after creation was unity, “They twain shall be one flesh”, Matthew 19: 5.
GWH Do you see salvation illustrated in Abraham’s life? and the testimony of it was that he walked as a stranger, a pilgrim down here. Is it a clear illustration?
FER Yes, I think it came out in that way.
JT He had the light of another world.
FER But what comes out now could not have come out in Abraham. Abraham was a heavenly man, and so a pilgrim and a stranger, but you could not get unity in connection with Abraham, nor could you get exactly the thought of salvation.
WM Would he not be marked morally by the power [p. 190] of that?
FER Quite so. He came out of the world, left country, kindred and father’s house.
JP What impresses me is the perfect spiritual order of things in christianity.
FER You may depend upon it, there is a divine order. There is a way of salvation in completeness; by salvation you can get unity.
JP And you get it without an effort; it is not that you try and get unity.
FER “For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father ... and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone”. For the first time God has brought unity about, not in the twelve tribes, like in Psalm 133, but in Jew and gentile.
JP And so here he goes on to say, “by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works”. That is the will of God.
EW Would you say salvation, as you are speaking of it now, is that which properly prepares us to take our full place in the assembly?
FER It is that which brings unity about, “we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father”. That is where you get the assembly. Then you get again, “ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God”.
JT In the beginning of the Acts there is a kind of an illustration of what you have been saying. They were delivered from the power of the enemy, and further there was unity in the company.
FER Unity was their testimony.
JT And then they were willing to give up place, for those who had possessions sold them.
FER Yes, Barnabas had a place and sold it.
JT Barnabas was a good man, full of the [p. 191] Holy Spirit.
FER Yes, he had a possession and sold it. I have no doubt that the work of the twelve apostles was to found the heavenly city. They had not to do Paul’s work, or Paul their work, and those who were saved through the apostles’ efforts were taught that they had a place in the heavenly city. That is plainly the case, because in the foundations of the heavenly city are the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. Paul is not found there because at that time Paul was persecuting. Those who were converted through their preaching learned the place that they had in the scheme of God’s purpose. They apprehended that, and the effect of it was they gave up their place here. Barnabas being a Levite having land sold it. Where do you find people doing that now? Not often.
PCR Is it possible to do it now?
FER I do not want to own any land.
Ques Does one at any time, even after he has exchanged his place, occupy a place of jeopardy?
FER You are never out of danger so long as you are down here.
Ques How will you account for Barnabas?
FER He never got his land back. He went back for a moment to his kindred and retired from the testimony, but then he was recovered, and Mark too. They both got cloudy for a time, but were restored.
GWH Why do you say you would rather not own land? Is it because it is a practical denial of your Lord being rejected?
FER What does the Lord mean by Luke 12? “Sell that ye have, and give alms”.
Ques What if some one would leave us some property?
FER I cannot tell you what you should do. I can only speak for myself.
WM It is a question entirely of devotedness to the Lord and spiritual wisdom from Him.
FER And of faith too. Unless a man acts in faith, it is not worth doing [p. 192] anything.
FC You do not think what we get in the beginning of Acts is to be imitated, but it shows the effect of grace on them, and we may ask ourselves how much does grace affect us?
FER That is right.
JT Now as regards the will of God down here, you think all that comes out in the end of the chapter.
FER Yes, the church has a peculiar place in the present interval. It fills the interval between the time when certain things were foreshadowed, and the literal fulfilment of these things. You get certain things foreshadowed in connection with Israel. For instance, in the case of Israel, salvation and unity are foreshadowed and the dwelling place of God. They were delivered from the power of Pharaoh, then there were the twelve loaves on the table of shewbread; there was unity, and at the same time God was dwelling there. You get these things foreshadowed, but hereafter all will be literally fulfilled down here in connection with Israel. They will be delivered from their enemies, even from the Roman enemy, and the twelve tribes will dwell in unity, and God will dwell among them. All that will come to pass, but in the meantime all that is taken up in the church, which does not belong to earth at all, so you get salvation and unity and God dwelling here. The church fills up the interval.
JT And the point is that the thing is presented in a living way in the saints in the way of testimony.
FER That is the testimony. People might naturally say, well, really, everything that God purposed has failed. Look at Israel. You see no salvation nor unity about them whatever, and you do not see the temple of God at Jerusalem. It is a heap of stones; people would say all has failed, but it has not failed. God has brought it about in another way; that is, He has brought in salvation and unity in which the Jew has his place with the gentile, like one flock in John 10, and Jew and gentile are built together for an habitation of God by the Spirit; that is,
[p. 193] God is dwelling here. Nothing has failed. Then what was foreshadowed in Israel will be literally fulfilled hereafter, there will come the Deliverer out of Zion and He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob, and the twelve tribes will be restored. You remember the burden of the prophets, Jehovah dwelleth in Zion, Jehovah in the midst of thee is mighty. You get that burden continually.
JS And is the hope of Israel maintained in the church?
FER Yes. The church is brought in in the meantime, though it does not properly belong to earth, in order to maintain the position on earth.
JT And when the period of testimony is over it goes up to heaven.
FER “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father”. Its own proper place is heaven, and there it will shine like the sun.
JP What a wonderful place for the church at the present time. If we only had the apprehension and sense of it in our souls, it would operate to make the seeking of anything in connection with the order of this scene very contemptible.
FER I think it would all fly.
JSA But on the other hand the worldly associations of which you were speaking are actually a hindrance to the apprehension of what it is.
FER I think so.
WM I suppose God has secured in the church that not one principle should be lost.
FER Everything is maintained. The one flock is maintained, and every principle which really ought to come out in Israel. The church is not properly a flock, and a shepherd is not exactly the relation with which Christ stands to us, but it is in that place for the time being.
WM So that all explains the kind of parenthesis that we occupy.
FER Yes, and here we are filling up the interval to be [p. 194] here for the will of God, zealous to maintain in reality everything that God has foreshadowed, so that nothing should lapse.
WM So you think this morally qualifies the assembly to be the vessel of instruction in the time to come?
FER Yes, it will shine as the sun. It does not shine exactly as the sun now. The sun is not exactly on earth.
JP Because things we know now as a matter of intelligence will be matters of public administration.
FER And really of public glory. “That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus”.
JP Because as to character, God is not going to bring in anything different. It is what is now maintained in the church.
FER And you can understand from the position the church occupies now that it is qualified to shine as the sun in the kingdom of the Father.
WM Do you think that God and not Christ is the prominent idea in Ephesians?
FER Yes, because everything must go up to God in result. ‘Glory all belongs to God’. In a sense Christ may be prominent, as in Colossians, but everything must go up to God, and you must remember, after all, that Christ is God.
JSA But looked at as the Christ, the head of Christ is God.
FER As man, but He is God over all, blessed for evermore.
WM So you cannot speak of God without taking in Christ.
FER No, it would be ruinous. Well, I think it makes our place down here very simple. One great point to maintain is the power of the Spirit, so that we can go on together in unity. The first thing is to accept salvation, and the reality of it in the place which belongs to us in the scheme of divine counsel. We want to get the light of that and then seek to maintain unity; to retire into the [p. 195] region of the Spirit, and there you will be able to maintain unity, and not outside of it; it is like the precious ointment that fell down upon the beard, even Aaron’s beard. We want to get into the precious ointment, so that unity may be maintained here and the presence of God accepted; Jew and gentile builded together for an habitation of God by the Spirit.
JP It is a wonderful thing that the domain of the Spirit remains.
FER Yes, the precious ointment is there. It was poured on the head of Aaron and it ran down to the skirts of his garments. We get into the domain of the Spirit, and that means unity.
The effect of it will be seen in lowliness and meekness, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.
WM The Spirit is the Spirit of Christ; He was meek and lowly.
FER Quite so.
JMD You spoke of testimony, what is the difference between testimony and witness?
FER None at all. It is a wonderful thing that God intends to bring in unity in the whole creation, instead of a disjointed condition of things. He will pour out His Spirit upon all flesh, and that will certainly bring about unity.
JP That very expression shows that all the results that will be reached then will be reached by the power and energy of the Spirit, just as they are now.
FER So through one Spirit we have access to the Father.
JP It is wonderful to see how unity is manifested in this chapter.
FER And so through Scripture. It is remarkable to me that the first witness that God gave in creation was unity. They twain were one flesh. It was not good for man to dwell alone and God provided a helpmeet for him.
JP [p. 196] I believe there has been a great pressure brought to bear to help us to give up the thought of it.
FER It is true.
JS I suppose Satan is bent on bringing in confusion.
FER Yes.
YL I suppose you would say externally there is very little sign of unity today.
FER How do you think the loss of it was brought about? I think I can tell you, they lost salvation; they began by losing the sense of their place in the counsels of God. They left their first love. The assembly ceased to understand the place it had in the divine counsels, to sit in the heavenly places in Christ. The next step was that they came into worldly associations. The world was let in, and being brought into worldly associations, another thing came in and that is the influence of the god and prince of this world, so that they came under the power of their enemies. They made terms. I do not know if you remember what the Lord said at the end of Luke 14. They sent an ambassage and desired conditions of peace.
JS And that is all outside of the region of the Spirit.
FER Yes. I think you can see how things were lost.
JP And they began at the top.
FER They lost their place, and then separation, and they came more or less under the power of the god of this world.
JSA And if I understand it aright, the recovery of these principles within the last century began with the separation of that which concerned the church from the things that belong properly to earth. The truth that came out, in prophetic study, for instance, had that particular object in view.
FER I think so.
Ques Is unity the fruit of the Spirit?
FER It is entirely the effect of the Spirit. There is no unity apart from the precious ointment on the head of Aaron. It is the effect of Christ going up on high and [p. 197] receiving the Spirit that He might be anointed with the Spirit. It is all brought out in the Acts of the Apostles.
JP You never can improve on the language of the Spirit of God.
FER The extraordinary perfection of scriptural language is astonishing. It strikes one more and more.
JP “Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity”. “It is like”!
FER Yes.
Ques You spoke of everything at the outset. What is the end of it?
FER It is that God brings Himself near to man in favour, so that man, instead of being in the sense of being forsaken of God, realises that God is near to him in favour; and in that sense there comes in “life for evermore”. There is a remarkable expression, “a moment is passed in his anger, a life in his favour”.
JP And I was thinking, too, in the same connection it says, “I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new”.
FER Is not that a comment on the expression, “there the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore”? No more death nor sorrow nor crying. The tabernacle of God is with men.
JP And so in Ephesians you have the ground because you have the habitation.
FER And the steps to it; salvation and unity; salvation is dependent on the heavenly city. It is that that brings salvation in in the fullest sense.
WM You spoke of three steps when you were in this country before, reigning, dwelling and blessing.
FER [p. 198] Yes. He must reign that He may dwell, and He must dwell in order that He may bless. These are the three great thoughts in the Old Testament. Blessing in Abraham, dwelling in Israel and reigning in David; the thoughts come out progressively; but when they are accomplished they come out in the opposite direction. You could not get God dwelling if there were not the kingdom. The kingdom must be brought in first, then when God dwells, His dwelling brings in blessing.
WM He could not bless apart from the dwelling.
FER Quite so. Then it is you get life for evermore. ‘It is a day in Thine anger and a lifetime in Thy favour’.
GWH It is a most wonderful thing to look on and to see such a condition of things to be brought in soon, and to be in the light of it now.
FER And you want to be in the light of God’s testimony as far as you can.
JSA It is the one thing that will enable you to stand in the present day.
HT If we are in the good of what we have been talking about this afternoon our thoughts would be very little here.