GOD'S PROMISES IN CHRIST
GOD’S PROMISES IN CHRIST
2 Corinthians 2: 20 - 22
There is this connected with the Son of God, that every promise is now established in Him. The promises of God had relation to man, whatever they were. They regarded man, and therefore, in order that these promises might be effectual, they need to be centred at a point from which God could affect and subdue man, for it was impossible that God’s promises could be brought to pass if it were not in God’s power to affect man according to Himself; but that is what God has proved His power and ability to do; it is in the Son of God that all the promises of God are yea and Amen. If you look for a moment at these promises, they related both to Jew and gentile. The great promise to Abraham, “In thy seed shall all the families of the earth be blessed”, had relation to the gentile as well as to the Jew, and so, many other passages in the Old Testament relate to the gentile. There are ample promises to the Jew, and at the same time rich promises for the gentile. Christ is to be the Head of the heathen: “a people whom I have not known shall serve me”. There are abundant promises for the gentiles, in Christ. The great promise to Abraham was connected with blessing, but we have also foreshadowed the complete victory over the power of evil — the head of the serpent was to be bruised; then there is, too, the promise of the new covenant — man was to be morally a reflex of God; and when that came to pass, God would dwell among men. And we have also the purpose of God to reign. God Himself was going to take the kingdom. God had the kingdom, in a sense, when David reigned in Jerusalem. Then, when the line of David became completely unfaithful, and God had to break with them, power was put for the time into the hands of the gentiles, and we have the times of the [p. 410] gentiles. But we see in the Old Testament the purpose of God Himself to take up the throne; Jehovah would reign. The kingdoms of this world are to become the kingdom of our God, and of His Christ. Now, these promises refer to man, whether it is the bruising of the head of the serpent, or the blessing of all nations in Abraham. Every promise involves the blessing of man. But then, the promises could not, as I have said, be established until there was a point from which God would affect man. Now there is such a point, that is, the Son of God, in whom is revealed God’s love, and every promise of God is held in Him to God’s glory. That is the light into which we have come — the light of God’s glory in the face of Jesus Christ, where every promise of God is established and firm, because from that point God can make man willing in the day of His power. That is what will come to pass in the case of Israel, and that is what God has done with regard to us. And now in regard of the promises of God, in the Son of God is the yea and the Amen, for glory to God by us, because the light of the Son of God can affect man.
And now, I just say a few words as to how we are affected. It is important to see that side of it, if these promises are to be the glory of God by us. “Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God: who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts”. The first expression that you get there is a little difficult to interpret. My impression is this, that it means, attaching us firmly to Christ. That is the work of God, and I think that work of God, as I understand it, is carried on in the hearts of the saints. God is the One who does it. The way in which it is wrought is this, that God gives Christ such a place in the hearts of the saints, as that He attaches us firmly to Him; He dwells by faith in the heart. Then, God has anointed us. He has given us intelligence in the power of the Holy Spirit, a spiritual intelligence of things. I think I can give you an interpretation of it. Look at the apostle’s prayer in Ephesians 3: “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love” — just notice how all the Godhead is brought into the passage: the Father strengthens you with might by His Spirit in the inner man, that the Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith — “that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend” (that is the effect of the anointing) “with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ” (that is, that your hearts may be firmly attached to Christ) “which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God”. I think that anyone can understand that if Christ dwells in the heart by faith, your heart is firmly attached to Him; He rules in your heart. And then, you have intelligence, you are anointed, and can enter into the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, that is into the whole range and extent of divine promises. You grasp the entire system, for all the promises of God form one grand system. The idea is not that there are a number of promises having little or no connection with each other, but that they form one grand system, of which the church is the crowning stone. “All the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us”, that is, by the church. The church is the witness of them now, and the glory of God is expressed in the church, because the church has and gives the sense of the stability of all God’s promises in the One who is the Yea and Amen.
Then, God has also sealed us. The seal is the mark which God has put upon us, and that is the Spirit. It is the expression, the evidence, that we are genuinely God’s property. He has His mark upon us. We get the consciousness [p. 412] by the Spirit that we are not our own, but God’s property. And more than that, He has given us the earnest of the Spirit; His Spirit is the earnest of the inheritance and of glory in our souls. That is what God has effected on our side. What He has effected on our side is in order that He might subdue the hearts of men by the revelation of Himself. What a wonderful company we should be if we were here in the full sense of the certainty and fixity of everything which God has promised, if our souls had power to take up the whole range of those promises. How conscious we should be of blessing if we saw the beauty of that system, everything established in the Son of God, and we firmly attached to Christ; anointed, that we might have intelligence as to the knowledge of God; sealed, as the property of God; and having the earnest of the Spirit until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of His glory.
Now, I think you will admit that the passage is a very profound one. It consists of only two or three verses, but it is pregnant with profound meaning. It would be a great study for a young christian to apprehend the promises of God as one complete whole. They lie about in Scripture, but they form one whole. God could not reveal them all together; He revealed them in part here and there; but now it is our privilege to see the completeness and perfection of the whole, established and firm in the Son of God.
[p. 413] Acts 11 We see here that the servant of the Lord has to justify his work as well as carry it out; Peter had to justify it before the apostles and brethren. In any unusual work going on today the servant has to justify it before his brethren, as we see in chapter 14: 27.
No servant can take a ground of independence. It was an unusual course of Peter in chapter 10, which God would have to be justified before the saints. The servant of the Lord now takes his direction from the Lord, but that will not lead to independence, he justifies himself before the saints. A servant has to be guided by the general judgment of the saints. As to what Peter actually did, it was that God shewed him, in the sheet let down from heaven, what the situation was, and all Peter did was to recognise the situation. The blessing of Abraham was gone out to the gentiles: that was what Peter had to recognise. It is important to put before people the blessing side of the gospel, and not the mere escape side. Peter only made known what was already true in Christ. He was used to shew that the door was opened to the gentiles. The nations had received the word of God, and the nations had received the gift of the Spirit, and in verse 18 it is to the nations God hath granted repentance unto life.
Cornelius was just brought in to shew what the situation was; the gospel today makes known the situation. A man gets repentance unto life; directly he gets his eyes open as to God he must be brought to repentance. It is the goodness of God that leads to repentance.
The prodigal arrived at a judgment of himself in presence of the goodness of God. If God were not revealed in grace there could be no turning to God. The reconciliation of the world (Romans 11: 15) is seen in the sheet let down from heaven, not the world there in the sense of “all that is in the world”, but in the way of contrast with the Jews.
Redemption has come in to enable God to take up all men. The promise could only be effected by redemption, because man lay under judgment and death.
In his going to Cornelius Peter was very wise, for he took six brethren with him. Cornelius and his house were to be told of God’s salvation, were to be brought into salvation. The expression, “added to the Lord”, seems to be added to Him in the way of profession.
The Greeks were gentiles, but the Grecians were Hellenists or Greek-speaking Jews. The wisdom of God was seen in using Peter, a Jew and the minister of the circumcision, to open the door for the gentiles. In the case of Saul of Tarsus, Ananias was indisposed to go to Saul, and Peter was indisposed to go to Cornelius, but the Lord was overruling all. Then we see that it was happily accepted by the church at Jerusalem, and they send down Barnabas.
The christian is one who professes Christ; it may have been at first a term of reproach, but it is adopted by the Spirit, as we see in Peter: “if any man suffer as a Christian”. Antioch becomes a special centre of the activity of the Spirit.
He is made Lord and Christ, and then you get His activities: He directs His servants, converts Saul of Tarsus and opens the door to the gentiles. The Lord, gone up on high, does all this.