EXTRACTS
DEVOTEDNESS TO CHRIST—TWOFOLD
I think we little comprehend what Bethany was to the Lord. He was not only at home there because they rested in His love, but because He was understood. Mary does two things most pleasing to Him. She sits at His feet, hearing His word, and she anoints Him for the burying.
The one shows that she appreciates His mind—what He had to unfold; the other, that the most fragrant thing in her possession goes into the tomb with Him. This is devotedness of a double kind; it is on the one hand to receive only from Him—to have no thought, no mind, but His; on the other, to declare plainly that what would most distinguish me in nature, I pass over to Him who has died here. It fills the house of Bethany with fragrance. What living one is worthy of it, if the One who has revealed the Father has died out of the scene? No doubt the knowledge of His mind enabled Mary to confide in Him in the hour of sorrow (John 11); and then she not only knows what His mind is, but she proves what He Himself is, when there was nothing to afford one ray of light; and this prepares her for anointing His body for the burying (John 12).
Thus the first part of devotedness—sitting at His feet, hearing His word, choosing the “good part” (Luke 10), leads to the proving of it all in His personal sympathy, so that it is not only His mind that is revealed to me, but I know how He meets me, and consoles me in a scene of death. Then follows the second part of devotedness, viz., to resign to Christ in death that which would lend distinction to myself. Now unless these traits exist, there will be a defect in the character which is so pleasing to the Lord. I might be like Peter, who truly desired to know the mind of the Lord when he beckoned to John to ask Him who it should be who should betray Him; and afterwards so unwisely zealous that he cut off the ear of the high priest’s servant. Here there were apparently the two parts of devotedness in Peter; but we see when the pressure came—when the Lord was friendless and surrounded by foes, Peter had not the stay which one who had sat at His feet would have experienced at such a moment. If I have chosen the “good part”—if I have sought Him for His own sake—I am sure to find and to know Him in my need and sorrow; for it is there I prove Him. Everything here loses its charm, because He is not here. Everything valued here is surrendered to embalm a Christ dead to this scene.
The wind and the waves test the stability of the house, whether the foundation has been laid deep in the rock; and if the house does not stand the test, it cannot fulfil the purpose of a devoted heart. If I am without sympathy in my trials, I become hardened by them, like the bark of an old tree, but if I have known the sympathy of Christ which is perfect, instead of having a hard exterior, I grow a soft and beautiful moss, though my nature be as the granite rock. Thus there is personal evidence of real, full devotedness. The one wholly devoted to Christ receives so from Him, that the very vicissitudes which harden another, only make him soft and gracious.
In my trials I prove Him; and I show my devotedness to Him by the easy way I express Him in my ways to suffering man down here. The moss tells me that I have received, and that I have nothing but what I have received. The thick bark indicates the effort to preserve something of one’s own.
J. B. Stoney (New Series Vol. 12, pp.1, 2)
The elevation is seen in Exodus 24 when certain ones are invited to go up. They do not stay there; they come down, for the idea is that what is set up here on the earth outwardly is a heavenly thing. If a number of angels came down they would not be affected by theatres; they have no taste for those things. God can trust us as we come down. When He takes us into what is heavenly, as it were; He gives us tastes and instincts so that He can trust us, as we come down. Therefore, in Ephesians the elevation is first; then we are made to sit down together; then there is the habitation here, a heavenly institution here below. The point is to keep to the heavenly in our tastes. That is what Exodus means—the tabernacle is a heavenly thing down here and God fills it with His glory.
J. Taylor (Vol. 75, p.438)
Edited and Published by J. Strachan, 59 Frederick Street, Dundee, DD3 9DE, Scotland Printed by Crystal Stationery, 22 Western Road, Billericay, Essex CM12 9DZ, (T) (01277) 650661