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Divine Order in Christ

Of the increase of His government and peace there will be no end. (Isaiah 9:7)

Everything which has to do with the realization of God's purpose in creating man, and this world, and its universe, is a matter of knowing God in Christ, which, of course, means knowing Christ. Every aspect and detail of God's will and God's way and God's end is a matter of knowing the Lord Jesus. All progress, as all life, rests upon that knowing Him. The Christian life here is meant to be one of continuous growth and development and progress, but that only takes place as we come to know more, and still more, of the meaning of the Lord Jesus. This progress will not stop when we leave this world, and when time gives place to eternity: "Of the increase of His kingdom there will be no end." Stagnation is no mark of Life, and Life there will be ever manifesting itself in new and more wonderful fullnesses and forms. Therefore, the knowledge of Christ which will, in time and eternity, be the secret of growth and progress, will continue in heaven, and it will take eternity to exhaust it....

Seeing He is so vast, so immense, so many-sided, we can only see Him from one standpoint at a time; we have to move round to see Him from every angle. And at this time we are just looking at the Lord Jesus from one of the many angles, or points of view, which is this particular aspect of His significance: that He, in His Person and in His work, stands related to an eternal, heavenly order. He Himself, in His wonderful, complex Person, is the very embodiment of all the principles and laws of a great heavenly order. When everything is conformed to Christ and takes its character from Him, it will be one glorious, harmonious whole, perfected into one, just one glorious unity... I have only opened a window to you through which you can see a universe.

That through death He might destroy him who had the power of death.

Our Savior Jesus Christ … has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. § He will swallow up death forever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces; the rebuke of His people He will take away from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken. § When this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.” “O Death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?” The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. § Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

Heb. 2:14;  2 Tim. 1:10;  Isa. 25:8;  1 Cor. 15:54,55;  1 Cor. 15:56,57  2 Tim. 1:7;  Ps. 23:4

Where is the way to the dwelling of light?

God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. § As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.

If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. § The Father … has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.

You are all sons of light and sons of the day. We are not of the night nor of darkness. § You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden … Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.

Job 38:19;  1 John 1:5;  John 9:5;  1 John 1:6,7;  Col. 1:12:Col. 1:13;  Col. 1:14;  1 Thess. 5:5;  Matt. 5:14,16

Church Plight

For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God" (Acts 20:27).

In regard to the external Cross, the obvious fact is that "Christ died for our sins." As to the internal Cross, while not so obvious, it is still a fact that we are to be "always delivered unto death for Jesus' sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh" (2 Cor. 4:11).

"Popular Fundamentalist theology has emphasized the utility of the Cross rather than the beauty of the One who died on it. The saved man's relation to the Lord Jesus has been made contractual instead of personal. The work' of Christ has been stressed until it has eclipsed the Person of Christ. Substitution has been allowed to supersede identification. What He did for us seems to be more important than what He did to us." -A.W.T.

"The death of the Lord Jesus was not only an atonement for sins, but a triumph over sin. By faith we see our sins not only on His head for our pardon, but sin under His feet for our deliverance. Multitudes who glory in the outward Cross know nothing of that inward crucifixion which it has also made possible, whereby they are delivered from the power of self and sin, the world, the flesh, and the devil. That they do not know: That their old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, so that they should no longer be in bondage to sin' (Rom. 6:6)." -G.M.

"We are not only to take by faith the fact that the Lord Jesus died for us to pay the price and penalty of our sins, but we are to appropriate by faith the fact that He also took us to the Cross with Him. In Christ, God put to death our old man that we might be delivered from the power and dominion of sin in our lives. So the story of the pathway of faith begins with Calvary and our identification with the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus." -G.M.

"You were set free from the tyranny of sin" (Rom. 6:18, Wey.).

ALL In ALL In Christ

Our Blessed Father