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- Aug 9, 2012
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“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest” (Heb 10:19). It is the happiest place; it is the home of the heart in the brightness if the Father’s presence. There is no place that I have such a right to, that I am so fully entitled to, as that position. There I find the Lord Jesus, the blessed One who has measured my distance from the Father; the One who is the measure of my nearness to Him—and I therefore enter into that place by the One who sustains me there.
Scripture never contemplates a believer as being in a lower class than that of knowing the Father: “I write unto you, little children, because you have known the Father” (1Jn 2:13). This knowledge affects you every hour of the day; you show it in every little thing here and there. What did the Father send His Son for, but that you might find your enjoyment in His presence! “For Christ also has suffered for sins, the just for the unjust (the holy for the unholy—NC), that He might bring us to God” (1Pe 3:18); and, if you have never gone into the Father’s house, never taken the child’s place in His presence, how can you grow (Eph 4:15)?
In Philippians we come to the Father making all our requests known, and what is the effect of it? That you get rid of the cares on your mind (4:6)? Not necessarily, but that you get Himself. The care is not the issue, but now I have got my Father. I had the weight of the cares; now I have the color of God. I come out with God upon me, and not the cares (because we cast them on Him by knowing His care for us - 1Pe 5:7—NC); I have got my Father’s way of looking at things, and not my own. So now, the Persons who entirely engage my mind and heart, are my Father, and my Lord Jesus Christ.
If I talk to a painter who is studying a work of art, I find that he is imbibing the beauties he is studying; and just so I study the Lord Jesus, but with this great difference that, as I study Him I am formed like Him. As I study the beauty of the Lord Jesus I am growing like Him; nothing can be more captivation to the heart, than this growing like the Person whom I love. As I am more “conformed” to His “image” (not conform but “being conformed” - Rom 8:29; 2Co 3:18—NC), I get enlarged tastes to love and appreciate Him; and to this degree I drop the “old man.” “I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phl 3:8).
Are you, like a true bride, studying your blessed Bridegroom”? “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2Co 4:6). People think they can acquire all this without any difficulty, but I tell you plainly that it is not so. The Lord Jesus knows His own worth too, whenever to disclose Himself to any who do not value Him (Jhn 14:21, 22). No, He does not make little of His own love. Did you ever give up a single thing for Him? If there are people who have never given up anything for Him, how then can I suppose that He is their object; and how can they expect Him to make Himself known to them?
If a person say to me, “I have the Holy Spirit in me;” I say, “Well, where does He lead you to? Is it earth? Never! My heart is carried by the Spirit into a new region, and I rest there. The Spirit does not turn the eye to earth. “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth” (Col 3:2). People say, “How am I now to be where Christ is? Set your mind on things above (as often as possible—NC), and you will soon enough know yourself to be there (because it’s certain you will be there – “has raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus - Eph 2:6: Col 3:1—NC). “Your life is hid with Christ in God” (Col 3:3: 1Pe 3:4).
—J B Stoney
Scripture never contemplates a believer as being in a lower class than that of knowing the Father: “I write unto you, little children, because you have known the Father” (1Jn 2:13). This knowledge affects you every hour of the day; you show it in every little thing here and there. What did the Father send His Son for, but that you might find your enjoyment in His presence! “For Christ also has suffered for sins, the just for the unjust (the holy for the unholy—NC), that He might bring us to God” (1Pe 3:18); and, if you have never gone into the Father’s house, never taken the child’s place in His presence, how can you grow (Eph 4:15)?
In Philippians we come to the Father making all our requests known, and what is the effect of it? That you get rid of the cares on your mind (4:6)? Not necessarily, but that you get Himself. The care is not the issue, but now I have got my Father. I had the weight of the cares; now I have the color of God. I come out with God upon me, and not the cares (because we cast them on Him by knowing His care for us - 1Pe 5:7—NC); I have got my Father’s way of looking at things, and not my own. So now, the Persons who entirely engage my mind and heart, are my Father, and my Lord Jesus Christ.
If I talk to a painter who is studying a work of art, I find that he is imbibing the beauties he is studying; and just so I study the Lord Jesus, but with this great difference that, as I study Him I am formed like Him. As I study the beauty of the Lord Jesus I am growing like Him; nothing can be more captivation to the heart, than this growing like the Person whom I love. As I am more “conformed” to His “image” (not conform but “being conformed” - Rom 8:29; 2Co 3:18—NC), I get enlarged tastes to love and appreciate Him; and to this degree I drop the “old man.” “I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phl 3:8).
Are you, like a true bride, studying your blessed Bridegroom”? “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2Co 4:6). People think they can acquire all this without any difficulty, but I tell you plainly that it is not so. The Lord Jesus knows His own worth too, whenever to disclose Himself to any who do not value Him (Jhn 14:21, 22). No, He does not make little of His own love. Did you ever give up a single thing for Him? If there are people who have never given up anything for Him, how then can I suppose that He is their object; and how can they expect Him to make Himself known to them?
If a person say to me, “I have the Holy Spirit in me;” I say, “Well, where does He lead you to? Is it earth? Never! My heart is carried by the Spirit into a new region, and I rest there. The Spirit does not turn the eye to earth. “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth” (Col 3:2). People say, “How am I now to be where Christ is? Set your mind on things above (as often as possible—NC), and you will soon enough know yourself to be there (because it’s certain you will be there – “has raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus - Eph 2:6: Col 3:1—NC). “Your life is hid with Christ in God” (Col 3:3: 1Pe 3:4).
—J B Stoney
