[“I became a minister according to the stewardship from God which was given to me for you, to fulfill the word of God, the mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we preach, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ Jesus.” (emphasis added) Colossians 1:25-28]
When God’s secrets break open, they do so in glory. The wealth of the root hidden in the ground is revealed in the hues of orchid or scent of rose. The hidden beauty of a beam of light is unraveled in the sevenfold color of the rainbow. The swarming, infinitesimal life of southern seas breaks into waves of phosphorescence when cleft by the keel of the ship. And whenever the unseen world has revealed itself to mortal eyes, it has been in glory.
It was especially so at the Transfiguration, when the Lord’s nature broke from the strong restraint within which He confined it and revealed itself to the eye of man. “His face did shine as the sun, and His garments became white as light.” [Matt. 17:2]
So when we accept the fact of His existence within us deeper than our own, and make it one of the aims of our life to draw on it and develop it, we shall be conscious of a glory transfiguring our life and irradiating ordinary things, such as will make earth, with its commonest engagements, like as the vestibule of heaven.
The wife of Jonathan Edwards had been the subject of great fluctuations in religious experience and frequent depression, till she came to the point of renouncing the world, and yielding herself up to be possessed by these mighty truths. But so soon as this was the case, a marvelous change took place. She began to experience a constant, uninterrupted rest; sweet peace and serenity of soul; a continual rejoicing in all the works of God’s hands, whether of nature or of daily providence; a wonderful access to God by prayer, as it were seeing Him and immediately conversing with Him; all tears wiped away; all former troubles and sorrows of life forgotten, excepting grief for past sins and for the dishonor done to Christ in the world; a daily sensible doing and suffering everything for God, and doing all with a continual uninterrupted cheerfulness, peace and joy.[1]
Such glory — the certain pledge of the glory to be revealed — is within reach of each reader of these lines who will dare day by day to reckon that Christ lives within, and will be content to die to the energies and promptings for the self‑life so that there may be room for the Christ‑life to reveal itself. “I have been crucified,” said the greatest human teacher of this Divine art; “Christ liveth in me; I live by faith in the Son of God. [Gal. 2:20]”
[“Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God… Now the Lord is the Spirit; and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.” 2 Cor. 3:5,17,18]
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From The Secret of Guidance, Chapter 3, (NY: FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY, 1896). http://www.ccel.org/ccel/meyer/guidance.txt
[1] Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) was an American pastor, Puritan theologian and philosopher. Sarah Edwards’ testimony is more fully presented in her own words in this Grace Note: https://gracenotebook.com/testimony-of-a-pastors-wife/
[Bracketed Scriptures added, NKJV]
Honorable Mention
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