"I used to think that I had lively faith, communion, and hope; but as I get older I find myself more like a babe, faithfully watched over by a mother's eye, and seem to get more satisfied to see what His thoughts of today are about me, and what His plans for the morrow. Less account made of my feelings, more of His; less notice of my faith, more of the fact that He died in my stead. More consciousness of the worth of His presence in heaven as a fact, than of the feelings which the knowledge of it produces in me -- more counting on the certainty of His coming back in order to put the finishing stroke to what He has wrought, than of the flutter of expectancy. Not that the work wrought in us by the Holy Ghost has sunk in value in my thoughts, but that I look more at the outgoings of that work in me. 'To me to live is Christ.' 'The life I live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.' Individual attachment of the soul to the person of the Lord seems of growing importance. He bare the wrath in our stead; He has confessed in heaven above His love to us; He means to come and fetch us home. How can I say such things, and not want to see Himself -- His own very self? True, when He comes the scene will be surpassingly grand and blessed -- Himself, the resurrection and the life, coming out from God to turn the low estate of those who have trusted in Him to an occasion in which to show forth the glories of His own divine person as the resurrection and the life. He will come, and call up out of the grave all that believed in Him; and then, standing on the cloud, will cause the life wherewith He will have quickened those that are alive, and remain to His coming, to burst forth; and then body and spirit shall be as instinct with His life as the souls of His people already are; and He will catch them away to be with Himself for ever in the Father's house. Most blessed as this, the doctrine of 1 Thess. 4, is, my soul seems to find its deeper, more individual portion in 1 Thess. 1. I appreciate Him, and do so in the very presence of God. He loves me, and I love Him; and I wait for Him to come from heaven. The individuality is so blessedly seen on the one hand, and the contrast on the other between this divinely-wrought love to Himself and the poor world all around. It is, too, one's portion for today just where we are now." G. V. W.
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Christian Friend, vol. 13, 1886, p. 134.
SALVATION has a divine as well as a human side. Nothing that God had created could satisfy Him, save to have Christ as man sitting on His throne. Ah! His ways are not as our ways. God's glory in redemption was to show how low He could let the Son of His love stoop -- in letting Him go down to the death of the cross -- break His heart in woe -- and then to set Him as the centre of a new system as the Lamb slain. Would that be according to man's thought of glory? But God would have His own way, and all His glory shone forth in redemption. His glory is to have heaven filled with poor sinners, brands plucked from the burning. And His Christ finds Himself sitting patiently waiting [2000] years for heaven to be so filled. G. V. W.
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Christian Friend, vol. 13, 1886, p. 140.
To me it is a more real thing knowing Christ as a man in heaven, than seeing Him as His followers did when down here. God has let the reality of His being there into my heart, and the light of that reality shines forth in rays that come to me right down from heaven. I call this, faith in living exercise; but I may have faith, and yet may not be dwelling on the reality of a living Christ in heaven. My heart may not be up there, with all its feelings gathered up to Him.
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Do I know that Christ has brought me near to God? Then I cannot go on a step without feeling a spiritual want to praise and worship God.
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Ah, shall I not say, when I see the worthy One in the very highest place in heaven, "He is the only worthy One! And if suffering for Him down here, will not the going forth of my heart be all praise?
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No one but the Lamb slain is recognised in heaven as worthy to receive power, riches, wisdom, strength, honour, glory, and blessing, in the place where God is, all laid down before the Lamb. G. V. W.
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Christian Friend vol. 15, 1888, p. 48.
"How far is Christ practically formed in our hearts and minds? I mean not, as in Galatians, Christ formed in their souls, but formed in us so that His thoughts are our thoughts, His cares our cares, His subjects of interest our subjects of interest, and none other. So it was in Paul; and so it might be wherever His life reigns in us, although our portion and calling be not so Nazarite as were Paul's. I ask for more of this for myself in my remaining sojourn down here -- one thing, and but one -- that, standing and abiding in Christ where I am, my range of affections and thoughts may be in unison with His until He comes. I can think of nothing as more blessed than this reproduction in oneself of His life, already ours through faith, but needing the unhindered action of the Holy Ghostfulness of the Holy Ghost -- in order to be practically seen and known of all around, as enjoyed by the soul in the secret of God's presence. The dust of the wilderness -- one thousand and one little cares -- would then drop off; or, if remaining, be but as the last year's fruits that have still survived the autumn blasts and the hard frosts of winter, and will drop off as spring returns and the fresh flow and sap come, and show what is and what is not virtually connected with us." G. V. W.
