[Songs in the Night - September 15]
The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of His calling, and what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. Ephesians 1:18
IT REQUIRES time for heart and head so to expand
as to take in a glimpse of such a wonderful blessing
as this which God has provided for the elect.
But
whoever gets even a faint glimpse of the greatness of
God's favor toward the church will not be surprised
that in the divine plan so liberal an allowance as nearly
nineteen centuries was made for the calling and chastisement
and perfecting of the saints for the great and
glorious work to which they, as joint-heirs with Messiah,
are called.
Neither will they think strange the
fiery trials which try all of these whom the Lord our
God calls, and accepts as probationary members of the
elect kingdom class.
They will perceive, readily
enough, that if it was expedient, yea, necessary, that
our Lord Jesus, with all of his experience in the heavenly
courts, must "learn obedience by the things which
he suffered," and prove his loyalty to the Father by
faithfulness even unto death, much more must his followers—whose previous history was that of sinners—be tried and thoroughly tested in respect to their
loyalty to the Lord. Z'03-93 R3168:1 (Hymn 291)