Faith Unto Enlargement Through Adversity # 6

Life, Liberty and Enlargement For Us In Christ

But what a testimony this is to the mercy of God. This is the point. I said a little earlier that this "I" of the Psalm is an inclusive and collective "I". In the first place, it is the nation speaking in this personal way, using this personal pronoun "I". Now it is taken up in relation to the Lord Jesus - "I shall not die." But, you see, it is not just personal. We know that the Lord Jesus had no need to go to the Cross for Himself. It has often been pointed out that those words used much later by an Apostle - "Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and hath sat down at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2) - should be translated: "Who, instead of the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despised shame, and sat down ...," and it takes you to the mount of transfiguration.

The mount of transfiguration was the seal to the perfection of His moral character. There is no transfiguration or glorification apart from moral perfection, and so God gave Him the great witness that He was perfect, that He saw no fault in Him, that He had passed the scrutiny of the eyes of Divine holiness, and there was not a flaw or a blemish in Him: He was perfect. Therefore He had a right to go from the mount of transfiguration right through to the glory for ever. The glory was His, it was His. But instead of the joy that was set in front of Him, He turned around and came down and endured the Cross, and if you will look at the context of these words in Hebrews, you will find that it was all because of ourselves - that He was not going  to glory without us! Bringing many sons to glory necessitated His coming down, foregoing for the time being His right, His immediate right, to the glory, and enduring the Cross. You remember how, in that same letter to the Hebrews, it is put into the mouth of the Lord Himself: "I and the children whom God hath given Me" (Hebrews 2:13). "He is not ashamed to call them brethren" (2:11).

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 7)