Reading: “But now in Christ Jesus, ye, who sometimes were afar off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ.”—Ephesians 2:13
Of all the vast alterations made upon our nature by grace that which is from death to life seems to be the greatest. I do not think the change would be as great if Jesus were to make a child of God, after his conversion, at once an archangel, as when, by His blessed Spirit He quickens the sinner, dead in trespasses and sins, and brings him into grace.
First, think where you then stood before this vast act of grace had quickened you. You stood on the very confines of hell, unawakened, unregenerate, uncalled, without God, and without Christ. Supposing the Lord had not saved you; supposing death had taken you while in this state. Where would you have been? And yet consider, how many nights and days you lived in this unconscious, unconcerned state?
Contemplate the subject from another point of view—from where you now stand. You are now, the apostle says, “made nigh by the blood of Christ.” And now, if death should come, it is but the messenger to glory. Advance one step more in this sweet subject, and consider, where you soon shall be. Paul answered, “So shall we be ever with the Lord.” Who can write down the full amount of this blessedness?—“Ever with the Lord.”
Here we are, in Jesus, interested in all that belongs to Him, but there, we shall be also with Jesus. Here we see Him but as through a glass darkly, there, face to face. Here, even the views we have of Him by faith, are but glimpses only—short and rare, compared to our desires; but there, we shall see Him in reality, in substance, and unceasingly, the precious, glorious, God-man Christ Jesus. Here, our sins, though pardoned, yet dim our view; there, we shall forever have lost them, and see, and know, even as we are known.
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