Know Now, See Later

[Netchaplain]

Since rebirth, believers have had the righteousness of the Judge imputed to them (not imparted, because He "is made unto us righteousness;" we are righteous but He is the righteousness - 1Co 1:30), and it's in this they will eventually stand before His "seat"! Even though believers have security from condemnation, it cannot be enjoyed if misunderstood, for it is only in understanding what one has that enables the use of it!  When He and the Father sees the Bride in her newly acquired array, Their Spirit will also be seen, for where the Bride is, there also will be her blessed Seal (Jhn 14:16; Eph 1:13; 4:30; Rev 22:17).
NC

Know Now, See Later

The Jew must wait until the High Priest comes out to know whether the offering is accepted or not. When the Lord Jesus Christ comes out again, all Israel (and the world—NC) will look upon Him and mourn (Zec 12:10; Rev 1:7). But I do not wait for that, because the Holy Spirit has come out, and His presence gives me the blessed consciousness that Christ has been accepted before God, as my Life and Righteousness (Col 3:4; 1Co 1:30). My faith enables me to know that I have all in Him.

But when am I to get the fruit of this? I have the Holy Spirit, but what is my relationship to Christ? The Spirit having come down gives me the knowledge of it. I have the Spirit, and the knowledge of these two things—that Christ is my righteousness in the presence of the Father, and that the Spirit is the seal of it.

More than that, Christ is the Head, and "we are the members of His Body, of His flesh and of His bones" (Eph 5:30); and what is their character when He talks about them? It is as His Bride (second only to the blessed Trinity—NC). It is never said of Christ that He was bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. Just as Eve was of Adam, we are of Christ—and more so—because the "Spirit of Christ" dwells in me and unites me to Christ in Glory.

When "the Sun of righteousness arises with healing in His wings" (Mal 4:2) there will be judgment, treading down of the wicked, etc. But meanwhile, while He is hidden from the world, faith sees Him (Mat 13:11; Col 3:3); and faith, seeing Him, has trusted and leaned upon Him as its righteousness before the Father.

Therefore He says, "Now He which establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us is God, who has sealed us, and given us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts" (2Co 1:22). He is these two; the earnest (i.e. guaranty of receiving—NC) of the glory, and the present certainty of the love. I know the love now, the Holy Spirit giving me the consciousness of "prefect love" (1Jo 4:18).

The bright and morning star is before the day dawns. We know Christ before we see Him (Num 24:17—NC). We have not seen Him and yet we believed (Jhn 20:29). "At that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you" (Jhn 14:20). We are associated with Him while He is not in the world. When the Son rises, I will see Him in His glory, but we know Him now behind the cloud.

He is the Son who has revealed Himself to me—this One who is in the heavens, as He revealed Himself to Paul (to us it's the glory of His knowledge, which manifests faith more significantly than Paul seeing the literal Glory - Act 22:11—NC); therefore it is the Gospel of the Glory. I know Him as my righteousness, and as the Bridegroom to the Bride.

—J N Darby (1800-1882)




Excerpt from the online Miles J Stanford devotional, "None but the Hungry Heart:"

The love motive is not adequate to carry the believer through to fruitful walk and service. Few seem to be able to face up to this fact, possibly because they see no higher alternative. But there is one: the life motive. "For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death" (Rom. 8:2).

"The law is for the man who departed from God—that man has been removed from God's sight in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, and I rejoice that now by the 'law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus' I am 'free from the law of sin and death' (Rom. 8:2)."
http://www.abideabove.com/hungry-heart/