In the Heavenly Places

0:00I should like to call your attention this morning to the words which are to be found in Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, the second chapter, verses 4, 5, 6 and 7. Verse is 4, 5, 6 and 7. In the second chapter of Paul's epistle to the Ephesians, we come back once more to this mighty and marvelous statement, then which surely we can say, without any hesitation whatsoever, there is nothing more glorious in the entire range of Scripture. It is one of the great and greatest evangelical statements, the full content of the Scripture being presented. And therefore it behorses to consider it carefully together that we may understand and receive something of its rich and the bounding content.

1:00Now we have looked at it already several times. The point which we must bear in mind is this, that the Apostle here is working out an analogy. He has been praying for these Ephesians that the eyes of their understanding may be enlightened. He wants them to know three things, what is the hope of their calling, the riches of the glory of gods in heritance in the saints and especially the exceeding greatness of God's power to usward that belief. Now he is elaborating that third petition. He wants us to realize that the power that works in us is nothing less than the self-same power that was exercised in the raising of the Lord Jesus Christ from the dead. And he works it out. He is hinted at this, he is laid open to us at the end of the first chapter and here in the second chapter he proceeds to elaborate it.

2:01The idea is in other words that what happened to our Lord physically is the very thing that happens to all spiritually who are truly Christian. Nothing less than that. Becoming a Christian is a profound operation which is worked in the soul by God. We were dead in trespasses and sins etc. God but God in spite of that, even when we were dead in sins, as quicken us together with Christ. And so you see, he elaborates again this great doctrine of his of the union of the believer with the Lord Jesus Christ. We've participated in what has happened to him. So you notice that each time he brings in this word together, even when we were dead in sins, as quicken us together with Christ and as raised as up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.

3:04Very well. The question is, what is it that's happened to the Christian? What is it that makes us Christian? Well, we've seen already that the first thing that must happen is this that we be quickened. We need life. We are helpless. We are dead. We can do nothing. Life, spiritual life. Well, he gives it us. He quits us. Then that is regeneration. Then we notice now, Sunday morning, that it goes beyond that. We've not only been quickened but we've been raised. As life was put into that lifeless body of our Lord in the grave. And then he came out of the grave, leaving the grave clouds behind and appeared. The grave was empty. He was no longer in it. He wasn't barely that he was given this new power of life in the grave. He came out of the grave. He was raised. And so the Christian is raised. And that was our theme loss and the morning, that we are indeed dead unto sins but alive

4:07and a God. Raised from the dead and we saw what all that means with respect to our standing and status and also in our experience. But you see, the story doesn't end there. It goes even beyond that. He's not only quickened us and raised us together with Christ. He has made us to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. For our Lord, after He had risen from the dead, it didn't remain perpetually upon us. Not at all. He ascended into heaven. He is seated at the right hand of God in the glory. And so the apostle goes on to say that this also has happened to the believer. And of course, it must happen to the believer. I say it must happen for this reason. That the doctrine of our union with Christ insists upon this.

5:10As we have been quickened with Him and raised with Him, so it must follow that everything else that has happened to Him must happen to us spiritually. Therefore, we have of necessity been made to sit with Him in the heavenly places. Another thing which we must bear in mind is this that all these statements which are made by the apostle, you notice, are in the past tense. He isn't saying that these things are going to happen to us. They have happened. You notice He puts that quite clearly by grace, He are saved. You have been saved. Well, in the same way, you have been quickened. You have been raised. You are seated. It's just something that's taken place. It's not a prophecy, it's not a prediction. It's not holding out a hope of our sister what's going to happen. The thing they are puzzling, anxious about, I say, is that these Ephesians should realize at this moment. But this is true.

6:10He says, I want the eyes of your understanding to be enlightened that you may know this thing. It has taken place. It's already something that is actually a fact. And again, I say it must be because of our union with our Lord. Well, very well. The next common point to the three statements is this. We have seen that the quickening and the raising together have got to be considered objectively and subjectively. They've got to be considered as having happened in Christ as our head and representative. And they've got to be considered also in terms of our mystical union with Him. Very well though, if that is so, let us now face this mighty statement. There is nothing more wonderful stated anywhere about the Christian believer than we have in the phrase that we are examining together at this moment. This is the supreme thing of all.

7:10This is the highest glory. This is the most priceless thing that is true of us as God's being. We are seated together with Christ in the heavenly places now. At this moment, we are in that position. Very well, what's it mean? Well, perhaps the best plan is to start by considering this term which is translated here in this authorized version as the heavenly places. Now you remember that we've already come across this phrase in the third verse of the first chapter, where we are red blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who have blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. Now you will recall that we then said that a better translation is the heavenly place is really a word that's added by the translators and it's rather an unfortunate addition because

8:16it doesn't convey the full idea that was in the mind of the Apostle. It localizes it just a bit too much. The heavenly place. What do you mean by the heavenly place? Well, surely it's the same thing that the Apostle has in his mind when in that striking bit of autobiography which we have in the second epistle to the Corinthians in the 12th chapter. He tells us in the second verse that he knew women 14 years ago you remember who was caught up into the third heaven. That's it. Now that was the way that people thought in those days. The first heaven was the atmosphere, the clouds and so on that we see. The second heaven was the part in which you had the stars and the moon and the sun. And then the third heaven is the place where God especially manifests His presence and His glory, the place in which the glorified body of the Lord Jesus Christ now dwells.

9:23That's the third heaven. And I think it is correct to say that whenever you get this heavenly place or heavenly place, it generally carries that meaning and connotation. Very well then this is the realm into which we have been introduced as the result of our regeneration. As the result of our regeneration we belong to that realm, the third heaven, the heavenly place in which I say the glory and the presence of God manifested in this marvelous and wonderful manner. Well now then says someone, all right I'll accept that definition but what does all this mean rarely in practice actually to me and for me? The answer to that question is again to expound our passage. And the way to do that is of course. To bear in mind that in these verses 4, 5, 6 and 7 we have the contrast to what we

10:23had in verses 1, 2 and 3. There we were but God. What? Well the exact opposite. That's the contrast and it works itself out as we've already seen quite simply and naturally. Being dead we were given life. You see the opposite that being spiritually dead is to be regenerated. Seeing that life in sin and under condemnation, well the opposite of that is to be justified by faith, to be under condemnation no longer, to be living this new life and of God. Well it's exactly the same with this third step. Seated in the heavenly places with Christ Jesus. What does it mean? Well again I think we must start with our negatives because they're not only important and interesting but they're really essential to us. What does it mean to say that the Christian is seated with Christ in the heavens? Well the first thing is that is to is this.

11:25He no longer belongs to this world. What a statement. He did before, belong entirely to this world. You were the quick and do word, dead in trespassies and sins, were in entire past. He walked how according to the cause of this world. You remember we've seen that. He was bound by this world in every respect, in his mind and outlook and understanding, in his enjoyment, in his hopes, in his desires. The man who's not a Christian is entirely confined to this world. Now that doesn't merely apply to people who are guilty of the gross manifestations of sin. It doesn't apply merely to people who live for pleasure and nothing else and who are purely the creatures of their physical, fleshly lusts. It's equally true of those who are governed by the lusts of the mind.

12:29It's equally true of your greatest philosophers. They can't go beyond this world. They know nothing beyond it. They're entirely circumscribed by this world. And so the Apostle says that the natural men, the unregenerate men, is a man of the world. He belongs to this world entirely and utterly and absolutely. And I think we must, as Christians, restore the use of this term. It seems regrettably to have dropped out of use. You don't hear it as often as you used to. It's not only used to be described as either Christians or men of the world. Well that is the exact description of a man who's not a Christian. He is a man of the world. He's entirely confined to that. But the Christian is no longer that. He's no longer walking according to the costs of this world. He doesn't belong to this realm any longer. The Christian cannot be a man of the world.

13:31As you can't be at one in the same time in the world and ultimate, you're one or the other. And this is the truth about the Christian that he has been taken out of it. Now the Apostle is very fond of this idea. In writing to the Galatians he says in the first chapter, the fourth verse, referring to our salvation, he says that Christ gave himself for us, that he might deliver us from this present evil world. And he does that now. That's not a reference to death and going out of this world. The Christian is a man who is delivered from this present evil world now. He's still in it but he's no longer of it. He's no longer banned by it. His whole outlook is no longer determined by it. So the Apostle John is equally definite about this and equally rejoices in it as we all ought to. This is the victory that overcomes the world.

14:36The difference between a non-Christian and the Christian is this. The non-Christian is overcome by the world. He's absolutely controlled by it. There's no need to demonstrate this is the way people live. There's an absolute proof of it. It's all depicted in the newspapers. They live according to what they see there, that is their life. They're absolutely and absolutely controlled by the thing to do and what everybody is doing, controlled by the world. The non-Christian is a man who has a victory over the world. And what a contrast. He's taken out of all that. He's out of that well. So I say that this is something that is found everywhere in the scriptures. Did you notice that tremendous statement of it which we had in our reading at the beginning this morning? Did you notice what we had told about these children of faith? These men of faith?

15:36It's always true of them. This is what they say. They confess that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth. That's their position. They're still in the world. Yes, but you remember we were told that Abraham and the father's, Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, they dwelt in tents in tabernacles. Why? Well, their idea was to impress upon themselves and upon all others. But they were but such aners. That's the term that he was. Such aners, strangers and pilgrims. Travelers just passing through. This isn't their permanent well-inclis. They're marching. They're on the moon. Here they say, have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come. Strangers and pilgrims in the earth. And you remember how the Apostle Peter, in pleading with the people to whom he was writing

16:38to live the life worthy of the high calling in Christ, puts it like this. Dearly beloved, he says, I be teaching you as strangers and pilgrims. Abstain from fleshly lusts which war against the soul, having your conversation godly among the Gentiles, that whereas they see and condemn you for your good works, they shall glorify your father which is in heaven on your account. That's a free translation of it. But that's the appeal you notice. Dearly beloved, I be teach you as strangers and pilgrims. You don't belong to this world, he says. Realize that. Indeed, this is an idea which is to me one of the great major themes of the whole of the scripture. Once a man becomes a Christian, one of the first things he's conscious of, that he's been separated from the world.

17:39He was writing it, he belonged to it, he was of its very essence, he's aware now of a separation. He's taken out of that. He no longer belongs to that world. He's estranged from it in his mind, his outlook, his taste, his of it, of course it may still tempt him, but he's still conscious that he's outside it. He was in it, he's now right outside it. And if he's foolish enough to look at it and to be enticed by it, well, he's just contradicting what's happened to him. Because we are in the hemilies with Christ, we no longer belong to this world. Love not the world says John, now the things that are in the world. That's the first negative, but let me say one about the second. The second is that because we are in the hemilies with Christ, we are no longer under the dominion of Satan. And we are no longer in the kingdom of Satan.

18:40Of course we were, listen, we're in in time past he walked according to the cause, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now workseth in the children of disobedience among them. We all had our conversation in time past. That is where we were. We were the victims and the serfs of Satan, not only controlled by the mind of the world, but controlled by the one who controls the mind of the world. We were in the kingdom of Satan, under the power of Satan, under the dominion of Satan. That's the position of the unbeliever. Now of course the world laughs at this and ridicules it. It's amazed that anybody still believes in the devil, thereby it proves that it's under the dominion of the devil. It's so completely fooled and blinded that it hasn't even seen it.

19:42If our gospel be heads as Paul, it is to them that are lost in whom the God of this world has blinded the minds of them, the believer. They think they're not Christians because they're so learned and so clever what's really true of them is of course they've been bludgeoned by the devil, blinded by Satan. They can't see. They're entirely under the dominion, but when a man becomes a Christian and is translated into the heavenly, he's no longer there. Listen to Paul putting it in addressing a gripper and festers in the company when he appeared before them in the prison you remember. He said that the risen Christ appeared to him on the road to Damascus and gave him his great commission. He said I'm going to send you to the people and to the Gentiles to open their eyes and to turn them from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God. That's the business of preaching, says the risen Lord to Paul.

20:44That's my commission to you. These people are under the power of Satan. I'm sending you to preach the gospel to them in order that they may take, be taken from under the power of Satan to God. What a transport. Right out of his dominion. Listen to John saying the same thing in his first epistle. We know he says that we are of God and the whole world lieth in the wicked one. The whole world is lying in the bosom in the embrace of the wicked one, but we, we are not there, we are of God. Entirely removed. Indeed I say it is something which is impressed upon us. The same apostle says that that wicked one touches us not. He not only touched us before he controlled us, but we are now so removed from out of his realm and dominion and power that he can't touch us.

21:46He can shout at us and entice us. He can't touch us. For again take it as the apostle Paul puts it in writing is the epistle to the Colossians. He says that the Christian is one who amongst other things has been translated from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son. My dear friends, I'm convinced of this. Not only all of us who are Christians realize that we are no longer under the dominion of Satan, that he has no authority over us whatsoever, that we need not even fear him if we realize who and what we are. It would revolutionize our lives. But this is the truth about us. We are in the himalayas, not in his realm, in this realm. Taken out of the dominion and the kingdom of Satan and the webeen. And the third negative is this, that because we are in the himalayas, we are no longer under

22:54the wrath of God that is coming upon the whole world. You remember that was the final thing the apostle said about the unbeliever? We were by nature the children of wrath. Because under wrath as it were belonging to the realm of wrath, even as others, as all others. But now God has acted upon us and has raised us up together with Christ and we no longer belong to that realm. We belong to the realm of the himalayas. This is the most tremendous and staggering thing of all. This world in which we find ourselves is a doomed world. It is a world under judgment. There is nothing which is stated more plainly in the scriptures than that from beginning to end. There is going to be a judgment of this world and this world and all that is evil in it, in its very constitution, in addition to the people who belong to it, are all going

23:55to be judged and the wrath of God will be poured upon them. There will be an awful judgment and a terrifying destruction. It is adembrated by the flood, by Sodom and Gamara, by the various captivity in the children of Israel, by the destruction of Jerusalem in AED 70, then which no more terribly went as probably ever taken place as described even by a man like Josephus. But all this is but a pale suggestion of the doom and the disaster that is going to overwhelm the world and all who are opposed to God under the wrath of God. The Christian is taken right out of it. He's already passed from judgment into life. It won't touch him. It won't affect him. It won't harm him at all. He needn't fear it in any sense.

24:55He's already out of that realm because he is in the heavenlies with Christ. Well, there are your negatives. Let me hurry to the positives which are glorious. The first thing that is true of us then on the positive side is that we belong to the kingdom of God. We know belong to a heavenly sphere. Now this is actually. This is fact. It is not ongoing to belong to it. I'm already there. Well let us listen to some of the scriptures as they describe this to us. Do you remember how the Apostle Paul puts it in writing to the Philippians? He's talking about people who don't obey the truth. People whose God is their belly, their delight in their shame and things like that. His end, he says, is destruction.

25:56But he says our conversation is in heaven. Our conversation is in heaven which means our citizenship is in heaven. It isn't there. We are no longer citizens of that realm. Our citizenship is in heaven or as somebody translated it, we are a colony of heaven. That's the homeland. This is just a colony. We don't belong to that which is doomed to destruction. The kingdoms of this world and all that belong to it are passing away. But we who belong to God shall abide forever. And therefore it is right to serve us. That that is rarely now our home. Oh I know it's been the custom in this century to put fun at the hymns which say I'm about a stranger here. Heaven is my home, people of ridicule that. And of said fancy people singing that and enjoying that. Well it's absolutely true if you're a Christian.

26:57Our citizenship is in heaven. And I know better way of testing ourselves and our profession this morning. But just to ask ourselves that question, are you aware, have you a consciousness within you that you're a stranger in this world? Do you feel estranged from it? Are you aware of a difference in yourself? Have you a feeling that you belong to another realm that you're just passing through this world? Our citizenship. That's the thing I'm proud of. That's the thing I'm bursting in. Is that citizenship? Our citizenship. Our conversation is in heaven. All to complete that quotation which I gave you from Colossians 1 who are translated as from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear son.

27:59But I suppose there's no more glorious statement of this than that which you find in the epistle to the Colossians again, the third chapter and the third verse. Listen to this astounding statement about you. For you are dead and your life is hidden with Christ in God. That's true of you. If you're a Christian it must be true of you. You can't help yourself because you are in Christ. You are dead. We saw that last Sunday didn't we? The Adamic men, the man you used to be, is literally dead. He's no longer in existence. He really isn't there. You are dead. And your life is hidden with Christ in God. And your life is hidden with Christ in God.

29:04You belong to a different sphere and to a different realm all together. Christian people do you know that? Are you aware of it? That's the vital question. This sense of belonging elsewhere, strangers and pilgrims on the earth belonging. We are away from home. We are just away from home for a time, for God's own purpose. But there is our home, our homeland, our citizenship resides there. That's the polity to which we belong. The second thing follows of necessity doesn't it? We are under the control of the Holy Spirit. No longer under the control of that evil spirit, but under the control of the Holy Spirit. Look out your own salvation then, with fear and trembling, says Paul, for it is God that works in you, both the will and the to do.

30:05He is doing it by His Holy Spirit. What is the Christian? Well Paul's answer in writing to the Romans is, they that are led by the Spirit of God. They are the children of God. Led by the Spirit. No longer led by the mind of the world. No longer led by this evil spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. No longer led in their whole life governed by what you see other people doing and the advertisements in the papers and the flashy thing to do. No, no, that evil led by the Spirit of God. They are the sons of God. I don't see how a man is in a writer call himself a Christian and this is aware of heavenly influences in his life. In heavenly love, tidy. No change my heart, Sophia. Do you know that? Do you know the influence of the heavenly love, drawing you and wooing you and speaking

31:09to you? Hendley mindedness. Oh, it's a sad thing, but I've even heard even jillical people joking about this. Saying that people they've become so heavenly minded that they're no earthly use and that's thought to be a clever statement or the tragedy. You can never be too heavenly minded. The trouble with all of us is that we're not sufficiently heavenly minded. We don't know enough about it. We don't dwell enough there. We haven't realized what's true of us. The eyes of our understanding have not been enlightened. The Christian is of necessity, a heavenly minded man. The life of God has come into him and his mind is changed as we've seen. He used to be governed by the desires, the lusts of the mind and of the flesh no longer. He's not governed by them. They tempt him, they try him. He's not controlled by them.

32:10There is this other influence. He's aware of it. He knows it. The spirit of God is dealing with him and working in him and moving him and drawing in and moving him from there to this heavenly minded, led by the spirit. Ah, yes, but that leads to this which is still more wonderful. The characteristic, I say, of the hemlis is this. The hemlis is this fear in which God peculiarly and specially manifests Himself His presence and His glory. That is what makes heaven heaven. If you want to prove that, well read the book of revelations, chapters four and five and others. John, you remember, he saw a door open in heaven and he had his vision. What did he see? Well, the first thing was this glory of God. That is the characteristic of the hemlis. Well now then, this is what it means, you see. We are in the hemlis.

33:11Therefore it means we are in a realm where we are near to God. Before we were dead in trespassies and sins in the grave of this world, away from God, estranged from Him, aliens and enemies in our minds, not knowing Him. Now in the hemlis we are near to God. And therefore you see that the apostle James can write a thing like this. He says, draw nigh unto God and He will draw nigh unto you. Ah, say someone, but is it possible for me to draw nigh unto God? Can I get near unto God? Of course you can. And you can, says the author of the epistle to the Hebrews for this reason. Seeing therefore that we have a great high priest with Jesus, the son of God, that is passed into the heavens, let us all fast our confession, but not only that. That as therefore he says, come boldly unto the throne of grace to find mercy and grace

34:23the health in time of need. It is possible. Yes, but let me put it still more plainly as that same epistle to the Hebrews puts it still more plainly in the 10th chapter and in verses 19 and 20. Listen to this. This is a proof that we are in the heavenlies and that we are near to God. Having therefore brethren, he says, boldness to enter into the holiest, the holiest of all we can enter in there by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way which he has consecrated for us through the veil. That is to say his flesh and having a high priest over the house of God, let us draw nigh with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Can you find a more explicit statement than that? The Christian is unable to go into the holiest of all that is God's own presence where

35:23the Shakyana glorias. All listen to this other majestic statement of it which we have read together in the reading at the beginning out of that 12th chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews. Where have we come to? Christian people, where are we at this moment? Are we in Mount Sinai? Have we come to some near place of morality and of law and of condemnation? Have we come to a place where we just commiserate with one another and be known our sins and failures and hang down our heads and feel that all is hopeless? Well if you've come like that you're not a Christian. No, no, we are coming. Untamount Zion. Unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, to the general assembly and church of the first born which are written in heaven, and to God the judgeable and to the spirits of just men made perfect, and to Jesus the

36:27mediator of the new covenant and to the blood of sprinkling that speaketh better things than that available, we have come there. It is not yet going to come there. You are there now? Yes, a Christian. You have arrived there. That's where we are, the heavenly Jerusalem. We are in the English. With this innumerable company of angels, we can't see them but they're here. We are in that realm. We are seated there with Christ. That's where you come to. Realize it as this man. And live accordingly. Coming to God you see we enter into the earliest of all and we have fellowship with God. Do you? Do you know God I ask again? Are you enjoying fellowship with him? Are you able to find him? Can you draw near unto him and know that he's there? You should if you're in the himalayas. Realize your position and live accordingly. But then I must say just one other thing because we're in the himalayas, we already know

37:32something of the life of heaven even in this world. This again is something absolutely essential and vital because we are Christians, because we are with Christ in the himalayas. We are already enjoying something of the life of heaven even now. The apostle talks about experiencing the first fruit. He talks about having a fortest. The great harvest doesn't yet come, are you? But the first fruits are available. We've got them in our hands. We are going to take of them. There was a feast. You remember in Israel of the first fruits just reminding us of this. The fortest and glimpses of glory. It isn't given to many of us to be lifted up into the third heaven as was the case with the apostle Paul. I haven't been there or that I might have been, but I haven't. I haven't been taken up whether in the body or out of it I don't know.

38:34I haven't had that. But though we may not have had that, we should know something about the glory. We should have had an occasional glimpse. We should occasionally have heard something of the music. We should have some sensation of the life that is lived there. Although Isaac Watts was quite certain of this, this is how he puts it in his verse. The men of grace have found glory begun below celestial fruits from earthly ground, from faith and hope, may grow. It begins here. The men of grace have found glory begun below. Do you know it? Have you experienced it? Have you felt at times this is not earth? This isn't men.

39:35This is hen. This is a fortest of glory. It must be true of those who sit with Christ in the glory. My final word. This word seated is a very fascinating word and obviously a very important word. It is a word that is used about our Lord Himself in connection with His resurrection and ascension. He gives you the quotation from Hebrews 1-3, who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person and upholding all things by the word of His power when He had by Himself purged our sins sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high. Again He says in the thirteenth verse, but to which of the angels said He at any time, sit at my right hand until I make mine enemies thy footstool or listen to Him again in the tenth chapter of the epistle to the Hebrews, verse is 12-13.

40:36But this man Christ, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God from henceforth expecting, till His enemies be made His footstool. That's what's happened to Him. Having done all this, He sat down waiting, expecting until His enemies shall be made His footstool. And in Him we are seated with Him in the heavenly places. What's it mean? Well it means this. He completed the work so He sat down, sitting down as a sign of completion. When a man has finished his task, he sits down and Christ has sat down. What else does it mean? No longer labor rests, but still more important victory henceforth expecting.

41:38Till all His enemies shall be made His footstool, a sign of victory. He sits down victorious. And you and I are in Christ. And we are seated with Him in the heavenly places. The work of your redemption is already complete. You need nothing further. For all it's the great argument of Hebrews. Nothing further required. It's all been done. Who may have called them and He also justified and who may have justified them. He hath also glorified. If you are in Christ, you are eternally safe. Complete. But are you enjoying the rest? Do you realise that these things are true in other words? Are you rejoicing in these things? Are you still trying to make yourself a Christian?

42:39Well, if you are, you are not understanding your whole position. You are denying what's happened to you. Rest in the finished work of Christ, the rest of faith, very many suffer the rest of the people of God. Let us try to enter into that rest as this man. That's it. Just realising that he's done it all. We know that we might realise the victory especially. Well, we are still in this world and there is still the world in the flesh and the devil. We timorous mortals, we fainting and we shiver and we are alarmed and the devil can terrify us and alarm us, my friends. We must learn to believe this truth, or that God would enlighten the eyes of our understanding by His Spirit, that we may know the exceeding greatness of His power to us with the belief, that we may realise that all this is true of us. He are of God, little children, who says the John, and of overcome them, because greater

43:41is He that is in you than He that is in the world. If we only realise this truth about ourselves, we'd understand what James means when he comes to us and says, resist the devil and he will flee from him. The devil. The one who didn't hesitate to stand up against God in eternity and to drag down a number of other angels with him. The one who was so powerful that when he approached Adam and even their perfection and innocence, he dragged them down and yet it said to you, want to be resisted the devil and he'll run away, he'll flee from him. Not because he's afraid of you, but because he's afraid of the one in whom you are and who's with you. The one who's vanquished him and routed him and finally defeated him. All the apophelps that puts it like this, you see. He says your adversary that devil has a roaring lion, roamed us about, seeking whom he may

44:47devour, what we do, do, do, run and hide ourselves not at all. You see this roaring beast coming at you, this devil, this Satan, this helispower, what you do. O resist, step first in the faith and if you do so, you will not be able to touch you. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their tested, Christian people because we are seated with Christ in the heavenly places. The apophelpoll can say this about us in Romans 6.40. Sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under the law but under grace. Well there it is. Do you know that you are in the himses?

45:49Are you aware of the separation? Are you aware of the presence? Can you draw nigh unto God and know that he's with you and you are with him and all your fears are taken away? Do you hear something sometimes of the celestial glory and music and joy? Do you ever see the eternal glory is gleaming afar to nerve your faint endeavor? Can you say, looking at life at its very worst, our light affliction which is but for a moment worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory while we look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen, for the things which are seen

46:49are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal. Are the clear affections on things that are above, not on things that are on the earth?