“And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood…” (Rev. 5:9).

            Redeemed — what a glorious word!  How deep, how high, how broad!  Oh yes, it is true that we have been redeemed, but, like salvation, redemption is no single act or experience; as one has stated, it is “a crisis leading to a process” as we are progressively “loosed away” from one realm to another, from one mind to another, from one nature to another, from one state of being to another.  Truly we are being freed from the dominion of the carnal mind, from a world of flesh-centered, self-assertive religious activities, and from the power of sin and death, first in spirit, working outward into the mind, will, emotions, and desires of the soul life, and finally in body by the mighty working of His power whereby He is able to change even our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His body of glory (Phil. 3:21).

            The prefix “re” in “re-deem” means “again” (as in re-copy, re-wash, re-write).  The main part of the word is from a root that means “to purchase, to buy.”  So an article that is left in a pawn shop can be redeemed by paying the money that was borrowed, plus the interest charges.  The item is thus re-bought or bought back.  The word is also used when a company finds it possible to call some of its indebtedness, pay the borrower, and cancel the obligation: this is the redemption of bond issues.  Spiritually, it means a return to that place, wisdom, knowledge, life, glory, and dominion which we once had in God before the ages were framed, ere this present cosmos or world-arrangement began.

            The English word “redeem” translates three Greek words, each of which has a rich meaning in connection with our salvation and transformation.  One Greek word, apolutro, means “to loose, untie, deliver.”  Another Greek word used in the scriptures and translated by our word “redemption” is agorazo, the common Greek word for marketing.  The noun agora means the market place, and the verb agorazo means to buy.  In the New Testament the word is applied to souls.  This would be readily understood in the ancient world, since there was a slave market that operated almost every day, and the traffic in slaves was very great.  That Christ should have walked into the slave market and purchased, or redeemed, men who were slaves to the realm of carnality, sin, and death, would have been easily comprehended!

            A missionary was working on a Bible translation for the Bambara people.  Realizing that the idea of “being redeemed” might not mean much to them, he asked his Bambara translation helper, “How do you say ‘God redeemed us’ so that your people can understand?”  “Why, we would say ‘God took our necks out,’” the helper replied.  “But how would your people understand that?”  “Oh, we remember that, long ago, raiders would come and take our people into slavery.  They would put heavy iron collars on our people and chain one captive to the next in long lines to be taken to the coast.  Sometimes a chief or friend would see a friend being led away and would want to free him, or redeem him.  He could do this by paying the slave traders gold, silver, brass, or ivory.  In redeeming his friend, he would ‘take his neck out of the iron collar!’”  What a beautiful way to say that we are no longer slaves, unable to free ourselves from slavery to self, sin, and death!  Jesus  Christ, the Lamb of God, has redeemed us by His own precious blood!  He has taken our neck out of the collar!

            There is another Greek word which gives additional light on the thought of redemption.  The word is exagorazo (agorazo with the prefix ex), and carries the idea of buying something out of the market.  There is a difference between a purchase that is for resale and a purchase that is made in order to take an article out of commerce.  For example, a dealer in rare books and works of art might purchase an item at a London or New York sale, and hold it for resale to a customer.  Some pictures, books, manuscripts, and other art objects are bought and sold again and again.  But finally, when a great work of art is bought by a museum, it is thus TAKEN OUT OF CIRCULATION PERMANENTLY.

            In consideration of these facts which I have briefly stated there is another truth to which I would draw your reverent attention.  The song of God’s kings and priests proclaims, “Thou hast redeemed us to God…”  Redeemed — unto God!  We have been bought back to God as His own peculiar possession for a special and wonderful purpose.  “Thou hast redeemed us unto God by Thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.”

            You have read what the scripture says of Moses: “This Moses whom they refused, saying, Who made thee a ruler and a judge? The same did God send to be a ruler and A DELIVERER by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush” (Acts 7:35).  We find that this word “deliverer” is the same Greek word which in its various forms is translated ransom, redemption, redeem, and redeemed.  The question follows, How was Moses a deliverer, a redeemer, or a redemption-price for Israel in Egypt?  Did Moses pay a price to Pharaoh for Israel’s redemption?  Did he promise Egypt anything in return for allowing Israel to leave?  Absolutely not!  Moses paid Egypt exactly nothing.  And yet, he was a redeemer and redemption for Israel!  How can this be?  It was his own life which he poured out for Israel, it was the freely giving of his life to Israel which led them up out of the house of bondage.

            This is the most beautiful type of Christ’s redemption!  When Jesus Christ became our redemption He didn’t have to pay redemption money to God.  He didn’t take His blood and say, “Here, God, is a price for the people.”  Nor did He go to Satan and say, “Here, Satan, is a redemption-price, now you let God’s people go.”  NEVER!  He, like Moses, poured His life out and freely gave it to the people!  “I am the living bread which came down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I WILL GIVE FOR THE LIFE OF THE WORLD.  Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you.  Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life.  For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.  As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me” (Jn. 6:51,53-57).  We are the ones who are receiving the redemption money, and receiving of His life we are able to get up and leave the filth of self, sin, and the world behind, and walk in the higher realms with Him.

            Can you not see the mystery?  In the natural the redemption price was paid to the slave owner or creditor; and it will clearly be seen that God operates by the same principle once we understand that that which had us bound was in very fact something inherent within ourselves.  Paul goes into a penetrating discussion of this in chapter seven of the book of Romans.  He talks about each of our experiences in which the good thing we want to do, we don’t do, and the evil that we don’t want to do, we do.  He says that in me, that is, in my flesh, there dwelleth no good thing.   He goes on to say, “For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin and death which is in my members.  O wretched man that I am!  Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?  I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord” (Rom. 7:13-25).

            Ah, the law of sin and death works within, the carnal mind operates within, and the devil himself is but a figure for the bestial spirit of this world which sits enthroned within the very nature and heart of man.  People have painted Satan as a huge, ugly, impish personage with horns, bedecked with a red suit, having a long pointed tail and carrying a pitchfork.  In our minds he belongs in dark pagan jungles where frenzied worshippers hysterically practice devil worship.  He belongs in ancient voodoo ceremonies where primitive peoples offer human sacrifices to appease his anger.  He belongs to the garden of Eden, spoiling life for Adam and Eve; to the Judean wilderness, tempting Jesus; to Berlin during the 1930’s and 1940’s , possessing and using Adolph Hitler, masterminding history’s great atrocities.  Certainly Satan is present in the above listed activities.  But may I hastily add that he is not present there one whit more than he has been in your life and mine!  The pen of inspiration truthfully records the fact that “You hath He quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins: wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience” (Eph. 2:1-2).

            That ancient serpent slithers about in the lowest realms of man’s earthiness, in the crooked thoughts, perverted desires, and unbridled emotions of the carnal nature, in all the corrupt motions of the flesh.  Within man lies the seat of satan.  We have been the captives of a power within us, slaves to our own bestial nature.  So Christ did not pay a ransom to God in heaven, nor to the devil in hell, in order to redeem us and gain our release.  Rather, He gave His life and poured it into us that the transcendent power of His Spirit within might break asunder the bands that bind us!  Victory over the carnal mind is gained only by putting on the precious mind that was in Christ Jesus.  Victory over the flesh is wrought alone by the mighty power of the Christ-life within.  HE GIVES HIS LIFE TO US WHO ARE IN BONDAGE, AND THEN WE HAVE THE VITALITY AND STRENGTH TO ARISE AND RETURN TO FATHER’S HOUSE TO CLAIM OUR INHERITANCE.  We cannot do it on our own, by any self-effort of our weak and helpless flesh, fettered by the shackles of our human consciousness and the power of sin and shame, but when He gives His life, and fills us with His strength, then through Him we are able to rise up out of our slave house and return to Father’s house.  Praise God, His life is given as redemption TO US, so that, as the apostle says, “Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us…REDEMPTION” (I Cor. 1:30).  Hallelujah!

REDEEMED BY BLOOD

            “And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood…” (Rev. 5:9).

            I am indebted to the writings of the saintly Andrew Murray for some of the thoughts shared in this portion. 

What is this stream of life from the Lamb upon the throne with the power to redeem us?  The wonderful answer comes, “Thou art worthy…for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us unto God by Thy blood.”  It is the blood of the Lamb that bestows this worth upon Him.  The blood of Jesus is the greatest mystery of the ages, the deepest mystery of divine wisdom.  Let us not imagine that we can easily grasp its meaning!  God thought four thousand years necessary to prepare men for it, and we must take time in His presence, if we are to gain knowledge of the awesome and marvelous power of the blood.  I know of no word in the Bible or in human speech that contains such glories!  This great and eternal truth shines with ever increasing brilliance from Eden’s fragrant garden of long ago to the jasper walls of the New Jerusalem descending from God out of heaven; from Adam’s covering of skins and Able’s humble sacrifice of the firstfruits of his flock to the very throne of God Himself where, glorious in power and might, the Lamb reigns and the seven spirits of His divine life are sent forth into all the earth.

            The blood of Jesus is of such vast importance to God the Father that He has decreed that there shall be  (1) no remission  (2) no salvation  (3) no atonement  (4) no redemption  (5) no propitiation  (6) no cleansing  (7) no justification  (8) no peace  (9) no new covenant  (10) no sanctification  (11) no reconciliation  (12) no entrance into the Holiest of all  (13) no sonship, without the blood of Jesus Christ whose blood is called by Paul THE BLOOD OF GOD (Acts 20:28; Heb. 10:19-20).

            Never forget, my beloved, that Jesus came as THE PRICE WHICH COVERS, the substance in the scale that replenishes all deficiency.  He shed His blood — His divine life — pouring it out for us.  Life and blood are synonymous.  Spirit and blood are synonymous.  Spirit, blood, and life are all different names for the same element.  Jesus performed His mighty works by the shores of Galilee, but then He died, resurrected, ascended, was glorified, and then returned in mighty spirit power to indwell His body and to be the miracle worker within. Nothing less must become ours, than His Life — the divine life He lived in human flesh.  “As I live by the Father, so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me,” Jesus said.  The truth is so simple — He poured out His blood-life to us to quicken us again to the glory of God that belongs to man.  When our spirit is quickened by His spirit we are brought to union with God!  Christ gave Himself for us and to us.  Our spirit must be quickened by His Spirit.  THAT IS THE POWER OF HIS REDEEMING BLOOD, OF HIS LIFE THAT RESTORES US TO OUR TRUE IDENTITY AS SONS OF GOD.  Oh, the mystery of it!  That He might liberally pour His dear-bought treasures into benighted human storehouses, was the inspiration of Jesus’ intense human sacrifice. 

Some hold not to this truth, choosing rather to believe that they are a self-sufficient god within themselves, needing no Redeemer beyond the development of their own inherent divinity.  Thus they bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them (II Pet. 2:1).  Do away with this wonderful stream of the precious blood of Christ as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, and every room within the towering temple of spiritual reality comes crashing down to earth!  The love of God became a man, the love of God became human flesh, the love of God in Jesus Christ has flowed into our spirits and souls and bodies as the precious blood of Christ to wash away the veil of carnal consciousness and quicken us again to our true heritage in God.  “Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed by such corruptible things as silver and gold from your vain manner of life received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.”  Hallelujah for the blood!

            Multiplied millions of believers in all lands hold the blood of Christ to be precious.  The word precious means of great price or value, costly, of great desirability, honored, esteemed, or beloved.  But there must be a reason why the blood is precious!  Through many years of my Christian walk I never learned of any reason why it is esteemed except that God counts it to be the most valuable and precious of all blood to Him.  I was never told whether it was intrinsically valuable or if it was valuable because of what it could and did accomplish.  To be intrinsically valuable or precious means that it is of itself precious and does not necessarily need to accomplish any work to get its value.  For example, the value of precious gems is determined not so much from their usefulness but from what they are within themselves — their intrinsic value — and that is why people desire to own them even though they can really do nothing.  On the other hand, there are certain medicines, extracted from plants, which cost a thousand or thousands of dollars for one pill or injection.  These actually have little intrinsic value, but their value is derived entirely from what they can do!  My sincere prayer is that the spirit of wisdom and revelation may enlighten the eyes of our understanding so that we clearly see that the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ was and is precious both in respect to its intrinsic value (for it is the life of God!) and because of what it could and did and does now do!  

            In the blood of Jesus the power of the divine life dwelt and worked — hence its intrinsic value.  He was a specially prepared body to contain a specially prepared blood that was to be the life of all humanity.  This blood was precious from the fact that it was a unique blood which would do something for all humanity that no other blood could ever do.  It was the Word that became flesh, who was made man.  It was the life of God that dwelt in Him in a measure that no other man had known!  God gave not the Spirit by measure unto Him! If the spirit in Jesus, which is the life and the blood of Jesus, was in no way different from the spirit or life of every other human being, then why is it that He was able to walk through this realm of sin and death and both remain sinless and manifest the very fullness of divine life on the human plane, while each and every other son of Adam has sinned and come short of the glory of God including you, my precious brother, sister, and including me!  The fullness of divine life gave His blood, every drop of it, an intrinsic value.  The blood of a man is of more worth than that of a sheep.  The blood of a king is counted of more value than hundreds of common men.  The blood of the firstborn son of God!  It is in vain the mind seeks for some expression of its value; all we can say is, it is His own blood, the blood of the Son of God!

            Oh, the wonder of it!  Jesus Christ was the Word made flesh; He was not old Adam’s flesh imbued with God’s life.  He was the second Man, the Man from heaven, the God-man, head of a new species of Men, a new creation of God in the earth, each member of which is a SON OR DAUGHTER OF THE MOST HIGH!  The life is in the blood.  As the value of this life, so the value of the blood.  In Christ there was the life of God; infinite as God is the worth and the power of that blood!  In Christ there was the life of man in its perfection; in His humility, and obedience to the Father, and self-sacrifice, that which made Him unspeakably well-pleasing to the Father.  The blood of Jesus, God and man, poured out in death, was the perfect fulfillment of God’s will, and a perfect victory over self and sin and death.  Therefore it was, that in the blood of the everlasting covenant Jesus was raised from the dead; that in the power of that blood He entered the highest heaven; and that precious blood is now and forever available to us with all its incorruptible power.  His blood is His divine spirit of life which has come into us, and he that is joined to the Lord is one spirit.  The precious blood of Christ is just Christ Himself, Christ in us — our hope of glory!

THOU HAST MADE US KINGS AND PRIESTS

            “And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us unto God…and hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth” (Rev. 5:9-10).

            Many translations use the word “them,” as this is the song of the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders.  A number of Bible scholars disagree with that and confirm that “us” is the better and correct translation.  Dr. Seiss in his “Lectures on the Apocalypse” gives the following explanation: “Some of the best manuscripts read ‘them’ in place of ‘us’; but the sense is not altered by it…for the subject is settled by the preceding declaration to be the persons singing the song, namely, by the phrase ‘redeemed US’; the genuineness of which must be considered established since the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus.”  It is therefore the four living creatures (kingship) and the twenty-four elders (priesthood) who are both redeemed unto God and made kings and priests unto God!

            Never under the Old Testament Aaronic order of priesthood, apart from one example, do we find where a king exercised the office or ministry of a priest.  In the Levitical order the offices of king and priest were separated, there were those who reigned as kings, and there were those who were the Lord’s priests.  Kings could not intrude into the priest’s office, and priests could not sit on the throne.  Judah produced the kings, and Levi produced the priests.  On one occasion Uzziah, king of Judah, tried to assume the role of priest and “went into the temple of the Lord to burn incense upon the altar of incense” and was smitten with leprosy in his forehead (II Chron. 27:16-20).  God had separated the two offices for that time, and the one was not to intrude into the other.  

            Melchizedek is the sign, the symbol, the first example of a priest designated in the word of God.  He was called a priest of God long centuries before the Old Covenant order was established for the Levites to be the priests of Israel.  Thus, the first or beginning example represents the pattern or true design of God for what He considers a priesthood.  Melchizedek had royal blood in his veins, he claimed the title of kingship.  The very meaning of the name Melchizedek is “KING of righteousness” and this righteous King was also the Priest of the Most High God.  What was always kept asunder under the Law Covenant, by divine wisdom and purpose was united in Him who was “made like unto the Son of God.”  Melchizedek was “made like” the Son of God, and we find in the book of Hebrews that the Son of God is made a high priest “after the Order of Melchizedek.”   It is the glory of Christ and His many brethren as KING-PRIESTS that Melchizedek so wondrously prefigures!  A new order has arisen in Jesus Christ.  He is a King-Priest!  And He has made us to be Kings and Priests, a Kingdom of Priests, a Royal Priesthood unto God!  “They shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him…” (Rev. 20:6).

            The principle idea attached to the title “king” is that of authority and rule; to the title “priest” that of mediation, mercy, ministry, and reconciliation, drawing men nigh unto God, and God nigh unto men.  Why is Jesus seated as a priest upon the throne of the heavens?  It is that man may be blessed, and that God may be glorified in man!  As priest He lives only for others, to bring them near to God.  He lives as king only that He might reveal the kingdom — the power, authority, dominion, and glory — of God in and through us!

            Deep down in the heart of men there is a strong and instinctive demand for a priest, to be a mediator, to lay one hand on man, and the other on God, and going between both to bring the two together into unification.  This instinctive consciousness of the need for someone to help us to enter into oneness with God is the reason why all the ancient pagan religions had a priesthood.  A priest or priesthood infers that there is a reason why such has been called into play.  It denotes that there is an estrangement between God and His creatures and the priest ministers to bridge that gulf and bring about peace or at-one-ment.  Many today proclaim that there is no estrangement, no separation between God and man, that it is only a false sense of duality in man’s mind, that he has only to see that he himself is God, and as soon as his true identity is recognized, he can proceed to manifest out of his divine self.  If that is the truth then man did not truly fall, there was no sin in Eden, and no penalty for that sin; God did not Himself drive man out of paradise, Adam just sort of stumbled out while sleep-walking, there was no need for Jesus to come to ransom us with His precious blood, and there certainly would be no need for the Melchizedek Priesthood!  Nor would there be any purpose in any scriptural teaching of forgiveness by God, atonement, justification, regeneration, new birth, or the baptism in the Holy Spirit.  Jesus should have just come and told us who we really are, and explained to us that none of these things can add anything whatsoever to our inherent divinity, and gone back to heaven.

            Webster’s dictionary defines priest as: a mediatory agent between God and man.  In the Old Testament the word priest is translated from the Hebrew word cohen, the root meaning of which is “one who stands up and draws nigh for another.”  The Greek word, in its root, means “to minister.”  Thus, a priest is one who “draws near and ministers on behalf of another.”  And the priest always draws nigh and ministers in two directions — drawing nigh to God on behalf of the people and drawing nigh to the people on behalf of God.  The priest stands and ministers to the Lord on behalf of the people while, on the other hand, he ministers unto the people on behalf of the Lord.  The ministry of the priest is an intermediary or go-between ministry.  He reaches out with one hand and takes hold of God; he reaches out with the other hand and takes hold of humanity; and he brings the two together by virtue of his priestly administration.

            “Thou hast made us kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.”  “Made us” are words pregnant with meaning.  Let me give you an illustration.  The name of the Son of God is Jesus.  That is His correct name.  That is His full name.  The name of the eternal Word of God who stepped across the stars to the planet earth to be born in a stable in the village of Bethlehem, is Jesus.  That is His complete, proper, full name.  His name is Jesus!  The angelic messenger appeared to the virgin girl Mary and announced, “Thou shalt call His name JESUS, for He shall save His people from their sins” (Mat. 1:21).  Someone says, “But the angel didn’t say His name was to be Jesus because that’s English — His name was given as Yahshua.”  Incorrect.  The common people of Galilee did not speak Hebrew in the time of Jesus.  They spoke Aramaic.  Undoubtedly the name was given to Mary in the language she understood.  We know it in English as Jesus.  And whatever language it is spoken in it still means the same thing, “the salvation of Yahweh.”  So when the mighty Gabriel appeared, he said, “Call the child that which will be descriptive or characteristic of what He is going to be and do.  Call His name that which will describe His accomplishment.”  The messenger said, “Thou shalt call His name Jesus, or thou shalt call His name Saviour, FOR He shall save His people…call Him God’s Salvation because He is the Son of God MIGHTY TO SAVE.”

            Since He would be the salvation of Yahweh unto His people, call Him Saviour.  Some who read these lines are now saying, “Hold the fort, Eby; isn’t His first name Lord and His last name Christ?”  NO!  Neither Lord nor Christ is a name.  It is important that we understand that.  Christ is not a name.  Christ is a position.  Christ is an office.  Christ is a title, as also is Lord.  Christ is a description of an individual who holds a particular office.  If I were to say to you, “What is the name of the first man to hold the highest office in the United States of America,” you would say, “His name was George Washington.”   And if I said to you, “What was his office?” you would say, “President.”  He was called “President George Washington.”  You understand immediately that his name is distinct from the title which designates his office.  Now we might call him “Mr. President,” but that’s not his name, we’re calling him by his office.  His name is George Washington; his office is President.  When I speak to you about King, that is an office.  When I speak to you about Prime Minister, that’s an office.  Christ is an office — it’s not a name.  Christ comes from the Greek Christos and means “anointed,” or better, “The anointed One.”  When we’re talking about the Son of God, we’re saying that His name is Jesus — Saviour.  His office is Christ — the Anointed One.  Jesus is the Christ, the anointed One of God.  And God has made this same Jesus to be both LORD and CHRIST.  Made!  Jesus was made Lord, and Jesus was made Christ.  It is something He became after He was named Jesus.  And now the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders proclaim, “For Thou hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth!”

            This passage is one of rare beauty.  It is like a precious diamond, the effulgence of whose radiance dazzles the mind.  It is a drop of pure distilled essence, whose fragrance fills the rooms of the heart of every man and woman who has been apprehended of the Father for His high and holy purpose.  It is a joy forevermore and a challenge to all who comprehend its message.  It must be engraved deeply upon every heart of God’s Royal Priesthood.  It exalts and glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ.  “THOU HAST MADE US!”  THOU!  There is so much depth to that word that I am afraid we often do not perceive it.  It is like a beautiful star-studded sky on a bright clear night and one cannot even begin to grasp the vast depth that lies above us.  So it is with these marvelous words: “Thou hast MADE US TO BE KINGS AND PRIESTS!”

             Hear now the testimony of the prophet Isaiah.  “But ye shall be named the priests of the Lord: men shall call you the ministers of our God…for as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth the things that are sown in it to spring forth; so the Lord will cause righteousness to spring forth before all nations” (Isa. 61:6,11).  The inspired prophet summed up in one bold statement what it means to be a priest of God.  “Ye shall be named the priests of the Lord: men shall call you the ministers of our God.”  There is a marvelous significance in that word “named.”  Named!  You shall be NAMED the priests of the Lord.   This passage forcefully reveals the great truth that all who would be priests of God must be re-named, they MUST UNDERGO A CHANGE OF NATURE, to become priests by name, that is, by nature, so that priesthood is not merely a title given to them but a nature lived out through them.  Oh, yes!  If our spiritual minds can grasp the fact, to be named the priests of the Lord means to be natured the priests of the Lord, to be so imbued with the priestly nature until we become a priest in our very state of being.  We think like a priest.  We speak like a priest.  We act like a priest.  We love like a priest.  We minister like a priest.  We reconcile like a priest.  We represent men to God, and God to men as a priest.  This is what the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders are declaring, “Thou hast made us unto our God kings and priests!”

            Kings and Priests!  Can you see the parallel between those two?  It is the king who reigns and the priest who serves.  All the holy sons of God shall reign as kings, and they shall serve as priests!  These kings and priests “reign over the earth.”  It is evident that our reigning as kings and priests over the earth is directly related to the fact that the seven spirits of God are from the throne of God sent forth into all the earth.  These two statements are made in the same chapter, only four verses apart.  Can we not see by this that the seven spirits of God are sent forth into all the earth through the agency of those kings and priests who are given authority over the earth and are made ministers of God unto the earth realm.

            He makes us kings and priests!  That is the present work of God in the life of each member of God’s elect who has received the call to sonship.  Though in our natural constitution we may have had a very different disposition, God is breaking, purging, changing, and transforming us, working into us the character of a king and the heart of a priest!  We may once have been vain, but God is making us solid, serviceable and useful!  We may have been proud, but God is making us humble!  We may have felt empty and useless, but God is filling us up and making us valuable!  Some of us have been very weak, but the Spirit is now making us exceedingly strong in the Lord and in the power of His might!  We may have once been ignorant and unlearned among men, but today the Lord is filling our minds and spirits with divine wisdom and spiritual understanding!  Our nature may previously have been shy, cold, distant, and indifferent, but the fire of the Holy Spirit is making us bold, warm, concerned, caring, and out-going!  Perhaps we were once critical, angry, hateful, or spiteful, but our Father is transforming us to be loving, kind, gentle, sweet,  long-suffering,  merciful, forgiving, and reconciling!  It is indeed wonderful!  Our mighty God is in this hour dealing with all His sons and truly He is making us to BE KINGS AND PRIESTS!

            Jesus, the High Priest of our profession, and the King over all the kings, does His wonderful work within us.  He imparts His own life, power, and ministry.  We cannot have the kingship and the priesthood in full power except as the power of His Life is fully inworked in us.  As we truly come to understand this, we then see what is meant by the fact that we are called to be kings and priests, because we have the very life of the King and the High Priest in us — not merely imputed, but the King of glory and the High Priest of the heavens Himself dwelling powerfully within us and working effectually through us, praise His wonderful name!  This is something far greater and higher than my own “Higher Self.”  This is His Spirit joined to my spirit — one spirit in the union of life.

            Why is Jesus seated as a priest upon the throne of the heavens?  He reigns as King to bring the dominion of His kingdom into our lives, and as Priest He lives only for others, to bless and lift us with His life, to bring us near to God.  He makes us kings to give power and efficacy to the priesthood.  He reigns as a priest!  It is because of this that the idea of authority stands out so prominently.  Jesus fills us with a kingly disposition; He enables us to rule over sin, over the flesh, over the devil, over the world, over MEN.  In the midst of all circumstances and difficulties, of all opposition or cruelty, of all powers of the flesh, the world, and the devil, the son who yields himself to be made king by Christ lives in the joyous certainty that he is one with Him who has won the victory, and that He that is in him is more than conqueror!

            He makes us priests that we might serve; that we might bring men near unto Him; that we might be filled with the fullness of the seven-fold intensified spirit of the Lord so as to be a channel for the outflowing of His glorious life unto creation.  How else shall the creation be delivered from its bondage to corruption and find its identity in the glorious liberty that belongs to the sons of God?  As priests through the blood of Jesus we live for others, to pray for them; to work among them; to love and bless them; to reconcile and redeem them; to bring them to God!  To be a king is marvelous beyond words, but to be a priest is no idle self-seeking blessedness.  It is a compelling power to enter into God’s presence on behalf of mankind; the power to receive from the Lamb all the blessings, benefits, and provisions of His wonderful life, and to receive and carry and distribute them!  “And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne… stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns (power, kingship) and seven eyes (vision, discernment, communication, priesthood), which are the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth…and hast made us… kings and priests: and we shall reign over the earth.”

            However clearly we see by the eye of revelation and faith the truth of this realm of kingship and priesthood, however earnestly we desire it, however firmly we think we grasp it by faith, all will not avail — GOD HIMSELF MUST DO IT!  God Himself must admit us into His presence, and make His face to shine upon us.  And as the path to kingship and priesthood, God Himself must write His law in our hearts, unfold in us the new divine nature in such power of the Holy Spirit, that it is HE that works within us both to will and to do.  God Himself must by the Holy Ghost so shed abroad His love in our hearts, that to love becomes as natural to us as it is for a dove to be gentle.  God Himself must by the Holy Ghost so fill us with the nature of righteousness that to be righteous becomes as natural to us as breathing.  God Himself must by the Holy Ghost so clothe us with the mind of Christ, that to think the thoughts of God becomes as natural to us as are the self-serving thoughts and desires of the unregenerated man.  God Himself must by the Holy Ghost so make us vessels of mercy that to be merciful becomes as natural to us as the emotions of anger and retaliation are to the carnal nature.  And God Himself must through the Holy Ghost give us His power!

            Consider, dear brother, sister, is it not God Himself who has faithfully directed all your steps, who has initiated each circumstance of your life, who has given sight to your poor blind eyes and caused you to behold the majesty of His purpose?  Is it not God Himself who has led you out of the blinding traditions and enslaving bondage of Babylonian religion, and nurtured you and brought you to the place in which you stand in Christ today?  I do not hesitate to say that no more than you can save yourself can you make yourself an overcomer, bring yourself to perfection and maturity, or of yourself apprehend the beautiful ministry of kingship and priesthood to God!  Those who apprehend in this hour are those who rest in His love, trust in His power, embrace His promise, and have no confidence in the flesh.

THE SHAPE-SHIFTERS

            There is a teaching about “shape-shifters” that is prominent among certain occult, new age, and UFO cult movements.  The belief is that there are certain “aliens” or “space creatures,” namely those specified as reptilians, who possess the ability to shape-shift or change their forms to appear as humans or other entities.  One writer (David Icke) who is deep into this explains, “Shape-shifting is the ability to change physical form, in this case between a human and reptilian appearance.  The ancient Danaan brotherhood of initiates and magicians called Telchines on the island of Rhodes could shape-shift into any form, according to the Greek historian, Diodorus.  Shape-shifting is a common theme in tales of esoteric ‘magicians’ and high initiates.  I have been told by hundreds of people all over the world, from every walk of life you can imagine, about their experiences of seeing well known and less well known people transform into a reptilian form before their eyes and then go back again.  There have been reports of shape-shifting reptilians for thousands of years.  In the Indus Valley and Hindu culture their serpent gods called the Nagas were one example.  The serpent ‘sea’ or ‘fish’ gods of Sumer and Babylon were said to be able to change shape and look human whenever they chose.  Another version of shape-shifting are the so-called ‘Men in Black’ who appear and disappear according to witnesses.  The story of Jekyl and Hyde is also symbolic of shape-shifting”   — end quote.

            Personally, I take such theories and claims with a very big grain of salt!  Yet — there is a true realm and reality of shape-shifting!  We see it in the post-resurrection appearances of Jesus during the forty days prior to His ascension.  Most of those who saw Jesus did not immediately recognize Him — only after some subtle familiar action were their eyes opened and it dawned upon them who this person was!  In the garden of the tomb Mary had seen a “gardener.”  Two of the disciples had seen and conversed with a “stranger.”  The eleven in the upper room saw the Master as He formerly appeared.  Later, a group of them saw Him on the lakeshore, and thought it was a “fisherman.”  He was with them forty days after His resurrection, but they saw Him only on a few brief occasions. 

            The entire time that He was manifest to them, had it all been crowded into one day instead of being at intervals during the forty days, would probably have been less that twelve hours, or one-eightieth of that entire time.  This being true, it is evident that He was present with them unseen about seventy-nine eightieths of that period of forty days.  And even when they did have manifestations, they were not (except once, on behalf of the doubting Thomas) in a form exactly like the one they had known so intimately for three and a half years, and had seen but a few days before.  It is not once intimated that they knew Him by the familiar features of His face, nor even that He was recognized by the same appearance as in other manifestations.  Yes, He was different, so different that they were puzzled to understand Him, and to know just how they could still be His disciples.

            “After that He appeared in another form unto two of them, as they walked, and went into the country” (Mk. 16:12).  He appeared unto them in another form — not another Person.  It was the same Christ and Lord!  But there was some difference of manifestation.  That is the plain truth coming to meet us out of the region of mystery where for us the final truth of things dwells.  After His resurrection Jesus was still to His disciples Jesus — but with a difference.  He was the same, yet not the same.  There was something about Him which differentiated Him from the Christ of the garden, and the hillside, and the country road, and the seashore.  The disciples never doubted that He was the same Jesus with whom they had passed through the corn-fields, and walked the highways, and sailed on the blue water of Galilee.  But the human form which was soon to pass from their midst already seemed to be becoming less recognizable to their view.  In a little while they would see Him no more — that is, as we see one another in the flesh.  Soon the vision of the living and ever-present Christ was to be internalized, reserved wholly for the inward eye of every quickened and transformed spirit.  But it seemed that already, in anticipation of this new order of things, the old order was changing, and the outward form of the Master was speedily becoming less and less the essential medium for the revelation and recognition of His unchanging personality.

            The record of the appearances of Christ during those forty days before the ascension tells us that the spiritual senses were now predominating over the physical, and the spirit played an ever larger part in the realm of perception.  It is abundantly clear that the Christ they saw and recognized was no mere apparition or illusion, but it is equally clear that those who sought to recognize the Lord in the same way they recognized one another now needed their physical senses to give way to the spiritual faculties of the spirit of wisdom and revelation from God, the eyes of their understanding being enlightened that they might truly KNOW HIM!

            Form plays an important part in our physical and material reckonings, outward appearance is so necessarily the basis of our judgments in this gross material realm.  But all who have been called to sonship to God are now learning the important lesson that, even as the same Christ came to Mary Magdalene, to the disciples by the sea, and to the two who journeyed to Emmaus in forms which they did not immediately recognize as Him, so that spiritual life which Jesus revealed in His resurrection, and which He revealed in even greater measure by His ascension and return as the power of the Holy Spirit, may express itself in more than one form of manifestation as it is raised up in the hearts and lives of God’s elect.  “He appeared in another form.”  He is always doing that!  Would that we were always able to see and recognize Him!  Would that our faith were deep enough, would that our love were broad enough, would that our insight were keen enough, to recognize Him in all the forms and fashions of His coming unto the children of men!

            Some find Christ as Mary Magdalene found Him in an instant when He called her name.  Some find Him as they are led in the paths of His will, like the disciples who cast their net in the sea of Galilee, and found it was their Master and Lord they were obeying.  Some take the journey to Emmaus — they meditate upon Him, converse with Him, and their hearts burn within them —then they discover Him in the breaking of bread by His hand.  At the center of all spiritual experience there lies the same eternal truth, for it is the same Christ who meets us all; but many are the forms we encounter as we each experience Him in a different way!  Some may find Him in blessings and experiences, while others find Him with Job in the severity of testings and trials, being brought very low upon the ash-heap of stripping and desolation, tested to the uttermost until at last they break through the gloom and shout with the voice of triumph, “I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear; but now mine eye seeth Thee!” (Job 42:5).  Therefore let not the man who has met the Christ in the form of a gardener doubt that He was ever seen by the waters of Galilee; and let not him who has encountered Him on that dawn-lit beach think it improbable that He ever walked and talked with the travelers to Emmaus.

            “HE APPEARED IN ANOTHER FORM.”  That is Christ the great shape-shifter!  It is the same Christ revealing Himself to men in another form.  So, my beloved, as we ponder the mysterious manifestations of the risen Christ among the faithful and devout disciples, let us remind ourselves that this same Jesus is in our midst, and we must be ready to recognize Him as He becomes manifested to us from day to day, from realm to realm, from glory to glory, by the power of the Spirit.  The Lord Jesus comes to us in different ways.  There are many modes and forms of the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ!  To those who suppose that they have attained to all God has for them, whether in the precincts of Babylon, in the deliverance of the feast of Passover, in the glory of Pentecost, or some who think they have already ascended into the highest heaven of their high calling in the feast of Tabernacles, to each I now say by the word of the Lord — we are going to have another manifestation!  It is dawning.  It has begun even now.  It is the same Lord Jesus, yet even now His many brethren are beginning to behold Him in the glory of His Kingship and Priesthood, the Lamb in the midst of the throne, sending forth the seven-fold intensified spirit of God into all the earth, to be manifested in a further unfoldment of Himself, in the glory and power of manifest sonship!

            All of us have this treasure in earthen vessels, and we are continually being changed from glory to glory!   For years the Lord had put me on His potter’s wheel and made me a certain shape.  For years I was an evangelist and, whenever the Lord wanted to move in the soul-saving, evangelistic realm, I was right there.  No problem at all!  I was in the evangelistic shape.  My whole mind and desire was conformed to that ministry, my whole heart, everything.  All about me was conformed to that.  But if God wanted to move in any other way through me, He could not.  That was my shape!  If He came in that shape I said, “Come, Lord Jesus.”  If He came in another shape I couldn’t handle that, so I said, “Go, Lord Jesus.”  I had not yet learned about shape-shifting!

            Most of us have had a certain shape and we have been hardened to that.  The only way the Lord could appear to us and appear in us and appear through us, would be in that form.  It has been the Baptist form, the Pentecostal form, or the Charismatic form.  It has been the evangelistic form, the apostolic form, the prophetic form, the divine order form, the healing form, the deliverance form, the miracles form, the tongues-speaking form, the prophesying form, the worship form, the word of faith form, or a hundred other forms.  But the highest glory of the ministry of Christ is embodied in those two wonderful offices: KING and PRIEST.  He is indeed “the King eternal” and “a Priest forever” after the order of Melchizedek!  And while we truly praise God for all the manifestations and ministries of this present “in part” realm, so graciously bestowed, yet our hearts cry out mightily for a greater reality and a higher ministry that proceeds from the throne of God and of the Lamb for the deliverance and transformation of the entire creation.  Our deepest desire is that He may so thoroughly transform us into HIS IMAGE, so completely CHANGE OUR SHAPE until we fully become all that Kingship and Priesthood mean.

            There is a wonderful contrast drawn in Revelation 4:11 and 5:10, wherein it is stated, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for Thou hast CREATED ALL THINGS, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created…and Thou hast MADE US unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.”  Oh child of God, consider how great and full of meaning these words are!  “Thou hast CREATED all things…Thou hast MADE us.”  There is a world of difference between the terms “create” and “make.”  Away back yonder in the dim and distant ages that are gone it was written, “And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it He had rested from all His work which God CREATED AND MADE” (Gen. 2:3).  The phrase “created and made” is a faulty translation, and it is so indicated in the margin of some Bibles.  It should read, “which God created to make.”  Young’s Literal Translation renders this verse, “And God blesseth the seventh day, and sanctifieth it, for in it He hath ceased from all His work which God had PREPARED FOR MAKING.”   Another translation says, “And God proceeded to bless the seventh day and make it sacred, because on it He has been resting from all His work that God has CREATED FOR THE PURPOSE OF MAKING.”  In other words, God created the whole vast universe for the purpose of forming or making it into something He still had in mind!

            And now comes the word — “Thou hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood…and hast MADE US unto our God kings and priests.”  Ah, “things” are created, but “kings” and “priests” are MADE!  If you are a king-priest, there is something about you that is not ordinary; you have distinct and distinguishing characteristics.  You are no longer a part of the problem — you have been so thoroughly transformed from the spirit of self and of this world system until you have become in your very state of being the solution to the problem.  What is a king?  What is a priest?  Who are the king-priests today?  They are those who are indwelt by the Christ and are living in the Christ and by the Christ to manifest Christ!  None of us are the finished product, but, praise God, as this reality is raised up in us more and more God is MAKING US to be kings and priests unto Him!

            “Make” means to alter the form or change thoroughly.  There can be no kingship or priesthood without first a thorough change!  Sin, self, greed, hatred, criticism, retaliation, ego, unconcern, immaturity, pettiness, unrighteousness, condemnation, all must be dealt with by the cross.  Thus, we are not seeking just a salvation experience, the forgiveness of our sins, covering over the past, and hoping for the best in the future, but we desire that the Spirit of God, working mightily within, shall bring a thorough change in us, until every word, will, attitude, action, and reaction shall flow from His heart unto all about us.  You can be a believer and die and go to heaven without such a thorough change, but you can NEVER BE A KING OR PRIEST WITHOUT IT!

            “It is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13).  “GOD working in you.”  What a marvelous expression!  We know how combustion works mightily in the cylinder, forcing up and down the piston, giving power to the engine.  We know how sap works mightily in the branches, forcing itself out in leaf, blossom, and bud.  We know of incidents where men were so possessed of devils that they spoke and acted as the inward promptings compelled them.  These express but weakly the idea of the “inward working” of God, which towers infinitely beyond.  Have we not all been conscious of some of these workings?  We have known them when the breath of holy resolution has swept through our natures: every sigh for the will of God; every strong and earnest desire to be like Him; every appetite for spiritual things; every impulse to live and sacrifice and give for others; every aspiration to love and lift and restore the groaning creation; every prayer lifted heavenward in intercession for weak, needy, suffering and sinful humanity; every cry of the heart for the kingdom of God to come and His will to be done in earth as it is in heaven — all these are the result of His inworking and the promise of the Kingly and Priestly Ministry! 

“And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the living creatures and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands…” (Rev. 5:11).

            What a vision greeted the enraptured apostle!  Have you ever tried to figure out how many messengers were around the throne?  Here is your answer: ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands — myriads of myriads!  The number of those who join in the praise is beyond count!  It might well be translated, “And the number of them was armies multiplied by armies, and armies of armies.”  These are all messengers of God, for that is the meaning of the word in Greek.  They are not necessarily angels as we usually think of angels, but they are messengers of God, whether of men or any other order.

WORTHY TO RECEIVE…

            “…saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing”  (Rev 5:12).

            The Lamb is here declared to be worthy to receive power — as well as wisdom, riches, strength, honor, glory, and blessing.  Remember, the things John beholds in the visions of the book of Revelation are things that were yet future at the time he was shown them, the “things which must be hereafter” (Rev. 1:19; 4:1).  How can Christ, who had already been given all power in heaven and in earth, receive power?  We know that all power originates with God.  “God hath spoken once; twice have I heard this; that power belongeth unto God” (Ps. 62:11).  Fifty-six times the scriptures proclaim God to be THE ALMIGHTY.  Almighty means “all-ruling, all powerful, absolute sovereign, omnipotent.”  The omnipotent God gave our Lord Jesus Christ all power in heaven and in earth!  The question follows — How can Christ who has already been given all power now receive power?

            The truth is, of course, that although God is the supreme authority and power of the universe He does not hold or exercise that power either arbitrarily or unilaterally.  While man is not truly a “free moral agent,” yet God does cede to His creatures the power of choice, decision making, and spheres of authority and dominion.  From the very beginning God ordained that man should choose to eat or not eat of the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  God did not interfere with man when he made an unwise choice for He had a great purpose in mind.   The one question possibly asked more than any other is: Why did God permit the present reign of sin, sorrow, and death?  Why did He permit the serpent to present the temptation to our first parents, after having created them sinless and upright in the image of God?   Or why did He place the forbidden tree in the midst of all the others?  Despite all the attempts to turn it aside, the question remains — Could not God have prevented all possibility of man’s fall?

            The difficulty arises from a failure to comprehend the plan of God!   God could have prevented the entrance of sin, sorrow, and death, but the fact that He did not should be sufficient proof to us that its present permission is designed ultimately to work out some greater good.   The problem lies not with God’s wisdom or ability, but with man’s denseness and dullness of understanding!  The natural man lives in a fantasy world.  There are many species of insanity.  All sin is insanity, in different degrees.  The carnal mind is an insane mind given wholly to destructive delusions.  The natural man is mentally ill beyond comprehension.  The carnal mind is spared from this classification in our world, only because the vast majority of the inmates in this vast asylum called “society” is equally mad and in harmony with the delusion.  There is a universal insanity of the so-called “wisdom” of this world, inherited from the deranged serpent in Eden.  The wisdom of this world is foolishness with God!  This mortal, this deranged mind of old Adam, must be put off, and the new man or real man, the sane man in the precious mind of Christ must be put on.  The carnal mind is exceedingly stupid.  Carnal reasoning is dull-witted, lame-brained, simple-minded, silly, and absurd!  God’s plans, seen in their completeness, will always prove the wisdom of the course He pursues.  Some inquire, Could not God, with whom all things are possible, have intervened in time to prevent the full accomplishment of Satan’s designs?  Of course He could have!  But such interference would have thwarted the accomplishment of His own wise purposes!   His purpose was to make clearly and eternally manifest the absolute perfection of His own nature and the integrity and correctness of all His ways, and to prove to all men, angels, and creatures in all worlds and realms the unavoidable disastrous consequences of departure from them.

            Sin, sorrow, and death are God’s great cosmic object lesson!  God could have made all of us like robots, programmed to be holy and to act righteously at all times and under all circumstances.  But should He have done so, the one thing we all would lack is character.  We would be holy, but without the knowledge of why we are holy, or the understanding of the consequences of not being holy.  We would not be holy because we desired holiness, or because, with knowledge, understanding, and wisdom, we chose to be holy.  God didn’t want robots!  He wanted sons and daughters!  God, in His omniscient wisdom and knowledge, understood fully the difference between good, evil, holiness, and life.  He planned for us also to understand! Not by being told, counseled, or trained like animals, but by experience.  Oh yes, experience is the best teacher!  Our heavenly Father purposed to take us a route through which we would learn experientially the true nature of all things, that through the interchange of good and evil, and the deep dealings of the Holy Spirit, every man and every creature ultimately would be brought to the place where they would knowingly, willingly, and eternally choose and cling to the way of life, light, and love!  Aren’t you glad!

            God deliberately gave to man an area of autonomy — self government — POWER.  God not only foresaw that, having given man freedom of choice, he would, through lack of full appreciation of sin and its results, accept it, but He also saw that, becoming acquainted with it, he would still chose it, because that acquaintance would so impair his moral nature that the sense-consciousness of the flesh realm, with its ensuing evil, would become more agreeable and more desirable to him than the narrow way of life.  Still, God subjected man to sin and death, while at the same time preparing the remedy of the sacrifice of Christ for man’s deliverance from its awful consequences — the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world! 

            God in His infinite wisdom knew that to subject the creation to vanity would be to lead mankind, through experience, through creation, the fall, redemption, and the restitution of all things, to a full appreciation of  “the exceeding sinfulness of sin” and of the matchless brilliancy and glory of God’s divine nature in contrast with it — thus teaching him the more to love and honor his Creator, who is the source and fountain of all goodness, and forever to shun that which brought so much woe and misery upon the human family.  So the final result will be undying love and overwhelming appreciation for our glorious Father, and eternal abhorrence and avoidance of all that is contrary to His nature and will; and consequently the firm and unalterable establishment of everlasting righteousness and spirit life throughout all God’s vast domains.  Every creature in heaven, earth, and throughout the furthest reaches of the universe shall eternally profit from the demonstration God is now giving His creation through the permission of sin and all its attending evils and woes.   What a plan!

             God intended from the beginning for man to rule.  “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and LET THEM HAVE DOMINION” (Gen. 1:26).   The writer to the Hebrews wrote: “What is man that Thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that Thou visiteth him?  Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; Thou crownest him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of Thy hands” (Heb. 2:6-7).  The expression, “Thou crownest him,” denotes clearly that God gave man KINGLY RULE and authority in the earth.   The eighth Psalm reveals that man’s dominion is to eventually encompass the whole vast universe of galaxies, stars, suns, planets, moons, and all that dwells in them!  God’s plan is to give man dominion over all the works of His hands, indeed, over   ALL THINGS!  But — God’s purpose is for man to exercise that ruling authority and dominion in union with Him.  And this is what man departed from in the fall!  Man chose to rule independently of God; to “do his own thing” apart from the life of the spirit.  He rejected God’s authority and rule over him.  The carnal mind ever pursues an identity apart from God, proclaiming the ancient error, “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will ascend above the heights of the clouds: I will be like the most High!” (Isa. 14:13-14).   “I will…I will…I will!”  So man, in his distorted consciousness, rules his own life and destiny apart from God, yea, in opposition to God!  And the inevitable result of this course is confusion, chaos, sorrow, and death.  How uncontrovertibly certain are the words of inspiration: “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death” ( Prov. 14:12).  Yet — God has ordained this to be for an appointed time!

            This brings us back to our question — If the Lord HAS all power, how is it that He receives power?  The answer is to be found in that great sonship prayer which is commonly referred to as the Lord’s Prayer.  Setting forth the great principles of sonship prayer Jesus taught, “When you pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name.  Thy kingdom come.  Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven” (Mat. 6:9-10).  What does it mean for God’s kingdom to come? What does it mean for God’s will do be done in earth, even in this earth which we are, as it is done in heaven?  Ah, I am the king of my life; I am seated upon the throne; I make the decisions; I do according to my own will.  But when Jesus the Lord comes I must abdicate my throne and let Him sit upon the throne!  The testimony of every son in the kingdom of God is: “Till Christ was raised up in my life I was the Commander in Chief.  Since I have been introduced to the Christ within He commands!” 

Oh, yes!  THY WILL BE DONE IN EARTH is something for now, not tomorrow, nor during the millennium, nor in the ages to come.  You see, my beloved, when I (that is, my human consciousness, my Adamic identity, my carnal mind) resign from the dominion I have exercised in my life and abdicate the throne, in that same blessed moment the whole realm of dominion which I have usurped and reserved unto myself IS GIVEN TO THE LORD, THE SPIRIT!  The power I once held in my own hands is yielded up to Him so that He now exercises the power and authority that I previously exercised.  Thus, HE RECEIVES POWER!  He receives the right to rule my life.  He never took that right by force — but He receives the right when I yield it up to Him.   All things shall be “subdued unto” the Son of God!  That is the testimony of scripture.  And that is how He receives the power, the riches, the wisdom, the strength, the honor, the glory, and the blessing!  It is all the wealth and strength and glory of the kingdoms of this world yielded up to Christ the Lord.   “And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of His Christ; and He shall reign for ever and ever” (Rev. 11:15).  Oh, the wonder of it!

            We are to crown the Lord, the Spirit, as King in every place of our being, outer and inner.  It was the humiliation of France, in the fifteenth century, that her king Charles VII, was not crowned in the proper city, where former kings were crowned.  Joan of Arc, burning with the high resolve to resolve this dishonor, and have the king crowned in Rheims, emerged from obscurity, gathered an army, drove the enemy back from one point to another, until she dislodged him from Rheims.  The king came then.  The crown was placed upon his brow in the right place; and the fair maiden bowed at the foot of the throne, with tears of joy streaming down her beautiful cheeks.  Where are we to crown our King?  We are to crown Him in the most sacred and authoritative chamber of our nature, from whence proceed the impulses and propensities of spiritual life.  The authority and dominion of life is in the spirit, in your spirit and my spirit.  AND FROM THENCE HE WOULD BE CROWNED AND RULE IN LIFE OVER THE KINGDOM OF OUR BEING.

            So, precious friend of mine, when you conduct the King to the place of crowning in your nature, you may have to escort Him down a winding passageway, intricate with illusions, imaginations, fears, errors, and distortions of the carnal mind, dismal with sin, sickness and weakness, bare and jagged with earthly consciousness and evil tendencies, on through the gloom and grind of carnality, corruption, and death, to the most sacred altar of your heart.  There implore Him to arise and cleanse and purify all your entire nature every whit.  Submit — trust all the powers of your being into His mighty hands that HE MAY RECEIVE THE POWER OF RULERSHIP in you and through you in the kingdom of God!

THE UNIVERSAL SONG

            “And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands…and every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever” (Rev. 5:11,13).

            As John goes on with his songs we might have expected him to say, “I heard,” but he first says, “I beheld.”  This is a book of visions, and there are continuing references to what is “seen.”  But he did also hear!    Though there are many singers he speaks of the voice, which is the one voice heard through the many — the voice of the spirit, the voice of the truth and the revelation in the Spirit of the Lord.  There is only one voice!  Hearing the voice goes beyond the sound, beyond even the words.  Jesus said, “My sheep know my voice, and a stranger they will not follow.”  It’s not just that the sheep understand the words the shepherd speaks, but they know — recognize, discern, and perceive the voice. 

            There are various Greek words for “know,” each bearing its own shade and depth of meaning, in this case it is oida, denoting absolute knowledge.  Praise God, there is a realm where you can have absolute knowledge of His voice — without doubt or questionings.  I do not hesitate to say that such absolute knowledge comes as a result of prolonged and intimate association, communion, and relationship with HIM.  I “know” my wife’s voice, not merely its sound, but also its meaning and intent.  By each inflection of her voice I discern her attitude, determination, state of being, etc.   Such knowledge has developed as a result of   more than fifty years of being her HUSBAND!   His sheep — His mature ones — shall come to the place where they unmistakably know His voice, not just hear it, but know it.  It is precious as we tune out the voices of this world, and of our own carnal minds, and listen only to the voice of the spirit within; the more we do so day by day the stronger and more resonant and meaningful becomes His voice unto us.

            There are many pitiful words and pathetic messages pawned off on God’s precious people under the guise of “the word of God.”  But the Lord is bringing forth a people in this day who have gotten beyond dead doctrines and religious traditions.  God is causing us to hear with our spirit the Voice of the Living Christ, for He is the Word of God, the Truth of God, and the Reality of God.  I cannot emphasize too strongly that it takes more than sermons on sonship, and exhortations on perfection, and claims about our high attainments in God, and boasts about immortality to make truly manifest sons of God.  We must HEAR HIS VOICE, for it is only those that hear His voice who shall live! 

            It takes more than having meetings, singing choruses, clapping hands, shouting Amens and Hallelujahs, prophesying, and preaching to one another about the deep mysteries of God to bring us to the knowledge of God and transformation into His likeness.   We shall have to see Him and touch Him and hear Him and walk with Him as did John on the Isle of Patmos.  We must hear His voice speaking to us in the deepest recesses of our being.   We must commune with Him in the glory that radiates from the face of Jesus Christ.  Sonship comes only by personal association with the living Christ!  And think not, precious friend of mine, if you cannot now discern His voice amidst the confused babble of voices that fill the earth, that you will hear HIS SHOUT when He comes in that glorious Word by which He shall finally deliver us from the last vestiges of sin and death and present us faultless before His Father as holy sons of God with power and great glory.

            In the heavenly mists of that long ago Eden Adam “heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool (Heb. — spirit) of the day.”  Every “day” has a voice!  Every “day” of the Lord bespeaks of a season of a particular dealing and purpose of God in our life.  The voice of the Lord is speaking in the spirit — anointing and purpose — of that particular day.   All who have truly been called to sonship to God are now hearing the “voice” of the Lord God walking in the spirit — in the anointing and purpose — of this new kingdom day to which we have now come!  We hear not just the message, for multitudes hear the message but never truly hear the voice.  Because they do not recognize the voice they do not discern the importance and significance of the word they hear.  It bears no fruit of righteousness and power in their lives.  They continue on in their carnal ways, and often in the old-order religious systems of man, professing to embrace the revelation of this new kingdom day, but void of its transforming power.  Those apprehended for this day are now hearing the voice of the Son of God and they that hear shall live!   The voice is a tone, a note, a chord, a knowing, an inner hearing and quickening beyond the message of the words.

            In our text above great pain is taken to declare another glorious day — a day when not a single creature of God, whether in heaven or upon the earth, whether in the sea or even the lowest realms of degradation “under the earth,” shall fail to bow the knee and joyfully proclaim the worthiness of the Lamb!  This includes all men and all creatures of all worlds throughout the universe!  This includes all angels, holy and fallen, and includes the devil as well!  “And every creature…heard I saying…”  It means that absolutely everything that has life or breath will, in that great day, rejoice and exult and jubilantly cry, “Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever!”  Praise shall be universal for the Lamb, for He is worthy indeed!

            John beheld in spirit the wonder of a day when the universe shall be free from sin and sinners, and a universal song of adoration goes up to God and the Lamb.   It is futile to attempt to apply this to the church in its present state, or to any time in the past since Adam fled from the garden of God.  At the time of which John speaks, every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth without any exception sends up its anthem of blessings to God and the Lamb!  While we praise God for every moving of His Spirit and every step of His all-wise plan, the fact remains that none of the revivals of history has ever once-for-all defeated Satan, sin, and death.  No revival at any time in any land has ever turned the whole world to God! No dealing of God with humanity has ever brought to pass the total triumph of His kingdom in all realms!  Sin and death still stalk across the earth, the vast masses of humanity held tight in their terrible clutches, with sorrows beyond description.  Is there no deliverance for these?

            How truly the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now!  And creation waits — not for another Luther, nor another Paul, nor another Finney, nor another Peter, nor another Moody; waiting not for another Pentecost, nor for another evangelistic crusade or healing campaign, nor for another prophet.  “For the earnest expectation of the creation waiteth for THE MANIFESTATION OF THE SONS OF GOD” (Rom. 8:19).  And why does all creation stand in the wings waiting with bated breath, crowding the door and standing on tiptoe to see the wonderful sight of God’s sons coming into their own?   “For the creation itself ALSO shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God!” (Rom. 8:21).   Think about it!

            Thank God, Daniel 7:27 is really true!  “And the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom, under the whole heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the most High, whose kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and ALL DOMINIONS SHALL SERVE HIM!”  Thank God, Ephesians 1:10 is actually the fully inspired word of God!  “And this is in harmony with God’s merciful purpose for the government of the world when the times are ripe for it — the purpose which He has cherished  in His own mind of restoring the whole creation to find its one Head in Christ; yes, things in heaven and things on earth, to  find their one Head in Him.” (Weymouth translation).

            What love!  What wondrous love!   What victory!  What an unspeakably glorious consummation!  The might of God’s strength which operated in Christ, raising Him from the dead, was sufficient to exalt Him to the highest pinnacle of the universe, thus ensuring that all His enemies would be reconciled to Him, that every opposing power would be made subordinate to Him, that all sin and death in every realm and in every man and in every creature throughout all the unbounded heavens would be so swallowed up of HIS LIFE until God would be ALL IN ALL, bless His glorious name!  The gospel of the grace of God!  Truly it is not just for this age, but extends to all ages and realms, for every creature cries blessing and honor and glory and power be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb “for the ages of the ages.”  That’s how it reads in the Greek! May it flood our hearts that they may, indeed, be illuminated with the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ!

The redemption of God’s elect, men out of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation, is far from being the whole story of Christ’s reconciliation and redemption.  John hears the choirs of heaven joined by the voice of the whole creation in a universal outburst of praise to God and the Lamb!  Hear it!  “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever!” (Rev. 5:13).  Such is the universality of Christ’s achievement that His victory cannot stop short of universal response.  No wonder that the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders sing a new song proclaiming the worthiness of the Lamb to take the book and open its seals!  No wonder an innumerable company of angels round about the throne take up the refrain: “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain!”  No wonder that every created thing in heaven and in earth and throughout the underworld unites in the great chorus of blessing, glory, honor, and power unto the Lamb! 

            This is the very music of heaven!  As we look at the praises rising up out of chapter four and chapter five of the Revelation, it can be seen that they comprise in substance two great oratorios — the Oratorio of Creation in chapter four, and the Oratorio of Redemption in chapter five.  It is interesting to note that an oratorio is a musical composition in which solos and choruses combine to the accompaniment of  instruments.  Here the voices of angels and the living creatures and the elders with their harps form an immortal choir, chanting celestial praise.  As one writer has pointed out, the arrangement of these musical numbers is most artistic.  The worship begins with a quartet as the four living creatures sing the seraph’s song, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God almighty, which is, and was, and is to come!”  This is followed by the choir, consisting of the twenty-four elders, which continues the praise of God, “Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and honour and power: for Thou has created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are and were created.”

            Then are heard the solo voices: “Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?”  Then comes the response: “The Lion of the tribe of Judah hath prevailed to open the book and to loose the seals thereof!”  Then as the Lamb takes the book out of the hand of Him that sits upon the throne, there is heard the unison of the quartet and the choir of elders singing the new song concerning the worthiness of the Lamb, “For Thou hast redeemed us unto God by Thy blood…and hast made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign on the earth!”   Scarcely had the quartet and the choir finished this ascription of praise, than with thrilling crescendo the climax and grand finale are reached.  The limitless expanse of God’s universe became vocal, and, led by the unnumbered angelic host, the infinite reaches of creation, filled with its myriads of worlds and suns and these all peopled with the creatures of the mind of God, joined the sublimest anthem of praise to the Lamb that divine ears will ever hear.  The strains of this mighty coronation song swell until their echoes fill all the ceaseless ages of eternity with unspeakable melody!  Then, as the tumult of universal praise dies away, there is heard the sound of a grand “Amen!”  It is from the lips of the four living creatures.  A breathless silence follows, and the elders fall down and worship.  Such is the Universal Song — the Celestial Song of Creation and Redemption!

            The following is a beautiful writing which appeared some years ago in The Sharon Star.  No name of an author was attached to it, so whoever the author is, deeper than the human heart can fathom is the meaning and mystery of the words he shares.  I quote:

            “Many centuries ago there was a Greek musicologist named Boethius.  Boethius theorized that there were three main levels of music, and he gave each level a name.  The lowest form of music was what he called musica instumentalis.  This referred to audible music, either sung or played, performed mainly for entertainment purposes.  This is the kind that all people are most familiar with.  As we all know, there have been countless works of music written and played over the years which have been and still are incredibly beautiful but which still belong to this category.

            “The second highest level of music, according to Boethius, was what he called musica humana, which was an audible music, but referred only to that which existed between God and man.   It was not intended to be entertaining, but the music was spiritual in nature.  The song being sung could be a prayer, an exhortation to people, or it could even be a prophetic song.  We, of course, are familiar with and thankful for the gift of spiritual singing, that of singing a higher song in the Spirit that has never been sung before.    

              “But Boethius recognized that there existed music  of yet a far higher nature.  He recognized that there are symphonies that have always been playing in a realm that far transcends our natural ears.  He recognized that the earth, nature, the atmosphere, and all of Creation are lost in melodies far, far more beautiful than any human ear can hear, but which can be heard only by those who have spiritual ‘ears to hear,’ those who listen to the voice of the Spirit.   He called this level of music musica mundana, also given the names ‘Music of the Cosmos,’ ‘Harmony of the Spheres,’ or the ‘Symphony of the Universe,’ which referred to this very vibration of all celestial and terrestrial bodies and all of Creation.  The scriptures declare that even the very elements give glory to the King of kings! (Isa. 55:12; Job 38:7; Isa. 44:23).  Yes, there is indeed such music saturating even the air all around us.  But only the sons and daughters of the living God can tune in to that higher frequency and sing its melody, for these are they WHO ARE LED BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD!

            “This music is more than just sound.  There are not necessarily any words with it.  It is not learned in words, nor does it depend upon words.  But it is a living, throbbing vibration of all that God is, which is felt and released from the very center of the spirit!  This music is the beauty and glory  of the Resurrected Christ!  It is the unbroken communion between Christ and His Church, between the Bridegroom and the Bride, and between the Creator and His Creation! 

            “The source of power behind this Song of Songs is not musical overtones but SPIRITUAL VIBRATIONS of Perfect Love, Life Everlasting, Joy Unspeakable, and unending expressions of Praise and Thanksgiving, springing up from deep within a heart that is filled with all the fullness of Him who reigneth forever and ever!  It is a song BORN OF LOVE!  It doesn’t just tickle our natural ears, but it pierces the heart and spirit of men!  The Song actually operates on a Love so great that men’s hearts shall be opened and melted as they hear!   The Day shall come when they shall respond to the quickening power of that Song and join their voices with all the angelical host and sing and sing with such a lyrity of heart, mind, soul, body, and spirit until they become enraptured into the beauty of infinite harmony!  Creation shall then be truly lifted!  Chains shall be broken!  Captives shall be liberated as the Resurrected Christ is made alive!

            “We, as members of this glorious body of Christ, are called not only to sing that Song, but to BECOME that Living Song of Songs!  ‘And give Him no rest, till He establish, and till He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth’ (Isa. 62:7).  It is when we BECOME this precious melody of love that its power is made manifest.   We then BECOME this rhythm of glorified life, yea, earth’s heartbeat of Joy.  I pray that we all put on ‘ears to hear’ and join our voices with all the myriads of angels and become that Song.  For each individual who develops the power to hear it with spiritual ears can send it on and lift the burdened hearts of a weary world!  Hallelujah!  For, “Blessed are the people that know the joyful sound…!’  (Ps. 89:15).

            “As the never-ending fire of God which cannot go out, this Song has always been ringing throughout Creation and it cannot die.  Its melody of Life, Love, and Praise DEMANDS expression!  Some men may slam their doors, and try to drown it out, but all their noise cannot smother the living crescendo of Love!  Its power and impact are too great; it cometh from above”    — end quote.

            Some time ago a word from brother Carl Schwing crossed my desk and I was especially impressed by the following testimony: “Some nights ago, upon my bed, as my thoughts were upon the Father, my spirit was carried away to the KINGDOM OF THE ELEMENTS…I felt the strong wind blowing against my face, I reached out to touch the rain and snow, I could hear the heaving of the oceans, and the song of the four seasons; I heard the clapping of the trees, I heard the mountains shout for joy and the valleys sing, and the song was always the same: ‘Christ is Lord!  Christ is Lord! Christ is Lord!’  I remained in that realm for an hour or so, as my body was in a state of perfect peace.  Tonight I understand more deeply what I experienced: The Kingdom of God had visited the kingdoms of the earth (not of the world), for as He had created these kingdoms before creating man, so now they are first to receive the ‘Knowledge of the Lord’ (the awareness of His presence).  My brethren, can you not see how close the Hour is?  The Father is walking amid His creation and all creation is being shaken by His presence…and we, O sons of God, are being changed in a ‘moment, in the twinkling of an eye’ by His presence!”   — end quote.

             Some years ago brother Paul Mueller shared the following illuminating experience in one of his papers.   “To help us understand this truth, I would like to share with you a wonderful experience I had while in Nigeria, West Africa thirty years ago.  One afternoon the Lord appeared in my room, and said to me, ‘The Kingdom of God is at hand!’   As soon as He said that, He immediately turned away and left the room.  Needless to say, I was surprised and amazed by that visitation.  As I thought about it later, I began to doubt that it was of the Lord.  Since I saw no other manifestation of the Kingdom, I thought the whole experience should be questioned.  A few days later, as I was walking down a path from our house to the Bible School where I taught Bible classes, the Lord again got my attention.  This time, as I was walking through the lush Nigerian bush, I heard the leaves, the shrubs, and the plants singing a combined song of praise to the Lord, and of travail for the Kingdom of God.  I stopped to listen!  The sound of it all was so arresting that my attention was fixed for a few minutes on the awesome, majestic wonder of that scene.  The sound was so awe-inspiring, I thought it to be a most heavenly sound.  The whole creation around me came alive with that combined song of praise and travail.  In fact, the creation is always singing and travailing (Rom. 8:22), but for those few minutes I was given ears to hear it!  As I stood there transfixed by the wonder of it, the Lord spoke again and said, ‘Now do you doubt me when I tell you the Kingdom of God is at hand?’  I replied, ‘No Lord, help me never to doubt your word again’”   — end quote.

            A distant relative of mine, Dr. Richard Eby, was accidentally killed a number of years ago when he fell to the street from a three-story building.  Instantly he was conscious in the realm of the spirit.  One moment he was conscious with a flesh-restricted mind, the next moment with a spirit-released mind whose speed of function was that of light.  He was instinctively aware that the Lord of lords was everywhere about him, though he did not at that time see Him.  Hours later he was raised from the dead, and of one of the wonderful experiences encountered in that heavenly sphere, he says, “Music surrounded me.  It came from all directions.  Its harmonic beauty, unlike earthly vocal or instrumental sounds, was totally undistorted.  It flowed unobtrusively like a glassy river, quiet, worshipful, exceedingly edifying, and totally comforting.  It provided a reassuring type of comfort much like a protective blanket that whispered peace and love.  I had never sensed anything like it!  This music was sounding within my head, not from an eardrum.   Obviously it was not airborne.  Most unusual to me was the absence of any beat.  Then I realized that without time this heavenly music could have no beat which is a measure of time!  I was hearing harmonic perfection, undistorted by any interposed medium between me and its source, as heard mind-to-mind.”

            Richard Eby explains that since God is the Creator of the universe He is the Composer of the Song of Creation.  This universal Song is the prime communication of worship, praise, and thanksgiving.  Music became the resulting harmony from all creation, both of matter and energy.  All resonated in unison with the Spirit.  It is like a triad of sub-electronic particles with and around which God constructed everything in the universe.  The wave-forms we call Light;  whereas the material forms we call earth and water and air.  The original creation mirrored the composition and perfection of Person-God.  All things vibrated in unison with Him!  There was total accord and harmony everywhere as the whole cosmos was resonating with and in God.  Each separate thing or being thus carried out an appointed task in His scheme for the universe.  A celestial-form of music resulted as the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy!  Dr. Eby adds: ‘The music around me suddenly seemed louder.  I rushed to a nearby tree and grasped its trunk to my ear; it was singing!   I lifted my right elbow to my head; it too emitted the same joyous, beatless melody.  Excitedly I stopped to pick some flowers, and found them already in my hand.  They too were ‘playing’ the tune!”

            There is a story of the Lost Chord that has been told in exquisite verse, and in rapturous music.  Perhaps you have heard of the lady who in the autumn twilight laid her fingers on the open keys of a great organ.  She knew not what she was playing, or what she was dreaming then; but she struck one chord of music, like the sound of a great Amen.  Something called her away, and when she returned to the organ, she had lost that chord divine.  Though she longed for it and sought it earnestly in unnumbered hours of practice, it was all in vain.  It was a lost chord.

            And so in our world today a voice of longing cries out of every human soul in surges of incomprehensible yearning.  It is a voice that is felt, not heard.  None has ever walked the pathways of this planet who has not felt the haunting refrain of that “Lost Chord” moaning out its unutterable lamentation.  And one and all try to silence that plaintive cry as it sobs forth its heartbreaking sorrow beneath the burden of a faint glimmer from some long forgotten memory…or world…or lost existence.  Whenever I hear the story of that Lost Chord it reminds me of the lost memory, the lost understanding, the lost knowledge, the lost joy, the lost peace, the lost power, the lost glory, the lost life that has fled from mankind.  That whining refrain of sadness, darkness, and death, echoing weirdly out of each man’s soul, is but the fragmented, scrambled notes of the great Lost Chord, as they are released with harmonic dissonance and discord.  It is like the exquisite notes of a masterpiece sounded forth indiscriminately without harmony at the hands of an unlearned child.  The notes may all be there but there is no lovely melody, only a raucous racket. 

            There is recorded in the book of Job the statement of a glorious former time when “the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy” (Job 38:7).  That exquisite harmony was muted when man was lowered out of the realm of pure spirit into this gross material realm, and then muted further by sin and the subjection of creation to the bondage of corruption, as mankind became overwhelmed with the consciousness of this dense realm of the earthly, material, and temporal.  But through the quickening of the Spirit of the resurrected and ascended Christ A NEW SONG IS ARISING — the Universal Song, indeed, the Lost Chord begins to vibrate and sing within our hearts again!

                                                Down in the human heart, crushed by the tempter,

                                                            Feelings lie buried that grace can restore,

                                                Touched by a loving heart, wakened by kindness,

                                                            Chords that are broken will vibrate once more!

            There is a glorious company that stands upon mount Zion with the Lamb, they are of the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north (Isa. 14:13; Ps. 48:2), brought there by the transforming grace of God, and they sing as it were A NEW SONG before the throne, which no man (earthly realm, carnal mind) can learn.  It is called “as it were” a new song because though it seems new, it is not new at all!  It is the same song Creation sang in that long ago beginning when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy!  It is heard through the celestial realms again as the new morning stars take up that lost chord and express the Life and Glory and Reality of God in spirit and in truth.  Well did Ray Prinzing write, “Thrilling to note that the word ‘song’ is the Greek word for an ode.  An ode isn’t the same as a hymn which is a song composed and sung, whereas an ode is a spontaneous outflow of melody and praise that finds its expression in song by the Spirit’s inner prompting.  Now a morning star means the first, early, or foremost one.  And it is given as the herald or messenger to announce the day which is coming forth.  The night might seem dark, but the morning star shines out to announce that the GREATER LIGHT OF GOD shall soon be seen over all the earth.  Truly ‘the knowledge of the glory of the Lord shall cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea.’  Ah, this gives new hope for coming days, His lighted stars betoken the victory”   — end quote.

                                    I cannot tell how all lands will worship

                                    When, at His bidding, every storm is stilled;

                                    Or who can say how great the jubilation

                                    When all the hearts of men with love are filled.

                                    But this I know, the skies will thrill with rapture

                                    And myriad, myriad human voices sing;

                                    And earth to heaven, and heaven to earth, will answer,

                                    At last the Saviour, Saviour of the world, is King!

            Thirty centuries ago the Psalmist cried out in spirit, “Praise ye the Lord.  Praise the Lord, O my soul.  I will sing unto the Lord as long as I live: I will sing praise to my God while I have my being.”   All the way through the book of Psalms, even in its most sorrow-laden passages, you feel that you are walking in a smoldering volcano of praise, liable to burst out at any moment into a great flame of thanksgiving to God.  And as the book draws to its close, the flame leaps high from the crater: here you have praise, and nothing but praise!  You have perhaps watched a great conductor bringing every member of his orchestra into action towards the close of some majestic symphony; have seen him, as the music climbed higher and higher, signaling to one player after another, and always at the signal another instrument responding to the summons and adding its voice to the music, until at the last crashing chords not one was left dumb, but all were uniting in a thrilling and triumphant climax.  

So these  final Psalms summon everything in creation to swell the glorious unison of God’s praise.  They summon symbolically to the sun riding in the heavens, “You come in now, and praise Him!”   And then to the myriad stars of night, “You now, praise Him!”  Then to the mountains, piercing the clouds with their summits, “Praise Him!”  Then to the kings and judges of the earth, “Praise Him!”  Then to manhood in its strength and maidenhood in its grace and beauty, “Praise Him!”  Then to the multitude of the redeemed in earth and heaven, “Praise Him!”  The crescendo continues until the whole wide universe is shouting with every voice the praise of God alone.  The Psalms in their sequence show forth the redemptive progression that can only end when every heart beats in unison with the heart of God; when every mind shall harmonize with divine wisdom and purpose; when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father!

            The loving, praising, worshipping attitude of the whole universe is to be complete and perfect.  Thus all the ends of the earth shall offer up their praise and thanksgiving to Him for His great love, salvation, and inflow of life.  What a THANKSGIVING DAY that will be!  Every knee on this globe, and in the heavens above, and in the underworld shall confess the Lordship of God and His sons.  What a TESTIMONY MEETING!  There has never been one like it.  The summing up of the universe is the revelation of harmony.  It is not that the harmony comes at the end, but that the harmony is revealed at the end.  The universe is all music, but it is not all music to our ear.  We only hear a few chords, and they are most often minor chords.  The minor chords seem discords when we hear them in their fragmented position; they lack the full symphony to bring out their symmetry.  Often our hearts cry out that we are living in a world filled with discords.  The Father must teach us that we are living in a world of perfect music, but we only hear a small portion of the music.  Sorrow, pain, disappointment, heartaches, frustration, and travail, not to mention sin and death, seem to our ear sad and discordant notes.  Often we feel that the coming melody shall atone for the grating chords.  Nay, my brother, my sister; say rather that the grating chords themselves shall be revealed as parts of the completed harmony.  Then shall we fathom the depths of the wisdom and knowledge of God!   Then shall we understand His ways that are past finding out!  Then shall we see just how it is that all things work together for good!  The melody is not to come, it has come already; it has only to be completed to be revealed, and then the harpers shall stand upon the glassy sea.