The Sign of the Prophet Jonah # 7

The Church's Constitution (continued)

What is of immediate concern to us here is that God "must" and "will" have His people and the full range of His testimony and glory. When Paul was in Corinth the whole situation was intensely difficult. The conditions set forth in Romans 3 are the actual local colorings of Corinth from where the letter to the Romans was written. The word of the Lord to Paul in the midst of such a setting was "I have much people in this city." It reminds us of the Master's words earlier, "Other sheep I have." The Lord had them before ever the Gospel was preached to them; before they had known anything about His salvation: He had them. In that "foreknowledge of God the Father" they were His, and all that the Father hath given me shall come unto me": even in Corinth, Rome, etc. Thus we see that "Ephesians" truth (if that is a right way of putting it) is implied in Jonah's commission outside of the limits of the Jewish covenant. This was the principle which so greatly provoked the Jews of Nazareth when the Lord told them that, while there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah the Prophet, it was to an outsider, a Sidonian widow alone that the prophet was sent; and while there were many lepers in Israel in the days of Elisha, it was only Naaman, a Syrian - an outsider - who was healed. The sign of the Prophet Jonah then reaches on to embrace the nature of  God's eternal purpose realized in resurrection and the Church is the abiding shrine of that sign and testimony.

The Church's Power

The Lord Jesus within such as have become united with Him in the likeness of His death and resurrection, joining them into one spiritual body causes that body to persist in the power of a deathless life. This testimony must of necessity be a practical one, and therefore all the forces of death gather around to quench that life or submerge it, and "wheresoever the body is thither are the vultures gathered together" to devour. Many, many times both corporately and individually it has seemed that there was "the sentence of death," and the Lord's people have "despaired of life," but although "cast down" they have not been "destroyed" for that which has been destroyed (Hebrews 2:14) cannot destroy that which has destroyed it.

As a corporate whole, represented on earth by one united people, the world does not see the full meaning and measure of this testimony. It sees divisions, schism, and internal conflicts and disagreements, but the miracle of the child of God persists, and in another realm of higher intelligences the testimony is recognized to the full (Ephesians 3:10). There is little doubt but that - given spiritually (that is, a fellowship in life with the Holy Spirit) the powers of death will exhaust themselves without success in the matter of the testimony of the Resurrection of Christ in His people. Viewed superficially there may often appear to be a triumph on their part. The merely human factors may entirely come to an end. The man or woman may "despair of life" in more ways than one. Understanding and sentient (perceptive)assurance may be totally eclipsed.

The individuals own victory may go, and on every count be termed defeat. But it is God's victory not ours, and it is not that He "causeth us to triumph" (this is an inaccurate translation) but He "leads us in the train of His triumph." Paul said this (2 Corinthians 2:14) immediately after he had touched upon one of the periods of most questionable success in his life - from man's standpoint, of course. The Lord had the victory even while Paul seemed almost under.

The Lord already has his end, and it cannot be taken from Him, but the working out or working back to it is a tremendous business in which man is involved in a practical, active, cooperating way. The truth of the representative and inclusive resurrection of the Lord Jesus has  to be wrought into the very being and life of the Church and its members.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 8 -"The Ministry of the Church")