The Cross and the satanic Kingdom (continued)
In light of this triumph and because He held this position in Himself He had said to His disciples, "Behold I have given you jurisdiction ... over all the power (dunamis) of the enemy," (Luke 10:9). After His having possessed Himself of this jurisdiction on behalf of the race - as He possessed it in Himself as the Son of God - He promises them that they shall receive power (dunamis) when the Holy Spirit is come upon them (Acts 1:8). There can never be "dunamis" until there is "exousia," that is, there can never be power until there is "position."
God will only put His power behind those who are in the authoritative position, and none are there who have not been incorporated into Christ in death, burial, resurrection, ascension, and reign, and this as a present spiritual experience. The jurisdiction of Christ through His Cross has to function through the members of His Body in concert. Christ has the jurisdiction, we are incorporated into Him if we have on all points accepted and claimed our identification with Him, and thus we have become the instruments of that authority over the driving power of the enemy in every sphere where His victory is not recognized. By a life in the Spirit we are able to receive by discernment those indications from above - the "Head" - and then command the situation and put the enemy's work out of action. The word "destroy" in the New Testament means "put out of action," and this is related to "the works of the devil," and progressively wrought out on the ground of Calvary by "the church which is his body." This is not vulgar exorcism, for it can only be effectual as the Holy Spirit takes the initiative in us and through us, and we must know His "energizing." Undoubtedly it was their absolute union with their victorious Lord, and the recognition of their judicial authority - not over men but over satan and his kingdom - which was the ground of the Holy Spirit's seal and anointing of the Apostles and first believers. Galatians 2:20 is forever the key to the situation.
The Cross and the Heavenlies, "Far Above All"
Perhaps one of the most mysterious statements in the Bible is that made by Paul in the Ephesian Letter (3:10) that
"now unto the principalities and the powers in the heavenlies might be made known through the church the manifold wisdom of God."
At least it implies that the Apostle had been given a very special revelation, for this is one of the things that could never be arrived at by study, reasoning or deduction. What it all means we do not know, but we can see something.
Firstly, we find it difficult to believe that these principalities and powers are the same as those mentioned in Ephesians 6. Why the Lord should want to display His manifold wisdom to the evil powers would indeed be hard to understand. If His all-governing object is the expression and diffusion of His glory in the universe so that worship comes back to Him in adoration, wonder, and amazed rejoicing, then we have the clue to this statement. The Church here is represented as seated together with Christ in the heavenlies, not in the realm of the evil powers, but above them, among the angelic hosts. There, intelligences having absolute confidence in the wisdom and ability of God are nevertheless capable of being instructed and learning. They are aware of the unspeakably great and immense problems that have arisen through satan's interference and man's complicity with him - the problems of man's disrupted and twisted nature; of the resultant power of satan over him and man's own utter helplessness; the problem of sin, enmity, hatred, price, selfishness, warfare, death, etc. It is like a mountainous argument built up for God to answer. They are sure that He can do it, but there is breathless suspense as to how He will do it. They behold the Church as the vessel in which He will give the answer. The components of the Church are humanly as manifold and diverse in dispositions, temperaments, natures, and propensities as there are persons. In them by nature are found all the results and effects of the Fall. Then grace gets to work; calls them chooses them, saves them, sanctifies them, and changes them so that they go altogether "contrary to nature." They no longer do what they used to do. They do what they never would have done. This is operating and developing every day. Grace, grace, grace! The word occurs a dozen times in Ephesians, and its glorious issue is that "in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace ... toward us in Christ Jesus". So the Church and its members pass into every kind of trial and testing - persecution, reproach, adversity, sorrow, loneliness, disappointment, physical suffering, frustration, etc. - and the reactions through the grace of God are quite other than they would be apart from it.
There, where things are known for their eternal value and right meaning, this "manifold wisdom of God" is causing principalities and powers to worship and glorify God. And because the Church serves Him in this way it is destined to share His glory, and come down "out of heaven ... having the glory of God." It can be easily seen how the Cross relates to this. Initially it secures for God the vessel. Progressively as a principle it empowers to put aside all that works against His glory. The Cross lies at the heart of every disappointment triumphantly born, and every adversity meekly endured.
Because of the great solution which the Cross is to the problem which has filled the universe, angels and archangels and all the host of heaven adore Him Who thought of it - Whose unsearchable wisdom found expression in "Jesus Christ and Him crucified."
~T. Austin-Sparks~
(the end)
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