COMING TO FINAL PERFECTION
"The love of
Christ ... the fullness of God" Eph.
3:19
Here are two great phrases. They occur in one of the apostolic prayers
for the saints. In that prayer the ULTIMATE DESIRE is that they should "know the love
of Christ," in order that they "may be filled unto all the fullness of
God." The idea, then, is that the knowledge of "the love of
Christ" brings to the soul the experience of "the fullness
of God." To be "filled unto all the fullness of God" is
to find the ultimate experience of life. Where this is so, there is no true
desire of the soul unsatisfied, no power of the soul undeveloped or idle. The
true meaning of life is discovered, and that not as an ideal seen but
unrealized, but as an actual experience. It is eternal life; it is PERFECTION;
it is satisfaction. How then can it be attained? By KNOWING THE LOVE OF CHRIST,
for in that there is the very FULLNESS OF GOD; and so wonderful is it, not only
as a VISION, but in its POWER, that to know it is TO BE TRANSFORMED by it into
the likeness of itself. To the finality of this knowledge and experience we
have not yet attained; but if we know anything of the love of Christ, we know
something of the FILLING OF THIS FULLNESS of God. That is the story of the beginning, the, process, and the consummation
of true Christian experience. The love of
Christ captures our hearts, and the
life of God produces rest and quietness. The love of Christ is PROGRESSIVELY
INTERPRETED to us by the Spirit, and the FULLNESS OF GOD BRINGS US MORE AND
MORE INTO THE JOY OF LIFE. At last we shall come to FULL APPREHENSION. Then we
shall come to a FINAL PERFECTION in the FINAL FULLNESS of God.
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