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"Teaching the things concerning the kingdom of God..."
FROM
THE CANDLESTICK TO THE THRONE
Part
75
THE
FOUR LIVING CREATURES AND THE TWENTY-FOUR ELDERS
(continued)
“In the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four
living creatures full of eyes before and behind.
And the first living creature was like a lion,
and the second living creature was like an ox,
and the third living creature had a face as a man,
and the fourth living creature was like a flying
eagle” (Rev. 4:6-7).
These four living creatures are in the “midst of the throne”
denoting kingship.
The four living creatures had four faces in the likeness of different
creatures, representing the four aspects of kingship
which are true in our Lord Jesus Christ and are also wrought out in the life
of every son of God apprehended to share His throne.
Each of the four faces reveals an aspect of the attributes,
characteristics, and qualities which qualify one to rule and reign with Christ
in His kingdom. They are,
furthermore, the four-fold manifestation of Himself to all mankind!
The face of the lion speaks
of strength — power, authority,
and dominion. The face of the ox
is symbolic of servanthood,
revealing Christ, Head and body, as the compassionate
servant of all. The face of a
man indicates intelligence
— divine understanding, knowledge, and wisdom.
We can never reign apart from these!
The fourth face or quality of kingship
is that of a flying eagle.
The eagle speaks to us of exaltation
— that which is high and lifted up. The
eagle is noted for its swiftness in flight (Deut. 28:49); it hastens to its
prey (Job 9:26); its courage and farsightedness (Job 39:28-30); rises to the
heavens (Prov. 23:5); and has great strength in flight (Isa. 40.31).
Although the eagle is a bird of prey, it is highly regarded as a sign
of power, courage, freedom, and exaltation.
In the land of Israel there are two kinds of eagles, the Golden
and the Imperial.
Gold bespeaks of the divine nature, and the Imperial of kingship.
The eagle is the king of birds, just as the lion is the king of beasts.
The characteristics of the eagle find a beautiful application in the
realm of the spirit, and are spiritual characteristics of those appointed to
the high places in God. The
“eagle saints” dwell in the high places and soar to the highest heights in
the heavens of God’s Spirit! They
continually follow on to attain to new heights in the purposes of God!
They will forsake the old paths and low places of dead religion, static
creeds, empty ceremonies, and flesh-oriented programs and promotions to soar
into the highest of the heavens to know and experience God in the heights of
life, truth, and reality.
The eagle is the highest form of bird, the only creature able to look
as it were directly into the sun’s dazzling radiance.
Aspiring to heights far beyond the physical or grossly material, this
great bird symbolizes the upward flight of our journey into God.
The Lord Himself is referred to a number of times in scripture as an
eagle. “Ye have seen what I did
unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you
on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself” (Ex. 19:4), and again,
“As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth
abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings: so the Lord alone
did lead him (Deut. 32:11). Christ
is that royal eagle, flying high; the one who is at the right hand of God; who
thought it not robbery to be
equal with God; that glorious One, the Son of God exalted on high!
I invite you now to meditate upon both the heights and depths of Christ
the eagle — Head and body. It
is one of the loftiest of spiritual emblems!
From the dawn of human history the challenge of flight has captured the
imagination of man. The conquest
of the air in the past century has embued men and women with a sense of awe
and romance unequaled in the annals of history.
Somehow the ability to fly has epitomized the longing of man to rise
above the confines of the earthy and the mortal and soar into the realm of the
spiritual and the supernatural. God
has made wonderful provision in His kingdom for man to have this spiritual
need met, yet few believers ever discover the laws by which this escape is
possible, few ever achieve the perspective of the eagle, an ability to rise
high enough to see things that those on the ground can never see, and to truly
see all things as they really are. How
can a man break into the high realm of the spiritual
and the eternal — to soar in the
heavenlies with Christ? In
response let us look at the beautiful illustration used by the prophet Isaiah.
“They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount
up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; they shall
walk, and not faint” (Isa. 40:31).
The wise man said in the book of Proverbs that among those mysteries in
the universe that were too hard to understand, one was the “mystery of the
eagle in the air” (Prov. 30:18-19). The
symbolism of this passage points to the inexplicable potential of each and
every son of God, which is like the eagle’s, which can fly higher than any
bird without once flapping a wing. Did
you notice that Isaiah said that eagles and eagle saints “mount up” and
not “flap up”? Eagles were
not made to go flapping about in soulish exercises, unprofitable self-efforts,
or wasted fleshly energy — they were created to soar
high and free! Eagles learn to
fly without struggling because they instinctively understand the air currents.
The eagle has about 7,000 feathers and weighs only about 14 pounds.
When the right wind is blowing he lifts effortlessly into the air with
a shrill scream of triumph and freedom. “They
that wait upon the Lord…shall mount
up with wings as eagles.” Herein
is one of the eagle’s secrets in being able to mount up — waiting.
Those who wait upon the
Lord, it is written, who trust in His
moving, who respond only to His
promptings, who rest in His timing,
who move in His purpose, will be
the ones to mount up!
The “mounting up” process is important and necessary to each son of
God who would take his place in the heavenlies, filled with the precious mind
of Christ, conformed to His wonderful image, and caught up to the throne of
God to reign with Christ over all things.
But it only comes to those who will wait
in His presence until the glory that shines from His face changes them from
the image of the earthly into the image of the heavenly.
Should the eagle fail to wait for the current that lifts, he would
never get off the ground. And the
saint of God who does not wait for the moving of the Holy Spirit in the
purposes of God will never get air borne or soar into the heavenlies!
We are soaring into the heavenly places of God’s Spirit!
But some think they have already soared as high as they can go.
I know precious brethren who are impatient to wait for God’s timing
and God’s moving to manifest His sons, and have reduced sonship to something
less than what God has sovereignly revealed by His Spirit.
They claim to be already walking in the power of the third day, in the
glory of the most holy place, in the blessings of the feast of tabernacles,
and even now are, they say, putting on immortality and ruling and reigning
with Christ over the nations and bringing the kingdom of God to pass in the
earth. Yet I see no fruit of this
in their lives, or in their aging bodies, or in their ministries,
or in this cursed earth, or in the agitated, confused, warring,
sin-blighted nations they supposedly are ruling over!
It is a delusion, they are still sitting on the naked limb of a dead
tree, imagining that they have
lifted into the air and circled high into the crags of the mountain.
Not everyone who professes Christ and enjoys the blessings of His grace
and embraces the word of sonship and the kingdom will pay the price to follow
on to know the Lord in the heavenly places.
But God has predestined those whom He has foreknown, and has placed
this instinctive and constant call within
to rise to greater heights in the celestial realms above.
And those who are willing to wait for the current of His mighty moving
shall in due time mount up with wings as an eagle!
We are mounting up from
realm to realm! We are learning
to recognize the currents of God’s moving and how to be lifted effortlessly
into the heights of God! Eagles
prefer the heights when they soar, and when they rest.
His is a soaring spirit! The
eagle is the jet plane of the bird family.
One of the most awesome sights I ever witnessed happened several years
ago when Lorain and I were on Resurrection Bay in Alaska.
There was a duck swimming placidly on the water.
Suddenly we saw this mighty eagle flying across the bay at an
incredible speed. Some eagles
have been clocked at 200 miles per hour, as he swoops down upon his prey.
This eagle flew right into that bird, catching it in his powerful
talons, without even a shudder from the impact, and flew away at the same
speed to a place where he could safely feed upon it.
The eagle soars the highest, goes the fastest, and is superior to all
other birds in this respect. I
began to understand why they represent the heavenly thrust of man: power,
beauty, freedom, the lord of their environment through their ability to master
the air. They move in regal
splendor, for they are born as kings! As
the eagle is born with the divine right of kingship, so every son of God born
from above possesses the inherent potential of soaring into the very highest
heights in the kingdom of the Spirit.
You
do not have to prompt the eagle to fly, once he has learned how.
No need to sing a chorus twenty-five times, clap the hands, stomp the
feet, and get loud and all emotional in order to work up the spirit of
soaring. Oh, no!
If he cannot fly, he is in misery — he was made for altitude.
He is born for the heights. And
flying is just as natural as breathing. Eagle
saints have their citizenship in heaven, in the heavens of God’s Spirit.
They live in the world, but their feelings, affections, desires,
aspirations, conversation, and actions are above it.
Their greatest impulses are upward, ever
upward! They build their
nests in the heights of the Mountain of God, and prefer and long to be where
they are no more annoyed with the noises, mundaneness, and dangers of this
world system.
John Wright Follette has shared in one of his writings some beautiful
observations about the eagle. He
says, “I believe the Lord purposely uses the eagle as a type here because of
special peculiarities of that bird. One
summer while in Yellowstone National Park, I had occasion to study or observe
some eagles in their natural habitat — and thereby learned some helpful
lessons. I think He speaks of an
eagle because it is the only bird which goes high enough and sustains its
position. They have been known to
fly at an height of 6,000 feet. The
lark also may reach the upper heights and pour out its songs, but it does not
stay so long in the heavens. God seats
us ‘together with Christ in heavenly places.’
We are heaven-born and now our affections are on things above.
The Holy Spirit will hold us in our lofty place!
“The eagle is not often seen — he is the most solitary of any bird.
Many birds are common to sight and even afford amusement.
Parrots can talk and entertain, causing remarks and comment. The eagle
stays alone.
Did you ever hear of a flock of eagles!
The noisy geese go in flocks. But
who wants to be a goose? God
seeks eaglemen!
No man ever comes into realization of the best things of God, who does
not, upon the Godward side of his life, learn to walk alone
with God. Had we time we could
trace through the Word the lives of many of God’s eaglemen.
We find Abraham alone upon the heights, but Lot (a just man and saved)
dwelling in Sodom. Moses, skilled
in all the wisdom of Egypt, must go forty years into the wilderness alone
with God. Paul, who was filled
with Greek learning, and had also sat at the feet of Gamaliel, must go into
Arabia and learn the desert life alone
with God. Let God isolate us!
In this isolation experience He develops an interdependence of faith
and life so that the soul needs no longer the constant help, prayer, faith, or
attention of his neighbor. Such
assistance and inspiration from the other members are necessary and have their
place in our development, but there comes a time when they act as a direct
hindrance to the individual’s faith and welfare.
God knows how to shape the circumstances to give us an isolation
experience! This isolation
produces another characteristic mark — quietness.
No other bird can keep quiet so long as an eagle.
The soul acquires a new grip on his life and is now moved by God rather
than by things seen. He can trust
God to control his spirit in the most vexing circumstances.
We see this majestic calm and quietness so marked in the life of
Christ. When we mount up with
wings as eagles…we can keep quiet” —
end quote.
Many of the Lord’s people have not discovered the way of the eagle.
Some who now read these lines know what I’m talking about.
You are stuck in a rut! Your
life, naturally and spiritually, just isn’t going any place.
Some of you are trapped and stuck, mired down on your job, in your
home, in your marital relationship, in family situations, in difficult
circumstances, frustrating problems, and binding limitations.
These are all holding you down in an earth-bound consciousness, hedging
you in and shutting you up to a state you think
you can’t surmount.
The cares of this world have turned many people’s lives into a
pressure cooker, choking the spiritual life of the kingdom of God.
The strain of everyday living is steadily growing worse because of
financial problems, pressures at work, responsibilities, sickness, doctor and
hospital bills, rebellious children, and
a thousand other things.
The pressures of “this life” are too numerous to mention, we are
all faced with them every day. There
are those involvements of daily living which we cannot shirk, but when they so
overwhelm
us that we find ourselves so fragmented and distressed that we are not able to
gather ourselves together to walk in the peace, joy, and victory of the
kingdom — then we need to be loosed
from these things, escape from them, and
soar above them! Praise God, we
find in Him a realm of freedom from all “these things,” so that whatever
state we are in we can rejoice and not be bound by any of them.
There is an escaping from
the pressures of this world, and only “the way of the eagle” can reveal
it! You can be like the eagle, my
beloved, you can soar like an eagle! Nothing
is impossible to those who mount up with wings as the eagle.
Whatever it is that is weighing you down, whatever it is keeping you
from soaring, it is possible to break away.
The ability to soar lies within
— you don’t have to go anywhere. You
don’t have to change any of the circumstances about you, or sit on the fence
and frantically flap away. You
can rise above them. The
eagle is in
you. You are the eagle.
You can soar high
above it all! Oh yes, you
can!
There
is a life within you that transcends all the lowlands of the flesh — it will
carry you high as you give yourself to it.
It is the life of sonship,
the power and glory of the Christ
within. He is greater than
all! I speak to you today by the
word of the Lord, God is delivering you in this very hour from your earthbound
existence, lifting you up by the Holy Ghost into heavenly places in Christ!
Fear not, for you are not a child of the earth.
Look up, lift up your head and rejoice, for you have come to this
planet from the bosom of your Father in the heavenlies, and you are a child of
redemption — you have inherited that heavenly nature!
Today God looses the prison doors.
Be free from your captivity! Let
your tears of joy wash away all the marks of the cords which have so cruelly
bound you! Be not imprisoned any
more by the circumstances about you, but learn the ways of your God which are
in your spirit, and follow Him alone. You
shall rise above all things and shall not fear nor be dismayed, for I am with
thee, saith the Lord!
Oh, to catch the winds of flight
And soar where eagles go,
To leave the woes of troubled souls
Behind me far below.
I’d listen to the song of birds
And sail in endless flight,
Then chase the sun through cloudy paths
And play with stars at night.
The boundless heavens for my home,
The breeze to lift me high
To rise above my mortal bonds
And never have to die.
Knowing I had found the way
To trails where angels trod,
And when my wings could fly no more —
I’d take the hand of God!
C. David Hay
Actually,
we do not move in and out of heavenly realms at our whim.
Our citizenship is in heaven,
we exist constantly in the heavenlies. This
is a spiritual state of constant existence, but because we are still in this
flesh realm, we are not always conscious of the greater privileges of our
heavenly state of being. In the
kingdom of God the heavenly man is the only man — the man is Christ.
“If I have told you earthly
things, and ye believed not, how shall ye believe if I tell you of heavenly
things. And no man hath
ascended up to heaven but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man,
which IS IN HEAVEN” (Jn. 3:12-14). Jesus
Christ while on earth was still in the heavenlies!
That is not a strange statement to an eagle saint!
“He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is
in heaven.” He had
eagle’s wings — the spirit of the heavenlies.
His body was on earth and His spirit joined to the heavenly Father far
above all. Those who have been
swallowed up by Christ gravitate around Him.
His life is their life, His thoughts their thoughts, His will their
will, His joys their joys, His peace their peace.
They have no other life. “For
me to live is Christ,” said Paul.
Paul was an eagle saint. Paul’s
life was heavenly. He was above.
He would not come down!
Let us look at the scriptural portrait of an eagle saint.
“The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord
from heaven. As is the earthy,
such are they also that are earthy: and
as is the heavenly, such are they
that are heavenly” (I Cor.
15:47-49). “Now the Lord is
that Spirit: and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the
Lord, are changed (transformed, transfigured) into the same image from glory
to glory, even as by the Spirit of the
Lord” (II Cor. 3:17-18). “Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ” (Eph. 1:3). “Which
He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead and set Him at His own
right hand in the heavenly places”
(Eph. 1:20). “And hath raised
us up together, and made us sit
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph. 2:6).
“Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly
calling…” (Heb. 3:1). “But
now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly
(spiritual)” (Heb. 11:16). “But
ye are come unto mount Zion, and
unto the city of the living God, the heavenly
Jerusalem” (Heb. 12:22).
In questioning Job the Lord said of the eagle, “Doth the eagle mount
up at thy command to make her nest on high?
She dwelleth and abideth on the rock, upon the crag of the rock, and
the strong place. From hence she
seeketh the prey, and her eyes behold afar off” (Job 39:27-29).
The eagle sons have the advantage, born of altitude.
“Her eyes behold afar off.” The
eagle son looks out to regions beyond, to heights and depths in God.
The call of God is upon him. The
life of God is in his heart. There
is response. There are
commitments, born of heavenly life. Heaven
is in control! The son and the
Saviour share the same life, fly the same heavens, have the same destiny.
Heavenly bounty fills all! Earth’s
splendors are fading for he who soars. Earth’s
treasures and recognition hold nothing for him anymore.
Heavenly investments are sure. Eternal
values are in view. Fear does not
plague the eagle son. “The
eagle dwelleth and abideth upon the rock.”
The rock is the Christ life. The
security of every son is in the solid rock of the Christ within.
He draws his life from above. Earth’s
pleasures and hopes fade. They
are made of poor stuff. The
saints of all ages have known this. The
Lord has taught them, in their hearts! The
Lord cuts His elect saints off from the world, from the systems of the flesh,
from the old-order religious activities of the church world, but in the same
stroke, He grafts them on to heaven. Far
beyond the confusion of play-church…far above the strife of the land, higher
than the yearnings of the flesh and the aspirations of the soul...yea, even
into the light of the Most Holy Place…the eagles soar!
Those who thus soar live in and by their heavenly life!
This heavenly life flows out of the very heart of God, like a river
forever. It courses through the
veins of the inner man, bringing life where ere it goes.
The heavenly life makes heaven. Heaven
has come to earth in the life of every son of God!
The life of God is heavenly life.
The believer who says that should his body die, he will be dead like a
dog, unconscious and non-existent, knows not that he has been born from above!
The impact of this new heavenly life determines everything.
This life governs the universe, and nullifies the kingdom of darkness.
Satan is never in his stride, in the presence of heavenly life.
This is raptured life, the
life from above. The old Adamic
man of the flesh, of human consciousness, is truly “left behind” in those
who live in the heavenly, raptured, life!
The eagle son is not waiting for a hole in the sky to escape this
world, for he has raptured life,
the joyful life, the peaceful life, the righteous life, the abundant life, the
satisfying life, the all-powerful life, the glorious life.
Every step that the firstborn Son of God took on earth was a raptured
step. Every word that He uttered
was a raptured word.
Every work that He did was a raptured
work. The life of Jesus was a raptured
life. He was caught up all the
time! That is what gave Him the
heavenly touch, enabled Him to hear the heavenly voice of His heavenly Father
within. That’s what made Him
what He was — the heavenly man! The
eagle son does not need death, or a miracle, or a meeting, to get him on the
wing. He is in the heavenlies all
the time! That’s all the life
he knows. He shares with the
raptured Christ, the heavenly life!
Learn to breathe the ozone of heaven — the rare, crisp, pure air of
the heavenlies, that is sweet to the nostrils and life to the lungs and body.
Our mortal bodies shall be quickened by
this heavenly life! (Rom. 8:11). Mountain
air is good, and in ancient times man found it, along with plenty of sunshine,
to be the cure for many diseases. There
is too much grime and smog in earth’s low atmosphere.
There are so many respiratory problems.
There is so much low living and difficult breathing.
The environment is wrong! Living
in the lowlands of the fleshly mind will weaken and kill you.
It is good medicine to meet a saint that is above — a saint with
eagle’s wings! They quicken and
refresh. Spend time with those
that live above. You, too, will
learn how to stay above. Remember
that the young eagles have to be taught to fly.
If they refuse to learn they are destroyed.
Learn to live the heavenly life if you would save your life.
Go as high as you can and stay as long as you can.
Get away from the depressing order of the valleys.
Learn to live in your habitat — your element.
Refuse to be embroiled in confusion and strife.
There is nothing to gain. Soar
and soar until you master all the strong currents of the upper atmosphere, for
they will lift you into the heights of God.
If the other fellow falls out of the heavenlies, just do not follow him
down to chew on his flesh. As you
stay in the heavenlies, you will help draw him back.
The wings of the spirit are eagle wings.
“And the four living creatures had each of them six
wings about him…” (Rev. 4:8).
Six is the number of man,
and having six wings speaks of man.
But this is not the earth-man, this is the exalted
man in the throne! Long
centuries ago the prophet Ezekiel saw visions of the glory of the Lord in the
temple of God and in that glory he saw the cherubim with their wings.
He described the scene thus: “Then…the house was filled with the
cloud, and the court was full of the brightness of the Lord’s glory.
And the sound of the cherubim’s wings
was heard even to the outer court, as
the voice of the Almighty God when He speaketh.
And the cherubim lifted
up their wings, and mounted
up from the earth in my sight” (Eze. 10:5,19).
These words teach us the great truth that the wings
of the living creatures represent THE VOICE OF GOD WHEN HE SPEAKS!
The wings are the living word of
God, or His voice by the Spirit.
This wonderful scene also teaches us the great truth that it is by lifting
up His voice, that is, by magnifying
and exercising His word within our
lives, that we
are lifted up from the earth! The
wings speak of flight, and they represent a
people who are empowered by the living word and the voice of God
within. God is speaking to us a
pure word in this hour, the present truth, His word from the very throne-room
on high! It is not a word that
the carnal-minded believers in the
old-order church systems can hear. Religious
minds have no idea what God is doing in this Day, nor can they hear even when
they are told. God is always
speaking! In the perfumed
magnificence of Eden He walked and talked with man face to face
in the spirit of that day. At
sundry times and in divers manners God spoke unto the fathers by the prophets.
Two thousand years ago the voice of the Galilean rang out over the
hills and through the streets and the hallways of God’s people, Israel.
All through the centuries of the church age God has been speaking by
His Spirit!
And
today God is speaking, not the same word He spoke to any other people in past
generations of His unfolding purpose, but He is speaking a fresh word, raining
down fresh manna, and His elect are prayerfully and joyfully receiving of His
mind and His will for this hour of the manifestation of the sons of God.
We are now receiving our daily bread, the bread for this
day, this new day that the Lord hath made.
When this new, fresh, present word of the Lord becomes a mighty power
and the inward motivation of our forward walk in God, we are transported from
the earth into the heavens of God’s Spirit!
God is teaching us to live by every word that is proceeding out of His
mouth, and as we do we are lifted up out of our fleshly, earthly, human
consciousness into the glorious mind of Christ.
These wings of His word will carry us to heights unknown, to the place
of their origin — the throne of God! Yet
— it is impossible to soar into the heights of God by wings alone.
Wings without wind are
absolutely useless! In like
manner, without the winds of God’s Spirit the wings of His Word are as good
as dead. Without the wind the
wings have no power by which they can rise!
It has been well stated that the Word without the Spirit leads
to legalism; and the Spirit apart from the Word leads to fanaticism.
God is bringing that beautiful balance
between the Spirit and the Word in those who follow on to know Him in this new
Day of the Lord! God is moving
powerfully by His Spirit within His elect in this hour, and the Word of God by
the Spirit of God is lifting us up into a higher place than we have ever known
before. It is indeed wonderful!
“In the midst of the throne, and round about the throne, were four
living creatures full of eyes before
and behind” (Rev. 4:6). “And
they were full of eyes within…”
(Rev. 4:8).
The “eyes” are of course symbolic, as is everything else in the
visions John beheld in the Spirit. The
eyes which are described as “before” and “behind” and “within”
denote the superior vision and perspective of God’s Christ, Head and body.
Each one in this called and chosen company of kings and priests
possesses those wonderful “eyes” of the spirit of wisdom and revelation!
John saw seven eyes of the Lamb, which he identified as “the seven
spirits of God sent forth into all the earth” (Rev. 5:6).
The elect of the Lord are being given the eyes of the Spirit, which is
the fullness of the anointing of the Spirit.
That anointing enables them to see things that others cannot!
The superior vision of the eyes of the mind of Christ make it possible
for us to see the deep things of the Spirit of God, and the eternal realities
of the all-encompassing truth of God. The
mind of Christ includes the full spiritual potential to see things that are
beyond the sight of the natural man. When
we have put on the mind of Christ in fullness, we shall indeed make up that
“living creatures” expression of the kingship of Christ, which is “full
of eyes before and behind and within.”
The spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ is the
result of having anointed and enlightened eyes.
The firstborn Son of God functioned solely by the “eyes” of the
mind of Christ. He did only those
things He “saw” the Father do. He
said, “The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He
seeth the Father do: for what things soever He doeth, these also doeth the
Son likewise. For the Father
loveth the Son, and showeth Him all
things that Himself doeth: and He will show Him greater works than these,
that ye may marvel” (Jn. 5:19-20). Jesus had a spiritual vision that was
beyond the ability of mere mortal man to comprehend.
He did not see these spiritual realities by the eyes of the natural
understanding. The things He saw
the Father do, He “saw” by the mind of Christ, by the anointed eyes of His
sonship. And regardless of how
much men proclaim about the so-called “finished work” of Christ, I do not
hesitate to tell you that there is much more to be done by the mind of Christ.
It is a great truth that Jesus has fully accomplished the sacrifice by
which He reconciles all men to God and provides salvation for all the ends of
the earth. But beyond that, the
Father’s works are not yet completed!
Not
until the closing chapters of the book of Revelation does the decree finally
go forth, “Behold, I
make ALL THINGS NEW! And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first
heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea.”
We all understand that sin and wickedness still abound everywhere, and
sickness, pain, sorrow, and death stalk the whole human race.
The wonderful work of the Spirit to put every enemy under the
Christ’s feet, to transform and restore all things back into God again,
until God is All-in-all, still remains to be done!
The very One who is credited with the “finished work” still must reign
UNTIL He has put all enemies under His feet, and the last enemy that shall be
destroyed is death.” It
shall be fully accomplished by the wisdom of the mind of Christ and not by
man’s carnal mind and works. Jesus
said that the Father will show Him (Christ) “greater works than these, that
ye may marvel.” Those greater
works are yet to be fulfilled by the many-membered Christ!
And we shall do those “greater works” when we fully possess the
mind of Christ with eyes before, behind, and within, and can “see” as
Jesus saw in the power of the Spirit!
The four living creatures, God’s kings who reign with Christ, will
express within themselves the totality of God Himself.
They will manifest the full wisdom, understanding, knowledge, and power
of the Father. They have eyes in
the forehead, eyes in the back, and eyes within!
They have eyes to see in the future.
They have eyes to see in the past.
And they have eyes to go within to perceive the true identity of
themselves in Christ. This
signifies that we are able to see all that is true in Jesus which is also true
in us, as the apostle John wrote, “A new commandment I write unto you, which
thing is true in Him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the
true light now shineth” (I Jn. 2:8). This
“new commandment” of which John speaks is not a rule, not a law, it is
rather the law of an inward life,
for he says that the commandment is that which is true in Him (Christ) and
in us. You see, my beloved,
it is not sufficient to know what is true in Christ, for what is true in Him
must also become substance within us. It
is not enough to know that Christ so loves the world, but that love must be
shed abroad in our hearts until we love as He loves, yea, until we love with
His love, and have eyes to see the reality of Christ raised up in us.
The eyes before see all things that God’s Christ shall perform and
accomplish in the future. The
eyes behind have perfect revelation of all that has been accomplished in the
past, even from the foundation of the world and from eternity.
But the eyes within are in tune with the Father and see all the
treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are hidden in Christ within!
They have a complete awareness of the spiritual world, within and
without. They penetrate into the
deep things of God in the Spirit! And
they reveal to us the identity of Christ within ourselves, the awesome
potential within our spirit.
The Indian mystic, Sadhu Sundar Singh, said in one of his teachings,
“Many there are that are like a hunter who, while wandering in the jungle,
picked up some pretty stones on the bank of a stream.
Unaware of their value he used them one by one in his sling to shoot at
the birds perched on the trees near the river, and so one by one they fell
into the water and were lost. With
one still in his hand he returned to the city, and as he passed along the
bazaar a jeweler caught sight of it, and told the silly fellow that it was a
valuable diamond for which he could get thousands of rupees.
When the man heard this he began to bewail himself and say, ‘Woe is
me! I didn’t know their value,
and have been using many of these diamonds to shoot at birds by the riverside,
and they have fallen into the river and are lost, otherwise I should have been
a millionaire! Still I have saved
this one, and that is something gained.’”
The spirit of Christ in every man is like a precious diamond!
Ah, yes, there lies buried within you the greatest of all treasures —
the fullness of God in Christ within you.
Discover the treasures of that Christ within today, my friend, draw
from His wealth, suck from His life, receive from His power and you will be a
son of God indeed! The fullness
of God is closer to you than the air that you breathe.
It’s closer to you even than the blood that courses through your
veins. All the fullness of the
Godhead bodily dwells in Christ, and Christ is
your life. Oh, the wonder of
it! And this is why you are given
eyes “within” — that you may see, perceive, understand, and appropriate
the life of God that is within you. You
are a son of the Most High God. The
very life of God is within you today. In
that life there is no limitation at all.
All the wealth of divinity, all the riches of the mind of the Father,
all the abundance of joy, peace, righteousness, love, and power that are in
Jesus Christ, all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge that are hidden in Him
are
in you today, and God has given you spiritual eyes within to behold
all that is yours, all that is resident within your spirit, and all that can
be raised up in power and glory in your life as your very own reality.
It is also said that the four living creatures are “full of eyes”
before and behind and within. FULL
OF EYES! The Lamb had seven eyes,
which are the seven spirits of God, or the fullness of the Spirit.
So these living creatures are full
of eyes which are the fullness of
the Spirit of God! The Spirit of
God gives you the vision of God, for no man can truly see
anything spiritual except by the Spirit of God.
The fullness of the Spirit brings fullness (perfect clarity) of vision!
As it is written, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have
entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them
that love Him. But God hath revealed
them unto us by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep
things of God” (I Cor. 2:9-10).
The four living creatures are full of the vision of God!
All things are clear and open unto them by the spirit of wisdom and
revelation from God. They see all
things as they really are, within and without.
Nothing in God is hidden from them.
This creature that we are becoming is empowered with knowledge!
It is truly wonderful!
There is a scripture passage in which the prophet Isaiah speaks of the
day when God brings forth His Zion company, and they shall see “eye to
eye.” “Thy watchmen shall
lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing: for they shall see
eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion” (Isa. 52:8).
Many have thought that in order for
Zion to see eye to eye we must come to the place where all our understandings
of God’s plan, will, and purpose and all our interpretations of scripture
are identical in every respect. We
thought it meant theological conformity or doctrinal purity.
We all need the Spirit of God to clarify our vision about many things
found in the scriptures. We are
still learning the truths of God’s ways, His will, and His word.
We don’t have any stakes put down in what we believe about any number
of things in God’s great
purposes. We do not tell God that
what we now know or think we know is sufficient, that we have learned all
there is to learn.
Well
do I remember sitting in geography class in the fourth grade in the rural
school house in south Alabama where I was raised.
I was about nine years old. I
sat there with my thoughts running to and fro throughout the world presented
to me in my geography book. I
gazed out the window in deep contemplation, and suddenly it occurred to me
that I understood just about everything there was to understand about life and
the world! My childish mind was
quite certain that very little could be added to my vast knowledge about all
things on earth. Of course, the
truth was that I knew nothing as I ought to know, and through many years of
crucial experience, growth, and development unto maturity, I finally came to
see just how much I didn’t know!
I personally am very
aware that spiritually we still see
through a glass darkly, we see men as trees walking, and still look at things
as we perceive them to be, but often without the crystal clarity of absolute
truth and full revelation. We
wait upon the Lord for the understanding that comes only from above and
crystallizes within our spirits as He moves in our experience.
If we abide in the attributes of humility, teachableness, yieldedness,
and remain in the atmosphere of His presence and glory we can’t go wrong in
this Day of the Lord!
The Spirit is not talking about doctrinal uniformity, as desirable as
that may be. It means that “eye
to eye” all will be of the same stature, there will not be some little
children and some tall men, or diverse degrees of spiritual development and
maturity in God. The Lord is
growing us up together into a common maturity and stature in Christ — unto a
perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fullness
of Christ! Thus, in and by
the Spirit, all God’s sons shall be elevated to the same place in the Lord,
and then shall truly see “eye to eye”!
Aren’t you glad!
To be continued…
J. PRESTON EBY
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