“MADE MEET.”
By Ethelbert W. Bullinger
[Selected Writings II. Holiness: God’s Way Better Than
Man’s. 1999, Invictus
for “Truth For Today Bible Fellowship.
Religion, as distinct from Christianity, is
known by several unmistakable marks.
1. It gives its votaries plenty to believe. It makes large demands upon
their credulity. Whether in
2. It gives its votaries plenty to do. Works of all and many kinds are
demanded; and gifts and payments have to be made. These works are Incessant and
unceasing.
3. But Religion gives its votaries
very little to hope for. From the
Chinese heavens, which are entered according to merit, to the Mohammedan heaven
of glorified licentiousness; Rome’s Purgatory and “four last things,” and the
heaven of unconverted Protestants, which consists chiefly in meeting one’s
relations again by some “fountain” or at some “gate.” In all these there is
very little to hope for compared with “that blessed hope” revealed in the
Gospel.
4. But one of the greatest contrasts
consists in this – uncertainty as to
salvation! In this, Religion and Christianity are exactly opposite. You may
always know the profession of religion by this mark. They all practically deny
that Christ’s work IS finished, that redemption has been accomplished, and that
salvation was completed at the Cross, that He came “to save His people,” and he
saved them. That is why religious people, today, talk about
people being “saved” now, not knowing
that all who are “in Christ” were saved on
Even the most religious among Protestant
Evangelicals, if asked whether they really believe when they profess and
confess again and again with their lips – “I believe in the forgiveness of
sins” – will seldom get beyond “I hope so,” or the assertion that “No one can
ever know” in this life. They can never speak with certainty about it. Some
call this humility and are proud of it, thinking it presumption to take the
ground which the grace of God in Christ Jesus has given to us.
But this brings us to the contrast between all
this and the Christianity which is revealed in the Church Epistles.
1. Christianity gives
us the simplest possible matter to believe. We have to “believe God,” i.e., what God says and has said in His Word, and it is counted to us for righteousness (Rom.
2. It gives us nothing
whatever to do for salvation, for Christ has “done it all, long ago”; and what
is now done by those who are saved is the irrepressible outcome of the New
nature, which knows no joy equal to this.
3. It gives us a great
and blessed hope, consisting of “exceeding great and precious promises.” The
hope of being caught up to meet the Lord in the air and so of ever being with
the Lord, glorified with His own glory.
4. But beside all
this, it gives us now and here a blessed certainty as to our present
accomplished salvation and a sweet enjoyment of it in our souls.
All who are in Christ are the happy possessors
of the New nature, by which they are able to see the incorrigible character of
the old nature (
This was the position of the saints in Colosse, and ought to be the position of every true
Christian to-day. The Epistle addressed to them begins with “Grace”: grace
which meets with us as lost, delivers us, cleanses us, and sets us in perfect
freedom before God our Father. God reveals it, Faith
enjoys it, and sets aside all reasoning from feelings or experience.
The saints in Colosse
are addressed as being “in Christ” (ver. 2) and
therefore as “complete in Him” (ver. 9). “In whom WE HAVE redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness
of sins” (ver. 14). “Who HATH delivered us
from the power of darkness and HATH translated us into the kingdom of His
beloved Son” (ver. 13).
Thus we are assured
of, and are dealt with as having, present
redemption, present deliverance, and present translation.
And more than this. Those who possess such wondrous
unmeasured blessedness, can only worship. We have
nothing to ask or pray for as to our standing
in Christ. This, we are assured, is “complete, in Him” (ver.
9), nothing can add to this completeness. We cannot ever grow or increase in
it. We can increase in our enjoyment and appreciation of it, but we cannot grow
in our relationship to God or our standing in Christ.
Of course, as to our walk and our whole path,
now upon earth, it is true that in everything by prayer and supplication we are
to let our requests be made known unto God; but if we realize our standing, our
prayers will be full of praise, because our heart is so full of rest, and our
cup so overflowing with blessing.
Hence, in verse 12, the prayer of the Apostle
by the Holy Ghost for us is that we may be occupied in “giving thanks unto the
Father, which HATH MADE US MEET to be partakers of the inheritance of the
saints in light.” Surely we are overwhelmed by “the riches of the grace” which
hat done such great things for us.
How few, even of the Lord’s own saved ones,
know anything of the extent of the “riches” which are theirs! How few are
engaged in counting over and dwelling upon this wealth of grace! Selfishness
occupies their thoughts with themselves
and their walk; and hence, the
inevitable result is that they are looking for some work yet to be done in them or by them to make them meet. Some think
that affliction and trials help to do this; others think that holiness of life
will do something for them, not seeing that they have been now already
“made meet” for glory, and not realizing that it is something not to be done, but which has
been done.
The solemn fact is that all such, not only lose
the peace and blessing and enjoyment of present certainty as to their standing;
but, by taking up a position which implies the possibility of anything being
able to add one iota to our meetness for Heaven, they
(1) deny the truth as to the ruin of man in the flesh, (2) they set aside the
work of God in having made us new creations in Christ, and (3) they call in
question the full value of the work of Christ who “by the offering HATH
perfected for ever them that are sanctified.” (Heb. 10:14).
There is no limitation in these words in Col.
1. They are true of the veriest babe in Christ; of
the humblest, poorest, weakest, and most ignorant believer, because they speak
of and refer to the work of God in Christ, and not to our own abilities or
attainments. True we may forget this, we may have doubts and fears, and we may
through our infirmities be conscious of many failures, but these do not and
cannot for one moment affect the work of God in Christ.
No! Ours is now a present meetness,
always a perfect meetness. Oh! What rest for the
heart! What peace for the mind, and All the work and gift of the Father, and
all “in Christ” (Eph. 1:2).
We wait for the redemption of our body; we wait
for the inheritance itself. But as to the forgiveness of ALL our sins,
righteousness, sanctification, union with Christ, identification with Christ,
completeness in Him, perfection in Him, we do not wait for this, because we
have it all now, for it is written:
“who
HATH MADE US MEET to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light.”
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