Calvary’s anthem – A Meditation (7)

 

 

“Though here my spiritual state is frail and poor, I shall go on singing Calvary’s anthem.”

 

There are many enigmas in Jesus Christ, things that are mysteries, which we may not understand yet which we may experience. Paul writes to Timothy that he is to be “strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 2:1), and to the Ephesians that they are to be “strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might” (Eph. 6:10). Yet, Jesus says, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9), and we know that the treasure of Christ is ours in our “earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves” (2 Cor. 4:7).

 

So we are strong, and we are also weak. Our strength is Christ, it is always Christ. We need not hide our weakness, our frailty, for His glory is manifested through it. Indeed, to pretend to be something we are not would be to deny Jesus Christ.

 

Christ is not only our wisdom, sanctification, righteousness, and redemption, He is our strength – our everything (1Cor. 1:30 – 31). We may put it, “Yet not I, but Christ” (Gal. 2:20).

 

We are indeed “to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man” (Eph. 3:16), always remembering that “greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).

 

When I confess that my spiritual state here is frail and poor, I mean that Christ is God and I am not. I mean that I must always abide in the Vine and that without Him I can do nothing, absolutely nothing (John 15:1 – 5). I mean that I need Him desperately, that He must be the Air that I breathe, the Water I drink, the Wine I enjoy, the Bread I eat, the Light by which I live and see all things, the Raiment I wear, the House I live in.

 

I mean that after knowing Him (in some measure) for 60 years, that I need Him more than ever, that I desire to do nothing independently of Him, and that I want to live every day for His glory and the blessing of others. I mean that I cannot possibly know my true spiritual condition, other than in Jesus Christ that condition is righteous, holy, glorious, and perfected in Him…always in Him. We overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the Word of our Testimony, which is all Jesus Christ (Rev. 12:11).

 

This is why Calvary’s Anthem means so much to me, I began true Life in the Cross, I will conclude this life in the Cross, I will sing of the Cross in eternity. The Lamb of the Cross will ever be the Light by which I live, and He is the Light which shines brighter and brighter until that perfect Day (Pro. 4:18).

 

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy – laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:28 – 30).

Calvary’s anthem – A Meditation (6)

 

 

“I have a longing for the world above where multitudes sing the great song, for my soul was never created to love the dust of earth. Though here my spiritual state is frail and poor, I shall go on singing Calvary’s anthem.” (The Valley of Vision, page 315).

 

As I grow older, I sense the eternals pressing upon me and drawing me into that world above. I feel it, smell it, touch it, taste it, breathe it into my lungs. Do not all of us who are in Christ breathe the sweet Holy Spirit as our way of life?

 

We live 5 ½ miles from the Atlantic Ocean. Sometimes I can smell the ocean. Since I am an early riser, most mornings I see the sun rise and many of those sunrises are beautiful, fleeting but beautiful. While I cannot see the ocean from our home, I know the sun is rising over its horizon, I know it is shining its rays on the beach, I know the waves are usually lapping, or at other times pounding, against the shoreline. I always “see” the coastline and the ocean when I look to the sky in the morning and consider the sunrise.

 

I can be at the ocean in a few minutes, and I can plunge into it shortly after my arrival. As long as I can remember, I have associated being in the ocean with being in the depths of God’s love, being enveloped in His Holy Presence beyond measure. One day I will enter the infinite ocean of His love never to return to the shoreline; I may come to the ocean on that day, or the ocean will come to me; some things we do not know, but in all things we can trust our dear Lord Jesus and His overwhelming love (Romans 8:31 – 39).

 

As Paul writes, we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven; God has prepared us for this very purpose (2 Cor. 5:1 – 5), and He has indeed given us the Spirit as a pledge and guarantee, as His Promise to us (Eph. 1:13; 2 Cor. 1:22; 5:5).

 

I suppose I visualize Revelation chapters 21 and 22 every day, and why not? I will be there sooner rather than later, that City even now is drawing me into itself, where the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are the only Light. If they will be our Light then, ought they not be our Light now?

 

“They will see His Face, and His Name will be on their foreheads” (Rev. 22:4). This, my friends, is to live for…to see Him and to have His Nature within our hearts and minds as His daughters and sons.

 

“He who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of My God, and he will not go out from it anymore; and I will write on him the Name of My God, and the name of the City of My God, the New Jerusalem, which comes down out of heaven from My God, and My New Name” (Rev. 3:12).

 

The fleeting sunrises that I am blessed to behold are daily promises of that Great Day when the “Sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings; and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall” (Malachi 4:2). The joy that skipping calves and lambs display is uninhibited, it is natural, it is without self-consciousness or fear – it is joy within joy and joy overflowing.

 

“Then you will see and be radiant, and your heart will thrill and rejoice” (Isaiah 60:5).

 

“No longer will you have the sun for light by day, nor for brightness will be moon give you light; but you will have the LORD for an everlasting Light, and your God for your glory” (Isaiah 60:19; see also Rev. 21:22 – 23; 22:5).

 

One of the many hymns embedded in my soul since my teenage years was written by Carrie Ellis Breck, Face to Face. It is my hope, my vision, my reason for living, my reason for sharing Jesus with others – that they may know the depths of His love and the expectation of seeing Him face to face. Here is a selection from the hymn:

 

Face to face with Christ my savior,

Face to face what will it be

When with rapture I behold Him

Jesus Christ who died for me?

 

Refrain: Face to face I shall behold Him,

Far beyond the starry sky,

Face to face in all His glory,

I shall see Him by and by.

 

Face to face oh, blissful moment!

Face to face to see and know,

Face to face with my Redeemer,

Jesus Christ who loves me so.

 

Are we living in the light of His love today?

 

Are we sharing the warmth of His love with others?

 

Are we inviting others to skip with us?

Calvary’s anthem – A Meditation (5)

 

 

“I have a longing for the world above where multitudes sing the great song, for my soul was never created to love the dust of earth. Though here my spiritual state is frail and poor, I shall go on singing Calvary’s anthem.”

 

I love Hebrews 11:8 – 16, for it is not only the testimony of our fathers and mothers of faith, it is our testimony too – or at least it should be. Our spiritual ancestors were “looking for the city which has foundations, whose architect and builder is God.” They confessed that they were “strangers and exiles on the earth” making it “clear that they are seeking a country of their own…a better country, that is, a heavenly one.”

 

“Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared a city for them.”

 

Our forebearers knew that the promise of a land was a shadow and type of a greater inheritance, a greater and lasting City and Land. Abraham was not focused on his descendants inheriting a strip of land in the Middle East, he was focused on what that land represented, becoming “heir of the world…through the righteousness of faith” (Romans 4:13). The world which he was called to inherit was a heavenly world, kingdom, and City which would encompass and envelop and renew all things, heaven would (and will) descend upon earth.

 

Hence Paul writes that the earthly city of Jerusalem is not our mother and should not be our identity and focus, but rather the heavenly Jerusalem – the mother of those who live in the faith of Abraham (Galatians 4:21 – 31). How foolish we are to identify with earthly things when Jesus has said that His kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36).

 

Paul writes that we are to “keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth” (Col. 3:1 – 2).

 

One of the great lies in our society is that a person can be so heavenly minded that he is of no earthly good. I have never encountered such a person, I have never read of such a person. On the contrary, it is often those who are heavenly minded who lead the way in caring for others – the poor, the refugee and alien, the homeless, the prisoner, the orphan and widow, the outcast, the sick. Those who are heavenly minded are those who point us to our destiny, to God our Creator and our Father, to the Christ of the Cross. Those who are heavenly minded insist that we do not prostitute ourselves to this present evil age, to its values, to its systems, to its prison of conformity to this world.

 

Those who are heavenly minded proclaim that, in Christ, we are citizens of heaven (Phil. 3:20). Those who are heavenly minded have the courage to live against the grain of the world, the flesh, and the devil; to witness for Jesus, to give their lives for Him and others. They also have the courage to live against the grain of a professing church that, at least in the West, has sold itself to the powers of the present age.

 

Those who are heavenly minded remind us that our souls were “never created to love the dust of the earth.”

 

Those who are heavenly minded sing Calvary’s Anthem, inviting us to sing the Great Song of the Ages.

 

Shall we join them?