Million Book Collection - The Fishers of Men Ministries

THE FIRST AND THE SECOND MAN.113and grown up to full stature in the Head. Thereis in the redeemed, not only the exceeding greatnessof the quality of their salvation, that is, thegift of divine sonship; nor, again, that this gift isheightened by its being the purchase of the Son ofGod, so that He is not ashamed to call those brethrenwhom He has first washed in His own blood :but over and above all this, one thing more,that the whole mass of the redeemed and adoptedare not so many souls, but the Body of Christ.Faint shadows, indeed, to our earthly senses areHouse and Temple, Kingdom and City paved withprecious stones of that mighty unity of all rationalnatures, powers, and virtues, each with the perfectionof his individual being, each with the super-added lustre of membership in a marvellous whole,under the Headship of Christ. The exceedin gloryof this creation, which will be the wonder of allcreation through eternity, is that God the Wordmade flesh, the Head and His Body, make onething, not an inorganic, but an organised unity,the glorified Body of a glorified Head.*Once more let us note the consistencyand un-broken evolution of the divine plan.In the first creation of the human race theBody of Christ is not only foretold but prefigured,not only prefigured but expressed in the verywords uttered by Adam in his ecstasy, the wordsof God delineating that act of God, the greatestof all His acts of power, wisdom, and goodnessii.i