Scripture Reading: Acts 5:31; 7:55-56
Ⅰ
God has exalted the crucified Jesus to His right hand as Leader and Savior—Acts 5:31:
A
The Greek word for "Leader" means "author," "origin," "originator," "chief leader," "captain"; it is used only four times in the New Testament and always in reference to Christ—3:15; Heb. 2:10; 12:2.
B
His being the Leader is a matter related to His authority; He rules sovereignly over the earth with His authority so that the environment may be fit for God's chosen people to receive His salvation—Acts 17:26-27; John 17:2.
C
Christ is the Ruler of the kings of the earth; He is the King of kings and the Lord of lords—Rev. 1:5; 19:16:
１
As the Leader, the Ruler, He is ruling the earth for the purpose of our salvation; we believe that God chose us, and then at the right time the Lord Jesus, the Ruler of the kings of the earth, exercised His authority to produce a certain environment so that we had no choice except to believe in Him.
２
In a sense, we have been "caught" by the Lord in His sovereignty; we have been caught by Christ and in Christ, and we have been caught in the church.
３
He is the Ruler of the kings of the earth, arranging the environment so that we were constrained to believe in Him—Luke 15.
D
He is the Leader and the Savior to give repentance and forgiveness of sins to God's chosen people—Acts 5:31:
１
Repentance and forgiveness of sins are major gifts, and only the Lord Jesus as the Leader and the Savior is qualified to give them; it is the Lord who has caught us and compelled us to repent—11:18; Rom. 2:4.
２
We were saved officially by the Christ on the throne, the One in glory; when we were saved, we were seated with Him in the heavenlies; Christ saved us from the throne and to the throne—Eph. 2:6.
E
Today the entire world is under the Lord's ruling; He is sovereign over everyone and everything—Dan. 4:17, 26:
１
In His economy God administrates the universe, including all the kings and kingdoms on the earth, in order to fulfill His purpose, which is that Christ should be preeminent in all things—Col. 1:18.
２
For Christ to be preeminent, God needs a chosen people to coordinate and cooperate with Him; under the rule of the heavens, everything is working together for the good of God's elect for the purpose of making Christ preeminent—Rom. 8:28-29.
３
Under God's heavenly rule, everything is working together for our good; this is especially true of the things in our personal universe.
４
The heavens rule for us, and Christ is for us; furthermore, we are under God's heavenly rule for Christ; because the heavens rule, Christ is with us in all our situations.
５
The purpose of the heavenly ruling is to complete God's elect so that Christ may be preeminent, that He may be the first—the centrality—and everything—the universality.
F
The God who rules the universe for His ultimate intention in His economy and for the care of His elect is a God who hides Himself—Isa. 45:15; 1 Kings 19:9-14; Rom. 11:3-5:
１
The book of Esther reveals that the very God who chose Israel as His elect became a hidden God to them to take care of them secretly and to save them openly while acting in secrecy during their captivity among the Gentile nations—1:1-2; 4:14.
２
We need to have a clear view of the intrinsic, divine history within the outward, human history; the latter is like an outward shell, and the former is like the kernel within the shell—Joel 1:4; 2:28-29; 3:11-21; 2:25-26:
ａ
God used the Roman Empire to afford everything necessary for the incarnated God to live and move and work on the earth (Luke 2:1-7; Matt. 22:20-21); it also provided the means for Christ to be crucified for the accomplishing of God's redemption (John 18:31-32), the occasion for the pouring out of the Spirit as the processed and consummated Triune God upon all flesh to produce the church as the organic Body of Christ (Acts 2), and the facilities for the spreading of the gospel to the entire inhabited earth (Matt. 28:19; Acts 1:8).
ｂ
The divine history, as the divine mystery of the Triune God in humanity, began in eternity past with the eternal God and His eternal economy and continued with the incarnation, human living, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ— Micah 5:2; 1 Tim. 1:4; Eph. 1:4-5, 9-11; John 1:14; Heb. 2:14; 1 Cor. 15:45b.
ｃ
As the enlargement of the manifestation of Christ, the church is part of the divine history within the outward, human history—1 Tim. 3:15-16:
⑴
We all were born in the human history, but we have been reborn, regenerated, in the divine history—John 3:6.
⑵
With the divine history there is the new creation—the new man with a new heart, a new spirit, a new life, a new nature, a new history, and a new consummation; our living in the new creation is what matters—Ezek. 36:26; Gal. 6:15; Rom. 5:10; Matt. 24:14.
ｄ
The world situation has always been an indicator of the Lord's move on earth:
⑴
For the spread of the gospel, the Lord prepared the Roman Empire; for the return to the Bible, God prepared Germany; and for the recovery of the gospel, the teaching of the Bible, and the proper meetings, God used Great Britain.
⑵
For the spreading of His recovery and for the final stage of His recovery— the building up of the Body as the preparation of the bride—God has sovereignly prepared, preserved, and blessed the United States—Acts 17:26-27; Rom. 12:4-5; Rev. 19:7.
ｅ
At the time of the Lord's coming back, there will be a meeting of two figures— Antichrist, a figure in the outward, human history, and Christ, the Figure in the intrinsic, divine history—2 Thes. 2:2-8:
⑴
Christ will come back, descending with His overcomers as His army (Joel 3:11) to defeat Antichrist and his army (Rev. 19:11-21).
⑵
After the Figure in the divine history defeats the figure in the human history, the thousand-year kingdom will come, and this kingdom will consummate in the New Jerusalem—the ultimate and consummate step of the divine history— 20:4, 6; 21:10.
Ⅱ
The ascended Christ is the Son of Man, who was seen by Stephen as he was being martyred—Acts 7:55-56; cf. Matt. 4:4; John 1:51:
A
Christ, as a man in His humanity, is like a refuge from the wind and a covering from the tempest, like streams of water in a dry place, and like the shadow of a massive rock in a wasted land—Isa. 32:2.
B
Christ, as a man in His humanity, is sitting on the throne of God above an expanse, like the sight of awesome crystal; He desires to fill us with the heavenly atmosphere, condition, and situation of His ruling presence—Ezek. 1:22, 26-28.
C
Christ, as a man in His humanity, is a man of bronze, measuring us (testing, examining, judging, and possessing us) so that the flow of life within us may increase for the building of God unto the glory of God—40:3; 47:1-5.
D
Christ, as a man in His humanity, was walking with the three friends of Daniel in the midst of the fire—Dan. 3:25.
E
In Daniel 10:4-19 the excellent Christ, the centrality and universality of God's move on the earth, as a man in His humanity, appeared to Daniel for his appreciation, consolation, encouragement, expectation, and stabilization.
F
As the Son of Man, Christ is the exalted One at the right hand of God, the highest place in the universe—Mark 16:19; Acts 2:33; 5:31; Phil. 2:9-11; Psa. 80:17:
１
The way to be restored from desolation is to exalt Christ—cf. Hab. 1:1; John 6:15, 57; 7:37-38; Rom. 10:12-13; Rev. 22:1-2a.
２
Whenever God's people do not give Christ the preeminence, the house of God, signifying the church, becomes desolate—Jer. 2:13; cf. Isa. 57:20.
３
Whenever God's people exalt Christ, giving Him the preeminence in every aspect of their living, there is restoration and revival—Psa. 80:1, 3, 7, 17-19.
４
The problem of desolation is solved by Christ's being properly appreciated and exalted by God's people—Col. 1:17-18; Rev. 2:4.
G
In His humanity Christ is taking care of the churches as the lampstands—1:11-13:
１
As the High Priest, He dresses the churches as the lampstands to cherish them, to make them happy, bright, and shining—Exo. 25:38; 30:7; cf. Zech. 4:6, 12-14.
２
He is also caring for the churches with His divinity as the energy motivated by His love, signified by the golden girdle on His breast.
H
"There with the clouds of heaven / One like a Son of Man was coming; / And He came to the Ancient of Days… / And to Him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom, / That all the peoples, nations, and languages might serve Him. / His dominion is an eternal dominion, which will not pass away; / And His kingdom is one that will not be destroyed"—Dan. 7:13-14:
１
Christ, as the Son of Man in His humanity, after He was cut off (9:26), after He finished His earthly ministry through His crucifixion, went to God in His ascension to receive the kingdom (Luke 19:12, 15; Rev. 11:15).
２
He, as the Son of Man in His humanity, will be a stone cut out, not by human hands, to crush (Matt. 21:44) all the kingdoms of the world and become a great mountain, filling the whole earth in His kingdom for the carrying out of the eternal economy of God (Dan. 2:34-35, 44-45).