THE FULL BLESSING-HOW IT MAY BE KEPT

The wisdom of the fathers

THE FULL BLESSING - HOW IT MAY BE KEPT Part 2

Jesus will keep the blessing, as He gave it, by faith. The law that prevails at every stage in the progress of the kingdom of God is: "Be it unto you according to your faith." The faith that in the first reception of the Lord Jesus was as small as a grain of mustard-seed, must in the course of the Christian life, become always so enlarged that it shall see more and receive and enjoy more of the fulness that is in the Lord. Paul wrote to the Galatians: "I live, yet no longer I, but Christ lives in me: and that life which I now live in the flesh I live in faith of the Son of God."

His faith was as broad and boundless and unceasing as were the needs of his life and work. In everything and at all times, without ceasing, he trusted in Jesus to do all. His faith was as wide and abundant as the energy that flows from Jesus for the enrichment of His people is mighty and glorious. He had given up his whole life to Jesus: he himself lived no longer. By a continuous and unrestricted faith he gave to Jesus the liberty of energizing his life without ceasing and without limitation.

The fulness of the Spirit is not a gift that is bestowed once for all as a part of the heavenly life. No: it is not so. It is rather a constantly flowing stream of the river of the water of life that issues from beneath the throne of God and of the Lamb. It is an uninterrupted communication of the life and the love of Jesus, the most personal and intimate association of the Lord with His own upon the earth. It is by the faith which discerns this truth, and assents to it, and cleaves to it with joy, that Jesus will certainly do His work of keeping.

(from "The Full Blessing of Pentecost" by Andrew Murray)