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with Martha Kilpatrick and hosted by John Enslow
(M) Ok, let’s go back and hear Austin Sparks.
Well he goes on to talk about the greatness of God’s Son. “So God’s interest in His Son is brought before us right at the beginning, and the declaration is that God’s purposes are all centered in His Son; that Son is now known to men as Jesus Christ. But the point here is having introduced and presented the Son, and having magnified Him, the Holy Spirit, through the writer, goes on in this way, to say, ‘Wherefore, for this reason, because of this, because of God’s purpose concerning His Son, because of the infinite greatness of His Son, greater than all others and all else, holy brethren, you are called into companionship with God’s Son and companionship in the heavenly calling of God’s Son.’” So we come to our point in this connection, there are two principals related to divine purpose throughout the Bible. First is, God works always in relation to His purpose. “He works all things after the council of His will”, Eph. 1:11. And that will is centered in His Son. He therefore works ever and always and only in relation to His Son.
(M) I’m just thinking of so many situations where I see the Son of God displaced, and an agenda, a cause , ‘a truth’ replace Him.
(J) A ‘Purpose Driven Life’.
(M) Yeah. And Sparks says that God works with one purpose in view, His Son. So if you’re not in that, if that centrality is not yours, then there’s no way. If you are serving a denomination, a group, a cause, an agenda, a truth, you’re missing it. It’s all about Jesus. And over and over again I’m put in places where I see in the most subtle, most people would say well meaning way, but it’s not well meaning, the most subtle, deliberate, sometimes blind way, Christ is displaced for something else. And that is never going to meet God’s purpose.
(J) A cause, rather than a Person.
(M) Right. There is One Person in the universe who matters and is important, who is going to be all there is; and everything is going to bow to Him, and everything is going to be summed up in Him. And He has got to be the center, for us to have our purpose. There’s no way you can know your own purpose, without it being wrapped up in God’s purpose in His Son.
(J) I took on a purpose of fighting evil; I think that’s one of the things I saw this morning. It’s all ‘for safety sake’ for me. Why do I council God, and direct God, and tell God what to do? It’s because I’m trying to control the situation so I can be safe.
(M) Ahhh. And it makes you unsafe to do that.
(J) Yeah, because it’s death. But if I will bow to His purpose, and trust His purpose, and say ok, you’re God, and You know, this is your universe, and I’m just walking through this with You. And I’m not going to direct You, I’m not going to have an opinion, which is oh God, have mercy. But I’m not going to make myself safe. I have proven it to myself.
(M) See, there is the power that we’re discussing, the control, for me, not for Christ.
(J) And I did see this morning, I went, what do I want these things for? Good things, good things though they may be; what do I want these for, for me. What do you want a life filled with early morning quiet times and Bible reading extraordinaire? What do you want that for, for John; I don’t want it for You, I want it for me. What do want a pure life for, what do you want all this for? God, I think really, I want it for me, oops. So when I want it for Him I guess, that’ll be good. (M) Only the new creation wants it for Him. It’s a matter of dying. Your transaction with God this morning was dying. And the cross is a daily dying of the old man who will never want anything except for ‘me’.
(J) I definitely saw it.
(M) So the new creation, Christ in me the hope of glory, that alone wants everything for Him; cares even. And that’s why we have to have an entirely new nature, an entirely new life.
(J) And in that new nature, your new life, there is His purpose, and that’s when you come in union with His purpose. And that’s when you are His companion.
(M) You are in union with His purpose the moment you’re born again. Your spirit is in union with His purpose. And the shedding of the old man is the only thing that has to be done to make you realize what you do have. We’ll see what Sparks says now.
So there’s a great deal that he goes into, but I think the thing that I want to bring us back to is that he says, “Israel was not the companion of God. Israel was once the companion of God, but the companion of God failed God. So this explains the wonderful letter to the Hebrews. It is the letter of the place and greatness of Jesus Christ. It sets forth the wonder of being called to be companions of Christ, and it makes clear what a terrible thing it is for those who are called to be companions, to fail the Lord. It says, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?” You can never understand that phrase ‘so great salvation’ until you understand what it means to be a companion of Christ. Is there anything greater than being a companion of Jesus Christ?”
(M) You know John I’m thinking of how much He is a companion to me. This was to encourage you that you are His companion, but I just so amazed that He’s ever a companion to me, He’s a friend to me, faithful, and “if I am faithless He remains faithful”. I just wanted to answer that, go ahead. (return to Sparks)
“When you think of who He is, and of all that God has purposed concerning Him, and then to think that you and I are called to be companions of that Son of God! That indeed is a very great salvation! It is the ‘so great salvation’. We’ve spent our time going around this one word ‘companion’. The New Testament is built upon that one word and around the one idea of companions of Christ. Christ is first seen choosing His companions, and then He is seen teaching them by word and by deed. Then He is seen testing and sifting them. Are they true companions? Are they only associated with Him for what they are going to get from Him? You can have plenty of companions if you give them everything and if they can get all they want from you. But what about the day when you give them nothing but suffering, and persecution, and everything that is against their natural interests? You can only offer them a place in the Father’s house! So he sifted them, He tested them, and on more than one occasion it is said, “many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with Him”. Companionship is something that is tested and sifted through adversity. So if you have a lot of extra testing and suffering in your relationship with Christ, remember that he is seeking to have us as His closest companions, in fellowship with Himself, not only in His glory, but also in His sufferings. So the relationship with Christ is on the basis of fellowship; oneness in life, in purpose, in experience, in discipline, in death, burial and resurrection, in anointing and then, at last, oneness with Him in His heavenly glory. This same Jesus is now going on with this same work with you and with me. He is repeating His earthly life in a spiritual way, more on the line of meaning than acts now.” Well, he ends by saying “His dealings with us are far more real because they’re spiritual and eternal. It is a heavenly calling, that which is eternal, that which will not pass as our life’s work when time is no more, “Wherefore, holy brethren, companions of a heavenly calling….we are become companions of Christ if we hold fast”. All that is only by way of laying a foundation.” And I just want to tell you John that you are more Enoch than you know. You’ve been tested and sifted, you’ve been scourged and tried, you’ve suffered persecution, and you’ve never left Him; you have come through that more His, more surrendered, more walking with Him. And as I listen to you, and as we walk through life, some of which is very difficult in this ministry, your eyes are always on Him; and if they leave for a minute, they always come back. And I want to encourage you that you are far more an Enoch that you realize, and that God has not forgotten what He said to you. He is accomplishing it, and He is doing it, and you are walking with Him more than most people I know. So my dear, you are an Enoch; and he was no more, because God took him. He’s a picture of the Rapture, so we’ll leave that one for the Lord to explain. So, ‘Happy Martha’s Birthday’.
