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Education
into the principles of heaven; the lifework here is a training for the
lifework there. What we now are, in character and holy service, is the
sure foreshadowing of what we shall be.
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“The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister.”
Matthew 20:28
. Christ’s work below is His work above, and our
reward for working with Him in this world will be the greater power
and wider privilege of working with Him in the world to come.
“Ye are My witnesses, saith the Lord, that I am God.”
Isaiah 43:12
.
This also we shall be in eternity.
For what was the great controversy permitted to continue through-
out the ages? Why was it that Satan’s existence was not cut short at
the outset of his rebellion? It was that the universe might be convinced
of God’s justice in His dealing with evil; that sin might receive eternal
condemnation. In the plan of redemption there are heights and depths
that eternity itself can never exhaust, marvels into which the angels
desire to look. The redeemed only, of all created beings, have in their
own experience known the actual conflict with sin; they have wrought
with Christ, and, as even the angels could not do, have entered into
the fellowship of His sufferings; will they have no testimony as to
the science of redemption—nothing that will be of worth to unfallen
beings?
Even now, “unto the principalities and the powers in the heavenly
places” is “made known through the church the manifold wisdom of
God.” And He “hath raised us up together, and made us sit together
in heavenly places: ... that in the ages to come He might show the
exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ
Jesus.”
Ephesians 3:10
, R.V.;
2:6, 7
.
“In His temple doth everyone speak of His glory” (
Psalm 29:9
),
and the song which the ransomed ones will sing—the song of their
experience—will declare the glory of God: “Great and marvelous are
Thy works, O Lord God, the Almighty; righteous and true are Thy
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ways, Thou King of the ages. Who shall not fear, O Lord, and glorify
Thy name? for Thou only art holy.”
Revelation 15:3, 4
, R.V.
In our life here, earthly, sin-restricted though it is, the greatest
joy and the highest education are in service. And in the future state,
untrammeled by the limitations of sinful humanity, it is in service that
our greatest joy and our highest education will be found—witnessing,