Beatitudes
29
In all ages Satan has persecuted the people of God. He has tortured
them and put them to death, but in dying they became conquerors.
They revealed in their steadfast faith a mightier One than Satan. Satan
could torture and kill the body, but he could not touch the life that
was hid with Christ in God. He could incarcerate in prison walls, but
he could not bind the spirit. They could look beyond the gloom to
the glory, saying, “I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are
not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in
us.” “Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us
a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”
Romans 8:18
;
2
Corinthians 4:17
.
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Through trials and persecution, the glory—character—of God is
revealed in His chosen ones. The church of God, hated and persecuted
by the world, are educated and disciplined in the school of Christ.
They walk in narrow paths on earth; they are purified in the furnace
of affliction. They follow Christ through sore conflicts; they endure
self-denial and experience bitter disappointments; but their painful
experience teaches them the guilt and woe of sin, and they look upon
it with abhorrence. Being partakers of Christ’s sufferings, they are
destined to be partakers of His glory. In holy vision the prophet saw
the triumph of the people of God. He says, “I saw as it were a sea of
glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory, ... stand
on the sea of glass, having the harps of God. And they sing the song
of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great
and marvelous are Thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true are
Thy ways, Thou King of saints.” “These are they which came out of
great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white
in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne of God,
and serve Him day and night in His temple: and He that sitteth on the
throne shall dwell among them.”
Revelation 15:2, 3
;
7:14, 15
.
“Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you.”—Matthew 5:11.
Ever since his fall, Satan has worked by means of deception. As
he has misrepresented God, so, through his agents, he misrepresents
the children of God. The Saviour says, “The reproaches of them that
reproached Thee are fallen upon Me.”
Psalm 69:9
. In like manner they
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fall upon His disciples.