{"id":838,"date":"2011-07-15T05:06:55","date_gmt":"2011-07-15T05:06:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/?p=838"},"modified":"2011-07-15T05:06:55","modified_gmt":"2011-07-15T05:06:55","slug":"what-it-is-for-christ-to-manifest-himself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/?p=838","title":{"rendered":"WHAT it is for Christ to manifest Himself."},"content":{"rendered":"

WHAT it is for Christ to manifest Himself.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Christ manifests Himself\u2014when He makes a clearer revelation unto His disciples of the excellency of His person; when He further unveils Himself and lets forth some beams and rays with greater luster and brightness, to reveal more of the radiance and transcendence of His soul-ravishing beauty unto them, of which they had but a dimmer light and darker apprehensions before. And this is done when Christ more fully imparts the Spirit of wisdom and revelation unto them. Upon this account, the Apostle prayed on behalf of the believing Ephesians that the Lord would give them the Spirit of wisdom and revelation to enlighten their understandings in the knowledge of Him,\u00a0Ephesians 1:16-18<\/a>. They had the Spirit and some knowledge of Christ before\u2014but he prays that God would give them a\u00a0fuller measure <\/em>of the Spirit to make a\u00a0clearer discovery <\/em>of Christ\u2014that the eyes of their understandings might be more and more enlightened unto a more spiritual discerning of the surpassing beauty and excellency in Christ\u2019s person, in the knowledge of whom the most enlightened Christians are capable of further growth unto the end of their life. Hence that exhortation of the Apostle Peter,\u00a02 Peter 3:18<\/a>, \u201cGrow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n

Christ manifests Himself when He makes a deep impression and gives a sweet sense to His disciples, of His presence. Christ is never really absent from those who love Him\u2014but He may\u00a0seem <\/em>to be so sometimes. They may apprehend Him to be afar off. He may, and often does, withdraw the\u00a0sense <\/em>of His presence,\u00a0Song of Solomon 5:6<\/a>, \u201cI opened to my beloved\u2014but my beloved had withdrawn himself and was gone!\u201d Christ manifests Himself when He draws near to His people, and makes them feel that He is near; giving them a sweet sense of His presence through the powerful breathings of His Spirit upon them, whereby their hearts are quickened, enlarged, and drawn forth towards Himself, and their graces excited unto powerful exercise.<\/p>\n

And, chiefly, Christ manifests Himself when He makes revelation of His love unto those who love Him; when He gives them to see not only the\u00a0beauty <\/em>of His face\u2014but also the\u00a0smiles <\/em>of His face; when He gives them to behold the amiableness of His countenance; when He sheds abroad the sense of His love into their hearts, giving them a full persuasion of His special love unto them, and also a sweet sense thereof.<\/p>\n

Thus Christ sometimes looks and speaks kindly unto His people; and this sweet language is not spoken to the bodily ear\u2014but inwardly by His Spirit to their souls when He says to the soul, \u201cI am your salvation and your Savior! I have loved you with an everlasting love, and My love is unchangeable. The mountains shall depart and the hills be removed\u2014but My loving-kindness shall never depart and be removed from you. I have given Myself\u00a0for <\/em>you, and I have given Myself\u00a0to <\/em>you, and I will never repent of this gift. I have chosen you for Myself, called and joined you unto Myself, and I will never repent of this choice, nor allow you to be disjointed from Me forever. I have you upon My heart and keep you in My hand\u2014and no powers of earth or hell shall be able to pluck you from there! I have given you My grace, and I will show you My glory! Before long, I will appear in the world and receive you to Myself that, where I am, there you may be also. Dry up, then, your tears! Clear up your countenance, banish your fears, droop no longer, despond no more\u2014but be of good cheer! Your sins are forgiven! Your name is written in My book, which none can blot out. You have a true love for Me, and My Father Himself loves you, and I love you with a most endeared love, and therefore, do not question or doubt My love any more!\u201d<\/p>\n

(Extract from) Christ\u2019s manifestation of Himself unto those who love Him<\/p>\n

By Thomas Vincent (1634-1678)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WHAT it is for Christ to manifest Himself. Christ manifests Himself\u2014when He makes a clearer revelation unto His disciples of the excellency of His person; when He further unveils Himself and lets forth some beams and rays with greater luster and brightness, to reveal more of the radiance and transcendence of His soul-ravishing beauty unto […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[69,68,67],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-838","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-author-thomas-vincent","category-christ-his-person-and-excellencies","category-taught-of-god"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/838","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=838"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/838\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":839,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/838\/revisions\/839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=838"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=838"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shoalhavengospelchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=838"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}