The Lord's Dealings Now.

Hebrews 9.

1880 124 etc. My thought now is to enter a little more into detail with the Lord's dealings in the dispensation in which we live. But first I would take up a more general view of God's dealings with man from the beginning; and for this purpose I now read Hebrews 9:26 is the great centre truth on which it all hangs: "Now once in the end of the world [that is, morally] hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." All that God had done up to that point was the bringing out of sin in the first man. But there followed immediately the putting away of that sin in the second Man. Then, passing over the present interval, he speaks of this second Man appearing again a second time.

Here, then, is the grand turning-point of all God's ways: the death of Christ, and its consequences — His coming again to take possession of all that His first coming had given Him a title to. They were His before, "For by him were all things created," etc. But in His second coming He takes possession of that which His blood had bought back to Himself again. "For he shall see of the travail of his soul, and be satisfied." (Hebrews 9:27.) "And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment." The end of man is to die (or rather, we may say, he there begins for eternity, and, it is terrible to think of it, begins in judgment). But God in Christ has introduced another thing; for as the end of man, either Jew or Gentile, is death and judgment, so "unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation." The first time Christ came it was about sin, in the sense of bearing it; being occupied with it, He was made it, in Himself the sinless One. But having put sin away, He comes the second time without sin unto salvation. In His second coming there is no question about sin whatever, but the full bringing out of God's purpose of blessing in consequence of the putting away of sin. Man's portion is death and judgment, as contrasted with the salvation Christ brings. But then mark another thing. In the meanwhile priesthood comes in; He is hidden from the world, as He said, "The world seeth me no more," but He appears in the presence of God for us. The word "APPEARS" is a legal term, as the One who represents His people; so He, as our High Priest, is representing us in the presence of God. He has taken His place, and sat down at God's right hand, having by Himself purged our sins. And we need such an High Priest in our daily walk; but then, as regards His bodily presence, He is gone, and therefore we have to walk as pilgrims and strangers in a seducing world, though not of it, our life being hid with Christ in God.

And then comes out another thing. The veil being rent, He has sent down the Holy Ghost to be in us, and to associate us in heart and life with Him in heaven, thus giving us the proper exclusive heavenly character of a family belonging to them now on the earth. For Christ being in the presence of God for us, our portion is in heaven. We are in the position of Stephen, who being full of the Holy Ghost, looking up into heaven through the rent veil, saw Jesus standing at the right hand of God. The heavens were opened to his spiritual gaze, which is now always true to us, and all we are now waiting for is, that Christ may come and take us bodily up there.

The crucifixion of Christ was the utter rejection of the Second Adam by the first Adam. This was man's turning-point; for man had been tried in every possible way, but all in vain. Then God says, "What shall I do? I will send my beloved Son; it may be they will reverence him when they see him." But when they saw Him, they said, "This is the heir; come, let us kill him, that the inheritance may be ours." All the dealings of God with man, as man, ended here; and therefore it is called "this present evil world." The rending of the veil, which closed all the previous dealings of God with man, opened the way to heaven; and, while it condemned the sinner, it saved the believer. It morally judged the world, but brought out full salvation to all that believe, associating them with heavenly things; for through the rent veil, that is, Christ's flesh, we have access into the holiest of all.

Then comes the question, how far such saved ones (for I speak now of real Christians) have been faithful in maintaining as a heavenly witness their testimony to the world's condemnation, and of their own association, as a heavenly people on the earth, with their Head in heaven. I hope, by the help of the Lord, to take up this question. But before entering on it, we will go a little through God's dealings with the first Adam from the beginning, up to the introduction of the Second Adam. We will trace all the different changes in God's dealings with the first man, till we come to this new starting-point — "Created anew in Christ Jesus." God has taken away the first, that He may establish the second. All God's actual dealings with man, till he came to the point of crucifying His Son, show how the patient goodness of God had tried man in every way, until obliged to pronounce man, on experimental evidence, to be utterly bad (of course, God knowing what man was all the while).

First, then, we will trace God's dealings with man, as man; secondly, with the Jews; and, thirdly, with this new man in Christ. For in whatever position man has been placed, it has been only to start aside like a broken bow — to turn from God. This is a solemn truth, and one that Christians ought to know well, for never was there a time when man's thoughts of man were so exalted, when so many efforts were being made, so many theories maintained, as at the present — that man, as man, may be turned to some profit. The great cardinal truth is, that there is no good in man; and it is most important that the soul should thoroughly understand this, as it gives both simplicity and stability; for the simple knowledge that man is thoroughly bad cuts at the root of ten thousand theories, all based upon the notion that good is to be found in man. But all these deep-laid theories will drop off by thousands, like autumn leaves, if it be only believed by the soul that in man good is not to be found. The death of Christ is the great and infallible contradiction of all this. "When we were without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly."

Thus on the cross was proved to the whole world that God could find no good in man. It is also given doctrinally in the Romans, and historically in the Old Testament. The next point is, that it is God's work to bring man back; and mark the blessed way in which God works to bring man back. For, after sin entered, there was no more rest for God or man, but in that rest which God hath prepared for us. The only rest the poor sinner can find is in "God's rest." God works, and then enters into His rest. Man rests in Christ, and then works for the glory of God. For there is no rest now but that into which Christ entered, and we which have believed do enter into that rest. It is in glory.

The sabbath rest was in connection with Jews, a sign of the covenant between them and God, which supposes that, after the work of the week is done, then rest comes; and, doubtless, in connection with creation it is a blessing to all. When Christ was on the earth, the question of the sabbath was constantly raised, and, when He healed a man on the sabbath-day, they charged Him with breaking the sabbath. And how does He meet this charge? By saying, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." A good and holy God could not find rest on a sabbath amidst the wickedness of man; there must be in such a state of things, either judgment, or working in grace. God's Son therefore came down to the earth, not to keep a sabbath in its polluted state, but to work in grace. And through communion in life with the Second Adam (God's rest) believers get all the fulness of the blessing of that rest, before it comes in fact.

But now we will look a little into this working from the beginning. And for this let us go back to the garden of Eden, for there we shall see man first put to the test in a state of innocence. And what do we find? A total and complete failure; for nothing could possibly exceed man's insensibility to God's authority, to His goodness, and to His truth. Man abandoned God to gratify his lust in eating the forbidden fruit. Nor was this all, for Adam sets up Satan as the one to be trusted instead of God. God had surrounded Adam with every blessing, and Satan comes, and says, "Ye shall not surely die." God is jealous of your prerogative, for He has not spoken truth when He said, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die." And on this liar's and murderer's word man treats God as a grudging God, for Satan says God has kept back from you that which is good; thus man believes Satan, and makes God a liar. I am not here speaking of the rejection of grace, but of the entire casting off the authority of God and His truth, and of the open manifestation of sin. Thus there was an end, without possibility of return, of man's innocence — it was gone, and gone forever. There could therefore be no return to innocence, no going back to man's paradisaical happiness; and, that he might not live on in his misery for ever, God turns him out of the garden, and sets the cherubim, with a flaming sword, to keep him from the tree of life.

But what does God, in the face of this failure? He sets aside the first Adam, and brings in the Second Adam. In Genesis 3:15, "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." And mark here, the Seed of the woman is the SECOND Adam; there was no promise to the FIRST Adam, for he was in no sense the Seed of the woman (though we may trust he was a partaker of the blessing). There was grace, but not in connection with the first Adam. Sin had come in by the woman; and therefore Christ, the putter away of sin, came in by the woman also. All God's ways and purposes tend to the Second Adam, "who shall appear the second time without sin unto salvation." The turning-point is the rejection or acceptance of Christ. Whenever the least reality of Christ is apprehended by a soul and used, the Holy Ghost can come in, and give power to the testimony, although in the midst of many mistakes; but where Christ is not, and the dependence is on the first Adam and his resources, there may be the appearance of fruit for a season, but perishing must be the final result.

I see no signs of idolatry before the flood, but men being the children of the wicked one, who was a liar and a murderer from the beginning, corruption and violence filled the earth; and these two principles continue up to the end, as we see corruption in mystical Babylon, and violence in the persecutions carried on by the beast in the latter day.

Even in the garden of Eden we saw the two trees — the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the tree of life. The first of these trees shows man's responsibility; the second tree is the symbol of God's gift of life. And in these two trees are set forth the two great principles that have given rise to all the controversies that have agitated the mind of man from the beginning, The simple truth is this: if man is put under responsibility — say the law, for instance — he fails; but Christ comes and glorifies God by fulfilling man's responsibilities; and then God can freely give life. Thus, in the work and person of Christ, we have the perfect and eternal solution of every abstract principle. For the very weakest saint knows that Christ bears the whole responsibility, and that He gives life; and he wonders that men should find such difficulty, when to him all is simple. For the soul that has Christ within knows that it is not merely an abstract truth to be reasoned about; for how can the Christian reason about Christ's having borne the curse for him, while he himself is in the possession of life in Christ? The saint owns his responsibility, but, he having failed, Christ has come in to suffer for his sins, and life is given in grace.

But now we will return to the double character of CORRUPTION and VIOLENCE, which became so insupportable, that God was obliged to come in with the flood. Then we get Noah saved out of it, and with Noah God begins the world over again. Man is again put under trial, for God brings in a new thing: government is added. Thus man is strengthened against the violence which had prevailed before the flood, and which, man not being altered, was still to continue. That which is technically called the power of the sword is given into man's hand: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." Well, failure comes in again, for after a while Noah plants a vineyard, and gets drunk with the fruit thereof; and Ham dishonours his father.

Before the flood there was the prophecy of Enoch (Jude 14), which was a mark of what God was going to do, and after his testimony Enoch goes up to heaven. This is the church's testimony now to man of the coming judgment which will take place when the church is removed. Noah's testimony was quite another thing; for he, "moved with fear, prepared an ark for the saving of his house," etc. Thus Noah passed through all the judgment, and begins the world again — the type of Israel in the latter day. But Enoch warned others, and then went up to heaven, our type, before the judgment came.

Then we have another most terrible thing. After the flood idolatry comes in. There were two great results of the breaking down in righteousness of those in the place Noah was set in. First, the association of man to get himself a "NAME" — "Let us make us a name;" and in doing this they were associating themselves against God; for, speaking of intrinsic title, God is the only one who has any right to a name; and the only name that God will allow to be set up on the earth is that of the Man Christ Jesus. Thus, in man's effort to make himself a name, we see the principle of pride brought out; and the judgment they were fully seeking to prevent by getting themselves a name, was the very judgment with which God visited them. For the Lord scattered them abroad thence upon the face of all the earth. Then, secondly, in one man, Nimrod, who began to be a mighty one in the earth, "a mighty hunter before the Lord;" for in Nimrod we have the individual development of will, and tyranny in government, instead of righteous government; and this in Babel, in the association for a name, the principle of pride. Thus we get the two great acts of corruption. And then, thirdly, demon worship comes in. For when men were scattered abroad upon the face of the earth, not liking to retain God in their knowledge, they began to offer to demons, and not to God (1 Cor. 10:20); they became conscious of dependence in spite of themselves; and therefore it is said in Joshua 24:2, "Your fathers served other gods." The scripture never speaks a word in vain. And now we can understand the meaning of the call of Abraham — what he was called out from. God appeared to Abraham, and called him out from serving other gods to serve the living and true God. The world was sinking fast into idolatry, and there was not only man's pride in getting a name by greatness on the earth, and tyranny and self-will in government, but also the coming in of Satan's power must not be confounded with man's wickedness. For Satan's power is altogether another thing, and quite apart from man's wickedness, although often most mischievously confounded with it.

Now God is calling a people out; before it was only individuals, whose hearts were successively touched with grace. But now God is distinctly separating a people to Himself. Thus Abraham is called the father of the faithful." And now God has a special stock on the earth, called out of the surrounding idolatry to be a depository for the promises of God, called the olive-tree in Romans 11. In Abraham we find three great principles — election, calling, and promise. Abraham did not get into the land until Terah his father was dead; but after his father's death he came into the land of Canaan. But God gave him none inheritance in it — no, not so much as to set his foot on; yet He promised that He would give it to him for "a possession," etc. Therefore "by faith Abraham sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles," etc.; "for he looked for the city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God."

1880 137 After this we get another thing. A people were to be redeemed; redemption was in a figure brought in when God visited Egypt in judgment, and with a mighty arm brought out a people to Himself. The blood of the paschal lamb was the sign of their shelter from judgment, and also of their separation to God Himself. Here we see the distinctness of His love, in that it was to Himself they were brought, as it is said, "How I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you to myself." Then the Red Sea passed brings out the song of salvation. And from the Red Sea to Sinai it was all grace. God dealt with them in grace; they murmured again and again, but they got the quails and the water without any reproach. It was perfect and unmingled grace.

At Sinai another change takes place, and a new principle comes in. The promises which were given to Abraham, without any conditions, are taken by the people on condition of obedience; "All that the Lord hath spoken we will do." This was entirely a new condition and principle. Man now puts himself under covenant with God, in which man is to perform his part, and God His. Thus Israel put themselves under the law, to obtain by their own obedience that which God had promised unconditionally. But before they get what God had spoken — the ten commandments, they had made themselves another god; for they had lost sight of the "man, Moses," and made themselves a golden calf, and said, "These be thy gods, O Israel." The very thing that Abraham had been called out of — idolatry — they had turned back to, the "serving other gods," and cast off the true God altogether. Thus all was gone.

Then we have another change, another principle in action. The mediator is brought in; and all is then in connection with a mediator between themselves and God. And the mediator, Moses, deals for them with God, pleads His promises, and comes in as intervening between God and man, to maintain man in the blessings in which he could not maintain himself. Moses was but a shadow of Christ, and not the very image.

Aaron is the next established to be the priest in the temple, and offer sacrifices; but just as his consecration is ended, strange fire is offered by his two sons, Nadab and Abihu. This is, as we have ever seen, the case with man. Although vengeance is taken, man goes on sinning; and the Lord goes on raising up saviours and deliverers, until the time of Eli, when not only his wicked sons were destroyed, but God's strength, the ark, was delivered into the enemy's hand, mediatorship and priesthood having both failed; and the ark, the very place of God's presence, was delivered into the hands of the Philistines; and where there was faith in Israel, in the little remnant of that day, it could only say, Ichabod, "the glory has departed."

But, before taking up David, we will return to Abraham again, and take up the promises made to Abraham, to show their distinctiveness from the church. First, the way in which Abraham is the father of many nations, as in Genesis 12. The reasoning of Paul in Galatians 3 is founded on Genesis 22. They were Jewish promises in Genesis 12. All the earth had fallen into idolatry, that God might make him the stock of promise — the olive tree, as in Romans 11; verses 2, 3 run thus: "I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great," etc.; "and IN thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed." Abraham is the vessel, so to speak, in which the promises are deposited. (I drop the great nation now, that being Jewish.) Then, in Genesis 22, this promise is confirmed to the seed. Abraham offers up Isaac, and receives him back in a figure, Isaac thus representing Christ in resurrection. Then God says, "By myself have I sworn, that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore." This multitudinous seed are the Jews. "And thy seed [Christ] shall possess the gate of his enemies." "And in thy SEED [that is, Christ] shall all the nations of the earth be blessed" — "in thy SEED," that is, the ONE SEED, Christ. The promises that were given to Abraham were confirmed to him in [the one Seed] Christ, for there can be no mixing up the two; for Isaac being raised up from the dead (although but in a figure, we know) keeps the promises distinct. And therefore the apostle argues, in Galatians 3:20, "If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promises."

Thus those who believe in Jesus are "heirs according to the promise," made not to the multitudinous seed, but to the one seed, which is Christ. There are two sets of promises — those to Abraham's seed, as the stars and the sand for multitude, in connection with the land; then Isaac, being offered up in a figure, confirming the other promises, in which all the families of the earth will be blessed in the Person of Christ, the ONE SEED. And mark, that both of these sets of promises ARE UNCONDITIONAL. For thus Abraham was made the depositary of the promises which were given to him unconditionally, both with reference to Israel and the nations. But in Exodus 19, when God says, "Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you to myself;" we have had an entire record of simple grace, without any condition whatever, from the Red Sea to Sinai.

But at Sinai the question of condition comes in. "If ye be obedient, ye shall be to me a kingdom of priests, an holy nation." And Israel said "All that Jehovah hath spoken we will do." And how long did it last? It was gone quickly. Whatever depends on man's stability is gone before he gets it. And so, before the ten words reached Israel, they had worshipped the golden calf, thus casting off God entirely. And thus Israel had lost the immediate connection with God; for it was then ordained in the hands of a mediator, having broken down in theirs. God says, Let me alone, and I will consume them in a moment. And Moses says, "Why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people?" And God turns from His wrath, and goes up with the mediator: "My presence shall go with thee," not with the people. And God calls the people the mediator's people. What beauty there is in this grace! First; God says, I will consume them in a moment, they are so stiff-necked; but their ornaments are put off, and Moses pleads their very stiff-neckedness as the reason why God must go up with them. Thus was their stiff-neckedness counterbalanced by His grace. For the moment that grace is brought in by the exercise of mediation, the same stiff-neckedness which prevented God's going up with them, lest He should consume them, was the very thing pleaded by the mediator why God must go up with them. Then God acts upon a different principle. Mediation is the grace which maintains people in the blessing brought by redemption. And this principle brings in priesthood. And here mark — for it is important to see — that redemption brings in priesthood; it is not priesthood that brings in redemption.

The priesthood maintains the people in the presence of Him who redeemed them; for, if I am to walk with a holy God, I must have that intercourse maintained. If God has redeemed us to walk in the light, as He is in the light, we need the priesthood to maintain us in the light, But if you confound redemption and priesthood, you will never find settled peace, for you will be looking for acceptance from something to be done or interceded for. But priesthood maintains our communion with a holy God.

I now turn to the subject of man's failure. Israel failing under the law, mediation comes in; and priesthood failing under Eli, the ark is gone; and then there is another redemption by power. And now the link between Israel and God is royalty, sustained in the person of David the king. This was the last link between Israel and God, His patience still forbearing. And now we get royalty sustaining Israel under the condition of obedience. The temple was newly set up, and filled with God's glory; hut royalty fails in David, Solomon, and Rehoboam. The obtaining and enjoyment of promised blessings must not always be taken as a mark of God's approval. Jacob told a lie in order to obtain the promised blessings; Solomon had asked of God wisdom, and to it God added riches and honour; but then he obtains the promised riches and honour by disobedience, for he multiplied unto himself chariots and horses, which God had forbidden. We require faith for the means as well as the end; that is, we must wait patiently for God Himself to make good to us the very blessings He promised. Then, again, Solomon loved many strange wives, and they turned away his heart from the Lord. In the very three things that God had forbidden to a king, Solomon failed. And let us ever remember that our own business is to walk with God in the humble and lowly details of everyday life, waiting on God to arrange everything for us. For God's ways towards us show out His character and His faithfulness in making good to us what He has promised. For if we obtain the promised blessings through our own contrivance, they will be accompanied by sorrow and chastening; nay, the very blessings themselves may become the source of sorrow, because we always have idolatry in the heart.

Then God meets this failure in royalty by another and fresh promise — in Shear-Jashub "a remnant shall return." (Isa. 7:3, see margin.) The nation was at that time cut off — "Make the heart of this people fat," Israel was called to maintain the name of the one true God, in contrast to the many gods of the heathen —  (not the trinity revealed for the saving of the soul). Now God promises another thing — a seed is promised to David; before it was the Seed of the woman, but now a Seed is promised to David to sit upon his throne for ever. After this God says, in Ezekiel 21:25, "Thou, profane wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come when iniquity shall have an end;" thus saith the Lord God, "Remove the diadem, and take off the crown, this shall not be the same; exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high. I will overturn, overturn, overturn it; and it shall be no more until HE come, whose RIGHT it is; and I will give it HIM."

After this God entrusts power in Gentile hands, the first being Nebuchadnezzar — power in one man. For man's vain thought is, If I could do all that I wish, I should make the country a paradise. Well, God tries him; and what is the result? The golden image is set up, and God's own people are cast into the fire for refusing to fall down and worship it. Secondly, the impiety of Belshazzar follows in prostituting the vessels of the temple to the honour of his false gods. And, thirdly, Darius sets himself up to be the only true, God. ere are brought out three principles of evil, which will be fully developed in the latter day. Cyrus then comes in as the restorer, setting it all aside (typical of Christ). Meanwhile prophecy comes in to sustain the remnant until the Messiah came.

Then, in the rejection of Christ, it was not merely the manifestation of man's sin, but the utter hatred of man's heart against God; "They have HATED both ME and MY FATHER." Thus the tree was proved to be utterly bad, and the more it was digged about and dunged, the more bad fruit it produced. Cut it down, why cumbereth it the ground? Then Pontius Pilate, who, being the governor of Judea, was the representative of the authority which God had put into man's hand, and which the Lord owned, when Pilate said to Him, "Knowest thou not that I have power to crucify thee, and have power to release thee?" To which the Lord replied, "Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above," thus teaching Pilate that, having received the power from God, he was responsible to God for the exercise of it. And how did he use it? In condemning God's Son.

Thus the very one that should have wrought justice in the earth delivers up Christ to be crucified, at the same time knowing him to be innocent; as he said, "Take YE him, and crucify him, for I FIND NO FAULT in him." Thus is fulfilled that word, "I saw under the sun the place of judgment, that wickedness was there; and the place of righteousness, that iniquity was there." What comes then? The solemn sentence is passed — the world is condemned — "Now is the judgment of this world;" "The world seeth me no more;" "Now shall the prince of this world be cast out;" "The god of this world:" "The spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience." The death of Christ closed the scene. Then the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom. The very thing that brought out the judgment revealed a heavenly salvation, which was before hidden by the veil. The death of Christ is the end of the world morally. Man has been tried in every way, and failed; and sin, in every shape and form, has been brought up to a head, and met, in this one act of rending the veil. For "once in the end of the world [morally] hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." When the sin is proved, it is put away. "They have seen and hated both me and my Father." The very act that proved their hatred of God put away their sin. "If I had not come, they had not had sin, but now they have no cloke for their sin, but they have seen and hated both me and my Father." That very crowning act of the utter enmity and wilfulness of man brought the sinner to God without the sin. For the Lamb without spot, by ONE ACT DIVINE in POWER (by Himself), "put away the sin by the sacrifice of himself."

The veil being rent, we with unveiled face behold the glory of the Lord. As to our bodies, we know that they are still on the earth, but our position morally is in heaven, Christ being there. The high priest under the law stood, but this Man, after He had "once offered," sat down for ever. The whole work being accomplished that connects us with heaven, we are only waiting for the redemption of the body. We are accepted in the Beloved; He is my life and my righteousness, and I want nothing more. All belongs to me now, by virtue of life in this heavenly Man, now in heaven itself for me. We are only awaiting His return, but our conversation is connected with Him up there now, for we are always confident while waiting, which may be in order to our ripening. There are three things connected with this position: first, my life is hid with Christ in God; secondly, if I should die before He come, my spirit goes up to Him immediately — "absent from the body, present with the Lord;" thirdly, if He come to take me up before I die, then I shall return with Him — "When Christ, who is our life, shall APPEAR, then shall we also APPEAR with him in glory;" but while He is up on high, we are members of His body down here, and cry, "Come, Lord Jesus;" and, consequent on our position, we ought to be as pilgrims and strangers on this earth, for we stand between the once offered and appearing Jesus. We have neither the world nor the glory yet, but we are identified with the rejected One. Christ's portion is our portion, we get it along with Himself, and we are to be conformed to Him now; we are members of His body, of His flesh, and of His bones; His bride, and when she is made ready, He will come and take her up to glory, after which the Lord takes up again His dealings with the earth, to reduce it into that condition in which He can bless it.

The Lord give us to know the wonderful grace of Christ, "who, though he was rich, for our sakes became poor, that we through his poverty might be rich" — "who loved us, and gave himself for us" — according to His perfect work, which has set us in the presence of the Father in love.