p477 [* * * I am surprised at the clearness in my own mind of the question of responsibility, which lies at the root of Calvinism and Arminianism. Responsibility there must and ought always to be; but in respect of acceptance, the first man was the responsible man, and his story ended at the cross, though each has to learn it personally. Our standing is in the Second, who charged Himself indeed with our failures in responsibility (Himself perfect in every trial in it), but laid the ground of perfect acceptance before God: lost on the ground of the first, we are before God on the ground of the finished work of the second Adam - not a child of Adam, as to our place, but a child of God, "the righteousness of God in him." Before the cross, and up to it, responsibility developed; after it, righteousness revealed, and the original purpose of God, which was in the second Adam, could then be brought out. This opens out what was purely of God, which we have mainly in Ephesians, though elsewhere; and conduct is the display of the divine nature as in Christ. This last is a blessed part of it. The study of what He is is surely the food of the soul. His Person, His work, may carry us deeper in the apprehension of what God is, for it was met and glorified there, and we worship and praise; but with Him we can walk, and know, and learn that none so gracious as He. What will it not be to see Him as He is! I find imperfection in a language a help to seeing how far all is real and realised in the heart. It cannot flow through in accustomed words. I must close. …]

Elberfeld, 1869.[1879?]

[52329E]