David said, “Surely that which concerneth me, the Lord will perfect make” (Ps 138:8 metrical version). The thought that strikes one in relation to this subject is that God’s purpose to make His people perfect in holiness overcomes every obstacle that stands in the way of that perfection. Every provision of the covenant of grace stretches forward, as it were, to being with Christ in glory.
Give repentance a voice and we will hear it say, “I will arise and go to my Father”. If effectual calling could speak, it would say, “Surely that which concerneth me, the Lord will perfect make” in the new birth. Let the new birth speak and, longing for glory, it will speak of being made perfect in sanctification. Let sanctification speak and, “forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before” (Phil 3:13), it speaks of being made perfect in holiness at death. Give a voice to the frequently-assailed “assurance of God’s love”, the oft-interrupted “peace of conscience”, the assaulted “joy in the Holy Ghost”, the seeming impossibility of “grace”, the “increase” of it, and its “perseverance unto the end” and, though they must dispute every inch of their way to glory, they are warranted to say, in holy defiance of the formidable opposition they meet, “That which concerneth me the Lord will perfect make”. Lachlan Mackenzie wrote that the Happy Man “loves Christ and longs for glory”.
What about the body?
We think of these words in connection with the believer’s soul, but what about the believer’s body? Does the believer have promises of sanctification for his body? In Job 14, he is musing sadly on a stark contrast between trees and men. “There is hope of a tree,” he says, “if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that the tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, and the stock thereof die in the ground; yet through the scent of water it will bud, and bring forth boughs like a plant” (Job 14:7-9). The second part of the contrast refers to dead men: “Man dieth, and wasteth away: yea, man giveth up the ghost, and where is he?” (Job 14:10). Job is saying that nature can revive nature but nothing in nature can resurrect a dead man’s body.
He then goes on in the same elevated language to sweet, believing thoughts of the resurrection of his body by the power of God: “All the days of my appointed time will I wait, till my change come”. Then, on the morning of the resurrection, “Thou shalt call, and I will answer Thee: Thou wilt have a desire to the work of Thine hands” (Job 14:14,15). Job knew and loved Christ as his Redeemer, and longed for glory through His redemptive work, not only for his soul but in view of a glorious bodily resurrection: “For I know that my redeemer liveth, and that He shall stand at the latter day upon the earth: and though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another; though my reins be consumed within me” (Job 19:25-27).
Ah, blessed holy expectation: “Surely that which concerneth me the Lord will perfect make”!
Rev John Ross of Brucefield, in Ontario, Canada, is the esteemed subject of a volume called The Man with the Book. A memorial stone, marking the place where he is buried, is inscribed with these words, “Surely that which concerneth me the Lord will perfect make”. His mourning friends believed that these words represented his faith in the redemption of his body (as well as the redemption of his soul). The Happy Man’s body, asleep in the grave, is still united to Christ. The deceased bodies of believers “sleep in Jesus” (1 Th 4:14). They “rest in their graves as in their beds” (Larger Catechism, Ans 86). The words of Jesus about the deceased Lazarus: “Our friend . . . Lazarus is dead . . . let us go unto him” (John 11:11,14,15) indicate (a) that though the believer’s soul is in heaven and his body is in the grave, they are viewed by Jesus as belonging to the one redeemed person and (b) that a bond of love exists between Jesus and the person of the deceased both as to his soul and his body.
For the redemption of the body as well as the redemption of the soul, Paul looked to Christ, “who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the working whereby He is able even to subdue all things unto Himself” (Phil 3:21). “It is sown in corruption; it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in dishonour; it is raised in glory: it is sown in weakness; it is raised in power: it is sown a natural body; it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. . . . And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly” (1 Cor 15:42-44,49).
When the mortal remains of a believer are lowered into the grave, we ought to think of his or her soul alive in glory. We ought also to think of the Lord’s conquest of the grave and, with the well-founded faith and hope of Job, David, Paul, John Ross and thousands of others who lived and died in faith, we ought to think of their being raised up in glory at the last day, for “Thou shall call and I will answer Thee”.
Everlasting glory and holiness.
The Larger Catechism speaks of the communion in glory that believers have with Christ: in this life, immediately after death and “at last perfected at the resurrection and day of judgement” (Ans 82). Sinners saved by grace are brought to glory. Is the entrance on glory the point at which the provisions of the covenant of grace are finally and fully realised? The souls of believers are then made perfect in holiness. This means that they are as holy and as happy as they can be. It does not mean they are infinitely holy, as God is. It does not deny that after death there is a capacity to grow in the knowledge of the goodness of God and so a corresponding capacity to grow in love to God.
In an affectionate letter to Mr John MacKenzie (a student for the ministry) Rev Neil Cameron wrote that the soul on entering glory will say of Christ, like the Queen of Sheba said of Solomon: “The report I heard of Him in my own country was true, but the half was not told me”. Mr Cameron went on to say that this initial flood of light is but the beginning of an eternal spiritual feast: “Sinners saved by grace will require an endless eternity to learn a little of the depth of the love, pity and mercy that are in Him”. He asserted, “It will keep them in a mist of amazement for ever and ever – in complete forgetfulness of themselves – while their understanding and affections are being enlarged to receive more and more of the knowledge of God and of Christ. Some with whom we had sweet fellowship on earth are now being led by the Lamb into those fountains of living waters.”
John saw the Church of the firstborn being fed by Jesus Christ, not on the mountains of the earthly Zion but the heavenly: joining in an eternal feast corresponding in its nature to the spirituality of the Church in the glory of her triumphant state in Immanuel’s land. He saw them being led to fresh and refreshing spiritual fountains of living water. Now they see, not “through a glass darkly, but then face to face”, seeing “Him as He is”. Now they “know even as also [they are] known”. In heaven, the same unerring right hand and holy arm that got Him the victory, in every contested step of their way on earth, is leading them and feeding them in every uncontested step of their rest in glory. “For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes” (Rev 7:17). “Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And He saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God” (Rev 19:9).
1Based on some of the material on this subject presented to the 2018 Theological Conference. The previous article, last month, considered sanctification’s “imperfection in this life”.