THE MOMENT THE PRESSURE BEGAN THE RELIEF BEGAN

Harold C Anstey

Song of Songs 1: 7, 8

John 20: 17

The bride and the flock are identical in the Old Testament and in the New, but in the Old Testament it is the earthly bride and in the New Testament the heavenly.

The bride turns to her beloved for relief!  It is noontide, when in this extreme heat of the  sun she demands, and seeks, and gets (SofS 2: 3) the shade.  The shadow is His  own portion down here.  It is well, beloved brethren, to be clear about this, and the Lord shows us in this passage it is so beyond all doubt.  He goes on high, and the church is left in the place of testing down here, but with the same provision as He Himself had in it.  ''My Father, your Father; my God, your God".   He  has  secured  it, and He hastens to declare it, giving also the Spirit that the relief may not only be known but also enjoyed.  What is the provision and relief?  It is the known relation into which He has now entered as Man (but in which He lived as Man when on earth), now further enhanced by  having  entered  into His glory and having sent down the Spirit to be in us the power of its apprehension and enjoyment!  ' He  shall  take  of  mine  and  show it unto you'.'

Beloved  brethren, this is the present state of things  -the every-day state of things.  May the Lord keep us thereby not under the sense of the pressure but in the joy of the relief, His own portion as Man down here, and as Man up there, all ours! 

Exeter

August, 1916

From Mutual Comfort 1916