2 Corinthians 12:1

CONTENTS

Paul is here speaking of Visions and Revelations, with which the Lord favored him. He speaks of his Infirmities.

2 Corinthians 12:1

(1) It is not expedient for me doubtless to glory. I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord.

As everything relating to those supernatural manifestations Paul was favored with, and which God the Holy Ghost hath been pleased to have recorded , for the comfort of the Church, becomes highly interesting; I would here more particularly beg the Reader's attention. All the visions and revelations which have been made to the Church, in the several periods of it have been uniformly intended to bring the Church, into some acquaintance with the Person, and eternal glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, as God-man mediator. As Christ in his Person, that is God and man in one is the first in all Jehovah's designs, and in Him, and through Him, and by Him, all revelations of Jehovah, in his threefold character of Persons are made, or capable of being made towards the Lord's intelligent creation; so, the ultimate end and design is, to centre all the glory of Jehovah; that is capable of being made visible to his creation, in the Person of the God-man Christ Jesus, that at the last day, all God's creatures may behold in Him the final issue of all Jehovah's decrees, in all the purposes of revelation, Ephesians 1:10 . Hence all those occasional glories which have been shewn the Church, during the different periods of the Church, both under the Old Testament dispensation and the New, have been with the express design to bring the Church into an acquaintance with her Lord's Person and glory, as God-man mediator. And for this end, and to this purpose, the several servants of the Lord, as so many representatives of his Church, have been favored with these glorious manifestations, such as Paul is here about to speak of, and such as we read of others, both in the Old and New Testaments, Exodus 3:2 &c; Exodus 24:9 to the end; Joshua 5:13 &c; Isaiah 6:1 &c, with John 12:41 ; Ezekiel 1:4-28 ; Daniel 10:5-6 ; Matthew 17:1-9 .

Reader! before we proceed, let us pause over the subject. If you recollect, when the Lord Jesus Christ was about to return to heaven, and when redemption-work was nearly finished, Jesus addressed himself in these remarkable words to his Father: And now, 0 Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee before the world was, John 17:5 . The question is, what glory is here meant? Not, surely, the glory essential in the Godhead, for this was, and is, the Son of God's own, unasked, underived, eternal, and unchangeable. But the glory which Christ had, as Christ, that is, God and man in one Person, in his covenant subsistence, and in his mediatorial glory before all worlds. This glory, except in the occasional burstings forth of it, as we read upon several instances in scripture, when it brake forth through the manhood, had been obscured during the ministry of Jesus upon earth. But now the offices which he came to perform, being fulfilled, Jesus thus spake in that sweet scripture, of being again glorified with his own personal glory as Mediator, which he possessed in this Almighty character before the earth was laid.

Now let us connect with this original and eternal glory of the God-man mediator, which Jesus possessed before he openly assumed humanity, and came upon earth, the glory of the same Almighty character, when he shall come to be glorified with his saints, and be admired in all that believe, 2 Thessalonians 1:10 , and we shall then form some faint, however imperfect idea, of those intermediate visions and revelations, in which the Lord hath been pleased to make himself known unto his people. Every manifestation is with a view to glorify Jesus. Every revelation hath this for its great and leading object. And Peter's explanation of the instance he had, when with James and John in the mount, plainly shews for what purpose, in every instance, the mercy was granted. We were eye-witnesses (said Peter) of his Majesty. For he received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to him from the excellent glory, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased, 2 Peter 1:16-17 . If the Reader be enabled to connect those views of Christ's personal glory, as God-man before all worlds, and Christ's personal glory, as God man at the end of the world; he will then, under the same divine teaching, be prepared for the right apprehension of all the visions and revelations of the Lord which have ever taken place in the present time-state of the Church, and he will also be the better qualified to enter into the apprehension of the One which Paul had, as he hath related in this chapter.