‘And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.’—Luke, xxi. 28.

It is perfectly clear that the redemption alluded to in these words is something still future. It is the bright hope which is to cheer the little flock through the storms of the latter days. When the world is full of perplexity, and men’s hearts are failing them for fear, the Lord’s people are to look up in calm, happy, peaceful, trusting hope in the full assurance of their approaching redemption. ‘When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.’ It is perfectly clear, therefore, that our Lord was not speaking of the great redeeming act which took place eighteen hundred years ago on Calvary, but of the final deliverance, the completion of His redeeming work, when He will come in His kingdom and set His people free. This final deliverance must be our subject in this lecture. May the Lord bless it to our souls, and grant that, when the time comes, we may be amongst those who rejoice in the blessing!

I. The redemption here spoken of is the deliverance of Jerusalem. We must not isolate the passage from its context, or forget that the words were spoken to Jewish believers. Thus up to the end of the 24th verse our Lord foretold the destruction of Jerusalem with the terrible afflictions that were to precede it, concluding with the words, ‘Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.’ Then follows the description of the latter days, and all the perils preceding the advent, concluding with the words, ‘Look up, and lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh.’ Surely, then, there is a connexion between the 24th and 28th verses. The one describes the desolation, and the other the recovery: the one the bondage, the other the freedom; the one the captivity, the other the deliverance; the one the iron yoke on the neck of the captive, and the other the glorious restoration when the Deliverer shall appear in Zion.

II. But though the passage refers to the restoration of Jerusalem, it clearly does not stop there, but includes the redemption or deliverance of the Church. When I speak of the Church I am not speaking of those who have nothing more than outward Christianity: but of the Church of the first-born, that Church described in the words, Eph. v. 25, ‘Christ also loved the Church, and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word.’ This Church is described in Eph. i. 14, as His ‘purchased possession,’ and all the members of it are now His own. They are His own by virtue of the ransom of the eternal covenant, and it is therefore called, Acts, xx. 28, ‘The Church of God which he purchased with his own blood.’ And they are His own by the call of the Holy Ghost, gathering them out from a wicked world, and by His divine power incorporating them into Christ. Thus in one sense they have been redeemed already, for the ransom has been given for their life, and they have found forgiveness through His precious blood. They may say, every one of them, as St. Paul did in the 7th verse of that same chapter in the Ephesians, ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.’ But yet, according to the 13th verse, they are still waiting for redemption, and during the waiting time are solemnly sealed unto God, and assured of what is to come by the present earnest of the Spirit. ‘In whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise;’ and so, in chap. iv. 30, they are told not to grieve the Holy Spirit, by whom they are ‘sealed unto the day of redemption.’ There is, therefore, hereafter to be a redemption of the purchased possession, a redemption of that which has already been redeemed, or, in other words, a final deliverance of the ransomed Church. The ransom is paid, but the time is not yet come for the ransomed Bride to be finally free, and presented to her Lord in glory.

It is delightful to look forward to this coming restoration when we think of the present position of the Church of God surrounded as it is by a wicked world outside, and, what is far more painful, harassed by division, false doctrine, inconsistency, and formalism within. I am not surprised that St. Paul compares this present waiting time to the night, for there is a great deal all around us exceedingly dark, but we must never forget the approaching morning. We may be greatly distressed by witnessing such defects and difficulties as we do witness in the Church of Christ, but according to this passage we need not be disheartened, for our redemption draweth nigh. The Deliverer will soon come to Zion, and there will be no difficulties then. The Redeemer Himself will soon set all things straight. There will be complete light when the Sun of Righteousness arises with healing in His wings. We are not, therefore, going to be downcast by difficulties, or to doubt His truth because we see His prophecies fulfilled; but, whatever happens, whether persecution from without, or false teaching within, we will remember His own most assuring words, and act on them, ‘When these things begin to come to pass, then look up and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.’

III. It will be a redemption of the body. I need not stop to prove that the body is not yet free from the bondage of the curse. Though the soul is free in Christ Jesus the poor body is still subject as much as ever to the strong hand of death. So we read, Rom. viii. 10, ‘If Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness.’ So that, even when Christ is in us, and the Spirit is life, the body still remains dead, subject to death, and actually dying as we all well know. The brightest and holiest living believers are not exempt from the trials of a death-stricken body.

But if this is the case with the living Church, how much more is it with the vast multitude of those who are now asleep in Jesus! Think of the noble line of the saints of God who were once, as we are, serving God on earth in the flesh, but who are now in the condition, to us quite inexplicable, of disembodied spirits, with the soul resting before God while the poor body in utter weakness lies prostrate in the grave. I cannot imagine a more marvellous contrast than that which now exists between the present condition of the two parts of man while awaiting the resurrection of the dead. It is impossible to imagine any thing more utter, more complete, more hopeless, than the bondage and subjection of the body; or more blessed, more peaceful, more joyous, than the present rest of the soul in the presence of the Lord Himself. But when the redemption takes place, as predicted in this verse, the body itself will be set free. You will see this in a moment if you connect two verses in Rom. viii. From ver. 10 we have already found that, even when the Spirit is life because of righteousness, the body is still dead because of sin; and the result is, as you read ver. 23, that even those who have the first-fruits of the Spirit groan within themselves. They share in respect of death the groaning of a death-stricken world. But in the midst of it all they can rise above it in triumphant hope, for they are waiting, and looking out for deliverance, as you read in the latter part of that verse, ‘Waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the body.’ The body therefore shall be redeemed and rise again. They that are in the graves shall hear His voice, and shall come forth; and the very sea shall give up the dead that are in it. I know that men say it is impossible, and I know that there are difficulties connected with the subject which to the eye of man appear to prove its impossibility; but there is no such thing as impossibility with God. He who created can restore. He who said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light, He can say ‘Let there be life,’ and there will be life. So that, although to us death is quite irresistible; though no wealth can ward it off, and no physician’s skill can baffle it; and although, when once it has taken place, all human hope is gone for ever; yet, when the Redeemer comes to Zion, death itself will be powerless: those dear ones who now sleep in the grave will come forth in risen bodies at the bidding of their blessed Saviour; and He, the gentle, and loving, and tender Lord Jesus, will fulfil His grand prophecy as given by the prophet Hosea (xiii. 14), ‘I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. O death, I will be thy plagues! O grave, I will be thy destruction; repentance shall be hid from mine eyes.’

IV. There will be a redemption of the soul, i.e. a completion of that sacred work now being carried on in the soul through the power of the Holy Ghost. There is clearly a wide difference between the sacred work of deliverance as carried on in the body and the soul; for the deliverance of the body is not yet begun, but will be accomplished in one sudden act when the Lord shall appear. But it is not so with the soul; for in it the deliverance has been long since begun, and is day by day being carried out by the power of the Holy Ghost. Our blessed Lord has already delivered us, if we be in Him, both from the curse and dominion of sin: from the curse, for ‘we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins;’ and from the dominion, for ‘sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law but under grace.’ Rom. vi. 14. If, therefore, we are in Christ Jesus, and under grace, our soul is delivered from the dominion of sin, though our body is not yet delivered from the dominion of death. You may ask, then, how it is that the soul still wants deliverance? Look at the 12th verse of the sixth of Romans, only two verses before the one just quoted, and you read, ‘Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body, that ye should fulfil it in the lusts thereof.’ It is, therefore, there, though it must not reign. It has life in it, and it is prepared to reign, but it must be put down. It has its lusts and desires, but they must be mortified, and not fulfilled. The power of sin is not extinct or quiescent, but in full vigour still. The old original corruption is not destroyed, but remains in full activity. The grace of God triumphs over it, but it is there; and there, not in a state of death, but of life and vigour. If you think you have done with sin you will find it will soon crop up, if in no other form, in pride of heart, and blindness to its power. We can therefore perfectly understand the complete harmony of the two verses in Rom. vii., that are sometimes thought contradictory: verse 6, in which he says, ‘Now we are delivered from the law,’ and verse 24, ‘Who shall deliver me from the body of this death?’ From the law, as involving the curse, we are already free; from the infection of a ruined nature we are still waiting to be delivered. And think for a moment what a deliverance that will be. Ye that have been deeply humbled at the discovery of your own utter unworthiness, ye that would describe yourselves as St. Paul did as ‘the chief of sinners,’ and ‘less than the least of all saints,’ think what it would be to be set at once absolutely free from indwelling sin. Picture to yourselves the day of His coming. Think of yourself on your knees in the morning, confessing sin, and praying for pardon and for help, for mercy and for grace. And then think of yourself at night, having in the course of the day beheld Christ as He is, and having been so transformed by the sight that you have become altogether like Him, without a single temptation or difficulty left, and with every stain and tendency to sin rooted out, and gone for ever. But this is what we are led to expect in these words of St. John: ‘Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.’ No wonder, then, that with such a hope in view our Lord directs us, even in the midst of the fears and perplexities of the latter days, to look up, and lift up our head, for our redemption draweth nigh.

But one thing we must remember. We shall never rejoice in the redemption or deliverance that is to come, till we can rest in the redemption or atonement that is complete. There are many amongst us, I sadly fear, who find no pleasure in the thought of the Lord’s return, and in many cases there can be no doubt about the reason. They have found no peace through His cross. I believe that no one ever cares for the Lord Jesus Christ as a Deliverer from either death or sin till He knows Him as the Redeemer from the curse. No man can look up and lift up his head if he expects to rise again to the resurrection of damnation, and to be cast forth for ever with all the guilt of all His sin on his miserable head. Therefore it is that, till you know the atonement by blood, you will never care for the deliverance by power. Till you know the sufficiency of the ransom you are sure to dread the coming of the Deliverer, as, I fear, too many do. Look backwards, then, as well as forwards, I most earnestly entreat you. Accept the assurance of the coming deliverance in all its fulness. Accept it in all its joy. Rejoice in the blessed hope. But take care; and while you look forward in the hope that your redemption draweth nigh, remember also to look back on that finished atonement, and never rest till you can appropriate these words to the Ephesians, ‘In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins.’

One word before we close respecting the sacred feast of the Lord’s supper, in which it is our sacred privilege as believers to gather round the table of our Lord. It is a connecting link between the two parts of redemption, the atonement and the deliverance, the cross and the advent. In it we look backwards and forwards, as we are taught 1 Cor. xi. 26: backwards, for we show the Lord’s death; and forwards, for we do so ‘till He come.’ When He does so, we shall sit down with Him at the marriage supper of the Lamb, and our symbolic service will cease in the realisation of the fulness of His blessing. Oh! how I pity those who are moved neither by memory or hope, by the recollection of what He has done, or the hope of what He is about to do; who never show the Lord’s death according to His own appointment, and never act as if they were waiting for His coming!