The Great Transition From One Humanity to Another # 1

The Great Transition From One Humanity To Another # 1

This book contains a series of messages given at a conference in July, 1968, by our brother T. Austin-Sparks just shortly before he went to be with our Heavenly Father in glory. Having received so many spiritual benefits from these messages, we feel that God would have us to share them with the Church, His Body.

Therefore, in an effort to retain the Holy Spirit's anointing upon them, we have sought to preserve these addresses in their original spoken form, with very little grammatical correction. We feel our brother Sparks has left behind an abundant spiritual legacy for the members of Christ's Body because we have found these messages have brought us into a fuller and greater revelation of the Heavenly Man. And so it is our sincere prayer to God that this book will help furnish in His Body what is needed until we all come to see what Paul saw in the Heavenly New Man of glory.
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The New Testament: The Great Transition

Our Father, our God, we ask Thee now that Thou, Who didst say "Let light be," will shine into our hearts at this time "To give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." It is that face we together have said we are seeking now. We seek Thy Face. We thank Thee that the veil is taken away. We thank Thee that the heaven is open. We thank Thee that the Holy Spirit has come. What we pray for is our need - so deeply conscious we are of it - our own impotence and helplessness, our inability to do anything, to say anything worthy of Thyself. O Lord, we confess utter dependence upon Thee, but we say to Thee, Lord, we trust Thee. Now make this then a time of entering into the good of that opened heaven, that anointing Spirit, that revelation in the Face of Jesus Christ. We ask it in His Name, Amen.

I want to lay the foundation for our meditation in this morning session, the first session of this week, by asking you to turn to several passages of Scripture from the Old Testament and from the New. Beginning in the Book of Genesis at chapter five, verse two, it states:

Male and female created He them, and blessed them, and called their name, man."

Now come over to the New Testament in the First Letter to the Corinthians, chapter fifteen, verses 45-49.

"So also it is written, the first man became a living soul. The last Adam a life-giving Spirit. Howbeit that is not first which is spiritual, but that which is natural; then that which is spiritual. The first man is of the earth, earthy, the second Man is of heaven. As is the earthly, such are they also that are earthly: and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall (or let us) also bear the image of the heavenly."

And then, please, in the Letter to the Colossians, chapter three at verse nine:

"Lie not one to another; seeing that ye have put off the old man with his doing, and have put on the new man, that is being renewed unto knowledge after the image of Him That created him; where there cannot be Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bondman, freeman; but Christ is all, and in all."

And finally, in the Letter to the Hebrews, chapter two at verse five, it says:

"For not unto angels did He subject the world to come, whereof we speak. But one has somewhere testified, saying, 'What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? Or the son of Man, that Thou visitest Him?"

As I have said, in this morning session we are laying the foundation for our meditations. We shall be somewhat general and comprehensive and later work inward to get to the real heart of things, however, first it is necessary for us to have a comprehensive view and vision of what is before us.

I have no doubt that not a few of you who  are here at this time have come with problems, and I find that Christians everywhere the world over are full of problems in our time. If it is not problems about their own spiritual life and themselves (as it is in many cases), it is problems about other Christians; or it is problems about the Church generally and, perhaps, locally. Also, there are problems about the world. These problems are manifold, and they are apt to drain our spiritual life and get us very much locked up and held up in our spiritual progress. It is like that. A lot of Christians are doing that today. They are missing the glory because their eyes are either turned inward or earthward: that is their problem.

You remember when the people of Israel were going over the Jordan into the promised land: the Word to them was this, "You shall set the ark,a space between you and the ark, of two thousand cubits, because you have not passed this way heretofore" (Josh. 3:3, 4 paraphrased). There is a wealth, a mine of profound wisdom, in that simple prescription: "a space of two thousand cubits between you and the ark,  because you have not passed this way heretofore." If you get too close to things, you will lose your perspective and you will lose your way. Do not get too near. Keep things in proportions, in perspective.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 2)