Col. 1: 9, 10 gathers up these factors into one prayer, and leads on to the goal

expressed in the opening words of Eph. 1: 17. "For this cause we also, since the day we

heard (heard what? Their faith, their love, their hope, their fruit--all that had been

prayed for in Eph. 1:; 3:; and Phil. 1:), do not cease to pray for you" (What! is there

something more? Had they not yet reached the goal? No!), "that ye may be filled with

the full knowledge of His will, with all wisdom and spiritual understanding to walk

worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing; in every work bringing forth good fruit, and

increasing (or growing up) to the knowledge of God". Some texts read, "increasing unto

the knowledge of God", and it is difficult to decide the question, but in either case the

truth remains, that all the knowledge of His will to which we attain in this life, all the

increasing worthiness of our walk, all the fruitfulness of all our good works is after all a

growth, an increase, a preparation to the one great and glorious goal, THE

KNOWLEDGE OF GOD. We know God now, mediately, but then face to face. Our

highest good during this life is fund in the recognition of this fact: during the pilgrimage,

the discipline, and the probation of this life we make it our chief concern to know Christ.

"That I may know Him" should be the desire of our hearts. To know the

knowledge-surpassing love of Christ, to know the power of His resurrection, to know the

Son of God, this is the knowledge for the time now present. This mediatorial knowledge

leads on to the next and fullest, to know God. One has only to read the creeds of

Christendom to see to what absurdities truly godly men may descend in their endeavour

to explain the invisible God. For the present, Christ is All and in all; in the future, God

will be All and in all. If ever the reader has thought about the occupation of the

redeemed in glory, here is an answer that reaches out to boundless infinity--they will

then begin to know God.

Let us accept the teaching of the Word instead of wasting precious time and

opportunity on that which is beyond our scope; let us learn the appointed lessons now

that we may the better learn the lesson then.

With what zest and earnestness shall we seek the knowledge of Christ and His love,

the knowledge of the hope of His calling, and the glory of His inheritance if we realize

the object with which those lessons have been set, viz., with a view to a future knowledge

of GOD.

The knowledge of the Son of God leads on to the condition of perfection, and then,

and not till then will the strong meat be allowed us.

To go beyond the appointed lesson of life is to be swayed by an unspiritual curiosity.

True yearning to know God will bow before His appointments, and will realize that as in

redemption and salvation, so with the knowledge of God, the Saviour can say, "No man

cometh unto the Father, but by Me".