Revelation 2:5 ‘Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place– unless you repent.
To repeat a few things from the previous post, we must understand that the judgment of God comes in spiritual things and that means that His hiding the Gospel of grace alone is a judgment. The Gospel is not just removed by a complete and total taking of it away, but it is also removed by its being distorted which happens by adding or subtracting. Adding to grace or subtracting from grace, regardless of the language used to do so, is still adding to or subtracting from grace.
The glorious Gospel of Jesus Christ and of His perfect and sufficient grace must have no addition and not an iota of subtraction to it. The Gospel is grace from beginning to end, or even from eternity past through eternity future. The work of God in the soul prior to regeneration is also by grace, though this is not stressed in our day. But in the days of Luther and the Puritans that followed, this was stressed. For God to give a person a humble heart, He must break that heart from its pride. For God to unite a soul to Christ, He must break a person from its unity with self and the love of self and pride. God stands against and is opposed to the proud, but He gives grace to the humble. But if humility is something that the flesh and pride of man can work into itself, then that is something man can do that will earn or bring the grace of God and as such it is not His giving grace for grace.
As long as a soul is not delivered from pride and self, it has not been delivered from the slavery of sin. The soul must either deliver itself from pride and self or it must be delivered by grace from pride and self. God will only dwell with the humble and the contrite, so He will only dwell with those who deliver themselves from pride or He will only dwell with those He delivers from pride. This again shows the utter necessity of the work of the Spirit of the living God in the hearts of those that He will bring to true and saving union with Christ which includes true faith. There is no true faith apart from union with Christ and as such there is no such thing as a proud man being in union with Christ. The Lord Jesus does not dwell with the proud, but instead He delivers them from their pride and then comes to dwell in them.
What is surely obvious, then, is that the soul that is still in the grip of pride and self is not a soul that has been saved by Christ. For Christ to save a soul by grace alone, that is, to call a soul by grace alone to a salvation by grace alone, it must be King Jesus by His grace who delivers the soul from pride and self. But in the modern version of “Church” this is not being stressed or taught. For the soul that is in the bondage of self and pride, it is good news that Christ will deliver it from self and pride and will only do that by grace alone. What soul in the bondage of pride can do anything but sin in its pride? What soul that can do nothing but sin in pride will be able to do something so God will show grace to it? Instead of that, it is King Jesus who comes as a Warrior and defeats pride in the soul of those He saves by grace and grace alone.
The Lord Jesus calls sinners to Himself when He says (in Matthew 11):
At that time Jesus said, “I praise You, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that You have hidden these things from the wise and intelligent and have revealed them to infants. 26 “Yes, Father, for this way was well-pleasing in Your sight. 27 “All things have been handed over to Me by My Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father; nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. 28 “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. 29 “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.
We see here that God hides things from the wise and intelligent, but reveals them to infants. We see that no one can knows the Son except the Father and no one knows the Father except the Son, but also anyone to whom the Son wills to reveal Him. Then the text issues the call to the weary and heavy-laden. Those who feel the bondage of their sin and are weary of it Christ calls to Himself and they are the ones that Christ reveals the Father to. But this is by grace and grace alone from beginning to end. Christ reveals the Father by grace but this includes the conviction and weariness of sin. But the proud (wise in their own eyes) He does not reveal these things to and does not even call them. This work of Christ by grace alone must not be neglected. When it is neglected, as it is in the modern day, it is Christ hiding these things from the wise and as such it is a judgment.
God Loves... Himself 
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