Page 254 - NOTES ON EZEKIEL

248 NOTES ON EZEKIEL.
place and season. They are but beggarly elements
now if taken literally, whatever spiritual instruction
they furnish, as they undoubtedly may and do.
All turns on Christ. If He is known to faith while
He is on high on the Father’s throne, a heavenly re­
lationship is formed; and “ as is the heavenly, such are
they also that are heavenly.” But when He is mani­
fested in glory and takes the earth, there will be a
corresponding change in the relative place of His
people. They will be no longer heavenly but eartlily;
and the Holy Spirit will not form them into the one body
of a heavenly Head, but place them as Israel and the
nations in their due positions, and of course, distinct;
though the old enmity and jealous alienation shall have
passed away under the reign of Him whom all own as
Jehovah, king over the whole earth. Hence also
earthly distinctions as priests and Levites, with the
other features of an earthly worship, are again set up
according to the will of God, instead of a commonplace
of heavenly nearness in Christians as now.