March 8

NOT TAKEN OUT, BUT KEPT
by Ray Prinzing

"I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil."                                                                                   (John 17:15).

Strangely enough, man is always trying to "get out" of everything, but Jesus did not pray that we would be taken out of the world, He never asked for a rapture for His saints, but that we would be kept from the evil that is in this world's system.  He prayed that we would come through these things victoriously - clean, pure, unblemished.

To be "in" but "not of" is indeed a working of sovereign grace.  To face the allure of the world, but not be captivated by it, bespeaks of the keeping power of God.  We are admonished to "to love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.  If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but it is of the world."  (1 John 2:15-16).  What a divine inworking that can remove the "love of the world" from us, and so fill us with the "love of God" that we seek only to do His will, and be found pleasing unto Him.

While not taken out of the world, once our spirit is quickened to the life of Christ, and we begin to partake of His glory, to be joined unto Him in one spirit, then we are no longer a part of the world, nor controlled by its spirit, and we do not need to operate on its nervous energy.  As far as the world is concerned, "We are dead, and our life is hid with Christ in God."  (Colossians 3:3). Physically, we remain in this world, to endure its travail and to be exercised therein, while we learn to "set our affection on things above."

Because Christendom has not been taught on the "keeping power of God," they have adopted their concepts of escapism - desiring to escape out of their trials, out of the pressures, etc.  But when we realize that Jesus prayed that we would be KEPT from the evil, and that His prayer is effective, we can commit our ways unto Him, and know that we shall come through ever testing, "not somehow, but triumphantly."