The First Place

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 5, 1908

THE place which the Son of God occupies in the administration of the divine government is thus stated: “He is before all things, and in him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead; that in all things he might have the pre-eminence.” This is not by arbitrary appointment, but the outgrowth of the very nature and being of the Son, and of his relationship to the eternal Father. As the Son was one with the Father, as he was the only begotten, and as he was thus able to enter into the counsels of his Father as no created being could possibly do, so he was necessarily the one through whom the Father made every revelation of himself. Christ was the beginning of his way, the mediator between the Father and all created things and all created beings. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him; and without him was not anything made that hath been made.” As it was in creation, so it was in revelation. “All things have been delivered unto me of my Father,” said Jesus, “and no one knoweth the Son, save the Father; neither doth any know the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son willeth to reveal him.”

It was in harmony with the plan of the divine government, and in harmony with the very constitution of things, that the eternal Son should be accorded this first place by all created intelligences, who would thus show themselves to be submissive to the will of God, loyal to the government of heaven. It was the unholy ambition of Lucifer, a “covering cherub,” to seek for and to demand for himself the place which belonged to, and could be filled only by, the Son; and it was this same unholy ambition for self-exaltation, which, transferred to this earth, brought sin and death and all the train of evils upon the human family. The root out of which every sin has grown, and the very essence of every sin, is the dethronement of the Son of God and the putting of the creature in the place of the Creator. Lucifer made no concealment of this purpose: “I will exalt my throne above the stars of God; . . . I will make myself like the Most High.” The “man of sin,” the personified “mystery of iniquity,” “exalteth himself against all that is called God or that is worshiped,” and claims for himself the title, “the vicegerent of the Son of God.”

The same principle is wrought out in the experience of every one who does not yield to the claims which Christ has upon him, and become a Christian. He is denying to Christ the place which belongs to him. To accept Christ is to give to him the place of power in our lives, to crown him as King, and to yield obedience to his rule. The whole question centers in the kingship of Christ, and that not merely in outward things like an earthly ruler, but his spiritual rule in the heart through the submission of the whole being unto him. It is the “gospel of the kingdom” which is to be proclaimed in all the world for a witness. Now the King sits as a priest on his throne, but soon he will reveal himself as the King of those who reign as kings and the Lord of those who rule as lords. We must acknowledge his kingship now, although he is despised and rejected by many, if we desire him to acknowledge us as his subjects in “the crowning day.” Listen to the words of the King: “Whosoever shall be ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of man also shall be ashamed of him, when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” Who can refuse to give the first place to Jesus, the Son of man and the Son of God?