But let us observe here that our wisdom and prudence lie in the knowledge of God's will. Truth is not to be found in any system of logical notions, in schemes and syntheses of the laws of nature or of thought. The human mind can never rest for long in abstractions. It will not accept for its basis of thought that which is less real and positive than itself. By its rational instincts it is compelled to seek a Reason and a Conscience at the centre of things,--a living God. It craves to know _the mystery of His will_.
III. Verse 11 fills up the measure of the bestowment of grace on sinful men. The present anticipates the future; faith and love are lifted to a glorious hope. "In whom also--_i.e._, in Christ--_we received our heritage_, predestinated [to it], according to His purpose who works all things according to the counsel of His will."
Following Meyer and other great interpreters, we prefer in this passage the rendering of the English Authorized Version (_we obtained an inheritance_) to that of the Revised (_we were made a heritage_).[39] "Foreordained" carries us back to verse 5--to the phrase "foreordained to sonship." The believer cannot be predestinated to sonship without being predestinated to an inheritance.[40] "If children, then heirs" (Rom. viii. 17). But while in the parallel passage we are designated heirs _with_ Christ, we appear in this place, according to the tenor of the context, as heirs _in_ Him. Christ is Himself the believer's wealth, both in possession and hope: all his desire is to gain Christ (Phil. iii. 8). The apostle gives thanks here in the same strain as in Colossians i. 12-14, "to the Father who qualified us [by making us His sons] to partake of the inheritance of the saints in the light." In that thanksgiving we observe the same connexion as in this between our _forgiveness_ (ver. 7) and our _enfeoffment_, or investment with the forfeited rights of sons of God (vv. 5, 11).[41]
The heritage of the saints in Christ is theirs already, by actual investiture. The liberty of sons of God, access to the Father, the treasures of Christ's wisdom and knowledge, the sanctifying Spirit and the moral strength and joy that He imparts, these form a rich estate of which ancient saints had but foretastes and promises. In the all-controlling "counsel of His will," God wrought throughout the course of history to convey this heritage to us. We are children of "the fulness of the times," heirs of all the past. For us God has been working from eternity. On us the ends of the world have come. Thus from the summit of our exaltation in Christ the apostle looks backward to the beginning of Divine history.
From the same point his gaze sweeps onward to the end. God's purpose embraces the ages to come with those that are past. His working will not cease till the whole counsel is fulfilled. What we have of our inheritance, though rich and real, holds in it the promise of infinitely more; and the Holy Spirit is the "earnest of our inheritance" (ver. 14). God intends "that we should be to the praise of His glory." As things are, His glory is but obscurely visible in His saints. "It doth not yet appear what we shall be,"--and it will not appear until the unveiling of the sons of God (Rom. viii. 18-25). One day God's glory in us will burst forth in its splendour. All beholders in heaven and earth will then sing _to the praise of His glory_, when it is seen in His redeemed and godlike sons.
* * * * *
Verses 9 and 10 (_which He purposed ... upon the earth_) are, as we have said, a parenthesis or episode in the passage just reviewed. Neither in structure nor in sense would the paragraph be defective, had this clause been wanting. With the "in Him" repeated at the end of verse 10, St Paul resumes the main current of his thanksgiving, arrested for a moment while he dwells on "the mystery of God's will."