“And they shall abide.”

“And he shall stand and feed in the strength of the LORD, in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God; and they shall abide: for now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth.” (Micah 5:4)

In his resurrection-power, in his ascension-glory, and in his indisputable session at God’s right hand, he stands! Divine decrees remain irrevocable! Divine prophecies are fulfilled! Divine promises are performed! — “He shall stand!” This concerns not the posture of his person, but the permanence of his place. What Divine, unerring certainty we have here. There is no fear of failure in any one of Jehovah’s plans or purposes. — “He shall stand,” not fall, but stand and never waver.

What is the sure and certain result of the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ “shall stand and feed in the strength of the Lord”? — “And they shall abide.” O glorious security! Not one shall perish. None can pluck the weakest believer from his omnipotent embrace. All the hosts of hell and earth combined shall never separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord!

Because he stands “in the majesty of the name of the LORD his God; … they” (all his people, all that elect remnant that comes to him) “they shall abide!” The scattered ones who are gathered shall, not may, but shall abide.

“When the foe desired to have me, Jesus said, ‘This sheep is Mine!’

He resigned His life to save me: Jesus, what a love is Thine!

All resistless is its force. Nothing can withstand its course.”

“They shall abide” on his loving heart, in his affectionate embrace, on his glorious throne, amidst the wreck of matter and the crush of worlds. — “They shall abide,” members of his body, never to be severed from him whom they love, because he first loved them. — “They shall abide” as the bride of his heart never to be divorced by him, never allowed to leave him, and ever indulged with the sweet kisses of his mouth.

Then comes the glorious climax of this precious prophecy concerning Zion’s King and Lord, “for now shall he be great unto the ends of the earth.” In these words we have a glorious description of him whose goings forth have been from everlasting, and shall be to everlasting in the salvation, glorification, and blessedness of his people.

O troubled and tried ones, “tossed with tempest and not comforted,” whom Satan delights to worry and assail with malicious glee, he may taunt and accuse you, insinuating that your hope is the hope of the hypocrite, that your faith is no better than his own, that your love, faint as it is, is all a delusion. Still he who from the mountain-top sees your distress will run to your relief and cause you to know his grace and power in the experience of your soul. The day and the night are both alike to him. He will cause his light to shine upon you, and his secret to rest upon your tabernacle, enabling you to rejoice in the blessed fact that the days shall soon be accomplished when, “Thy sun shall no more go down; neither shall thy moon withdraw itself: for the Lord shall be thine everlasting Light, and the days of thy mourning shall be ended” (Isaiah 60:20).

Don Fortner

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