The name which rescues and which brings together

"Save us, O LORD our God ! and gather us from among the nations, that we may celebrate your holy name, and glory in thy praise." Psalm 106. 47

This verse applies prophetically when the twelve tribes of Israel are all delivered from the yoke of the nations and brought back to their land to live there as brothers united together (Ps 133: 1). But can the people of God today, composed of the true Christians, apply it also by recognizing the full power of the name of Jesus, both to save and to gather his own ?

"To save," for there is not under heaven any other name given among men, by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12).

- To gather together, since the Lord Jesus promised : "Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there in the midst of them" (Matt 18:20).

"Save us ... bring us together" ; the order in which we are given these two verbs emphasizes that the name of Jesus can gather only the people saved by him. He said it in a parable : "I leave my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this enclosure ; I must bring them, too ; they will listen to my voice and there will be one flock, one shepherd" (John 10:16).

Caiaphas, the high priest, prophesied nothing else when he proposed to put Jesus to death ! As to the importance of this death, he spoke words of which he did not know the weight : "... it is to our advantage that one man die for the people, and the whole nation should not perish. But he does not say that of himself ; but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation, not only for the nation, but also to gather together the scattered children of God." (John 11: 50-52).

The day of our "gathering with him" is yet to come (2 Thes. 2: 1). That day, "the dead in Christ will rise in the first place; then we, the remaining living, shall be taken together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air" (1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17).

It will be the same for its earthly people at the dawn of the millennial reign (Mark 13:26, 27).

Wonderful gathering in one, for which Christ must have died !

Source (To pleasing the Lord)