,
He will bear it with you, for if so be that we suffer with Him, He
suffers with us, and our oneness with Christ brings about a community
of possessions whereby it becomes true of each trusting soul in its
relations to Him, that 'all mine (joys and sorrows alike) are thine,
and all thine are mine.' II. There remain some other considerations
which may be briefly stated, in order to complete the lessons of this
text. In the second place, this community of suffering is a necessary
preparation for the community of glory.

I name this principally for the sake of putting in a caution. The
Apostle does not mean to tell us, of course, that if there were such
a case as that of a man becoming a son of God, and having no occasion
or opportunity afterwards, by brevity of life or other causes, for
passing through the discipline of sorrow, his inheritance would be
forfeited. We must always take such passages as this--which seem to
make the discipline of the world an essential part of the preparing
of us for glory--in conjunction with the other undeniable truth which
completes them, that when a man has the love of God in his heart,
however feebly, however newly, there and then he is fit for the
inheritance. I think that Christian people make vast mistakes
sometimes in talking about 'being made meet for the inheritance of
the saints in light,' about being 'ripe for glory,' and the like. One
thing at any rate is very certain, it is not the discipline that
fits. That which fits goes before the discipline, and the discipline
only develops the fitness. 'God hath made us meet for the inheritance
of the saints in light,' says the Apostle. That is a past act. The
preparedness for heaven comes at the moment--if it be a momentary
act--when a man turns to Christ. You may take the lowest and most
abandoned form of human character, and in one moment (it is possible,
and it is often the case) the entrance into that soul of the feeble
germ of that new affection shall at once change the whole moral
habitude of that man. Though it be true, then, that heaven is only
open to those who are capable--by holy aspirations and divine
desires--of entering into it, it is equally true that such
aspirations and desires may be the work of an instant, and may be
superinduced in a moment in a heart the most debased and the most
degraded. 'This day shalt thou be with Me in Paradise,'--_fit_ for
the inheritance!

And, therefore, let us not misunderstand such words