Verses 9-11

These are the counsels of God in Christ, and the position of the Church; never before had such wisdom been seen. Man might have been struck with wisdom in the creation; with the interposition of God in the deluge; Noah kept; Abraham called; the law given; other wonders accomplished; the government of God over His Jewish people. In all these the wisdom of God was manifested; but here is a wisdom altogether different. A heavenly Church was not even known to angels.
The Jewish people having rejected the Messiah, God's plan as to the earth was suspended; a new thought is brought in; a people whose position is after such sort that they have no place whatsoever save in heaven. Now God does not punish according to a rule distinctly revealed to man; there is no immediate government of God upon earth, though He still acts in Providence; but there is a people, in suffering it may be, but heavenly, in the midst of the world. God's ways are of a new kind.
It is striking to see what is now the position of the Church set in sight of heaven; it is in the heavenly places she bears witness; her conflicts (Eph. 6) are in the heavens; her blessings are there also (Eph. 1); and it is there again that she is seated (Eph. 2); the witness borne by the Church in the heavenly places, gives importance to the present testimony of the Church down here. I do not here speak in thought of the glory to come; but in thought of God's dwelling in the Church by the Spirit.
Christ came-He was rejected: quite another wisdom was then manifested. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob will be heirs in the glory; but they have not been gathered together in one body in Christ like the Gentiles, according to the purpose of God before the world began. The fact of our election before the world was, adds nothing to the sovereignty of God; if God had elected us in time, his sovereignty would have been the same; but election before Time-before the world was, shows that the Church is NOT of the world, since she was before the foundation of the world in the counsels of God. Neither the position of the Church, nor her life hang upon anything in this world; the world is but the sphere through which she moves.
Verse 12.
This verse is the practical consequence of what has preceded. This position being based upon the love and upon the work of Christ, we are before God with a good conscience; with a conscience perfected forever. I am in Jesus, in the presence of God, by the faith that I have in Him-that is Jesus. Certainly, if I grieve the Spirit, the Spirit will be in me a Spirit of reproof; but Christ has finished all. The work which He has done, is perfectly finished according to the thoughts of God, and he is in His presence according to the efficiency of these thoughts and of this work.