THE LOCAL ASSEMBLY
[p. 390] THE LOCAL ASSEMBLY
John 13:34,35; Jude 20 - 23; 1 John 2:20 - 27
JT The brethren will note the word ‘yourselves’ in these verses. What is in mind is that our minds should turn to ourselves, that is, to the local conditions which mark us. There is first the obligation that there should be love amongst ourselves, then ability to keep ourselves; then in John’s epistle, as to the unction which we have and which teaches us among ourselves, in verse 27 it says, “and yourselves” — the word being emphatic; a footnote in this English Translation reads: ‘Personal pronouns, used as the subject of a verb, are normally emphatic in Greek, but in John their use is almost universal. Still, there is some distinctive emphasis here’.
The first passage read comes in at a very momentous time in the history of our Lord. Judas had just gone out from the supper table. He had gone out to betray the Lord — the very opposite of love; he was incapable of love in the true sense. He was marked by love of money which is “the root of every evil” (1 Timothy 6:10), and he was about to sell the Lord Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. But the Lord, instead of mourning for Himself, says: “Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him” — that is moral glory. While Judas was about to betray Him, He was about to die for the glory of God. He speaks of His sufferings elsewhere, but not here. Here, He speaks of being glorified in the work of the cross, and God being glorified in Him. It was the supreme act of love. So He calls the disciples “children” — Judas was not among them now; He would bring them into the current of love, which was flowing in great power. And so it is that in our local meetings — the Lord’s supper brings this before us — the current of divine love normally flows and the Lord would [p. 391] bring us into it on each occasion. The Spirit develops love amongst us; He causes the love of God to be shed abroad in our hearts, and each occasion therefore should deepen the precious current. It was flowing here, and so the Lord says, “A new commandment I give to you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another”.
Rem The chapter begins with the Lord’s love in spite of every circumstance that might arise.
JT The terrible fact is related: “And during supper, the devil having already put it into the heart of Judas son of Simon, Iscariote, that he should deliver him up ...” Satan had found a place in the heart of one of the Lord’s apostles. But the current of love flowed irresistibly. The Lord, having died since, and having gone into heaven, according to the later chapters, sent down the Spirit who maintains this current amongst the saints, but it must be in us. We read indeed of “the love of the Spirit” (Romans 15:30), but the activities of love by the Spirit are in the saints. The current will be weaker or stronger according to the state of the saints. The Lord’s thought here is that there should be a steady permanent quantity of love among the saints.
Ques Has not love an imperative character here — a commandment, and a new commandment?
JT Yes, it has a peculiar force in John; it is not simply that it is another commandment, added to all the rest; it contemplates the Lord’s absence. The old commandment is what they had from the beginning, referring to the flow of love and light and life in the Lord personally. Now that He is to be away, and the Holy Spirit about to come, the new thing is to start in them; so that the presence of love among us during His absence can be relied upon, and thus we are marked off as disciples of His. In John’s epistle the new commandment is said to be “true in him and in you” (1 John 2:8).
[p. 392] Ques Would you say that this is normal but not automatic; there must be exercise in each one of us?
JT What was true in Christ here was true in Him alone until He died and was taken into heaven, but subsequently the Holy Spirit came down to form the same thing in us.
Ques Is that why it is called a new commandment?
JT That is what I thought. We can easily see, I think, that what was true in Christ as Man here, can only be true in us because He died and went to heaven, and the Holy Spirit came down; and not only as the Spirit has come, but as there is exercise to give Him room. There must be enlargement of vessels, and that leads us to consider the widow in 2 Kings 4. She had oil, but was not making use of it, and so it is that many of us have the Spirit, but we do not make use of Him. She was in debt; we are indebted to one another to love each other. It is by the Spirit we discharge our moral obligations. So, as I have suggested, the exercise directed by Elisha implied enlargement of capacity. He said: Get vessels, not a few; and she did, and every vessel was filled. So that the more capacity we have, the more wealth we have; the Spirit will fill all the capacity we give Him.
Rem It is very interesting to see that the Lord says in the chapter we are considering, “As I have loved you, that ye also love one another”. There was no limit to the Lord’s love, and it seems that there is none for the love of the brethren.
JT He was always full of the Holy Spirit. We are to be filled — that is a development.
Rem Thus our special exercise should be to have greater capacity to receive the Spirit, to possess a greater measure of the Spirit; and if we have the Spirit, the normal state will be love.
[p. 393] Rem If we look for love through our own exercises and forget the Spirit, we risk having an imitation of love; comradeship or something of that kind.
JT Love in us is to be love in the Spirit. Returning to the type in 2 Kings 4, the widow was to procure vessels, not a few. Elisha said to her in verse 3, “Let it not be few; and go in, and shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons, and pour out into all those vessels, and set aside what is full. And she went from him, and shut the door upon her and upon her sons; they brought the vessels to her, and she poured out. And it came to pass when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, Bring me yet a vessel. And he said to her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil stayed”. That is, God does not give His Spirit by measure. As the Spirit was in Christ, so He is now in the assembly; so that He fills each of us whatever our capacity may be. The woman told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil, and pay thy debt, and live thou and thy sons on the rest”. So that the clear lesson is that through the exercise that has been alluded to, in self-judgment, the Spirit fills us. We are “by the Spirit”, to “put to death the deeds of the body”, and that makes room for the Spirit.
Ques “There is not a vessel more”. Is that relative to limitations on our side?
JT There was no such limitation on Christ’s side. The woman was to sell the oil — it is a figure, of course — and pay her debts, which means that we love one another, because that is our great indebtedness. (Romans 13:8).
Ques Do you think that the result here flows from obedience to prophetic ministry?
JT Quite so. That brings up the question of prophetic ministry. It helps us to judge ourselves, to make room for the Spirit. As we make room for the Spirit, we make room for love. Thus, as we have [p. 394] love amongst ourselves in any locality, we are always sustained. When the apostle came to speak about gifts in the letter to Corinth, he says, “yet shew I unto you a way of more surpassing excellence” (1 Corinthians 12:31), and that way is the way of love; so that he says, “Love never fails” (chapter 13:8).
Ques Would the pressure of circumstances in which the saints are found give occasion for love one to another, as in the case of Christ?
JT It says in Romans 5:3, “And not only that, but we also boast in tribulations, knowing that tribulation works endurance; and endurance, experience; and experience, hope; and hope, does not make ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”. That is what you have in your mind?
Rem I was thinking that the pressure of circumstances in which the Lord was found was an occasion for the manifestation of such a love.
JT A well-known scripture from Psalm 4:1 comes in here: “In pressure thou hast enlarged me”. In Romans 5 we have the workers that the believer has, such as tribulation; and in chapter 8:28, “all things work together for good to those who love God”.
Ques Do we find in the Song of Songs all the circumstances which contribute to the production of the fruit of love? “Awake, north wind, and come, thou south; blow upon my garden, that the spices thereof may flow forth” (chapter 4:16).
JT Very good. The passage in the book of Jude also brings in this word twice: “But ye, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God”. A note indicates that the verb ‘keep’ is in the aorist tense in Greek, meaning that we are always to be kept in that state. That shows that in the circumstances contemplated in this epistle, love is [p. 395] maintained by prayer in the Holy Spirit. The fact of praying in the Holy Spirit gives a remarkable character to our prayers. Here again we have a current. I have often observed in meetings for prayer, as I have occasion to attend a great many, that our prayers do not go very far afield. Prayers in the Spirit would include all the divine interests, inclusive of course, more particularly of the local interests.
Ques Should we be powerfully held by the thought that Christ has loved the assembly and delivered Himself up for her?
JT Quite so. The whole field of divine interest would be in mind. Jehovah said that His house was to be a house of prayer for all peoples (Isaiah 56:7).
Ques Would this thought of praying in the Holy Spirit be all the more touching because it occurs in a writing which speaks of apostasy?
JT The leading epistles on apostasy make room for the Spirit, especially 2 Thessalonians and this epistle.
Rem It speaks just before, in verse 19, of those “who set themselves apart, natural men, not having the Spirit”.
JT It is what they do in the monasteries and convents; a terrible thought, nauseous to God, separation pretending to be in sanctification, and yet the Spirit not there. So our verse is the antidote to that. The monkish idea must be wholly repudiated by us — any pretension to sanctity without the Holy Spirit. What a word that is for us in the midst of all this darkness: “But ye, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, awaiting the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life”. This verse fits well to the verse in John 13, where we have the new commandment to love one another; here, we keep ourselves in the love of God as praying in the Holy Spirit. The prayer meeting becomes [p. 396] very delightful as answering to this. Many stay away at home on the Monday because they have had a hard day. The meeting for prayer is therefore reduced in value in our eyes. The more we have to do, the more we need the prayer meeting.
Rem Seeing we have here the Holy Spirit, and “your most holy faith”, do we need to be formed in holiness?
JT “Building yourselves up on your most holy faith”, is as if it were basic. I suppose the word ‘faith’ here would include the truth, the doctrine. In verse 3 Jude says: “I have been obliged to write to you exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints”. So that “building yourselves up on your most holy faith” would include a meeting such as the present.
Ques It would not be limited to a meeting like this perhaps; it would be continual?
JT Yes, but it would apply specially to meetings where the truth is before us, with faith inclusive of the truth.
Ques Does it help to refer to Acts 16 where it speaks of the riverside where they were wont to pray, referring to prayer by the Spirit perhaps?
JT The assembly at Philippi was like a tree planted by the riverside; that is, the continuance of prayer maintains freshness — “a tree planted by brooks of water, which giveth its fruit in its season, and whose leaf fadeth not” (Psalm 1:3). Prayer by the river really is the key to the position of Philippi. It involves continual freshness amongst us. So the apostle says to the Philippians that they had fellowship with him in the gospel from the first day till the day on which he wrote.
It is said in Acts 16:16, “And it came to pass as we were going to prayer that a certain female slave, having a spirit of Python, met us”, they were going to prayer, as we might say, to the prayer meeting,
[p. 397] and it is here that they met the satanic opposition, showing how Satan resists the idea of prayer amongst the brethren.
Rem If there is freshness there is also fruit, as in the case of Joseph, who is a “fruitful bough by a well”.
Rem The river is not local; it does not come from, nor stop at, Philippi.
Ques It was women who were assembled by the riverside at Philippi, in Acts 16; what does that suggest?
JT These women give character to the work of God there. Lydia is an outstanding sister, a remarkable subject of the work of God at Philippi.
Ques Would it be the subjective side?
JT Quite so, and in an intelligent way. The apostle speaks about women in the epistle also (chapter 4:2): “I exhort Euodia, and exhort Syntyche, to be of the same mind in the Lord; yea, I ask thee also, true yokefellow, assist them, who have contended along with me in the glad tidings”, — “them” — is feminine, as you will notice, alluding to women.
The passage in John’s epistle stresses the word yourselves as we have already noted. “And yourselves, the unction which ye have received from him abides in you, and ye have not need that any one should teach you; but as the same unction teaches you as to all things, and is true and is not a lie, and even as it has taught you, ye shall abide in him”. This is a word that fits in in view of modernism, and parents do well to take note of it in regard of their children, because the schools teach modernism. The children, of course, must have ordinary instruction. In itself the acquisition of this instruction does not harm them; but destructive principles are introduced today; denying the inspiration of the Scriptures, and denying the truth of what they teach. The children should be protected against these deadly errors.
[p. 398] Rem Sometimes we meet people who say in regard to this passage, “ye have not need that anyone teach you”: ‘I have the Holy Spirit, I do not need the meetings’.
JT That is very unintelligent, and I should suspect an excuse for spiritual laziness. But what is extremely serious is that such an attitude sets aside what God has given in the gifts with which He has provided the assembly.
Ques In such a case there is no place for the teaching which comes to us through those whom the Spirit uses?
JT No indeed. Absenting ourselves from the meetings — the devil is behind it — we are sure to miss something that we will never get again.
Rem We should find the answer in John’s second epistle, written to the elect lady: “I rejoiced greatly that I have found of thy children walking in truth” (verse 4).
Ques Would you say a word as to the anointing, as being different, for instance, from the reception of the Spirit?
JT In verse 20 it is said to be “the unction from the holy one”. It is the Spirit, of course, but more the power and the effect of His presence in teaching.