THE IMPROVEMENT OF LOCAL CONDITIONS

A. J. E. Welch

Philippians 3: 12–17; 2 Corinthians 13: 11–14

We know that the Pauline ministry has reference often to what we speak of as local conditions, and we well know that it was a prime concern with this beloved writer, that what we speak of as local conditions might be greatly improved. I need scarcely say that I have no specific locality in mind in speaking of this, but rather to reflect the Lord’s concern that in each of our localities, interest, growth, improvement in every sense, in conditions that He finds there may take place. I speak of this matter, not negatively, and certainly with no inference or reflection on the brethren, but to strengthen them and stimulate us all, that what the Lord finds among us, as He is pleased to come in and take His place among us, may be richer and richer still, as the time of His coming approaches.

Now I begin by speaking of Paul himself, because each of us in this matter has to begin by thinking of himself or herself. God has set me in a certain place; He has set you in a certain place. How am I there? How are you there? What are my objectives? What are your objectives? I believe a real need exists, which I find first in myself, and let each find in himself, to identify the divine objectives. We are not just together as to a certain company of persons, but we are in movement, we are walking, and we are walking together, detail by detail in the same steps. There is no thought of you going one way and me going another, but in the same steps. I would especially appeal to the dear younger ones here to get their objectives clear and settled, and stand to them; because Paul, in this section, refers very significantly to his manifestly deep exercise in this connection, in appealing to the brethren in this love letter as it has often been called. Written to saints in a place where conditions were good; he just has one point to touch as to two sisters that they should be of one mind in the Lord. You might say in the midst of so much of a positive character that he sets forth, what a detail that is, but you know it is a most significant detail, because if two of us get out of step with one another, whoever we be, the enemy has won a point, a fresh and potent attack. Let us heed these things, that Satan may not get in at a time so full of significance spiritually for the people of God. If there be any element of estrangement anywhere, let us see to it, let us get at it; not by staying apart and saying nothing about it, but by getting together and going to the Lord, making room for the Spirit, that every element of estrangement of any kind might be abolished never to appear again.

You may say that is asking a great deal, it is indeed, but it is that which the Lord and the Spirit in the assembly are abundantly equal to; to maintain what relates to the practical united walk of the saints in these closing moments, against which the enemy is so distinctly set.

So he says, “I pursue”, it is a fine expression being used by Paul, who never uses exaggerative expressions. “I pursue”, it is the energy of the man that is referred to. Is there anything outside of Christ, and what is of Christ, that I am pursuing with greater energy than what is of Him? Where are my energies directed? Let each of us ask himself or herself that.

We have a need to attend to matters in righteousness as to our course here, providing things honest before men, under the hand of God, but I am speaking of what I could think of as the prime thing in the application of energy and definiteness in our course.

So he says, “seeing that also I have been taken possession of by Christ Jesus”—“taken possession of by Christ Jesus”. Would we all acknowledge the force of that in respect of ourselves? Is there any other claim that is being sanctioned by us outside of such a claim as

this, “taken possession of by Christ Jesus”? As it is in another place, ye are not your own ye have been bought with a price (see 1 Corinthians 6: 19, 20). Are we shutting Him out in anything? Are we hindering Him of the true power of this possession in which He would hold us? Is there any other will that is governing us but His? Are there any other interests which are being allowed to assert a claim outside of His? These are practical questions, dear brethren, but having a bearing upon what we could speak of as the conditions in the locality, involving persons walking together with a single object, a single, calculated object. I use the word calculated because these matters are not matters to be dismissed in an instant of time.

We need to think about them, we need to calculate as love would calculate, and to reach, as a result of the calculation, that there is no other claim that we can really answer to, than the claim of the Lord Jesus who has taken possession of us for Himself. I would like that every one of us down to the youngest, because I think the youngest here could understand this point, might leave this occasion with some sense of being taken possession of by Christ Jesus, because that is the beginning of so much that is for His pleasure and His glory.

Even the dear writer Paul says, “I do not count to have got possession myself; but one thing—forgetting the things behind, and stretching out to the things before, I pursue”. There are things behind, and there are things before, and love again is to calculate in respect of both; things behind and things before. Am I going back to things behind which I have left? Is there something which is, so to speak, holding me back, hindering energetic application to a glorious testimony to a heavenly Man? Any single thing holding us back in respect of these immense matters? Things behind, and love would calculate thankfully you know, to see that there are things behind and forsake them, finish with them. But there are things before, and when you stop to calculate about the things before, it affects you and

reaches your affections more and more. Christ in glory, the assembly’s place, her true place with Him there; a place in the Father’s house prepared, for which He will soon come that He may take us there; a place now in the assembly, a place in the fellowship of God’s Son, which is that which reflects and holds dear what is near to Christ; things before. Things before, those are the things which have a claim upon us which no mere point of man can touch or infringe; “stretching out to the things before”. You see stretching out is an energetic expression again, it involves the exercise of energy and forcefulness; not the forcefulness of flesh that often comes into expression in different respects, but what I would speak of as forcefulness spiritually. Even the Lord speaks of taking the kingdom by force. And it implies in the course of our way down here that we are definite, positive, energetic in pursuit of things which we regard as supremely precious.

Well, dear brethren, I know very well how easily we slip away from this; how easily we squander our time on things that are not worthy of having time put upon them. How many an opportunity we miss of getting in some respect into the heavenly order of things, and taking on from Christ, and in the Spirit, that which is of abiding and eternal value. Let us calculate, and be definite, not slipping on from day to day casually, it is so easy to do that as I find; Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday; the days come, there is work to be done, meetings to be attended, thank God for every one of them, but you just go on. But single out by what I might call spiritual calculation what your objective really is and rate it alongside Paul’s objective. You say, Yes, Paul was an apostle; he was indeed, but notice particularly that as he begins this epistle he does not speak of himself as an apostle, he rather presents the truth in relation to himself, not by the assertion of apostolic authority, but by the true measure of the man himself in divine things. Well, what is our measure in divine things? Whatever it is God would increase it,

there is no doubt about that. I do not necessarily speak of gift, but of spiritual stature, capacity to embrace and continue in faithfulness the divine interests in all their preciousness.

I am not speaking just of gift although gift may be included. God would increase our measure. I believe in the way he sets things forth here, the beloved apostle is clarifying things; searching out things, challenging us, bringing himself forward rightly under the Spirit as a pattern, a model in respect of things, so that we can measure up where we stand in reference to Paul. We get, so to say, a basis just of calculation, to what extent have I taken on the Pauline objectives. You see you can take on the Pauline objectives, even although you may not become of Pauline measure, you can take on the Pauline objectives, as he sets them before us here. He says, “I pursue, looking towards the goal, for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus. As many therefore as are perfect, let us be thus minded”—“let us be thus minded”. If we claim to be of any stature, especially if we imply what he speaks of as perfection, how do we manifest it, as .he says, “let us be thus minded”? How am I minded in these things? How we are minded is not always in expression in the practical things that we do. We undertake things sometimes and our mind is not fully in them. How are we minded, dear brethren? Are we minded in any sense away from the divine objectives which are set before us so feelingly here? “Let us”, he says, “be thus minded; and if ye are any otherwise minded, this also God shall reveal to you”. So we can get to God about this. He will make it clear to us, to clarify just what these objectives of ours are. You may think I am pressing this very hard and I realize that I am, but I believe it to be a basic matter. If the course of things in any local assembly is to be marked by prosperity, the persons are thus minded, are not minded in any other sense, because the prosperity of the local assembly depends upon me in some sense, and in some measure; it depends on others too, but let me not abrogate my responsibility for the prosperity of the local assembly in which, under God’s hand, I have been set.

So he says further, “But whereto we have attained, let us walk in the same steps”—“let us walk in the same steps”—meaning that we are concerned just to move together; that I move with you and you move with me, but we move together, and that we bring this down, so to speak, each one to himself or herself, moving together. It is not an authoritatively enjoined oneness; authority enters into it in reference to the truth, but we are moving together because we have, as wrought upon by God, and as taken possession of by Christ Jesus, the same objectives, and we are moving together and we may strive together to so walk. “Be imitators all together of me, brethren”. That is the introduction again of the “all together”—“Be imitators all together of me”. As if at every point in this remarkable appeal he is seeking to bind the saints into one, to maintain constantly the concern that we move together in what is so precious, because if we move rightly in it we shall move together, it must be so, the truth involves that, but he says, “fix your eyes on those walking thus as you have us for a model”.

We have someone on whom to fix our gaze. You think of the beloved apostle Paul, not just in reference to his authority as an apostle, but his measure as a man, and you say, O, to be in the same steps as Paul! O, to have the same objectives as Paul! And you can, the measure may be another matter, the measure of the man shines out remarkably in this whole epistle, the measure of the writer in spiritual things. Who of us would attain to that measure? We are challenged, but as to the objectives, you can have just the same objectives as Paul had, as they are set out here.

If you think of a local assembly, such as the assembly at Corinth, you can have the same objectives as Paul had. You remember what he says towards the end of the second letter, “for I have espoused you unto one man, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ”, 2 Corinthians 11; 2. Now that is Paul’s objective in respect of a local assembly, one which was not in a sense his local assembly, in the same way in which you or I have a local relationship and responsibility, but his concern was “to present ... a chaste virgin to Christ”. Are we thinking of anything less in respect of any local company of saints anywhere in the world? What are our objectives, dear brethren, for the testimony in general, and the course of what God has effected in these times of reviving? Are we content to see any of it lapse? Are we content to see anything die out? Are we content if conditions in local companies do not improve? I would just remind myself and all of us of that very brief, but peculiarly potent word of the beloved writer of 2 Corinthians, “I have espoused you to one man, to present you”, not to present the saints in general, but “to present you a chaste virgin to Christ”.

Well, beloved brethren, if we have these objectives we shall apprehend that remarkable word of blessing at the end of the second letter to the saints in Corinth which I read in closing, and I refer but briefly to it. Think of the divisions that had existed in that city, depicted as they are sufficiently in the first letter; not to make much of evil, but just to show the simple facts of the situation presented clearly and concisely. Paul would not allow that to stay there; Paul was not content that such a condition should continue, and he labours, and labours, and labours. How little we know of labour of the true Pauline quality and character. I would say it for myself anyway. The way he laboured over those saints at Corinth, and you see something can be accomplished, under God’s hand, by dependent labour in His interests. Someone said to me, Those epistles are apostolic and rare. They are apostolic, of course, but they set out divine principles, and they show how God came into a critical situation, and God is not changed in His ability to come into a critical situation. He can do that, but He would have us with Him in the sense of committed and devoted labour.

How remarkably the beloved apostle, under the Spirit’s touch, opens up the truth in these two letters. It is a wonderful thing to try to get a view of the epistles to Corinth as a whole, and see the extent of positive truth that is opened up in them, and yet in the midst of it all the searching touches which dig right to the roots of the situation in Corinth, and bring about a change. The Spirit of God makes it plain to us in the second letter because there had been brought about a change, and he makes it pretty plain to us that the second letter would still bring about yet further change, and that the Lord would effect something of remarkable extent at Corinth. What ground is covered in the teaching of these epistles! Can we cover ground in the truth, and set the truth in its right relation to matters that arise? What a challenge that is, and yet the scripture gives us every encouragement; the Spirit of God in this scripture gives us every encouragement that whatever condition we may encounter, the Spirit of God is equal to it, and He would have us just to take it up in the way that He Himself would intimate, in the labour of love. I am not speaking of administration, I am speaking of labour, and we can labour towards, and among the dear brethren, anywhere where the testimony rightly is, and the fellowship is rightly maintained; we can labour, and labour, and labour. That is what so often tests us. This is what challenged Paul in Corinth and he rose above the challenge in his labour there in the place, and then the remarkable character and power of these two epistles, he applies himself in the sense of labour to the conditions in that city. He had his own secret with the Lord about it; the Lord had said to him at the beginning,

‘I have much people in this city’, and I suppose Paul often went back to that in his considerations; what the Lord had in that city. Such touches give us every encouragement to go forward in view of the prosperity of local assemblies, in view of conditions being found in local companies of saints delightful to Christ, where He can come.

So the word is, “For the rest, brethren, rejoice”; these are not matters to be disheartened about. There are matters yet that call for attention, as he indicates in the later chapters, but he says “rejoice”. We are in touch with the great spring and source of all that is necessary to keep things pleasurable to the heart of God—“rejoice; be perfected”; that is to say, do not be content with any lower standard than Christ. “Be encouraged; be of one mind; be at peace”, He is addressing himself now to all the brethren, “be of one mind; be at peace”. That would come home to every true hearted brother and sister as this letter was read in Corinth—“be of one mind; be at peace”. Involving, of course, that these are not unattainable objectives; you do not have such in the divine realm, you do in the human realm, but not in the divine realm—“be of one mind; be at peace”. Let us strive, dear brethren, after these things—“and the God of love and peace shall be with you. Salute one another with a holy kiss”. Shutting out what are merely social links, “a holy kiss”; involving mutual affections which are according to the truth and in the Lord, “a holy kiss. All the saints salute you. The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, be with you all”. He does not allow one to be omitted—“be with you all”.

He ends on a note of blessing, and God would end a meeting like this on a note of blessing, that is to say, great things are in view, prosperity is in view; what is pleasing to God is in view. How the enemy would fill our minds with negative things. The Spirit of God in a passage like this gives us every encouragement to go forward energetically and with clear objectives until the Lord come. May this indeed eventuate in this very company for His name’s sake.

Address at Dundee
8 September 1979