JOHN 16
FER It is evident that, in the mind of the Lord, it was the Jew who was going to turn persecutor. “The time cometh that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service”. Paul was a pretty good expression of it. Then He goes on, “These things will they do unto you” — not because they have not known God, but because “they have not known the Father, nor me”. Anyone instructed in the knowledge of the Father and the Son could never turn persecutor, and if a man is a persecutor it means this much, he does not know the Father or the Son.
Ques They had the knowledge of God, I suppose, in a way, under law; there was a way in which God had made Himself known as under law, and they could persecute as knowing God in that way?
FER I think they had become legal; the effect of the law was to make men legal, if they took it up in the mere letter of it — the outward thing.
Rem And a legal man always persecutes.
FER The legal man to my mind is a man who covers up a strong will under a cloak of religiousness. You will find a great deal of that about now. The most curious thing is that people make the greatest mistakes about will; people mistake will in a mechanical sense, for will in a moral sense. You see people who, in a kind of way, will scarcely lift their fingers, who will scarcely exert themselves in any way; even, for instance, in their way of singing, some people will scarcely move themselves even in that, and they think that they are in that way practically setting their will aside. They are mistaking will in a mechanical sense, for will in a moral sense. In one sense, I cannot lift my hand without an exertion of my will, but there is nothing moral about that.
Rem Only the knowledge of grace can really set [p. 339] will aside.
FER Yes; grace practically teaches us that; if you have light from God, you see that the will of man has brought nothing but confusion into the world, it all ends in confusion, so the best thing possible is that the will of man should be set aside. If place is given to the will of man, you see there are so many of us, and it is not likely that you could get all those wills in accord. Take the history of nations, for example, think of all the different wills at work there; but then all these different wills only bring confusion into the world! So grace comes in to set aside the will of man, and to subjugate man to God.
Rem I suppose it is man’s will today that creates all the confusion in the world?
FER Yes; the spirit of disobedience already works; lawlessness, and all that kind of thing, is there, but covered up by a very fair exterior of voluntary humility; but then that is only, after all, the result of strength of will and purpose; it is unsubdued will covered up by fair exterior. Man’s will, of course, is legal.
Ques And man’s will is the very principle of sin?
FER Yes; it is lawlessness.
Ques Would you call the man legal who troubles about weeks and days?
FER Yes, I think so; he would not be very particular about days and weeks if he saw that grace had set aside the man. You see, grace works to set you free of the man that was obnoxious to God; now if grace is effective in you, you get rid of that man; and days and weeks are, after all, only connected with that man — the great point is to get rid of that man.
Ques They are really occupied with making fallen man better?
FER Yes.
Ques All this has to begin at home, I suppose you [p. 340] would say?
FER Well, that is always a perfectly safe place to begin.
Ques Was it this that spoiled the Galatians, do you think?
FER Yes; certainly their wills were not at all in accord; but, if you think of it, it is very striking what the apostle says to them, “before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you” — they had had a very full testimony of the cross, but then apparently the testimony had not become effective in them, they were prepared to allow the man who had been removed for God in the cross; because, if that man was gone, it is evident he did not want to be circumcised. Circumcision is the putting off the body of the flesh, that is, you come back to your baptism; but then baptism is burial, and if a man is buried there is no object in circumcising him.
Ques They were wrapped up in legality?
FER I think it was that they were trying to run with the world, it was trying to get rid of the offence of the cross, and that was, in a sense, running with the world.
Ques And was it so too with the Colossians?
FER Not exactly; I do not think it was the world that was the snare to them. Now with the Corinthians, and the Galatians too, it was the world; it was the world in its wanton form with the Corinthians, and in its religious form with the Galatians. But with the Colossians it was not that, it was more reason and imagination, and that is the great snare in the present day, I believe.
Rem Where it says, “Touch not; taste not; handle not”?
FER Yes; all that is connected with asceticism; but, you see, their imagination was also at work, they were intruding into those things which they had not seen, and their reason was at work, they were to beware [p. 341] lest any spoiled them through philosophy and vain deceit.
Ques And in all three cases it was a question of will?
FER Yes, it was all will.
Rem So that in presenting Christ crucified to souls, you have to look that it may become effective in those you seek to teach?
FER Yes; that is the teaching of grace. The cross is the full expression of the grace of God; but then the grace has to become effective in each one of us, it has got to teach us. “The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us” — it hath appeared, that is, in the cross; but then it says, “teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts” — well, that is the man that is gone; and then it goes on, “we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world”. That goes on to Christ.
Ques And that was done at the start?
FER Quite so; you could not put righteousness and sobriety on the first man at all; it is the practical bringing in of Christ, we walk as He walked — as He walked as a Man down here.
Ques And to have these three things you must displace self?
FER Yes, quite so. You have to come back to your baptism.
Rem Do you not see it in the woman in chapter 4 — you have had the Lamb of God, and then the One lifted up, and then in chapter 4 you get the woman in whom grace had become effective?
FER Yes, I think so; you see there the grace that practically emancipates a person from the control of sin. I will give you a verse that makes it plain: “That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life” — the grace is established in a person, in the individual.
[p. 342] It is established in a Christian in the power of the Holy Spirit, and it takes complete possession of him — it reigns. Well then, what is “through righteousness”? Why, the man that is obnoxious to God has gone in the cross, and the water that Christ gives is a well of water that springs up to eternal life. That is the reign of grace in the individual. It is “righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit”.
Ques And the object is to bring you to eternal life?
FER Yes; to lead you from the responsible man to Christ; from the first man to the Second.
Ques And that is why you say the kingdom subsists for our blessing?
FER Quite so. “God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in his Son”, that is the point you want to get to. I made the remark the other day, I dare say all did not understand it, that eternal life is presented in Scripture objectively, because it is always presented to us in another Man, and that other Man is the expression of it. He is “the true God, and eternal life”. That is an objective idea, not a subjective one.
Rem Objective, because it is entirely outside ourselves?
FER Outside ourselves, and in another Man, and we have to find it in Him.
Ques What is the difference of idea between “through our Lord Jesus Christ” in Romans 5, and “eternal life in Christ Jesus” at the end of Romans 6?
FER It is grace in chapter 5, that grace might reign; but then, in the next chapter, it is “The wages of sin is death; but the act of favour of God, eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” — there again the thought is objective, it is the gift of God, eternal life in Christ Jesus.
Ques In the one chapter it is what is administered through Jesus Christ, and in the next chapter it is positional, it [p. 343] is in Jesus Christ?
FER Yes; in chapter 5 He is the great Administrator, grace reigns through Him. To my mind, everything connected with the kingdom is most beautiful — I mean the process of grace, and the acting of grace in the Lord Jesus, the nurture and admonition of the Lord — that is, the teaching of the Lord. Then you are to carry out the same thing in regard of your children, but you cannot do that if you do not understand for yourself the nurture and admonition of the Lord. It is all with a view to the practically setting aside in you of what has been set aside for God; that is the working and object of the nurture and admonition of the Lord — He will practically set aside in you what has been judged in the cross for God; you come under His nurture and discipline.
Rem One can see in that way how very important is the truth of the kingdom.
FER Yes; the working of it is to bring you to eternal life, it is “unto eternal life”, that is grace. I think it is most beautiful to be under grace; wherever you have grace at work it has nothing but your benefit in view; of course it is all according to God, and to bring you into power.
Ques And into deliverance from sin?
FER Yes, practically; it is to bring about in you the removal of the man that is removed for God — and that is eternal life.
Ques Was it not always God’s purpose to set man free from sin?
FER Yes; but it all has to be made good in us individually as believers; and the great point down here in this world is to be free from the domination of sin; it is all new creation.
Rem I was thinking of how Peter in the beginning of the Acts says, “God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in turning away every one of you from his iniquities”, as if that was God’[p. 344] s purpose.
FER Yes; and you get again, “This is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins”, Romans 11: 27. It is all on the same line.
A point that has struck me very much in thinking of the death and resurrection of Christ is that, speaking of man generally, he is not affected by sin — I mean not painfully affected by sin, he likes it. As to the sin itself, he may, of course, have to suffer for the indulgence of it, but it is not the sin itself that painfully affects him, it is not that that makes him suffer. Now to God sin is obnoxious in itself; and sin must go, and in the death of Christ, not only sin but the man himself went in judgment. Now what you can often affect men by is death and judgment, but you do not see all that met in the death of Christ, but in the resurrection. God removed first that which was obnoxious to Himself, and, in the resurrection of Christ, He dealt with that by which man is affected, death and the fear of judgment; and then grace comes in to practically set aside in us what has been removed for God, both sin and the man. It is that which really brings deliverance.
Ques What would you say is the difference between righteousness and reconciliation?
FER Well, I think reconciliation is based on righteousness; reconciliation indicates that the distance is gone, but it is gone in righteousness. Righteousness brings in the truth that man is gone judicially, he has been removed in sacrifice, it is the sacrifice that testifies to the righteousness. The man is removed and reconciliation is effected but according to righteousness.
Rem You see how the two are connected in 2 Corinthians 5, do you not?
FER Yes; the ministry of reconciliation there is connected with that, “Be ye reconciled to God. For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”.
[p. 345] Now, I think, returning to our chapter, it is pretty plain that if a man does not accept the light of the Father and the Son, the tendency with him will be to turn persecutor, and with the religious man too.
Ques How would you explain it?
FER Well, the purpose of God is abhorrent to man, as you know, and the thought of “the Father and the Son” does not exactly bring in the thought of blessing to the world, as such; it comes in really to conduct man out of the world. I do not think “the Father and the Son” is quite the same idea as in Almighty and Jehovah, names in connection with man, or a people here upon earth.
Rem When it is a question of going out of the world, they come out of God’s house and say, “Go up, thou bald head” — that is what we see in connection with Elisha.
FER Yes; and I think you must see that the revelation of the love of God is in the Son, you must have the Father and the Son — it is in the Son that the love of God comes out. It indicates the sovereignty of love. The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world, but love will take its own way of carrying this into effect.
Ques In a certain sense the world lost its Saviour?
FER I think it did. The whole gospel of John is written on the line of the Father and the Son. It begins with it, and all through John it is the activity of love that comes out. You see the Father and the Son, as the Lord says, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him” — it is the activity of love down here; but at the same time, if there is the activity of love, there is the sovereignty of love, too. It is illustrated in the words, “Jacob have I loved”. Man naturally dislikes and refuses the idea of the sovereignty of God’s love.
Rem It was not because there was anything more in Jacob than in Esau that God [p. 346] loved him.
FER I do not think so; it just expresses the sovereignty of God; Jacob’s ways and character were just as repugnant to God as were Esau’s. As a matter of fact, Esau was the more manly of the two, as men think.
Ques When you come to the Father and the Son, you could only have a witness of love?
FER Yes, I think so.
Ques Must righteousness therefore be settled before you can touch this point?
FER Yes, I think so.
Ques God’s righteousness in that way was as much for Esau as for Jacob, but not His love.
FER Quite so. You do not get the love of God coming out until Romans 5, and yet His righteousness has been shown to be towards all; and His power too, in a sense; but you do not get His love until chapter 5. The first mention of love, as far as I know, is when it says, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given unto us”.
Rem The love of God is made known to people, but they will not be judged by it.
FER No. Grace brings salvation to all men, but I could not exactly speak of the love of God being in that way towards all men. The Jew was in a peculiar position given to him of God; he had the benefit of a great deal of light; he had the oracles of God, and a very great deal of light from God; but then the point is that the Son came, and would he accept that?
Rem Had he allowed that, it must have set him aside, and he refused it.
FER I think that was it. “Men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil”. “But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God”.
[p. 347] Rem It is only a man who does that who comes to the light.
FER Yes; only a man who does truth. You see that the revelation came first to the Jew and he was tested by it; Christ was presented to the Jew with abundant proof that He was the Son of God. He did the Father’s works and spoke the Father’s word, and it was not a question as to whether the Jew could understand Him entirely, but was he affected by the revelation? There was plenty to affect them, even people who did not understand Him at all, there was the evidence of His works, there was no harshness or anything of that kind.
Rem It says they “wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth”.
FER Yes; the Lord would not have condemned them for not understanding, but the thing was they were not themselves affected.
Ques The disciples themselves did not understand Him much?
FER No, very little; and yet you see how the Lord attributes to them a very great deal more than was apparent.
Ques Then He told them all these things in order that they might not be affected when they came?
FER Yes; you see the very people they had looked up to had turned persecutors, and would kill them. I think one can understand that if you were brought up, for instance, in the Church of England, how that you might receive light, and then you come to find that the very people you have been accustomed to look up to, the dignitaries of the church, are turning persecutors — it would be a very bitter lesson to you. And I think it was a very bitter lesson for those poor disciples to learn, and the Lord foresaw that and prepared them for it. The real thing was that those who hated them had not known the Father nor Him.
Ques What is meant by “render service to God” in verse 2?
FER It is the word for offering service to God; but if they had known the Father or Him they would have known love. No intelligent Christian could turn persecutor — it is an impossibility. If he did so, he would only prove that he did not know the Father or the Son. There is nothing much more dreadful than human will covered up by ecclesiastical zeal, there is no end of it; it is really “Saul ... breathing out threatenings and slaughter”. You take the history of this country at the time of the Reformation; it was not simply the Roman Catholic party that turned persecutors, no doubt the Protestants were that too. There was ecclesiastical zeal, but underneath there was man’s will ready to assert itself; and what was wrong in one could not be right in the other. I could not think that any of them ever knew the Father or the Son; they never got beyond a justified man, or reached the idea of a man in Christ, they never got beyond grace, and they had not a very clear idea even of that. I think it is very beautiful to see the great consideration and tenderness of the Lord towards the disciples, that warns them here of what they might have to encounter, so that it should not take them at all unawares. Then He says later, “I go my way” — “But because I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart”, and one can well understand it; it would have been very wonderful if sorrow had not filled their hearts. The Lord had been with them daily, and now He was going away from them. It might be in a kind of way human, but then we are human.
Rem And then He brings in the truth of the Comforter?
FER Yes; and when He was come He would reprove the world; the Lord, in His lifetime, had stood between them and it, as He said at the end, “If [p. 349] therefore ye seek me, let these go their way”, but now He would send them another Comforter.
Ques Do you think He intended a reproof when He said, “None of you asketh me, Whither goest thou”?
FER Well, I think it was selfish, in a kind of way.
Rem But they were not on the risen side of the cross, and that makes all the difference, the question had not been settled which must have troubled every pious soul.
FER Yes; they were not in the truth of resurrection. It is a most wonderful thing to be in the light of resurrection.
Rem They were really neither in the light of His death, nor of His resurrection.
FER No; the great point with them was not that He should die, but only that in their eyes things were all going wrong — the Messiah dying, and the religious leaders becoming their persecutors. They were to see their leaders, their great people, their priests, killing Him.
Rem And then too the people had said, “We have heard out of the law that Christ abideth for ever ... who is this Son of man?” They could not have said “out of the prophets”, for the burden of the prophets was that Christ should suffer and die, and be raised from the dead.
Ques I suppose that, like the mass of people today, they had some way of getting over these things, covering them up in some way?
FER Yes, I think so. I think we judge too much by our own way of looking at things. We have been taught to look at things simply, and to come simply to the truth, and we think they looked at the truth in the same way. But there was so much legality, and so on, with the Jew, that the authority of Scripture was got rid of in that way.
Ques I suppose that, in the case of [p. 350] the disciples,
they were insensibly drawn on by a power over them.
FER Yes, I think so; a Person was the attraction. I think it is the great end to which Christ is drawing in the present time, attracting to, and governing people by a Person.
Ques And that is not accomplished by working miracles?
FER Oh, no; the miracles came in to confirm their faith, but the faith was there. The disciples believed on Him before. And it says, too, of them who saw the miracles and believed, that He did not commit Himself to them, He did not believe in them.
Rem Because their faith simply rested on outward miracles, and if some day He did not work miracles, then it was all over.
FER Now the Lord brings out here the great truth that it was expedient for them that He should go away, “For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you”. You cannot conceive a much more wonderful thing than that the interest of the Lord was taken up with those few poor men. It is blessed to think that God is not like men. A great man in this world likes to be taken up with great things, but, as far as I see, there is nothing either great or small with God; God could not put any sanction on anything that men call great down here. Of course, we know great results come out of God’s workings, the final working out of God’s way is great. The effect of a Babe laid in the manger is the complete overthrow of all that exists — very great results will come out of that which seems, to the natural eye, to be small enough.
Rem But yet the angels could say at His birth, “Glory to God in the highest”.
FER Yes, quite so; and you see in the case of the children of Israel, Balaam looked at them [p. 351] from above, and could speak of them from that standpoint, very much more wonderfully than Moses did.
Rem We find that nearly all the true witnesses were small and despised during their lifetime.
FER That was a proof of the obstinacy of the people, “Your fathers killed them ... and ye build their sepulchres”.
Rem God’s weights and measures are absolutely moral.
FER But it is beautiful to see the interest of the Lord in this little company, so that He says, “If I go away I will send you another Comforter”. What a sense they must have had, on the day of Pentecost, when they really received the promise of the Father, of its connection with Christ.
Rem It is a wonderful thought that He had come to make known the Father, and now, having done that, He is going away, and He says, “I will send the Comforter”.
FER Yes, it is when the revelation of the Father is complete that He sends the Comforter, He sends Him from the Father and He Himself is gone to the Father. It is a very important point to see that the Comforter is sent from the Father, because it connects those who have the Comforter with the Father.
Rem So that you see the Father and the Son and the Comforter all occupied with this little company.
FER Yes; you see just the same thing in the Ephesians. “The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ ... that he would grant you to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that the Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”. So that you are to be filled to all the fulness of God — Father, Son, and Spirit. What governs your heart is Christ, the strengthening is of the Spirit, and the source of it all is the Father. Christians are bound up in that sense with all the fulness of the Godhead.
Rem “Now I go my way to him that sent me”.
FER That was the way He was going to take. He might have gone back by other ways, but the path He takes really leads through death; other ways would not have been suitable to the divine counsels. All was to come in on that platform, the glory of the Father — the great foundation for the Father’s glory must be laid. He went into death and He was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. In John the ground of it all is that the world might know that He loved the Father; it is love to the Father that is the motive, “that the world may know that I love the Father”, it was a testimony to His love of the Father.
Then you get the very important principle coming out, the conviction of the world in connection with the presence of the Holy Spirit; the world-system is convicted, but, on the other hand, you get the things of Christ brought in — the Father’s things. These are the two things put in contrast in the chapter. Demonstration is brought to the world by the presence of the Comforter, but the same Comforter makes known the Father’s things to them. “All things that the Father hath are mine”. It brings to light the whole new order of things in connection with the Father.
Ques Is it in the abstract that He brings demonstration to the world?
FER What the Lord was occupied with here was the state of the disciples, He puts things in their proper place in them. The world was convicted in the hearts of the disciples; demonstration is brought to those who have the Spirit, that they may really enter into the true position of things, “We are of God, and the whole world lies in the wicked one”, that is the conclusion you are bound to come to. If sin and righteousness come to an issue, the result must be judgment. The prince of this world is judged morally in connection with the presence of Christ here; sin and righteousness have been brought to an issue, “because they believe not on me”. The world [p. 353] in that way has been tested, and failed; it is the last overture that could be made to the world, and the end of it is, “they believe not on me”.
Rem Then it is consequent upon His rejection by the world that He says in chapter 17, “I pray not for the world”.
FER Yes, and then He will never be seen again in this world, “Ye see me no more”.
The moment the church lost the power of the Holy Ghost, they fell under the power of the world. There was nothing else for them.
Rem They lost all that moral judgment of things which the Spirit alone could give them.
FER Exactly. Christ alone could tell them of the Father’s things, and they lost all that, too. The only possible thing to be done in such a state of things is to recognise the presence of the Spirit. When the virgins were awakened by the midnight cry, you find that the wise virgins had oil in their vessels with their lamps; they returned, in that sense, to the Spirit.
Ques In what does righteousness consist, would you say, “Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more”?
FER It is a question between the Father and the world; there is no righteousness here, and so Christ goes to the Father, where there is righteousness.
Rem And what passes as righteousness in the world has no knowledge of the Father in it.
FER No; and therefore what you may expect is this, that there is no single Christian body that, sooner or later, may not turn persecutor, only let the conditions be open for it. I would not trust a dissenting body any more than the church, and I would not trust the church more than popery.
I think those principles referred to in this chapter which claim the rights of God here in the world are only known to the one who has the Holy Spirit, if [p. 354] the foundations are destroyed.
Ques You are referring now to the demonstration?
FER Yes; if the foundations are destroyed, what are the righteous to do? Their refuge is in the Holy Spirit, and then it is seen that the principles which maintain divine rights still remain, although they may not be in evidence.
Rem And that leads you to what you get afterwards, “He shall guide you into all truth”?
FER Yes. If divine rights are let go, you have no security for anything, “If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do?” The conclusion you are bound to come to is that there is a God that judgeth in the earth; the moral foundations of God — that is, His moral dealings in connection with the responsibility of men — are there. If there is no such thing as righteousness, there is no such Being as God; and, of course, if there are no such things as sin and righteousness, there is no such thing as judgment, they are correlative expressions. If these principles are not maintained, it simply puts God out altogether. They are principles which are really consequent upon the existence of God, and if God is a moral Being, and concerns Himself at all about what is going on here in this world, you must recognise sin, and righteousness, and judgment. As a matter of fact, the foundations cannot be destroyed; the righteous may fear it, and they will fear it, but I think you get the sense by the Holy Spirit that the foundations cannot be destroyed. Now I think that became exceedingly important for them to see, and so I can understand what the Lord says to them, “It is expedient for you that I go away”. It is useless to go on talking about glorifying Christ, and all that, if you have not got hold of the principles that maintain the rights of God.
Rem It is all idle.
FER Yes.
Ques Does “He shall glorify me” mean He shall make much of Me?
FER I think so; it is in taking of Christ’s things and showing them to them; they could not know these things as long as Christ was here, it is all dependent upon Christ being with the Father. The burden of the whole of the latter part of the chapter is that Christ is going back to the Father; the Father was with Him as long as He was here upon earth, but now He is about to return to the Father. What I think you get here is the fulfilment of the prayer in Ephesians 3, “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”. “He shall take of mine, and shall shew it unto you”. I think the two passages, in a kind of way, help one another; you comprehend the breadth, and length, and depth, and height.
Ques And you could not do that if you had not the Spirit?
FER No; you are strengthened with all might by His Spirit in the inner man, that the Christ might dwell in your hearts by faith, and then it is that you may comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height. This passage contemplates that really — the result that would be brought about by the coming of the Comforter.
Rem Is not this more what is wrought in us by the power of the Spirit? I mean, you could not get these things simply by the letter of Scripture, but by the power of the Holy Spirit.
FER Quite so; you could not get anything from the letter, you could not understand anything in that way; the letter comes in to teach you what you have got already. You have really got the thing, but then the scripture comes in to show you what you have got.
Ques So it is really what the Spirit will effect in us?
FER Yes; it is not reading it down in the scripture [p. 356] simply, but divine teaching consequent upon the coming of the Comforter.
Ques And the same in connection with the demonstration?
FER Yes, all was dependent upon the coming of the Comforter; it is effectuated in those who have the Comforter — “He continues with you, and shall be in you”. It is all the effect of the presence and coming of the Comforter. I think we look too much upon it that the Comforter came as Christ came, but the coming of the Comforter was in contrast to Christ’s coming. He was not manifested as Christ was, He was not presented to men; the coming of the Comforter is in this way — “He continues with you, and shall be in you”. He is in you, and so everything that comes with the Comforter would be subjective in you.
Ques While the Lord Himself was here He was apart from them?
FER Yes.
Ques But now the Spirit is one with us in a certain sense?
FER Yes. In one way the Lord presented a very great deal to men in general; but the Comforter has nothing to say to the world; the Lord says, “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin”.
Ques What would be the effect on the world of the Comforter being here in the believer?
FER He enables believers to maintain moral principles, those principles which give God a place here on earth. If these were maintained, there would be great power morally, although I think the presence of the Holy Spirit would not be recognised by the world. The demonstration is appreciated by those who have the Holy Spirit, but still it is a demonstration which the world cannot gainsay. Now the philosopher wants to get rid of everything absolute, and you can get nothing absolute unless you bring [p. 357] God in. Everything else, if God is not brought in, must be according to the traditions of men, after the rudiments of the world. You cannot get anything absolutely certain — no certain principles of right and wrong, unless you bring God in.
Rem The chief Person is left out.
FER Yes, they leave out the chief Person; you cannot have such ideas as sin and righteousness absolutely unless you bring God in. Man will not tolerate the idea of these things today.
Rem And yet many a man will be careful to be strictly honest and that sort of thing.
FER Yes, while it is advantageous to him. It is on the principle of “the greatest happiness for the greatest number of people” — but if you take men, though there are a great many who are upright men, who would go in for honesty and all that because it is advantageous to them, yet they will not tolerate the idea of sin, as we understand it. It appears to me that the principles which are brought out here are of the very last moment to us, if we are to stand here in the world; unless they have their place in the heart and conscience the foundations will be destroyed, and the world will overpower you. Now the bulk of the men of the world reject the idea of sin, as we understand it; they would admit such a thing as evil, but sin, as we understand it, they would reject altogether. It is only a question of expediency with them, but there is no real standard of right and wrong if God is left out. But I do not believe, you know, that so long as the Holy Spirit is here, and these principles are maintained in the power of the Holy Spirit, that the world could overthrow them. You are to be in the power of the Spirit, and the demonstration is in the presence of the Spirit; but you are only conscious of the demonstration as you are in the power of the Holy Spirit, and I do not believe that the world could overthrow that. But I believe that when the Holy Spirit is gone [p. 358] away, then the foundations will really be destroyed.
Ques At present He still lets (2 Thessalonians 2: 7)?
FER Yes, and He lets in this way — He hinders in that He is here to maintain these principles. It is the overthrowing of the foundations that really brings down the judgment of God; I think you can very well understand what an awful moment it will be to stand in — the moment of temptation that will come upon the world to try them that are upon the earth — it will be an awful moment to stand in that day. The demonstration to the world is in the saints. The Holy Spirit does not come to the world as Christ did; He brings demonstration to the world by those who are outside of it, and I think it is a great advantage to the world in that way, because, where people are affected by it, and they are, they may be really gathered out of the world.
Ques These are really very great moral questions — as to sin, and righteousness, and judgment?
FER Yes; and you can see the great importance of giving even children a sense of sin and of righteousness; nothing can be more important to my mind in the training of children. I have no doubt that the great effort today is to get rid of absolute truths, because they flow from what God is; but if there is no God who takes account of things, then there is no such thing as sin, and if there is no sin, there is no righteousness — they all hang, in that way, upon one another.
Ques “Ye see me no more” — who are referred to there?
FER Oh, I think it is that He is no longer seen in a general way. The great thought is this: righteousness comes out in this way, that there is a place with the Father; you know, I very much doubt if it has anything to do with Christ personally there; it is that righteousness has been established, has been vindicated, so that there is a place with [p. 359] the Father.
Rem And for others as well.
FER Exactly; and that is what comes out in the latter part of the chapter; it was not only a personal question of His going to the Father, but He goes there really as having secured a place for the company. I do not think it was what was personal to Him so much; it is as having secured a place for the company — for others.
Rem He goes there representatively.
FER Yes, in that way, “I go to prepare a place for you”. The Lord here gives the disciples the greatest possible encouragement to go to the Father. He had not before pressed upon them to go to the Father in quite that way; they were to go freely to the Father. It was really the consequence of His going to the Father.
Ques It was not like the petition in the prayer, “Our Father which art in heaven”?
FER No; everything is altered in this chapter. He went to the Father, and if He went there, there was a place there for them. He went there, as you say, representatively.
Ques Is righteousness established here?
FER Well, you see in this verse how righteousness works; you cannot have a place here in this world, because the world is convicted of sin — there is no place for the saint here, and you must have a place somewhere, so He goes to the Father, as having secured a place for you with the Father. There is no footing for you here, and really you find that righteousness is with the Father.
Ques Is there no sense in which we have to do with the “heavenly Father”?
FER Well, I think there is a way in which we are regarded of the Father as to our pathway down here, “Your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things”. Of course, we have our heavenly privileges, but then we are still down here upon earth,
[p. 360] and I think He takes account of our circumstances in that sense. The point here is to give the disciples the fullest possible access to the Father, because He Himself was with the Father when He was here upon earth, and the Father was with Him, as He says, “Ye ... shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me”. Now He goes to the Father, and the great idea is to give them a place with the Father, too.
Rem Not in the same way as they prayed, “Our Father which art in heaven”?
FER Well, “heavenly Father” in that way suggests distance; it looks as if the Father were at a distance. And yet you know people think one very irreverent for not using it. The desires in the “Lord’s prayer” are, like everything else coming from Him, so good that it would be presumption on our part to discuss them, but that does not justify the use of the prayer now in its formal character. It was clearly never intended to be used in this way. “Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven” — every godly soul desires that. “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us” — that is governmentally true, and fully applicable, in that sense, to ourselves. Then there is another petition, “Lead us not into temptation” — which is a prayer that it would be very well for anyone to make; do not let us get into circumstances for which we are not able — like Peter in the high priest’s palace. It would have been better for him to have been outside. But the prayer, as a whole, is not suitable to those who have the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit having come, and Christ having given us the Comforter, and access to the Father through Him, any kind of formality is unsuitable to such a position.
Rem “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous”.
FER Yes, there is the righteous One with the [p. 361] Father, but not only so, but righteousness is there too. Christ being there is the proof and expression that righteousness has been vindicated; and I believe He has gone there representatively. God “made him to be sin for us ... that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”, we get a place with the Father.
Ques Then it is no question of righteousness when a divine Person goes back to the Father?
FER That is all bad, root and branch — that is a bad contention.
Ques It really maintains the man here?
FER Yes, that lies at the bottom of it all, but it is not a holy contention.
Ques But you do link righteousness with our place?
FER Righteousness in Scripture is correlative to sin — we are in sin, and if you are going to have a place in the holiest, you must have that place in consistency with the righteousness of God, just because we have been in sin. There is another expression which has been given utterance to, that “God was indebted to a man for His glory”. Now I think that is a very objectionable expression. God takes very good care to maintain His own glory.
Rem I must say I have never liked it, either.
FER God can maintain His own glory and vindicate His own glory independently altogether of man. Of course the expression has been used innocently enough, I have no doubt, but if you come to examine it, it does not give you a true idea of things. What could He do as Man that He did not do as Son?
Rem The question has never been raised between the Father and the Son.
FER No; I have no doubt in my own mind that, in taking up things, in undertaking to do the will of God, the Lord entered fully into all that sin meant on the part of God — that He entered fully into all that sin was obnoxious to. I think it very much [p. 362] better, instead of having to work it out in such a roundabout way, to say God is indebted to Himself for His glory, and that His own Son came forth to secure His glory. Now the way Scripture puts it is that having made purgation of sins, He “sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high”. It was that He — “being the effulgence of his glory, and the expression of his substance” — “set himself down”.
Rem I fear we have all been a little guilty as to it.
FER Well, then, do let us get out of it now.
Rem You must not lose sight of the One who came, “Lo, I come”. Who is it comes?
FER Righteousness is for us, because righteousness is correlative to sin; and that is why you get the expression, “new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness”. You would not have had that said unless there had been an old heaven and an old earth, in which sin had resided. That is the way Scripture states it. The fact is, the longer I go on, the less difficult I find it to understand the statements of Scripture, and the more difficulty I have in understanding the moulds in which man casts it. Men attempt to safeguard the truth by casting it into all sorts of moulds, but they will not protect the truth in that way, and it is man’s way of casting it that is the difficulty to my mind.
Well, I think that what we get here really results in Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith; you are to be prepared for testimony, and this chapter really gives you the preparation for it — the Christ dwelling in your heart by faith.
Rem I think that Ephesians throws a very great deal of light upon this chapter, I had not seen it so before.
FER It has often been spoken of. Now the first preparation for testimony is the maintenance of the principles that give God His place; you have not any real power for testimony unless these are maintained.
[p. 363] If you approach the world, or attempt to stand down here, you need to have a very real sense of these principles. Infidelity to my mind is a terrible thing, it is the giving up of all principle — of all right principle — it has no principles really.
Rem The gospel really maintains the righteousness of God.
FER Yes; in the gospel it is in regard to sin; God’s righteousness is vindicated. “He shall glorify me” — that is, in the heart of the disciples, they were to see the breadth and length and depth and height — that is the whole range of the Father’s purposes of love established in the Son — that is the idea of it. You know, it is not an easy thing, in the midst of this world, to maintain that everything belongs to Christ, you want to have on the whole armour of God for that. I do not think you will find people very much prepared to allow that.
You see all these chapters are progressive. The great truth in chapter 14 is the coming of the Comforter, and Christ going to the Father; then in chapter 15 it brings in that there must not be any flaw in the company, the company itself must be right; and then in chapter 16 you get the Christ dwelling in your hearts by faith. You could not properly have testimony unless all was right in the company; it was of all moment that all should be right with them, that they should be morally a continuation of Christ here — that is the great point in chapter 15; then in chapter 16 He glorifies Christ, the Christ dwells in your heart by faith, “He shall take of mine and shall shew it unto you”.
Ques What is the difference between the thought of the “Spirit of truth”, as here, and the Spirit in Ephesians?
FER I think the expression “Spirit of truth” is limited to John, you do not get it elsewhere; it is in contrast to the letter of truth. People do no good who [p. 364] have only got the letter of the scripture, it is the Spirit of truth that you want. “The Lord is that Spirit” — that is the Spirit of Scripture, not the letter of it; they were made “able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the Spirit”. Truth is what may be known of God, that is the idea, and the Spirit is the principle of it, not the letter. You really get all that may be known of God by the Spirit; the love of God is not shed abroad in our hearts by the Scriptures but by the Spirit. It is the Spirit of truth that will guide you into all truth — into the whole, complete, entire revelation of God, and God’s will, that is what I understand by God’s truth. Mr. Darby used to say that if a man went along the streets with a perambulator, he would not do much damage, but if he went along with a steam engine, he might do very much.
Ques What are we to gather from that?
FER Well, that when a man talks about his own things, that is like his going along with a perambulator, it is within his own control; but if he has a steam engine, that is something infinitely beyond his own strength.
You see the Lord makes the greatest possible point, in the latter part of the chapter, of His going to the Father, in its bearing and importance for them; it was all an enigma to them, they did not understand the “little while” at all, nor what it was that He said, “Because I go to the Father” — but He knew they were desirous to ask Him, and He goes on to show them, “The world shall rejoice” and “ye shall weep and lament ... but your sorrow shall be turned into joy” — it will be a great day for you when I go to the Father; it is a great day for us, too.
Rem They would weep because He would go away from them.
FER Yes, but that really ushers in another day. “I go to the Father”, and they would learn that by one Spirit they too had access to Him. Their sorrow [p. 365] was because He told them He was going away, but the joy was that they found that they could go to the Father, they had the benefit of the Spirit, and the great benefit, too, of access by Him to the Father; they went to where Christ went — because He was there they could go there also.
Ques Why is this figure used of the woman?
FER Well, because everything is changed when the child is born — the anguish is over and all is changed; and it would be a very different thing for them to know Him with the Father, compared with what they had known of Him as a Man down here — despised, and scorned, and denied, and all that kind of thing.
Ques And it is a man of a new order that is born?
FER Quite so.
Rem “And your joy no man taketh from you”.
FER Yes, we read in the Acts, they “were filled with joy, and with the Holy Spirit”.
Ques Was the first “little while” from the time that He was then speaking until His death?
FER Yes, until His death; He will not give them the idea that He continued with them. It was “a little while” because He went to the Father; you cannot over-estimate the importance of that statement, “Because I go to the Father”. It was a statement of the very greatest importance for them, and not only in regard of them, but for us too. When the Lord Himself was here, He had the Father with Him, as He said, “The Father is with me”.
Rem He changed their entire position and gave them a new home?
FER Exactly. I think that if you get the conception of what the Lord intended to leave here — a company ready for the Holy Spirit, and that loved one another as He had loved them — if it were possible to conceive such a company, and then that they were the vessel of His testimony here, you would see how [p. 366] important it was for them to know that He went to the Father so that they might have a place there too. And all this was brought about — it is folly to say it never was fulfilled — it was fulfilled. You could not have it now, of course; we suffer from the weakness and ruin of things, but the great point for us is fidelity — fidelity to Christ; you cannot have what was at the beginning, it cannot be restored; but what you can have is personal fidelity to Christ, and to what was at the beginning; you want to be satisfied with nothing short of that.
Rem You do get the fulfilment of this in Acts 2.
FER Yes. The Lord always addressed Himself to the company, not to individuals, in the Revelation. In the addresses to the seven churches He in every instance addresses the company. If man has failed, God has not failed; He speaks to a thousand generations, and when you come to the New Testament the Lord speaks to the church right along to all the generations of the church, but all through He addresses Himself to the company.
Rem It could only be realised in the company.
Ques So you would expect a company right on to the end?
FER Yes, I think so. I look for a company, and for fellowship, right on to the end. The Lord gives us the ground for such an expectation in His addresses to the seven churches. “He that hath an ear” — a circumcised ear — will clearly be found listening to the voice of the Spirit in the churches until the Lord comes.
Now the Lord says here, “I say not unto you that I will pray the Father for you: for the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me” — there could be nothing more touching than that; I will not pray for you, you must pray for yourselves, for the Father Himself loveth you. I do not expect they would pray for much as long as the Lord was here with them, I [p. 367] think they left all the praying to Him, but now they were to pray.
Ques They went to Him, I suppose, for everything when He was here?
FER I should think so; but now He says, “Ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full”. The Lord knew everything that was coming to pass for them, and all that was before Himself. He knew that they would receive the promise of the Father, the Comforter; they had lacked nothing while He was with them, but now He was going to the Father.
Ques What about “Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name”?
FER They had depended wholly and entirely upon Him, I should say. I think Christ had the most wonderful influence upon them, they had contemplated His glory, and no doubt they were very greatly affected by it — it was overwhelming.
Ques And He commended their love?
FER Quite so, He controlled everything while here; even persecution and the enemy were held back during the time of His public ministry. After the temptation, we read that Satan departed from Him for a season; he comes in at the beginning and again at the close of His pathway.
Rem I have sometimes thought had it not been so, the poor woman would have been turned out of Simon’s house.
FER Yes.
Ques Is there any record in the Acts of the Apostles of their asking anything of the Father?
FER I do not think so; you see little is recorded but what was in connection with the public testimony; the Spirit of God only records what bears on that.
Rem He gives us, too, Christ’s place of supremacy as Lord?
FER Yes, there is full testimony to Him as Lord; the Holy Spirit was testimony to that, and [p. 368] then the testimony of the twelve was to that — that was the burden of their testimony.
I think the Lord wants us to understand that righteousness has given us a place with the Father; you have no place in this world, but you have access to the Father by one Spirit, so that you may freely come to Him; the power of the Holy Spirit is all exercised in that direction. The Father Himself loveth you; if you love, it is because you come under the Father’s love.
Ques Because you see Him as the Object of the Father’s love?
FER Quite so. The Lord effected a very great deal in principle when He was down here; He passed out of the world almost in solitude, but in principle He had effected a great deal; you cannot judge by appearances, but the foundation was all laid; righteousness was established, and the foundation all laid for the accomplishment of God’s counsels, and a company prepared for the coming of the Holy Spirit — a small company, perhaps, but still a company prepared for the Holy Spirit and where He could work freely.
Rem As you sometimes say in connection with resurrection, if you have one man risen from the dead, it is as good as one thousand.
FER Quite so. Christianity is all the outcome of that little company, and you look abroad in the world and see what the effect of Christianity has been. We should have nothing but barbarism apart from Christianity. What about benevolence and mercy and all these things — they have all followed in the line of Christianity; they are not found outside of it. Apart from Christianity there is nothing but heathenism and darkness. But now that men have got the benefits of Christianity they want to tell you it is no better than Buddhism, but it is the greatest impudence to come and tell us that the dark things outside Christianity are equal to Christianity itself.
[p. 369] I was thinking whether we might not get a little more from the latter part of the chapter as to the characteristics of “that day”. The Lord speaks in verse 23 of “that day”, that is, the day in which we live, and therefore it is important for us to understand, if we can, something of the characteristics of this day. You get the same expression in chapter 14: 20, “At that day ye shall know”. Here it is, “In that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you”. It is another day, the present day.
Rem In both cases the expression follows on the coming of the Comforter.
FER Well, I think there is this distinction — all that comes out in the latter part of chapter 16 is consequent upon His going to the Father, but in chapter 14 it is consequent upon the coming of the Comforter. They are the two sides of the one day; here you have all that was involved in His being with the Father, that which would characterise that day really, and then the other side of it is all that is involved in the Spirit being here.
Rem Is it not connected too with the access which we have to the Father?
FER Well, that is included in His being with the Father. He has gone to the Father really on man’s account; it was not very wonderful that He Himself should go to the Father, there is no difficulty about that, the extraordinary thing is that He should go to the Father on our account. There would be a difficulty for them, but there was no difficulty for Him. It was nothing wonderful for Him to go there, but the difference was what that day would be for them. “In that day ye shall ask me nothing” — that day was for them, not exactly for Him.
Ques What is the meaning of “Ye shall ask me nothing”?
FER Because they would know everything. In chapter 14 He says, “At that day ye shall know”. That indicated the great change that was coming to pass. The Father was veiled to them as long as Christ was here, and they asked everything of Christ — they knew He was in the secret, but they were not, and so they asked everything of Him; when He brings in that day, He is going to the Father, and then they will not need to ask anything of Him, they will know.
Ques What is “in my name”?
FER He was with the Father for them, and they were for Him in the world, and therefore they asked in His name. I think they are two distinct thoughts. I think it is more asking about anything, not quite so much prayer.
Ques The word used for “ask the Father”, in the same verse, is different, is it not?
FER Yes, the first word is the word ‘demand’, and the other to ask a person so-and-so.
The apostles are looked at as being representative here, but the Lord is opening up the characteristics of that day — what a day it would be. I think if you only had chapter 14 you would not have it complete, you would only have one side; you would have the company down here with the Comforter, and the Comforter abiding with them, and even Christ coming to them, but, to complete the circle of the truth, you must have the other side — Christ with the Father, and they asking Him nothing because they would know all.
Rem They would be with Him in the Father’s presence?
FER Yes; they would not have occasion to ask Him anything, because they would be with Him in the full light of the Father, and on the other hand, for Him here in this world. When Christ was here, the words of the Father, and the works of the Father, were all set forth in Him, but man was not with the Father. The fact is, what the Lord had said to them in [p. 371] chapter 14 was inexplicable to them, or they would not have said, “Shew us the Father”. In their sense of things the Father was not seen, but at that day, the day to which the Lord refers in this chapter, everything would be completely altered because He was going to the Father. He did not go exactly on His own account, because He was perfectly able to go to the Father — He went where He came from — but the extraordinary thing was that He could go to the Father on our account, and that introduces “that day” down here, it is this day. You see, the fact is this — though I do not want anyone to misunderstand me — when Christ came into this world He came alone, but when He went back to the Father He took the church, in principle, with Him. Of course it was not at all then worked out, but that was the real meaning of His going back to the Father, He really carried back with Him what He came to seek — He came to seek the church, and in one sense He carried the church back with Him.
Rem And therefore He could say, “It is expedient for you that I go away”.
FER Quite so. Take Hebrews 12, “Who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame” — what do you understand by the “joy” there? Why, it was the church, He carried the church back with Him.
Rem And it refers to the church in Hebrews 2, where it says, “Behold I and the children which God hath given me”.
FER Yes; the fact is He came into the world to seek the pearl of great price, and He carried that pearl right up to where He Himself came from — that is the idea to me in the joy set before Him; it was to that end He endured the cross, despising the shame; He came into our place, and He carried us back to His place. The joy, I believe, is connected with the pearl of [p. 372] great price.
Rem He did not go back empty-handed.
FER No; the cross was our place, it is the actual cross, the place of crucifixion, but He came right down into our place that He might carry the church back with Him to His place, and for that He despised the shame, coming into the place of shame and contempt down here. He came into that — but it was for the joy of taking the church back to the Father. He endured the cross, despising the shame, it was the shame of the cross — I think the connection is perfectly intelligible — He comes into our place that He might carry us into His place. He was going to carry up there what He had secured down here.
Rem He would have carried nothing back on the ground of His pathway?
FER Oh, no; He comes down into death that He might secure the church. The cross, in a certain sense, was the greatest expression of shame and ignominy.
Rem And the place of the greatest expression of love.
Ques What is the “fulness of joy” in Psalm 16?
FER He knew that perfectly well because He had come from that; He had been accustomed to that presence where there is fulness of joy; but in Hebrews 12 it was for the joy set before Him, something more definite. Christ could speak about the joys at God’s right hand, for the simple reason that He knew them.
Ques But the pathway for man there was through death — “Thou wilt shew me the path of life”.
FER Yes, but you could not put that as a necessity for the Lord Himself; it was so for man, and if He had not gone that way there could have been no way there for us. That is the reason for His going back to the Father in this latter part of chapter 16. He goes to the Father that He might make a place there for us; He only could do that. The Father was with Him in all His pathway down here, but there was [p. 373] no proper place for us with the Father. The disciples did not understand His going to the Father at all.
Ques And that is where the question of righteousness comes in?
FER Quite so.
Ques Does it not give us the new order of things here in the Man-child born?
FER Yes; they could not have to do with the Father in the old condition. As was said just now, “that day” is characterised by two things, Christ’s being with the Father, and the presence of the Comforter here — it is the side of Christ being with the Father that is taken up in chapter 16.
Ques Is there any connection between the Man-child caught up to the throne of God in Revelation 12 and what we have here?
FER Well, there is a connection, but not a very apparent one. You cannot put it too literally, but you get the idea here, I think.
Rem Their joy was all in connection with the fact of His going to the Father?
FER Yes; they were to be privileged to be where He went. Now this is where the difference comes in between John’s gospel and the others. The other gospels bring out grace, but John’s gospel brings out life. The point in John is not the question of grace at all, or the benefits you get through Christ — peace with God, and favour, and even the gift of the Holy Spirit — but when you come to the question of life, you have the full and complete expression of God’s mind in regard to us, and you do not get that in connection with grace. Grace is founded on the sacrifice; there is a sacrifice adequate, and we get the benefit through Christ, through His sacrifice. But when you come to the question of life, you have the complete setting forth in Christ — in His death and resurrection, and even, too, in where He is now — of God’s mind in regard of us. He is “the true God, and eternal life” — because He is the expression of God’s mind in regard of us.
Rem And grace, as in the other gospels, is worldwide, whereas, in that way, life only comes to those who are in the circle, so to speak.
FER Quite so. The ground of his statements is that in Christ there is the complete expression of God’s mind in regard to us, “In whom also ye are circumcised” — that is really the cross, and the cross was God’s mind in regard of us. Then, too, it says, “In him ye are filled full [complete]” (Colossians 2: 10). We get in Christ the expression of God’s mind in regard to us, and God would have us complete, so that we do not turn to anything of man’s mind, or anything of that sort. “In whom also ye are risen with him” — the resurrection of Christ is the expression of God’s thoughts with regard to us, and the same is equally true of eternal life; Christ is the full and complete expression, both in death and in resurrection, and even in ascension, of the mind of God with regard to us. I think there is a great deal of difference in that way between grace, that is, what you get through Christ, and what is set before you in Christ — the full expression of the thought and mind of God in regard to His people. And therefore we have to come to everything, we have to come to crucifixion, so that you can say, “I am crucified with Christ” — God has set that forth in the crucifixion of Christ. Christ had to come to it in fact, but I come to it in mind. Then Christ was raised from the dead by the power of God — well, I have got to come to that, too, in mind. Then the same thing comes out with regard to His going to the Father, we see in Him the setting forth of the Father’s mind with regard to us, that we should have a place with the Father. “This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent”.
Ques So you would read “in whom” in Colossians 2, where we have “wherein”?
FER I think the expression is used twice. You get the same thing coming out in Ephesians 1, the whole chapter is the expression of the mind of God with regard to us in Christ. We are “blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ”; then He has “chosen us in him before the foundation of the world”, and we are “accepted in the beloved”, so that there is the complete setting forth, in Christ, of God’s mind for us, added to which it is said, “in whom we have redemption”.
Ques Is it in Him then that we are risen?
FER Yes. If any one were to say that we were risen in ourselves, we should repudiate the idea altogether. You are risen in the apprehension of God’s mind for you, you have apprehended the mind of God in raising Him from the dead; it is not simply that you should be freed from Egypt and tread the wilderness, but His pleasure is that you should be in association with Him beyond Jordan; the latter is a moral necessity, because if you are brought to God the world must become a wilderness to you.
Rem All that we get through Christ is, in a way, for earth?
FER Well, it is our side. I think there are plenty of people in the world who apprehend the benefits that they get through Christ and His sacrifice, but who do not see that God has been pleased to set forth fully and perfectly in Christ what His mind is for His people. As to the scripture in Colossians, I think it is a continuation, a succession of thoughts as to Him; and baptism is only brought in in connection with circumcision, you just come back to your baptism — very likely with a long interval between. Many people are baptised, long, long before they know the significance of baptism, and then, too, they never come back to it until they have got circumcision; you [p. 376] must accept what God has expressed in the death and resurrection of Christ, it is an infinite and perfect expression of God’s thought. I tell you honestly, I am not content merely with the benefits that I have got through the death of Christ, they are of all-importance to me down here, but I see that there is the perfect expression in the death and resurrection of Christ of God’s mind in regard to me, and I will go on to that.
Rem The first is an absolute necessity for everyone.
FER Yes; it is just the difference between Luke and John. In Luke you get, “Thus it behoved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem” — it is the grace of God having Jerusalem as its starting-point, but going out to the whole earth. That is Luke’s thought, it is the effect of the sacrifice, and no one could do without it.
Rem The one is God meeting our need, and the other God satisfying His own heart.
FER Exactly; and the importance of it is that when you have received light, you see that you have come to this point, that “I am crucified with Christ”; you have to come to it in mind, not in fact. The apostle had come to it in mind; he says, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me”.
Rem I suppose the idea here in John 16: 21 is that the Man of the new order brings in the joy?
FER Exactly, because it was the expression of the Lord’s mind in regard of them, and it ushers in that day of which the Lord speaks. You see what a wonderful thing it is, “In that day ye shall ask me nothing” — you do not want to demand of Him, for you are in the place; if people do ask Christ for this or that, it shows they are not very conscious of being in the place. Take, for example, a family, and I mean [p. 377] a family where things are as they should be, where the children are enjoying the love of the parents, and loving one another; well, you do not get one child asking another about the parents, each child knows the parents for itself; and you are in the Father’s presence with the Father, and there you do not even ask Christ anything in that sense.
Rem You would be lacking in personal knowledge of the Father if you asked anything.
FER Well, I think it would indicate that. Then, lower down, you get, “At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you: for the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God” — I think we are actually left here in this world to be representatives of Christ, and therefore they ask in His name.
Rem “In my name” carries the thought of His interests, does it not?
FER Yes, I think so; and we would get anything that tended to promote Christ; whatever we ask that tends to promote Christ I think we should get, anything else would not be asking in His name. You see, you are asking in His name. If a man went and asked God to give him a better situation, that would not be asking in Christ’s name.
Rem “In that day ye shall ask me nothing” — I suppose that, in the assembly properly, we should be conscious of that?
FER I think so. I think that if you are with Him in the Father’s presence, you do not ask Him for anything, you are really in the scene and oracle yourself. I do not think it means that you do not address Him, that is not the idea, but you do not ask Him anything.
Rem “The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended”.
FER Well, quite so. You know, I cannot [p. 378] imagine anything more wonderful effected by Christ than that He went back to the Father, and, in principle, carried those few poor men with Him. It was a very wonderful thing that He could have them right there. He could carry a little company of men, on the one hand, into the presence of the Father with Himself, and on the other, that little company could be descriptive of Himself down here. I think people might be astonished, I daresay many have been, at the small outward effect of the Lord’s ministry on earth; the apparent effect was very small, but in principle, the effect was very great indeed.
Rem Though the Lord Himself was the Sower, yet only one seed fell into good ground; you would have expected that it would all have brought forth much fruit.
FER Yes. I think people ought to be greatly encouraged if they could but see the place of Christ with the Father, if you could but get people to understand at all the import of “that day”. But there would not be very much to see; conversion is a far more showy work; you would never hear of this kind of work; it is a silent kind of thing, it does not show on the surface.
Rem But there would be eternal results.
FER Yes. Well, what value is there to be attached to “brethren”? Whatever it is, it is the result of Mr. Darby’s work — whatever there may be bound up with them is the result of his work; the effect of his work remains, and I would venture to ask this, what would the gospel be worth in the present day except for “brethren”? You may say it is making a good deal of “brethren”, but I ask, what would gospel preaching be?
Ques What is the answer to that?
FER Well, I say, look outside, and see what it is worth there. Outside they have largely given up the truth, and even those who are converted make no [p. 379] break with the world, they do not come out in testimony; they are all formed on the model of those who have been blessed to them, they all go on that line, but there is no real spiritual vigour in it.
Rem Is the Man in glory preached outside?
FER Well, I would go lower down than that, I do not believe the bulk of preachers give their converts light — the light of God.
Ques Because they have not got it?
FER I do not know at all.
Ques What would you say is the object of the gospel?
FER Well, the object of the gospel, if I understand it at all, is that God may be known in the heart of man, and the work of the gospel is not done until that is brought about.
Ques If you get peace with God, how do you know it?
FER Because the scripture says you have peace with God; but the true scripture idea of it is really that you are in the light of God, and of His mind in the resurrection of Christ; God has set forth His mind in regard to man, and you learn that He has nothing to say to man but peace, and you have reached His mind.
Ques And in that way you are at home with God?
FER Quite so. There are many devout Christians who would answer an anxious soul in that way.
Rem The difficulty in the preaching of the gospel is that it does not succeed in bringing people to God; they are told that they believe when they really do not, and so they do not get the good of Christianity.
Ques Has not the gospel been made a means of relieving man rather than of reaching God?
FER To a very large extent, I should say.
“The hour is coming that I will no longer speak to you in allegories, but will declare to you openly concerning the Father. In that day ye shall ask in my name”. I think it is a wonderful thing to think that the Lord would announce to them plainly of the Father.
Rem Is that not exactly on the same lines as when He said, “I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God”?
FER Yes, I think so; He announced to them plainly of the Father, so that they stood now in direct relationship with the Father.
Ques Was it the thought of His taking them back to the Father when He spoke to Mary?
FER Yes, I think so; and then He breathes on them and says, “Receive ye the Holy Spirit”, so that everything that was not of the Holy Spirit had to go.
Rem It is as last Adam here?
FER Yes; people seem to have very great difficulty in apprehending the truth of another Man — but what man is there with Christ? Is man in the flesh associated with Him? If you are to be associated with Christ, depend upon it there must be another man; no mere reformation will fit you for association with Christ. You must be after His order, and He is another Man. It is certainly not the old man, but another man, and a different man. The man formed is in the presence of the Father with Christ; it is another man formed on entirely new principles. I am surprised at the difficulty that people make of such a thing. I fancy, too, that the first man is gone for God, that the first man has been removed for God in the death of Christ. I do not think that one need say the old man, but the first man. No doubt there are certain relationships, and so on, connected with the first man that are recognised of God, so long as He goes on with His dispensational dealings on the earth, but that does not alter the fact to my mind that the first man has gone, that the cross is the end of that man. The proper answer to the cross is the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness — [p. 381] where there is no trace of the old man left, that order of man is gone.
Ques And is not God occupied now with displacing all that is left in us of that man?
FER Yes; but the argument that they bring up is that there are certain relationships and things still recognised of God, human relationships and so on — and God will own what is of Himself in that way. But really for Him, and for the accomplishment of His counsels, the first man is gone, and even these relationships now are to be carried out in the power of the Spirit, not simply on the ground of the flesh.
Rem You come back to the old thing in a new way.
FER Well, of course, man must go on with these relationships and so on, but if you have come into the mind of God, that you are risen with Christ, you have to put off the old man, and to put on the new, and Scripture distinctly states that in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female.
Rem In Romans 6 it says, “Our old man is crucified with him”.
FER Well, that is the moral thing, I have no doubt at all. Male and female exist now, and will through the millennium, but Christ has brought to pass another order of things, and another order of man, in which there is neither male nor female. I think there is a sort of effort to save the old man to a certain extent, but what I see is that I am placed in certain relationships — I may be a father or a husband — and I accept it; but all these claims I carry out “to the Lord”, I do not take them up on natural ground. I am in them just for the moment for the will of God, but in another sense I am out of them already. If I am with God, I am out of them.
Rem So far as you enter into what it is to be “in Christ” you are outside them.
FER Quite so. All these things will come [p. 382] in under the law in the millennium, but even in the millennium they will only be transitory. In the new heavens and new earth the whole thing will be gone, you will have nothing left but what is of Christ, and in Christ. The Lord entered into these things, and yet who could say that He was not the Man out of heaven — the second Man from heaven? Yet He was born of a woman, made under law, but He was, all the same, the Man out of heaven, living bread that came down out of heaven.
Rem The purpose of God is to take people out of the world, and therefore the world as such is condemned.
FER Well, the great end of redemption is that the Spirit of God should be given to man. It is the Spirit of another man, the Spirit of God’s Son, but it is the great object of the work of redemption that the Spirit shall be communicated, just as, in the old order of things, the man was sprinkled with the blood, then he was anointed with the oil. So the same One who takes away the sin of the world baptises with the Holy Spirit. Whatever the Spirit touches, in that way, is made new.
I think it is a wonderful expression, “I shall shew to you plainly of the Father”; the Lord seems to contemplate that they will still be in His company: “In that day ye shall ask me nothing” — but they were to ask of the Father, that their joy might be full. The word that is used for “ask” there is not like praying to God in heaven, but really asking of One in whose company you are — it contemplates that they would be still in His company. In verse 23 it is demanding in that sense, just as I might ask of you, or you of me.
Rem But in verse 26 it is different, “Ye shall ask in my name”.
FER Yes. Then He goes on to say, “I say not [p. 383] to you that I will demand of the Father for you”. The word here is the one always used in connection with Christ in John’s gospel, He asked as of One present with Him. “Ye shall ask in my name” involves that they were to be here representative and descriptive of Himself; they were to be here in His interests, and not only that, but they were to be here morally representative of Himself — descriptive of Himself; and therefore they would ask in His name — it is as though He was here. You know, I do not think that this privilege is used half enough; my firm belief is that if we were set with a single eye on the promotion of Christ here, we should get whatever we asked.
Ques. Is it individual?
FER Yes, everything is individual in the present day pretty much, on account of the state of the church.
Rem Mr. Stoney constantly pressed that what you value you get.
FER I think so. The fact is this, what really comes to pass is that you ask a thing, very often a right thing, long before you are prepared for it. I think I can understand it with regard to myself. The first time I ever thought of being free of occupation for the Lord’s work was five-and-thirty years ago. I was set for it, but I have had to wait all these years for it. I believe that what a man is set for he will surely get, perhaps not immediately, but he will get it. I believe you get it when you are equal for it. It would be a mistake to give it to you when you are not prepared for it, and God is too good to give it to you. I do not think that we have an idea of the pains God takes with people. Now if you are going to turn any gift that God may have given you to the gratifying of the man that is here — of yourself — it would be ruin to you, it would spoil you. But, all the same, I can say that everything I have desired I have got, though often not at the time. We get things when we are equal to them. “For the Father himself loveth you”.
Ques Why are the two things linked together, “ye have loved me”, and “have believed that I came out from God” (verse 27)?
FER Well, the two things naturally run together; but I do not think they had faith to say that He came from the Father.
Ques And He declares that to them here?
FER Yes, He says now, “I came forth from the Father”.
Ques The great test is loving Christ?
FER Yes, no person could be conscious of loving the Father except as loving Christ; the Father Himself draws to Christ, He draws and attaches you to Christ, and if you love Christ you become conscious of the Father’s love. I do not think a person could love the Father apart from Christ. Christ, in that way, is the object of affection, but then you become conscious of the Father’s love. I think the disciples were sure that Christ came from God, but that was as far as their faith went. Of course, the Lord had told them, He had stated things to them, but as yet they were little able to apprehend them.
Ques What is it, “that in me ye might have peace” (verse 33)?
FER I think it was perfect serenity and undisturbedness of mind. You have perfect serenity and peace in Christ, the peace of Christ; you look at Christ and you see the expression of God’s mind in regard of you, that you should be here undisturbed and undistracted. “In me ... peace”, there is nothing to harass or disturb.
Very few people, I think, take in the force of the expression, “I have overcome the world” — the vast majority are still under the power of the world, but the world is not absolutely the master of the situation. “I have overcome the world”.
[p. 385] Ques Do you not get the peace of Christ in Matthew 11, when He says, “Even so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight”?
FER Yes, I think so.