THE CONTINUANCE OF CHRIST IN THE SAINTS

^[p. 519] THE CONTINUANCE OF CHRIST IN THE SAINTS

Luke 24: 34 - 36; Jonah 3: 10; Jonah 4: 1 - 11

I have in mind to seek to show how God intended to continue here what Christ was as Man before men, and in the midst of His own. He said when challenged as to Himself that He was altogether that which He said to them. “Altogether that which I also say to you”, He says (John 8: 25). That sets out the idea of the candlestick in the type; its own ornamental function is called attention to. That is what the light is accredited by, that through which it comes, otherwise it must remain light without a model, the thought being that the effect of the testimony is that it becomes like that through which it comes, that those who are affected by the truth become like the Person or persons through whom it comes; so that there is not only light but example, or model; so that the formation may be in keeping with it, and thus there is the great continuance of the divine thought, of the thought of God. And in this respect I may say, dear brethren, that all is on the principle of faith at the present time. Christianity has lapsed (and began to lapse almost as the apostles departed) into a sight system, a system that was comprehensible by the natural mind and was, in fact, the product of that mind. It took form among the Greeks and was adopted, and the truth of christianity incorporated with it was so mixed and adulterated and lowered to the level of the human mind, that it has become one of the sciences, that which is called theology; whereas the divine thought was something altogether outside the range of the natural mind, the natural man all the time being responsible, but the testimony was ^[p. 520] presented to faith, on the principle of faith. Luke 7 has ofttimes been produced to prove that forgiveness was to man in his natural state, whereas in truth it was to faith. We have to understand the gospels by the epistles. It is a mistake to read the gospels so as to understand the epistles; the epistles teach us what the gospels mean. The epistle to the Romans says that righteousness of God is on the principle of faith to faith, and moreover in chapter 4 it is said that it is on the principle of faith that it might be according to grace, being the predominating thought in the public testimony; in fact it is that which reigns; it reigns; and “reigning” in Scripture is absolute; but it reigns in relation to what is morally in keeping with it, that is, righteousness. Grace reigns through righteousness, and it would not be righteous to assume that man as in the flesh could be reinstated and set up, for it is said, “Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life”. It is not righteousness to assume that man in the flesh is set up in eternal life. It is a question of faith, and faith lays hold of another order of man. So the apostle says it is on the principle of faith, that it might be according to grace. Man in the flesh does not really relish grace; he relishes works; he will go to a point in regard to works, because that recognises him; whereas God has put the gospel on the principle of faith, so that grace might reign, that it might be altogether grace. Hence, in Luke 7, when the Lord applies the gospel, it is “Thy faith has saved thee”. “Thy faith”, that is to say no one comes into it otherwise, nor is it intended for any other. It is on the principle of faith to faith, whilst all are under responsibility to hear.

Well, I wanted to show how this thought of continuing was to be in grace, but really that all that Christ was as Man here before men, and amongst His own, was to be now in resurrection, as our text ^[p. 521] says in Luke 24, and that is to be continued. And so in dealing with the subject of life, John says, “That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes ... and our hands handled”, 1 John 1: 1. It is a substantial thing that is to be continued. Now I want to show briefly how this works out, dear brethren. It is in the gathered saints, that is, in the assembly as properly constituted that the resources are, the resources for the support, not only for the preaching verbally, but for the support of the preaching by the example of it, by the vessel which is according to Christ, the true Candlestick. And so the two that had been restored at Emmaus return to Jerusalem and find the eleven and those who were with them. The eleven in themselves could not constitute the assembly; they constitute competent testimony as to who Christ was, what He said and did, but they could not constitute the assembly. The assembly is the pillar and base of the truth. The apostles are not said to be that; they represent authority; they represent what is best from God’s side in the way of testimony, but they do not constitute the assembly; hence they find the eleven, and those with them, gathered together. And as they were saying certain things — I wish you to follow this suggestion, dear brethren — they were saying certain things, and what they were saying is to continue, as exemplified in them and so carried down. “They found the eleven, and those with them, gathered together”; the two that had been restored did not take back seats; it is not well to take back seats until we are obliged to by the directions of the assembly; there is as much will in taking a back seat as there is in taking a front one; it is all a question of order, of regulation, of the spirit of control; they were perfectly free, and although a little while before their backs were on Jerusalem, they are now in it again. They left it, and now they are back in it ^[p. 522] again; and in it, they find the eleven, and those that were with them, and grace prevails. That is one great thought to get hold of; they were saying, “The Lord is indeed risen”. It is a place of certainty; the assembly is a place of certainty; it is very doubtful whether persons who do not know the assembly are really certain of things; very doubtful. I do not unchristianise them, but it is very doubtful if they are spiritually certain of things if they do not know the assembly; that is where certainty is. “The Lord is indeed risen”. Why put in that word “indeed”? It is to call attention to the certainty that was there. It is no mere orthodoxy like Martha saying, “I know that he will rise again”. That is what she said about her brother; that was orthodox, which is cold; but these people were saying, “The Lord is indeed risen”. There is no doubt about it,”and has appeared to Simon”. The certainty of the resurrection was set out, was expressed in grace. He appeared unto Simon! That is to say, Simon, having been a sinner, one who turned aside, like a deceitful bow, at a critical moment, is spoken to by the Lord Jesus risen from among the dead! Grace is there; grace is reigning there, at least so far as their words are concerned. And then, the next thing is the Lord’s supper. The two from Emmaus said that He was made known to them in the breaking of bread. There is no doubt about that; they had seen Him with their eyes. Well now, how are these great thoughts to be continued? It is as they were saying these things that Jesus Himself stood in their midst. The continuance of these things that they were saying, the exemplification of them right down to our day, could only be by Jesus in the midst, known in the midst. Hence, those who neglect the assembly do not pay attention to the Scriptures, though they speak of them; there are many students of Scripture, many have well-thumbed Bibles, well marked Bibles, but ^[p. 523] they know nothing about the assembly. They rightly go by their Bibles, but then we want something concrete. The assembly is the realm of that; it is where substance is, where concrete evidence is, where we learn what Jesus is, not only what He says, but what He is. He says I am “altogether that which I also say”. You have got to get that thought, and where would you get it? It is not merely by the fact that Jesus has died, and has risen and gone into heaven; there is more than that, beloved, and if there is one heart who has never thought of it in this way before, I would urge upon him that confirmation is in the assembly and continuance in the testimony necessitate the assembly if we are to have something more than a mere objective Christianity. And I doubt whether those who do not know the assembly (but every Christian is of it) have formation spiritually. I do not deny their faith, that Jesus died, rose again and has gone into heaven, and is coming again, but verification is by the Spirit, but by the Spirit as He brings Jesus to us, or as Jesus comes to us through the Spirit. It is persons who are in the apprehension of the assembly, as I am speaking of it, that continue the thought, the thing itself, the candlestick itself, so that the light shines over against the candlestick.

Well now, I want to show, just briefly, from Jonah, the negative side of what I am speaking of. Here we have Jesus “himself stood in their midst”, that is to say it was Jesus really; it was not a representation of Him; it was Himself; it was the real presence of Jesus. Now we have no corporeal presence, but we have a real presence, that is, by the Spirit. It is no less real. The Holy Spirit is quite competent to give us the sense of a real presence, and an understanding, too, so that we apprehend it, and bear about something of His qualities, so that people take notice of us that we have been with Jesus. There are those who take much more liberty with Jesus than they are ^[p. 524] entitled to. The Lord is surely entitled to His rights, and His rights are in the assembly. The assembly forms the sphere of His rights. “The world sees me no longer; but ye see me; because I live ye also shall live”. I believe there are many who speak about Jesus, and their acquaintance with Jesus, who nevertheless do not know the assembly, and refuse the truth of it, maybe; that is a very mixed setting, which does not make for a real representation of Jesus, nor for the setting out of what He is as risen and glorified in heaven, for that is the Jesus of christianity; it is not only the Jesus of the gospels, not even the Jesus who is seen in the ends of the gospels as risen, but the Jesus that is in heaven, His own sphere, the place to which He is indigenous, for He is heavenly. The gospel involves that, the bringing out not only of a new order of man, but of a heavenly Man, for “as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly”. How great that word is! That is the thought for every subject of the gospel, every believer, and that is to be reflected here; that is really the testimony in its fullest sense — the setting out of Jesus as He is in heaven. So, as I said, as they were saying these things, that “the Lord is indeed risen and has appeared to Simon”, and “how he was made known to them in the breaking of bread”, Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them. So that what we are saying to one another, the truth of the resurrection and ascension of Christ, and the grace that goes with that, and the breaking of bread, is all confirmed, all carried forward, by the coming in of Jesus, Jesus Himself! It is no less real than that, the coming in of Jesus known in the assembly. “It is I myself”, He says, and He recognises what is amongst us, however little. “Have ye anything here to eat?” That is, we are sustained here by His coming in, and He ate and drank before them, as Peter says, that is, as a real Man.

^[p. 525] Well now, in Jonah we have the converse of this, and I want to just dwell on it a little, so that we might question ourselves as to whether we are of the Jonah class, conversant with the gospel, preaching the gospel, and yet, out of keeping with it. Our converts are let go; he went out of the city; he did not stay with them. He is of the ostrich kind of preacher; according to what was intended to be presented, there was a wonderful opportunity for assembly formation in that great city (I mean according to what we may understand spiritually), and yet what you find is that Jonah goes outside. Think of leaving your converts like that! He was displeased, in fact, that they became converts, and he left them, these converts, to see what would become of the city! He is outside. The Lord Jesus did not stay outside. He came in, and He says, “It is I myself”. How many there are who have preached the gospel in our own times, and God has used them, too; there were converts, and they came into the light of the assembly, but the preacher stayed outside; many of these converts were hindered, too, they never got in. Jonah built a but for himself, that is to say, he would take care of himself; he was selfish, but selfishness of this kind deprives us of the best. Unselfishness brings us into the best. Why not stay in the midst of the city? Look at that sackcloth, covering these people, and covering their beasts! Never was such a thing known or seen! Not only themselves, but their beasts were covered with sackcloth! They are worthy people; they are not people to be turned away from. People who repent are respected in heaven. Why should I turn away from them? If there is anyone here who is turning away from those who are marked by repentance, you are depriving yourself of the best there is. You are thinking of yourself, it may be. You are selfish, but in truth you are depriving yourself of the best.

^[p. 526] He went out and built himself a booth. He is going to have a good time with himself! Well, he will not have a very good time, a man that lives with himself, or in himself, or by himself is not going to have a good time. God loves him too well to let him have a good time. He went outside of the city; he left God behind, as we might say. The people were repentant, and God takes account of repentance; God is not going out of the city; God has come into the city; and one great feature of christianity is that it is set up in cities. Paul was told to go into the city; Jonah went out of the city. You may say, Well, it is right to go out of the world; but God is in the city, and God is working in the city, and there is sackcloth in the city; it must be a spiritual thought, for you would wonder where they could get all the sackcloth, to cover themselves and their beasts; it was “an exceeding great city”, but there is plenty of sackcloth; it is a question of repentance towards God, and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jonah went outside. It may be there are some here tonight who are outside. It may be you are serving the Lord, and the Lord may be using you, as He used Jonah, and your converts are elsewhere. They have found an inheritance amongst the sanctified; and you have not. It may be you are alone in a booth of your own construction. God will not forsake you; that is not the God He is. He is a gracious God. Jonah had quite a knowledge of Him; so have you. But your booth is of your own construction. I have no doubt that God in grace pays attention to these booths that are constructed by such persons. It says, “God prepared a gourd, and made it to come up over Jonah, that it might be a shadow over his head, to deliver him from his grief”. Now this is a very solemn presentation of a certain negative phase of the truth, and it is current. Where people turn their backs on the work of God, even although like Jonah they ^[p. 527] have had part in it themselves, and go outside the city, and build something of their own choice, they say, ‘Well, the blessing of God is with us; see what He has done for us; He has caused this gourd to come up’. Yes, God would help you along, because you belong to Him. He never loses sight of His own, and grants them mercies, and you may comfort yourself that you are in a right position because of the mercies, but you are deluded. Guidance is not by providential mercies; guidance is on the principle of faith; guidance is according to what God presents of Himself in righteousness. The light of God in that respect is accompanied by repentance in men. He is moving there; you will find Him there, not in the way of providential mercy, but He has a habitation there. And if you are trusting in the intermittent mercies of God, and counting upon these as guidance, you will be bitterly disappointed. Life is not there. Life is not in isolation, however well furnished your booth may be, however ornamented! Life is not there, and the intermittent mercies of God that come to you there are not guidance, are not assurance, are not intended to be assurance that your booth is God’s booth. It is still your booth. The mercy is for you to assuage your grief, but then it is short-lived, whereas what the gospel proposes is long-lived; it is eternal.

And so Jonah is bitterly disappointed. That is the word; you may be sure that you will be bitterly disappointed if you are in isolation even although you may be signally used of God, or if you are not where God is where He is among those who repented.

He requests for himself that he should die, and he has the hardihood to say to God, “I do well to be angry”. It is a hardening kind of an atmosphere, to be outside the sphere of the divine operations in this scene. It is a hardening atmosphere. So that there is no change; the mercy of God as it has passed,

^[p. 528] leaves the poor rebellious servant in the same state; there is no change in his state; he is still doing well to be angry. How serious it is to be in a state of rebellion against a God whom you know, for Jonah really did know God; he knew Him objectively; he knew Him to be a gracious God, but why did he not stay where God’s grace was operating? Why did he not stay in the realm of grace, where it was operating so manifestly that the king and the whole city were coming under the influence of it, and covering themselves with sackcloth; so that God repented Him of the evil? Why not stay there? There will be no disappointment there. What you come into there really is what is abiding, not a passing providential mercy, but an abiding thing. I am speaking now from the standpoint of the New Testament; you can only speak of the Old Testament rightly in that way; and where you have repentance towards God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ, you have what God can identify Himself with. Why not stay there? Why not find that sphere and be in it and abandon the booth of your own building? You will get in that sphere much more than a gourd, coming up in a night and withering in a night; you will get what is permanent; God is there; the Holy Spirit is there; God is dwelling there Spirit-wise, and as I said already, Christ comes there. So that there is a constant impression of Christ, and those that are there become like Him; they have all drunk into one Spirit; they are satisfied. The epistle to the Corinthians shows that those who form the assembly of God all drink into one Spirit. Poor Jonah! if he drank at all, he drank alone. Christianity is the very opposite to being alone; it is a collective thought. We all drink into one Spirit, we are all partaking of the same food; they are all alike in that sense; they have the means of sustenance there, and they are satisfied; they are not angry. If anger is a ^[p. 529] necessity it is not to last overnight. “Let not the sun go down upon your wrath”. There may be need for it; but it is not continued. Those that are in God’s booth, beloved, are satisfied. The trees of the Lord are satisfied; they are not complaining; they are not angry characteristically; certainly they are not angry with God; there is no cause for being angry with God; no, if you are angry with God you are in a serious state of soul. Are you complaining against God? He bears long with us, but He is slow to anger. But these people who are angry with Him are not doing well; anger is not one of the works that God has prepared for us to walk in; He has prepared good works for us to walk in, and anger is not amongst them. So Jonah did not do well to be angry, although he said, “I do well to be angry, even unto death”; we have this remarkable testimony to the grace of God to His servant, and God has not changed a bit. If there is anybody here who feels like Jonah, the same God would plead with you; it is beautiful to see how He reasons with His servant, and apparently His servant continued angry. I do not say he died angry; I do not believe he did; I believe he wrote this book, and the writing of the book is the testimony to the fact that he regretted his course.

And so it is well not to continue to be angry. If there is a state of complaining against God it is well to pause, and to listen to what He has to say. It says that the gourd came up in a night, and perished in a night; it was a transient bit of mercy, ‘that you might know what I can do, but’, He says, ‘Inside the city there are one hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle, should I not be merciful to them?’ What a pleading that is! And what is the thought, beloved, but that we might leave our own booths, and return to God’s, or if we have never been in it at all to find it, and drink into one Spirit, where ^[p. 530] you will find satisfaction, for the principle of God’s house is that we are all satisfied. A complaining person in it is extraneous, is foreign, it is a place of soul satisfaction, where we do not say we do well to be angry, and ask God to kill us! How poor that is, to put God in the attitude of slaying His servant! He does not do that; He does not do what Jonah asks Him to do. He loves us too well; He wishes to bring us into His own sphere, into His booth, where He is known, where all are satisfied, where the Spirit is, and where Jesus comes. Surely the most beautiful thought in the assembly is that as they were saying these things Jesus Himself stood in the midst of them, not simply in the midst, but in the midst of them, as if they were in His mind; they were so pleasing to Him. Hence there is the continuance of what He is as known thus by those who are gathered together, who know what it is to assemble themselves together.

Well, that was what I had in mind. May God use these thoughts to promote the thought of grace, the predominance of it, that grace may reign, that we may be the exponents of it, the thing continued in us.