THE MYSTERY
[p. 297] THE MYSTERY
On former occasions we have had before us certain truths presented in the Scriptures, first the promises made to Abraham; then the “better hope” of the epistle to the Hebrews; and, last time, the subject of eternal life and the gift of the Spirit; and I have sought to show each truth in its connection with, and as the outcome of, the counsel of God. Tonight I wish to speak of a truth of a different character — the mystery — but, by the Lord’s help, to present it also in the light of counsel. My conviction is this (I may be mistaken, and am not dogmatic on such a point), that the peculiar ministry for the moment is the counsel of God. There are plenty of other things which are prominent and have a great place in the minds of Christians; but I think, for the establishment of the people of God, and for the working out of God’s will in them, it is all important to present to their souls the counsel of God. I have not spoken of the truth of election, which has reference to individuals, but in a broader way of the counsel of God. And by the counsel of God I mean the things which God has taken in hand to establish according to His will, on the basis of accomplished redemption.
Before speaking on the subject of tonight, I should like to say one word in reference to the gospel. I am convinced that the basis on which the gospel rests is the counsel of God, and that were it not for the counsel of God there would be no gospel. One cannot shut one’s eyes to the fact that the world has rejected every overture which God could make to it even in grace, and that so far as the responsibility of man is concerned all hope is closed. This is evident from what the Lord said in reference to the coming of the [p. 298] Comforter, that when He was come He would convict the world of sin, because they believed not on Him. You have to remember that Christ was presented to the world in divine grace and power and goodness, and that the world did not believe in Him. Therefore, the Holy Spirit convicts the world also concerning judgment, “because the prince of this world is judged”; that is, that as the result of the rejection of Christ, Satan is declared the prince of this world. I do not say he was not the prince of the world before, but I do not think it came out until the world had definitely rejected Christ. And the Lord says, “The prince of this world cometh, and hath nothing in me”. Then the gospel comes in on the ground of divine counsel; that is, it is the means which God uses for the accomplishment of His counsel, though at the same time the gospel opens the door to all, for Christ died for all. One could not be free in the preaching of the gospel if that were not accepted. “There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all”. But while the gospel opens the door to all, the object of the gospel is not only to save souls, but to bring them into the counsel of God about them. You may say that the preaching of the gospel does not effect that fully; but I think the preaching of the gospel ought at all events to pave the way for it, and not to give to souls the idea that, being saved from judgment, they are free to live in the world out of which Christ has died.
Now, beloved friends, all that I have presented on previous occasions has been connected with saints individually, whether the promises, or the better hope (which is really fellowship with Christ in glory), or eternal life and the gift of the Spirit. All those subjects refer to the blessings we are brought into and privileged to enjoy individually. It is evident that life refers to us individually; individually we are alive to God in [p. 299] Christ, individually we live in the Spirit. Tonight I am going to bring before you, by the Lord’s help, what refers to us corporately. The moment we come to the mystery, in the sense of the one body, we bring in the truth of corporate blessing. And corporate blessing, what we are as one body here (for that is the mystery), is according to the purpose of God. It is brought out as distinctly as possible in the chapter before us; for after that the apostle has told us what God had in view in it, that is, that “now unto the principalities and powers in the heavenly places might be known by the assembly the manifold wisdom of God”; he adds, “according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord”.
I will first speak a few words as to the meaning to be attached to the expression ‘mystery’, and then I desire to show you what the mystery is. People have not always a very definite idea of what is intended to be conveyed by Scripture expressions, and there may be some here tonight that have not any very clear thought of the expression ‘mystery’. I trust to make clear to you what mystery means, that we may understand it, if the Lord give us understanding. And to what end? That we may be practically in the truth of it, that is, that it may be, so far at least as we are concerned, carried out. I am not at all blind to the difficulties peculiar to the present moment, because the truth of the one body applies to every saint upon earth, and yet it is but a very small proportion of the saints upon earth who have any understanding at all of the one body. If I were to talk to the greater part of Christians about the mystery, they would not know what I meant at all. It is but a fragment of them who have any idea at all of the truth of the one body. My conviction is that ninety-nine out of every hundred saints, as to the condition of their souls, have never got beyond congregationalism; they have never got to the idea of a structure. And even amongst ourselves,
[p. 300] we know a great deal more about gathering than about building. The great mischief is where the two are not held. I quite admit the importance of gathering: “Where two or three are gathered together unto my name”; but without building it must result in congregationalism, which does not present the truth of the church. What the Lord says in the very first allusion to the church is, “On this rock I will build my assembly”, and that is a structure. I allow that there is the Lord’s congregation here in the world, but what the Lord speaks about in Matthew 16 is a structure. Building and gathering, I am convinced, ought to go hand in hand. If souls are gathered out to the name of the Lord Jesus, there ought to be at the same time the building up of souls in Christ; for there is only one material in the structure which Christ builds, that which grows to a holy temple in the Lord, and that material is Christ. It is not man as such that is built in it, neither Jew nor Gentile, I mean morally; it is Christ and nothing but Christ: “On this rock I will build my assembly”.
But now as to the idea connected with ‘mystery’. The word is employed in Scripture in many connections. I do not know that we find it in the Old Testament, but we find it frequently in the New. The Lord spoke of the mysteries of the kingdom. So, too, mystery is employed in a more general sense in the first chapter of the epistle to the Ephesians. And in the Revelation we read that the mystery of God should be finished. It has been said, and I quite go with it, that mystery means something which is known only to the initiated. It was an expression current among the heathen. I daresay someone would ask me, Who are the initiated? Well, I say, everyone who has the Holy Spirit is of the initiated. Therefore the mystery is the property of every real Christian, for we could not speak of a person being a real Christian unless he have the Holy Spirit, though, as it has been said, he [p. 301] may be on the road to it. But every real Christian is of the initiated, and is entitled to be in the secret of the mystery.
But there is another and a very important moral thought connected with it. A mystery is something which cannot exist in the public ways of God. Let me give you an illustration from Matthew 13. The mysteries of the kingdom of heaven could not exist in the public ways of God. If the kingdom were established in power and glory, you could not have such a character of things as is presented in that chapter; because the form of the kingdom shown there contemplates no difference between Jew and Gentile; “the field is the world”, and there are “the children of the wicked one”. And do you think when God comes in in His public ways there will be the children of the wicked one, the ‘tares’ in His kingdom? Not a bit of it. And do you think in that day there will be no distinction between Jew and Gentile? But no such distinction is known in the mysteries of the kingdom. The Lord says, “It is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven”; and He explains to them how all is brought about: the seed is sown, and springs up, and the consequences of it are seen. The kingdom of heaven, in the form in which it is presented to us in Matthew 13, exists in the time when the king is hidden and God has not come out in His public ways. When He does, the kingdom will have a totally different character.
But now I come to another point, that is, to the mystery presented to us in the epistle to the Ephesians (chapter 5: 28 - 32): “So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself. For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as Christ the church. For we are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife,
[p. 302] and they two shall be one flesh. This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church”. In this very striking passage, we have Paul saying, “This mystery is great”. Peculiar stress therefore is to be laid upon what you get there; but he says, “I speak concerning Christ and concerning the church”. Now the mystery as presented to us in this passage refers first to Christ. What I understand it to mean is this, that Christ in the time that He is cut off from His natural kindred, becomes the head of a joint body on earth, composed of Jew and Gentile. I think there is an allusion to this in the passage. Christ is separated from His kindred after the flesh, as Joseph was; and in the time of His separation He has become the Head of the assembly composed of Jew and Gentile. And that is what never could be in the public ways of God. When the Lord comes again, and the kingdom is set up in glory, do you think such a thing could be possible? It is totally impossible. Jew and Gentile will have their respective places in that day, but what will mark the Gentiles will be that they will eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table; they will be blessed intermediately through Israel. Israel will be the channel of light and blessing on earth in that day, because the promises belong to Israel, and the Gentile will be brought into blessing subordinately to Israel. Jehovah will reign, and Christ will be King of the whole earth, and the Head of the Gentiles; but not the Head of a body composed jointly of Jew and Gentile. It is in the time of His rejection that He takes that place.
Now I want to come to another side of the mystery. I have spoken of the Head, now I want to speak of the body; Ephesians 3: 4 - 6. “Whereby, when ye read, ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles [p. 303] should be joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint par-takers of his promise in Christ by the gospel”. The mystery here is connected with the body, and what is presented is that which is impossible in the public ways of God, that Jew and Gentile should be joint heirs and a joint body. It evidently refers to the present moment, because, if it referred only to the future, the word ‘heirs’ would not be used. ‘Promise’ I understand to mean here that to which God has engaged Himself. I do not think it refers to a promise specifically made to any person. A promise on the part of God is an expression of purpose. Just as we get “the promise of life in Christ Jesus” — God has been pleased to engage Himself to it.
I just show you the two sides of the mystery; on the one that Christ has become the Head of a joint body composed of Jew and Gentile; and on the other, that the Gentile has become a joint heir, and a joint body, and joint partaker of God’s promise in Christ through the gospel — the gospel being the way by which it has been brought about.
Now I go on to a few thoughts in connection with chapter 3. It is a deeply interesting chapter, and brings in Paul and the administration committed to him; and in order to lead up to it, I must refer to what comes out at the close of chapter 1 and the beginning of chapter 2 of Ephesians. Chapter 1: 19 - 23: “What is the exceeding greatness of his power to us-ward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power, which he wrought in Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly places, far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come: and hath put all things under his feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the assembly, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all”. There is not a word about mystery [p. 304] there, because it does not refer to Christ as the Head of a joint body of Jew and Gentile down here, but in the greatness of the position in which He has been placed as man according to the purpose of God; while the body is looked at in the whole extent of it as the fulness of Him which filleth all in all. It is Christ alone, in His proper place, as one might say, in heaven, and therefore there is no allusion to the mystery. At the beginning of chapter 2 it says, “And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins; wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: among whom also we all had our conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others. But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace are ye saved); and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness towards us through Christ Jesus”. There is not a word of mystery here any more than there is in chapter 1 in connection with Christ; because it is no question of what the church is down here, but of what the saints are in heaven; they are raised up together, and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ; and the point that governs the whole passage, whether in reference to Christ or us, is the power of God. There is not a word about administration, nor about mystery: it is the calling of God and the height of the exaltation of the saints; they are quickened by the power of God out of death, raised up together, and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Mysteries do not refer to heaven; mysteries refer to what is [p. 305] taking place here upon earth. When God comes out in His public ways, then the mystery of God will be finished; God will have brought about the counsel of His will, and there will be no longer mystery; nothing to be known in that day by the initiated, because everything then will be public. It is clear to me that mysteries can have no reference to heaven; and therefore, when it is a question of setting Christ at God’s right hand in heaven, and of saints being made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ, mystery is not introduced. But in chapter 3, when the apostle refers to the administration which was committed to him, and to the assembly as here upon earth, then the thought of mystery is introduced, as that which had been revealed down here. Look at chapter 3: 1, 2, “For this cause I Paul, the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if ye have heard of the administration of the grace of God which is given me towards you”. It is a question of the administration given to him. Look also at verse 8, “Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what is the administration of the mystery [the word ‘fellowship’ ought to be ‘dispensation’ or ‘administration’] which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God who created all things, to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God”.
It has often been observed that chapter 3 is really parenthetical. It comes in between chapters 2 and 4, the beginning of chapter 4 being continued on from the end of chapter 2 and chapter 3 comes in to show us the special administration committed to the apostle, by which everything was brought about in souls. The power of God is that which effects everything, but as to the means by which the result is brought about in souls, it is a question of administration; and hence [p. 306] the apostle claims that he did not get what he had from other men, but that it had been specially revealed to him, an administration committed to him.
And mark this — it is by the administration of the mystery that the angels and principalities and powers in the heavenly places were to become acquainted with the manifold wisdom of God; and you cannot therefore attach too much importance to administration, that is, how God’s ways are administered down here, how the one body, the assembly, has been formed.
Now I desire to bring out a thought or two in connection with what the mystery, the one body, is. The apostle says, “Which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men, as it is now revealed unto his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit, that the Gentiles should be joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel”. It was when the whole world was lost in dark insensibility to God, that God began to bring this about. The Jew was lost in the darkness of unbelief, in spite of every possible testimony presented to him; and the Gentile was sunk in the degradation of idolatry. Such was the condition of the world before God. What God does in the first place is to set Christ at His own right hand in the heavenly places. And the next thing God does historically in the unfolding of His ways is to call out a remnant of His people — it is shown in the epistle to the Hebrews — He presents to them the better hope. “The Lord added daily the saved ones to the assembly”; He saves a remnant of His people, and He brings them into the assembly; they were baptised by the Holy Spirit. Now if Jew and Gentile were to be a joint body, do you think the Jew was to come down to the level of the Gentile? Such a thing could not be. The Jew had rejected Christ, but dark as the poor Jew had been, he was not, when his eyes were opened, to come down to the level [p. 307] of the Gentile. On the other hand, was the Gentile to be put on the Jewish platform? Not at all, for that was all gone because on that platform man had failed totally. The Gentile was not to be put on the Jewish platform, nor was the Jew to come down to the degraded Gentile, but both were to be on a completely new platform. The Jew was baptised by the Holy Spirit; that put him on new ground; and the Gentile, too, received the Holy Spirit, which put him on the same ground with the Jews who were saved; it made one body of them, because the secret of the one body is the possession of the Holy Spirit. It is that which astonished the Jews, that the Holy Spirit fell upon Cornelius and his friends; and some were apparently unready to baptise uncircumcised Gentiles; but Peter said, “Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptised, which have received the Holy Spirit as well as we?” The truth is that God put no difference between them. He linked the Jew and Gentile with Christ in heaven by the Holy Spirit.
And I say without hesitation that union must come before unity. If there were not union there really could not be unity. Unity must properly begin from the top, from Christ. It is like the precious ointment that was poured upon the head of Aaron and flowed down. Unity flows properly from union; that is, we are united to Christ by the Holy Spirit, and therefore there is unity down here. When the Holy Spirit fell on the day of Pentecost, the saints were united to Christ, though I do not think they knew it. Then afterwards the Gentiles, too, received the gift of the Holy Spirit, and were united also to Christ. And thus both Jew and Gentile were a joint body, though as yet the truth of it had not come out. Neither the one nor the other was entitled to that ground; it was all completely new, and it was on that ground the Gentiles became joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel.
[p. 308] Take a case which might occur in the present day. Suppose I had a slave, and both I and my slave received the Holy Spirit. I say we are joint heirs, and of a joint body, and joint partakers, though that man does not cease to be my slave. When we come to our individual paths here upon earth, I do not cease to be his master nor he to be my slave. The apostle Paul made Onesimus go back to his master. He suggests in the most tender and gracious way to Philemon that he should give him his liberty, but he is to receive him as a brother beloved. When we come to corporate truth, we have to remember that it lies outside of our individual path upon the earth. The difficulty is to conciliate the two things. Each has his individual path subject to the Lord; and we are told to abide in the calling in which we are called. But then, outside that, we have our corporate blessing — joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel; it is on completely new ground by the fact of union with Christ in the reception of the Holy Spirit. That is a point of all moment, because it was not a sort of mutual concession, nor a kind of evangelical alliance; but that the Jew who had forfeited his place upon earth, was by the fact of his receiving the Holy Spirit united to Christ in heaven, and the Gentile, having received the Holy Spirit, was also united, and therefore they were one body upon earth; the gospel was the instrumentality which God employed for that purpose. The apostle Paul went among the Gentiles preaching “the unsearchable wealth of Christ; and to make all men see what is the administration of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things; to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the assembly the manifold wisdom of God”.
A word now upon the wisdom. I think the idea of the word ‘wisdom’ is ‘resources’ — the manifold [p. 309] resources of God, for see what God has brought about. If we only understood it we should appreciate the greatness of it. It is obscured at the present moment by the condition in which saints are; but if you could understand what the assembly was at the beginning, and what it would be if every saint entered into the truth of his calling, you would apprehend the greatness of what God has effected. There was the world as to its moral condition lost in unbelief and degradation; that was the spectacle before principalities and powers in the heavenly places, and what had God brought about? He had set a Man in heaven at His right hand to begin with, and made Him the Head of a joint body on earth in which His moral completeness was to be displayed. Do you know what the idea of a body is? There are two thoughts. One is that the body acts under the direction of the head; and when the body ceases to act under the direction of the head it is paralysis, there is clear proof that everything is out of gear. But there is another thought in connection with it — the head is displayed in the body, for every member of my body derives from the head. Those are the great ideas, I believe, connected with the assembly, as the body of Christ — there was a body here upon earth composed of Jew and Gentile, acting under the direction of a Head in heaven, and at the same time a vessel for the display of the virtues of the Head; as the apostle says, “Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood ... that ye should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light”. That was the spectacle before angels and principalities in the heavenly places. What a wonderful and morally beautiful sight it was — to have a body here in which every member resigning its own will was contented to act under the direction of the blessed Head in heaven, and in this body was the display of the moral beauty and comeliness of the Head in heaven! What could [p. 310] be more amazing? What a mighty triumph of wisdom on the part of God!
In the epistle to the Colossians we get the truth of the new man, which is intimately connected with the body. The great idea in it is that “Christ is all and in all”, and that the sensibilities and affections, and the word of Christ, the whole moral beauty of Christ, come out in the saints as one body here upon earth in their relations one toward another. When you think what the history of the world had been in the presence of heaven, was not that an amazing result for God to produce? Did not that prove to principalities and powers in the heavenly places the unbounded resources of God, to see a body here upon earth, composed of those naturally so diverse as Jew and Gentile had been, directed by the Head, and displaying all the blessed characteristics of the Head? I would to God we had a greater sense of the beauty of the Head, of the fulness of the Lord Jesus Christ; that we knew more of the unsearchable wealth of Christ. The apostle says, “Whom we preach” — speaking of Christ — “warning every man, and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man perfect in Christ”. I trust that Christ is formed in every soul I am speaking to, but are you anxious to “grow up unto him in all things which is the head”? We ought to have such a sense of the virtue and moral excellence of the Head that the one thing to be desired is to grow up unto Him in all things; that we might get more away from man, and ourselves, and all the workings of flesh, to be more conformed to Christ in glory. It is a great thing to get the Head before you. You will never understand what He is as Head to the body if you do not understand what He is as Head to you. The Head is the source and the standard to each one of us, and when I understand what He is as Head to me, then I understand what He is to the whole body.
Then will come out the blessed truth of unity here.
[p. 311] It will not be a unity of agreement or an alliance, but unity in the character of Christ Himself; as the apostle says, speaking of the new man, “There is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free; but Christ is all and in all”. That is the great reality God did produce down here. It has been terribly marred in the hands of man. But then, all the work of man and the failure of man cannot possibly alter what God has effected. The body is here, and it is a very great thing if God has given us just to return to the truth of it; and although our sphere of influence may be a very small one, and we may have very little opportunity of coming into contact with the saints of God, yet so far as we can, it is a very great point to walk in the truth of the mystery, not only correct in our individual path, but deeply concerned in regard to our relations one towards another, so that the character of Christ may be seen in the company of the saints collectively.
In conclusion I may say that I do not think anybody would question for a moment that the mystery is connected with the eternal purpose of God. And it is a very important truth for us. The knowledge of the mystery marks us off practically from the great mass of Christendom. Of course, all saints are in the body, and in the mystery; but they are not instructed in it. I suppose everybody here tonight is so more or less, and the point for us is to walk in the reality of it. The first thing is to give up our own heads, that is, the direction of our own minds, to be under the direction of the Head in heaven, and then to be very jealous that the blessed traits and features of Christ should be reproduced in us in our relations one with another down here. If you want a guide for the assembly, study Colossians 3, and see what comes out there.
I am entitled to say that the truth of the mystery places us more distinctly on the ground of divine [p. 312] counsel than any point I have brought before you on previous occasions. The very fact of being heirs of promise puts us on the ground of divine counsels; so does the having part in the better hope; so, too, eternal life and the gift of the Spirit; and more distinctly so does our being of the one body. The administration of the mystery has, as we have seen, a very definite object, “that now, unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the assembly the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord”.
One word more. It goes on to say, “In whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him”. There is your privilege. I do not go on to the prayer at the end of the chapter, save to say that what it means is this, that the truth may be made good in our hearts in our practical state down here, “that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith”, so that we may know “the love of Christ”, and “be filled into all the completeness of God”, that saints may not be one-sided, for that is not the idea of ‘fulness’, ‘completeness’. May God work it, beloved friends! Thank God, He has made these things in a great measure plain in these last days, and I dread very much lest we should slip away from them. It is very easy to hold things in terms when the vital power of them is gone; and if we are not going on, depend on it we are going back — you cannot remain stationary in divine things. If you are not growing up into Christ, you are retrograding. And therefore it becomes every one of us to be exercised as to how we are holding the truth and going on with it. May God give us understanding, and maintain us in power, by His blessed Spirit that dwells in us.