GOD’S END REACHED THROUGH SUFFERING AND TRAVAIL

J. Mitchell

1 Samuel 1: 9–18; Genesis 35: 16–20; Galatians 4: 19

I am looking for help, dear brethren, to say a word about God’s end being reached through suffering and travail. We were reading in the house this morning, “From that time Jesus began to shew to his disciples that he must ... suffer”, Matthew 16: 21. It seems from the way the Spirit of God puts it in that chapter that suffering was a divine necessity. If we think of the necessity of the whole moral question being cleared in the sight of God, we can understand the divine necessity of Christ going that way. Then in Luke’s gospel, to the two going to Emmaus He said, “Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory?”, Luke 24: 26). This indicates that the divine way of reaching God’s end is through suffering. That might seem a little hard and a little difficult to take in, but it is clear that that is the divine way. Therefore it is one of the things that we have to face squarely.

At the present time we suffer little at the hands of men or from the authorities, but I notice in Mr. Taylor’s ministry, he says quite a number of times that suffering is the order of the day.

That is something we need to think about. There is a good deal of suffering among the saints in one way or another. Perhaps one of the most common sources of suffering is the break up that has come in among families, causing quite extreme suffering. But what is in mind for this occasion is that suffering is not only to yield a result for ourselves, although that is so, but it is to yield a result for God. In John 16, when the Lord is instructing His own as to His going away. He tells them that His going away will result in suffering, but He goes on to tell them that as they go through the suffering a man will be born and the result will be joy (John 16: 21). Now that is very blessed and should sustain us, because the end in suffering is that God secures what is in His mind; but the end too, as far as we are concerned, can result in joy.

So I have read these passages because each of them brings out that point. Indeed, 1 Samuel very largely teaches that lesson. Hannah is a suffering woman, persecuted by those who were nearest to her. She suffered day by day, and there is nothing more wearing than having to suffer day in and day out. But that is what Hannah had to bear. Later on in this book you get another woman who was married to Phinehas the priest, a man who displayed an extraordinary low state in his soul. As the news comes to her about the ark of God being taken and the death of her husband, she says, “The glory is departed”. She suffered in her spirit, but she went through travail and a child was born. She named that child, Ichabod, saying, “The glory is departed from Israel”, 1 Samuel 4: 21. You see the intensity of suffering these women went through. As the book goes on we finally reach. David, but in 1 Samuel David is not king; he is the sufferer. That is what is set out in David, and particularly at the close of the book at Ziklag. David was not at his highest spiritually when he went down among the Philistines, but as he and his men came back to Ziklag and discovered that everything was carried away, and Ziklag was set on fire, David and his men wept until they had no more strength for weeping. But it also says that the people spoke of stoning him (1

Samuel 30: 6). The whole thing was so much to the persons who really loved David that they would have stoned him. But he strengthened himself in Jehovah his God and he called for the ephod. I say that to show that the whole of 1 Samuel is really a book of suffering, and you do not get the kingship of David until 2 Samuel. His kingship was the result of the suffering.

That suffering was initiated in that woman Hannah. She felt the need of a man child. The situation required

that. She was a spiritual woman, a woman who was with God as to the state of things that existed at that time. She felt the conditions that were there and was able to assess the need among God’s people. Then additionally she travailed with God in order that there might be a result in the saints being taken out of that low state, in view of God having His portion among His own people. In that household, everything was against her. She was childless and the other woman, Peninnah, taunted her with that. She knew what it meant to Hannah, and she played on it in the way of persecuting her. What suffering this woman went through! But she not only suffers from Peninnah, she travails in her soul with God. It is a much greater thing to go through the travail with God in relation to the saints. Where we read it says, “Hannah rose up after they had eaten in Shiloh, and after they had drunk ... and she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to Jehovah, and wept much”. Even Eli the priest was no comfort to her. He accused her of what did not mark her at all.

Eli’s accusation brings out the spirit of Nazariteship in Hannah. She said, “I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink”. It brings out in a public way that inwardly in her soul she was really a Nazarite. In the law of the Nazarite it says, “If a man or a woman have vowed the special vow of a Nazarite”, Numbers 6: 2. It goes on in that chapter to set out the detail about a man who is a Nazarite, but there is nothing said about a woman. Then you come to Hannah and see a woman who is a Nazarite, a very fine feature. Apparently the Nazarites were few, but they were very precious to God. They were purer than snow, whiter than milk (Lamentations 4: 7). God valued a Nazarite and He values this Nazarite spirit that is manifested in Hannah. She had one concern only—that there might be what would meet the state among the people at that time, and secure what was for God’s pleasure. So she prayed and had in mind that the Nazarite feature should mark the result of her prayers. It says, “if thou ... wilt give unto thy handmaid a man child,

then I will give him to Jehovah all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon his head”. She was not only that in her own spirit, but she was going to dedicate to God in the same spirit the result of her travail in the man child.

When we think of the man child we must always think of Christ. It is a great thing to desire that Christ might be in prominence among the saints. We should not be concerned about how things affect us personally, the great thing is to be concerned that Christ should have His place, that He should be prominent among the saints. That should be not only in an objective way, although it is right that Christ should be presented to the affections of the saints, but as we shall see in Galatians, that Christ might be formed in them. It is a very great result that He might be formed in the inwards of the saints. That was Hannah’s concern; the man child was the solution to the crisis that existed at that time. How low the people had got, but you think of one woman taking the matter up and travailing before God. Oh, dear brethren, I would say this without a moment’s hesitation, there is great need for this kind of exercise and it is something in which the sisterhood can have a particular part. If this exercise was taken on there would be far better conditions among the saints. Crises that arise would be solved if we travailed before God.

That is what she did but she had to wait for the result. It says in 1 Samuel 1: 18, “the woman went her way, and did eat, and her countenance was no more as before”. The matter was settled in her soul. She had poured out her soul to God. One challenges oneself as to whether one has ever poured out one’s soul to God. That is the solution to everything that comes into our private lives, and particularly our assembly lives. The great solution to it all is to pour the matter out to God. Then a peace comes into your soul and you can go on your way, not unduly burdened about matters. It is right to be burdened, but then you can pour it out to God

Himself, so that you are released from the burden and can go, as it says, “And the woman went her way, and did eat, and her countenance was no more as before”. Think of the peace of soul that must have come into that dear woman! All Peninnah’s actions to cause her suffering would now be of no account whatsoever; she had poured out her soul to God, she could be restful and go on in peace.

I trust the Lord may help us in these matters. There is much among the saints that causes concern and exercise, and we get burdened about it. Maybe we get over burdened, and it might become an obsession with us. The great thing is to be before God about it and pour out your soul and your feelings to Him. It is right to feel things. Would indeed that we might feel things even more, to feel what the state of the saints really means to God Himself. But pour it out to Him and then you can be relieved of your burden. You do not become obsessed with it, you can go your way, you can eat, as it says, “and did eat, and her countenance was no more as before”. You notice it does not say that she did eat and drink. Not that I want to say anything about drink, that is not on my mind, but it is just to bring out the point that she continued in the spirit of Nazariteship, which gave God occasion to bring in His own solution. The solution comes in in Samuel. It is the beginning of recovery among the people of God at that time, and it stretches on.

Results may not happen immediately, that is another matter that we have to learn. Sometimes we have to wait. Jacob said that, “I wait for thy salvation, O Jehovah” (Genesis 49: 18), and sometimes we have to wait for an answer to our prayers. We may have to carry through in the waiting period the sorrow of matters and be with God about them. But what she prayed for happened; it was Samuel. And what was on her mind, finally came to light in David. In 2

Samuel, David’s exercise was that he might find a place for the ark,

typical of a place for Christ. Hannah’s song in chapter 2 indicates what was really in her soul.

I have often marvelled, that at the very beginning when God took His people out of Egypt.

Moses says, “Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thine inheritance.

The place that thou, Jehovah, hast made thy dwelling, The Sanctuary, Lord, that thy hands have prepared”, Exodus 15: 17. God had to wait a very long time, He had to wait till David for that. I ask the question, Are you keeping Him waiting? The answer to Hannah’s exercises was when the ark was brought into Jerusalem. Do not stop short and have partial thoughts.

Reach out to the full thought of God!

Now I come to Rachel. She is in a certain sense even a more extreme example of what is before us. At the beginning Rachel was the one who was loved, but there were four women there. There was Leah and the two maidservants, all of them were fruitful, but Rachel had no children. She had in mind that there should be fruit from her relations with Jacob. Do you carry that in your exercises, dear brother, dear sister, that there should be fruit for God? And then it comes about; God listened to her travail and she had a son Joseph. What a son Joseph was. Joseph was born in Padan-Aram, and immediately Joseph comes on to view Jacob says, I must go back (Genesis 30: 25). It was Christ, typically, coming on to view in Joseph, that caused exercise with Jacob. But when Joseph is born Rachel called his name Joseph, meaning, He will add. That is an important point. The divine thought was twelve, representing the saints complete for God.

If I could divert for a little. Joseph was a man whose operations were in relation to the twelve.

He wanted the twelve intact. The rest were not concerned about the twelve; they were quite prepared to sell Joseph down into Egypt, and that as far as they were concerned was the end of him. They never thought about Jacob’s feelings. Think of the awfulness of it; dipping that coat

in blood, taking it back, and saying to Jacob, Now discern for yourself what has happened.

They were not concerned about the twelve at all. Eleven would have been good enough, for them. They would get rid of one. It was Christ, in type, the features of Christ. It is a terrible thing that brethren could do such a thing, that would be so hard and devoid of family feelings as to do violence to the feelings of Jacob their father. They would say, Look, discern for yourself what has happened to him. It was utterly callous, and the matter of the twelve was of no concern to them. I impress upon you, dear brother, dear sister, bear in mind the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. Bear in mind the need to keep the saints together. I do not say keep them together at all cost, because there may be circumstances in which you might not be able to do that, but your exercise would be to keep the saints together in the truth. There has been far too much in recent years of the allowance of matters coming in to disrupt family relations among the saints. I appeal to the brethren to have in mind the need of maintaining the saints as one whole, keeping them together. I know we are in days of breakdown, and we cannot have the whole; but nevertheless all our activities should be to keep the saints together in love for Christ and love for the truth, pre-eminently, but also in love for one another.

Now Joseph did that in his whole operations. When his brethren came down, Joseph said nothing about himself, he asked about his father. He wanted to raise exercise with his brethren, not as to what they did to Joseph himself, but the way they were absolutely callous about the affections of their father. Do you ever think of what your activities mean to God?

What they mean to Christ? These are things to think about soberly, and to weigh up in the presence of the Lord. What are your activities? What do they mean to Christ? Are they furthering what He has in His mind? Or, are they doing despite to His feelings? I remember a servant of the Lord, visiting this area, saying, In protracted exercises

among the saints what is required is the skill of Joseph and the spirit of Judah. I think that is what is needed at the present time, the skill of Joseph, who works to get the brethren to judge themselves that they might come to the real thought of the twelve. The remarkable thing about it is, while he is doing that, he fills their sacks, he keeps them fed. That is the skill of Joseph.

Now I have departed a little, but nevertheless it bears on what I am saying, that Rachel’s exercise was related to the twelve. She had the complete thought in mind; that needed to be worked out, but it had to be worked out through suffering. If things are to be worked out for God, and for Christ, if His place is to be secured among the saints, that involves suffering on our part. It is a very serious and sobering matter, and I wish to be sobered about it, and I wish that every one of us present here this evening would be sobered in their own spirits about it; what the saints really mean to Christ, how precious they are in His sight. Rachel is concerned about that, and it means that she has to go through this awful sorrow. It says, “it went hard with her in her childbearing”, Genesis 35: 17. These exercises are not gone through easily; they cost us something in the way of suffering, in the way of travail, in the way of sorrow.

There is need to take up the sorrows of the testimony before God. But it says, “the midwife said to her, Fear not; for this also is a son for thee”. There is a product of the exercise, which involved severe sorrow, severe suffering and severe travail. These things are not easy, they are not matters to be taken up lightly, they are matters to be taken up soberly and worked out in the presence of God. It says, “And it came to pass when it went hard with her in her childbearing, that the midwife said to her, Fear not; for this also is a son for thee”. That is the completion of her exercises. It is beautiful that she suffers and travails in view of reaching the divine end, and that end is reached. It means Rachel’s death. How much are we prepared to work among the saints, and to work with God in relation to the saints,

and then go out of sight?

She calls his name Benoni, as the footnote tells us ‘Son of my affliction’, but it says “his father called him Benjamin”. There is a touching reference by Mr. Taylor where he says that Saul of Tarsus was really a child of sorrow, a true Benoni. There was the sorrow and suffering of Stephen. You might have said that the enemy had secured a great end in the death of Stephen. But what came to light in the suffering of Stephen were the features of the body of Christ. He exhibits the spirit of Christ, it is Christ all over again. When the Lord says to Saul of Tarsus later, “why dost thou persecute me?”, the “me” was seen in Stephen. The very same kind of spirit is seen in those men and women whom Saul dragged off to prison.

That was the “me”. That is what the Spirit of God is working to produce. He is working to produce Christ in the saints, the same character of person, and that is the assembly. The assembly is the reflection of Christ Himself, it is the “me”. The Head in heaven, and the body here, was the truth recovered under Mr. Darby. We need to value these things.

Saul was a child of sorrow, a true Benoni, but he becomes Benjamin, son of His right hand.

What a man was Saul, as he became Paul. Think of the strength that was there! The enemy would have thought he had secured a great victory in the removal of Stephen, but it brought in Paul. Think of the son of His right hand, the power that came in through Paul in the building up of the assembly here, in producing the features of Christ inwardly in the saints.

Not of course that we can produce that. It is the Spirit that produces it, but I mean Paul’s ministry brought that to light, and the Spirit produces it in answer to the ministry. I repeat, because I think it is so necessary, that this is what the Spirit of God is doing at the present time, to produce the features of Christ, that Christ might see Himself all over again. As we have been taught, that is what the assembly is, it is the same character of manhood that was seen in

Christ. That is what He is striving for, but I say that involves travail on our part.

So I read in Galatians, just to touch it briefly. Paul says, “of whom I again travail in birth until Christ shall have been formed in you”. Now that is the servant, that is Paul. None of us would take the place of being Paul, and when you come to a passage like this you feel extremely humbled as to your measure. It is not only a question of ministering among the saints. There was no greater minister outside of the Lord Himself than Paul, and yet he says,

“I again travail in birth until Christ shall have been formed in you”. To the Ephesians he says,

“I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Ephesians 3: 14); ministry that brought the truth into expression had come to an end, but what remained was the bowing of his knees. That is a powerful exercise, and I commend it to those who take responsibility in some measure to serve among the saints, as I commend it to oneself, that what is needed is this character of travail in order that Christ might be formed in the saints. It is not an easy matter, it is not a simple matter, it is not a light matter. We are in days when lightness is completely inappropriate. We are in sobering times. I do not wish to cause depression among the saints, but these are sobering times, and we need all of us to be sober. How much more the ministers among us need to be sobered about matters! That is what Paul says, “I again travail in birth until Christ shall have been formed in you”. I believe that is the crying need, that is the formation of something substantial, inward and solid; something the enemy cannot touch. He cannot affect Christ formed in us. Paul wanted the Galatians to be really the body of Christ, to have true assembly features, and that should be a concern for us all. How much we think about ourselves, how much we love ourselves. We really need to love Christ, and we really need to love Christ formed in the saints. It does mean sacrifice. It means giving up a good deal; it means possibly giving up all your own thoughts and aspirations; above all it

would involve this matter of travail. I feel challenged by it, as to how much we travail before God that Christ might be formed in the saints. To what extent are we concerned for the welfare of the people of God? How much do they mean to us? Do we carry in our minds what they mean to Christ, what they are in His affections? I think it would change our outlook.

That was a little of what one had in mind, that the Lord is reaching His end. There is no question about it, He will reach it. I often say this, because it is necessary at present. Because of the smallness of numbers, we tend to think in a negative way, but I have no doubt whatsoever that the Spirit will secure what is in His mind in the dispensation, and He will secure it according to the divine level. There is no diminution of the standard in the Spirit’s mind. That is one side of the truth. The other side is that we have to take up our responsibility in relation to it and to suffer for it. May the Lord bless His word, for His name’s sake.

Address at Peterhead
27 June 1998