PART 1
Before any one is capable of either understanding or speaking on the subject of God’s testimony on the earth, it is necessary that he should have as the truth that there is a testimony for God on the earth today, that it is full and complete, and a definite idea also of what that testimony is now, namely, that which was in the mind of the Spirit, and given out by the apostle when he employed this word in writing to Timothy, “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony ( μαρτυριon) of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner”, 2 Tim 1: 8.
It is an important statement—but on the authority of this holy scripture one makes it without the least fear of any sound contradiction—that God Himself is by this testimony in direct, active communication with men at this present moment. Communication does not of necessity involve communion, but it precedes communion, for to bring men into communion with Himself has been ever God’s design in communicating with them. Not only is God in active communication with us, but never at any period in this world’s history, has He been so active, and so distinctly speaking to us, as He is today. By today I mean the today of the gospel of His grace, the “now” of 2 Cor 6: 2, the “hour”
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of which the Lord spoke as “coming”, and which “now is”, John 5: 25. The Holy Ghost (God Himself) is now present on the earth, and is active in testimony.
This is the origin of the “present testimony”. It is that which God COMPLETED (see Col 1: 25) by his chosen vessel Paul, that which Paul committed to Timothy, and that which he instructed Timothy to commit, in his turn also to “faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also”, 2 Tim 2: 2.
Observe, that God’s thought as to the church was not originally committed to the whole of the apostles, but to Paul, and they were instructed in it by him. This full completed testimony, when evil had come in, was committed by Paul to an individual who was not directed to associate himself with all professors, but on account of unfaithfulness, only with “them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart”, 2 Tim 2: 22. Observe also that nothing can be more delusive than is the common idea respecting this deposit. That idea is that if you have the gospel preached, or if you preach it to the lost, you are in and of the
“testimony”. The testimony is much more than the preaching of the gospel. It is very doubtful if the preaching of the gospel to the lost was in any way a present thought of the apostle at this final moment of his life. It is also very doubtful if we have any authority for including Timothy in the number of those distinct gifts from Christ called
“evangelists” (compare for instance the instruction, “do the work of an evangelist”, with “As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus … that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine”, 1 Tim 1: 3). Furthermore, it was the completed testimony which was committed to Timothy, what Paul calls “my doctrine”, and that could not be limited to the preaching of the gospel to the unsaved, because all the other apostles and evangelists were preachers of this gospel. Hence what the apostle calls distinctively “my doctrine” was more than the preaching to the unsaved. This is clear. Timothy had been, by companionship and similarity of interest, long in the line of it, and learning it too of the apostle. Thus, therefore, he addresses him: “Thou 12
hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, long-suffering, charity, patience”, 2 Tim 3: 10. It was not then a part of what the apostle taught that he confided to the care of Timothy. It was Paul’s doctrine fully known. We have the same doctrine now in Scripture. Other of the apostles preached the gospel, some too (as Apollos) with more eloquence even than Paul, or the timidity and bodily feebleness of Timothy would lead us to expect that he was able to do. But the testimony was not committed to them, as leaders in it, but to him. The other apostles who had seen the Lord on earth did not teach Paul as to that which he calls
“my doctrine” (including also the gospel which he preached).
They received it from him. He received it direct from Christ Himself, as he tells us in Galatians 1: 12, 1 Cor 11: 23, and Eph 3: 2, 3. These two considerations therefore (1) the doubt of Timothy being an evangelist, and (2) that all Paul’s doctrine was committed to him, lead one to refuse to limit the “testimony” to the preaching of the gospel to the lost.
Let the importance of the subject of the present testimony be now somewhat before us. It was the one all absorbing topic, on the heart of the great apostle (to whom alone God had committed it) on the eve of his departure from this world. Most solemnly and repeatedly does his yearning heart urge its immense importance upon his beloved child in the faith. How could he leave in Timothy’s hands the precious deposit which he had himself received from the Lord, and neglect thus to speak of it? Thus then we hear him speak, and oh, that in our days of indifference we may be aroused by the fervour of his words, and may grasp the importance of their subject! “Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me”, 2 Tim 1: 13.
Again, “O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust”, 1 Tim 6: 20. Again, and most solemnly, “I charge thee therefore before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom, preach the word ... for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine”, 2 Tim 4: 1-3. Sound doctrine then is that which was committed to Paul, and by him 13
to Timothy and which, as time went on, the apostle forewarns him and us that some would not “endure”.
Let us note here before passing on, that the other apostles and early Christians fully accepted that completed testimony which God had seen fit to entrust solely to the apostle Paul, though the decline of saints generally soon came in. He “communicated unto them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles … they gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship”, Gal 2: 2 & 9. Again, “by revelation he made known unto me the mystery ... now revealed unto his holy apostles [plural] and prophets”, Eph 3: 3 & 5. Did they accept it? They did. The apostle Peter places the epistles and teachings of Paul on the same ground of authority as “the other scriptures”, 2 Pet 3: 16.
Notice now the peculiarity and characteristic marks
of Paul’s doctrine and of that testimony which he calls “the testimony of our Lord”. His testimony was that a body on earth (the church) is united to Christ the Head in heaven, Eph 1: 23; 3: 2-6. He had heard the very words of Jesus Himself as the Head of that body, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?”, Acts 9: 4. He never forgot those words which reversed all his plans at the time. Moreover, Paul’s testimony was to the distinct setting aside of the first man in the cross (Rom 6) and the truth that now there is a
“new creation” (Eph 2: 10), to which the saints belong, and which the saints are, 2 Cor 5: 17. Nothing less than the whole contents of Paul’s writings can bring before us an answer to the question, what is the testimony of our Lord?
This testimony is the only true one for this day, since it has never been withdrawn, and (Col 1: 25) the word of God being completed by it, it could not be added to.
If we further ask why did not the apostle entrust to the whole professing church that which he calls “the testimony of our Lord”, the answer is that that they had had it, and already turned away from it, before the death of Paul.
He knew of no man “like-minded” with himself as to the saints, save Timothy. All in Asia had turned away from him.
The state of the professing church on earth at that time is 14
drawn with the most vivid and unmistakeable clearness in 2 Timothy. How could the apostle entrust the secrets of the Lord to those who were already unfaithful? Do we thus act to those who have already betrayed our confidence? He was in prison, and well-nigh deserted by the Christians who knew he was there; and who knew he was there because he was the faithful vessel of God’s testimony on the earth in that day, 2 Tim 1: 12, and 4: 16. Yet they deserted him. And from this time his only hope is in those who in true remnant character will, with Timothy, be true to the “testimony”. He looks onward for them, and points them for their reward to where and when he expected his own (see 2 Tim 4: 8), namely, at the “appearing” of the Lord Jesus Christ. All hope of the church as a whole ever maintaining again in its entirety the “present testimony”, was then, and surely is now, at an end. He says that things will only wax “worse and worse” (2 Tim 3:13); false teaching and false teachers (Christians, so called) will abound. 2 Tim 3 is full of this, as indeed is the whole epistle. Peter is similar (2 Pet 2: 1, 2, 3), and Jude 17, 18, 19, and all this, the apostles testify, will continue until the coming of the Lord, Jude 4-15.
God’s testimony divides itself into two distinct displays.
1st—It is His voice, the present word and truth from God, displayed and communicated for this time. 2nd—It is a testimony in human life and conduct, going out from those saints who have received the first as the truth. Both united form “THE TESTIMONY OF OUR LORD”. I must know the first (the truth) before my conduct can in any way answer to it.
And these two the apostle has connected, “thou hast fully known (1) my doctrine, (2) manner of life”, 2 Tim 3: 10.
Timothy, who is here addressed, was to be the vessel of the testimony in this world, in company with all who called “on the Lord out of a pure heart”. No isolation is contemplated here, yet while this is true, the characteristics of the company with whom he is to unite himself are clearly defined. But to walk in isolation with God is far better than to give up the testimony, which is the revelation of His present mind.
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In the perfection of sovereign grace, God did not at once act in judgment, nor withdraw Himself from man when sin came into this world, Gen 3: 8. But two things came in as necessary consequences of the fall. One was, that if God should still go on with man, He must have some of the fallen race on earth who should hear His voice, and who, in measure at least, should respond to His claims, and be governed by them, and that God should thus have some kind of testimony on the earth for Himself. The other consequence of the fall was that it had now become impossible for God to come and communicate His mind to all men alike—that is, there could be no intimacy between God and man, save for those who took their true ground before Him, Gen 4: 7. It is sin which necessitates a testimony for God. There would have been no intelligence in speaking of a testimony to Adam in innocence.
By sin, man had exposed himself to judgment, and he cannot ignore this, and yet approach God. In the sacrifices, from Abel downward, this was confessed, and placed before God in those who rightly approached Him.
Death—that is judgment—was admitted as man’s desert, though how much those who came understood we cannot
say. Still, faith took this place, and the ground was laid for a further revelation of the mind of God. But it could not be known apart from this, because there could be no approach to God without it, Gen 3: 24 (compare Exod 12: 12, 13).
But man, having approached God in His own
appointed way, is in a position to be instructed further as to the mind of God respecting all things that God would reveal to man. Sin is here, and I find sin in me; and to know aright as to anything in such a scene as we find ourselves a part of, we must have the mind of God about it. “As I hear I judge” (John 5: 30), the Lord said, speaking as a man on earth, and this verse referred to what He heard in daily communion with the Father, and not to what He heard from those who surrounded Him.
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But as I know anything from intercourse and communion with God, I become the depository of that knowledge and a vessel of testimony, displaying light as to the things in the midst of which I move, and as I move according to the mind of God in them, I am in my measure a testimony here for Him.
Having learnt, then, that those who have taken God’s own appointed way of approaching Him are in a position to be further instructed as to His present mind, I have still to be instructed in another detail, namely: that God does not communicate (nor has He ever communicated) His mind indiscriminately to all, whom He has yet owned as His people. (Compare 1 Chron 12: 32, 2 Pet 1: 21, and 1 Cor 2: 12-16.) It is found that only in so far as there has been in any of them that uprightness of heart which has acted on the already communicated mind of God for them, that He has communicated more. It may seem unnecessary to quote passages of Scripture in proof of this where so many might be referred to; but for the help of any who may not have noticed the divine principle, I shall refer to two illustrations of it.
1. Although Lot was a righteous man (see 2 Peter), yet
“that thing” which was in the mind of God respecting him was not revealed to him, but it was revealed to Abraham, Gen 18: 17, 18, 19.
2. In like manner, when the mind of God desired to
make itself known respecting a company, whom He owned as His own “peculiar treasure” (Mal 3: 17 NT), He was obliged to make it known to one chosen individual in that company. “He made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel”, Ps 103: 7. (Compare Num 12: 7, 8, and Deut 32 and 33.) Surely it is a far greater favour to be instructed beforehand by the Lord in the secret of His ways, than to be instructed afterward by seeing His acts.
But those two manners in which He still deals with His people, point out clearly how His people get a knowledge of His mind. For we all have to do with Him in either one or the other of these—His ways or His acts. When God had 17
acted, Lot learnt His mind about Sodom and its associations; but Abram knew it before, and was separate from them all. Again, Israel, after ages of trial, is learning what Moses (already cognisant of God’s mind) sung of in Deuteronomy 32, Israel has learnt by His acts, and is still learning, for “God hath not cast away His people”, Rom 11: 12. As to Lot, God could say beforehand, “Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do?”, Gen 18: 17. In the New Testament, “To every one that hath shall be given” (Matt 25: 29), enunciates this principle of God.
In two ways in the word of God He has instructed us
as to His testimony on the earth. First, when He has communicated to individuals a knowledge of His mind.
Second, when He has communicated it to a company. The period of Genesis, before the giving of the law, may illustrate the former, and the history of the nation of Israel the latter.
In the time of Genesis we find that, leaving aside the descendants of Cain, God chose to communicate His mind for that time to certain individuals of the family of Seth. Heb 11: 1-22. We find that these, characterised by their faith in God, passed successively off the scene, through death, and left the testimony to be continued by others. Then, when Israel was chosen, it was that they might be as a company—
a nation—the witness on the earth that there was but ONE
true God, Mark 12: 29, Exod 6: 2-8; 19: 5, 6. And not only so, but to be the depository of His mind amidst the idolatrous nations of the earth, Deut 4: 31, 39, Exod 29: 43-46.
It is evident that individual testimony and collective testimony (the two which we have before us in the Old Testament, and more or less connected with the history of the Jewish people) must include the whole testimony on earth. It is also clear from reading these histories recorded in the writings of the Old Testament, that there have been periods when outwardly there has been very little that has been remarkable, while again there have been moments of revival as to the testimony, God raising up afresh a very distinct witness to Himself. Thus in the day prior to the 18
birth of Christ, things in Israel seemed to be going on in a very quiet and unobtrusive way. Since the last of the prophets ceased to speak, God had apparently remained indifferent to human affairs. Yet it was only in appearance.
Israel was—as to her own land—in servitude, the mass of the nation (the ten tribes) far away, scattered among the nations of the earth, Jer 31: 10. But there was a “feeble folk”
(Prov 30: 26) in Israel, who had made their nest in the rock.
With them remained God’s testimony in that day, though they were, as to the great and noble of the earth, an unknown company.
Simeon and Anna, Zacharias and Elizabeth, a priest
of the Lord, and an aged widow of fourscore years, are brought before us by the Spirit, as the representatives of a company which, during those days of gloom, yet “waited for redemption in Jerusalem” (Luke 2: 38 NT)—Jerusalem which has still to wait for its new name, as the prophet says,
“and the name of the city from that day shall be, THE LORD
IS THERE”, Ezek 48: 35. It was the company described by Malachi 3: 16 who, fearing the Lord, “spake often one to another” during those days of Israel’s dark departure from God. How little are these accounted of by the great of the earth. Yet the testimony for that day was with them. How great, then, in the eyes of the Lord! His, He says, in the day when He makes up His “jewels”. His, listened to and heard, and for whom a “book of remembrance was written” then,
“them that feared the Lord, and thought upon His name”. It was to them that He accorded the wonderful favour of a knowledge of His present ways. These ways were displayed in the holy Babe brought into the temple by His parents.
Israel was in apostacy from God, but these kept up still their connection with the temple, for it was God’s house on the earth, see 2 Chron 20: 9. Here was a manifestation of faithfulness to Him. Not merely in spirit, but also in that they “departed not” from that place. It was that place God had condescended to visit and to call His on the earth, and it was still left them in the midst of the ruin of the nation.
It was the place—dear, therefore to our hearts—which HE
had chosen, “to set HIS NAME there”, Deut 12: 5, 21.
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HOW GOD ACTS WITH THE FEEBLE WHO CLEAVE TO
HIS TESTIMONY
And this brings us to a very important principle which can be verified from scripture, as to the ways of God.
God may remove any servant as the vessel of testimony from the earth, and carry on the testimony by means of others.
There may be also great weakness, and failure even, in those to whom God has distinctly committed His testimony in any particular day, but I cannot find that He ever withdraws the testimony from them and gives it to others until there is in them the deliberate action of will, which turns away from, and ignores, and gives up, that which He has revealed. To proofs of this I now turn.
First as to individual faith. We find (Gen 12) that Abram had been called to leave his country, and his kindred, and his father’s house, and to go into a land that God would shew him. God thus raised up a distinct testimony in the midst of idolatry, Josh 24: 2, Acts 7: 2. “He looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God”, Heb 11: 10. This was the testimony of one who took the place of a stranger and pilgrim on the earth, Heb 11: 13. Now Abram did not leave his father’s house; he took his father with him. He did not leave his kindred; he took Lot with him. Yet “he went out”, Scripture says, “not knowing whither he went”, Heb 11: 18. But he did not reach (at that time) the land that God would shew him. He “dwelt in Charran” (Acts 7: 2), where he remained until the death of his father, when he moved onward again in obedience to the call of God. He was not at first acting up to the testimony of God to him in these points, and no further revelation of the mind of God (as far as we read) reaches him until he does. Hence there was, we may conclude, failure in fully responding to the call of God, although God owned the measure of faith which he had. Yet Abram did not give it up. It was in abeyance, and his faith then not fully up to it; but it was treasured in Abram’s soul, and when the link which held him back was broken, he responded to it. But I see that God did not withdraw it and give it to another when 20
His servant’s faith was not up to its requirements. And this is the point before us. He waited on the feebleness of Abram, and this I believe it will be found He has always done. When, after he had entered the land, and there was another breakdown as to the faith in leaving it for Egypt (though the pressure was great), God similarly waits upon the feeble faith of His servant. We read of no fresh communication to him from God as long as he remained away from the place of testimony—no altar in Egypt—but as soon as the patriarch recovers his position, we find a direct and immediate confirmation from God of all that He had purposed and promised concerning him, Gen 13: 14-18.
Such is His grace. Similarly (for “as in water face answereth to face so the heart of man to man” (Prov 27: 19)), failure may be traced, more or less, in those to whom God has committed His testimony, down to this day in which we live.
But the point before us is—what did God do in such cases?
And I think it is clear what He did, and, therefore, what He does still, the history of Israel as a company confirming this.
For what do we find? When Israel was called out to
be a distinct people, in separation to God from all the nations of the earth, and to be the depository of His counsels do we find that they were faithful and true to their testimony? Surely not. Paul says the “name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles through you”, Rom 2: 24.
And when, instead of witnessing to Jehovah, “one God”, they fell into idolatry, God raised up in their midst judges, and His servants the prophets, but His present mind was not hidden from them, nor the knowledge of it taken away.
See 2 Chron 36: 15, 16, 17. He passed them through long years of trial, and sorrow, and captivity, again and again, on account of their sins, yet God’s testimony still remained with them in the land of their captivity. We can trace that this was so in the writings of Ezra, and Nehemiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel—there it was, among His people in a strange land. Furthermore, when the Lord was Himself speaking to the woman of Samaria, He owned it when He said,
“salvation is of the Jews”, John 4: 22. There were those in the nation who never gave up the truth committed to them 21
by God, however few they might be, and God did not withdraw His testimony from them.
THE TESTIMONY PASSES AWAY
But as we read onward in their history, we come to a moment when the whole nation by its representatives deliberately gave up the truth of God committed to it. All the truth of God was grouped around the promised “seed of Abraham”—the Seed, too, of the woman. He, their long-promised Messiah had come, and was in their midst; and they rejected Him, giving up all the testimony of God about Him, in refusing Him. He was solemnly presented to them as their King, and they said “We have no king but Cæsar”.
More than this, they crucified Him (Acts 3: 13, 14, 15,) and also stoned to death Stephen, the witness of the Holy Ghost, testifying what their past history had been, Acts 7. The Holy Ghost sent down from Him exalted in heaven, was then presenting by self-judgment a final way for national blessing. All was in vain, and then the testimony of God departed from Israel as a nation, see Matt 21: 33 to 43. The Spirit of God formerly with that nation (Hag 2: 5) without which there can be no testimony, DWELLS now IN THE
ASSEMBLY (Acts 2), and after the death of Stephen acts therein, going out in blessing to all the world. After the persecution that arose about Stephen, “they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word”, Acts 8: 4. The history of Israel as detailed by Stephen, is a history of the nation’s final rejection of the testimony of the Holy Ghost, thus now concludes, “ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye”, Acts 7: 51. The whole truth of God being given up, Israel, as the olive tree (Rom 11), has had its branches broken out, and others are grafted in, to bear testimony as partakers of the “root and fatness of the olive tree”, Rom 11: 17. God’s testimony to man in this world could no longer be found within the limits of the nation of Israel, see Matt 28: 19. Still it could only be found where the Spirit dwelt, because no testimony can be of God which is not the testimony of the Spirit. Therefore God’s testimony in this world henceforth went out from the 22
assembly, the place where GOD DWELT by His Spirit. He had formerly dwelt in the tabernacle, then in the temple, then in a human form, “God manifest in the flesh” (see John 2: 19-21 and compare “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him” (John 1: 32)) and now, and ever since, in the assembly, Eph 2: 22.
WHY THE EXISTENCE OF THE PRESENT TESTIMONY
OF OUR LORD IS ALMOST UNKNOWN TO SOME
CHRISTIANS
But the principle on which God now communicates
His mind to those who form the assembly has not changed.
Israel (God’s people though they were) did not get His mind directly communicated to them as a nation, when in apostacy, but chosen and faithful vessels (His servants the prophets) did, and by them the mind of God was urged upon the nation. Now since God changes not, He acts on the same principle in every age, Matt 13: 12. If then the testimony of God to this world is now from the church, it can only be found among those who are faithfully cleaving (however feeble in themselves) to what God has revealed as His present mind to the church; and this cannot be known (as it was not to Israel) by the people of God if their hearts are away from Him, Mark 7: 6. I shall accept two things as proved by the history of Abram and Lot, and Moses and Israel, to which we have referred. First—that when God’s people are unfaithful, while they do not cease to be His people, they cease to be in the secret of His ways. His testimony in grace, however, still lingering, but only remaining in chosen vessels among them. Secondly—that when in deliberate self-will they give up and refuse the truth and testimony of these vessels, that then it finally passes away from them altogether. From Israel it has passed to the assembly. From the assembly it finally passes away also, see Rev 3: 16. The professing church will be rejected as God’s witness on the earth.
One important remark should then be made here.
Individuals (or companies of such) may, before it is done, as 23
it will be, universally, either unfaithfully or deliberately (and if the last, therefore in self-will), depart from and ignore God’s revelation of Himself and His purposes for His people; and then God’s principles just quoted must apply.
WHAT IS THE TESTIMONY OF OUR LORD
But in order to see what is the present testimony, it is important to see that during the lifetime and ministry of the apostles, the whole testimony of God came out.
Scripture is very clear and very positive that this was so.
Referring to the coming of the Holy Ghost, the Lord says to His disciples, “when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth”, John 16: 13. Now the day of Pentecost (Acts 2) was the witness of His coming, when the result of His presence on earth made itself felt. They were guided into all the truth by Him. The apostle Paul, still “by the Spirit” (Eph 3: 5), was led into all the knowledge of “the mystery”, in order to “complete the word of God”, Col 1: 25
NT. No ‘advance’, then, can possibly commend itself to any Christian which is not contained in the writings of the apostles, 1 John 4: 6.
THE TESTIMONY LOST IS RECOVERED FROM
SCRIPTURE
But darker days came for the assembly, as the apostles clearly in the Word predicted that they would (see Acts 20: 29, 30, 2 Pet 2:1), when the bright testimony rendered by them, and now written in the Word, was clouded, or almost unknown. God cared for His testimony during what men have called the ‘dark ages’, until in His grace there came moments of public revival, such as in the preaching of Luther, when “justification by faith” was insisted on afresh—a truth lost for long ages before. I think none will have any doubt but that this was of God, and that all who rejected it were outside the line of testimony at that time. Fuller light on other subjects in the Word could not justify any Christian in rejecting or ignoring Luther’s doctrine, because it was clearly the doctrine of the apostles.
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To do so would be to reject a part of the present testimony, which although it may be more full and clear than Luther had, cannot ignore or refuse whatever was the truth of God in the past as given to him for the church.
It was at a moment of profound darkness and
ignorance, a time of gross superstition and error under the church of Rome, that God was pleased to revive the truth of His Word, preached afresh at the Reformation. Although He has since given further light on the Word, yet the importance of the truth, then afresh revealed, must remain.
About sixty years ago there was a further distinct action of the Spirit and an adding to the light given in Luther’s day, among a people that thereafter began to be called ‘Brethren’.
Will any call this statement an assumption? Let him consider that a proof that it was from God, and a revival of the “testimony”—as was Luther’s—was manifest, since that which was unfolded then neither existed in the public teachings nor in the writings of Christian men of that day.
But then it was found that it did exist in the word of God, and that it formed part of the testimony therein given by the apostles, and by the early Christians. Hence, we are reduced to but one conclusion if that truth is rejected, and if the history of God’s chosen people Israel be accepted as
“written for our admonition”, 1 Cor 10: 11. And I repeat here, that which taught in the history of Israel, namely, that people do not cease to be Christians today when they reject or fail to act up to what God has now afresh revealed, but they cease to be in the line of the testimony for this day, just as Israel did of old, when in departure from God He revealed His mind to His servants the prophets, Matt 21: 33-43.
Connected with the revival in Luther’s day, and also with that sixty years ago, I desire to refer to one or two scriptural accounts of men raised up of God at different epochs, and to whom His mind was revealed, in order to show how the testimony they gave from God was carried on after their death. It appears to me that when God continued the testimony they gave, it is a divine principle that those who succeeded them as the vessels of testimony should not 25
only accept and be controlled by the truth of God revealed to their predecessor, but that they should also invariably have accredited themselves beforehand as faithful men and associates in the testimony during the lifetime of those whom they succeeded. (I desire my reader to remember that I trace the existence of a scriptural testimony from Abel down to the beginning of the last sixty years, for “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets”, Heb 1: 1.
For examples, we may refer first to Moses. When the time came that he must die, we find that his great anxiety was about the Lord’s people, “Let the Lord, the God of the spirits of all flesh, set a man over the congregation, which may go out before them and which may go in before them, and which may lead them out, and which may bring them in; that the congregation of the Lord be not as sheep which have no shepherd”, see Num 27: 16, 17. Joshua is the one chosen of God, in answer to the prayer of His servant, v 18.
If we turn back to Exodus 17, where we have the account of the defeat of Amalek, we find the eye of God was already upon Joshua, the future leader of His people. Thus the Spirit speaks of him: “And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this [ the defeat of Amalek] for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua”, Exod 17: 14. But why is Joshua—a young man—and not Aaron or Israel’s elders thus distinguished and named? Again in Exodus 24: 13, Joshua is called Moses’ “minister”, and in chap 33: 11, we find Joshua named as accompanying Moses outside the camp, and remaining there, after the idolatry of Aaron’s golden calf. “His servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle”. We find also that Joshua was not associated with Israel, but was with Moses at the time of their sin in making the golden calf. We cannot say that all this is accidental, since Joshua again is distinguished with Caleb for encouraging the people, when the other spies brought back their discouraging report. We see then that Joshua’s former life and conduct in these incidents all point him out as one who had commended himself to God’s servant in that day. We have only to turn 26
to Joshua 1: 13 to read how jealously he guarded the truth that had been committed to Moses. God makes this a matter of first importance. “Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law which Moses my servant commanded thee”, v 7. We notice here that Joshua receives a personal communication of the truth from Moses, and that God distinctly endorses it, so to speak, with the further sanction of His own authority, in verse 9: “Have not I commanded thee?”
A second example of the testimony passing from one
to another (and so ordered of God) we have in the time of Elijah and Elisha. It is (as was the last) an example of great moment as to this subject, because we see in it that, when God has in His grace carried on and sustained a servant in testimony for Himself up to His departure from this world, notwithstanding times of failure in him, his successor must receive from him departing, his credentials—the truth—the deposit of what the departing one had himself received from God. God thus accredits the one who is passing off the scene, and it therefore is evident that God connects His servant always with the testimony, and is jealous of any slight put upon him, see Gen 20: 3-18; Num 11: 7, 8; 2
Kings 2: 23, 24; John 13: 20. Elijah, about to leave this world, is bidden of God to anoint Elisha in his room, 1 Kings 17: 16-21. And from that time we see that Elisha identifies himself and his interests with the Lord’s servant, and with the Lord’s interests. “Then he arose, and went after Elijah, and ministered unto him”, 1 Kings 19: 21. After this we find them both, in the last journey which they took on earth together, 2 Kings 2, and that journey no ordinary one to either of them. Gilgal, the place where death to the flesh was accepted, is the starting point in this remarkable journey. Gilgal—Bethel—Jericho—Jordan, and crossing which last, heaven itself is reached—these are the stages grouped together in this last journey of the prophet. It appears to me that GOD was going over with them, in that journey, the history of His ways—that all on earth is ruined—and in starting Elisha from the other side Jordan, was starting as it were afresh the heavenly testimony, 27
starting it with a fresh spiritual power in the hands of a new servant (2 Kings 2: 9, 10), while carefully connecting him in it with the one whose work on earth was done. Elisha then begins his journey and testimony from the other side of Jordan—from heaven—where he leaves Elijah, and we trace him in this chapter over Jordan again, thence to Jericho, and onward until we come again with him to Bethel (the
“house of God”), where God maintains by judgment that testimony which He had committed to Elisha, when those who were there despised it, in despising him, 2 Kings 2: 23, 24. Is that testimony of less importance in the mind of God today? or must we conclude that God is indifferent to it, and ceases to care for those to whom He has entrusted it?
When Israel, as a company, proved untrue to the testimony, we have seen it continued in individuals, in Moses and Joshua, in Elijah and Elisha, and passed on from one to another. In like manner, when the second company—the church, or assembly—failed collectively, God, ever true to His principles, has continued the testimony on earth for Himself, by means of individuals.
Now this is of all moment for me to insist upon, and for every Christian to be clear about. We have not to go outside of the written word of God to prove this, though abundant proofs of it exist on every side.
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FAILURE OF THE CHURCH IN COLLECTIVE
TESTIMONY
The church as a collective thing and a witness for God on the earth had failed to keep that which by Paul God committed to its care, before the close of the New Testament records. The second epistle to Timothy, one of the latest epistles in moral order, proves this, for Timothy is called upon (chap 3) to “turn away” from some who had the “form of godliness” but denied its power; when too there should be professedly Christian “teachers” turning away their hearers “from the truth”, and when “evil men and seducers”
should “wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived”. Timothy is then exhorted to “continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and also been assured of”, knowing of whom he had learned them. He is told to walk in separation from some, and “with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart”, 2 Tim 2: 22. What testimony for God existed collectively in such a state of things as this?
For the second epistle to Timothy does not depict the state of things in a local assembly, nor mention one. It gives a picture of the general state of things then called Christian, which had at that time become so corrupted. Timothy was given a special line of action in the midst of this condition.
Nor is Paul the only witness we have of departure. John, and Jude, and Peter all admit the same. See 1 John 2: 19, 26; 4: 1; 2 John 7-10; 3 John 9; Jude (all the epistle); and 1 Pet 4: 17; 2 Pet 2, all this chapter predicting it; and this last epistle bearing in itself the proof that it was written after the true church testimony committed to Paul had all come out—see 2 Pet 3: 15, 18. To this we may add the early chapters of the book of Revelation, all witnessing to the failure of the assembly as a witness for God, and John’s own word in his first epistle insisting it was even then “the last time”, 1 John 2: 18.
In the time then of this failure, and seeing it all around him, Paul, who had been made the especial vessel of testimony as to all the truth of the church (see Eph 3: 2-29
21, Col 1: 24-29)—that is, the present testimony—Paul turns to an individual, to Timothy, anxious with a godly anxiety (like Moses) for the Lord’s people and for the truth which God had committed to him. Paul was about to pass off the scene, his work on earth he saw was done (see 2 Tim 4: 6). He had no man “like-minded” with Timothy. As we have seen before with Joshua and Moses so here Timothy had proved his affection for the apostle and for the testimony committed to him. And to him therefore Paul turns, on the eve of his departure from this world, as the fitted one to carry on the testimony in the midst of the declension around. “Be not thou therefore ashamed of THE
TESTIMONY OF OUR LORD, nor of me his prisoner”, 2 Tim 1: 8. From close intimacy and companionship with God’s witness, Timothy had heard and received fully the truth of God. “Thou hast fully known my doctrine, manner of life, purpose, faith, long-suffering, charity, patience”, 2 Tim 3: 10. As always, the testimony could only be learned from him who was the one to whom God had committed it. We have seen that the part of the present testimony most affecting the church was distinctly and only committed to Paul. But the testimony then, and even after Timothy’s death, was not to be given up. “And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also”, 2 Tim 2: 2. Now it is evident that to give up the apostle (“me his prisoner”) was in that day to give up the testimony, since no other had it. Demas did this, and he is in remarkable contrast in this epistle with Timothy, to whom the apostle distinctly committed it. “Demas hath forsaken me” (2 Tim 4: 10)—had left him—the apostle’s heart chronicles the departure, and he has nothing to say further, except to add that it had been the state of the soul of Demas that had led to this action. Do we depart from the testimony if we depart from those who have it? Demas had not given up the profession of Christianity, nor had he merely moved from one place to another. He had avoided the “afflictions of the gospel” (2 Tim 1: 8), that was all, for the world had offered to him a smoother path than he could find in identification 30
with the aged prisoner at Rome. To forsake him to whom God had committed the special testimony for the day, and whom God sustained up to his last moments on earth, true to it (2 Tim 4: 17, 18, compare verse 7), was to give up the testimony. No one can question that the testimony of God will not assort with love to this “present evil world” (Gal 1: 4), which means satisfaction with the present sphere, while the testimony is wholly connected with refusing it, and looking on to a future one.
THE TESTIMONY IS AS TO A NEW PLACE—HEAVEN
It may be well, in conclusion, to gather together some of the points that have come before us. First, the testimony is God’s voice speaking to man; and second, as he hears and obeys, he is practically in the testimony, so as to communicate it to others. However dimly it was known, the testimony which Abraham was led into, savoured of heaven, Heb 9: 10. And when He came, the promised Seed of Abraham, the One whose testimony exposed everything, and who spake as never man spake (John 7: 46), He came to speak of heaven. “If I have told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe, if I tell you of heavenly things?”, John 3: 12. “He that cometh from above is above all … And what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth; and no man receiveth his testimony”, vv 31, 32. That testimony is referred to as the “testimony of our Lord” in 2
Tim 1: 8. Sin having ruined the first creation and defiled its place, the true testimony must have reference to heaven.
Sin has polluted the earth (Mic 2: 10), nor is recovery to Eden happiness the present object of the heart of God. Yet He seeks to have man in spirit now, as really hereafter with Him. Faith, which accepts this, looks onward to a new place; and it is as to this place, and as to those who are in grace made meet to occupy it, that the testimony of God goes forth and is connected, Eph 2: 6; Phil 3: 20, 21; Col 1: 5; Heb 11: 16. The church belongs to heaven. Nothing but heaven and the heavenly side of truth can be the full and true testimony in the present day, because it has now come clearly out what the “testimony of our Lord” was, both 31
during His life on the earth, and from heaven since, to Paul concerning the church which is “his body”, Eph 4: 8, 11, 12. This world is reserved unto fire, and now all hope is connected with Heaven, 2 Peter 3: 7; 1 Thess 1: 10. This will guide us as to the matter of the completed testimony, especially if we clearly see also that it is the testimony of the Spirit sent by Christ, and so completed from Christ, who is in the new place, 1 Pet 3: 22; Heb 9: 24. And it concerns those who are associated with Him there Eph 2: 6.
It is I think, clear too that the “present testimony” is that of the apostles and writers of the New Testament, completed as to the church, as we have said, by Paul; and that nothing short of this is worthy of being called the
“testimony”. If also the church as a body has failed as to this (and Scripture proves that it is so), God has confided it, according to His wisdom and grace, to individuals—bidden not to isolate themselves—but who are to seek others also, with whom they can walk, calling upon God out of a pure heart. This is the direction to Timothy, the one who was to go on in the power of testimony for the truth, after the apostle’s departure. Outside of the company who were thus going on with Timothy according to the truth committed to Paul, the testimony of God could not be found. Do we Christians really believe this, and act as though we did?
This is an important question for us all, and it is so because revived truth is original truth. We are responsible to walk in the power of ALL recovered truth, and to maintain it because it is the truth, just as if it had been first committed to us as it was to Paul, and by him to Timothy. Departure from recovered truth is departure from the testimony of God. There is no hint in Scripture of the recovery of the church corporately to a Pentecostal or a Pauline testimony, and there is no hint of any such prospect given to Timothy.
Still the testimony is given to him, and to the company associated with him.
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THE RECOVERED TESTIMONY OF OUR LORD
WHAT IS IT?
I have remarked that the record of the Christianity of the last sixty years bears on it a testimony to truth recovered from the darkness of ages. I will indicate a few points. Christ is the Head of His body the church, Eph 1: 22, 23. The members of that body are united to Him and to one another, Eph 4: 30; 1 Cor 7: 13-26.
The Holy Ghost dwells in each member of the body of
Christ (1 Cor 6: 19; Eph 1: 13), and in the church corporately, 1 Cor 3: 16. There is a personal coming of the Lord, John 14: 1, 2, 3; 1 Cor 15: 51, 52; 1 Thess 4: 15, 16, 17. Connected with these there is also the rejection of all usurpation of the place of the Holy Ghost in the assembly by a humanly appointed ministry, 1 Cor 12: 1-11; 1 Cor 14: 1-40. The recognition of all Christ’s gifts, A PERFECT
MINISTRY, for the edification of His body the church, Eph 4: 11, 12; 1 Cor 4 1. The breaking of bread on the first day of the week, a memorial of the death of Christ, an expression of this one body. Faith in that death gathering each in the confession of living union with the Head, Acts 20: 7; 1 Cor 11: 23-34. The total refusal of all that is of the first man, as commending any one to God, and the first man’s definite judgment and condemnation in the cross of Christ, Rom 6: 3, 6, 7, 8, 10; Gal 2: 20. The new creation, and our union with Christ in heaven (Eph 1: 6; 2: 6 10), all our interests therefore there now, Col 3:1; Phil 3: 20. “HEAVEN”, the place of our eternal abode (John 17: 24), in contrast with “earth”, whereon we are “pilgrims and strangers”, Heb 11: 13. All this has come out with increased freshness during the last sixty years, and it is seen from Scripture that this was the testimony of God for the early Christians, and for as many, therefore, as should follow them as depositories of the testimony of God on the earth. But as we have seen the testimony COMPLETED was committed to Paul, this he commits to Timothy and to those associated with him, and not to the whole professing church, and at the same time Paul indicates that this remnant character of testimony 33
would continue, the testimony being handed on by Timothy, by Paul’s direction, to “faithful men”, who should “be able to teach others also”, 2 Tim 2: 2.
Such is the state of things wherein we find ourselves today. The testimony is revived, but the professing church has become so leavened, so worldly, so corrupt, that it is difficult (if not impossible) to say where one (the church) ends and the other (the world) begins. The conduct of Demas has many followers, while Paul’s words to Timothy attract but few. Yet are they addressed to every Christian who has an ear to hear, and a heart desirous to obey. “Be not thou therefore ashamed of THE TESTIMONY OF OUR
LORD”, 2 Tim 1: 8. Our consolation is in the Lord alone.
Our failure to act fully up to the testimony each devoted Christian must admit. “The Lord looketh on the heart”, 1
Sam 16: 7. Thank God that it is so. He sees the faint desire to be for Him on the earth, where it exists in any, and—as with Abraham and Israel, so with us—He waits on our feeble faith. “To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word”, Isa 66: 2. Nor does He withdraw the testimony from them, as we have seen; but departure and giving up exist all around us, and with some who once walked with us in the joy of the truth, what can be done? We must go on, for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. “The night is far spent, the day is at hand”, Rom 13: 12.
“THE TESTIMONY OF OUR LORD”, that is, the word from
God for the present moment, this has never been withdrawn.
It is perfect, and cannot be added to. Then there is the second part of the testimony, a life and conduct seeking to answer to the truth communicated. This can only go out from those who are bowing to the truth. How can it go out from any others? There was a distinct revival of the testimony about sixty years ago, as I have said, and there is a company now on earth which, in feebleness and trial, has sought to cleave to what then began to be revived, a company which, notwithstanding pressure, has not given up the truth then recovered. It is no matter of surprise that those who 34
gave up the full truth preached by the apostle, and who rejected this truth sixty years ago should have their representatives also in our own day. This is the class who, being blind to the truth, reject now also, as then, those who accept it. They do not see that there has been granted, through grace, in our own day, a revival of the testimony of our Lord, as it was completed by the apostle Paul. True wisdom will not contend with such. But there are others who do not deny that the testimony revived sixty years ago was of God. But these say that that testimony has now been withdrawn from those to whom He then committed it, on account of their failure. Now while the failure is not denied, the Scriptures we have considered prove that this charge of the withdrawal of the testimony is false. What then is the position in God’s sight of those who individually, or in companies, have withdrawn? Let them answer that question in God’s presence. Surely the word of God will help to an answer.
Many have withdrawn. Some have given up truth they
once confessed. Some have adopted new views unsanctioned by Scripture, and some with but one earnest desire I fully believe, to maintain the truth which they thought was given up by those they have left. Scripture, had they eyes to see it, does not support any in acting on a false assumption, but the reverse. Scripture speaks, thank God, and must be heard, and it shows what company God is with, and whom He supports today. He is with the company which cleaves to, and is seeking to walk in the power of the truth committed to Timothy. Their failure, which is our failure since there is but one body, humbles us, and rightly so; but with the voice of God addressing us in His Word. We may and MUST take courage. And while every Christian ought to be able to “give an answer” to the questions heading this paper; true lowliness will ever mark those who by being in and of the present TESTIMONY, “THE TESTIMONY OF OUR
LORD”, are thus by Him so signally honoured.
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OR
THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD
WITH PROOF TEXTS FROM SCRIPTURE
Q1. What is the church?
A.
The church is the body of Christ.
Q2. Who is the Head of the church?
A.
The Head of the church is Christ in heaven.
Q3. What is a Christian?
A.
A Christian is one who has believed the gospel, and who is therefore sealed with the Spirit.
Q4. What place have individual Christians in the church?
A.
As the human body is composed of many members,
so every individual Christian is a ‘particular member’
of the body of Christ.
Q5. How are Christians united to the Head and to one another?
A. “There is ... one Spirit” (Eph 4: 4), who dwells in every believer, and by whom all believers are baptised into one body.
Q6. Are there more churches than one?
A. No, since Christ can have but one body. “There is one body”.
Q7. But do we not find churches spoken of in scripture?
A. Yes; though not as having diverse interests, but as a local expression of the one body, the church.
Q8. What do you mean by a ‘local expression of the one body’?
36
A. This, that the hope, interests, discipline, and relationship of the church to Christ are there locally displayed in one company before the world.
Q9. Does Scripture sanction this?
A. Yes; when people were converted, then, as also gathered together, they are owned as the “church of
God” localised at Corinth, Philippi, &c., and in both cases are so addressed; and in the messages to the
seven churches “the assembly” in each place is in contrast with every other in that city.
Ql0. Does God look upon such local churches as acting representatives of the body of Christ at large?
A.
Yes; He says to the Corinthians, “Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular”, 1 Cor 12: 27.
“Ye are … the epistle of Christ”, 2 Cor 3: 3.
Q11. How is the church—the body—nourished and
sustained?
A.
In two ways: By a continuous ministry from the Head
in heaven, through the Spirit, to the living members on earth; and by each member discharging its proper
function in the body in responsibility to the Head.
Q12. Are these the only means of nourishment and growth of the body?
A.
Yes. All that ministers refreshment or strength or direction must come from one or the other.
Q13. What place then does the “word of God”
occupy with the church?
A. The Holy Ghost uses the written Word, which contains the mind of Him who is the living Word, in order to preserve to the church the truth, both in doctrine and practice; and by it every Christian may test whether what is presented to him, through himself or any other member, comes from the HEAD
or not.
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Q14. Since the word of God in the word “church” now includes all true believers, by what name does it describe all classes and conditions of responsible beings on earth who are not of it?
A.
Scripture includes them all under the name “the world”.
Q15. Why is it manifest that there are now only two responsible classes before God—the church and the
world?
A.
Because there are only two future eternal states—one of happiness, the other of misery; and the two classes that will enter one or the other of them are here around us today.
Q16. What causes the difference between the two classes, since all Christians were once “of the world”?
A.
Repentance and “belief of the truth”, 2 Thess 2: 13.
The acceptance or rejection of the gospel.
Q17. What is the present condition of those who repent, and believe the gospel?
A.
They have passed now “from death unto life” (1 John 3: 14); they are even now not of the world, even as Christ is not of the world. They were “children of wrath” (Eph 2: 3); they are now “children of God”, 1
John 3: 1. They are the “CHURCH OF THE FIRSTBORN
which are written in heaven”, Heb 12: 23.
Q18. What is the world?
A.
The world is composed of all responsible beings on earth, whether Jews or Gentiles, who have united in
crucifying the Son of God, who still reject Him, and in all the guilt of which they must appear before Him.
Q19. What is the future of the world?
A.
The unsparing judgment of God, as referred to in many passages of the Old and New Testaments, but
detailed in the book of the Revelation (chaps 6-20) 38
“He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained”, Acts 17: 31. The world’s religious form is “Babylon”, and it is thus judged first. In its secular form all the living nations finally unite against the Lamb for their judgment. Then at the end of the thousand years we have the multitude of apostates destroyed by fire, after which comes the solemn session of Christ for the judgment of the dead, and this closes the story of the world as such.
Q20. What is the future of the church?
A.
She will be caught up “to meet the Lord in the air”, before the judgment, when He “shall descend ... with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God”, 1 Thess 4: 16.
Q21. What will follow the judgment of Babylon, and the taking away of the church?
A.
The marriage of the Lamb in heaven, celebrated there with untold joy; then follows the judgment of the secular power, after which the church will reign with Christ a thousand years.
Q22. What follows the thousand years’ reign and the judgment of the dead?
A.
“A new heaven and a new earth”, the eternal state.
God all in all. “And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and His servants shall serve Him”, Rev 22: 3.
Q23. Reader, we have answered the foregoing questions; but answer for yourself now this one, ere you lay aside the book, Do I belong to the CHURCH or to the
WORLD?
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SCRIPTURE PROOFS OF THE ANSWERS
IN
“OUR FUTURE”
For Answer to Question—
l.
See Eph 1: 22, 23; Acts 9: 4.
2.
3.
4.
5
6.
7
1 Cor 7: 17; 11: 16; 11: 35; Acts 9: 31.
8
1 Thess 1; Phil 3: 20 ; Col 2: 5 ; 1 Cor 5; 2 Cor 11: 2; Eph 5: 31, 32.
9.
1 Cor 1: 2 ; 2 Cor 1: 1; Phil 4: 15 ; Rev 2 and 3
10.
11.
Eph 4: 11,12,15,16; Col 2: 19.
12.
Eph 4: 11,12, 15, 16; Col 2:19
13
See Acts 20: 32; 2 Tim 3: 11-17; Jude 3 ; 2 Pet 3: 2.
14.
John 15: 18, 19; 16: 8, 20; 17: 14-16, 25;
15.
16.
17.
John 5: 24; 17 16; Eph 2: 3; John 1: 12;
18.
John 7: 7; 1 John 2: 15-17; 3: 1; 5: 19 ; Rom 3: 19.
19.
Acts 17: 31 ; Rev 17: 9: 20: 7-15.
20.
1 Thess 4: 15-17; 1 Cor 15: 51, 52
21.
Rev 19: 6-8; 19: 11-20; 20: 4-6.
22.
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“Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus” (Heb 10: 19)
Is this our place, with Thee “within the veil”?
Oh Love, divine, unsought—
Boldly we enter in, LOVE cannot fail,
“What for us hath God wrought”!
Within the veil! O Lord, while yet on earth
We here with Thee abide,
As MAN we meditate Thy peerless worth,
“CROWNED” at the Father’s side.
In full effulgence all God’s glory shines
For ever, in Thy face;
For ever all Thou art as SON combines
To form our ground of grace.
“Within the veil”! Faith’s vision here can see
All brethren own’d as His,
By Him once “sanctified” for aye set free,
E’en now made “as HE is”.
Near Thee and as Thou lead’st our hearts we sing,
Thy theme the Father’s praise,
To us His name, declared by Thee doth bring
The light of all His ways.
Amen! We hail Thee Lord, in sovereign grace
The “sanctified” among,
We fill, in blest accord, this “holy place”,
With one melodious song.
“Within the veil”! Here Lord detain my heart,
To learn, till earth’s day’s o’er,
What ‘tis with Thee and Thine to have my “PART”
Beyond this death-strewn shore.
NOTE—In order to be in the good of the Lord’s work for us as the sacrifice and as the Priest it is necessary that we enter the Holiest. There “Christ is all, and in all”. It is the secret of the worship of the assembly.
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What is now, and what has always been, the secret of spiritual power in any? This is a question of grave importance for us; but the answer is one we as Christians ought to know something at least about. Such a question is seriously necessary to be both asked and answered today; and little able as we may be to reply to it fully, our lack may help us to seek the divine answer. One thing at least is clear, that where power has been known, either individual or collective, two things (among others perhaps) have been realised by the saints who have known it. First, God’s own immediate presence with His people; and secondly, man’s (ie their own) utter impotency.
It is to be regretted that with certain Christians there should be such an appearance of satisfaction in speaking of that power which they knew in early years long past, and which they gravely tell us has now passed away. They are fain to cry out with Job, “Oh that I were as in months past, as in the days when God preserved me; When his candle shined upon my head, and when by his light I walked through darkness; As I was in the days of my youth, when the secret of God was upon my tabernacle”, Job 29: 2-4. All this is sorrowful, inasmuch as it neither helps themselves nor any who hear them. Very different is such a state of soul from that of Paul, who says, “But this one thing ...
forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus”, Phil 3: 13,14. Very different too was this experience of Job from that of the wise man in an earlier day than that of Paul, who declares that “the path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day”, Prov 4: 18. And surely this is as it should be. Nearing the object of desire, the way becomes brighter and brighter. Brightened as the past may have been by His presence, I am nearer to Him now; how can I therefore regret and long for those days of shadow and darkness to come again through which in the past He led me? “Now is our salvation nearer than when 42
we believed” (Rom 13: 11, 12), and we are journeying from the night of shadows (illumined notwithstanding by His love) to the day of His manifested glory; and if glimpses of His power and presence have cheered us here, what will it be to abide with Him?
But as to power, I turn now to a passage in the Old
Testament to see how in the past His presence was manifested, the power of which wrought in a twofold way; and then I desire to note for myself this twofold effect: first, on His own people; and secondly, on all that raised opposition thereto. “When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange language; Judah was his sanctuary, and Israel his dominion. [consequence] The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs. What ailed thee, O thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan, that thou wast driven back? Ye mountains, that ye skipped like rams; and ye little hills, like lambs? [answer] Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord, at the presence of the God of Jacob; Which turned the rock into a standing water, the flint into a fountain of waters”, Ps 114: 1-7.
What a picture we have here drawn by the Spirit for
our contemplation! As the morning light dawns on Rameses we see, not a well-disciplined army with ability to meet its enemies, but six hundred thousand footmen going forth apparently without resources, and encumbered with the care of wives and little ones. May we not say, What a powerless, defenceless, and easy prey they are to the wandering hordes of the desert? But no, beloved reader; a blood-bought people, and powerless in themselves truly, is going forth; but not alone. At that time “Judah was His sanctuary, and Israel His dominion”, Ps 114: 2. Jehovah was in the midst of His people, and what was the result?
“The sea saw it, and fled: Jordan was driven back. The mountains skipped like rams, and the little hills like lambs”.
Now nothing in nature is more restless than the sea (Isa 57: 20, etc), and nothing in nature so apparently immovable and unbending as the mountain (Ps 46: 2, 3; Matt 17: 20); 43
but both confess to a power sovereign and supreme; both bow to its presence, and own it. Nature’s might must flee and tremble in His presence; and this is man, who hath power as lord over all His creation—man in his restlessness, man in his pride!
And while they marched on in obedience and
dependence on it (the power of His presence with them), all was well. It scattered all the opposers; it prepared for them fountains in the desert. But they must remember that He is with them; they must not be inconsistent therewith.
Truly He is for them, and against all who are against them; as He says, “Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee” (Num 24); but He cannot overlook inconsistency in any of His people with the fact that He is there. If they practically ignore Him, it is but that independent restlessness and pride of man which ever opposes Him; and if it work in them, then because they are His people He must deal with it. So again and again He had to remind them of Himself, there in their midst, as they murmur and wander forty years in the wilderness to humble them, Deut 8: 2, 3. If they desire to have Hobab for eyes (Num 10: 31-33), He (the ark) immediately goes before them to find out their resting-places. If they faint, feeling but as grasshoppers before the giants of Anak, and the “cities great and walled up to heaven” (Deut 9: 1), they faint because they have left the Lord out. But Caleb, the man of faith, cannot do this. He brings Him before the rebellious company, saying, “If the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land”, Num 14: 8. Yet the people must bear their iniquities for this their unbelief forty years, “each day for a year”, from twenty years old and upward; “in this wilderness they shall be consumed, and there they shall die”, Num 14: 35.
“Our God is a consuming fire” (Heb 12: 29), and His
saints must not forget it; they must own it first, before (going out in power) it makes itself felt for them. I see this everywhere among the saints who have gone before us in the path of faith. Thus it wrought in Jacob’s case. While 44
he was in servitude in Padan-Aram, and oppressed by Laban (Gen 31: 38-41), far away from the place of testimony, God does not interfere on Jacob’s behalf; but when (himself in obedience, and a crippled man) he is again on the way, though weaker than before as to outward appearance, yet it is then, as he journeyed, that the Spirit writes of him: “the terror of God was upon the cities that were round about them”, and they did not pursue after Jacob, Gen 35: 5. Ah! in that being crippled lies the secret.
He has learnt that he is in the way with God—it regulated him—and then God makes the power of His presence to be felt on those who would hinder His poor servant. It is the same today. And Paul learnt it in his path down here. “Most gladly”, says he, “therefore will I rather glory in mine infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest [ lit have its dwelling-place] upon me”, 2 Cor 12: 9. And thus, too, it bowed Job in its presence before it dealt with his three friends, and before it blessed his own family, Job 42: 5, 6.
Similar also was its effect upon the prophets Isaiah (Isa 6: 5) and Elijah, 1 Kings 19: 11-13. That power which if it please “rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord”, makes itself known to Elijah, and to His saints, in a still small voice: “And it was so, when Elijah heard it that he wrapped his face in his mantle”. Blessed Master, and blessed servant, may we now more diligently listen to catch Thy voice!
What have we left, beloved reader, as our resource today? The most blessed revelation that we can have here on earth: “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them”, Matt 18: 20. HE IS
THERE. (Not He will come there perhaps before our meeting closes; He nowhere says that); He is there when we come.
Does the fact of His presence regulate us who are gathered?
Does it banish for ever all that restlessness and pride of nature which we all more or less possess, so that His people may unhinderedly go up to Him? Do restlessness, natural ability, and the pride of man, ever exalting itself, flee and tremble in His presence? In short, do we really desire spiritual power individually, and in the assembly? Then we 45
must begin with ourselves. Can I expect to know it myself, or to see its action on others (1 Cor 14: 24, 25), if it have no power over me then present? Nature, and the carnal mind, can find no quarter in any soul who truly realises the LORD’s presence, whatever others may allow. But He is there, even if I do not realise it individually. May it lead us to judge and refuse that in us which we know HE cannot own.
One question more. If I go on, forgetful of what is due to His presence, must He not deal with me, and will He not do so sooner or later, in order to maintain what is due to Him, and to separate me from evil, 1 Cor 11: 30-32?
From The Christian’s Friend—vol 6, 1879
46
FURTHER THOUGHTS UPON THE SECRET
OF POWER
The question considered in a former paper was, What
is now, and what has ever been, the secret of spiritual power in any? The attention of the reader was there directed to God’s presence in the midst of His redeemed people, and that this apprehended and governing us was and is the secret of spiritual power; ie the Spirit of God in us, and God Himself with us, and for us. I would now seek to direct attention to how far this presence of God with His people may be hindered in its manifestation, and how far spiritual power may consequently be thereby lost.
It is evident, whether we look at Old Testament days or New Testament times, that there was not and cannot be spiritual power in us, save by the action of the Holy Ghost.
Then, as now, where spiritual power was manifested in an individual or in a company, He wrought it. We see the first in such a case as that of Samson (Judg 13: 25; 14: 6, 19,
&c), and again in Zech 4: 6; and the second in that of Israel (already quoted), in Ps 114, and Hag 2: 5, &c.
Now two things are true as to the Holy Ghost, since
His descent on the day of Pentecost: first, He dwells in the individual believer (1 Cor 6: 19; Eph 1: 13; Acts 2: 3, 4); and second, He dwells in the assembly, 1 Cor 3: 16, 17; Eph 2: 22; 1 Cor 12: 4, 11, 13, 28, 29, &c On these two facts, the presence of the Holy Spirit in the individual believer, and His presence in the assembly of God, two important exhortations are founded in the New Testament: first,
“Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption” (Eph 4: 30); and second,
“Quench not the Spirit”, 1 Thess 5: 19. “God hath spoken once; twice have I heard this; that power belongeth unto God”, Ps 62: 11. And it is well for us ever to remember this, lest pride occupy us with the vessel and what is wrought, rather than with its Author. He ever abides the same, whatever be the state of the vessel—whether it be an 47
assembly or an individual. Ah! it is well for poor man, for us, ever to remember this, “Power belongeth unto God”.
But redemption being wrought out, and Jesus
glorified, necessities for the descent and dwelling down here of the Holy Ghost, power came down (see John 7: 39; Acts 2: 33), He descended (Acts 2: 4) to work in testimony in the assembly of God, and in the individual believer, and to
‘abide for ever’, John 14: 16, 17; 15: 26, 27. “Power from on high” (Luke 24: 49) is down here on earth, and will ever abide (Acts 1: 8); not a mere influence, but a Person—one whose influence is felt. The redeemed of the Lord need a leader, and they need power; and He came to be both, and He is both for us, as was said in an earlier day to Joshua.
“As captain of the host of the Lord am I now come”, and what is this to me? “Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so”, Josh 5: 14, 15. Reader, is it thus with thee and with me?
Oh the liberty and joy of such a moment! and the peace of soul that I (though one of the redeemed) can only know, as I learn in His presence that “power belongeth unto God!”, Ps 62: 11. “God is greater than man ... He giveth not account of any of His matters”, Job 33. And while it is true that by the Holy Ghost God dwells in, and desires to act in the assembly, and also in the individual believer, His actions are not limited to these, though He is primarily here to act in these two; and when His action is hindered in either, it is clear that there is something wrong. But, as always, so now, God can act, and does act, as He will, and in whom He will. So in the world outside He used an unconverted Balaam, and spoke when He chose, through a dumb ass, Num 24: 2. And thus, too, He used Saul, the son of Kish, though he was not himself the Lord’s, 1 Sam 10: 6, 10; and 16: 14, &c Again, He can use, in New Testament days, those of whom He will have to say, “I never knew you”; though they themselves may boast, “in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?”
(Matt 7: 22, 23); and to this class, doubtless, Judas Iscariot must belong, who was one of the twelve, compare with this last-named scripture Matt 10: 2, 4, 8.
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But besides using an unconverted man, God can also use one who is a believer, but who may not be intelligent as to what the Holy Ghost is bringing out through him. Thus in past ages holy men of God spake as they were moved of the Holy Ghost, themselves not always understanding their own utterances, see 1 Pet 1: 10, 11, 12; and 2 Pet 1: 19, 20, 21. So was it also in 1 Cor 14: 14, where one using the gift of tongues may possibly pray in the Spirit, while the understanding may remain “unfruitful”; and this the apostle seeks to correct. In the spirit one might, thus speaking, “speak mysteries”; but the apostle would rather speak five words with his understanding in the assembly.
He says, “I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding
also”.
In
the
Old
Testament
communications, and again when they used the gift of tongues, it did not always happen that the “understanding”
of the speaker grasped the import of his message; but now the word of God is complete (Col 1: 25), His purposes all revealed (Rev 22: 18, 19), and the vessel should understand the mind of the Spirit, and should be in perfect harmony with the mind of Him who uses it. “We have the mind of Christ” (1 Cor 2: 16), so that while to them it was said, “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man”; to us today it is said, “God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God”, 1 Cor 2: 9-10. It is only “he that is spiritual” that discerneth the “all things” in this passage, or grasps the Spirit’s mind.
It has become necessary to draw the attention of believers to these two facts; for they are sometimes challenged: first, That God can use even an unconverted man if He so please; and second, That He can also use a converted man, when he who is so used may not understand what the Spirit is communicating through him.
Let us remember these things, lest we be found unintentionally guilty in these days of that early sin of the house of Jacob named in Psalm 78: 41. They “limited the Holy One of Israel”. But we must remember that if the Holy Ghost thus uses one unconverted, or again one who lacks 49
“understanding” though converted, these are now the abnormal actings of the Spirit. He desires rather to use the believer, and he who, being himself of full age, has the understanding developed, so that He can identify the one used with Himself. So likewise He desires to act in, and to identify the assembly with, His actions, Rev 22: 17. The Spirit abides on earth for ever, as we have seen, and is
“power from on high”. And God desires that the believer should be “filled with the Spirit”, Eph 5: 18. In himself he is an empty vessel, yet he remembers (wondrous truth) that
“he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit”, 1 Cor 6: 17.
His desire for every believer then is that He may be
“strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man”, Eph 3. Was it not manifest in Stephen, a man full of the Holy Ghost, and full of faith and power? who, being thus
“full of the Holy Ghost” (a power not of man, but which filled the poor vessel), could calmly yield to be stoned to death for Christ’s testimony, and by those too who did “always resist the Holy Ghost”, yet he in the moments of bodily anguish was enabled, like His Master, to pray for his murderers.
Here the power of the Holy Ghost is seen so acting as to identify itself with the vessel, the two being practically one
“one Spirit”.
Now a disregard of the exhortation, “grieve not the Holy Spirit of God” (Eph 4: 30) (to which we will now return), hinders the action of the Holy Ghost, and prevents His thus manifesting His power in the vessel to so sustain it—that it is, not sometimes, but daily seen to be sustained (John 4: 14) by those who know nothing of the secret, Ps 25: 14.
While, as of old (for the power abides), if the Spirit guide and direct all that is said and done in the assembly, being ungrieved and unquenched, the power is felt there; it is one voice, and one unbelieving falling down must own it and confess that “God is in you of a truth”, 1 Cor 14: 25 NT; Rev 22: 17—1st sentence.
And further, and what is of all importance, my own
individual enjoyment as a believer, of the ministry of the Holy Ghost, the Comforter (John 14: 17, 20, 26; John 16: 50
13, etc), which is my portion until I am with the Lord, must depend on my not grieving the Holy Ghost; and my present peace and rest of spirit (and the consequent manifestation of them) derived from Him—a power that keeps me superior to surrounding influences—depends on this too; for God is in no way hindered in His communion with a faithful soul, whatever may be the confusion and evil, either among the Lord’s people or in the world, of the day in which he may be living. To deny this is to say God is overcome of evil (see Rev 3: 20); while the power for blessing and edification of a gathered company (where manifested) will as surely depend on the unquenched presence and action of the Holy Ghost in their midst; for in both “power belongeth unto God”.
The source of spiritual power, then, God present by
His Spirit, is continuous; the manifestation of it is not necessarily so, but dependent. May we challenge our hearts, as the day darkens, as to these two things: first, What is there in me individually? and, secondly, What is there among us as a company, which hinders the manifestation of spiritual power? And first let us keep continuously in mind that, notwithstanding the point to which, as a Christian, any one of us has attained in past days—and there are attainments (Phil 3: 16); who among us will boast of them?—there is no such thing as the present enjoyment by me of spiritual power—the ministry of the Holy Ghost—if the Holy Ghost be dwelling in me a “grieved”
Spirit. And while this is so there cannot be to others the manifestation of spiritual power in me. When the Holy Spirit is grieved in me, every attempt to go on before others as if nothing had happened does but manifest my weakness to them. And this is true, however useful I may have been to them, as one owned of God for blessing in past days. Like Achan, the thing that weakens has been allowed where I ought to govern. With him it was in the tent; with me it is in myself; and in vain, though a very Samson before, will one who has grieved the Spirit (unless there has been self judgment) go out to shake himself “as at other times”, Judg 16: 20. In vain; his strength is gone, and God’s Nazarite, now powerless in the presence of the enemy, though once 51
so mighty, is presently seen to be blind—the poor blind captive and sport of the uncircumcised, Judges 16! Sad and sorrowful sight! yet is it one by no means uncommon to Him who has spiritual vision. What is it, then, to grieve the Holy Spirit? Where He dwells ungrieved there are manifested “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law”, Gal 5: 22, 23. All these are not human, but divine; and the Spirit must be acting where they are produced. Can it, then, be said that I am lacking any of these, and yet the Holy Spirit is not grieved? Impossible; for the fruits then seen are those of the flesh in the activity of human will, and not the will of God, Gal 5: 16-21. There may be recovery, both of an individual (see 1 Cor 11: 28-31) and of an assembly (see 2 Cor 7: 8-11), and this is wrought by self-judgment, so necessary to us all; but without it there surely must be a loss of spiritual power, and nothing but confession and self-judgment will restore it. Everything that is done in an individual or in an assembly, until self-judgment has done its work, is done with an effort—the sure sign of weakness—and, as before said, will but manifest the real condition to those who may have eyes to see, 1 Cor 2: 15.
Again, the opponent to the working of the Spirit of God is the spirit of the world—“the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience”, Eph 2: 2. “But”, says the apostle, “we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God”, 1 Cor 2: 12. Hence arises another question, Can I allow in myself that which is of the world (and hence of the spirit of disobedience), and the Holy Spirit yet remain in me ungrieved? In myself I detect the workings of nature—“the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life”; to all of these Satan ministers, in this huge system called “the world”. All these are “not of the Father, but is of the world”, 1 John 2: 15-17.
Can I allow them to work in me? and will the Holy Spirit meantime preserve and manifest in me His own energy?
Impossible. Says the apostle James, “Know ye not that the 52
friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God”, James 4: 4. And I have not to go outside of myself to discover these principles that govern the world. And it is in little things—things scarcely suspected, yet things which, if examined in the light, will be found to be not “of the Father, but of the world”, that we are so easily robbed of spiritual strength. Everything that I do as one in whom the Holy Ghost dwells, strikes a thrill for good or for evil through all the saints; for “by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body”, 1 Cor 12: 13, 26. And besides this, my enemies are not “flesh and blood”; they may come to me in that form, but they are not natural but “spiritual”. No carnal or natural weapons can overcome them—no conquest and victory can be by spiritual power alone. “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places”, Eph 6: 12. But all our power is gone if the Holy Ghost be hindered from manifesting His power in us, since in ourselves without Him we possess none.
Finally, I suppose none will question that one who is
“grieving the Spirit” (Eph 4: 30) is not the one to minister in an assembly of the saints, however useful he may have been to them in former days. Two evils are committed where such an attempt is made; for the Spirit is not only further grieved in the effort, but is also quenched possibly as to His action by means of another in the assembly. Edification in such a case there is not, but the manifestation of weakness, manifest to all present who have spiritual discernment.
Hence the frequency of our “leanness”, felt both individually and collectively; for the ministry of the Holy Ghost in both is the secret of spiritual power. Without it there is none, and confusion reigns. The apostle says, “I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also: I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also”, 1 Cor 14: 15. The instrument understands the mind of him who plays on it, if the Holy Spirit be not grieved or hindered 53
within him; and if in the assembly He acts in such a vessel, the assembly is edified, if the Spirit be not quenched there.
The day darkens. We are in danger of seeking to keep up a form of godliness without the power, 2 Tim 3: 5. May the Lord give us increased energy in these last days. “To them that have no might He increaseth strength”, Isa 40: 29. And may all His beloved people seek to maintain the grave importance of not grieving the Holy Spirit of God in themselves, whereby they cut off their own individual supplies of food, which ever come to us by the Holy Ghost’s ministering Christ to us; and as to the assembly, the solemn importance of not quenching the Spirit, and thus depriving the gathered saints of that ministry and sustenance so necessary for the edification and growth of the body.
From The Christian’s Friend—vol 6, 1879
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It is important in a day of decline—for the day of apostacy advances (Jude 14, 15), and the saints are in danger of becoming infected with its premonitory symptoms, those of ‘lukewarmness’ (Rev 3: 15, 16)—it is of all importance to return to what is the desire of the great Head of the church for us all. This, if cultivated and sought after, is calculated to preserve from this spirit, which is tingeing almost the whole of religious profession. I refer the reader, in illustration of His desire, to the Lord’s reply to the question asked in Matt 18: 1: “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” In the preceding chapter there had been given them a glimpse of the “Son of man coming in His kingdom” (Matt 16: 28)—a little foreshadowing of His glories, which, as Son of man, are yet to come. Would one who gazed thereon seek to place any on an equality with Him? No sooner is the proposal on the speaker’s lip than the voice of the Father is heard interrupting the vain desire,
“This is MY BELOVED SON, in whom I am well pleased: hear ye him”, Matt 17: 5. From the excellent glory He is thus declared beyond compare glorious and beloved, the centre of all, greatest and highest. Thus Peter’s voice was hushed; and though there with Him, and the eye-witness of His majesty, as he afterwards declares, yet He is God’s Centre, the only One who in Himself has title to be there. In the day of the manifestation of that glory we who believe shall be with Him too, our voices hushed in the contemplation of Him who is God’s Centre—a day which will see the fulfilment of His prayer in John 17: 24: “Father, I will that they also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world”.
Descending from the glory where they had heard the
testimony of the Father as to the Son of His bosom, they ask the question already quoted, whose tenor is, Which of us shall be next to Him? And what a reply comes from those gracious lips—a reply for each heart to weigh the import of then, and a lesson for us to ponder still! Does He deny that 55
there is such a place? Does He assert that we shall be all equal in that day? No, He does neither; but, exposing by contrast their love of self with what will be the true ground of exaltation, personal love, and devotedness to Himself, He replies, “Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven”, Matt 18: 4. He does not say, as is (perhaps unintentionally, but commonly) misquoted, ‘whosoever shall humble himself as this little child humbles itself, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven’. We cannot understand a little child humbling itself, because one who is in the place, who is that, needs not to come down to it; for already he is a little child. The Lord’s words are rather, ‘You must become as this little child, if you desire the highest place in the day of my kingdom glory’. This expression of infant helplessness,
“a little child” ( paidion), is the same as the apostle John delights to use in his first epistle, chap 2, when distinguishing, “Fathers”, “young men”, and “babes” (little children). This is the word he uses in verses 13 and 18. It describes the infant, the youngest in the household.
Such is the attainment, my reader, which the Lord Jesus proposes to each of us to aim at and to reach “a little child”. Do we ask why? It is because we are not in heart and spirit, and ways and affection, such; they betrayed it in their question; and do we not betray it in ourselves day by day? May I then draw your attention to two or three things, seen prominently in the model before us, seen in “a little child”.
Watch him in the nursery (picture of this world wherein we grow up, and where the child of God now is); not a fear, not an anxiety, not a care has he! Dependent for food, and shelter, and raiment, and every thing he wants or possesses on another; while in himself without plan, or thought, or resources, and with no ability to make his wants known save to one, who alone can understand the baby language that he speaks—such is our model. Is he happy?
Let any who doubt it observe him; or let my reader look back at the days of his own infancy, and the reply is at hand. But 56
while his feebleness is thus before us, we must remember that he has a consciousness, young as he is—a consciousness that only deepens and increases with the lapse of years—that consciousness is that he is beloved, beloved by the one we have already mentioned, with a perfect and never-changing love. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment.
He that feareth is not made perfect in love. That person who loves fills the whole range of his vision—a person, my reader, not a place. And is it so today? Is it so with each of us? One, as he walked this earth, has borne the marks of it. “One thing I do” ... “that I may win Christ, and be found in Him”, Phil 3: 13, 8. “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain”, Phil 1: 21. “Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus”, Phil 3: 12. A Person filled the sphere of his vision. He was beloved, and he knew it.
He “loved me, and gave himself for me”, Gal 2: 20. Reader, do you know it? Can you say it? and has it power over you as it had over him?
But the nursery time is passing away with all of us.
Let our model, “a little child”, be brought then from the nursery into all the light and brilliance of that day of the coming glory for which we wait. Let the assembled company stand back to make way for the approach of a “little child”.
“Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven”, Matt 19: 14. Why amidst the brilliant throng wanders his eye timidly from one to another? Is there not enough in the grandeur of all around to engage his attention? No; the place is nought to him, while all the grandeur and all the dignity do but distress him. He seeks for one whose heart’s affections are twined around him, and whose love he has learnt and proved in other days, and in other scenes, than these; for that same person, who fully satisfied him then, can only fully satisfy him now; and passing by all else, he hastens to the arms and the bosom of love. And He, whose is all the 57
grandeur and dignity of that day, delights to pillow that timid, trembling head on His own bosom.
And thus shall it be in the day of the kingdom glory; and THUS has the “little child” reached the highest place, even the bosom of that. One to whom it shall be confessed in that day, that fast-coming day of His glory, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing”, Rev 5: 12.
Reader, who will occupy the place of the little child?
If you occupy it now He declares you shall occupy it then.
Again we would ponder His blessed words, “Of such is the kingdom of heaven”. Oh, may we cultivate day by day, and seek grace to manifest day by day, the simple heart and ways, and the spontaneous affections for Him, our one beloved object, which are seen in “a little child”!
From The Christian’s Friend—vol 7, 1880
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In the Christian’s Friend and Instructor of last year, we read, ‘As with Balaam so with Job, there were those outside the immediate circle of Abraham’s family who knew and worshipped the Almighty’. Again, later, we read, ‘In the world outside God used an unconverted Balaam’. This is an apparent contradiction. But it is clear from Rom 1: 21, etc, that a certain knowledge of God may exist apart from conversion or the working of divine life in the soul. Balaam, speaking in Num 24: 16, speaks there, I judge, more of what he had learnt of God since being invited to come to Balak than of any of his previous knowledge of Him gained in Pethor; and for these reasons it is apparent that Balaam’s character as a soothsayer or diviner was well known. Balak, when he first sent to him to come and curse Israel, sent his messengers “with the rewards of divination in their hand”, Num 22: 7. Also, there was no knowledge of God’s ways with Israel, His people, in Balaam’s mind at the moment.
God forbade him to go, and says the people are blessed; then allowed him to have his way (for he loved the wages of unrighteousness, says the apostle Peter); then stood in the way as his adversary, with a sword drawn to kill him, forcing thus from the prophet the cry, “I have sinned”.—When come to Balak he does say, for God had already warned him,
“Peradventure the Lord will come to meet me” (Num 23: 3); but there is evident doubt about it in his mind, and the second time he does not say whom he goes to meet, Num 23: 15. In Num 24: 1, the Spirit records that “he went not, as at other times, to seek for (or to meet) enchantments”, including in “other times” his two former efforts. All this shows, I think, clearly that there was another power than that of Jehovah which was influencing his mind at this moment, though it is also clear that he knew this power to be impotent against God. His language in Num 23: 23,
“Surely there is no enchantment against Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel”, would indicate two things—the futility of his efforts, and also what he had learnt in the hands of God. Further, soothsayers, and those 59
who use divination, are an abomination to the Lord (Deut 18: 10-14; Lev 20: 6, 27); and this is Balaam’s description in Joshua 13: 22, “Balaam … the soothsayer”. When he came to Balak, Balak took him at once to the high places of Baal (Num 22: 41), and it was there that Balaam proposes,
“Build me here seven altars” (notice the words “me” and
“here”). There they unitedly offered their sacrifices, Num 23: 2. Can we suppose this to be the action of a prophet of Jehovah? Then Balaam’s own words, as, in “the vision of God”, he pondered the blessed end of His people, were, “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his!”, Num 23: 10. Again, “I shall see Him, but not now: I shall behold Him, but not nigh”, Num 24: 17. They remind one of Luke 16: 23, and Rev 1: 7, and imply anything but a heart then at perfect rest with God. The words Balaam “rose up and went and returned to his place” (Num 24: 25), too, are very suggestive, where he perished as a soothsayer among the Lord’s enemies, at the hands of His people (Josh 13: 22), who were commanded to cut off all such as an abomination in His eyes.
Moreover, in the New Testament, Balaam is classed
among those to whom is reserved “the blackness of darkness for ever”, by both Peter and Jude, see 2 Pet 2: 15-17; and Jude 11-13. Terrible end of one with whom there was a certain knowledge of God, coupled with a love of honour and reward on earth, making him a servant of iniquity and unrighteousness, deceiving himself, and yet calling Jehovah the Lord his God, Num 22: 18.
Finally, as to Balaam worshipping Jehovah, as
another has said, we must not confound Christian worship today with the worship of God in the past, nor with what will be found on earth again in the future. The hour “now is” when the true worshippers worship the Father, and when they that worship God must worship Him in spirit and in truth, John 4. None can worship now save those who worship thus, and in order to it there must be divine life in the soul; but this was not a necessity in the past. Thus we see that all Judah and Jerusalem worshipped the Lord, 2
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Chron 20: 18. Were they all converted? Saul worshipped the Lord 1 Sam 15: 25, 31. Nor will conversion be a necessity in the future. Men in the millennium will worship Him, and yet be unconverted, Ps 22: 27-29; and Zech 14: 16. See also Jer 26: 2-6; and Zeph. 2: 11.
From The Christian’s Friend—vol 7, 1880
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Men are attracted towards one who devotes all the energies of his life to the attainment of one settled purpose.
They admire it, for there is a kind of tacit acknowledgment in many a sober mind among them that it is better than the butterfly occupation in which they are engaged. And if such a man seeks to be a statesman, a soldier, or a sailor, he will make everything else subservient to this one great idea of his life. Governed by one fixed principle, to which he ever returns, he is like the magnetic needle that ever points to the pole. Only at rest in himself when he is governed by it, and ever restless and disturbed in any other occupation.
Now we are in difficult times, and we do well sometimes to pause and ask ourselves if we Christians are such men as I have spoken of, working in the quiet energy and confidence of the Spirit of God? Restlessness is manifest all around us, and God has lately tested us and will test us, to seek to manifest to ourselves and to others whether we have received, and are held in the quiet power of that “which cannot be moved” , Heb 12: 28. What then is the life object, before which everything else, yea, even the troubles of the assembly (Phil 4: 6), will obtain their rightful value as hindering or ministering thereto? What is the pole star, the guiding star of our way? I know I shall be answered readily by many —‘Christ and the church’. Well I say, ‘blessed if it is so’, but I candidly confess that the reply is often so flippantly made that we do well to examine if it be really so in truth. In these days especially (as always) the teacher and the taught must turn to the word; we must take heed what we hear and how we hear, Luke 8: 18; Mark 4: 24.
The Lord has Himself left us in what He has done for us, a blessed example of a man of purpose. As the man Christ Jesus He has passed on before us, leaving us the example that we should follow in His steps, and so shew forth here “the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light”, 1 Pet 2: 9! How often, as we have traced His path, have we in adoring fervour exclaimed, ‘Nothing turned Him aside!’ No, neither the 62
rejection of Israel, nor His own house, nor the turning aside of many from following Him, nor the meeting at the final hour with all the power of the enemy, nor even the forsaking of God — nothing moved Him from it! “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God”, Heb 10: 9. This ever governed Him. And if this was so in the past, may we not say that He, Christ Himself, is in the present, the only model (and only perfect example, as He must ever be) of a ‘Man of purpose’ for today? How do we imitate Him as to this? A few thoughts may not be out of place as we ponder His present occupation, for it is clear that we must be in fellowship with Him today as to this, if we too would be ‘men of purpose’.
“Upon this rock”, He says, “I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”, Matt 16.
Here we hear for the first time of what is His purpose and present occupation, which only began when He had Himself laid its foundation in His death, 1 Cor 3: 11. This occupation of the Lord is further developed in other places (John 13 and Eph 5: 25-32), for not only is He today building the church, but He is preparing her, by the washing of water by the word, for that glorious day, when completed, He shall present her “to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle or any such thing”. In our infirmities, “he ever liveth to make intercession for us”, Heb 7: 25. If we sin, He is our “advocate” (1 John 2: 1), and we also are called to like occupation, “prayer and supplication … for all saints” (Eph 6: 18), as well as to wash each other’s feet from defilement, John 13.
1 Chronicles 22 is a blessed word of encouragement.
Solomon means “peace”, and he is the builder of the Lord’s house. He and the men of purpose (God’s purpose) work together, and on a divine pattern. So whatever may be the discouragements (for today we do not lack the presence of Sanballat without and Shemaiah within (see Neh 6: 9-14), yet any and every workman (rightly feeble in himself) may take courage. If he is working with Solomon, and in subjection to that one master mind, which is God’s, what has he to fear? Solomon’s temple might be razed to its 63
foundation, but of this building (Eph 2: 21) He has said,
“The gates of hell shall not prevail against it’’, Matt 16: 18!
The Lord builds, and for the first time in John 20
(peace having been made) He says, “Peace be unto you”.
Thenceforward he builds. Not a stone was laid in the building in the day of Matt 16, though the material, the
“living stones” were there, manifested by a God-taught confession of Him such as Peter’s —“ Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God”, Matt 16: 16.
To Solomon, then, it is said (see v 15), “Moreover there are workmen with thee in abundance, hewers and workers of stone and timber, and all manner of cunning men for every manner of work”. Is any feeling discouraged?
feeling lonely? Pause, my beloved fellow workman! Are you working with Solomon and at the same edifice? Then remember that “There are workmen with thee in abundance” (for you are working with Him). And who will be discouraged since naught can let God’s building? It goes on today furnished and supplied “with all manner of cunning men for every manner of work”. Nor is material lacking for the use of every willing hearted workman, see v 16. “Of the gold, the silver, and the brass, and the iron, there is no number”, what then is lacking? Ah! we only want to be ‘men of purpose’. Listen to what comes next, and may the Lord give to thee, my reader, and to me grace and faith to act upon it, “Arise, therefore and be doing, and the Lord be with thee”.
And Solomon was only building an earthly house, a
footstool for the Holy One of Israel, but the Lord is now building for Himself His assembly, and all the magnificence and glory that were found in Solomon’s temple will be as naught to it. Oh! blessed day, daily drawing nigh, when he shall present her to Himself a glorious assembly, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, when God’s habitation shall be set up without sound of hammer or axe, and when from the tear-stained faces of His people, and of those who now labour with Him and for Him (Rom 16: 15; 2 Tim 1: 4; Phil 3: 15, and Jer 9: 1) — no angel, nor archangel, but God 64
Himself will wipe away every tear; His delight fulfilled to dwell among and with us, and to be known of us as our God.
And this will be our eternal state, that one blessed day whose sun knows no setting, for as in the city, dwelling place of God and the Lamb, there is “no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it” (Rev 21), so in the day of eternity, “And there shall be no night there; and they need no candle, neither light of the sun; for the Lord God giveth them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever”, Rev 22.
Now what does the apostle Paul say, himself among
the greatest of workmen, one too who knew more intimately than any since (read 2 Cor 11: 28-80) the trials found by those who would seek to serve Christ by serving and being spent for those who are His? “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord”, 1 Cor 15: 58.
May we then each be found to be “men of purpose,”
Christ’s purpose, in these days, wherein the shipwreck (1
Tim 1: 18-20) is manifest all around us, but when such men, the men of faith, will thereby be more distinctly manifested. Those that would discourage and hinder are not forgotten. They were found in every past day that required faith. Witness the day of Caleb, Num 13: 33; 14: 1-9, the day when Israel advanced to take possession (Deut.
20: 3-8), the day of Gideon (Judg 7: 87), and the day of Nehemiah (Neh 6: 9-14), and many others that might be named. The word is, ‘Is any faint-hearted?’ “Whosoever is fearful and afraid, let him return”. Such men tend to cause their brethren’s heart to faint, as well as their heart. But are you, beloved reader, working with the true Solomon?
who, having loved His own, is still occupied on high for them. Are you seeking to present every man “perfect in Christ Jesus”, Col 1: 27- 29? Then fear not. We shall probably be disturbed in this work. The troubles of the assembly in her time state (she will know no other) and the individual trials and oppositions as we have said, to be expected if we seek to follow Him, these will all make 65
demands more or less pressing upon us, but I see no reason to falter. There is the one settled purpose, the Lord’s work at the present hour, and is it ours? Like the needle, trembling as the waves strike the ship, but ever returning to its true work, may you and I be found obeying the exhortation of 1 Chron 22, “Arise therefore and be doing, and the Lord be with thee”.
From A Voice to the Faithful—vol 14, 1880
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CHILDHOOD, AND DEFORMITY
Growth is the natural advancement of the children of God from the state of babes to become “young men” and
“fathers” in Christ, 1 John 2: 12-14. But this may be either hindered or unnatural, and the state consequently may become all wrong. The Corinthians were still remaining in the condition of babes when the apostle addressed his first epistle to them: “And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able”, 1 Cor 3: 1, 2. The word “hitherto” (οὔπω) in this passage shows that they had never yet been in any other condition; they had remained in the condition of babes. The Hebrews also, when the apostle addressed them, are somewhat similar. Only with this difference, the Hebrews had advanced, but had afterwards returned to the state of babes. “For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe”, Heb 5: 12, 13. Ye “are become such” shows that they had gone back to it. “But call to remembrance the former days!” Ah, he says, you have gone back from the days when you “endured a great fight of afflictions”; you have forgotten the time when you “took joyfully the spoiling of your goods”, because you knew that you possessed “in heaven a better and an enduring substance”, Heb 10. “Now the just shall live by faith”.
There are three states of soul, or stages of growth, in the children of God to be found in Scripture; three states easily discernible too among Christians in our own day; and all three are evil, because they all arise from an arrested or unnatural growth. First, the dwarf state remaining in the condition of babes; second, the state of second childhood, 67
or returning to that condition; and third, the result of both the others—deformity.
I have referred to the first, as illustrated by the Corinthians, and say one thing more as to it ere passing on; namely, that Christians in this state are generally perfectly satisfied with themselves, and with what they know, and they are never found running in Paul’s company in 1 Cor 8: 2, and Phil 3: 12-14. (As to this, see and contrast what they are doing in 1 Cor 3: 21; 1 Cor 4: 7, 8; 1 Cor 8: 1; 1 Cor 9: 24-27; 1 Cor 11: 31; 1 Cor 14: 36; &c.)
Second, there is the state of second childhood; this we see was the condition of the Hebrews. In this state you have not impeded growth, as at Corinth, but unnatural growth; the internal has not kept pace with the external; it is more difficult to detect, for there is all the outward appearance of wisdom and manhood, with the intellect and the power wanting. This is a sad condition. There is refreshment in looking upon the confiding fresh young life of a babe; internally and externally there is harmony in such an one. But it is sad indeed to be brought face to face with second childhood. The hoary head, that should have guided aright, or curbed the impetuosity of youth by its sage and prudent counsel, that should have encouraged the feeble steps of the tottering babe, what can be more touching than to see its utter impotency and helplessness? (It is interesting and profitable to compare Deut 34: 7; Josh 14: 10, 11; Job 12: 12; Job 32: 6, 7; with Titus 2: 2, 3; Philem 9; in order to see that second childhood, whether in natural or spiritual things, is not part of God’s order.) I pass on to notice now the third state—“deformity”, in which state something is manifested externally repulsive to the spiritual eye. I take as examples of those in this condition the saints addressed in 1 Corinthians and in the epistle to the Galatians. It is clear that in natural things deformity may be either mental or physical; that is, it may be that of the mind which is internal, but it does not therefore escape a spiritual eye, or that of the body which is external and more visible; this, too, is also true in the things 68
of God, and both are illustrated in those addressed in these two epistles. Doctrine was wrong with the Galatians, practice with the Corinthians, the one internal, and far more serious and solemn than the other. Not to all the dreadful moral evil existing at Corinth does he address such solemn warnings and denunciations as he addresses to the Galatians, Gal 1: 6-9; 3: 4; 4: 11, 20; 5: 1, 4, 7, 12. No outward immorality is denounced by him as allowed among them, such as we find in 1 Corinthians, and it is possible that there was outwardly very little to complain of, the breaking of bread going on as usual, and those who attended at it not blamed. But they had gone back (Gal 4: 9), had begun in the spirit, but were now hindered,
“bewitched”. The “first works” (Rev 2: 5) were no longer done, legal works adopted, and “the bondwoman and her son” being brought back to the house, Gal 4: 30. But what had they done? In effect they had only neglected the teaching of the Word by the Spirit, a certain line of action not left to their judgment, but laid down for them, which is called ‘obeying the truth’, Gal 3: 1. This was the result of their bad state; but this was terrible to the apostle; for if the teaching of the Spirit and the Word are given up by saints, what is left?
It needed no great spiritual discernment to detect the deformity at Corinth. That which was allowed among them was a ‘common scandal’, and such as was “not so much as named”, even among the Gentiles, 1 Cor 5.
To remain, then, in the condition of babes is dwarfishness, and produces external deformity; while to return to this condition, having known better, is second childhood, and provokes this solemn condemnation of the apostle, “I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain”, Gal 4: 11. Doubtless the Hebrews were exposed to the danger of falling into the same state, though not so far advanced as the Galatians in it. But what strikes one is the overwhelming danger of this state, that it produces inaction of the Word by the Spirit. The soul is slumbering and content with itself, and no human power, 69
nothing but the solemn voice of the Lord by the apostle, can arouse it. He was not, and He cannot now be, indifferent to such a state.
It is a matter of comfort to the servants of the Lord, that souls in the three evil states we have been considering are not beyond recovery through the application of the Word in the power of the Spirit of God, for we have all three of them addressed in the passages we have had before us.
Nothing but divine wisdom can help us in dealing with such souls now, for by ignoring their state we are but continuing them in it, and by ignoring them because of their state we deprive ourselves of the duty and privilege of helping them to recovery.
In 1 Peter 2: 2 (which does not in any way militate against what we have been saying) we find the means of growth: “As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby”. We have been looking at growth arrested, and have considered a little what we have termed unnatural growth; we have seen that deformity follows each, but our view would not be complete were it not also to embrace what true growth is, and how it is manifested, and for this we must turn again to John’s first epistle.
I believe we learn there and everywhere in Scripture, as well as in walking up and down in service among the saints, that true growth always manifests itself in increased occupation of the soul with the person of Christ. When John is there writing of the “fathers”, he says that he has written and still writes to them because they have “known him from the beginning”. This is all he has to say of them, and he adds no further counsel to them, gives them no further occupation. He does to the young men, vv 15-17. He does also to the babes (vv 18-27), but to the fathers nothing, save in a general way, vv 28, &c But the omission is full of instruction, for the few words he does say of them are in effect, ‘You have already begun, while yet upon earth, the occupation of heaven and eternity, and I know of nothing beyond it’. Thus true growth was manifested. For in the 70
day of Revelation 5, a day swiftly approaching for us, “Jesus only” fills the scene, and occupies the whole of the surrounding companies, “every family in heaven”, and that, whatever their intelligence, or however varied their comprehension of Him and His ways may be. But if this is true in heaven, and we are growing now upon earth, it will manifest itself in more caring for Him and His approval, pleasing the Lord at all cost (2 Cor 5: 9), and how but in ministering to those who are His, those so dear to Him, and those for whom He died 1 John 5: 1?
“When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things”, 1 Cor 13. And, says the apostle Peter, “grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ”, 2 Pet 3: 18. May we see that there is no growth but by the Word, and the dangerous condition of those who are not obeying it, that “word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe”, 1 Thess 2: 13.
If at first it gave me life, it must effectually work now in me if I am to grow; and may it be thus with us increasingly to the praise and to the glory of His grace.
From The Christian’s Friend—vol 8, 1881
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THE OLD TESTAMENT WITNESS AS TO
THEM
It may be asked, What do we know of their origin?
and it is right that we should seek to know the meaning of what God has seen fit to write in His word. Neither intellect nor science can answer this question. These notes from scripture on this subject have helped the writer; they may also help and interest the reader, if the Lord will.
Man, as God’s creature, is made up of these three distinct parts. Like men, the lower animals are said in scripture to possess both soul and body, but not spirit. In the word of God (Gen 1), where alone we can read anything of the origin of this present creation, God has been pleased to instruct us as to this matter. “Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life” (or, in Hebrew,
‘ nephesh’1, soul); and again, in v 21, “every living creature that moveth” (or, every living soul—the same word). So also in v 24, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature (or living soul) after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so”. God thus created them by His word living souls ( ghahy nephesh) upon the earth; and verse 30 tells us that that class wherein there is ( nephesh)
“soul”, includes “every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth”.
But when we come to man, we read something
different. As to all the other animals, God had but spoken and had called them into being. At the fiat of their Creator they had come forth; but He now consults as to the creature that is to have dominion. This is man. Neither the earth, nor the air, nor the sea is called upon to produce him. He is to be made, and made also in the very image and after the likeness of God. “Let us make man in our image, after our 1 These words are intended to represent the Hebrew words as they are pronounced. So with ‘ rooagh’ in this article (or ‘ ruach’, as some prefer).—ED
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likeness”. “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ( n’shahmah ghahy); and man became a living soul ( ghahy nephesh)”—the same expression as we find used of the lower animals in Gen 1: 21. But what an important and twofold difference! First, man was, as to his body, God’s own formation out of the dust of the ground—not, as they were, called into being by a word; second, he was, as and when he was thus formed, the receiver (from God still) of this ‘ n’shahmah’ of life into his nostrils. Thus the formation of his body and his inspiration, by which it is said he became a living soul ( ghahy nephesh), are by no secondary means. Both are immediately from God; two things which we do not read of any of the lower creatures.
But further, “There is a spirit ( rooagh) in man, and the inspiration ( n’shahmah) of the Almighty giveth them understanding”; so says Elihu, Job 32: 8. But that the beasts have “no understanding” David tells us in Psalm 32: 9, using this same word for “understanding”. Again, he also says, “Man that is in honour, and understandeth not (same word), is like the beasts that perish”, Ps 49: 20. The prophet Isaiah also declares that they (the beasts) have not the spirit ( rooagh). “Now the Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses flesh, and not spirit”, Isa 31: 3. With men, therefore, the beasts partake both of soul and body, but not of spirit. As to the spirit ( rooagh) in man, it too (as soul and body are) is God’s work. The first place we read this word
‘ rooagh’ in Scripture, it is applied to God, Gen 1: 2. We read that “in the beginning Elohim created the heavens and the earth”. Later, when the creation as it at present exists was formed, we read, “The Spirit ( rooagh) of God moved on the face of the waters”. Elihu also, who applies this word to the spirit in man (Job 32), applies the same word to God in Job 33: 4. This spirit God forms in man. “Jehovah, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundations of the earth, and formeth the spirit ( rooagh) of man within him”, Zech 12: 1. Again, as to this work of God, “Lo, He that formeth the mountains, and createth the spirit ( rooagh), and declareth unto man what is his thought”, Amos 4: 13.
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That both soul and spirit were not confounded, but were known and distinguished, we may learn from other passages of the Old Testament. Hezekiah said that he spoke in the bitterness of his “soul” ( nephesh); but further adds,