FEATURES OF THE ASSEMBLY
[p. 414] FEATURES OF THE ASSEMBLY
1 Corinthians 11:16 - 26; 1 Corinthians 12:11 - 13; 1 Corinthians 14:15 - 20
JT The main thought in these passages is subjection, unity and intelligence. It will help us to consider the assembly as characterised by these features. As has already been remarked today, the assembly is subjected to Christ — that is God’s thought for it — in order that divine thoughts should be developed in it.
Ques Perhaps you will tell us whether you are speaking of the assembly as Christ’s assembly (”my assembly”) or as the assembly of God.
JT Both, but Corinthians has the assembly of God in mind.
HD'AC It says here, “Do ye despise the assembly of God?”
Ques What is the difference between the assembly of God and the assembly of Christ?
JT As far as I see, the assembly of God has to do with the testimony down here, but when the Lord says “my assembly” He is expressing what it is to Him.
HH I was thinking about the first part of the chapter, where the man is the head of the woman, that there we have the thought of subjection.
JT It is very significant that here, before we come to the subject of the breaking of bread, God’s order in creation is mentioned. In verse 16 it says, “But if anyone think to be contentious, we have no such custom, nor the assemblies of God”. Contention can only hinder the working out of the thoughts of God in the assembly. One who is subject will wait. We need not hope to understand everything at once; it says, “Think of what I say, for the Lord will give thee understanding in all things” (2 Timothy 2:7). That would save us from much strife. If we receive [p. 415] the gospel aright, it brings about subjection in the believer, the “obedience of faith” (Romans 1:5).
Rem A subject mind is teachable — one who is learning does not contend. Does not Peter refer to that when the says we are sanctified unto the obedience of Christ?
JT “By sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 1:2).
HD'AC The assembly is no place for contention.
JT Subjection is therefore a fundamental principle, if we want to make progress in the truth.
HH We see that in Christ — it says “the Christ’s head God”. We see it in the church, and we shall see it in the coming day in Israel.
JT How perfectly the will of God came into expression down here in Christ in subjection!
Rem According to the first verse the apostle was also subject, for he says, “Be my imitators, even as I also am of Christ”.
JT That is just what comes before us in Exodus; there we find Moses and Aaron in subjection to God, together in brotherly affection; and such were available to God, those whom He could use. Later we see the tabernacle as a type of the assembly. All the parts of it were brought to Moses, and Moses blessed the people on this account. All was set up under divine direction and then the tabernacle was anointed. Every feature of the tabernacle as set up stood in relation to service. The ark contained the testimony, the loaves were on the table, all the lamps on the candlestick were lighted. Then the altar is mentioned, on which the sacrifices were offered, also the laver, in which Moses and Aaron washed; all stood immediately available to God, and the glory filled the tabernacle. From this we see that, if we are subject and anointed, we are available to God.
Ques Are those “the approved”, mentioned in verse 19 of this chapter?
JT Quite so. The Corinthians, in a general way, God could not use. The Lord had said to Paul He had much people in this city, and He secured them for Himself by the best possible preaching, the best possible service. Although the Son of God had been preached among them by Paul and Silvanus and Timotheus, still God could not use them.
H.D’A.C. Why?
JT Firstly, because they had a party spirit.
Rem They had become contentious.
Rem They had given up the first principle, that of obedience, with which they began.
JT The apostle says to them in 1 Corinthians 1:10, “Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all say the same thing, and that there be not among you divisions; but that ye be perfectly united in the same mind and in the same opinion”.
HD'AC They gave the first place to the first man, and not to Christ.
FWK They were not standing in that of which 1 Corinthians 1:30 speaks, “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who has been made to us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and holiness, and redemption”.
JT What therefore is necessary among other things is to set forth afresh the principle of subjection; without it we can make no progress in the truth of the assembly. If there is room for contention, then one man’s word is as good as another’s. With Aaron, on the other hand, we see, as already noticed in Exodus, that he had intended to seek out his brother Moses, which was right in itself, but then in reality he went at the divine command. The principle of subjection is thus proved, not only by the fact that I wish to do something, but that I wish to do it on the principle of God’s will. If God has brought in in Christ the principle of His will, He will not be diverted from it.
HH Moses and Aaron could, so to speak, break bread together, for it says, “When he seeth thee he will be glad in his heart” (Exodus 4:14).
JT In this type we have a perfect combination of light and brotherly love. Moses had light from God; he had seen Him in the bush and had been taught to take his shoes from off his feet, for the place where he stood was holy ground. God had made known His name to him. We have nothing about Aaron’s history, all that we are told is, “Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother?” Aaron plainly sets forth that which is secret in the history of a soul, known only to God, so that He can give it a name. He says, “Is not Aaron the Levite thy brother? ... he goeth out to meet thee; and when he seeth thee he will be glad in his heart”. Aaron thus represents the secret history of a soul with God, which He alone knows, for He says, “He will be glad in his heart”. And so Aaron goes out by divine appointment to meet Moses, and when he meets him he kisses him. He met him on the mountain of God. Subject and standing in brotherly affection, they set forth the great feature of divine resource. It says, “On the mount of Jehovah will be provided” (Genesis 22:14) — and there they met.
PL Here in Corinthians the vessel of light is the called apostle and the vessel of brotherly love Sosthenes the brother.
JT Quite so.
Ques Is that the meaning of 1 Corinthians 11:11?
JT It is a matter there of being “in the Lord”. The behaviour of the Corinthians proved that they were not subject, so Paul had to say in verse 17, “But in prescribing to you on this which I now enter on, I do not praise, namely, that ye come together,
[p. 418] not for the better, but for the worse. For first, when ye come together in assembly, I hear there exist divisions among you, and I partly give credit to it”. There were thus divisions among them when they were actually together. Chapter 1 has more to do with their state in general and what characterised them within and without, but here he refers to actual divisions when they came together in assembly and therefore he says, “It is not to eat the Lord’s supper”. On this account he brings the Lord’s supper afresh before them. It had already been delivered to them, but now he says, “For I received from the Lord, that which I also delivered to you”. He stresses the Lord. Now it says, as it were, ‘I have received it from the Lord’, and that stands in agreement with the twelve apostles who were at the institution of the Supper.
HD'AC The Lord could not say to the twelve anything different from what He said to Paul.
JT Evidently it was His intention fully to confirm the witnesses to the institution of the Lord’s supper. That is a very important matter for us, for the combat which has raged round the Lord’s supper has been continuous. On this account subjection is so necessary. The twelve, under the Lord, developed this principle of supremacy in love, so that we read that those who were converted continued in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles; (Acts 2:42). The fact that it was their teaching shows that the converts were subject; from the very beginning they had the principle of subjection.
HD'AC It was a strict rule, but a rule of love.
JT And in addition, a rule of twelve men whom the Lord had already influenced and used.
HD'AC His prayer for them was heard; they were all one.
Rem So we have in 1 Corinthians 11 no new institution, but that which Paul had received from [p. 419] the Lord agreed with what he had brought to them before.
JT It is very beautiful to consider that. “I received from the Lord, that which I also delivered to you” means that he was not bringing in anything new. So he declares clearly that they had sinned against what they had already received from him.
HH The principle of subjection is contained in the words “I received from the Lord”.
JT He added nothing to it. What marks the history of the Lord’s supper in the hands of the public profession is additions and human innovations which went so far that it was quite lost to sight. The apostle added nothing to it. He received it from the Lord and what he received he gave to them. The point here is, “I received from the Lord”. Inasmuch as the Lord’s supper has been so degraded today we have here a very peremptory word. This degrading was already setting in at Corinth, therefore these words are so important, “I received from the Lord”.
AM Do you think the Corinthians were in a condition to receive what Paul had from the Lord?
JT It was a matter of emphasising the supremacy of the Lord. The second epistle shows that the apostle was not mistaken. The foundation which he had laid in Corinth was still there, so that the epistle had a result. “If the foundations be destroyed, what shall the righteous do?” (Psalm 11:3). But here the foundations were still there, and so the word was received and the saints humbled themselves.
Ques Do you not think that in the Supper we can see God’s way of bringing the Corinthians into the gain of the anointing?
JT The anointing is only to be seen where there is subjection. What is needed is correspondence with Christ. In Him subjection was to be seen in infinite perfection, so that it says here that the head [p. 420] of Christ is God. When He was baptised, and praying, He was anointed. He took His place according to the will of God with the repentant remnant and there He was anointed. So chapter 11 of Corinthians leads to the anointing in chapter 12. Chapter 12 does not only speak of one body in Christ as does the epistle to the Romans (chapter 12:5), but of one body through the baptism of the Spirit. That means that through subjection the Spirit has freedom to give us, as it were, to be merged in the body.
Rem If each takes his own supper there is no principle of subjection.
JT So even now in the whole of christendom there prevails an independence of action.
AM Does the baptism of the Spirit not involve the setting aside of the flesh?
JT “All these things operates the one and the same Spirit, dividing to each in particular according as he pleases” (1 Corinthians 12:11). We see then that the Spirit is free, it says “as he pleases”.
HD'AC He has this right as a divine Person.
JT So when we are subject, the Spirit can use us and so the apostle can immediately in verse 12 bring in the figure of the body. “For even as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also is the Christ”. That makes up the Christ, the anointed vessel down here. In it we see what God is. That with which God can identify Himself comes to light. Christ means ‘anointed’, is not that so?
HD'AC That is a very extensive thought; it embraces all saints on earth, and yet all have not part in it, because they are not true to the anointing.
JT If there is not subjection, there is room for our own wills and independence.
Rem The twelve apostles received the Supper from Christ on earth, but Paul from Christ in glory,
therefore he says, “I received it from the Lord” which, of course, is also an allusion to His supremacy.
HD'AC He was the apostle of the nations, which is important, as otherwise the gentiles could have said, if the Supper had only been given to the twelve, ‘Our apostle has not given it to us’.
JT The importance of it in relation to the assembly lies in this, that it was given to Paul directly from heaven, and that he formally separates it from our meals among our families and places it in the assembly. He says, “Have ye not then houses for eating and drinking?” In chapter 12, therefore, the saints are viewed in subjection, as the vessel in which Christ finds His expression down here. The act of the Spirit is to baptise us into one body; we are all given to drink of one Spirit, so that we are happy to be merged. That is more than fellowship or partnership, which we have in chapter 10, but here we come to the inner side; the saints merge happily in it, as given to drink of one Spirit.
HD'AC That is mutual enjoyment.
JT That was my thought, we are happy in it.
FWK In that way we lose our individuality.
JT And we are happy to lose it. We should notice that the little word ‘for’ stands at the beginning of verses 12, 13 and 14; one is the result of the other.
Ques Is chapter 12 the result of enjoying the Supper in the right way?
JT Quite so. Room is made for the Spirit. They had written to the apostle about it (compare chapters 7:1; 8:1, 12:1), and he brings in his answer when he had spoken about the Lord’s supper. It is a matter of confirming which spirit is working in the assembly, and so in keeping with this he develops the truth of the body, seen as the vessel in which the Spirit operates.
[p. 422] Ques Can we only arrive at this in our experience on the principle of suffering?
JT That remark is very apt, I think, because the holy anointing oil of the tabernacle refers much to the sufferings of Christ (”myrrh”, Exodus 30:23), so that “the Christ” down here, the anointed vessel, has to do with that.
Ques Have we in Matthew 26, in the woman in Simon the leper’s house, how every member is prepared for the assembly?
JT She anointed the Vessel and thereby acknowledged that He was the very Vessel to anoint. God had already anointed Him and now she anoints Him.
Ques. In view of what?
JT In view of that which had been set forth in His ministry. She anointed Him for His burial.
Ques Is that in relation to the baptism which is mentioned here?
JT This is the act of the Spirit. We have all been baptised by one Spirit into one body, and the apostle brings forward the figure of the human body and says, “So also is the Christ”. That is the divine thought and the basis of the assembly down here.
HD'AC At present there are two serious principles at work. There are some who say, ‘I am not of thee’, and others who say, ‘I have not need of thee’.
JT That would be independence.
HH It would also be wrong to have good men at the head of a party, as at that time when they said, “I am of Paul”, and so on.
JT The better these were, the more harm they would do.
Rem But as a matter of fact Paul was not the head of that party.
Ques Why would they do more harm?
JT Because they would have more influence. In chapter 14 all this works out in the service, as the [p. 423] saints are together. So it is a matter of being governed by intelligence in what one does. Chapter 13 brings in the more excellent way of love, but according to chapter 14 I should be governed by understanding. In verse 15 it is twice mentioned, “I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray also with the understanding”, and then “I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing also with the understanding”. It refers to the best that there is, not the Holy Spirit, but one’s own spirit. As secured for the assembly I belong entirely to it. One’s own spirit is that which one is, in one’s innermost being, in reference to God; it is the source of true spiritual sensibilities. Understanding governs the part which I take, but I am inwardly urged to it, so we read that the Lord rejoiced in spirit and after that gave expression to the beautiful words in Luke 10:21,22.
PL Have we not in chapter 12, as it were, descending suffering love for the saints, and then in chapter 14 love in the Spirit rising up to God?
JT Love never fails; it is the great reserve. In assembly affairs we are never up against a wall if love is present, and it never fails. It triumphs in all circumstances, so that the apostle makes a comparison and says “the greater of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13).
HH The death of Christ is the sublime example of it. His pathway led through the most testing circumstances.
JT If any hindrance is put in the way of love — that happened there, but it did not fail — love never fails. Gethsemane shows the greatness of the hindrances which were raised up against the love of Christ. Satan brought all his power to bear on the Spirit of the Lord to deter Him from taking this way. The Lord went through in triumph, and so I think the apostle triumphs here too. To write this letter corresponded with love’s way. He says, “Yet show I [p. 424] unto you a way of more surpassing excellence” (1 Corinthians 12:31).
HD'AC He wrote it with tears.
Rem We are now coming to the side of the testimony?
JT Quite so. It is a matter of showing the thing and the Lord did that with the utmost perfection.
Rem Not only that love did not fail but it reached its end.
GRA It is not here a question of the soul?
JT In my soul I stand more in relation to men, but the spirit returns to God who gave it, so that it is here a matter of the spirit.
Rem “He that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit” (1 Corinthians 6:17).
HD'AC When the soul takes prominence in prayer, there is too much of the natural there.
JT One is not then so near to God, as when one is praying with his spirit to God. The gospel of Luke begins with an angel on the right side of the altar of incense.
Rem The Lord says of His soul, “Now is my soul troubled” (John 12:27).
JT The soul is a part of man, who consists of body, soul and spirit.
HH Do you not think that to be in one’s spirit with God has a great influence on how one is publicly with one’s brethren?
JT I think that. “Mary said, My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit has rejoiced in God my Saviour” (Luke 1:46,47). I think, in my spirit, I am nearer to God, and have God’s things before me in my prayers, so that the angel is seen at the right of the altar of incense. It was the time of prayer and the people were actually praying without, and Zacharias was within, but the angel stood at the right of the altar of incense, as if he wanted to express that this was what was lacking. In truth, the [p. 425] condition was marked by unbelief, for Zacharias had prayed for a son and now that he was told he should receive him, he did not believe it.
Gabriel stood before God and in Revelation 8:2,3 it says, “I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and much incense was given to him, that he might give efficacy to the prayers of all saints at the golden altar which was before the throne”. It refers there to the prayers of the saints to God. In prayer we stand before God, therefore it is a question of faith and what God will do. So unceasing prayer was made to God for Peter, but when He set him free they did not believe it; (Acts 12:5,15).
Ques Why do you emphasise so much the right side of the altar?
JT We see there the best that God has. He does “far exceedingly above all which we ask or think” (Ephesians 3:20).
Rem That is His goodness.
Rem His love.
JT It is according to the power which works in us. The answer to our prayers displays what is in us according to the Spirit. God takes up nothing new; He works according to the power which works in us. I think we see here in chapter 14 the spirit of the saints, that means all that they were now in the assembly according to God. There we can give expression to all our best sensibilities and affections, but along with that we should be guided by intelligence, so that the principle of measure is immediately mentioned, “five words with my understanding”.
HD'AC Intelligence is given us by the Spirit.
JT That is already taught in chapter 2:16, “We have the mind of Christ”.
Rem But we have received no divine [p. 426] inspiration?
JT No; that means that we have the thinking faculty of Christ.
Rem At the same time we keep within the limits of Scripture.
JT We find the principle of measure in both of these epistles. The measuring instruments of the watchmaker must be very exact.
Also at the forming of the universe God employed measure and weight, so it says in the next epistle, “the God of measure” (2 Corinthians 10:13). That applies also to our service in the assembly, for it is quite clear that the principle of measure must decide.
HD'AC We should not go beyond what the Spirit gives us.
JT We should not go beyond what is fitting. If a dozen brothers are taking part, then it is clear that I have to adjust my contribution accordingly and I must divide the available time by twelve.
HD'AC That is praying with five words.
Ques What is the difference between, “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit” (Romans 5:5), and “Follow after love” (1 Corinthians 14:1)?
JT Love is spoken of in this epistle as if it were a person. It was perfectly set out in Christ and in a certain measure in the apostle. They had to follow after it; in a word they had to be men in their minds, grown men.