KNOWING THE WAY
D. A. Burr
Romans 8: 26–30; 2 Corinthians 4: 17, 18; 2 Samuel 7: 1–13; 23: 3–5; 1 Chronicles 22: 6–10, 14
I would like to begin what I have to say about these scriptures by raising a question. I believe that every believer would recognise the idea that their life is a journey, because they have received the Lord’s promise as to where that journey will end. “I am coming again and shall receive you to myself, that where I am ye also may be. And ye know where I go, and ye know the way”, John 14: 3, 4. If our lives are a journey, it follows that all the experiences and encounters of life form part of the journey. If that is the case for you, the question I would like to ask is, Why does your journey follow the course it does? If I can put it more simply, Why are you going this way? Thomas says to the Lord, “we know not where thou goest, and how can we know the way?”; I would like to pursue that question. How can we know the way? What understanding do we have about the encounters and experiences of life viewed as part of the journey? Many of our experiences are relatively trivial and forgotten, but are they for that reason to be regarded as of no value?
The scripture in Romans introduces the principle of predestination, which has baffled a lot of people over the years; but we recognise at any rate that the idea of a destination is the end of a journey. It is a point that you arrive at by taking a certain course, and in the case of a believer that course is overseen by God. The solution to all the difficulties about predestination is that it follows foreknowledge. It is not that God has made some random selection of people who are going to heaven. He has predestinated those whom He foreknew.
It was not simply that He knew in advance whether you would receive the gospel, although that is included, but God
saw everything else that your life would encompass. You have not seen some of it yet, nor have I, but God has seen it all. The destination is therefore the end of a journey that God has mapped out for you. I do not think it is open to any of us to say that there are parts of that journey that do not make any contribution to reaching its destination. Paul says here “all things work”; that is probably more than we can encompass. We cannot remember everything that has happened in our lives, and it would be difficult to find much value in some of it, but Paul says “all things work”, and he adds “all things work together”.
Here we see the hands of a divine Planner who has encompassed everything that enters into our lives and formed it into a whole that will bring us to His end with us. How marvellous God’s dealings for us are, that He is able to take everything and work it together to reach His end with us. Paul says we know this; we might say, How can we, because we have not seen the end yet and life still holds some surprises? We only know that things work together because we understand that our lives are looked over by God, and that what we encounter is in and from His hand. The brethren have buried a beloved brother this morning. Perhaps it was suggested that his journey was over, and in one sense it is. It would not, however, be right to suggest that God’s work in our brother is finished, because he has yet to be clothed with a house from heaven; he has yet to have the treasure that has been seen by his brethren and by God in an earthen vessel transferred to something that is capable of holding it for God eternally. John says, “what we shall be has not yet been manifested”, 1 John 3: 2. So today is part of the journey that none of us knows about, the most wonderful part—the moment of arrival; but in the meantime we work our lives out with God as One who has a purpose for us in everything that we encounter.
I read the scripture in 2 Corinthians 4 because it brings in the matter of affliction, and affliction is very
much on the spirits of the brethren, understandably so. I want to speak about the variety of affliction. Paul says, “our momentary and light affliction works for us in surpassing measure an eternal weight of glory”. I do not think Paul intends to belittle affliction; it is perhaps a natural tendency to expect others to make little of their afflictions, to put a brave face on things, and so on. I do not think God expects us to do that. God knows what one and another are passing through. He knows the severity of it, He feels it deeply; He feels it more deeply than the sufferer can, “he doth not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men”, Lamentations 3: 33. These things are understood by God, but if it were right to suggest that any affliction is momentary and light, and in many cases it is, still it has the potential to work
“in surpassing measure an eternal weight of glory”.
Now, if that is true of what might properly be called the trivia of life, how much more so of its major episodes and the trauma through which some of our brethren pass. I say some of our brethren because so far, at any rate, that is not the portion of us all. We do not all have these extreme experiences and some people complete their course without ever having had one; where are they to learn life’s lessons? Do we just try and learn them by being sympathetic with others, something that we are not very good at, or are we perhaps discounting apparently more routine experiences by failing to see their potential and learn their value? Are we, like Enoch, or Noah, walking with God, or does it need some extremity either to fall our way or to come close to us before we begin to think about the meaning of life’s experiences? These are sober things, beloved, and they are not confined to afflictions. I think we may fail to see the importance of the present time. How short our lives may be and how superficial much of them may be, but for God they are preordained and preparatory to an eternal weight of glory.
These things are arresting and the Lord may place severity among us so that we should think about them. He also places joys and happiness
among us for the same reason. It was remarked in a prayer meeting the other day, when we were much occupied with the sudden death of a beloved brother, that the week’s news also included a birth. This was a happy outcome of what had been a more than usually protracted exercise; and the Lord was in that also. He would teach us to carry all the variety of our experiences with Himself.
I did not mean in diverting to Corinthians to overlook the other reference we read in Romans; it raises a question about how we pray. I think we sometimes imagine that the object of prayer is to change what would otherwise be the course of events, but then if it is all predestinated we might ask, What is the point? If we cannot change things, why attempt to?
There is a lot of general value in prayer; it brings us into the presence of God and God loves us to be there. I would encourage even the little children—God loves to hear you pray, and one thing He loves about little children praying is that they take it for granted that He will hear them and that He can do anything. God misses that simplicity in grown-ups, and He has a special ear for the prayers of little children. They do not have to put their hands up (as they should at table perhaps)—God is very simple in His relations with them. He loves to hear you, He loves to hear your simple trust in His power and His wisdom, and God also loves to do things in answer to prayer.
Perhaps He would do it whether we prayed or not, but He loves to do things because someone has asked Him. That is the way God deals with us; but then there are other things where we might well ask, What can we ask for? It is also a very fine thing to carry just the name of a beloved brother or sister before God in prayer; whatever they may be passing through. It is testified beyond question that such feel the benefit of their name being brought into the presence of God. Sometimes all we can pray for is to understand what the will of God is,
to see how things fit into that plan that we so dimly see, to understand what lesson there might be for us in something, the course of which may not be changed by any supplication on our behalf, on our account or on our side. It is very touching here that although there are manifest limitations to what we can ask for, the Holy Spirit serves. It is one of His most blessed services to add a fulness where there is limitation in what we can pray for. What He does especially is to ensure that whatever might be the subject of prayer is properly felt in the presence of God. Think of the communion there is between the Father and the Holy Spirit about the things that the people of God pass through, so that divine feelings are shared about them. I might say I do not know how to feel about this, but the Spirit knows and so we can be assured that the matter is felt properly and fully in the presence of God.
Having said all that I pass on to these references to the life of David. When we think of affliction, our minds perhaps go first to illness and bereavement. It is evident that David knew something about bereavement, and he had other sorrows that are attached to it—the loss of a wayward son, and the loss of a newborn child. As far as we can tell David was physically well, I do not think he knew much about physical illness. I believe he did know something about depression. If you read some of the Psalms, you would see evidence of it. In Psalm 38: 6 he says expressly that he was depressed. I might just say a word feelingly about that. It is a more severe condition than we allow. It is a condition that induces despair, and it is a particularly acute and protracted form of suffering through which many of our brethren have passed. It tends to be aggravated because others of us say, Well you will just get over this, or maybe you should pull yourself together, or something of that sort, so that the sufferer feels isolated and misunderstood. The Lord knows these things.
The Spirit of Christ entered into so many of David’s
psalms when he evidently and understandably felt like that. That is a very beautiful form of comfort to people who are afflicted in that way. But the afflictions I especially wanted to draw attention to are perhaps of a rather different character, and if I just go over what these three scriptures speak about you will see what I have in mind. David had a lifelong aspiration.
From the days of his boyhood it had been his longing to build God a house. It is one of the noblest ambitions that any man has ever had; and in this first scripture (in 2 Samuel 7) God takes it away. He says, you are not going to do it; God says, I will bless your house instead—
what a compensation, but I think David would then have suffered the affliction of disappointment; things had not worked out as he would have liked. A pure and noble idea was withheld by God without any reason being given. God is free to do that, but what an affliction that must have been to David. He had this apparently wonderful idea and God said he was not going to do it, and He did not give him any reason.
I will take the three scriptures I read together. I read these other two to show what David did when God made His decision. David might have accepted that there was a reason and that maybe he would be able to work it as life went on. By the time that he came to the end of his life, he could easily have convinced himself that the reason why God had not allowed him to build the house was that God knew that he was going to fail. David could have said, Well God knew the sins I was going to commit; He knew I was going to take someone’s life, He knew I was going to commit adultery. He knew I was going to count the people, He knew what a failure I would be; and I was not worthy. You can imagine David’s disappointment turning into despair. And then he might have thought, Well at least God said He would bless my house, and that has all gone wrong, which is all my fault too. God has had to tell me that the sword is never going to depart from my house (2 Samuel 12: 10); God has had to take away what He
promised me.
That is all a natural way of looking at things; but we need to understand how to carry disappointments rightly. We look at those, for example, who are available to us, we think of the sorrows that have reduced the numbers of those we walk with. We take account of the difficulty in drawing near to some and their unreadiness to heal the breaches; the tearing aside of natural relationships and the distances that have come in; the pain and sorrow of all that; and many of us have had our part in it too. We might well say that God has had to be severe because of the nature of the departure from which they spring. But we do not have to carry these things in our own hearts and try and work out for ourselves what they might mean. We can do what David did and carry them with God. These other two scriptures show what happened to David when he carried these things with God. I say they were afflictions, not of physical illness or bereavement, although he had this too. If what I say applies to this kind of affliction then I suggest it applies to any kind of affliction, and indeed to any kind of experience, which might not be affliction at all. I want to show the value of carrying things with God.
David comes to his last words but he allows God to have His say too; it is very fine. David refers very simply to his disappointments here in 2 Samuel 23. He says, “Although my house be not so before God”, and, “For this is all my salvation, and every desire, Although he make it not to grow”. David speaks simply and freely in the presence of God about unfulfilled expectations. Then he calls Solomon his son and he speaks to him about the life’s expectation he had had. He says in 2 Chronicles 22, “But the word of Jehovah came to me saying, Thou hast shed blood abundantly, and hast made great wars—thou shalt not build a house unto my name”. Somewhere along the way he has discovered a reason in the interval since his transaction with Nathan. The
reason is interesting; God said, You shed much blood and you have been a man of war. How does that disqualify David? We need to remember that David had not fought a battle on his own account. As Abigail says he fought the battles of Jehovah (1 Samuel 25: 28). I like to think that Abigail prayed David would never take up the sword in his own cause, and I think we can say about David that he never had; he had fought the battles of Jehovah. I might say it all seems a bit unfair therefore that David has exercised himself and endangered his life on God’s account, and God gives that as a reason why David should not do the very thing he wanted to do.
I think we need to understand, beloved, that God’s purpose was not first fixed through anything we have done. In that sense God’s end is not subject to whether we are more or less skilful in conflict. We rightly draw on David’s history to show how the practical possession of the truth has been recovered through conflict, but God’s purpose was fixed before there was any conflict. Believers have had to be recovered to the truth and there has to be conflict if we are to possess it—and also conflict with those who have resisted the truth; but the truth was first fixed in divine purpose. All the wars that David fought did not make God’s purpose any more or less. It is fixed already in another Man and at another time. God must have simply said to David, I would not like it to be thought that My purpose was subject to what you were able or not able to do. Yes, I helped you, I was with you wheresoever you went, in all those wars and conflicts you found Me as your Shield and Helper, and I was glad to do it; but you understand that this is not how My eternal purpose was determined. God’s purpose came before ever a scene of conflict existed, before the worlds were made. David arrives at that through carrying his exercise, his affliction, with God. God as it were peels away his affliction and all the self-occupation it might bring, and He shows him the means by which His purpose would come to pass, “a son shall be born to thee, who shall be a man of rest”.
David’s afflictions brought him into the presence of God and he got beyond his afflictions—God revealed to him His purpose in Christ.
So God interrupts David’s last words very beautifully. This may be the last thing that David has to say but God says, I must have part in this, there is something that I would like to say. I would like everyone to know what it was that David learned from bringing his exercises to Me; so “The God of Israel said … The ruler among men shall be just, Ruling in the fear of God; And he shall be as the light of the morning, like the rising of the sun, A morning without clouds”. Think of that! David might have said that clouds had gathered over his life in the course of his reign over Israel, and he might have wondered if they could never disperse; he had done things he could not undo, he had to live with the consequences of them and how could he ever escape from that; there were things that he had done that he could never change. God speaks of a Man who shall be as a morning without clouds. He says that David’s son “shall be a man of rest”. David has come through this with God, the encounters and experiences of life, whatever character they may have, but especially affliction, and seen God in it all; seen His purpose and His choice, what He has secured for Himself and for us in Christ.
I love to think of that passage in 2 Samuel 7. It is a very fine verse where God speaks about being with David all the journey. That is the point that I am trying to make, He had been with him all the way, and where was He leading him? “I will appoint a place for my people”. That was their destination, they had not reached it yet. He says, “and will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own, and be disturbed no more”. How wonderful to think of that, beloved. Think of the things that press upon the spirits of some of our brethren, and things that so easily intrude into our peace of mind; the burdens that people carry whose loved ones are
suffering, the need for care day and night, and the pressure and the uncertainty of it all. God says, They shall dwell in a place of their own and be disturbed no more. God does not only disclose to us that His purpose finds its focus and centre in Christ, but that it would not be complete until we are there also, chosen in Christ, as Paul says, before the world’s foundation (Ephesians 1: 4); predestinated, as it says in Romans, that we should be conformed to the image of His Son.
David speaks in 2 Chronicles 22 about what his affliction had yielded. We know that there were three sources of material for the temple. There was David’s power and David’s affection and David’s affliction. The biggest share was the fruit of his affliction. He was a man with a large heart and surely his heart would have yielded the best; certainly he wanted it to. But he had learned that his affliction was more productive even than his affection, because his affliction had brought him into the presence of God. It is very interesting that he does not say to Solomon, You add to what my power has brought, although Solomon was well placed to do that; and he does not say to Solomon, You add to what my affection has brought—
Solomon was well placed to do that; but he says that he was to add to what David had brought out of his affliction—“and thou shalt add to it”. Did Solomon ever do it? What did he know about affliction? How much did he really carry things with God? Perhaps it was one of the secrets of Solomon’s eventual downfall that he did not apply himself to add to what his father had secured in his affliction. Even momentary and light affliction would have worked the surpassing weight of glory.
These things show that God does not pass us through anything for nothing. He passes us through things so that we might learn. I was reflecting on various references in the gospels to people who spoke of the Lord as a Teacher, and not all of them seemed very ready to learn, but I will just draw attention to three.
Bartimaeus from Jericho, Martha from Bethany and Mary of Magdala speak of the Lord as a Teacher. If you look at what we know about their lives you can see what potential they had.
Why did Bartimaeus not refer to the Lord as his Saviour—or even as his Doctor? But he referred to Him as his Teacher because he was going to follow Him in the way; he was going to learn what his life was for and what it was all about, and for that he needed to be in the company of Jesus.
That brings me finally to where we ended our reading. The Lord Jesus says, “Come to me, all ye who labour and are burdened”, Matthew 11: 28. He does not say which kind of burdens.
He does not say what the cause of the labour is, but “all ye who labour and are burdened”. I remember that many years ago now I was quite agitated about something and we were away.
A young brother in the place, as he then was, suggested that we take the scripture at the end of Matthew 11 for a reading. I think he expected we would have a discussion about the gospel. The old brother who asked him to suggest something said, Well, you do have to understand that this passage is aimed at those who feel what has come in in the testimony.
Jesus is not actually referring immediately to illness or bereavement or personal sorrow, He is referring to those who feel what has come in among the people of God. He does not exclude other things, but this is another form of affliction, and you may bring it to Jesus. “Come to me”. He says, “all ye who labour and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me”. How simple and how blessed this is, to find that the weight goes out of the burden because it is carried with Him, the uncertainty and difficulty and obscurity of the path is enlightened by walking it with Him. Above all, to learn not just what the lessons of life were about, but to be formed by passing through them with Him. So, beloved, if we say that the time in which we are is a time of severity and affliction, it is also a time of opportunity, it is a time in which the Lord Jesus would draw near to us
all, and invite us to see ourselves and everything else coming through in His company; so that those blessed spiritual features, about which we said a little in the reading, might take their place among the treasures that God’s house will be filled with eternally. May He bless the word.
Address at Dundee
6 December 2003