MEMORIALS

MEMORIALS

Psalm 56: 8; Numbers 19: 1-9; 2 Chronicles 5: 7-9

In speaking to you, one is conscious that one is speaking to lovers of Christ. The apostle Paul makes clear that when the Lord comes, those who do not love Him will be in a very serious position — a terrible position. He says, “If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha,” 1 Corinthians 16: 22 — accursed at the coming of the Lord. Not now, thank God! We cannot say that anyone here, if he is not a lover of Christ, is now under a curse; but when the Lord comes he will be, if his heart has not been affected by our Lord Jesus Christ and by what has come out in Him to woo the heart of man. Then if the heart is untouched by that, the apostle’s judgment of the position is that such a one would come under the curse of God.

But in speaking to one’s brethren, one is conscious that every one of us loves Him, and as loving Him, I am sure we delight to think of Him as having completed His sufferings. Luke says that He appeared to them after he suffered; that is, the sufferings were ended, and He is known to His own after He suffered. The apostle Peter also says that he was a witness of the sufferings of Christ, “and the glories after these,” 1 Peter 1: 11. The Lord Himself said, “Ought not the Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his glory?” Luke 24: 26. So that anyone who loves Christ delights in the thought that His sufferings are ended, and that the “glories after these” have begun. They are not ended, they are not completed, but they have begun. Peter says, “the glories,” not “the glory,” but “the glories” — the word is plural, and then he speaks of “the glories after these.” Think of the glories that Christ already has entered into! Think of the glory of one Man out of death! Think of Jesus standing here and actually remaining on this earth for forty days entirely free from the power of death! No one else has had that glory. Great men of this world have never been one day, one moment out of death. They cannot take themselves out of death nor can anyone else, but think of the glory of one Man — Christ Jesus — who for forty days assembled with His own and was “seen of above five hundred brethren at once,” 1 Corinthians 15: 6. A Man with this glory; He is the Firstborn from the dead! Then think of the glory that He already has in that He has “gone into heaven,” 1 Peter 3: 22. Not only was He “carried up,” Luke 24: 51, but Peter says He “has gone into heaven,” by His own right and His own power He has gone there. That is glory. Then think of the glory of His reception, for it says He was “received up in glory,” 1 Timothy 3: 16. Heaven held a reception for Christ, it is not simply that He went there, but He was received in heaven. To receive persons implies that you welcome them, not simply that they open the door and come in, but reception suggests that you welcome them.

Thus the heavens have received Him in glory. Not in shame or in dishonour as He was here, but it says He was “received up in glory.” Then He has received this glory after His sufferings. He has millions of lovers and He engages millions of hearts on the earth. No one else does that. A leader of this world cannot do it. There is but one blessed Man who for two thousand years has secured untold numbers of lovers — persons who are married to Him. That is what the apostle says in Romans, “that ye should be married to another,” Romans 7: 4. No one has glory like that. The position of being married is that of a wife. She loves her children and she loves her parents, but in connection with the thought of a husband she loves him exclusively, and the Lord Jesus has won the exclusive love of millions of hearts as married to Him. Also He is the Head of the body — of the assembly, and that is part of His glory. He is soon coming in His glory — that is future — the glories are already His after the sufferings, but He is soon coming in glory, “When the Son of man shall come in his glory,” Matthew 25: 31. He will take control of the whole world in His day of glory; but I do not wish to pursue that now. There is a vast range of glories after these that we could never exhaust — a vast range that follow the sufferings. As Peter says, “the sufferings which belonged to Christ, and the glories after these,” but as to the sufferings of our Lord personally, they are over.

I want to say a few words as to what is connected with the sufferings that remain as a memorial, as a witness to the hearts of the saints, and which furnishes their worship with depth of feeling and holy response to Christ and to God. It is clear in Scripture that His sufferings are to remain before our hearts and minds as a witness of what He has been through. While the enduring of it is over for ever, I believe the memorial of His sufferings and of His pathway remains ever before the hearts of God’s people to maintain living responses to Christ and to God.

The first thing to which I would refer is the manna — “the hidden manna.” That remains — the Lord says, “To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna.” The Lord personally is not now in the wilderness; He has been in the wilderness, but the manna is stored up before God, for those to whom the Lord will give it. We shall not always need the manna, for we shall not always be in the wilderness; indeed, the wilderness journey is nearly over for the assembly, but the manna will ever be available until the wilderness is completed. The whole memorial of the manna is preserved by God for us to feed upon, so that our hearts may be stimulated to respond to Himself. Manna means “what is it?” You remember it lay upon the face of the wilderness — an awful wilderness — it says, a “waste, howling wilderness” — the roar of its desolation came into every soul. No one could miss the howl of the dreary barren wilderness, and as they came out morning by morning “when the dew... was gone up” on the face of the wilderness there lay something. It says it was small and round and white, it tasted like wafers made with honey and like fresh oil. The people said, “What is it?” We can now answer that, for it typifies grace that came down in the coming of Jesus from heaven, down into the wilderness. It was so small, so accessible to everyone, it speaks of Jesus in His path from Bethlehem to Calvary; so sweet to the taste was the grace that came out in Him that it was like honey; so holy that it was like fresh oil — holiness in freshness and in life. What is it? O how little can we answer it! It was called “manna” because they had no name to give it. It refers to the pathway of Jesus through this wilderness, come as food for us as we are in the wilderness; but the memorial of it, when the path is over for Him, remains to speak to us of the lowly life of Jesus here in this wilderness, and is calculated to waken to all eternity those movements of living praise and worship from our hearts, that are delightful to God.

In the same way I refer to the word in Psalm 56. The Psalmist is no doubt in the Spirit of Christ as he writes, and he refers to Christ. He says, “put thou my tears into thy bottle: are they not in thy book?” The Lord Jesus will never weep again. When He has to do with the wilderness again, “the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose,” Isaiah 35: 1. He will never weep again, never a tear will fall from those holy eyes. God, as far as He is concerned, has wiped every tear from His eye, but Jesus has wept — holy tears have flowed from that blessed Person. He has gone forth weeping, bearing precious seed, Psalm 126: 6. He has been into the night of tears, and every tear, speaking spiritually, every tear of Jesus is so precious to God that it has gone into His bottle. You will understand that I am speaking in connection with what is spiritual, and not material. Those tears did not fall into the ground. His tears could not be lost. The depth of sorrow and feeling that each tear represented was taken account of by God and those tears are in His bottle. They are the witness of the sorrows of Jesus in all their intensity, and they are in God’s book, recorded there permanently. A book is something that can be seen and looked into, and remains as a record.

Scripture says, “in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears.” “In the days of his flesh” — not one day, nor two days, it was characteristic of His days. Think of His days, and every day contributing to those tears — “prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death.” As the Lord looked over Jerusalem, it says He wept over the city. He said, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,” Matthew 23: 37. The feelings of His heart were so moved that it says He wept over the city. Do you think those tears are lost? As He looked at the havoc of death when at the grave of Lazarus, His own inward feelings were moved by the dread breaking up of affections by reason of death, and when He saw Mary and the Jews which were with her weeping, it says “Jesus wept,” John 11: 35. In the intensity of His feelings as to what death had done and was doing, He wept, and every tear, speaking spiritually, went into the bottle of God. They remain on record, having in view that there might be an answer in joy from those for whom He wept. What the Lord will feel when He sees another Jerusalem! He wept over the Jerusalem that rejected Him and said, “If thou hadst known, even thou, at least in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace! but now they are hid from thine eyes,” Luke 19: 42. He will yet see another Jerusalem filled with them that love Him, where the throne of the Lamb shall be established, where the Lamb is the light, where the gates are not shut by day and where there is no night, a city of which it will be said, “Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife... and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem,” Revelation 21: 9, 10. These tears in the bottle of God demand such an answer, none but this new Jerusalem could answer sufficiently to the tears that were shed over the Jerusalem that hated Him — “where also our Lord was crucified,” Revelation 11: 8. The tears at the grave of Lazarus demand that death should be abolished. “The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death,” 1 Corinthians 15: 26, so, “there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying,” Revelation 21: 4. The answer to those sorrows of Christ demands that death should be annulled — not only as it is now for the believer, but finally dealt with. When we think of the tears of Jesus stored up by God, how it will enter into the eternal responses, the maintenance of living praise! In the golden pot there is the manna, in the bottle there are the tears, and the record of them in the book of God; these should surely move our hearts to praise and worship for ever.

I refer now to the blood of Jesus. In Psalm 49 we read, “the redemption of their soul is costly, and must be given up for ever.” The price of the redemption of the soul is so costly, and what is paid is given up for ever; that is the blood of Jesus. The apostle says ye are redeemed not with silver and gold, “But with the precious blood of Christ,” 1 Peter 1: 19. That is the price of redemption, that life is in the blood — the blood of Christ; the life which He took part in here on earth in flesh and blood. It says, “Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same”; but He has laid down that life, never to resume it. He will never be in the life of flesh and blood again. He took life again in manhood, but not the life of flesh and blood. He was “put to death in flesh, but made alive in the Spirit,” 1 Peter 3: 18. He says, “a spirit has not flesh and bones,” Luke 24: 39, but the life that is in the blood He has given up for our redemption, and He has given it up for ever, but it is not lost — its value remains. The blood of Christ, as speaking typically, is seen in the basins, which we read of in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and other passages. The blood of the sacrifices was poured into basins which were kept to receive the blood. The blood that was received into these basins on the day of atonement was taken into the holiest of all, into the presence of God. This speaks of the blood of Jesus. He “is not entered into the holy places made with hands... but into heaven itself,” Hebrews 9: 24. In Hebrews 9: 12 we read that He has entered there “by his own blood,” that is “in the power of” or “in the virtue of his own blood.” He has thus gone into heaven; into the presence of God. We have come to the blood of the sprinkling — a blood that has cleansing power. We read further of those who “...have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb,” Revelation 7: 14. It is the same precious blood that gives “boldness to enter into the holiest” — the blood of Jesus, Hebrews 10: 19. That shows, dear brethren, that while the Lord has given up that life, the value of the blood is preserved before God. The Lord said when He instituted the supper, “This cup is the new testament in my blood.” The cup is a vessel, that presents the “new covenant” — the love of God made known in Christ. The covenant is in all the value of that precious blood. The precious blood of Christ brings holy liberty to the soul, and the enjoyment of the eternal covenant. It is spoken of as “the blood of the eternal covenant” to remind us of the eternal bonds by which we are held by God, through the blood of Christ. Christ gave up His life to redeem us to God, as it says, “thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood,” Revelation 5: 9.

Now I want to say a word about Numbers 19. We have the same thought there. This time it is the ashes. The ashes that are laid up in a clean place. What would an Israelite think as he looked on the ashes? They are not lost or thrown to the four winds as the ashes of evil men are in these days. The Spirit of God says they are to be laid up in a clean place, to be available, and are not to be destroyed. The red heifer was perfect, and without blemish, upon whom the yoke had never come. It had been burnt — those awful sufferings were over, never would it be burnt again. The thing was done and done for ever, but the ashes were kept. The red heifer is the figure of Christ as One who was perfect in the inwardness of His being. It speaks of the devotedness of His suffering love inwardly — what you cannot see outwardly, but it was there. He never came under yoke, never came under bondage to any. We may often appear to be free of bondage outwardly, but what are things like inwardly? The Lord speaks of some who are like “whited sepulchres,” Matthew 23: 27. There are beautiful monuments of marble, and so forth, with lovely remembrances and verses on them, but what is inside? He says inwardly they are “full of dead men’s bones,” but that was not Jesus! Outwardly He was spotless, free from every yoke, the power of evil had never touched Him, and inwardly He was the same; secretly and inwardly He was what He was outwardly — that is the heifer. But it was such an One that went into the fire of the holy judgment of God against sin, and suffered outside the camp — outside the gate — outside the holy city, Jerusalem. In Numbers 19 the heifer was burnt until all that was left was the ashes, the evidence of the fire. That is a figure of the sufferings of Christ at Calvary. Dear brethren, the fire of God’s judgment came upon Him, but never to do so again. He is in the unclouded favour of God; He has sat down with His Father in His throne, a place of infinite nearness, but He has been into the fire. The three hours of darkness and the forsaking were the fire. It is over now for ever, but the ashes are laid up in a clean place. As an Israelite looked on those ashes, so in a spiritual sense we are to be reminded of the judgment of God which was poured out in the forsaking of Calvary.

The Lord has passed through the judgment once for all, but the witness of what He suffered remains for us as the means of our being cleansed. We are reminded of what came upon Jesus that we might be cleansed. It is the divine process; it is a symbol that is used for the purifying of God’s people. As we touch a bone, a dead person, a grave, or as our vessels are left open we are defiled. Any vessel that is uncovered becomes unclean. We need to remember that at school, in business, or in having to do with men, if our vessels are left open we are bound to be defiled; it is only a covered vessel that can be clean, and if we touch what is unclean with our eyes, or hands, or feet, however unintentionally, the element of defilement is in it all. But the application of the ashes by the power of the water suggests the Holy Spirit as available in a clean place to remind us of Calvary, where all uncleanness was judged by One who personally was pure and spotless. Nevertheless the heifer was burnt — no more terrible figure of suffering than being burnt could be presented to the mind or heart. The fire is out, as far as Jesus is concerned, for ever, but the ashes are laid up for our cleansing as required.

Just a word or two about the staves. We have exactly the same thought in the staves of the ark. In the passage I read in 2 Chronicles 5 the ark had reached its place. It says, “the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of Jehovah to its place.” The wilderness was not its place. It was in the wilderness, but the wilderness was not its place. The Jordan — that mighty river — was not its place. It went into the Jordan, and it says as soon as the feet of the priests that bore the ark touched the brim of the water, the waters went back, but the Jordan was not its place. The ark went round the city of Jericho for seven days, but that was not its place. It was carried round and it brought down the walls of that city, but that was not its place. How much less Dagon’s temple into which it went! It was taken by the Philistines into the temple of Dagon, but that is not the ark’s place. It destroyed Dagon and left only the stump, it also brought terrible judgment on the Philistines, but that is not the place of the ark. It came ultimately to the house of Obed-Edom, where holy hands and holy hearts delighted for three months to provide for it a home, but that was not its place. David built a tent in the city of David for it, where his rule was at its height, and where he could use all his power to protect it. He had a tent there and put the ark into it, but that was not its place. It says they brought it into its place — into the oracle, the most holy place, under the wings of the cherubim, into the holiest place of the universe, the holiest of all, where God’s voice is heard.

Then it says they drew out the staves, and the wings of the cherubim are over the staves as well as over the ark. The staves, we read, are not seen without, but they are seen in the holy place, and then it says, “there they are to this day.” It refers to Christ — the Ark of God — the Ark of the covenant — the Ark of the testimony — the holy Ark — the blessed Vessel that contained the thoughts of God, and where God found His own delight. Christ is in His own place, not now in the wilderness, He has been in the wilderness; not now in the Jordan, He has been into death, but that is not His place now. He is not in conflict with enemies, He has been there; He is not now in the house of Dagon, He has been there. It says He “delivered his strength into captivity, and his glory into the enemy’s hand,” Psalm 78: 61; but God has awaked and smitten His enemies and put them to perpetual reproach. He is not now in the house of Obed-Edom, but He has been there. It is not now that godly, devoted hearts are treasuring that blessed Ark in their houses, but in the scene before us it is in its own place, even heaven itself, not holy places made with hands but heaven itself — in the holiest spot in the universe — in the presence of God, where God’s voice is heard — the oracle, where the wings of the cherubim, all that is connected with divine government, is seen. Never could the power of evil touch it again; nevertheless the staves are there. What for? The journeyings are over; never will He journey again. Why the staves? The staves were to carry the ark on all its journeyings and it will never journey again. The position is fixed eternally. He is in His own place, but the staves are there to speak to us of the reality of His journeyings, to remind us that He has journeyed and that He has been all through the wilderness. He has risen up and faced the enemies. He has gone before us to search out the resting-place. He has been in the house of the Philistines; He has been loved by the Obed-Edoms; He has had His place in the tent — a provisional position, not a permanent one. He has accepted this and journeyed through all, but now He is in His own place; yet the staves are there to remind us of the journeyings of Christ. John tells us that “the temple of God was opened in heaven,” Revelation 11: 19. The Ark of His covenant was seen in His temple, but we are glad to be reminded of the journeyings of Jesus in their varied character, “there they are to this day.”

There is much more, but let us for a moment review these things. Manna stored up in the golden pot to remind us of the lowly descent of Jesus into the place of the wilderness, to be food for us there. The tears in God’s bottle to remind us of His sorrows in the days of His flesh. The blood of Christ — the precious blood of Christ — a witness of the life that has been given up for ever, and whose efficacy abides to all eternity. The ashes laid up in a clean place, the memorial of the awful sufferings of Christ under the judgment of God, that we might be cleansed practically, and then the staves to tell of all His wonderful journeyings. He had followed them wherever they had been. He accepted whatever they had given, but the time came when the ark is in its place; and the staves are there to remind us of the holy and gracious journeyings of Jesus in every situation. Never, dear brethren, are these things to be forgotten. We sometimes mourn over the poverty of our worship and praise; it is because these things are not living to us, are not seen spiritually by us. You cannot see the manna without worshipping; you cannot see the bottle of tears without worshipping; you cannot see the blood without worshipping; you cannot see these ashes in a clean place without worshipping; you cannot see these blessed and wonderful staves of shittim wood overlaid with gold under the wings of the cherubim, in the holiest of all, without worshipping.

We need that these things should be realities to us, that they may produce living praise from our hearts.