PRESERVATION IN CIRCUMSTANCES OF PRESSURE (2)
PRESERVATION IN CIRCUMSTANCES OF PRESSURE (2)
JT This series of psalms which begins here points to the wealth that may be found in God’s people, as in the circumstances the book indicates and of which we spoke this morning, people driven out and deprived of their ordinary privileges, yet marked by power to speak richly, first to Christ, and then of His things, as in this psalm. The following psalm speaks about the river of God: “There is a river the streams whereof make glad the city of God, the sanctuary of the habitations of the Most High”, Psalm 46:4. The next one speaks about God: “All ye peoples, clap your hands; shout unto God with the voice of triumph!”, Psalm 47:1. The next one speaks of God greatly to be praised: “Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the hill of his holiness. Beautiful in elevation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King”, Psalm 48:1,2. So our lesson should be on these lines. The other psalm which we looked at this morning points to the individual believer gaining in his soul, and speaks of his external appearance, so that he is a testimony personally. The health of his countenance has been stressed. It would look as if in the history of the assembly, this set of psalms would find an answer in the sense that, while the assembly itself and its services were largely lost sight of, there was yet a remarkable appreciation of God and of Christ and even of the Spirit, as instanced in the hymns that are still extant. The brethren perhaps may not have observed that in our hymn book there are a large number of hymns from authors that were not, as we [p. 332] say, strictly in fellowship. Were such authors to offer hymns now to the brethren walking in the light of the assembly, they would not be accepted, whatever their wording, because the fellowship now has a place which becomes a test as to spirituality and godliness. In the Middle Ages there were very many precious productions with which the service of God has been enriched now, but particularly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; we have a large number of hymns that are usable now by the Spirit. Since the assembly has had a place and the fellowship a place, all those in the systems or organisations of men have been tested, and the door has been opened to them to come into the service of God in a true sense; they have elected to stay out, so what is there has become greatly impoverished, and what is coming now in productions of richness for the service of God is from those in the fellowship. Those who elect to stay out of it, seeing it now exists in a spiritual way here, are discrediting themselves. I mention all this, because Psalm 45 is a wonderful production, it is attributed to an individual who says, “My heart is welling forth with a good [p. 342] matter; I say what I have composed touching the king”. Then he goes on to tell us about the King.
JWD Would you say the golden vessels in 2 Timothy always existed until the call came for them to withdraw?
JT Yes, God has opened up the door for these vessels to have their proper places. They were not only rich, but they have the places assigned to them in the fellowship, for them to function.
ANW Do you mean that principle did not govern in the gathering of the present hymn book in 1932?
JT What principle are you alluding to?
ANW I mean, excluding those hymns supplied by authors [p. 333] not in fellowship.
JT They were already accredited in the fellowship. We have not time to count them or point out the number; but there are a large number by Charles Wesley, Isaac Watts and many others which we, in the enlightened position today, seeing that the test has come and we are all exposed, could not accept. The fellowship must be the test for any production now. I am only calling attention to this, because it is important to know what the Spirit of God recognised earlier and what we recognise now, because they have already found recognition.
WR Would you say that the fellowship is really what has taken place inwardly? The Lord spoke of what would be in the believer, “a fountain of water, springing up into eternal life”, John 4:14. Would that not be the basis on which compositions can be made also?
JT Yes, because the test has come out; the whole of Christendom is tested, and the Lord says, “He that is not with me is against me”, Matthew 12:30. It is that principle. When the test has come out, persons are exposed as to whether they are going in the way of the truth. “Send out thy light and thy truth: they shall lead me”, Psalm 43:3. There is nothing else beyond what they had outwardly, until the Spirit of God wrought and gave a test, a standard, that is the truth itself and the light.
AAT Would you apply those remarks also to the gospel hymns in the book?
JT Yes, the same thing applies.
HGH Do you consider the fellowship is a greater test than we get in the first verse? Is “Touching the king” a more general setting than the fellowship?
JT The psalm is the product of an individual and it is called “An instruction”, so it has its place in the Maschils, as we call them, that is, it carries [p. 334] out the test of truth. And so today, many of the hymns we have in the hymn book now have been altered to make them stand the test of the truth, but the psalms of instruction, such as this, carry with them the standard of truth, because the idea is instruction. There is instruction in them, not mere words used to make poetry, but to convey the truth of God, “Thy light and truth”.
CAM Would it be right to omit a hymn if you had a sense that the writer would not have gone on in spiritual matters, so as to be in line with what the Spirit is saying today? There may be adjustments; is it not right to feel that the composer would have acquiesced in them?
JT If he were moving in the Spirit he would, and they did; many did. The standard was there, the idea was the light, “Thy light and thy truth”. The hymn book ought to guide us, as we had this morning; “they shall lead me, they shall bring me to thy holy mount, and unto thy habitations”, Psalm 43:3. So that every hymn has to be challenged as to whether it leads in that direction.
Rem It would seem as if the tests are getting more severe as we go on. Would you say a word as to why that is. It seems to me the question of sonship is the distinct test now.
JT It is. It has thrown light on the position and it certainly affected us very much in the selection of hymns some years back. The brethren, I am sure, who have looked into the matter, are aware how much we have been affected by the truth of sonship, the sonship of Christ, which has been made clearer to us, and other features too. So the test is becoming more and more severe, and the enemy’s effort is constantly to reduce it. The admission of radios into the houses of the brethren and mixed marriages are constant tests. I have noticed this markedly [p. 335] lately.
JTJr The character of the test is really seen in the previous psalm: “But for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are reckoned as sheep for slaughter”, Psalm 44:22.
JT I am glad you mention that. It should have entered into our enquiry this morning, because it enters into Romans 8, a chapter which is outstanding in that book, that is the truth of the Spirit. The truth of the Spirit is mentioned thirteen times in the first thirteen or fourteen verses, and then later the Spirit is greatly stressed. So the truth works out in this, “For thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are reckoned as sheep for slaughter”. There is a constant attack, because the most precious things have come out, eternal life some few years back, and sonship later. We are killed all the day long; it is an enigma in the minds of some that these truths that we know to be most precious are held.
Ques Does it help to revive inwardly “the sentence of death in ourselves”, 2 Corinthians 1:9. Given over to death, “killed all the day long” refers to pressure outside, but “the sentence of death in ourselves” would help in the composition.
JT Yes, it is inside, calling upon all that is within us, because that is the realm of the Spirit. “Man’s spirit is the lamp of Jehovah, searching all the inner parts of the belly”, Proverbs 20:27. All our inwards are searched. What for? To purify us, and not only that, but that God may get His portion, because it is the realm of the Spirit. The saints are the realm of the Spirit, and God is looking for a product from us, and so there is the external killing, and also the sentence of death in ourselves, so the well springs up into everlasting life.
JTJr Both Matthew’s and Mark’s gospels, the two gospels under great pressure, give the hymn in regard to the Supper.
JT [p. 336] That is very remarkable. They are the two gospels that furnish the hymn that they sang. The saints undoubtedly sang the hymn, but the Lord joined in it, whatever hymn it was. Some say it was a selection from the psalms that they had. Anyhow, they sang a hymn and then went to the mount of Olives, showing the trend from the hymn. It was sung in Jerusalem where the pressure was, but the trend of it was upward.
JH-t Are you suggesting that something substantial should come out of these days of pressure? I was thinking of Paul and Silas, the same word is used of their singing in the jail at Philippi as was used in Matthew 26.
JT I am glad you brought that up. The pressure really was to come. The Lord’s supper was instituted before the pressure; Gethsemane came after it. So the hymn involved that the pressure is to bring out what is in us. The Lord entered into Gethsemane and He disposed of what He had, the disciples; He disposed of them, and it was to bring out what He knew was there, because His work was there and Gethsemane would bring it out. In due course, the incoming of the Spirit brought it out, and what is happening now is the same thing in a small way, of course; the pressure is to bring out something, and God is going to bring out something, and proposes to enlarge and to increase the wealth of the service.
Rem The great composition of the Lord Himself in Psalm 22:22, “I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee”, follows upon the section that deals with most excruciating sufferings and pressure.
JT Quite so. That is the great sorrow psalm of the book; we shall come to that point more fully in Psalm 69, which comes into this book. The 22nd is the great sorrow psalm; it is the very heart of the whole book of Psalms; it is what came out of the [p. 337] heart of Christ in pressure. It is what He sings in the assembly.
ANW Is the same principle seen in the song in Revelation 5? There is a great ascription of praise in chapter 4, but the song is not until chapter 5, where the Lamb, as slain, is in view.
JT Quite so. Chapter 14 brings in the hundred and forty-four thousand as the result, as the yield for God. They are mentioned as a hundred and forty-four thousand in chapter 7, but in chapter 14 is the quality of them and the singing. They can learn singing; they can learn the song of heaven.
ABP Would you distinguish between the wine press and the olive press in speaking of pressure? You referred to Gethsemane, and that has in mind the olive press, has it not?
JT Very likely it would. The mount of Olives would suggest that. The wine press is also alluded to in Revelation. It is an allusion to Christendom and the way the judgment of God overtakes it. If we look at the olive as being pressed too, it would rather be the positive side of things.
Ques This psalm seems to have a bearing in the present tense. The difficulty with many of our hymns is that there are many wholly or partly in the future, and some in the past. It seems a great difficulty to secure hymns that are bearing immediately on the service of God. Is this psalm all in the present tense?
JT There is no doubt there is that need. We do not know whether the Spirit of God will ever go as far as formally adding to what we have in the selection of hymns, but certainly there is great need of hymns to the Father and hymns of a present bearing. There are only fifty hymns to the Father and about two hundred and fifty to the Lord Jesus, showing there is disparity in the balance. There is no doubt the Lord means this psalm to give rise to [p. 338] what we are saying at the present moment. One is saying, “My heart is welling forth with a good matter: I say what I have composed touching the king. My tongue is the pen of a ready writer”. That is the introduction; we shall be all tested, I am sure, as to that, if there is a demand for a revision of what we have got, or increase to it. We shall all be tested as to it, because when the time came for the revision of the hymn book, the volume of the so-called hymns was very great, but the quality very poor.
Rem This is not an extemporaneous composition. The word is “composed” or ‘my occupation’, like Genesis 46:33.
JT It evidently was rhythmical, gone into thoroughly, not casually.
ANW It is present, “My heart is welling”.
JT You mean it is important that the mind is brought into it. But then the heart must be brought into it if we are to have any substance, and the “welling” must be that. At the same time, the writer must have been controlled and have all the necessities for hymn writing.
Rem I wondered if it would not help us to follow certain features of the Lord’s glory in the composition of psalms and hymns, to pay attention to the idea of occupation. It is not just a flow of words; it is the application and putting together of things in an intelligent way.
JT There is no doubt Christianity (and Judaism for that matter in the old dispensation) was developed with great care. The language used then, Hebrew, was the richest of all for spiritual terms, affording far more terms for conveying spiritual thoughts than even the Greek. Modern languages are so filled up with worldly things that it is very hard to use them for sacred purposes. So we are reminded, I think, “knowing this first, that the scope [p. 339] of no prophecy of scripture is had from its own particular interpretation, for prophecy was not ever uttered by the will of man, but holy men of God spake under the power of the Holy Spirit”, 2 Peter 1:20,21. Every scripture is inspired of God; the word “scripture” there alludes to spiritual writing indited by the Spirit of God. Think of the control under which the writer or writers must have been, really abstracted, and that means complete self-control in those whom God would use in these holy matters, so that they had a right product.
CAM Would you say it was subject to censorship? It would be subject to the feelings of those who are intelligent among us. Would you think the dedication, those words at the top of the psalm, would show it was not the composition of a freelance? It was in keeping with all the spiritual thoughts of those who are able to judge.
JT The heading is undoubtedly inspired in each of the psalms, and we are reminded in the work of this book of Psalms what skill there was, and how God was to form the vessels, so the writer gives an outline, an indication, of what was in his mind, and as was said, the word “composed” shows that his mind was fixed; his powers, his senses, were all active and he had power to shut the door against extraneous things.
JTJr The love of God in our hearts would enable us to make a right composition; love would be active in the heart.
JT The heart is the vessel in that sense. The Spirit of God has put the love of God there. The mind must control all that, and we see that here: “I say what I have composed touching the king”. That is very plain; he has only Christ before him, whatever else he may say, and “My tongue is the pen of a ready writer”. “My tongue” is a member, often an unruly one. James says that “the tongue is fire,
[p. 340] the world of unrighteousness; the tongue is set in our members, the defiler of the whole body, and which sets fire to the course of nature”, James 3:6. How much fire is set going by evil speaking, unfair criticism, but here, “My tongue is the pen of a ready writer”. Writing is a matter of accuracy in a person.
Ques Would the cry of the Lord in the garden of Gethsemane bring out the intensity of the feelings of His heart crying, “Abba Father”?
JT Look at the feelings there! You marvel at the activities of the Spirit as to the Lord Himself. The feelings He gave expression to, the sweat as great drops of blood falling down to the ground. Think of all that! What exercise! The word ‘exercise’ is so common in our language, but the exercise was there physically in the Lord, and so here, the writer is guided by Christ the King. That is the first verse. Then the second verse is, “Thou art fairer than the sons of men”; that is, he is now turning to the Lord and able to speak to Him about Himself. “Grace is poured into thy lips: therefore God hath blessed thee for ever”. That is worship.
AAT You have been speaking of hymns, and the hymn book that we use is in the English language. How about the universal aspect of the assembly, where other languages are used, does not something in the way of poetry come into it?
JT Quite so, these hymns that we have are undoubtedly the most spiritual you can find in any collection. They are translated into other languages. That is another vehicle the Lord has given us. The Spirit has come down, the tongues were there, and God is saying He has in mind all languages in this dispensation, all men, and that tongues would not be a barrier, as at Shinar. The gifts that the Spirit brought were to furnish ability to translate things that the Spirit gives, so they should be available to all believers in all countries. The universal idea was there. “We hear them speaking in our own tongues the great things of God”, Acts 2:11. That is the principle. So this is a time of pressure and it is a question, some one mentioned this morning, of paying our vows, that is, addicting ourselves. The house of Stephanas addicted themselves to the care of the saints. We are dealing now with this section, which is one of buoyancy, richness of thought and word; we can have all this in spite of the pressure and in spite of the dispersal of the brethren.
RA Does the richness of David’s psalm come out in that way in 2 Samuel 22 over against all that he had gone through?
JT Yes, that helps us too. 2 Samuel 22 is put into the book of Psalms and is numbered 18. The song leaves out David’s thought in saying, “I will love thee, O Jehovah, my strength”, which he inserts in the psalm (verse 1), making it really a psalm. But then, in addition to chapter 22, there is the 23rd, which fits in with what we are saying, particularly the first verse: “Now these are the last words of David: David the son of Jesse saith”; the word “saith” there refers to what is oracular, what David said, “And the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel saith, The Spirit of Jehovah spoke by me, and his word was on my tongue. The God of Israel said, the Rock of Israel spoke to me, 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; when from the sunshine, after rain, the green grass springeth from the earth” (verses 1 - 4). That is a wonderful contribution, which could be carried through into a hymn. It is a question of a king, and he is ruling. Here it is the same David who says — I am not saying this is David here, but it is in this selection — “My heart is welling forth with a good matter: I say what I have composed touching the king. My tongue is the pen of a ready writer”. Then he goes on to tell us about the Lord; he speaks of the Lord Himself, telling the Lord about Himself.
Rem In the section you have just read in 2 Samuel 23:3, it says, “The Rock of Israel spoke to me”, and in this psalm, “Grace is poured into thy lips” (verse 2): is that an allusion to the grace of manhood as seen in Christ as receiving things, although His deity comes in later in the psalm? It is clarifying the beauteous character of His manhood that receives from Jehovah.
JT Very beautiful. “Thou art fairer than the sons of men”; it is Christ in manhood. We have in Philippians 2 the Lord becoming Man, how He became Man, and what was the language of His heart in becoming Man; it is said He took His place in the likeness of men, that is, He was among them, but what a Man! Verse 2 enlarges on that, “Thou art fairer than the sons of men”. He was among them, but there was none like Him; “Grace is poured into thy lips: therefore God hath blessed thee for ever”. It is manhood in itself earning, as it were, a reward from God in this beautiful exhibition of grace in his lips, “therefore God hath blessed thee for ever”. Then the next verse is military; then in verse 6, “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever”; the writer is extremely skilful and able in what he is writing, and we can see how he is worshipful, how he is full of Christ.
ANW Will you compare His reward which He receives, “Fairer than the sons of men”, and the reward He receives of God, “Anointed thee with oil of gladness above thy companions” (verse 7)?
JT It is the same idea running through; he says in verse 7, “Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated wickedness; therefore God, thy God, hath anointed [p. 343] thee with the oil of gladness above thy companions”. Earlier it was “the sons of men”, but now it is His own companions that He is above in a sense of superiority, “Anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy companions”.
JTJr Would Proverbs 8:6 - 9 help in regard to this wisdom? “Hear, for I will speak excellent things, and the opening of my lips shall be right things. For my palate shall meditate truth, and wickedness is an abomination to my lips. All the words of my mouth are in righteousness; there is nothing tortuous or perverse in them. They are all plain to him that understandeth, and right to them that find knowledge”.
JT It shows how wisdom is personified and how it speaks in Proverbs, corresponding very much to what we are speaking of in this psalm. Wisdom is a quality, of course, but it came out in time, as needed. It was always with God, of course, but when the need of it came into evidence in Proverbs 8, it was there and viewed as brought forth, that is to say, brought in as needed. Is it not a great principle? Where the need is, it is supplied and wisdom comes forth and speaks, as you said, “My delights were with the sons of men”, Proverbs 8:31.
CAM In Hebrews 1:9 this section of the psalm is said of the “Son”. It closes with the expression, “Has anointed thee with oil of gladness above they companions”. Do you connect this thought of companions with the sonship of Christ?
JT It works out in Hebrews, showing that the principle of the whole Bible is one great thought, and the epistle to the Hebrews, although the author of the epistle to the Hebrews is not mentioned, yet he is there, we can discern who he is. It is accredited to the apostle Paul; and we can discern that he is the writer; he brings in the thought of companionship,
[p. 344] and, in principle, applies it to ourselves, that is, those of the assembly are made the companions of Christ.
CAM Would you say the reason the Lord occupies that place above His companions is because He inherited the name of “Son”?
JT No doubt it is a question of the first chapter. How rich the writer of Hebrews is in thought! This first chapter of Hebrews is wonderfully rich but it is almost all taken from the Psalms. The writer says, “As he inherits a name more excellent than they”, that is to say, Christ is seen in the first chapter as “being the effulgence of his glory and the expression of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power, having made by himself the purification of sins, set himself down on the right hand of the greatness on high”. Words are used here that you do not find elsewhere in that sense. In the expression, “He inherits a name more excellent than they”, you can see the affections of the writer coming up. “For to which of the angels said he ever, Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten thee?”, that is Psalm 2, “And again, I will be to him for father, and he shall be to me for son?”. That is Solomon, of course, quoted from Chronicles and from Samuel too. “And again, when he brings in the firstborn into the habitable world, he says, And let all God’s angels worship him. And as to the angels he says. Who makes his angels spirits and his ministers a flame of fire; but as to the Son, Thy throne, O God, is to the age of the age, and a sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hast hated lawlessness; therefore God, thy God, has anointed thee with oil of gladness above thy companions” (Hebrews 1:6 - 9). So that you can see how the richness of the second book of Psalms is expressed and enlarged on by Paul, the probable writer of the Hebrews, and how the book of the Hebrews runs [p. 345] along and enters into the service of God as perhaps no other book does.
JP What is the link between the sonship of Christ and the kingship of Christ? I was thinking of 1 Chronicles 23:1, “And David was old and full of days; and he made Solomon his son king over Israel”.
JT They are both the one person. The book of Chronicles shows that Solomon was made king alongside of his father, a most unusual thing. They reign together. The son is brought in in 1 Chronicles 23, and then David tells us that he made instruments of song and then he instituted courses for the service of God. The father is operating, but the son is on the throne too, so we have two great thoughts merging in the idea of the king, that is to say, the father and the son. The father and the son are seen at the end of 1 Chronicles; and the courses for the service of God are instituted under these conditions; and chapter 29 tells us that Solomon ruled instead of his father, but for a while they ruled together. So the father and the son are merging, and sonship is the great prominent thought now. I believe God had that in mind in clarifying the position of Son, so that while in a certain way it is inferior, the Persons are equal, David and Solomon are equal in the sense that they ruled together; the service of God was inaugurated under those circumstances.
Rem “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever” shows the quality of the Person.
JT Yes, His Deity is seen there, and He is spoken of as what He is among men as compared with men, and as compared with His companions, but “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever”. Hence, we have the Lord Jesus in the service of God as an Object of worship equal with the Father, only that in the economy He retains His place as [p. 346] Son and as Man. The Father is the supreme Object of worship.
HB Verse 11 says, “For he is thy Lord, and worship thou him”.
JT Quite so.
ABP Is the Father a more limited thought than the thought of God?
JT I think it is quite right to use those words; “Neither does the Father judge any one”, John 5:22. And moreover, the great end in Revelation is God, not the Father, but God shall be all in all.
ABP Would, it be profitable if we did not use the expression “God and Father” so frequently in our thanksgivings? In the latter part of our meeting there should be more distinction in our minds.
JT It may be. I think the progressive order is the Son first, then Christ known in the assembly in relation to the Lord’s Supper, not God’s Supper, nor the Father’s Supper, but the Lord’s; and then the marital relation to the assembly, which ought to have a place in the service. Then we have God. It says, “The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”, Colossians 1:3. But then we have God Himself, “that God may be all in all”, 1 Corinthians 15:28. It seems to be the terminal, so to speak.
ABP Is there a period when it is proper to use the title “Father” only?
JT I think there is: “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father”, Paul says in Ephesians 3:14.
CAM Do you use the word “God” in speaking to divine Persons without discriminating in your mind as to whether it is the Father or the Son you are addressing?
JT I think it is permissible to. I think John’s epistle has that in mind in using pronouns. It is a question of spiritual discernment as to whether we are speaking to God, or the Father, or the Son. The [p. 347] Trinity is so much in our minds, that it is sometimes a question in our minds to know what is meant.
CAM I am glad to hear you say that, it helps things. Scripture seems to warrant what you say.
JT I think it does. We cannot label pronouns too accurately. We cannot assume to label them too precisely, because, after all, we are dealing with infinitude, and we are creatures; we are finite. If we attempt to label terms and pronouns too accurately, we are going beyond our limit. In that very scripture we quoted, “For this reason I bow my knees to the Father”, the original leaves out other titles, it is just ‘the Father of whom every family in the heavens and on earth is named’. And then he says, “To be strengthened with power by his Spirit in the inner man; that the Christ may dwell, through faith, in your hearts, being rooted and founded in love, in order that ye may be fully able to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height; and to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge; that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”(Ephesians 3:16 - 19). But we are in the realm of infinitude nevertheless, and can we undertake to give names to divine Persons in those circumstances, or should we not humbly and soberly recognize our limitations?
Ques If we are privileged to come to the ultimate of assembly service, do you think that some sense of prostration will take hold of us in the realm of creaturehood in the presence of God, or do we carry forward some of the dignity of sonship into this service?
JT The word “worship”, it is just what you say, it is a prostration idea. You are falling forward. The word used for worship has that meaning, so that we are absorbed, but we carry that idea of falling upon our knees as Paul says. It becomes us to do this [p. 348] in our limitation in the presence of infinitude, that is, in the presence of God.
JWD In this section, Ephesians 3, Paul still retains the idea of the Father’s personality, does he not? He is still bowing his knees to the Father. Is he not conscious of the Father’s personality in all these circumstances as an extremely wonderful thought?
JT No doubt he is to a point, but if you go on you are in a realm of infinitude, in so far as you can be there. The realm is filled with God, the Persons of the Trinity, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. So the passage runs into that, “That ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”.
JWD I would like a little help as to the reference to God in the morning meeting in a fuller way. Paul refers to “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”(Ephesians 1:3), which covers practically every known spiritual thought in the revelation of God, then to the Father as a distinctive divine Person by Himself. We can rarely use the name of God, except in an extreme sense of worship, prostration, could we?
JT Well, “That God may be all in all” is the greatest thought, I think.
JWD You would just pass into that, would you not? You would not use the title “God” promiscuously. These titles, “The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”, and again, “Father”, cover every feature of the revelation of God that we can touch.
JT That is true. But are you able to discern them and label each thought? Is it within your range to do it in the realm of infinitude? Suppose you take the Spirit as operating in you, by Him you may speak to God, but are you able to say it is just the Spirit? It is God. The Spirit is God. I mean to say, we are dealing with infinitude; we are brought [p. 349] into it in the measure in which we can be brought into it as creatures, and that measure is limited, but at the same time, we are touching the thing. If you are at the edge of the ocean you are in it, although you are only a few inches in it, but think of the depths of it! Can any creature name the particular divine Person he is influenced by?
Rem It is really the sense of inscrutability and the sense of limitation on our side that prostrates us.
JT It is the sense of inscrutability and the sense of limitation on our side and the necessity of prostrating ourselves, because the word for worship implies that. I think you would say, I had better begin to draw the line and not assume to go beyond my reach.
CAM In Romans 9:5 where the apostle is referring to the Lord Jesus, he refers to Him as God: “The Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen”. Would it not be possible in a spiritual way to be addressing Him as Lord and use the word God in that sense?
JT It is possible to pass from One to the Other. The service as we have it regulates that. The first part of it is to the Lord, but we gradually merge into the thought of God. We are led into the thought of God. We begin with Christ and lead into the thought of God and it is very happy, but we stay there, so to speak, and go no further perhaps.
Ques In John 10:29,30, the Lord says, “My Father who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one can seize out of the hand of my Father. I and the Father are one”. Would you help us to distinguish between these two features?
JT I am not sure I could do that, because They are both doing the same thing. The Father and Son are doing the same thing. In fact, the Lord begins with that in John 5:17. “My Father worketh hitherto and I work”. The Father shows Him all He is doing, the Father raises the dead and quickens them; and the Son quickens whom He will. They are both doing the same thing, and can any creature undertake to say that it is this Person or that Person? The simple thing is to accept limitation and that we are brought into that realm, and as we are intelligently able to address the Son we can do so.
AAT I notice in Psalm 43:4 “Upon the harp will I praise thee, O God, my God”. Is that the language to be used in the service? The language there seems to fit in with this thought of the service of God as God. I was wondering if the psalmist was as high in the knowledge of God as we assume to be.
JT They thought that God was One. That was the great thought in the Old Testament. They did not attempt to work out in detail the thought of the Father and Son, the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, but we can do that. We are in the realm of revelation, which they were not in, but still, it is wonderful how they did touch these things, and the language they used indicates that some, especially David, had greater thoughts than others. After sonship came out with Solomon, David entered and sat down before Jehovah; that shows he was consciously greater than before. He had greater liberty and he used it.
AHP Would it be right to remark that when speaking to the Lord Jesus we are speaking to God? Whatever title may be used in our minds, we should always remember He is God.
JT It is a question of how you can control your mind. The thought is there anyway, but at the same time, when you are speaking audibly, you are governed by what belongs to that part of the service.
JWD I am trying to get help on this thought of going into infinitude, the distinctiveness of [p. 351] divine Persons merges.
JT Yes.
JWD One has followed your previous ministry, with the sense that in speaking to God, you still have the Father in His distinctive personality before you, but now you say it is a little different; that is, it appears to me, when you reach God, distinctive divine Persons in Their personalities merge, so that it might be the Father, the Son or the Spirit.
JT It is a question of scripture; scripture is accurate. We cannot say our hymns are accurate in that sense. We had a hymn that we did not carry through which said, ‘Thy death hath brought to light the Father’s heart’. That is not an accurate thought. The death of Christ brought God’s heart to light, not the Father’s heart. The Father is not connected with judgment, but with grace, so we did not use that hymn. In another hymn (207:3) the third verse says, ‘Thy heart, our God, made known — all, all is told!’ which is a wider thought.
JWD One thought that you stressed in ministry that, while we reached the idea of God, it was in that Person, the Father, Deity.
JT When we come to God, we come to God, how can you limit it? It is beyond us. It is infinitude. ‘Thy heart, our God’. “Our God”, that leads you to think how that expression stands in the scriptures. Then in the fourth verse of the hymn, O circle of affections all divine, The foretaste of eternity’s bright scene, Where all the glories of Thy love shall shine In everlasting joy, and peace serene! the expression, O circle of affections all divine, is infinitude; we may touch it, but that is all we can say.
ANW Is it fair to refer to 1 Corinthians 15:24 - 28 in connection with delivering up the kingdom? “Then the end, when he gives up the kingdom to him who is God and Father”, but in reaching finality the word is, “Then the Son also himself shall [p. 352] be placed in subjection to him who put all things in subjection to him, that God may be all in all”. Does that not confirm what you are saying?
JT I think it does. “To him who is God and Father” lays a basis for that, but God is a wider thought. “Him”, that is the Person, the abstract idea of the Deity. “To him who is God and Father”, but the last statement is, “That God may be all in all”. He is all in you.
Rem In Psalm 90:2 Moses says, “Even from eternity to eternity thou art God”. Between those two words “eternity” is time, when the Father has been revealed in Christ.
JT Quite so. The revelation came in there; a great dip, as it were, from above, down from the Deity, “From eternity to eternity”. We have the disclosure of the Persons. Moses could not have said that, but the revelation, that is, the incarnation of Christ comes in between the two eternities. Therefore, we have the Persons of the Deity. The question now before us is whether as in that realm, as we have in the hymn, ‘O circle of affections all divine’ (207:4), we can undertake to name things? We are in the inscrutable, as well as infinitude; we are simply creatures after all. “Able to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height” (Ephesians 3:18); that is revelation; that does not refer to the Deity. That is what has come out in Christ. We cannot talk of the length and breadth of the Deity; that is infinite.
Ques The mention of the height, would that be something beyond us?
JT The height means that it is not all obvious; that helps too. It is beyond us.
Ques When we come to this point of touching things, the absolute essential Being of God, do we come to the confines of the economy, are we looking at something outside of it?
[p. 353] JT Well, we can look at that, the economy. The word ‘economy’ is simply to bring out what God has come into, what the Persons have come into in order to be known and become operational for the designs of love. We can apprehend that in the length, breadth and height of the thing into which They have come; but when we think of the Persons Themselves, we cannot apply “the breadth and length and depth and height” to Them; but we can say that the Persons have come in so as to be apprehended and loved.
Rem I was wondering if we do not get out of the economy, but we look over the ocean of inscrutability, so to speak, and that is what helps us to assume the attitude of prostration.
JT I would be very hesitant about that; we are very limited, you know. The economy is enough, the fulness of God is in the economy: “That ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”. That is what we get in that passage in Ephesians.
Ques Moses asked God to show him His glory and God said, “Thou shalt see me from behind”, Exodus 33:23. But the Lord Jesus has said, “He that has seen me has seen the Father”, John 14:9. There is further revelation there.
JT Quite so. That is the economy; the Persons have come into that so as to be apprehended.
JWD Did you say something at Indianapolis in regard to the fulness of God, the idea of fulness in Colossians 1, and the greatness in the heavens, implying we could stand in infinitude just over the brink?
JT The brink is in the heavens, “where the Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God”, Colossians 3:1. As to the word “fulness” in Colossians, it is said of Christ that “in him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily”; the thing has come out. I do not know how far we can undertake to say anything about [p. 354] abstract Deity; my impression is that it is beyond the creature’s ability to grasp it, but the economy into which Christ has come and where the Father also is with Him affords us opportunity of knowing the Persons, knowing Their love, and loving Them too.
JAT Are the economy and revelation commensurate thoughts?
JT Pretty much. The revelation includes the economy. We cannot go beyond the revelation; we are creatures and we never cease to be creatures. Of course, we have the Holy Spirit in us, operating in our minds, but nevertheless we never cease to be creatures.
Ques God has created the creature capable of prostration, and it is a wonderful thing if we have our part in that prostration.
JT Quite so. That is what the Lord means. He tells us, “The hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth; for also the Father seeks such as his worshippers”, John 4:23. That word “worship” involves prostration “in spirit and truth”. We are all brought into that; that is open to us all. It does not, however, intimate that we have access to the knowledge of Deity in the abstract sense, because it is beyond us.
ABP In 1 Corinthians 8:5 - 6 in regard to idolatry it says, “There is no other God save one. For and if indeed there are those called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, (as there are gods many, and lords many,) yet to us there is one [p. 355] God, the Father, of whom all things, and we for him; and one Lord, Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him”.
JT That is all referring to the economy, of course, the Father, the Son and the Spirit, “One God, the Father, of whom all things, and we for him”. That is all the economy.
ABP That is, to us.
JT What we have objectively; how we look at things.
RWS Does that require that the instrumentality of the Lord Jesus Christ should be alluded to before a brother says ‘Amen’, or is there liberty to just say ‘Amen’?
JT I think so, so long as it is clear the service is carried on in the name of the Father and the Son. Whatever is done is carried on in the name of the Lord Jesus. I would say the service is carried on in that way. The apostle closes his doxology without any formal reference to the Name. That is how I look at it.
We have not got to the end of our psalm. I think it is worth while to have it before us in this way, so that in this time of pressure there might be richness, there might be something developed inwardly through the pressure, some production for God, something that adds to the service. The following psalms are very rich, looking on to the end of the 49th. We shall have to touch on these again in the next reading. God willing. We should read the 51st, which is a matter of repentance, another element that certainly enters into the present time, and this richness links up with that.
Ques In Psalm 47:5 - 7, “God is gone up amid shouting, Jehovah amid the sound of the trumpet. Sing psalms of God, sing psalms; sing psalms unto our king, sing psalms! For God is the king of all the earth; sing psalms with understanding” (verses 5 - 7). That is a beautiful link there. Does the remnant come into that?
JT It shows that in spite of their being driven out, dispersed in different circumstances, they retain richness in their thoughts, so we are holding the [p. 356] ground in an individual way. We can see how a psalm like this bears that out. “God is gone up amid shouting, Jehovah amid the sound of the trumpet. Sing psalms of God, sing psalms; sing psalms unto our king, sing psalms! For God is the king of all the earth; sing psalms with understanding. God reigneth over the nations; God sitteth upon the throne of his holiness. The willing-hearted of the peoples have gathered together, with the people of the God of Abraham”. Thus these scattered ones are holding to the truth of the promises that were made to Abraham.
ANW Would you say a word more about the queen? You mentioned it this morning.
JT I am glad you brought us back to that. It is a balancing thought, I believe, in regard to government. “Kings’ daughters are among thine honourable women; upon thy right hand doth stand the queen in gold of Ophir”, Psalm 45:9. I think that is a full divine thought suggested from the first chapter of Genesis. “Let them have dominion ...”, the man and the woman. The government requires that, as in the book of Esther, for instance. We have already alluded to the queen sitting by when Nehemiah made his request and how successful he was, and I think these saints we have before us are maintained richly in divine thoughts, beginning with Genesis 1, worked out in relation to the people, as it says, of the God of Abraham. “The willing-hearted of the peoples have gathered together, with the people of the God of Abraham. For unto God belong the shields of the earth: he is greatly exalted”, Psalm 47:9. That is, God’s purpose is involved there, but others are brought into it. “For unto God belong the shields of the earth: he is greatly exalted”.