DIVINE TEACHING
[p. 126] DIVINE TEACHING
Hosea 11: 4: 5; Ephesians 2: 10
The subject in mind is divine teaching as applied to the walk of a believer. There are many things taught of God, for God Himself teaches. He teaches through His servants, and indeed, He teaches the saints, through one another, but it is formally stated that God teaches, and that He teaches all His people. The word in mind, as it is in John’s gospel, chapter 6, is, “They shall be all taught of God”; the ‘they’ of course, would be believers. It may indeed come out later as to Israel and as to men generally in the millennium, because the millennial period is to be a time of great light and knowledge. Indeed it is said that as the waters cover the sea, so the earth will be covered with the knowledge of the Lord — a very great promise, a very encouraging promise, and one to be kept in our minds, especially when there is so much ignorance abroad. In the prophets it is said, “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge” (Hosea 4: 6), which is a very humbling thing to be said of God’s people. There is no reason why there should be a lack, because the knowledge of God is available. It is available in various ways. If people are ignorant, it is largely because they will be ignorant, as Paul says of one, “If any be ignorant, let him be ignorant”. You may say, that is a very hard thing to say, but then there are people who are wilfully ignorant, and will not be instructed. So he has to say to the Corinthians, although he tenderly thinks of them and serves them, he has to say of some that they were “ignorant of God” — a serious thing to be said that people are ignorant of God. That is not because God is not known, for He is; the Lord Jesus has made Him known, and yet it had to be said of some in Corinth, that they were ignorant of God,
[p. 127] and this ignorance showed itself in the denial of resurrection.
Well, as I said, John’s gospel makes much of knowledge and teaching, and one of the greatest statements as to knowledge is that “they shall be all taught of God”. If there is anyone here who is ignorant of God, or ignorant of these things, then the word is to search the Scriptures; they are available; Bibles are cheap, and if any be devoid of knowledge, then get a Bible and read it. We are told that a certain man called the eunuch of the queen of Ethiopia was reading the Bible on his way from Jerusalem down to his own country in the south. Philip, a servant of the Lord, was directed to join the chariot of this man — He had been up to Jerusalem where there ought to have been plenty of knowledge as to God and Christ, and as to the Lord, but he was returning from Jerusalem untaught, but reading the Bible. Philip as he joined the chariot said to him, “Understandest thou what thou readest?” It is not enough simply to have a Bible and read it, but there is need for understanding what you read. As I was saying, the prophet says, “They shall be all taught of God”. I would say the persons alluded to are believers, nominally so any way, but they shall be, not that they ought to be, but “they shall be all taught of God”. If it be not so today, it will be so, that the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord. Wonderful thought! But then presently there is a peculiar time of knowledge, and knowledge of the highest order, of the choicest quality, and that is what is in mind in this meeting, that there might be increase of knowledge in the souls of the dear brethren who are here.
As I said, the teaching that is in mind is about walk. We are not to be content simply with our knowledge of the holy page or even of the ministry that is current amongst the people of God. We must [p. 128] apply it to walk, meaning walk in the sense of one’s ways and customs and relations and associations, and that means that each one has to be really a christian, and not simply a professed one; not simply that you can say you are a christian and not a Jew. Sometimes that is said. Advertisements are made for services or helpers or workers, and the addition very often put is ‘Christian’, which means he or she is not a Jew or a heathen — I am not thinking of that kind of profession. I am dealing with the christian profession in the true sense of the word. Knowledge, divine teaching, is available to us as christians as regards our walk, so that we shall walk aright, and I have taken the passage in Hosea, because it tells us that Jehovah had taught Ephraim to walk. Ephraim was one of the sons of Joseph, but the mention of the name here refers to the ten tribes. What he really implies is Israel, and that God had taught Israel to walk. In the same chapter we are told that God had said, “Out of Egypt I called my son”, Hosea 11: 1. This refers not only to Ephraim then, but to Israel as a whole, and the passage is applied in Matthew 2: 15 to our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. He had been in Egypt.
Some of us lately, having a prayer meeting on the ship, were talking about Egypt, and how much God has had from time to time in that country. I should say, in this country, for we were speaking more of Africa at that time. God’s Son, the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, had gone down into Egypt. God would take Him out of the way of Herod, the wicked Herod who would have destroyed Him. Another scripture is brought in there in the second chapter of Matthew to speak of Rachel, the weeping of Rachel. About what was she weeping? She was weeping about her children. She was not exactly weeping about Christ. The word to Joseph, the reputed father of Jesus, was to take the little child [p. 129] and His mother and flee into the land of Egypt. Joseph was the reputed father, and Mary His mother, and the word to Joseph was, “Take to thee the little child and his mother, and flee into Egypt”. You may say, Why take His mother with Him? She was the right person to take care of the Lord at that time, and He was taken care of. I refer to that, dear brethren, to indicate the way things are presented in Scripture. How the idea of the divine teaching is applied in Scripture and particularly to the walk of the believer; when I say the believer, I mean every believer. God has furnished instruction for every believer as to how he is to walk and please God. It is said, moreover, He teaches the believer how to love. We are taught of God, we are told, how to love one another, and if we are not loving one another then we have to consult God about that, because He teaches us how to love, but not only how to love, but how to love one another. It does not say just there that He teaches us how to love Himself, but no doubt He does, but it does say, “Ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another” (1 Thessalonians 4: 9), and there is no part of the teaching more necessary, more needed, dear brethren. There is no greater need than to learn how we should love one another.
Now I am speaking, as I said, about walking, about how we can walk, and how God said that He taught Ephraim to walk. It was not that Ephraim was lame or halted like Jacob. Jacob halted on his thigh. God made him to halt, but He did not take away his power to walk. Jacob was able to walk, and he had instinct and discernment as to how to guide cattle, to know that cattle should not be overdriven, and if the thought is applied to believers, if believers are viewed to be the cattle, they should not be overdriven. That is to say, older brethren should not be severe on younger ones, because that is [p. 130] what Jacob meant. He said the little ones must not be overdriven, and that is very important here, the children, the lambs of Christ, because that is what they are called. The Lord said to Peter, “Feed my lambs”, “Shepherd my sheep”, “Feed my sheep”. They had to be carefully handled and attended to, for they might fall out of the way, they might be lost. We were reading this morning in the epistle to the Corinthians, how we are saved, and amongst the things mentioned is the gospel, the word of the gospel by which we are saved. Other things are needed too, for salvation, but the word of the truth of the gospel is needed, and needed to be followed too, if we are to be saved.
Well, now to come back to my scripture as to how Ephraim was taught to walk. I believe the allusion is to the book of Numbers. The book of Numbers, the order of it is Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, the fourth book of Moses. I have no doubt it was in this order that the books of Moses were written according to divine direction. The book of the Revelation was written by divine direction too. You remember how the Lord Jesus taught John, the writer of the book of Revelation, how to write the book, and if we are to understand the book we must study the order in which the book is written. The book was written by John, the writer of the gospel, and the Lord taught him how to write the book of Revelation. He signified to His servant, to His bondman John, not simply an apostle, but a bondman. You will all understand what that means, and it applies to every true christian. He is to be a bondman of Jesus, and His bondmanship is easy, it is not severe; His burden is easy and light. “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest ... for my yoke is easy, and my burden is light”, Matthew 11: 28 - 30. It is most attractive, and I would like everyone to come under that burden;
[p. 131] it is light. We are invited to come to Jesus, and as I said. John was taught by the Lord how to write the book. He is a remarkable writer, John the evangelist. He was one of the apostles, but he does not make a show of his apostleship. He puts Jesus in the front and he speaks of himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved, a more precious and beautiful title than that of an apostle. He styles himself the disciple whom Jesus loved. You may say, he was special. In a way, he was, but you can be special, and I can be special, and I have taken advantage of it too, for I know much about the love of Jesus, but I am not wishing to occupy you with myself, yet it would be a poor thing for me to be speaking as I am now unless I knew in reality the love of Jesus, and I urge upon every young man and woman here to get to know that love, “the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge”. Get to know that love. John the evangelist knew it; he is “the disciple whom Jesus loved”.
Well, the Lord taught John how to write the book of Revelation. If anyone becomes interested in the book of Revelation through what I am saying and has the desire to understand it, there is always a reward for one who reads that book. If you read the first chapter, you will see that there is a blessing for those who read that book. Jesus taught John how to write it, and the order of the instruction of it was “the things thou hast seen”. That is the first thing, what he saw. Wonderful things were to be seen, and he saw them, then the things that are, then the things that relate to the coming terrible experiences that are threatened against this poor God-forsaken world. I said God-forsaken, because the whole world lies in the wicked one; that is what Scripture says. Terrible thought! Not that everyone in it lies in the wicked one, far otherwise, and I would say that the powers that be, the rulers of this country, and other countries, are not amongst them. They are not [p. 132] regarded as lying in the wicked one. We here tonight are not lying in the wicked one, thank God. We are in accord with the mind of God. We are pleasing God in being here.
In the first chapter, as I said, the Lord did teach John how to write the book of Revelation, and the first thing is “what thou hast seen” and then “the things that are”. We have to learn what these mean, and then, “the things that are about to be after these”. There are three phases; “what thou hast seen”, “the things that are”, and “the things that are about to be after these”. They are a fine matter of study for every young man and woman here, and for the old brethren too. The old ones, I believe, really are acquainted with the book of Revelation generally. The teaching needed to write the books of Scripture began as Jehovah taught Moses how to write the Pentateuch, and He taught David how to write psalms. I do not say he wrote them all, but he collected many, I would say, and made them publishable, made them usable for believers at all times, that they might be comforted by the book of Psalms. David had that task, but Moses had the task of writing the Pentateuch, and we are now dealing with the fourth book, and it refers to the walk of God’s people. God taught His people how to walk in the wilderness. It was no easy matter to go through the wilderness, because there were no roads, and there were no motor cars I need not say; there were no signposts on the way. It was just what it is called, a wilderness, and I believe the original title of the book I am speaking of was just this, ‘In the wilderness’. Israel was in the wilderness, and God taught them in the wilderness how to walk, and hence they found their way into Canaan. Israel found their way out of Egypt through the Red Sea and over the Jordan into Canaan. This is what happened, and [p. 133] spiritually it applies to ourselves. It is a time of being taught how to walk.
In order to clarify what I have been saying, I refer to the first chapter of the book of Numbers. Israel are numbered; all the males from twenty years old and upwards, not all the women and children but all the males from twenty years old and upwards, are first and were to be taken account of according to their pedigree, another important word. That ought to have a searching effect on every one of us as to what it means spiritually, what a spiritual pedigree means. One has to show it if one is to be recognised by heaven, that I have a pedigree that is according to God. The numbering began in the second year after they had left Egypt, in the second month of it, in the first day of the month, and the numbering was by Moses and Aaron, but they were to have with them head men of every tribe in Israel. It was to be accurate, it was to be taken in the sight of heaven, as one might say, in the presence of the universe. These people whom God had brought out of Egypt are to be taught how to walk, but first they must be numbered, and numbered accurately by Moses and Aaron, and by one man out of each tribe of the children of Israel.
The pedigrees given are of the most remarkable company of people that ever appeared on the earth, but there in the wilderness, without any houses around them. Israel had cattle, of course, but it was a wilderness, and the numbering began there by Moses and Aaron and by one man, a named man, out of every tribe, and the numbering began according to the order of the tribes. They were all mentioned, Reuben and right down the line. They were all numbered. That is the first thing they have to learn, and in connection with that they have to learn the idea of a pedigree. Well, you say, what does it mean for me? Well, that is what I want you to think [p. 134] of and ask too, when the time comes for it. You must have a pedigree. There must be some good ground for your claim to christianity. You cannot get the information at the City Hall. The City Hall does not keep any such records. It does keep records, I know, of children, of men and women and children, but this record is to be of the males only and from twenty years old and upwards, six hundred thousand men from twenty years old and upwards. They were not rationed, and there were no clothes made for them, but God preserved their clothes, and gave them bread from heaven. That is the idea. Wonderful! But more wonderful when we apply it to ourselves, for we are the very persons that are in mind. I would say to you everyone here, learn your pedigree, learn the reality of your conversion, that you are born again, and then born of God; that you know redemption, and you have real faith, faith in the Lord Jesus. Then that you have the Holy Spirit, the greatest gift given to men. He is to be yours, as a believer. I do not say, yours simply automatically, but you should desire it because it is part of the gospel, it is part of the truth, and you should know the truth. The Lord says, “Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free” (John 8:32), and what I am talking about is just the truth. We have got to learn our pedigree, and that idea includes all that I said; it includes the knowledge of redemption and especially the gift of the Holy Spirit on the ground of believing in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The next thing is the learning how to walk. Many walk a good deal when holiday-making in the summer time, and summer time is coming on in this part of the world, and there will be a good deal of walking, going to the seaside, and such like, but what I am dealing with, beloved, is how to walk, not at the seaside, not for holidays. Pardon me, I am not going to put you under any bondage in that sense.
[p. 135] It is all very well to get fresh air, but there is often too much time spent in such pursuits. We want to know how to walk even as God taught Ephraim how to walk. He took him by the arms; very beautiful expression indeed. I will read it again in Hosea 11: “I it was that taught Ephraim to walk — He took them upon his arms”. That is what Jehovah did. He took them upon His arms; what a beautiful thought, showing the interest that God had in His people, taking them upon His arms as a parent would a child, so as to teach them how to walk. Then it adds, “They knew not that I healed them”. That is to say, they were defective in that sense, but then it goes on to say in the fourth verse, “I drew them with bands of a man, with cords of love”. Think of that.
Following up the thought of pedigree, let us think of what is said here as to being taught how to walk, and the tenderness of Jehovah in taking you by your arms, and it is further said drawn by bands of a man. That is how He did it. You may be in the burning sun of the desert and the heat and other things like that. God took pains to take the Israelites by their arms and to draw them by the bands of a man. I have no doubt that the man was Moses and Aaron. Moses and Aaron would represent all these things, the tenderness with which they took care of the people of God in the wilderness, and the antitypical teaching, dear brethren, is for every one of us tonight, so that we may be taught how to walk. God Himself would teach you how to walk along with the brethren. First of all to take the ground of being a christian, and then as confessing the Lord, get the Spirit, and further as confessing the Lord, come into fellowship, that is to say, let yourself become attached, not unattached, to the Lord’s people. Link up with them vitally, recognising the Holy Spirit, and walk with them. Walk with the [p. 136] brethren, do not walk with others. It is a question of associations, and of those that you can walk with. Let us walk with the brethren, seek them out, and find them, and when you find them, walk with them.
Well, the next thing that I would say as regards the teaching of how to walk in the wilderness is in the second chapter of Numbers. I will be brief, at least, as brief as possible, so as to get through, so that we will not be over the usual time. The second chapter of Numbers has in mind the military position. In fact in the first thought of pedigree the numbering of each family is also military. The military idea is in the age of twenty. It is just the beginning of the first age, not the dying age, but they are beginning to live, as I might say, by the Holy Spirit, because antitypically that is what twenty years of age would mean; that the believer has the Holy Spirit, and as having the Holy Spirit that he is part of the military. He has part in the defence of the truth, not only of the walk that is suitable to it, but the defence of the truth. He is not to get out of step in the ranks. He is to learn how to walk, and to keep rank, as it says in Scripture. There were one hundred and twenty thousand who came to David who knew how to keep rank, how to walk together and not have diverse principles or methods. As Paul says, “Thus I ordain in all the assemblies”, that is to say, all the assemblies are to be governed by the same principles, and it is a question of walk, how we walk together. If one gets out of step with the brethren he is in danger; God would say to such, You are in danger if you get out of step with the brethren in the wilderness. You may be lost in the wilderness, you may fall in it, and there are many such. With many of them God was not well pleased; they were strewn in the desert, a terrible thing. The bodies of nearly six hundred thousand of them were strewn in the desert. How awful that is, but [p. 137] how awful is lawlessness in a christian, or in a nominal believer, so what I am saying is a most serious warning to every one of us.
In Numbers 2, “the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, Every man of the children of Israel shall pitch by his own standard”. That is a military thought. He is to learn his place in relation to the tribe he is associated with, and to pitch by his own standard, take a place by his own standard. There are many deviations at the present time, people saying they are this and that, and there are so many denominations, perhaps a hundred different kinds of denominations in professed christianity. A very humbling thing to think of, but there is really only one assembly. The word church in Scripture is generally the word assembly, and the word assembly means persons who are called out of the world and linked up with the saints, those who are saints by divine calling, linked up in the fellowship of God’s Son, and so it is here that each Israelite was to pitch by his own standard. On the march he would not get out of step, or he would become lost in the wilderness. He would know how to keep rank and walk with the brethren. Where are you, may I ask? Where are you morally, where is your fellowship, where do you walk, with whom do you walk? Are you walking in the light of God? Only as in the light is fellowship according to God possible. If you are not walking in the light, the word comes to you, “What fellowship of light with darkness?” The apostle Paul says, “What part for a believer along with an unbeliever?” 2 Corinthians 6: 14, 15. These are questions to be answered by every one of us. The answer is, that there is no fellowship between believers and unbelievers, there is no fellowship between light and darkness. So it is a question of walking in the light. We are to be taught how to walk in the light as God is in the light, and when we do, we have fellowship one with [p. 138] another. That is the idea in chapter 2, the standard by which we are walking.
Well, brethren, I only want to add something about Ephesians 2. The verse read says, “We (meaning christians) are his workmanship [that is, God’s workmanship], created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them”. They are not modern things, modern methods, they are things before ordained of God. “We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them”. They are not novelties, beloved, they are not things that anybody could take on and engage in as he pleases. He cannot do as he pleases on these lines. God has created beforehand certain things for the believer, certain methods and ways in which he is to walk now. Why? We are not told how old they are, but they are what God has before ordained, that we should walk in them. Well, you can see the character of the things that God has ordained for us as to our walk. We have to consider what anyone may call us into, or ask us to do. Was it before ordained for me to walk in? It cannot be if it is a worldly thing. Let me give it up therefore; renounce it. You will walk with power if you renounce it. You are brought on to the highest possible level as to walk; in fact, you are walking with God. The first man specially commended in the Bible in this sense was Enoch; he “walked with God”. Of course, Abel did, too, but he was slain. He died for his testimony, but Enoch was not slain, he went to heaven without dying. Did you ever think of that; a man going to heaven without dying; he is there yet. We must think of these things; Enoch is there with Elijah too. Elijah went to heaven without dying, and we may go to heaven without dying presently; all christians living when the Lord comes will. The Lord Himself [p. 139] shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first, and then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up in the clouds to be with Jesus. You say, Is it not wonderful! It may happen tonight, or at any time. The Lord has not fixed the time. Heaven knows, God knows, Christ knows, the Spirit knows, but otherwise we have to leave it, but it is very imminent; that is the point, and our walk enters into the matter. We are to be taught how to walk with God and how to please God. That is what the first epistle to the Thessalonians speaks of, and the same epistle says that God teaches how to love one another; these two things we are to be taught, how to walk and please God, and how to love one another.
Ephesians would go higher than that and say God has prepared a walk for us, prepared it before time. God has prepared works, too, that we should walk in; that we should exercise ourselves in. He has created these works. He has created ways for believers to walk in, and it for us to walk in them, dear brethren. It is a time of reality, the very time when the imminence of the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ is kept before us by the Spirit. The word speaks to us of those who love Him, those who love His appearing, and I want everyone here to think of it, to come to really love His appearing, and at the same time to walk so as to please God, as it was with Enoch. He “walked with God; and he was not”, meaning that he was translated. He was not, because God took him. Beautiful thought that one man should be taken by God in those days, and that before the flood, in antediluvian times. There was one man taken up into heaven without dying, and it was because he walked and pleased God, and he is an example for us to be that now. We are at the very end of the dispensation, and the point for each [p. 140] one of us is to walk and please God, for soon we shall be translated, and the joy of pleasing God in this sense will cease. It says of Enoch, “Before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God”, Hebrews 11: 5. May it be so with each one of us, dear brethren.
Pages 141 to 536 — “The Testimony of Grace and Judgment”. Australia, 1947 (Volume 174)