KNOWING THE NEED
W.Lamont
1 Samuel 1: 9-11, 26-28, 2: 1-2; Judges 6: 11-16; 1 Corinthians 1: 18, 2: 9-10; 2 Timothy 3: 6-17
One’s exercise, and one would be dependent on the Lord to express it, is the need for persons who are with God, persons who feel with God as to matters, not marked by their own opinion, or their own feelings naturally but who have discovered the secret of what it is to be with God. I have not read about the Lord personally, but it would be important, as always, to bring Him distinctively before the saints. We have read of persons who identified a need and were able to meet that need. How much more so in perfection our Lord Jesus, with a whole scene given up to the will of man, the destructive will of man. I do not need to enlarge unnecessarily on that, but we live in a day when the world is being decimated by the activity of man’s will. Havoc, distress, slaughter is happening as the result of the activity of man’s will as away from God; it cannot be anything else. But there was one blessed Person who identified a need and that need was that the will of God should be fulfilled. So much so, as we know, that He said, “Lo, I come (in the roll of the book it is written of me) to do, O God, thy will” (Heb 10: 7), the blessed glorious One who came in, in the perfection of manhood and wrought in order that the will of God should be established and that He should take away the first and establish the second. He has done that. All the activities of men as away from God make no difference to the fact that there is one glorious Man who has filled out the will of God in perfection. One who could say, “I do always those things that please the Father”, and He came in, in the fulness of times. Today we are into a year when men are making much of time. The Lord speaks about times and seasons (see 1 Thess 5: 1). He is observing times and seasons, but people are making much of the millennium. There was a time when the fulness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, come of woman (see Gal 4: 4). What a time that was in the history of the universe when Jesus came in, in order that He should fulfil the will of God, and He did so saying, “I have completed the work which thou gavest me to that I should do”, John 17: 4. “Glorified thee on the earth” – what a statement – a scene where God had been dishonoured repeatedly, continually and characteristically. One glorious Man could say “I have glorified thee on the earth”, bringing forth that approbation from heaven, the Father’s voice “my beloved Son in whom I have found my delight”, Matt 3: 17. We have sung about our delight being in Him; that is little compared to the delight the Father found in Him.
As a child, as a boy leading a secret life in perfection – even before His public service – brought forth that explanation “my beloved Son in whom I have found my delight”. Afterwards again, some three and half years later, His public service the same thing is said. Oh, the consistency, the perfect answer to the oblation, the fine flour mingled with oil (see Lev 2: 4). The Father did not alter His opinion in these three and a half years, when His Son was assailed from every side by the opposition, none less than the opposition of the Jews – He came to His own, and His own received Him not (see John 1: 11). These persons, especially in John’s gospel, were religious persons devoid of moral discernment. That is the world we live in and, it is evident even in the religious world, coming to light increasingly that there are persons who take the name of Christ upon their lips, and yet are devoid of moral discernment. What a terrible state of things we live in! But there in the midst of that condition, the Father says again, “my beloved Son in whom I have found my delight”. He was with the Father in every moment of His life, resorting continually to that area of the mount of Olives in perfect communion with His Father, whom He loved (see John 14: 31). As we know, Luke presents His coming to the garden; he does not speak about Gethsemane, but about the Lord’s coming from the mount of Olives. He approached those sufferings, intense as they were, from the standpoint of His communion with the Father, in view of that time when communion would be broken. For those hours of darkness on the cross He was forsaken by the holy God whom He loved. Why? In order that He should solidly establish for now and eternity God’s will, never to be rescinded for the glory of the blessed Man whom we love. He was the One who identified the need and He was the One who met the need.
I want to speak about these persons. Hannah identified the need for manhood. If there ever was a day when manhood was needed it is today. The Lord speaks to the Father about “the men whom Thou hast given me”. Hannah identified that need in those complacent circumstances, Peninnah satisfied with what she had, Elkanah thinking that he was more to Hannah than ten sons. Oh what presumption! What self-satisfaction! We are living in such days, but Hannah was one who knew that more than that was needed. Hannah knew that what was needed was a man for God and she prayed to God for such. I think we should take account of that. It is a great need today that there should be the emergence of manhood. Hannah was one who identified one of the needs of the moment and asked God for it, and God granted it.
I was reading a remark of Mr Coates, that probably the recovery began by the prayers of some obscure, unknown person who was with God in their exercises. I believe there is a lot to that – someone whom we do not even know, but earnest, like Hannah, and ardent and real in their prayers to God for the need of the moment that there should be a recovery of truth and to the truth and the Lord answered that prayer. It came to light that there were persons all over exercised as to that matter. We should all be quite clear that, for instance, Mr Darby did not commence the recovery, the Lord began the recovery and used these distinctive men in it for our help and edification. So, Hannah here wept much – see the reality of Hannah’s exercises – and she had no ambition for Samuel except that He should serve God. It is another important thing, what our ambitions are. Hannah says, “I will give him to Jehovah all the days of his life”, and it leads to the worship of Jehovah. Hannah continues in her prayer “My heart exulteth in Jehovah, my horn is lifted up in Jehovah”, she makes much of God. That ought to be the result in every exercise, that divine Persons are made much of. So any exercise that we pass through, if we are with God at all in it must lead to the praise of God’s name, the service of God. The result was something for God. It says of Samuel that God let none of his words fall to the ground (see 1 Sam. 3: 19). How important that was! A prophetic service was accomplished. Someone else said that Samuel’s words fell into the heart of Abigail; there was a result from God. If we consider for God and are with Him, there is certain to be a result. May there be with us a result for God. Hannah identified the need for manhood and Samuel was the result, a man indeed who served God all the days of his life.
Gideon in Judges was a man who recognised the need for food. State will never be corrected administratively; in fact that will often make it worse if things are not done in a right way. It has been said that the only thing that will correct state, if it needs correcting, is spiritual food. That is what I am sure we are so graciously provided with in these days in which we live, a supply of heavenly ministry that not only exercises us but provides food for our souls and promotes growth. That in itself is corrective.
Here is Gideon, a young man, and he is concerned with the conditions. We were reading about the conditions in which Hannah lived, very real conditions among God’s people. Here we have the Midianites, and Gideon is concerned about it, concerned about the lack of food and he works in secret exercise in order that there should be food provided. He threshed wheat in the wine-press to secure it from the Midianites. What has come down to us is so valuable, and I believe it has been wheat that has been secured in the wine-press. How we should value it! How we should value our heritage! What has come to us in these ministries of the recovery is to be valued. The enemy is attacking many things. I believe one of his main attempts is to undermine the authority and distinctiveness of the ministries of the recovery. What has come down to us in these things was decidedly of God and is to be made our own, not borrowed. Remember the young man with the axe said, “alas master, it was borrowed”, 2 Kings 6: 5. We need to make these things our own, to go in for them. You young men, not only pray and read the Scriptures, but read the ministries. It becomes evident when persons have assiduously read the ministry and absorbed it as food. We will see that when we come to Timothy.
Gideon here is aware of the danger of the Midianites. I suppose we all know what the Midianites refer to, it is a great danger. We live in days when the enemy is militating against the food supply and seeking to starve the saints of proper food, but here is Gideon and he threshes wheat in the wine-press to secure it from the Midianites. I trust in these meetings today we have been threshing wheat in the wine-press. We are all aware of the pressures of the present time, but in such circumstances of pressure, reproach and suffering in spirit, especially the suffering that there is in the spirits of the saints is beyond human calculation. One can observe that. I do not think that there is anyone here that is not affected and afflicted in spirit. The enemy would use all elements to militate against the securing of the food supply. Gideon threshed wheat in the wine-press. It is a process, it requires energy, perseverance. He did not give up in spite of the opposition of the Midianites. I suppose he did it in secret – we should understand that. These things that we speak of together, for instance as to the fellowship, the communion of the Holy Spirit, are the most blessed things that a human being could understand and enjoy and that the world knows nothing of. Everything for us is made good in that same blessed Spirit. The spirit that marks Gideon is noteworthy. God uses him. There is a word which I believe is apropos at the present time, “Jehovah is with you while ye are with him”, 2 Chron 15: 2. I think that is the day we are in. We can claim, if we like, the presence of the Lord, the support of God, but there is a qualification to it. If we want to continue rightly in the testimony to the end it will be on that very principle, that God is with us as we are with Him. He pledges His support. The Lord says “I am with you all the days, until the completion of the age”, Matt 28: 20. I think there the Lord is speaking about the persons to whom Her refers to in Matthew 18, “where two or three are gathered together unto my name, there am I in the midst of them”. I think “of them” means persons of a certain character and it is of such that the Lord pledges His support to – “I am with you all the days to until the completion of the age”. I am not un-Christianising anyone, I am not saying that the Lord does not support true believers, but I believe support is pledged, as God is with you, as you are with Him.
I go on to Paul – Paul identified at Corinth the need for the application of the word of the cross and of the Spirit. You might say, This was needed and that was needed. Paul saw in spiritual clarity that the great need at Corinth was the word of the cross. That is the application of the death of Christ, not the kind of man that had sway in Corinth, the persons who were ruling, who came behind in no gift, as has been said, they were using their gifts as toys. Paul saw that the need was the application of the word of the cross.
In chapter 2 he points out quite clearly that there is no entrance into the things of God apart from the Spirit of God. Paul identified clearly the need in Corinth as to these two matters and he points out that no matter how intelligent they were, as natural men, they had no entrance into the things of God apart from the Spirit of God. So he says “which God has prepared for them that love him, but God has revealed to us by his Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God”. It has been said – the Spirit is searching these depths in the hearts of the saints – it is where the depths of God practically are. The truth remains, but there has been something formed in the heart of believers, and the Spirit is searching that out, bringing it to light. He says “For who of men hath known the things of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him?” – this is absolute, “thus also the things of God knows no one except the Spirit of God”. We may acquire knowledge, we may read Scripture, we may memorise it, we may speak of it, but this remains absolute “the things of God know no one except the Spirit of God”. If we are to enter into them rightly, it must be by the Spirit of God.
I finish with a few remarks as to Timothy – I think Paul recognised that if things were to continue rightly it would be in complete men, “that the man of God may be complete, fully fitted to every good work.” That is complete as to qualifications and it relates to Scripture which he had known from a child, “Thou hast known the sacred letters, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (v 15). Then Paul clearly brings out the greatness of Scripture, divinely inspired. There has never been a day like it when the Scriptures are under attack, even by persons who ought to know better. We would stand by what Paul said so long ago and publicly would reiterate it here, even in the reading of the Scripture and in the face of any who may be bold enough to challenge it, “every scripture is divinely inspired”. That remains, unalterable and it is profitable for teaching, for conviction. I understand that Mr Darby himself was converted not by hearing the gospel, but by reading Scripture – that “the man of God may be complete”. I believe that there is a need for men who are complete, that are fully qualified, not novices. What damage has been done by novices, as Paul says elsewhere; “not a novice, that he may not, being inflated, fall into the fault of the devil”, 1 Tim 3: 6. Mr Darby said, Divine principles in the hands of an unspiritual man, are like a sword in the hands of a drunkard. How careful we need to be in taking up divine matters, holy matters. It is safe and best left to persons who are of the character of men of God, who are complete and fully fitted for every good work. I am not speaking of anything official, because it is not an official thought here; it is persons who are morally qualified. It is not officially qualified but that the man of God may be complete, fully fitted to every good work. This coming in towards the end of 2 Timothy shows clearly what was in Paul’s mind for the continuation of the testimony, so that everything we say, and what we say in meetings, must be solidly based on Scripture. As one who taught us and helped us said, What saith the scripture? It must be based on Scripture, if it is based on Scripture it is unchallengeable. That is one of the qualifications that the Man of God may be complete, complete as to qualifications, fully fitted to every good work. Not just some good works, but every good work. The Lord is looking for such, not officially, but morally and spiritually. May everyone of us here, brothers and sisters and young persons, in their measure, be able to identify the need of the moment and one of them is that we should be men of God – I speak morally – who may be complete, fully fitted for every good work. It is such persons who will continue in the testimony and maintain the testimony until it is no longer needed. May every one of us in our measure be in it. For His Name’s sake.
BUCKHURST HILL
2 January 1999