DIVINE ANTICIPATION

J. R. Cumming

Genesis 24: 13, 14; Mark 12: 41–44; Deuteronomy 32: 9–14

We had a touch on Lord’s day, beloved brethren, as to Genesis 1: 2, “And the earth was waste and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters”. What a matter that is as we think of the anticipative view that the Spirit had in regard to the whole area of things where the divine will was to be worked out, ‘ hovering’, anticipating what would emerge, suppose the fulfilment of matters was when the Spirit as a dove descended on Christ. At that point the whole divine will in its conception was seen in its totality, a Man in relation to God

upon whom the Spirit of God could descend and abide upon Him.

I read these scriptures as thinking about this matter. The Spirit, in type, in Genesis 24 is, you might say, on the outlook in regard to what is emerging for the divine will. It is not in any forceful, arbitrary way; the features here are patience and dependence and along with that a complete committal to what was pleasing to God. It is interesting that these are exactly the features that come to light in Rebecca. I think the Spirit was looking for this consonance, an affinity with the Spirit in affirmation of the way that He was on as to what was coming to light. It would speak to us, I believe, beloved brethren, as to what the Spirit of God is bringing out as to features of the assembly and how there is response, by His touch, to Christ.

So there would be joy in our hearts as we think how the Spirit is looking for this—we might say, is helping us that it might be so—and as soon as these features emerged in Rebecca, there was that moment when, as it says in verse 21, “the man was astonished at her, remaining silent …”. It is just as though the whole thing had emerged under the Spirit in the patience that He had exhibited and in the dependence that He had shown, and yet it had all come to light under the touch that He knew would be pleasing to the Master.

Beloved brethren, what a moment we are in, the Spirit’s day; not a day when everything is going just the way we might want it to go, but rather a matter of our dependence on the ability of the Spirit to bring to light that which is pleasing to Christ and to God. What a matter this is for us in the alertness that should increasingly mark us in regard to the opportunities of this the Spirit’s day. This young woman was energetic. She “ran”, it says. I suppose the danger always is with us

that we settle down to a complacent way of thinking about things. I think the Spirit rejoiced in the energy that this young woman exhibited and her willingness in answering the question that was put to her, “Wilt thou go with this man?” How she responded! Beloved brethren, let us have the consciousness in our hearts that there is that under His touch which, as we would seek to be dependent upon Him, would bring confirmation in our own souls that the pathway we are on is right. When we come to that, other things will maybe not trouble us quite so much. May the young people with us get some touch in their souls, in the power of the Spirit, as to the glory of the present moment.

When we turn to Mark’s gospel, the Lord had taken up very many matters in the chapters prior to where we have read. In Mark 11: 11 He “looked round on all things” and later

“entering into the temple, he began to cast out those who sold and who bought in the temple”

(Mark 11: 15). How jealous He was, and is, as to what is due to God. The Lord has had to say, and has the right to say, to things in this setting. In our experience we have had to learn and re-learn this. He “sat down opposite the treasury”; I think it would be a touch for us, on the lines of my exercise, that the Lord was just waiting to see what would emerge. The disciples were close alongside because it says. He “called his disciples”, but they are not the focal point at this moment. There was something for them to be instructed in just before He went out from the temple in chapter 13. What a moment this is then as the Lord waits anticipatively to see what would emerge and, despite all the antagonism and the contradiction of the Pharisees and the Sadducees and all that kind of thing, there emerges in this woman a person who is marked by features of the Lord Jesus in preparedness to give everything she had. O, beloved brethren, how our hearts should warm as to

what is seen in perfection in Christ, ‘reserving nothing’, as we sometimes sing, ‘save the right to love’ (hymn 318). In character the same feature is in this woman. It is what was in the Lord Jesus personally, in the path of suffering and sorrow that He was on and, in some measure at least, there was an answer to it in this woman’s heart. “She of her destitution”, the Lord says, “has cast in all that she had, the whole of her living”. It has been well said, often said, she could have kept one of these coins, but she cast them both in. What a moment this is then and we should be encouraged as we have come together in this way that the Lord would speak to our hearts afresh that He is anticipatively watching and looking to see what is emerging in the power of the Spirit in response to Himself—and how He appreciates it!

Now just a touch as to Deuteronomy 32. This is a fine chapter in the maturity of Moses, a man in relation to God. The faithfulness of God is borne witness to here by Moses himself, how He had brought the people through and what was in the people for God, “For Jehovah’s portion is his people”, and how the faithfulness of God had seen them through in the “waste, howling wilderness; he compassed him about, he watched over him, he preserved him as the apple of his eye”. Then it goes on to say, “As the eagle stirreth up its nest, hovereth over its young, spreadeth out its wings, taketh them, beareth them on its feathers”. God has been faithful in regard to what is here in relation to the divine Name. What Moses is saying is that God has been a Father to us in this setting. A brother mentioned in the prayer meeting last night that Philip could ask the Lord, “Show us the Father”, and Jesus answered, “He that has seen me has seen the Father”, John 14: 8, 9. What has been seen in Christ is just the same in the Father, that

ability to carry through everything in this attractive way. So the exercise would be raised in our hearts, what sort of features are there amongst us? Can we look after things on the line of these verses we have read together?

“The eagle stirreth up its nest”—we had a word a week ago about the discipline that comes in, and that would have a result like this, that there would be a stirring up. If we take things from the Father in that regard there will be “the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those exercised by it”, Hebrews 12: 11. But along with that, beloved brethren, may I say again, we so easily settle down into a routine of things. What it is to get stirred up in our affections so that there are desires and exercises raised with us all on the lines of ‘hovering over its young’.

The whole potential in life is there, especially so in our young people, and family affections and care would be aroused to see that that potential might come to full fruition. This calls for watchfulness which is essentially a fatherly feature. You might say that was Paul in relation to the Corinthians. He was just watching how they were going to act. He did not want to come in amongst them because he knew he might have, as it were, to lay the law down, but he was watching to see how they would conduct themselves. “Ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers” (1 Corinthians 4: 15)—he was one of the fathers; he says that, and they had to acknowledge it, and what a fatherly spirit was exhibited by him. So the word in relation to the fathers is, “Ye have known him that is from the beginning”, 1 John 2: 13.

What experience have we of the Father’s touch with us and can we relate it to the generations that are coming on?

Then there is an ability to lead into where there is fruitfulness and where there is that which

will sustain us and keep us. Maybe the outward look of things is not always so attractive, but what is within? You might never think of getting “honey out of the crag” or “oil out of the flinty rock”, but that is what is there, and that is what the fathers would bring out, so that there is sustenance and a food supply leading us on in relation to the whole privilege side of things where, as we read in Deuteronomy 32: 14, everything is in abundance.

These are the few thoughts I had, beloved brethren. May we be encouraged as to this so that we might get a quickening touch as we come together. I believe that is the whole contrast in a gathering like this compared with anything else that is happening in the city at this very moment. The Spirit of God, the Lord Jesus, and the Father would bring in a quickening touch, so that we realise that we are connected with that which is going through, related to the divine will and arrangement; and may our committals be all the more real on this line of dependence, patience, devotion, and watchfulness, for His name’s sake.

Word in meeting for ministry, Edinburgh
16 January 1979