“THE THING PROCEEDS FROM JEHOVAH”

Genesis 24:50 (“The thing proceeds from Jehovah”)

Quite early on in our brother and sister’s new link together, this scripture came to me; “the thing proceeds from Jehovah”. I felt that the link that was beginning to be formed and starting to mature was something that the Lord could take hold of and bless. We are here to commend our brother and sister to the Lord in this relationship of marriage, and what our brother has said about love is important; it never fails. So this scripture came to me and I feel that the Lord has something that He can lay His hands on and bless in the maturity in which the relationship has been taken up.

When you reflect on the verse; this is Laban and Bethuel answering the servant, who had set out the whole matter clearly before them. It is a very interesting chapter to read, full of wonderful detail. The servant set it all out, and then they said, “The thing proceeds from Jehovah”. That was all they could say, although they go on to say, “we cannot speak to thee bad or good”. Nevertheless, what was being displayed there was God’s mind, and it was so clear that there really was not anything to say, good or bad. We are happy, glad to commend the couple to the Lord. It is from the Lord, it is the Lord’s mind. The verse has already been referred to; it says “It is not good that Man should be alone; I will make him a helpmate, his like”, Gen.2:18.

What really made me think more on this was that when we say that the thing proceeds from Jehovah, we can see it in relation to Christ and the assembly that “The thing proceeds from Jehovah”. That relationship proceeds from God; it was in God’s heart. Think of the knowledge of God that extends from before time was. Think of the knowledge that was involved, those counsels of old, when divine Persons counselled together before the worlds were made, before time came into being, that the thought of Christ and the assembly was going to be worked out in such a wonderful way. We sang of God’s matchless moral ways (Hymn 342). It is worked out like that, that there should be one of the Godhead come into manhood’s form. It says of Him, “having been found in figure as a man” (Phil.2:8); all that entered into that – the Lord Jesus coming in as a Man. How blessed, how wonderful to know the work which He came to accomplish on Calvary’s tree, the work of salvation, and we also know that He came to secure an answer in the assembly.

There are the personnel of the assembly, each one of us, all those that love and trust in the Lord Jesus and have the Spirit, as our brother and sister do. There are the personnel, but then there is the collective side, the answer in love and affection to the Lord Jesus as a Man. He remains a Man for ever, not any longer in flesh and blood condition but as a risen and glorified Man. Our Saviour is glorified, we have our link with Him there on the other side of death; we all live because He lives. The assembly, that corporate vessel, a collective response to Christ – she is there, she is a vessel, as we often say of Eve, with no past history. Eve was formed, she was a helpmate. The assembly will come when Christ comes, she will reign with Him. Speaking reverently, she will add to the glory because of her very presence. It speaks of her “having the glory of God”, Rev.21:10. What glories there are in the assembly. She remains a creature vessel, but as we understand it, she is the greatest creature there is. Think of what she is as a vessel for divine praise, a divine residence! We often touch on these things on a Lord’s day morning.

As reflecting on these things, we see how God in His wonderful wisdom and ways has given opportunity, which He has chosen, to allow us to enjoy something of that relationship. The different relationships that we have – the Lord has His hand over all of those. We sometimes sing about the assembly during the long night:

‘Throughout the long night she has waited

To see thee her faithful bridegroom’ (Hymn 131).

Perhaps something of that long night has been entered into by our couple in these months of waiting which they have had to endure. The Lord would pass us through these things in order that we may have a greater appreciation of what He finds in His assembly.

I just leave the word with the brethren and commend the couple to the Lord: “The thing proceeds from Jehovah”.

Given at a meeting for ministry on the occasion of a marriage, Buckie

14 November 2020

R W McClean