THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS
P. Buchan (Peterhead)
I felt encouraged, dear brethren, to read this scripture following what has been said as to this precious thought of the bride and the wife. I do not know anything that moves the heart more than this scripture which says, “Let us rejoice and exult”. We are here to rejoice; what an occasion for rejoicing this is, to think of the joy our dear brother has in having a bride, having a wife. The Lord would use this scripture, and use the occasion, to bring home to us the blessedness of what this must be to the heart of Christ, the joy it would be to Him. We think of the dying of Jesus week by week at the Supper; we follow in affection the way that love took Him, the Lamb, to Gethsemane and to the cross, but the point now is, “Let us rejoice and exult”. What an object He is for our affections, and we give glory to the Lamb. This meeting stirs in our hearts a note of response to the One who alone is worthy.
Well, beloved, think of His wife, think of what she is to Him. It has come before us this evening very touchingly that there are persons who have laboured amongst us that this may be realized for the heart of Christ in a scene of corruption and degradation. Something is being secured by the work of the Spirit in securing the bride. It says here, “His wife has made herself ready”. Our sister has prepared for this occasion; how much preparation goes into these things. It comes right down to our day; this scripture has a current bearing; that is why there is an allusion here to “thy fellow-bondman, and the fellow-bondman of thy brethren who have the testimony of Jesus”. I think that is how it is going to be brought about, dear brethren, through persons who have the testimony of Jesus.
I would like to encourage our dear brother and sister to have the testimony of Jesus; that is to say, to be learning to take on that spirit and character. It is being wrought out in individual exercises, household exercises, and assembly exercises. O, beloved brethren, the objective is the preparation of the wife. We are antedating the supreme occasion when it shall be given to the wife to be “clothed in fine linen, bright and pure; for the fine linen is the righteousnesses of the saints”. As we look round a company like this we think of the saints. Heaven is looking on at this meeting, looking on the saints in the light of the divine calling, the heavenly calling, of the saints relating to Christ and the assembly. I would appeal to the dear brethren to be exercised to have the testimony of Jesus in our committal to one another, in our committal to our local assemblies.
Peter tells us, “to this ye have been called”. What for? He has given us a model, ‘a copy’ as the footnote says, “that ye should follow in his steps”, 1 Peter 2: 21. That is how we are to take on, and have, the testimony of Jesus. I just leave these few words as an encouragement to our young brother and sister, and to us all, to have the testimony of Jesus.
Words at the marriage of Herr F. Pfeiffer and Miss M. Robertson, Cumnock
4 October 1985