READINESS FOR SERVICE
[p. 106] READINESS FOR SERVICE
Luke 24: 28 - 36; John 20: 14 - 23; Acts 1: 15 - 26
JT It is in mind to show that the Lord, in joining the disciples, as seen in John and in Luke, affords opportunity for them to do things, to act for Him, and the facts show that they acted with intelligence. John’s record has this clearly in mind. Luke’s record is less definite as to the Lord coming, in fact it does not say that He came, but that He “stood in their midst”. I, says, “as they were saying these things, he himself stood in their midst”. The things they were saying were right. Then further, Luke, in the Acts, shows that the number of the apostles must be complete, the number being twelve. According to Acts the Lord remained with them for forty days after He arose, and then went up to heaven and was there for ten days before He sent the Spirit. There was enough time for them to show that they had right exercises and intelligence, and specially that the Lord’s designed number should be completed.
These remarks are made having assembly service in mind. God has recovered this truth to us and has greatly enlarged upon it in the ministry, yet one notices that there is considerable hesitancy in going forward on the principles mentioned, before the Lord joins us at the Supper. There is considerable hesitancy and awkwardness and lack of intelligence too, and hence time is lost. It is hoped that these scriptures, with the Lord’s help, may help us as to the great matters that are involved in the service of God, so that we may be ready. One of the things that is mentioned in connection with the Passover, which preceded the institution of the Lord’s supper in the gospels, is that the disciples were to make things ready, and the suggestion of containing vessels is mentioned. There is the pitcher of water and then [p. 107] the cup, and these bring out the idea of vessels which would be usable in the service of God.
GHP Is your thought that we are lacking in these features of the truth to which you refer and hence the slowness and awkwardness as we come together?
JT Just so. And that is seen not only in the Lord’s supper but also in what follows on the first day of the week, and in other meetings such as prayer meetings and Bible readings. There is a great waste of time because there is not readiness for service in a priestly way. The epistles to the Corinthians are intended to govern assembly service externally and hence the great stress on order in those epistles, especially the first. So it is a question of the priests being ready.
CH The disciples and those with them appear to have had great experiences, but they did not seem to connect them with the Lord coming to His own, for when He came they did not discern the fact, nor were they ready for Him.
JT They were not ready in Luke. John, however, in his account shows they were ready. There is no need to wait. It would be perhaps wise to take up Luke first, as he indicates adjustment is needed.
FB You stress the idea of intelligence; how is that to be obtained?
JT Well, that is a good question, and Luke helps us particularly as to it. He tells us that one of the disciples, seeing the Lord praying, asks, “Lord, teach us to pray”, Luke 11: 1. And then, apostolically, Paul is the great servant whom the Lord uses. Of course, all the apostles were qualified, but Paul is peculiarly qualified to teach. So in view of the Lord’s supper, which is the great initial feature in the service of God, Paul says, “I speak as to intelligent persons”; that means, that he takes them up abstractly, as if they were that, and he had a great [p. 108] part in teaching them. It was through him that they were converted. The Lord said to him in Corinth, “I have much people in this city”. We also see Paul and Barnabas in the service in Antioch, and it is said that “for a whole year they were gathered together in the assembly and taught a large crowd”. The suggestion is that initially they were a crowd, but the teaching for a year brought about an assembly in the place, and they were serving God. Then in Acts 13 we have names given, and the saints there were honoured in serving the Lord and in laying their hands on the two missionaries Paul and Barnabas. The Lord honoured them as evidently they were ready to join in the great operational service that He had in mind. That service was completed too, and Paul and Barnabas returned to Antioch whence they had been committed to the grace of God for the work which they had fulfilled. Then it says they stayed no little time with the disciples. All this would help to bring out this great matter that is now before us. The Lord, in Matthew, says, “Come to me, all ye who labour and are burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me”. That is what is needed. He is the Model as well as the Teacher, and so John, as having love in mind would have things right, and he tells us that those who left John the baptist, and followed Jesus called Him “Rabbi”, which means Teacher. They desired too to know where He dwelt, saying, “Where dwellest thou?” and He says, “Come and see”, John 1: 38, 39. He would have them go to where He dwelt, as if to suggest that they would then know how things were done. In keeping with that Mary .Magdalene later on says to the Lord, “Rabboni”. She needed teaching very much. She is much thought of by many of us, and rightly so, because of her love for Christ, but it was an unintelligent love at the first.
[p. 109] So it was stressed in her own words that the Lord was her Teacher, and I believe that is the idea that we would have before us in John’s gospel. It says, “They shall be all taught of God”, John 6: 45. Lack of teaching and the imperfectness of the teaching is one of the great weaknesses, resulting in what is unsuitable happening in the service of God.
FI In Luke 24 the Lord drew nigh to the two who were going away from Jerusalem and in His gracious way so brings things before them that they realise they are moving in disobedience. They return to Jerusalem and find those gathered there saying, “The Lord is indeed risen and has appeared to Simon”, indicating that the Lord had also been moving in grace to Peter, and then they relate their experience.
JT Well, that is very good. One was struck this very day with the severity of the Lord’s language to those two on the way to Emmaus, “O fools and slow of heart”, He says to them (Luke 24: 25). He points out that they were defective in the truth of the Scriptures. “And beginning at Moses ... he expounded unto them ... the things concerning himself”. Luke in that way would show that the Lord stressed the idea of teaching in recovering those two. Then as He went on and spoke to them, their hearts burned; that is the inward effect, and after that He vanished from their sight, because His desire was that they might be set in movement. They then returned to Jerusalem that same night and found the eleven, and as coming in they knew what to say. There was something already being said, but it was not enough. There was something else to be said, and the two who were recovered said it.
HB Are we to understand that the defect is absence of teaching, but that we have not profited by [p. 110] the teaching?
JT Quite so. Very soon after the time of the apostles we find that leading persons in the assembly had turned to human methods and to human education, and hence the great religious system of learning which we find all around us. But it was not all departure and God has come in to revive the truth. We see, too, how men have been raised up to teach and qualified not by the colleges or the universities, but by God. Timothy and others like him were raised up to teach. He becomes a qualified teacher and those who come down after him were to teach others. God has provided teachers.
Ques Is it in mind that insubjection might underlie our lack of intelligence? In John 13 the Lord says, “Ye call me the Teacher and the Lord, and ye say well, for I am so”, and then He says, “If I therefore, the Lord and the Teacher”. He reverses the order of the titles as if to stress the importance of subjection. Is that necessary for us in order to get the gain of the teaching?
JT Yes, and that we should value the teaching. I believe Enoch being “the seventh from Adam” is a suggestion of one who has learned all that preceded him from Adam. Much had come out in the course of time and through the channels specified and it all had to be gathered up, the fragments. The teaching of the Holy Spirit is precious, and it has to be gathered up, but the idea is for us to gather the things up in our souls. It is said of Samuel, that none of his words fell to the ground. How often it is, that things said at the meetings are immediately forgotten. We speak of good meetings, but the goodness does not extend beyond the meetings. The things are forgotten and not carried through and made use of.
ECM It says of Mary in Luke 2 that “she kept all these things in her mind, pondering them in her heart”.
[p. 111] JT Very good. And that is characteristic of Luke.
WA Is that what Luke had in mind in writing to Theophilus, that we might know the certainty of the things in which we have been instructed? There should be no uncertainty.
JT Quite. And he writes with method. I suppose that would enter into the book of Revelation which was reserved, and is an additional matter in the order of the revelation of the Scripture. The Lord in chapter 1, after saying to John, “I am the first and the last, and the living one: and I became dead, and, behold, I am living to the ages of ages”, tells him to write and gives him the order in which he should write. These principles ought to enter into all ministry, because gift is a great feature of the present operations of God. In Revelation we have the order, namely, “what thou hast seen, and the things that are, and the things that are about to be after these”. These three divisions mark the book of Revelation. It is a remarkable book, and the order in which it is written should be noted, for the Lord told His servant how it was to be written. So in view of gift the power of speech is in mind, and speech capable of conveying right thoughts, because the idea of the word of God is that the thoughts of God are to be rightly presented, that those who hear should profit by the things they hear, as they are set out in an orderly way.
CH Would what you are calling attention to be seen in Peter in the Acts where, as he was speaking, the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who were hearing the word? Were Peter’s words accredited in that way, and did the Holy Spirit act in relation to them because they were in keeping with the truth as a whole?
JT Quite. God without doubt governmentally ordered it that there should be such a language as [p. 112] Greek which is especially intended to enter the human mind and illuminate it. It is important that the brethren should have those that are ministering in mind, and that there should be concern that they speak right. In Mark’s gospel the Lord Himself makes much of speaking right. In chapter 7 we read of a deaf man who could not speak right and in loosing his tongue the Lord looked up to heaven and groaned, a most remarkable thing, and He says, “Ephphatha”. This shows how much entered into the Lord’s service to this man in view of his being made to speak right.
FI Have you the same thing in principle in Luke 24? Before we have the Lord indicating to the disciples the fact that repentance and remission of sins was to be preached in His name to all the nations, we have the fact recorded that He opened their understanding to understand the Scriptures.
JT Just so. Some of us have noted that in Luke the Lord (speaking reverently) appeared to hasten to the ascension. If we were to go by the actual wording in Luke 24 we might conclude that the Lord went up to heaven on the day He arose. I believe the Lord intended that His own should be impressed with the fact that He wanted to reach that point, for there were great operational matters to be entered on, and they have continued now for eighteen hundred years and are still going on. The Lord, as it were, hasted to go to heaven so as to proceed with the great matter of the gospel and of the assembly. In Luke 24, verse 36, we read that “as they were saying these things, he himself stood in their midst”. The Lord valued what they were saying. He must have been pleased that they could speak right and in an orderly way. They were gathered together, saying, “The Lord is indeed risen and has appeared to Simon”. That is a remarkable statement to have on record. Then these two who [p. 113] had been recovered had their part in relating what had happened on the way and how He was made known to them in the breaking of bread. That was a great matter also. They had received a touch sufficient to move them and they moved at once. They were able to say these things which were needed to be added to what had already been said by the disciples. Then it goes on, “As they were saying these things, he himself stood in their midst”. It does not say that he came, although we might think He did, but the thought is rather that He was there. It shows that He is not far away at any time. Then the Lord says to them, “Peace be unto you. But they, being confounded and being frightened, supposed they beheld a spirit”. As already remarked they were not ready, which is very often the case with us and we lose time. “And he said to them, Why are ye troubled? and why are thoughts rising in your hearts? behold my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Handle me and see, for a spirit has not flesh and bones as ye see me having. And having said this he shewed them his hands and his feet”. It shows how a state of unreadiness might hinder the Lord. Then He said to them, “Have ye anything here to eat?” This I would apprehend would be the conclusion. The Lord would hasten to the conclusion. “And they gave him part of a broiled fish and of a honeycomb; and he took it and ate before them. And he said to them, These are the words which I spoke to you while I was yet with you, that all that is written concerning me in the law of Moses and prophets and psalms must be fulfilled. Then he opened their understanding to understand the scriptures, and said to them, Thus it is written, and thus it behoved the Christ to suffer, and to rise from among the dead the third day; and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name to all the nations beginning at Jerusalem”. This is the point that was in mind to bring out and to show that the matter of the gospel was in the divine mind, that it should proceed without delay, and as we shall see later, the assembly too. The Lord then goes on to say, “And ye are witnesses of these things. And behold, I send the promise of my Father upon you; but do ye remain in the city till ye be clothed with power from on high”. From this we see that if the matters in mind are to proceed, all these things must happen so that there should be witnesses here and the divine system set up. It seems to me that these are matters of great importance and the instruction is that time should not be wasted, but that we should be ready as such services are opened up, to proceed in them.
JG Do we get the thought in Luke 12 where we see the Lord giving certain instructions to His disciples, having in mind that when He comes and knocks they may open to Him immediately?
JT Quite; they may open to Him immediately.
SR In the case of Joseph and his brethren he says, “Come near to me, I pray you”. Was he looking for things to proceed?
JT I am sure he was! He had a great matter in his heart and Joseph is a type of the Lord in this very matter. He was a man of affairs. We marvel as we think of the great men of old, such as David and Solomon, how they carried on their household affairs and at the same time were able to carry on with the things of God. In the Psalms too we see how much David was able to do, and then how much Solomon was able to do, and all this indicates how much we may be able to do. It is a question of doing things, as it says of the Lord, “All things which Jesus began both to do and to teach”.
JCT When it says, “As they were saying these things, he himself stood in their midst”, is it in your [p. 115] mind that what we say as we are together would enable the Lord to come in?
JT That is what I was thinking, and I was saying also, that the two took a good journey that night covering about eight miles. They did not intend to do it, but the Lord so stimulated them that they started out immediately and they came and found the eleven. They did not go to a hotel, but went to the brethren. Then there is what the company were saying, and what the two from Emmaus could say, and then what the Lord did following that and in keeping with it. There is also the inward service of opening their understanding and telling them what should be preached, and then His going up, as if He would say to them, that He could carry on now that they knew what to do and were ready for service. Much more had to be done, and in view of that the Lord enjoins them not to go from the city until they were given power from on high; that must take place, for the Spirit of God must be recognised.
CH In view of the Lord going on high He seems to be putting it upon them that they were to be witnesses of Him. Is He appropriating them as they are available, although they were not fully intelligent?
JT We might confirm that from the first chapter of the Acts. This second treatise, as Luke calls it, was evidently an afterthought. We cannot say how long a time had elapsed between the writing of the first one and the second one, but it was addressed to the same person. It says, “I composed the first discourse, O Theophilus, concerning all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach, until that day in which, having by the Holy Spirit charged the apostles whom he had chosen, he was taken up; to whom also he presented himself living, after he had suffered”. Several things are said in the chapter [p. 116] that are very important, specially from verse 10 and going on to verse 14. The whole matter is set out in order with a view to the great matter that is in the divine mind being apprehended, and then the next chapter brings out the great thought of the Spirit and His operations.
CH Are you thinking that they are holding to the whole idea of the twelve, and that they set about to remedy the broken situation which had arisen?
JT That is why I thought we should read that closing paragraph beginning with verse 15, “And in those days Peter, standing up in the midst of the brethren, said, (the crowd of names who were together was about a hundred and twenty,) Brethren, it was necessary that the scripture should have been fulfilled, which the Holy Spirit spoke ... concerning Judas, ... It is necessary therefore, that ... one of these should be a witness with us of his resurrection”. Another thing that should always be before us, is to recognise that the Lord has constituted elders fitted to lead and give direction to the brethren generally, so that there is no stoppage or delay. We may proceed to the right point at once and do it.
FI In Acts 1 in connection with the appointment of one to take the place of Judas, Peter is able to give a lead and he acts according to Scripture and that was before the Spirit came down.
JT Yes. He had learned much already. The apostles were all supposed to be complete in their education, and so they are constituted as authoritative, and hence when the Spirit begins to operate He directs these converts to Peter. They themselves discerned that Peter and the eleven were men of whom they could ask questions, and get answers. The result was that “they persevered in the teaching and fellowship of the apostles, in breaking of bread and prayers”, Acts 2: 42. So that the matter is set up and it has not been altered. The apostles of course have died, for “one generation passeth away, and another generation cometh”, but divine things continue at the present time, and the economy remains.
In the earlier verses of Acts 1 the Lord is saying, as it were, ‘I am doing as much as I can for you’. The Lord was infinite, but at the same time, He was acting as the Mediator for God and hence He speaks of the Father placing certain things in His own authority. So the Lord does all possible for those whom He was going to use, but He is saying, so to speak, ‘I want to go up there’. The system must be set up there and the proceedings will go on henceforth from that centre; that is where the centre is, in heaven.
JW It says in 2 Chronicles 30, that Hezekiah spoke consolingly to all the Levites that had understanding in the good knowledge of Jehovah. Is that word to encourage us?
JT Quite so. The knowledge of Jehovah, and they are all ready for the work.
JW At the close of that chapter it says, that “the priests the Levites arose and blessed the people; and their voice was heard, and their prayer came up to his holy habitation, to the heavens”.
JT That is what we get here. They had continued in prayer and then the Spirit came down, because that is the great climax of all God’s operations, and now, as we are saying, simply and humbly and reverentially, He goes up, because the great operational system is up there and it is to continue its operations from there.
Ques What was the thought of waiting ten days before the Spirit is given?
JT The Lord, I think, was giving the apostles an opportunity to show how much they had been affected. I believe He had great pleasure in what there was with the disciples. Mark would make [p. 118] very little of them, he says they were unbelieving. These persons had such an opportunity to learn things from the Lord, but they were unbelieving, but in due course the Lord says to them, in spite of the fact that they were unbelieving, “Go into all the world, and preach the glad tidings to all the creation. He that believes and is baptised shall be saved, and he that disbelieves shall be condemned”, Mark 16: 15, 16. The work is to go on; we cannot afford to waste time; things must be done for the time is short.
GB Would Rebecca and Abigail illustrate the features of preparedness, intelligence and sacrifice, in line with your thought?
JT Quite so. They are seen in both. Intelligence such as we see in Rebecca is needed, but especially so as seen in Abigail. She was a woman of good understanding, and ready to discern what was needed, and her young man is typical of a person who belongs to the assembly today. If we should hear anything that is apt to militate against the truth we ought to tell the brethren. This young man was a servant of Nabal, but he was also a servant of Abigail, and he told Abigail what a difficult man Nabal was and warned her to see to it. She took his word and did what was needed, and then David says, “Blessed be thy discernment”. David himself thus honours Abigail, as she showed that she knew what to do and what to say, and she acted accordingly. In all that she said and did David was the central thought with her.
SG Would what the Lord says in John 14 be in line with what you have before you, “He that believes on me, the works which I do shall he do, also, and he shall do greater than these, because I go to the Father”?
JT That corresponds with what we are saying. The personnel in the upper room are set over against [p. 119] clericalism; the outward formal and antiquated religion having lost its power, the upper room was the centre of all that the Lord had. The Lord Himself had centred all that He had there, and so we have the list of those who were there, beginning with “Peter, and John, and James, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon the zealot, and Jude the brother of James. These gave themselves all with one accord to continual prayer, with several women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren”, Acts 1: 13, 14. These are the personnel, you might say, in view of the great operational dispensation that was now ahead, and we can see what pleasure the Lord had in them and how He would foster them from heaven and furnish them with all that was needed down here and teach them, as we have already remarked. We read in Luke 11 that one of the disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray”. There is no need for a prayer book in the new system. There is need for a hymn book, but prayer should be spontaneous, the outcome of the Spirit operating in our hearts. So the idea would be to overthrow all antiquated religion which God has abandoned, and to maintain that which is of God. These are the persons that the Spirit of God would occupy us with, in view of the services that are now opening up to us.