BALANCE IN GOVERNMENT
[p. 299] BALANCE IN GOVERNMENT
Genesis 1:26,27; Exodus 1:20 - 22; Exodus 2:1 - 9; Revelation 12:1-6; Revelation 12:13-17
The connection between these scriptures will, I hope, be clearer to us all as we proceed to look into them. What is in view is the re-establishment of the agency of government in its proper equilibrium, for the verses read in Genesis 1 show that the woman was included in the government — “Let them have dominion”, it says. The word ‘man’ includes both the man and the woman; one word is used for man denoting what he is made of, the other, the next one used, denoting his place in the divine economy as a being. Woman is included in both; she, as the sequel shows, formed that part of the being or race which is peculiarly amenable to adverse influence. It is no question of discrediting the female sex, but of how God was pleased to make man, for that is the first word used, and then to create him. He was pleased to create him in that form, “male and female created he them”, which did not apply to any other order of being in the universe at that time, as far as we know. God is pleased to create man that way. One feature amenable peculiarly to influence, that influence should have emanated from the stronger side of the being or race, but as the sequel shows, it was an adverse influence, and that has run on ever since; it is the weak side in man, any one of us viewed as a man or a male.
In Pilate’s case, for instance, he maintained in measure what is proper to man in the execution of his governorship, for Matthew stresses that side in him; he was called “Pilate, the governor”. Matthew 27:2. Viewed abstractly as Pilate the governor, he saw no flaw in Jesus, nor would he have put Him to death, he would [p. 300] have delivered Him. But the side in him amenable to adverse influence soon showed itself, for God reminded him very strikingly that the female side, the proper equilibrium of government, was right, maintaining her place. Pilate himself showed the feminine weakness, that which is in the race peculiarly exposed to adverse influence. His wife was right, she maintained the man’s side, the masculine; that is the side of government. She sent a word to her husband at the critical moment when the manhood that was proper to the moment should have stood out in him — but he failed. “Have thou nothing to do with that righteous man; for I have suffered today many things in a dream because of him”, Matthew 27:19. A remarkable fact! So that the governmental ability was there which should have warned Pilate and strengthened his hands in his own judgment. His own judgment was right viewed abstractly, but this mean, weak, contemptible side showed itself; although he argued his case in favour of Jesus, of righteous government, he succumbed to the false reasoning of the enemy and delivered over a righteous man to be put to death. I mention all that, dear brethren, to show what is in mind tonight, and how God would warn us by the history of Pilate as governor not to be like him. Each one is in a position of a governor, first as to himself; “he that ruleth his spirit” is better “than he that taketh a city”. Proverbs 16:32. A man may be very able in warfare against others, but fail in ruling his own spirit. It is as that masculine side so essential amongst the brethren in judgment, in rule, in care, is maintained today, that the weak side so readily influenced by false accusations or statements or petty feelings will be ruled out. We should be woman-like, or men in the feminine sense as Pilate’s wife in a critical moment, “Have thou nothing to do with that righteous man”. Matthew 27:19. A message like that is often needed in our so-called meetings for care, a better word than ‘rule’, it takes precedence of the word ‘rule’, for it is a shepherdly thought. If a man does not rule his house, how shall he have care of the assembly? The principle of rule must be there, or our meetings for care must fall short of righteous judgment. Not Christ Himself personally, but something of Him may be handed over to the enemy through influence. It may be by the Jew, by the legal element amongst us, or by some other influence, and the judgment miscarries. “Have thou nothing to do with that righteous man; for I have suffered today many things in a dream because of him”. Matthew 27:19. How wholesome that would be if the dear sisters did suffer in regard to these problems and carry them in a suffering way! The enemy would be shut out. Let the brothers be notified by their godly wives as to these matters. Pilate’s wife spoke of Christ to her husband as a “righteous man”, and said that she had suffered on account of Him. God will respect our sufferings in regard of these problems that have to be faced and dealt with. One sees them constantly in local gatherings, wrong judgments reached, or failure to reach right judgments. We fail to reach a judgment and let it rest, and the weak side of us is there exposed to influence.
Well now, you will see the drift of what I have in mind, and the right thing is to be presently carried out through a woman, seen in Revelation 12. She bears the marks of the governmental dealings of God, early succumbing to false influence, she is suffering in pain in God’s governmental dealings, but she has gained; she is not listening to Satan now. I will show that in a moment. I want to show, before going to Revelation, in the book of Exodus, how the prince of this world is aiming at the male side. The Lord said, “For the ruler of the world comes, and in me he has nothing”, John 14:30. He had nothing in Christ; the fulness of manhood was there, Satan had [p. 302] nothing there. Never could he weaken Christ, there was no weak side there. You understand that the types are full of instruction. The birth of a male caused but half as much time of uncleanness as that of a female child; it is to bring out this principle that I have a weak side in me. God is taking notice of it, and is pointing out that it means weakness and sin coming in. Whereas if the male side is maintained, there is so much gained, half the suffering, half the time to suffer under the government of God. And so the prince of this world, Satan, instinctively understood this. He considered Adam and Eve as they were created. You may be sure he spent time in considering these two persons, these two beings. They were new to him. He said to Jehovah later as regards Job, I have considered him. “Jehovah said to Satan, Hast thou considered my servant Job?”. Job 1:8. He says, I have. What did Satan discover in him? He considers every one of us. And in the care meeting he will act upon you according to your propensities that he has observed. If you are a brother amenable to influence, personal influence, personal feeling, he will work on that.
So the king of Egypt directed that every male should be cast into the river to get rid of that element, but every female was to be saved alive. What did it matter to him whether the female child was saved? It did matter, for that element would build up his world. The so-called church has become part of the world. Why? Because that element has been saved, carefully won over by the worldly governors of the assembly in the early days. The emperor would say, I want conditions such as I can influence, all other elements cast into the river, put out of the way. Well, we do not want that in our ruling in the assembly, dear brethren. We want to save the male. I will show in a moment from Revelation how intensified the male thought is in this child who is to be [p. 303] born, how carefully he is watched over and caught up into heaven too. Pharaoh has all the people of Israel in his realm, and he has got power to cast the male into the river and to save the female alive. It is a part of his system. That element in man as a characteristic is available to Satan; it will build up this world, adorn this world, that is, as I am amenable to his influence.
Well now, having made those remarks about Exodus, I want to show you how God came in; and the object of this meeting is that God may come in, because these conditions are prevalent. It is pitiable to see how brethren contend over what is not right. Others are suffering because of it. What they wished preserved, others are suffering that it might be dealt with, and what is needed is for God to come in and to turn these very elements that Satan is using into an element, a masculine element, as it were, that will act for God. The wonderful thing is that all the agencies in this chapter are feminine, all the divine agencies are feminine; I mean in the first chapter and the early part of the second. I am not including the father of Moses; he is, of course, to be included, but he is not mentioned here as looking after the child; it is the mother. The New Testament credits him with seeing what is in the child. The Spirit of God draws a picture here and it is the mother who is prominent. God is acting against the prince of this world, and that is what is needed, dear brethren, where wrong judgments are reached or where right judgments are not reached. Will God come in and will He change conditions, will He turn the very elements that Satan is preserving for his use into instrumentalities for God? Will God do that? He does that constantly. He does not always give account of His matters. We do not know the history of Pilate’s wife, but it would look very much as though God had to say to that [p. 304] woman, formed her in secret, and when the momentous crisis was on, she was ready to act in it sufferingly. That is what is needed. If we suffer for a thing, we are right in it, and God will support us and use us against the evil. So what you find is two midwives. You wonder how it was that Pharaoh knew these women, just ordinary nurses, but we have to understand Scripture spiritually. These women are God’s servants. Pharaoh is saying, ‘Save all the female children alive’. Does he see that these women are used of God? Why save all the female children alive if God may use them, as He does? He is using them here. So the midwives are outstanding in this matter. We have their names given. I suppose they are registered in heaven. I suppose we shall see them in that day; I should like to see them. They were saviours of the race, the saviours of mankind on the male side; they have a great place. There were two of them, and God dealt kindly with them. I am speaking in the most practical way, dear brethren, that this matter of the salvation of what can be trusted, what is recognised of God, what is created of God for government, should be preserved. Persons who not only care, but rule their own houses and rule themselves in truth. The epistle to the Romans reaches this point, it makes men out of us, that is the idea. As the apostle says, “Quit yourselves like men”, 1 Corinthians 16:13. Conditions at Corinth were feminine in the sense in which I am speaking of it; they were exposed to the devil. Paul says, “For I have espoused you unto one man, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear lest by any means, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craft, so your thoughts should be corrupted from simplicity as to the Christ”, 2 Corinthians 11:2,3. This is the battle that is going on all the time. So God gets the victory in Exodus. It is very striking: it is a question of exodus, of our going out of the world, and whether there is [p. 305] the element, as we go out, of the salvation of what will rule, what will preserve what is right, what will act for God. We are going into the wilderness; the governmental hand of God is to be amongst us. That is the position in Exodus. So God deals kindly and well with these two women and makes them houses. I suppose there were no such houses in Egypt as those two houses; each of these women was to have a house divinely made. Is there not something to indicate the assembly? What a wonderful kind of architecture would be in those houses! How repelling of everything Egyptian! They are God-made, and the furnishings are suitable for the saviours of the race, for the preservation of what is needed for God.
Then we have others in the next chapter. We have Moses’ mother, that is number three, and Moses’ sister, number four, and Pharaoh’s daughter, number five; five women acting for God in the presence of the prince of this world, saving men alive. What irony there is in it! As if God were to say, ‘If you destroy the men, then I will use the women, I will have such as are suitable for the preservation of what is of Me, like Pilate’s wife’. Well now, the moral is that one as a christian has learned Romans, has arrived at his individuality, in saying, “So then I myself with the mind serve God’s law”. Romans 7:25. You are secured for God, that is the principle, you are no longer in flesh. The apostle sees that his flesh is amenable to the work of the devil. We are no longer in that, and therefore we come to what is needed in the service of God, in the government of the assembly. Here is a man who stands on his own feet and says, I am determined that with my mind I will serve God’s law. I will not listen in the care meeting to personal feelings, I will rule them out, I will stop my ears and rebuke those who bring them in. I will stand by the law of God. It is not simply the ten commandments; in Romans 7 it is God’s law, whatever [p. 306] it be of God that governs this case I stand by that and repudiate all else. I am no longer in flesh, in that which can be influenced by personal feeling. Personal feeling is most damaging and the root of all divisions amongst us. It is not simply that I am contending for the right, I am contending against a brother. That is all. There is so much of that, dear brethren. If I arrive at Romans 7, I am in principle beyond that. “I myself with the mind serve God’s law”; Romans 7:25 whatever it be I will stand by that. God has reached that in Exodus. I believe it is morally the ground of Exodus, that you can go out into the wilderness in this. God was turning what was amenable to Pharaoh against Pharaoh. It is the converse, taking us out of the flesh and putting us in the Spirit where we serve God’s law. The ark was brought in later. It was not made in Egypt. God’s law was being served in these two women; His rights were being preserved. It is in the wilderness that you have the ark; that means Christ having the law in His heart; He magnified it and made it honourable. That is the principle that is governing these women and preserving what is of God. God is honouring them, and now it is perfectly seen in Christ, in the ark. All that is in the mind of God is seen in Christ. Adam was a figure of Him that was to come, so that the two midwives, and the mother and sister of Moses, and Pharaoh’s daughter, five of them, are the saviours of Moses, saviours of what God needs in His government here below, wrested out of the hands of the devil, the prince of this world, and used by God in the preservation of what is of Him, worthy to be preserved, for Moses was a proper child, fair to God. How sorrowful it is where even a babe as Moses becomes a victim of personal feeling, or any such feeling, in the judgment reached in our care meetings! So the apostle says, “Quit yourselves like men; be strong”. 1 Corinthians 16:13.
[p. 307] I want to show how perfectly it is carried out in Revelation. Revelation is a book of results. What worked out from the outset in the garden of Eden is seen in its results, for good or for evil, in the book of Revelation. So we find the heavenly city coming down from God out of heaven, having the glory of God; that is what man is, he is God’s glory. That is the masculine side. Although retaining her own place, the feminine side, she has got that, the glory of God, she has got the twelve apostles of the Lamb, government, the twelve tribes of the children of Israel, government, and the angels, again government (Revelation 21:10 - 14). In that way, she embodies the divine thought in government and yet retains the proper equilibrium of the female side. She is thoroughly balanced. Many a brother is right in the abstract, but gives way to personal feeling, and goes against his better judgment, as Pilate did. The equilibrium is what is needed, Pilate’s wife was that, but Pilate failed in not listening to it. So we find this woman in Revelation 12. She is clothed with the sun. Think of that beautiful mark, the symbol of government! And the moon is under her feet, and she is crowned with twelve stars. How beautiful is the picture! It is the complete reversal of Genesis 3, save that the sign of the government of God is there in her pain. Doubtless it is there to remind us that God has used His government to reverse the disaster of Genesis 3. God turns to account His governmental dealings with us, where we fail, to bring us round to His thought. He has put the thing prominently there. This woman is where she is “clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars”, in the humble recognition of the government of God; it helped her. Satan is against this again, he is not now the prince of this world. It is very stimulating to see the degradation of Satan. He began as a serpent, the most degraded [p. 308] animal. God made him that, and dust his meat. Through falsehood and brazenness he attains the position of government. Now he is degraded, he is a dragon, he is waiting to devour the male child. It is the same thing as Pharaoh again. I am endeavouring to make a present application. Satan is watching every one of us, and knows what we are amenable to. Is that brother ready to listen to an evil tale, a false story, and to be influenced by it, or some other personal consideration? That is what Satan is watching for.
Now here is a man child. Look at the beautiful clothing, the attire of this woman! Nevertheless, the sign of the government of God, through all the centuries it has come down. She is crying in pain, but see how she is robed! It is worth while. She is clothed with the sun, and the moon is under her feet, and she has a crown of twelve stars. It is worth while to go through and endure the government of God and what it entails if that is to be the result, dear brethren. So the devil knows. Why did he not devour her? He is waiting to devour the child, because it is a male child that is going to be brought forth. A remarkable expression! “She brought forth a male son”. Why is the word ‘male’ added? It is to intensify the thought. God says, I am reaching infinitely My thought in this Child. Satan knew it, knew something of it, and he is ready to devour the Child. The names he gets are degrading: he is called “a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his head seven diadems; and his tail draws the third part of the stars of the heaven; and he cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bring forth, in order that when she brought forth he might devour her child” (verses 3,4). That is to say, making the thing applicable, whatever the conception of what is right, Satan would destroy it at the very beginning, would not let [p. 309] it develop. Whereas God is bent on the development of this masculine side, so that His interests should be preserved, right judgments reached, and the interests of God in that way preserved. Before we get the picture finished we have, as I said, the serpent: to identify this being that is described here under the heading of the dragon, he is said to be the serpent (verses 14,15). And later, “He laid hold of the dragon, the ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him a thousand years” Revelation 20:2. There is no mistake about it; whatever his appearance is, that is what he is, “the ancient serpent” who acted on that which was amenable to his influence. Pilate was influenced by the Jews and he went so far as to scourge and hand over to His enemies “that righteous man”; Matthew 27:19 that is what influence will do. His better judgment justified Jesus. So in our manhood let us stand by our better judgment and refuse the evil influence. So, as I said, Satan is bent on that, to destroy this male Child; so it says, “And she brought forth a male son, who shall shepherd all the nations with an iron rod; and her child was caught up to God and to his throne” (verse 5), and He is there now. Satan is bent on destroying the male side, as I have been describing it, and here it is, as I might say, infinitely provided in a male Son. You might say, Tautology. Never mind, the Spirit of God can bear that. He is stressing the idea that God began with, that Adam was not in the transgression — the man viewed abstractly is out of it — it was the woman who was in the transgression, and she brought him into it. If I apply that to men, it is amenability in my flesh to come under the influence of the devil. Whereas as reaching my personality in Romans 7, “I myself with the mind serve God’s law”. Romans 7:25. I stand by that, and my salvation is in that, and refusing the condition of the flesh, so that the male son is born, and God says to Satan virtually, This is to be preserved, and He is caught [p. 310] immediately up to God and to His throne, but He is to rule the nations with a rod of iron, “who shall shepherd all the nations with an iron rod”. What a beautiful touch that is in contrast with what is now before our eyes in the nations. It is rule in Christ, and it takes the form of shepherding. There is no compromise, of course, because it is a rod of iron. There can be no compromise when it is a question of God and His rights, but tenderness and patience in regard of the person; that is shepherd care. God has that Man away from the serpent, away from the dragon, He is caught up. It is a question of preservation, of being taken out of the way. God is going to work out something in the meanwhile, and that is in this woman, this mother. Is she going to hold her ground? Christ has gone, the male son is born and gone up; she remains here; is she going to fall under the influence of the serpent again? No! No! She fled into the wilderness to get out of his way.
I give advice to every young person here, keep out of the way of the devil. You say, I want to see a little bit of the world; why should I not? You are putting yourself in the mouth of the dragon. This woman does not do that. Eve listened to the dragon, but this woman does not. This woman is keeping out of his way; she goes into the wilderness, out of his way. “And the serpent cast out of his mouth behind the woman water as a river, that he might make her be as one carried away by a river”. But then we are told earlier that she gets wings as of a great eagle. One says, I cannot stand the influence of this world; you do not know what I have to stand in the office, in the workshop, in the school. Well, this woman had to stand the terrible opposition of the dragon, but she kept out of his way and is keeping out of his way. We are told that she has got the wings of the great eagle, the wings by which God carried His people out of Egypt are in her possession,
[p. 311] so she flies out of his way. That is the best advice I can give to young people, do not put yourself in the way of evil; keep out of the way of the dragon; and again it says, “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you”. James 4:7. God has given you power in that way. And then the dragon makes war with the remnant of her seed. Will they give way? No, they keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus. There is the man and the woman, “male and female created he them”, and “let them have dominion”. They have it today in Christ and the assembly, and they will have it in the coming age. The assembly is still retaining the feminine side; she has got all the features of the masculine in the names on the gates. That is the point I believe God is insisting on now. Government must go on; let these petty things go, judge them, they are just appealing to that side of me that Satan can influence. Maintain the man’s side and God’s interests will be cared for, rule will continue. May God bless these words to us.