THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS
THE NEW ORDER OF THINGS
What mount is that which might be touched, mentioned in verse 18?
I had connected it with Sinai; it speaks of it in that way. Instead of speaking of it definitely by name it speaks of it characteristically. It was material, I think; we have come, as I understand it, to all that is moral in contrast to what was calculated to affect the imagination and senses. Everything connected with mount Sinai was calculated to impress people, to strike awe, and the point here seems to be that we have come to another order of things entirely.
Nothing that would repel us, is rather a point in it? You have not come to anything of which the senses can take cognisance.
Is this Christianity?
Well, I think it is the unfolding of God’s mind, I think that when God redeems a people, He makes known to them His mind. I think it was so in the case of Israel. When God redeemed the people, brought them out of Egypt, and brought them to Himself, He made known to them His mind. They had got the light of His mind, and I think the same thing is true in Christianity. When you get the real company, a people redeemed to God, God then makes known to them His mind. He has got a mind about them. He had a mind about Israel, and so God has a mind about Christians, and He sets to work to instruct them in His mind when He has redeemed them.
Therefore, I suppose, you are come to that which affects the spiritual mind?
Quite so; it is what the senses can take no cognisance of. The senses can take no account of it, whatever there is, they are not tangible like the mount [p. 247] that might be touched. Sight and sense are nowhere. Under the first order of things to which the Hebrews were accustomed there was a very great deal; there were many things that tended to affect the imagination and the senses. I think all the order of things which was connected with their services was calculated to affect the senses and the imagination. That is where Christendom has got to. It has become, to a very large extent, sensuous, not sensual; that is, what acts upon the senses. The senses can only take in what belongs to them.
Quite so; the senses can only take account of buildings and ritual, and a great many things which are in these days connected with what is called the service of God.
They can take account of all that — music, and a great many things that are connected with the service of God. The senses can take account of them. If they do that, they really ought to have what you get here: that is, “that burned with fire”, “blackness” and “darkness, and tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words”, which voice, they that heard, entreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more. If people want something for the senses that is what they ought to have. If God has anything at all to say to man in the flesh, it is that. I mean not music, and ritual, and gorgeous buildings. God does not speak in these things to man in the flesh at all, but in “blackness, and darkness, and tempest”.
What does Moses mean when he said, “I beseech thee, shew me thy glory”? He went beyond what belonged to the senses.
I think so. I think he felt that the glory of God was entirely outside of all that is connected with man. He felt there was the glory of God. The glory of God was entirely outside of all connected with man. Now we have the glory of God revealed in the face of Jesus [p. 248] Christ. The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. It is entirely outside of man on earth, it is in the face of another Man, in the face of Jesus Christ. It is a very important thing to apprehend that God has got nothing pleasing to say to man in the flesh.
If He speaks to man in the flesh it is “blackness, and darkness, and tempest, and the ... voice of words”, which man entreats he may not hear any more; therefore you cannot bring the senses and the imagination into the service of God. The imagination and the senses belong to the flesh. If people want to bring the imagination and the senses into the service of God, they ought to have “blackness, and darkness, and tempest ... and the sound of a trumpet”.
What God has for the natural man is just what the natural man will not take up.
What they want is all that pleases the senses and imagination. They have no title to it. The only thing that God has to say to the flesh is what you get here.
Why does God speak to man in this way?
Well, I think man is under the judgment of death. He was under the sentence of God, and therefore God had nothing pleasing to say to man as man.
Apart from the law?
Yes; apart from the law. The law did not bring him under the sentence of death. The law brought death home to man; but man was under the sentence of death long before the law came.
What was Moses’ position in regard to it?
I think Moses was mediator, but then, do you not see, the mediator in that sense was not from God. The mediator was taken from men, and therefore the mediator could not be superior to what affected men. In Christianity the striking thing is that the Mediator is from God. “There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”. The [p. 249] Mediator is from God; there He is not affected by what affects man.
That is very beautiful, is it not?
It is the difference between law and Christianity. When God took man up under the law, there was the recognition of man under the law. God took Moses up as mediator, and Aaron in the same way. The priest was taken from the people. Now we have got everything from God’s side. The Mediator and the Priest are both really from God.
He (Moses) became, in a sense, the spokesman of the people to God. He had to entreat God that they might not hear the voice any more. They could not endure what was commanded. I think the great object of it all was to impress upon man that there was an impassable barrier between him and God, that all this lay between himself and God, blackness and darkness and tempest; the fact is this: the sentence of death lay upon man, and there was an impassable barrier between God and man, or between man and God.
The Mediator Himself felt it. He was in that position really.
I suppose you may say the Mediator now is the One who is above everything?
The Mediator in Christianity gave Himself a ransom for all. So that now if any one goes to the Mediator, he has to keep off blackness and darkness.
If man approached God in this way, with the imagination and the senses, God has to say, keep off.
It is very remarkable that it should be “blackness and darkness” there, and that today it is all light.
Then, do you not see, it is not light for the flesh?
No, not a bit of it!
When God comes to communicate with man, the flesh has no place; God reckons on something entirely different to the flesh; that is the renewed mind. All these communications that God makes now are [p. 250] for the renewed mind. The mind of man cannot understand it one little bit.
It is only the renewed mind can take account of mount Zion and the city of the living God. They are things which have no existence for sight and sense, but they must exist for the renewed mind. I think God has brought us into His kingdom in order really that we may learn the kingdom; to a very great extent it runs with the school of God.
Then would you say the schooling is different in either dispensation?
The law was the schoolmaster up to Christ. But then the point of that was to teach man what he was, to bring home to man what he was. Now the teaching is different, it brings home to man what God is; but I think you are brought into the kingdom under the moral sway of Christ in order that you may be taught. I think the way in which it works is this: when man is brought under the sway of Christ, then it is that he begins to practise righteousness, to understand righteousness, and, by means of that, you get the senses exercised to discern good and evil. Then you get spiritual perception: then you can define in a way between what is of God, and what is of the flesh. I think it all works in that way, when a man has got perception; that is, to distinguish between what is of God and what is of the flesh. He cannot take in really, he cannot get into the enjoyment of what is of God unless there is discernment.
Grace reigning is the kingdom?
Yes; grace reigning is the kingdom; grace reigns through righteousness. You cannot carry righteousness out until you come under grace; but when you come under grace, then it is you walk in righteousness. You get the senses exercised to discern good and evil. When you get to that point you get solid food. In Hebrews 6 it says they had not got their senses exercised. They were really content with milk; but [p. 251] the effect of getting your senses exercised, to discern good and evil, is that you are prepared for solid food.
Under the reign of grace we are brought into a condition to learn. You get perception to distinguish between what is of God and what is of the flesh, then you are in a condition for solid food.
Then grace is really the teacher, we might say?
Yes; if you take the bulk of Christians at the present day, the kind of literature which is abroad, and with which Christians are fed, the bulk of it is all of the flesh; all the anecdotes and stories which are abroad and with which the minds of Christians are fed. They would not feed on them if their senses were exercised to discern good and evil. Sentimentalism is not of God, it is of the flesh. I have no doubt Christians read such things advertised as penny stories, and such like; they are abominable, that is what they are. Sentimentalism, the imagination and senses, that is all of the flesh. It shews the sort of food on which persons never grow.
They never get their senses exercised to discern good and evil. They do not distinguish between what is of God and what is of the flesh.
Is that the good and evil?
I think so; one thing is perfectly certain, that all good is of God, and I know that in me (that is, in my flesh), dwelleth no good thing; so you cannot get good out of the flesh, and, on the other hand, God is good.
Does the apostle refer to that at all in Hebrews 6? It is all the goodness of God coming down and expecting to find an answer. If God makes known His goodness to us, He expects to find some sort of response on our part. If God takes pains to till the ground, He expects the ground to yield some sort of fruit. You know He expects man to be affected by what He makes known to him. Well, now, God has brought us to Himself, and the Christian is justified [p. 252] and he is brought to God, and the love of God is shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Spirit, which is given to him. Now the purpose of God is to instruct us in His mind, I think He will make His mind known to us, and therefore you get unfolded here what is in the mind of God, and that you have come to. You have come to these things.
What is the thought in having come to them — that they are within your reach?
Yes, I think so.
Is it not also a fact to the soul; “Ye are come”?
Yes, I think so; I think they are there. The great point is that they are there; and, in having come to God, you have come to them. This is another order of things, different entirely to what has been before.
Entirely, the whole thing, if you take every part of it, the whole thing is the complete expression of God’s will. That is what is according to Himself. He has spoken from heaven. Now the truth is this, in the death of Christ, man, according to the flesh, has been so completely removed from under the eye of God, that God now is perfectly free. He has got a free hand to accomplish all His will and purpose. If you accept the removal, if you have grace to accept what has been effected — the removal of man — then it is you begin to apprehend how perfectly free God is to accomplish all His counsel. What stood in the way of God was man. As long as God was testing man, man stood in the way of the accomplishment of His purposes; when it has all come to an end in the death of Christ, and man has been removed judicially before God, then it is that God is perfectly free to accomplish His purposes.
Do you think one will not get forward until they accept the fact that the whole thing is set aside?
I think every man has to come back to his baptism; only he takes a precious long time to do it. People [p. 253] make a great deal of baptism, it has a very common place in the minds of a great many people, but they never really come back to it.
What do you say to that?
It was the case of most of us when we were baptised, we had nothing to say to it; one had no hand in one’s own baptism; you were baptised by another. No man baptises himself. I never heard of a man baptising himself. You have to bow to it. It is the responsibility of the one who baptises you; but I think the moment has to come in the history of Christians when you have to come to the truth of it, or rather, when you have to come to what is set forth in it. I think that has to come.
You mean the baptism of Romans 6?
He takes it up on that ground, but you have to come to the import of it. Baptism sets forth burial. You are buried, but then you have to come to it. A man has to accept death, or else he will not understand his burial. You bury what is dead. If a man has to come to the import of baptism, he must accept death. If you accept death, then you can understand burial. When you have come to that point, then in your mind your old man is crucified with Christ; that is gone. Now, you see everything has been removed which stood in the way of God’s purposes, and God is now free to accomplish the purposes of His will, because man, who was the great hindrance, has been removed. Although he was the subject of God’s goodness, yet after all he was obnoxious to God.
Man has been removed, and now the coast is clear; and now God can carry out all the purposes of His will. You see God has not now to meet man with blackness, and darkness, and tempest, but the coast is clear. Man has gone. He has been removed judicially in the death of Christ. Now the coast is clear. The way is clear for God, and God makes known to man now the whole range of His counsel, because man has [p. 254] gone. If we are coming to the sense of that, it is not enough that man has gone for God, but it has to be accepted; we have to accept it. That is, you have to come back to the import of baptism, baptism is that you are buried, then if buried you must be dead.
I suppose it is what we are very slow to come to. That God’s attitude to us is one of grace.
I think so. I do not think people have an idea really of the pleasure which God has in teaching. That is my impression. I think very few Christians have an idea of the pleasure which God has in teaching, if you will only be taught. God has the greatest pleasure in teaching; only people are not too willing to be taught of God, and mark you, no man can teach you. It is a great mistake to suppose you are taught by man. You are not taught by man. If you are taught at all, you are taught by God.
What you were saying of our being taught in the kingdom will be equally true of the kingdom in its millennial character. “They shall be all taught of God”, and that would be schooling leading on to the eternal state.
Yes.
Then was your mention of the kingdom in connection with verse 28 receiving a kingdom?
Yes, quite so; “receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear”. You see the great thing in Christianity (and you cannot impress it too much) is the reality of having to do with God, with the living God. It is not the knowledge of doctrine, that is not the knowledge of Christianity.
Christianity is being brought to the reality of the living God, and so with everything else. The work and the teaching is of God. It is not that anybody has to intervene between God and Christians. Everything is of God. God begins the work in us, and it is God that works in us to will and to do of His good pleasure.
[p. 255] God is the Teacher. I do not think that can be impressed too deeply on people. Do you, Mr. — —?
I am sure not. It is the great reality of having to say to the living God. He is Teacher, God is the Teacher, and they are all taught of God. You come in great simplicity then.
I think so, and I think you learn wonderful lessons. I think you must be prepared. The first principle is this. “I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing”, and that the source of all good is God. I do not think you can learn very much until you get there. If man is looking to find anything at all in himself I think he is looking in the wrong direction. I think it ought to be a settled thing in the mind of every Christian that there is no good to be found except in God. It is futile to look for it elsewhere, then I think it is the pleasure of God not to meet you with anything that repels, but I think it is to present to you all that tends to attract. Every item that you get here is attractive; it is not repelling, it is attractive. Mount Zion is not repelling, mount Zion is intensely attractive.
Mount Zion, as I understand it, is symbolic, it represents the sovereignty of mercy; I think the sovereignty of mercy is attractive to one who knows God. I think you will have to accept it, God who is rich in mercy. You accept the sovereignty of mercy. “I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy”, that is what God says. He is sovereign in mercy, and mount Zion is the great expression. So it is “God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us ... hath quickened us together with Christ ... and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus”. I think that is the first thing you must accept, the sovereignty of mercy. We begin with grace, for God’s attitude is grace towards all. Once you come under the sway of grace, you learn mercy; that is the sovereignty of God’s [p. 256] mercy. He asserts it in Romans 9. “I will have mercy upon whom I will have mercy”. You accept that, that is mount Zion.
A contrast to the other mount.
Quite so. Mount Sinai really meant demand. Mount Zion represents the sovereignty of mercy. I have no doubt it is an allusion to when David brought back the ark. He places the ark on mount Zion; then begins the psalm, “His mercy endureth for ever”.
Is the city of the living God here the same as mount Zion?
Oh, no. I think mount Zion represents the principle in contrast with mount Sinai. The city of the living God brings in an additional idea, that is, the ruling city. It is the ruling city which is to rule over the earth. The idea of the city is the city that rules over the earth. That is the idea in Christianity, like Babylon, or like Rome, they were ruling cities. They had rule over the earth, and the city of the living God is the city that rules. It is the ruling city, the nations walk in the light of it, “that in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus”; and what you find is that the nations walk in the light of the heavenly city. It is the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. It is the city that rules over the earth. I have no doubt it comes in to take the place of the ecclesiastical Babylon, that is, Rome.
But you say then the thought is connected with the city that rules?
It is symbolic. You know you get all that picture in connection with ecclesiastical Babylon; it rules over the kings of the earth. “Is not this great Babylon that I have built?” The city was symbolic of rule: that is the character of the heavenly city, it is symbolic of heavenly rule, which has its expression in the church, because the church reigns with Christ.
What is the innumerable company of angels?
[p. 257] I think they are the guardians of the city; it is a curious thing in Scripture, you get the thought of numbers connected with angels, an innumerable company of angels, ten thousand times ten thousand.
What is the force of the word living as applied in that sense towards God?
Living God is in contrast to generations of dying men. I think what impresses me in coming to the scripture is the great idea of living God, you get generation after generation passing off the scene. It is God who lives, not affected, not touched by death.
Can it be in any sense the place where life is?
Yes; “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God”. “How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God”, therefore He cannot be served by dead works.
We are really come to the city where life is, and the life is of God. Then you get the church of the firstborn which are written in heaven. I think the thought in the passage is, you first get the church of God as presented by Peter, then you get the church of God as taught by Paul, I mean the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and the church of the firstborn which are written in heaven refers to the work of Paul.
Why do you get the angels put in?
I think they come in as an illustration, the illustration is connected with the city, I think the angels have a place in connection with that. They attend upon the city in that sense.
Is it setting forth the new occupation of angels?
The law was given by the disposition of angels.
“Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?”
They take that place in connection with the heavenly Jerusalem, ministers sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation.
[p. 258] Why is it the church of the firstborn, the expression firstborn?
I think it is some sort of allusion to what God took from Israel.
It is the firstborn ones, is it not?
The firstborn in the case of Israel was devoted to God and He took the Levites in place of the firstborn. Then you get in connection with these “which are written in heaven”. They are inscribed in heaven.
I have been accustomed to look upon that as being an expression of the eternal purpose. Then you reach the top, as it were. God, the Judge of all. I think it is an attractive thought to me, to think that God is the Judge who has taken all into His own hands. It is more the thought of ruler.
Yes; the sovereign Ruler, the idea that God is going to be Judge Himself. I think you will have everything right upon earth when God is Judge. God Himself is Judge. Then you get the spirits of just men made perfect. I suppose it refers to those who passed away before Christ. Their spirits are there. They are made perfect; the spirits of just men are made perfect. They are made perfect now.
Then, as to there being nothing repelling, why do you get at the end of the chapter, “Our God is a consuming fire”?
That does not come in in this connection. You must take that separately. It comes in in connection with the admonition at the end of the chapter. You must not turn away from Him who speaks from heaven: He is a consuming fire; that is, you must not become apostate.
There is all the difference between the turning away and coming to.
Quite so; having come to God you must not turn away.
The possibility of apostasy is contemplated in Hebrews.
“[p. 259] To Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel”. You come down now to the new covenant and the earth, the spirits of just men made perfect, and the blood of sprinkling speaking better things than Abel, Then you get an admonition: “See that ye refuse not him that speaketh”. Although they were spoken of as having come to Jesus, the Mediator of the new covenant, they were very weak, were they not?
They were weak, but they had come to these things. It is impossible to have come to God without having come to these things. You have come to the whole range of His counsel. He takes care of that. He presents Himself in that way.
So the apostle says to the Ephesians, “I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God”. Then he begins to warn, as there were marks of declension, so the apostle brings this warning: “See that ye refuse not him that speaketh”. They accept, in a certain sense, the first principles of Christianity — there they stood. They had not gone on to be taught of God. If God has brought you to Himself, you may depend upon it God has something to communicate to you. Then it is of all-importance that you should be prepared to hear, and that you should seek to understand and not turn away.
Nothing is more depressing to me than when I hear sometimes the truth put out, and people say, “Well, I have not understood anything”. I think they ought to be deeply humbled and exercised.
That is my impression. If you are brought to God, it is that He may teach you, and here God brings before you a whole system of things in which His counsel and His wisdom are expressed.
I think you ought to be exercised in order that you may understand it. If God is going to teach us, He is going to teach us wonderful things. The natural [p. 260] man cannot understand them, but I think we, as Christians, ought to be exercised to understand them. Do you not think so?
He winds up with that, “We receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire”.
Would you mention what the new covenant is, if you have time?
I think strictly it is the covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, but that we come under the principles. We come under the spirit of the covenant.
I do not think the covenant is established exactly with us, but being brought to God, God must be on some kind of terms with us. The terms on which He is with us constitute the covenant. Every Christian must learn, properly speaking, the terms on which God is with him. Christians must be very slack if they are not exercised to know the terms on which God is with them; if you are in relation with God there must be some terms on which God must be with you, and I think every Christian ought to be deeply exercised to know the terms on which God is with him, and that, to my mind, is the spirit of the new covenant.
Broadly, would you say what those terms are?
I have no doubt whatever, love and righteousness. The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given to us, and in the presence of God’s love you are perfected for ever.
Might we say that love welcomes and that righteousness justifies that love?
I think so. God has His own pleasure in His people; His love is upon them in that sense, and it is impossible that God can impute sin to those whom He loves. You would not impute sin to those you love.
Those are the terms, then?
[p. 261] I think the new covenant indicates what God is for us, while reconciliation brings out what we are for God. Hence I think the important thing for a Christian is to learn reconciliation, and reconciliation indicates what they are for God — for His pleasure — that is, they are a new creation in Christ for God’s pleasure.
And I think I heard you say once, reconciliation is that there is but one Man.
Yes; that is reconciliation. Every order of man, every kind of man has disappeared, that one Man may remain. That one Man is Christ, and you are of Christ. If any man be in Christ, there is a new creation. You are in Christ Jesus, that is reconciliation, but that is for God’s pleasure, like the prodigal in the Father’s house at the Father’s table. He was there not for his own pleasure, he was there for the Father’s pleasure. Therefore the Father says, “It was meet that we should make merry, and be glad”.
Then the new covenant and reconciliation go together?
They do; but I do not think anybody will learn reconciliation until they learn the new covenant, and they will not learn the new covenant until they have learned the kingdom.