(1) THEIR CALLING
([p. 274] 1) THEIR CALLING
It is a singular thing that one who afterwards suggested the means of Israel being seduced into sin should have been used of God for the utterance of perhaps the most remarkable prophecies on record. Balaam can only be regarded as a prophet in the sense of his being a channel for conveying the mind of God. For the most part the prophets came to remonstrate with and to recall the people to the ways of God. It was not so with Balaam, for he uttered no word of remonstrance to the people. He had the word of God, but the principle of covetousness ruled his heart. He was used of God to make known His ways and thoughts in regard to the people wholly apart from any question of their state. In fact, he spoke of the elect of God.
God takes account of our state, but He does not in result deal with us according to our state. He has His own way, and it is well for us to understand His way, but we must learn it from Himself. The truth of the New Testament is intended to lead the thoughts and hearts of Christians away from themselves to Christ, from the first man to the Second. The thought of God is made good in Christ after the old man has been crucified. Having received the forgiveness of sins, God shews us that everything He has for us is bound up in another Man — Christ.
The children of Israel were an earthly people, and were about to be placed in the land of Canaan, but as passing through the wilderness they represented in type and shadow a heavenly people. Here are four prophecies concerning them. The point of the first is separation. In verse 9 it is said, “Lo, the people [p. 275] shall dwell alone, and shall not be reckoned among the nations”.
Separation has, since Abraham’s time, been an unvarying principle of God’s ways in dealing with men down here. I will endeavour to shew you the reason. God is not in the course of things in which man is naturally. If Adam had lived in the state in which God made him, I have no doubt that God would have been to him in everything around him. There would have been no providence. Adam would have seen God in everything, both in heaven and earth, and would have been filled with thanksgiving. Sin brought all possibility of that to an end. If the principle of separation comes in, it proves that God is not in the things that He separates us from.
God began to act upon this principle after the building of the tower of Babel, which for Him had great significance. After the flood God started man afresh with the principle of government: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed”. Then came Babel, which shewed that man was bent upon constructing a great imperial system of which he was himself to be the centre. He would make a tower and a city. It was really for the glory of man. This idea was fully expressed in Nebuchadnezzar, who was the head of an imperial system. He was the head of gold. Man was bent on making a name for himself, and if this was the case, there was no place for God. God will not go on with man upon these terms. This line of action which man has adopted will be headed up in Antichrist. In John 5 we have the Lord’s words, “I am come in my Father’s name, and ye receive me not; if another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive”. Antichrist will be the head of the imperial system, and will come in his own name. Thus there is no place nor glory for God on earth.
God intended to bless man. Before ever the law [p. 276] came in with its curse, God had anticipated it with blessing. The first intimation of His purpose to bless was to Abraham, after the purpose to build the tower of Babel. Two very important principles then came out: it was God’s purpose to bless, and He intended to dispose of the earth as He saw fit. Think of man’s arrogance in claiming the earth for himself! The earth belongs to God, and He will dispose of it as He pleases. Naboth held his vineyard by divine right (1 Kings 21), but at the present time, whatever a man may hold providentially, he cannot prove that he has a divine right to it. If the world is claimed and divided by men, God is not in such an order of things, though He may be over it providentially, therefore His first principle in dealing with men is separation. Thus, there was a solemn call to Abraham, “Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee”. He had to come out of all things in which he had been before, that he might please God. He obeyed the call of God and, so to speak, was sanctified.
Israel went down into Egypt. Now, the only way in which God could be known in Egypt was as a judge, therefore if He would bless Israel, He must call them out. Time after time Moses went to Pharaoh with God’s demand, “Let my people go”. They were called out, and then the Red Sea was brought between them and Egypt; they were never more to return to Egypt. Had God been in Egypt, do you think He would have called His people out? He was not in it, and therefore when He came to deal with His people He called them out.
After Christ was born into this world He became identified with God’s people from the very outset. To avoid Herod’s malice He was taken down into Egypt; then again we have the principle, “Out of Egypt have I called my son”. Thus was He identified with the people in the eye of God.
[p. 277] Now I wish to shew you how the call of God reaches us in the gospel. The gospel does not reach us for the purpose of settling us in the things in which it finds us naturally, but to call us out from them. God is not in the things in which we are naturally, and therefore the gospel comes to call us out, and to separate us to God. His people are not to be reckoned among the nations. The Lord Jesus Christ gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world. The great object of the gospel is that we might have the privilege of knowing God in the sphere in which He works. The power of God does not come out in this world. Evil of every kind abounds, and it is not yet the time for God’s power to be shewn in signs and judgments. The sphere of His operations is the resurrection sphere, and if we know Him in that, it is easily seen that we are thus taken out of the sphere of things which are natural to us. We cannot now claim country or kindred, for we have been called out that we might know God in the sphere in which His power works.
The foundation of all God’s ways is the declaration of His righteousness in the death of Christ. The blood of Christ is the vindication and establishment of God’s righteousness in regard to all that would call it in question. Now in Him, as Lord, God has been pleased to set forth all His thoughts in regard to man. All that is in His heart for men is established in the Lord Jesus Christ. We have peace, reconciliation, and eternal life, in contrast to disturbance, distance, and death. All this is established in the Lord Jesus Christ in resurrection. He has gone to the right hand of God, and the Holy Spirit has come to shed abroad in man’s heart the love of God, to make good in us all that is in the heart of God for man.
When we look at Peter in Acts 2 and 3, we find that what gained the attention of the people and surprised them, was the power of the Holy Spirit. They were [p. 278] confounded at the power which had come down from a risen Christ. To the man at the beautiful gate of the temple Peter said, “Silver and gold have I none”, but he had the power of the risen Christ, in which the man was enabled to stand up and walk and leap. It was resurrection power. The apostles had themselves reached the resurrection sphere, and were the instruments of the power by which God works in that sphere.
I think the tendency of the present day is to connect the gospel with country, kindred, and father’s house. We appropriate Christ by faith, and call on Him as Lord; then we are entitled to peace, reconciliation, and eternal life. The Holy Spirit has come down from a risen Christ to shed abroad the love of God in our hearts. But the object in all is to separate us from everything down here to God Himself. We are sanctified in the Spirit, and God takes the first place with us, even in the duties of the wilderness. We are called out to know God in the blessed sphere where His power operates.