THE KNOWLEDGE OF CHRIST IN RELATION TO THE GOSPEL AND THE ASSEMBLY (4)

THE KNOWLEDGE OF CHRIST IN RELATION TO THE GOSPEL AND THE ASSEMBLY (4)

1 Peter 2: 1 - 8; Colossians 1: 18; Ephesians 3: 14 - 21

SMcC The brethren will note how full and great this subject is. In Ephesians 2 the assembly grows to a holy temple in the Lord. That is not an arbitrary position. The assembly will be a holy temple in the Lord, in the millennial world, because it is composed of persons who have been built up in the knowledge of Christ - not in any meagre way, but in a rich and full way. Any matter therefore that arises as to the knowledge of Christ - the personnel of the assembly, the holy city, will not be lacking in supplying the knowledge that is necessary, for the temple means that. The expression, “in the Lord”, means that there will be an administration of knowledge in the millennial world through the assembly. That knowledge is not acquired in heaven exactly; it is being acquired now. At the rapture we enter upon final conditions and there will be no growth in the knowledge, we have referred to, after the rapture. In between the two great events, the rapture and the appearing, there will be the judgment seat of Christ, or the judgment seat of God as Romans refers to it, in which our place in the kingdom will be determined, according to our faithfulness now in the time of suffering and reproach. Then the Lord will come out with the saints. He comes, as we know and have been taught, for us at the rapture, and He comes to us at the Supper, but He comes with us in the appearing. It will be a wonderful manifestation, because God is going to bring in knowledge, and the glory of the Lord is going to cover the earth as the waters the sea. Now what we are considering all enters into this, because the knowledge that will be disseminated in the millennial world is not a knowledge that is arbitrarily imparted when we get to glory, it is a knowledge that the souls of the saints are built up in now. It is now or never! We want to see, therefore, and especially those of us who are younger, that the present time is the time. The millennial day, wonderful as it will be, will not equal the present time. While God’s triumph will be displayed over evil in a public way, and sin will be held in check (although it may break out) yet the glory of the millennial world will not equal the glory of the present moment. We want to see the advantages of the present moment, and lay ourselves out in relation to them. We never get anything unless we lay ourselves out to reap the gain of the advantages that are present in our day. The passages we have read bear upon the building up of our souls in the knowledge of Christ in relation to the assembly in a general way, and in a spiritual way. It is not so much in a local or testimonial way - although there is a close link in Peter with the testimonial position in our localities, but it is a spiritual house. The world certainly does not understand, nor can they see a spiritual house. They may see the fruits of it. All these passages refer to the spiritual and inward side of the assembly and Christ comes on to our view in a very distinctive manner. The first passage presents the structural side, where Christ is presented as the “living stone”; in Colossians it is the organic side, Christ as “the head of the body”. That is a wonderful feature of knowledge in which we would want our souls built up. In Ephesians it is “the Christ”. Ephesians gives us what is official. Colossians is not official. Ephesians is official in its teaching and therefore you can understand that in the great domain, referred to in the passage we read, the title “the Christ” is employed. That is the official title of the Lord Jesus in regard to the operative side. Then we have the agricultural thought in relation to ourselves in that we are “rooted and founded in love”. Christ acquires a place in that kind of environment, so that He dwells in our hearts. He is contemplated, in the prayer, as dwelling in our hearts. Then we have His love - the love of that wonderful Person, who has consummated the great operations of God in regard to the spiritual realm of which we are in the very centre with Him; as it says: “To know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge; that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”. Now, it is very interesting that it does not say, ‘To know the power of the Spirit, the love of Christ and the knowledge of the Father, that ye may be filled to all the fulness of God’. The stress is on “the Christ”, that He may dwell in our hearts, and that we may know “the love of the Christ”. The love of the Christ is the mediatorial thought and we are in the presence, in that passage, of the full result of mediatorial operations, so that there might be “glory to God in the assembly in Christ Jesus”.

This passage in Peter is a very affecting one: “To whom coming” - that is the Person we are speaking of - “a living stone, cast away indeed as worthless by men, but with God chosen, precious”, The writer is Peter, Peter who left the boat, Peter, who said, “Lord, if it be thou, command me to come to thee upon the waters”. Peter is the one who is writing.

LES “The latter glory of this house” (Haggai 2: 9) is greater now than it will be in its literal setting in the coming day, because it is clothed today with all the fullest and most glorious thoughts of God that have been unfolded. The place that the saints have in the heart of Christ, according to divine counsel, and the place they will fill in the millennial day and in the day of eternity, is to be understood now in the fullest way of understanding, in the power of the Spirit.

SMcC The presence of the Spirit, in the days of recovery, and the way in which Christ makes Himself known to the assembly in the word to the Philadelphians, would show what you are saying. Philadelphia is introduced into the greatest things possible for the creature.

LES “Do ye not then know that the saints shall judge the world?” 1 Corinthians 6: 2. Does that not confirm what you are saying as to how the millennial setting will be filled out? How we need to understand fully the position now!

SMcC Yes, it is remarkable. It says: “Do ye not then know that the saints shall judge the world? and if the world is judged by you, are ye unworthy of the smallest judgments? Do ye not know that we shall judge angels?” Where does that come about? Think of that! Think of the greatness of the angels, having been created long before man and their higher rank in the created order of things. But think of what has come about through redemption and the exaltation of man in Christ so that we shall judge angels as well as the world!

WBG That would not be so apart from redemption.

SMcC No, because redemption has made a great change. Man has always been God’s greatest thought. The angels were not God’s greatest thought. In creation the angels were higher in rank than man, but Christ having come into manhood and redemption having been accomplished, that is changed. Man, in Christ, takes precedence of the angels. I think there is a lingering thought with some that when we get to glory, we will have a wonderful knowledge that we never had here, but our knowledge in glory will not be any different from our knowledge now.

WBG Why does Peter introduce the thought as to the kingdom and the government of God?

SMcC I think it is important to see that while he is writing about these subjects, he brings in the thought of the assembly as the spiritual house. He does not develop it, because it was not his ministry; he was given the keys of the kingdom, but the administration of the dispensation of the assembly was not his, it was Paul’s. The same with John. The dispensation of the assembly was not John’s, it was Paul’s. Nevertheless, John gives us things that Paul does not give us. Thus Peter here would leave, in our minds, something to look into as to the spiritual house. He would impart a touch as to it, that would enliven our interest so that we might look into it more.

WBG As being of the dispersion, in principle.

SMcC You can see that the dispersion in the government of God did not alter spiritual thoughts. However much they were suffering, as dispersed of God through the persecution that arose at the time of Stephen, this remains. Jerusalem literally may go, but the spiritual house and the living stones remain. But before Peter speaks of this, the reference to the constitutional side is very important, “Laying aside therefore all malice and all guile and hypocrisies and envyings and all evil speakings, as newborn babes desire earnestly the pure mental milk of the word” - notice the reference to knowledge - “the pure mental milk of the word”. It comes into our subject that we are to desire this side. The mental milk is a reference to knowledge that we have before us, in which we are to be built up.

JAK So that salvation seems to be connected with it.

SMcC As the mind is built up in spiritual knowledge and the apprehension of Christ, it becomes a means of salvation. We all know that if you are ignorant about a matter you may fall into it. I mean, for example, if you are ignorant that there is a hole in the middle of the road you may fall into it.

To transfer that to what is moral and spiritual - it means that as your mind is enlightened by the mental milk of the word and your soul is built up in knowledge, you learn to avoid the pitfall.

LES What you are saying is really very wonderful because it shows us something of the constitution of a Christian. In his mind, through the workings of divine grace, there are affinities to the Logos.

SMcC That is the point. We want to see the practical bearing of desiring the pure mental milk of the word. We use this word so carelessly. Sometimes you hear a person being written off by this word: ‘Oh, he is all mental’, or ‘It is all mental with him’. But we want to see that this is a prime word in Christianity, and that the mental is a very important side in Christianity. How are our young people going to be saved, except by the pure mental milk of the word and growing by it? They go to the drug stores and they go to the shops and they look at the novels and they look at the fiction magazines, especially those with sexual appeal, and corrupt lusts are aroused that belong to the flesh, and they do not read the Word, and do not desire the pure mental milk of it. How can they grow? Novels and fictitious literature are destroying to their minds and to their souls.

Rem It puts special emphasis on these kind of gatherings that our minds may be instructed in the way of truth.

SMcC That is it. You take a person who goes into the low company where the most corrupt and filthy subjects are dwelt upon. He is bound to become affected by it, it could not be otherwise; his mind becomes saturated with that kind of thing. Whereas the assembly is a means of salvation, where we get the mental milk of the word ministered, where growth is taken account of, and where we get the pure streams that are spiritual and heavenly in origin and character.

UG “I myself with the mind serve God’s law”, Romans 7: 25.

SMcC Never was there a time when there was so much literature around and especially of a corrupt nature and character. Our minds are to be in control. We are not to allow them to flow loosely and carelessly. We know what the flesh is and how it is drawn out by these things that are of no value whatever. We need therefore to see the importance of our minds being controlled, so that the Scriptures have a great place with us and what divine Persons say has a great place with us.

AJ It says in 1 Corinthians 2: 16, “We have the mind of Christ” - the thinking faculty of Christ. Would that link with what you are suggesting now as to the renewed mind?

SMcC Yes, it shows the value of the assembly in that way, for that is a collective reference, meaning that amongst the saints there is this kind of thinking faculty and a very important thing it is.

Rem In our scripture it says: “grow up to salvation” as though there is advance in it.

SMcC That is it. The believer thus, especially in the tender stages, would go towards the mental milk of the word. Some of us were commenting the other day out on the farm, that the young animals, without instruction, know where to draw sustenance from. Well, the young believer, in a much greater way, should know where to draw sustenance. The “pure mental milk of the word” bears on what is constitutional and the instincts are in the believer, if they are not suppressed.

ABM'N In Psalm 119, there is an excellent phrase: “Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his path? by taking heed according to thy word” (verse 9).

SMcC A very important passage! Psalm 119 is a wonderful psalm in that relation, bringing out the importance of the word, as he says in another verse, “Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against thee” (verse 11). Think of a person hiding God’s word in his heart! He is going down to the shop and instead of looking around on what would damage every spiritual instinct, he hides God’s word in his heart (or her heart) that he might not sin against God.

Ques Does the renewing of your mind come into this?

SMcC It does, because our minds have to be renewed, so that there is constant freshness maintained.

ABM'N Why is the idea of the newborn babe introduced in that setting?

SMcC Peter has in mind normal Christianity. Paul could not speak to the Corinthians as unto spiritual; he had to speak to them as babes. It was a question of stunted growth with them, for they were carnal. ‘Carnal’ is a remarkable word. An unconverted man cannot exactly be carnal; it is only a believer who can be carnal. It is the believer turning to things that engage the unconverted man that makes him carnal. Peter has in mind the normal growth and development of our souls by the pure mental milk of the word. Oh, how we want to go in for what is pure! The ministry brings before us what is pure. We shall not get impure thoughts from it. We go into the shops and other places, and there are all kinds of things available, magazines with lurid illustrations to appeal to us, and if we are not girt about in the loins of our minds by the truth, we shall allow ourselves to settle on them in our minds and become damaged and defiled. We then become impure.

Rem As well as going in for what is positive, he mentions here things to be laid aside.

SMcC We all know that if a young man or woman is going in for something in the world, some position for example, there are certain things that must be laid aside until the end is reached. It is the same in Christianity. If we are going to grow up to salvation, through the pure mental milk of the word, we have to lay certain things aside. Now look what they are: malice, all guile, hypocrisies, envyings, evil speakings! How much damage has come into local positions by these five kings, on the necks of which you might say, we have to put our foot, as in the days of Joshua!

Rem By these things we are preserved.

SMcC The instincts are in us by the incorruptible and abiding word of God. The right instincts are there, but we sometimes ignore them. We all know that instinct tells us that we should not read certain books, yet sometimes the more corrupt suggestions in them the more we are driven towards them by the enemy, through the flesh. It is Satan working as he did through Amalek. We do not want to drown or suppress our instincts; let them assert themselves.

WBG So the suggestion is very strong: “desire earnestly”.

SMcC None of us gets anywhere without earnestness.

LES The Holy Scriptures and the ministry cover the need of what is constitutional in relation to manhood. Our minds need not be diverted. There are certain features that might be necessary for the filling out of matters, but in general the Holy Scriptures and the ministry are sufficient for the completing of everything. The Psalm 119 covers every letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

SMcC Therefore the importance of the Scriptures. It is really painful, to a spiritual mind and heart, how little the Scriptures are read. We may read them in a family way, but we should addict ourselves to the reading of the Scriptures, so that our minds are coloured by the reading of the Scripture, for therein is our salvation.

Rem Do we get a similar thought in Proverbs 5: 15, “Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well”?

SMcC We do not want to go to the world’s cisterns or wells. They are corrupt.

JHS Is not this matter of tasting a challenge as we contemplate it?

SMcC And is it not remarkable? It says, “If indeed ye have tasted” - not ‘that the word is good’ but, “that the Lord is good”. Notice the interchange of the expression now, for after all, the Lord is the living word, as our brother was referring to earlier. He is referred to as the Word; the Lord Jesus is the living Word. And notice how when speaking about the pure mental milk of the word, it immediately turns and says: “if indeed ye have tasted that the Lord is good”.

LES Would you say a word now as to our households, as to our children? Paul says to Timothy, “from a child thou hast known the sacred letters”, as if the Holy Scriptures became his food in his youthful days. One speaks feelingly but one feels that our children are often nursed up on literature that is not of any real value to them.

SMcC That is right. We need to see to it that the Scriptures have their proper place. I find, from experience, we do not have so much difficulty with the children when they are babes and when they are children as regards the Scriptures. It is the teenage that presents the difficulty and even after the teenage. It is then they think that they have a right to assert their own personality and a right to choose What they should read, as they think, and there is nothing more damaging. Whereas it is that time of life that the gain of the reading of the Scriptures is to be valued, because in our tender years there is, through the work of God, a peculiar ability to take in and be impressed by, the Scripture.

JAK Paul says to Timothy: “Till I come, give thyself to reading ... Occupy thyself with these things: be wholly in them”, 1 Timothy 4: 13 - 15.

SMcC It is a humbling thing to say, but there may be reproach among the brethren in relation to it. If a young brother or a young sister sets himself or herself to be devoted to the truth, they may come under the reproach of other young brethren in the locality. It may be said: ‘Oh, you think you are better than we are!’ and they may ridicule them. That is a very humbling thing.

WBG In principle is that not what Joseph carried on with?

SMcC I was thinking of Joseph. That was the attitude his brethren took towards him. They would not even greet him with friendliness, because he exposed them. It is very humbling how young people think they have to observe a certain code of honour amongst themselves. They do not tell on one another. We are not speaking about ordinary things, but about sin. If young people know that sin exists and they are a witness to it and they do not speak of it, they are held responsible by God. They are guilty according to Leviticus 5.

UG I was thinking of Isaac dwelling with his father. It is something that is affecting the young; they do not want to dwell with the older brethren.

SMcC That is the modern age. We need to see the value of Abraham dwelling with Isaac and Jacob. Now this passage goes on: “To whom coming, a living stone, cast away indeed as worthless by men, but with God chosen, precious, yourselves also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house”, The “coming” and the “living stones” here bring out the vital side in our souls in relation to the work of God. It is not ‘to whom ye came’, but “to whom coming”.

Ques Is the ‘coming’ an initial thought, or is it the believer coming to the Lord in this way?

SMcC It is coming to Him, a living stone; the whole context is to be taken into account. It says “cast away indeed as worthless by men, but with God chosen, precious”. That is, it involves the death and resurrection of Christ, meaning that we are coming to Him in relation to a new order and new condition of things. It is not exactly our relief, but coming to Him as the great focal point in the new system, that is established for God, “a spiritual house ... to offer spiritual sacrifices”.

JHS Is Nathaniel in John’s gospel, one such? He is taken account of as coming.

SMcC He is. It shows there is movement in our souls toward Christ, because we are living stones. There is affinity in our souls with Christ as on this line and it involves that we have to leave things. If my mind is to go on with certain things in this world, well, the Lord says: ‘If that is your mind, let it be your mind’, That is a terrible thing. It says “And let the filthy make himself filthy still”, Revelation 22: 11. That is the Lord’s word. If I consent to go on with what is filthy, then the Lord says, ‘Let him be filthy still’, It is like the word in Hosea, “Ephraim is joined to idols: leave him alone”, Hosea 4: 17. What a terrible thing that is! If we only got a realisation of that in our souls - to be left alone!

JHS Does it really amount to us having as much as we want spiritually?

SMcC It is a question too, of our reactions to the way Christ presents Himself. In Matthew 14 the Lord came to them on the water in the fourth watch of the night. He did not go to the boat and take Peter out of it, but Peter had to come out of the boat himself, and he did.

WBG So the whole section is very important, the early part providing the desire for this kind of food.

SMcC You can understand therefore the bearing the food would have on living stones, because the wording is anomalous. Whoever heard of living stones? But that is what we are, and constitution lies behind that.

LES Are these stones taken out of Jordan, and now moving rightly they have had to do with the Lord?

SMcC He is the great Centre of attraction, like the ark going through the Jordan. The Person of Christ is the great centre of attraction here involving movement. What will happen at the rapture is on the great principle of attraction. We know that we cannot go up now at our own bidding, but we will go up then without any difficulty. What will be the difference? It will be the great law of attraction.

LES The great, mighty, magnet, the Person of the Lord Jesus.

SMcC That is what it will be at the rapture and that is what it should be now in the assembly. We should be held to Christ in spiritual movement in our souls in relation to the structure in its present form and setting.

Ques Would it help us to get away from looking at things as ‘worthless’, but rather to see them from God’s side - “chosen ... precious”? Then further down it is “spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God”.

SMcC What value attaches to the position in that light! What apprehension do we have of this? Are our souls being built up in the knowledge of Christ? Have we the experience of coming to Him as the living Stone?

LES “To you therefore who believe is the preciousness”.

SMcC This was said to believers who were dispersed, in the government of God. Despite their suffering, and the reproach of their circumstances, Peter is seeking to impress them with what abides. So he uses expressions like, “an incorruptible and undefiled and unfading inheritance” in chapter 1 of the epistle. We want to see what is incorruptible and unfading.

WBG That comes to us as accepting the government of God.

SMcC Christianity does not take us out of the sphere of the government of God. It leaves us there, but helps us to reign in life in that sphere. So that instead of being under the circumstances, and turning aside through them, we are reigning in life in them - not grieving, but superior to them through grace.

LES What could be more dignified than what Peter says in chapter 1: 2, “Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace to you and peace be multiplied”. What a position to come to in our souls!

SMcC These great thoughts should affect us. The world little knows what the saints are. You take Gothenburg; the brethren are looked upon with contempt by some, but think of how God looks upon them! We want to get that into our souls. God looks at them as corresponding with Christ, the living Stone. They are living stones “being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ”.

Now in Colossians, we have the hidden position. It is the position of mystery and that is a great test to many of us. Colossians corresponds in a certain way with Philadelphia. Philadelphia has accepted death to the world and Christ has become everything,

and that is what Colossians really means in its teaching. We are content with a hidden, secret position. The world does not understand, know or see it. But the believer knows, understands and sees it. So the Person of Christ is before us in the section in a peculiar way. We have not time to refer to the different things that are alluded to, but this verse 18 says: “And he is the head of the body, the assembly; who is the beginning, firstborn from among the dead, that he might have the first place in all things”. It is as if it is among the last things that are referred to, this wonderful glory that attaches to Christ. He is the Head of the body, the body bringing in the mysterious side, in the saints here.

JHS Because it is hidden, is that why you say it is not official?

SMcC That is it. It is Christ apprehended personally and cherished in the affections. It is like what we have in Rahab; she secreted the men, hid them under the stalks of flax. That is the Colossian idea. The world is puzzled, they do not know. They would like to know what lies behind our position and where things are. Colossians involves that Christ is known spiritually, operating in a living way amongst us. It is Christ among the Gentiles, the hope of glory.

JHS So what we have had in Peter lays the basis for appreciation, “your life is hid with the Christ in God”, Colossians 3: 3.

SMcC It does, because the Person to whom we have come in Peter, is the Person in Colossians who is our life. And the life is hid. The world cannot enter into it, nor understand it, but the believer understands it. The saints know it. How important it is that our souls should be built up in the knowledge of Christ as Head, because wisdom is involved in that and resource, guidance and direction, in a subtle, inward, spiritual way.

JAK That is, headship is an inward influence under which the saints are moving.

SMcC In lordship it is an authoritative influence, but in headship it is an inward influence, through the affections. Lordship is through the mind and the conscience; headship is through the affections.

JHS So that ‘impulse’ is the word that would fit in.

SMcC The link between Christ and the body, in Colossians, is marvellous because the body lives in the life of the Head. The Head, as presented in Colossians, is the Head who is risen in glory, who lives in the power of indissoluble life. He is the One who is our Priest, but Colossians is presenting Him as our Head. As the Head of the body, He is the source of all direction in the body. Any move that the body makes, it makes by His impulse and His direction.

Rem “That he might have the first place in all things”. ‘All things’ covers a lot of territory.

SMcC It does. It is remarkable that in Colossians you get two references to Christ in that way. In the verse read in chapter 1: “that he might have the first place in all things”, and then in chapter 3: 11 in regard to the new man: “Wherein there is not Greek and Jew, circumcision and uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bondman, freeman; but Christ is everything, and in all”. The great point of Colossians is that Christ becomes everything to us. God is not said to be everything. God is said, in a coming day, to be “all in all” (1 Corinthians 15: 28), but Christ is said to be “everything and in all”, and that “he might have the first place in all things”.

Ques Does that involve His manhood?

SMcC It involves His manhood, but it involves the greatness of the Person who has come into manhood. His headship is linked with His manhood, but lying behind it is the greatness of His Person.

CAH Would you explain a little more what this “everything, and in all” means?

SMcC I think it means that Christ characterises everything. He is everything in the way of character, characterising the whole position in relation to what is new.

CAH Would it refer at all to persons?

SMcC “In all” would bring in the thought of persons, although it may involve more. He is ‘everything’ as characterising things, and ‘in all’ involving state.

WBG Would the present moment be involved in Christ being everything?

SMcC The reference is to the new man. The new man is a provisional testimonial thought; it is not an eternal thought, and it is in that relation that Christ is said to be “everything, and in all”.

WBG In spite of every circumstance that would interfere.

SMcC Showing that there is nothing that can arise in our history here but what He can be to us all that is necessary. He is everything, not some things, but everything. The contrast is the old man with his deeds and what marks him. In relation to our subject, the building up of our souls in the knowledge of Christ, this knowledge of His headship is very important, because it helps is as to where to turn for direction and influence and impulse.

JHS Would philosophy and vain deceit in this epistle involve just that, turning to other sources?

SMcC It does. It is turning to the world, in that sense. It may be in a religious way, we are turning to other sources than Christ, whereas Christ is to be everything. He is to have the first place in all things. That is objective, but “everything and in all” involves what is subjective. We do not therefore need to go outside of Christ for anything.

JHS So the new man, bearing the features of Christ, would involve His being in all.

SMcC Exactly. Now we must come to Ephesians. I think it is very affecting the way that Christ is alluded to here. This is a well-known passage, oft gone over, but the particular thing that is in one’s mind in relation to our subject, is “that the Christ may dwell, through faith, in your hearts, being rooted and founded in love, in order that ye may be fully able to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height; and to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge; that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”. “The Christ” is a wonderful reference to the operating side, but not, as in Colossians, the Person in His divine majesty and grandeur, as being divine and as having part in the Deity. “The Christ” here involves the greatness of the Person in relation to operations in the mediatorial economy, in that wonderful arrangement divinely devised, into which God - Father, Son and Spirit has come. The great Operator is this Person, “the Christ”. And in the result of the operations He is in the very centre of the vastness of the divine domain and we are with Him in the centre of it. He dwelling in our hearts by faith, reminds us that it is still the position down here, it is not eternity yet. And then it says: “to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge”. I believe we need to weigh that statement in view of the building up of our souls in the knowledge of Christ in this relation.

JHS Could you help us as to your early allusion in this reading to the official side here?

SMcC We know that in Colossians the great thought is Christ. His personal glory being peculiarly before us; whereas the great thought in Ephesians is God. In referring to the official side, we are using the word ‘official’ in the right sense. The Christ is alluded to in a peculiar way in Ephesians because He is officially the appointed Operator in the divine economy for bringing to pass divine thoughts.

JHS So I think it has been said that His headship in Ephesians is according to God’s sovereignty.

SMcC Just so; whereas, His headship in Colossians is because of what He is personally; He takes that place, He is Head of the body. But in Ephesians, He is appointed Head, as it says: “and gave him to be head over all things to the assembly, which is his body”, Ephesians 1: 22.

Ques Would Joseph in Egypt represent that same thought?

SMcC Well, Joseph on the administrative side would correspond in that He brought everything, in the working out of the administration, in subjection to Pharaoh. Just as Christ, in the operations and working out of things, brings everything in results to God.

LES You have something in mind as to the love of the Christ.

SMcC It is important we should see how it comes in here: “and to know the love of the Christ, which surpasses knowledge”. Why should it come in in this passage, in this way? It shows that while the official glory of Christ, as the great divine Operator, is impressed upon our minds in this great, vast system of glory, yet the love of Christ is projected on to our view, as if to suggest His relations with us on this line. It is not so much on the official line now, but on the inward line, such as the Lord’s supper builds us up in relation to.

LES So there is nothing greater than to understand, and to know, and to be responsive to, the love of the Christ in this setting. It is love in its most exalted and highest setting.

SMcC It is. We might have thought it would have said ‘to know the love of God which surpasses knowledge’, but it does not, it says, “to know the love of the Christ”, the official divine Operator, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Christ, that blessed Person as apprehended in this realm, has expressed a love to which we may say there is no equal. It is a love both that is divine, because it surpasses knowledge, but it is a love that we have constantly been helped in relation to through the Lord’s supper, involving His relations with the assembly here.

CAH Would Joseph again come in there as showing his love to his brethren in the administration of affairs?

SMcC There would be a link in the sense of his love for them although in fulness I do not think that Joseph’s position takes us to what we have here. That involves more the Colossian position - Christ amongst the Gentiles, but here, where it refers to the breadth and length and depth and height, it is the eternal scene that is projected on to our view, while we are still in a position where faith is required. I think it would involve a higher aspect of the love of Christ than we have in Joseph’s love for the brethren.

JAK Would you say something as to “the fulness of God”?

SMcC I think the love of the Christ bears on it, “and to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge; that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”. That filling to all the fulness of God is not arbitrary, but through this channel - the Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith and knowing the love of the Christ. It is the glory of the mediatorial system in which the Christ has come on to our view as operating with this in mind that we should be brought to all that God is in the outshining of Himself in Christ.

JAK Would it be right to say that it is all that is knowable of God set forth in Christ?

SMcC It is to affect our souls that the allusion to the Christ here has in mind that we should be filled to all the fulness of God. It is not exactly filled to the fulness of the Christ, although Ephesians does refer to “the measure of the stature of the fulness of the Christ”, which is wonderful in itself, but the Christ is operating here, and His love is serving towards the end, that we should be filled to the supreme thought, to all that God is in the outshining of Himself in His nature.

JHS Is the same thought of His love carried forward into chapter 5 where it says: “the Christ is head of the assembly” and then alludes to His love: “as the Christ also loved the assembly”?

SMcC I think so. I think “the love of the Christ” embraces His personal relations with the assembly. It is very affecting that as we reach God in His fulness, we are helped along the road, we might say, by the love of the Christ. It is a tremendous advantage, as the Song of Songs would show, for there the journeys and movements are by the one who leans upon her beloved. As our souls therefore are built up in the knowledge of the love of the Christ, it has a sustaining effect in regard to reaching God as indicated in these passages.

WBG Would it give lustre and distinctiveness at the Supper in relation to Christ?

SMcC It would, and it also helps us to see that it is not through academic means that we reach God in His fulness. It is through our souls being built up in the knowledge of the Mediator, the divine Operator. It is not only the knowledge of what He is in His operations, but the knowledge of what He is in His personal relations with the assembly. It says, “The love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge”.

LES As rooted and founded in love, does that not show the way by which we reach it?

SMcC We are not strangers to this scene. We are indigenous to it, we belong to it as rooted in it. That is a word for us: Where are our roots? Are they in the world, in our families, or business, or in this realm where the Christ is to dwell in our hearts and where we reach, through the sustaining power of the apprehension of His love, the fulness of God?