ASSEMBLY MATERIAL (2)
[p. 445] ASSEMBLY MATERIAL (2)
Philippians 1:1 - 11; 1 Thessalonians 1:1 - 10
JT Perhaps we should begin with Thessalonians.
ANW Are you suggesting that it is a younger assembly?
JT Yes; we have had much as to Philippi this afternoon, and I think this epistle is intended to show how results may be quick from divine sowing, may be early. Philippians will show purity and depth, but Thessalonians is intended to show how in certain fields there are quick results; in others, they are slower.
ANW Why is it that there is a small slight put on them in the Acts?
JT You mean the Bereans were more noble? Of course that would not allude to the saints; that would rather allude to the Thessalonians as such, but still it gives us a clue as to the characteristics of the place and the people. The Bereans were an inquiring people, a people that would look into things and prove them and have them confirmed — a very important feature.
TH Are you alluding to the quick results because of the apostle’s having been there only three Sabbath days?
JT Yes; it was a very short period of service. The results were rapid — rapid growth. We get that in agriculture.
CAM You were alluding this afternoon to the matter of soil, and you have just made reference to the matter of agriculture. Do you propose to look at it as growth in this connection?
JT Yes; as to the soil yielding quickly.
CAM It has another setting, too. We were considering it as a stronghold gained for God. Does the thought of conquest enter into it?
JT Thessalonians or Philippians?
CAM I was really referring to the line we were [p. 446] pursuing this afternoon, God getting the best of the conflict; the enemy has a power established in a way, and God comes in and gets the victory. Do you look at it like that?
JT Yes, I do.
AFM Would an example of quick results be seen in John 4? as if the Lord sowed and the results were almost immediate — many of the Samaritans believed on Him.
JT That is a good example.
HAS It is remarkable that in floriculture, quick growth is brought about by a warm moist atmosphere. That is what we need in divine things, an atmosphere of warmth and love.
ANW Referring to John 4, what was meant by the harvests being white?
JT Well, I think there was much there from Old Testament sowing. That is what the Lord alludes to, corresponding with our own times. The Spirit of God has our own times in mind in John, times when there is much result from earlier sowing.
AFM There was no particular welcome from their houses in John 4. The Lord stayed there two days, but there was no response to the testimony as there was in the place before us this afternoon.
JT There is nothing said about households in Samaria; where He stayed, we do not know. The testimony often has very poor housing, while there may be evangelical work carried on. I believe that has marked christianity for centuries. It has had very little household protection; whereas there has been considerable evangelisation. What the Lord is looking for now is household accommodation. That is what David thought of, and that is what we should think of — household accommodation for the testimony. David thought of it, and was reminded of it when the house of Obed-edom was blessed because of that. He would [p. 447] build an house of habitation for the mighty God of Jacob.
ANW I wondered whether the light as regards baptism would help in that regard.
JT I think it has. The Lord has been helping the brethren in the last forty years on the line of the households, and I believe the truth as a whole has gained enormously through it; the testimony is housed in a brother’s house, and those who represent the Lord, make way for the assembly.
CAM The reference to Samaria that there were no households mentioned and what you said about it helps. There is nothing to build on in certain areas where evangelisation has been carried on but where there has been no holding to basic things, and where things are confused as in Samaria.
JT In the evangelical effort of the past seventy-five years, since 1859, extending back to Whitfield and Wesley and carried down to modern times in Moody and Sankey, there has been no thought of housing the testimony; that is what resulted immediately here at Philippi. It is not prominent in Thessalonica; it is not mentioned: but it is well to keep it before us in our inquiry now. Assembly material and assembly formation and household accommodation for the testimony as in the assembly all require households, believers’ households.
JS Would not material for the testimony be largely secured from the household?
JT I think it is. That is how it comes now and the provision of accommodation in households in a locality where there is to be a meeting, or where there is a meeting, for those who represent the Lord in a special way, is an immense service and leads to the full thought of the household itself in the assembly where the work is housed.
FHL Would Lydia and the honourable women [p. 448] suggest the subjective work in love, which would be a principle in connection with that?
JT I think that is right. The woman is largely the one who graces the house and makes provision for entertaining the Lord’s servants, and I believe in a new meeting or in any meeting, that the assembly position is immensely augmented by hospitable households.
AFM Do you not think that what Aquila and Priscilla did for Apollos, taking him home and helping him there, is a principle; we can all speak of being helped in houses, being invited there through affection and personal interest, and it has been more to us perhaps than a good address?
JS At the beginning, it would appear that the enemy’s attacks were largely on households.
JT As was remarked this afternoon, they beset the house of Jason. That would be the enemy’s effort to get rid of that house and damage it; so that hospitality, I believe, is opened up particularly in Acts 16, and runs on. Hospitality is intended to augment the assembly, so that in the end of chapter 16, the apostles went to Lydia’s, as if to honour the hospitality there.
JS Would the goodness of God be seen in the addition to households, in that way?
JT You can see how much opportunity there is for the goodness of God in a man’s household; how it becomes an opportunity for God to show His goodness, what the house is as for Him, what there is for God in it. A reading is held and there is morning prayer and the altar, and the smoke of the man’s altar ascends every morning. It is a wonderful thing for heaven; I am sure of that.
ANW It is particularly interesting in Philippi in connection with Lydia and the jailor because there is a large spoil in each. It does not say that Lydia was married, but she had a house; it is that that was [p. 449] very important.
CAM The daily maintenance of the morning and evening sacrifice, as you were mentioning, seems almost to require household conditions. It must add greatly to a place.
JT I am afraid that it is very much neglected, I mean, the morning and evening oblation and lamb.
CAM I think the emphasis that has been laid on it, the recent emphasis, has probably had a very great effect on households.
JT Now coming to Thessalonica, there is a suggestion of quick results, but then quick results may not be so stable, and the second epistle to the Thessalonians would show that they were in danger of being easily shaken by the enemy and easily turned aside and damaged by various things being brought to them, but we get the lovely side of youthfulness in the Thessalonians. They were said to be in God the Father.
JS How do you view that?
JT I think it refers to the delightful freshness of youth in God the Father. It meant they were in the Father’s affections. You do not get it just that way in any other epistle.
ANW How long after the first was the second writing, for they are also called there “in God our Father”?
JT It was not very long. They still retain their freshness, but they have been shaken a bit, and the epistle, of course, is to steady them in respect of the coming of Christ and the day of the Lord. That line of instruction is very important now when we are apt to turn aside on current happenings and the fulfilment of prophecy, so the apostle makes it very plain that the great falling away that is to come is before the man of sin appears.
CAM Does the mention of the Father imply that these are the little ones?
JT Well, they were youthful believers, but very [p. 450] fresh and vigorous and intelligent, too. That is what is in mind, I think.
JEH The statement that they had turned to God from idols is very beautiful. It shows they had great light about God in their souls to turn to Him.
JT You will notice the very idea of God, the word and title, is very frequent in this epistle.
AFM It is Roman-like in character. In the second epistle, had the hope of that day in their hearts become dim? It is not mentioned at the beginning of the second epistle. Is that because they were shaken?
JT I suppose so. They were thinking of the day of the Lord. They were rendered fearful, and necessarily they were darkened, I suppose.
RWS They were spoken of as being imitators. Was that good?
JT That is the point I think we should notice in a young assembly. “And ye became our imitators, and of the Lord, having accepted the word in much tribulation with joy of the Holy Spirit, so that ye became models to all that believe”. They became imitators of Paul, and later it says, “For ye, brethren, have become imitators of the assemblies of God which are in Judaea in Christ Jesus”, 1 Thessalonians 2:14. That is an important part of the instruction, for youthful christians, or a youthful assembly, to be imitators of Paul, and then of the Lord, and then of the assemblies at a distance, the assemblies in Judaea; it meant that they were not national in their feelings; they picked their model from a distance, the assemblies that were most likely to be according to the mind of God, those in Judaea at that time.
CAM This word is not used as we sometimes use it. This was a dignified following of a model.
JT It is good when the model that you are following is right, especially when it begins with Paul and then goes on to the Lord. It shows that it is on the up line; I am not being damaged by [p. 451] it.
JS How far would it go? Would you not begin with a work and then take on character with respect to order in the assembly?
JT I think first Paul; what he was, and the kind of man he was, because it is said he went in among them (Acts 17:2). He did not go in, in any official dignity or stiffness; he was as one of them. They would thus be impressed with the kind of man he was, and how he carried on his service. I am sure it is well for every young christian to pay attention to those that are more spiritual than he is. That is the divine thought, but then that leads upward from Paul to the Lord; they had a higher Model, and that is always safe.
AR That would save them from being mere copyists.
JT When you think of the ascending thought — from Paul to the Lord.
JTJr It speaks in verse 10 of how he had conducted himself. “Ye are witnesses, and God, how piously and righteously and blamelessly we have conducted ourselves with you that believe”. Would that be the model that they would follow?
JT Well, exactly; that is what they saw. They were impressed by that. It is a very good sign when a young christian says, ‘I would like to be a brother or sister like that’. A godly sister or brother commands their respect, and it is right to follow in their steps to a point, but there is more than that. There is a greater Model than that, but it leads up in that direction.
AFM No brother or sister can take you beyond where he is spiritually, so you must necessarily look to some One higher.
ANW He says “but have been gentle in the midst of you, as a nurse would cherish her own children” and then he says “as a father his own children”. There would be a combination of nurse and father.
JT “As a nurse would cherish her own children”; that makes it more touching. That was what marked [p. 452] him; so there was a great deal to imitate with safety.
FHL He was there three sabbaths, and he speaks of their work of faith and labour of love and enduring constancy of hope, as if there was progress in answer to that service, perfect testimony in that regard.
JT Quite.
RWS What impression did this youthful assembly have of the Lord and of God the Father as over against the Philippians?
JT The Philippians would be more mature, representing, I think, the heavenly side, having capability for the heavenly side. The Thessalonians represent the younger thought of the assembly here. They have been called cabbages; that is, they grow up in the place; they are distinctly local. They are the assembly which is at Thessalonica; they are purely local to the place; it was a large place, I think, the capital of the country. They had their own national characteristics as in the city, but they were the assembly of the Thessalonians. They were distinctly local; they were not imported; and they were taken out of the place, a distinct movement of God in the place.
JS Does that not show that the soil was good?
JT It was an excellent field for a quick growth.
JS You not only require good soil but favourable conditions, sunshine and rain.
JT Just so; Paul was evidently there in a different way from what he had been at Philippi. At Philippi his sufferings were immeasurable, beyond words. He refers to it later. At Thessalonica he went in amongst them as one of them as his custom was. He just went into the synagogue “and on three sabbaths reasoned with them from the scriptures, opening and laying down that the Christ must have suffered and risen up from among the dead” (Acts 17:2,3); they must have seen a great deal of him in those three weeks.
AR It says he reasoned with them. He would not be the kind of man that would dominate the meeting.
JT [p. 453] He would give them to understand that he was one of them. I believe the idea was that they should see as much as possible of him.
C,A.M. I think the matter of distinctiveness is very impressive. They were quite youthful, but there was nothing distinctive at the start, was there?
JT The work began in the synagogue; it does not say what the setting in their houses was, but I think coming in among them is to be noticed. There is a suggestion of mutual feeling in that he was among them.
AFM Would the father and the nurse idea be very prominent as he was among them? The nurse and also the character and instruction of the father would be required in this setting.
JT I think so. I think the apostle would know before long as at Corinth and Philippi, what was needed in the place. That is one feature of the levite’s work, the knowledge of what is needed in the place. At Corinth he says, “For I did not judge it well to know anything among you save Jesus Christ, and him crucified” (1 Corinthians 2:2), and he dwells rather on the way he spoke and how he ministered, but I believe he saw that the Thessalonians needed fatherly and motherly nursing care and that the minister himself needed to get as near as possible to the converts, so that those ministered to would understand that he was one of them, and not far away. I believe he put much time among them in that way, showing himself so that they might know the divine thought as exhibited in him.
JS In the way of love and care for them.
JT Quite; that is what the Lord would impress on us as we deal with the young, the elder brethren need to be amongst them to get them to understand that they are not beyond them and stiff, but that they want the younger ones alongside of them. They should get to their side of matters.
JS In result, they turn to God.
JT The point was God was there. They grasped [p. 454] the divine thought exhibited in the minister, that God was working in Paul. It is that kind of thing.
TH Would you mind helping us in relation to Philippians? The letter was addressed to the saints, the overseers and the ministers at Philippi, but that to the Thessalonians was to the assembly there.
JT That is an important question. There are no allusions in Corinthians, either, to the official side; it is left out. Unless there is plenty of love, it is very dangerous to make eldership prominent. It just establishes a hierarchy; so the point in Corinthians is the assembly. You can understand those big men at Corinth saying, You are an elder. How pleased they would be and how they would use it!
J.S. Officially?
AFM But it is all right at Philippi?
JT Yes; it is safe enough at Philippi. The elders are overseers and ministers.
JS He associates himself with Timotheus and Silvanus, does he not? There is a brotherly element there.
JT These two men were known there, too; they were with Paul in the ministry there.
WB-w Timothy was the product of a household. He would be a model as coming from a godly house.
JT I think the apostle Paul would make a point of it at Thessalonica, a special point of brethren having others in their houses and talking to them about things. He would be very sociable. I am sure there was not a more simple man in the whole world in that respect.
CAM It is an interesting thing that the young become like what they see most of and we do well to have a good model brought into our households because otherwise the young will come out wrong. They always become like what they look at all the time.
JT The divine thought is that the elder brethren are to be models to the flock, that they go in among [p. 455] them. That is the very word used at Thessalonica — he went in among them. You do not get it elsewhere.
ANW His ministry would be quite in keeping with what he was himself. He spoke of the suffering side.
JT Yes; he would exhibit it in his own body, what he had just suffered at Philippi, “the brands of the Lord Jesus”. What a fine time it must have been to sit down for a meeting with the apostle Paul and Silas and Timothy, to hear how the jailor laid the table for them at Philippi, or what they saw and how they saw it!
WB-w At the jailor’s house in Philippi, there were about three meetings before morning. First when the jailor was saved, and then it says he spoke to them the word of the Lord, then there was the baptism meeting — the three would be between midnight and morning.
JT That looks to be right. We should not hesitate to sit up all night if the Spirit of God is working or if there is anything like this. Think of what the Lord endured immediately before the cross; the whole night was occupied. John’s account would mean that a great deal of time was taken up with the disciples. What a time they had with the Lord!
CAM It was not an entire night he spent; it was until break of day. That seems to have been the point.
JT At Troas? — just so.
ANW In speaking to the elders at Ephesus, he says “night and day”. “Remembering that for three years, night and day, I ceased not admonishing each one of you with tears”, Acts 20:31.
JT Quite so; and he went from house to house.
CAM It is wonderful all he gets in; you cannot understand a man doing it.
JT I remember seeing an account of Mr. Darby’s setting forth at night to give an address on prophecy. They did not stop at nine o’clock in those days, but that only points to the spiritual energy there was. I am not [p. 456] advocating long meetings at all, because we are not equal to them. 1 Corinthians rather stresses brevity in ministry, but where you get long meetings like Acts 20 it is to call attention to the energy there was. That is what comes out here — the night and day exercise.
JHE You see that in connection with the Lord and the two on the way to Emmaus. He would have gone on further with them.
JT Yes quite; He was not tired, but then they were not either for after they saw Him they went back to the city. That would be 15 miles, I believe.
JS And they found the eleven.
JT Yes; they did not go to a hotel; they went and found the saints. You would like to see the brethren sacrificing to attend meetings; then you will get good meetings, because the Lord takes account of the sacrifice.
JEH I suppose these Thessalonians were waiting for the break of day, awaiting His Son from heaven. Is that your thought?
JT Just so; that is stressed here throughout this epistle. You have the coming of the Lord right through in that chapter. I suppose it is suggestive that the young believers need that side of the truth. They need to have the hope of the coming of the Lord.
ANW Is it not the only assembly favoured with the ministry of the rapture?
JT Yes; it is the only one.
RWS Is it a handicap in taking up assembly status to have material which is youthful as to age or in the knowledge of God?
JT Well, it is certainly no handicap if they are Thessalonians. They are material needed. Of course Philippians gives the other side, the overseers and deacons; they give the mature side. Thessalonian christians were fresh and delightful to God.
JEH Would you have to wait for overseers and deacons before starting a meeting?
JT No, I do not believe you have to wait for them [p. 457] to start a meeting. You must have the meeting before you look for the overseers and deacons; that is where they come in as necessary. Having the meeting first is what you get in chapter 14. They established the meetings and then they came back again and chose them elders in each of them.
JS You must have the thing first.
JT Quite so; the meeting first.
NMacC Elders, bishops and overseers are the product of the meeting.
JT That is right; this gives provision for the assembly after the meeting is there; do not look for elders before you have the meeting there.
FHL There is no question of age with these Thessalonians. Are we not too apt to think of age; whereas the thought is spiritual status?
JT That is right — Thessalonian cabbages, local growths but normal growths, quick growths; then you may be sure the elders will come into place. God provides what is needed.
TH It says of Aaron that “he may minister unto me in the priest’s office” (Exodus 28:3), suggesting the office was there before the priest came into it.
JT That looks to be all right. The office was filled first of all by the youths in Israel. Exodus 24 says the youths offered the offerings on that great day. That was the office of the priesthood, but chapter 28 says, Now we must have the clothing suited to the priest.
NMacC We must be careful in checking youthful activity.
JT Very very careful not to check it. We can guide it and set it a good example, but let there be growth, room for growth.
WB-w That is the idea of the father and mother.
Ques Why does he say, “Let no man despise thy youth” 1 Timothy 4:12?
JT That was for Timothy to see that he did not [p. 458] give way to youthful pranks; that he should commend himself by sobriety. A young brother should see that he does not take too much liberty and forget the sobriety becoming to the things of God.
WB-w You referred to fellowship when you opened up Philippians. There is no scripture to tell us that they sought fellowship from other meetings. Paul evidently kept on opening meetings like that.
JT There was not much of it. Of course the power was so great, and then it is beautiful to see here that they imitated an assembly so far away in Judaea, these christians at Thessalonica.
ANW How do you suppose they did that practically? I can understand a brother imitating a godly brother, but how can an assembly imitate another assembly practically?
JT That just brings up the actual state of things! The difficulty was great, but they overcame it. They must have made inquiry as to what the local procedure was in Judaea. It does not say Jerusalem; that would make it too metropolitan. It is rather that they were overcoming natural prejudices. As a gentile company they had no prejudice as regards the Jews. They were free from that. No doubt the apostle Paul could have given them information. I can understand a Thessalonian brother saying, Well now, how do they do in Jerusalem? And the apostle would tell them, That is how it was done.
JS That would be very necessary, for the work must be co-ordinated.
JT This was to maintain the universal thought, the unity of the Spirit and the uniting bond of peace.
AR We may not be national in our attitude but we might be local.
JT We might, indeed. I think we ought to be glad to imitate any good thing. If the brethren in London or any other large place have anything there in their procedure that we have not, why should we [p. 459] not take it on, proving it to be of God? It tends to maintain universality.
ARS Why not use the word “adopt” instead of imitate?
JT If you love the brethren you are glad to be linked on with them. To adopt a thing leaves out the person from whom you get it. You leave out the promotion of love in your relation with others. Love is promoted. I value them and link on all the more with them.
Rem At Philippi, the girl that had the spirit of Python imitated, in a way.
JT She was prophetic. In a way, this principle of imitation may be followed wrongly and it may be followed rightly. It is being followed rightly here. It is where you link on with the person you are imitating; so the Thessalonians valued the assemblies of Judaea; they took on their way of doing things and were all the more joined up with them. It has been very beautiful during the past few years to see how the Holy Spirit brings out a thing, how the brethren take it on and how we seem to be drawn together more by it.
AR This imitating the saints at Jerusalem would be the result of Paul’s being among them. If we had Paul in our meetings, it would have the effect of uniting us all as to what we are doing in each locality.
JT I suppose what they saw in Paul was to show there was no doubt as to what prevailed in Judaea.
Rem Judaea had extended fellowship to Samaria; they sent down Peter and John, and then they sent out Barnabas to Antioch.
AFM What are you going to say about Philippi?
JT We have already explained it, I think. It brings out not only the mature side, the official side in the overseers, but the Philippians were capable of the heavenly side of the truth. They were ready to take on the heavenly side of Paul’s ministry to them and it shows how he himself was controlled by that; “to [p. 460] know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being conformed to his death, if any way I arrive at the resurrection from among the dead. Not that I have already obtained the prize, or am already perfected; but I pursue, if also I may get possession of it, seeing that also I have been taken possession of by Christ Jesus”, Philippians 3:10 - 12. They were called to that, and had had the Lord brought before them: “let this mind be in you”, Philippians 2:5. Paul had ministered some of the greatest thoughts about Jesus: the downstooping, the mind that was in Christ Jesus. They were capable of taking it on and the apostle’s exercises were that they might prove that this is the great result. In writing to them he would lead them up to the highest thoughts of christianity, and he bases all that on the fact that he had them in remembrance. They were sympathetic with the gospel from the first day. They continued on and were not turned aside like the Thessalonians. Young christians are apt to be turned aside easily; the Philippians were not.
CAM He brings himself before the Thessalonians as a minister whereas he seems almost like a priest as he speaks of the wonderful things to the Philippians.
JT He does not address them as an apostle. He says, “Paul and Timotheus, bondmen”. He is a bondman amongst them at Philippi. I think he is very deferential to them in calling himself a bondman. He goes on to say, “I thank my God for my whole remembrance of you, constantly in my every supplication, making the supplication for you all with joy, because of your fellowship with the gospel, from the first day until now”. And then he says he had confidence in them that what God had begun He would perfect.
Ques Would He not lead them up to the thought of Christ? — “let this mind be in you”.
JT “Bondman” is really that mind in the apostle.
AR When he speaks of your fellowship, what [p. 461] would that be? Would it have incorporated Paul’s ministry in it, or the glad tidings?
JT I think so. I do not think it would be the ministry of the assembly. It is just the glad tidings. They were the pillar and base of the truth. They correspond to what the assembly is here in relation to the testimony.
AFM Would the Philippians be intelligent as to where the epistle to the Ephesians would bring us?
JT I think so; they are a counterpart of Ephesians. I think we may read the two epistles together.
JHE Would not Ephesians be like a holy priesthood going in and this be a royal priesthood coming out?
JT Yes; it is practical christianity on its highest level.
WB-w Why does he not address the assembly of God at Philippi as he does that at Corinth?
JT I think it is because they are nearer to heaven. It is the heavenly side. The persons are more in mind; it is the same at Ephesus.
JEH Why did he address them as “O Philippians” (Philippians 4:15) in the last chapter?
JT It is an exhibition of feeling. He says, “O ye Corinthians” (2 Corinthians 6:11), but I think he is on a higher level in saying “O Philippians”. They had a great place in his heart. If you looked in Paul’s heart, you would see how each assembly had its own place in his heart.
Rem “Written in our hearts, known and read of all men”, 2 Corinthians 3:2.
TH They ministered to him at Thessalonica.
WB-w What are those things that are more excellent?
JT Well, whatever they are. The idea is to get on to the best. Do not miss the best, whatever it is.
JS I suppose it is to show how the Philippians had been delivered from earthly things and therefore are led on to heavenly things.