FAITH AS CHARACTERISTIC
FAITH AS CHARACTERISTIC
JT It occurred to me to take up the subject of faith, and how all must be in the region of faith. Service is only effective as carried on on the principle of faith. The jailor at Philippi in Acts 16 asked, “Sirs, what must I do that I may be saved? And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved, thou and thy house”; then something was added to this statement of salvation, “they spoke to him the word of the Lord with all that were in his house”. In that house itself there was the state of faith, and of joy too.
This that I speak of is not just the faith that brings one into salvation; it is not a faith that afterwards lapses. It is intended to characterise the believer so that the Lord accredits certain with having it, and it is also intended that it should be continued. Whether individually or household-wise, the believer is to be marked by it. Yet in this 16th chapter of Mark we see how, even with positive ground for faith, our hearts may be unbelieving; and where such a condition arises, individually or household-wise, the Lord must come in. What had preceded had resulted in no testimony being rendered. “They said nothing to any one, for they were afraid”, (verse 8.) The Lord takes the matter up and the result is a clear ending, but He holds to the thought of faith right through, drawing our attention to the fact that it is by believing we shall be saved.
CCE What is your thought of faith — how would you define it for us?
JT One always reverts in one’s mind to the definition given in Hebrews 11: “Now faith is the substantiating of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen”. It is an assurance of things hoped for, and a conviction of things not seen. In contrast to sight, it is the conviction of things not seen. It stands in relation to [p. 131] things in the unseen realm, outside the realm of sight. Adam, the first man, was set up in relation to things seen. There is no word to him about believing, but testimony was there for him to see and the facts given indicate that he was affected by it. When Adam called his wife’s name Eve, she was not yet a mother, nor had anything of the judgment pronounced yet been executed. So there was in Adam a conviction that there would be such happenings. There was to be the bruising of the serpent’s head; “he shall crush thy head, and thou shalt crush his heel”, Genesis 3: 15. That is how matters began, with a conviction. This is followed up in Abel. Though Adam is not spoken of as having faith, he certainly had conviction. I think it arises in that way. Things are substantiated to us; the assembly is outwardly formed by that principle, the constitution and continuation of the assembly is, of course, also by the Spirit. Eve, too, is convicted by the testimony given by God — she had the thought of acquiring a man with Jehovah as Cain was born.
HWR Would you say faith for the believer is the receiving of fresh light?
JT Yes; and then the state of faith is to continue. Many think of faith as a historic matter, as exercised at a given time, but they neglect the need of the continuance of it as a state in the soul. The jailor took in the word “with all that were in his house”. The apostle had spoken a word that would enhance and open up what had been first announced to him. “And he took them the same hour of the night and washed them from their stripes; and was baptised, he and all his straightway. And having brought them into his house he laid the table for them, and rejoiced with all his house, having believed in God”. The experience was sustained and the state of faith was in relation to his house; the conditions of faith were in the house. John’s gospel works it out in a peculiar way, repudiating what is spurious. There is a kind of faith that is not trustworthy,
[p. 132] as seen in John 2: 23 - 25. New birth is the only ground for true faith. “These are written that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life in his name”. Notice that. It is as believing that we have life. It is the state of faith.
HWR It is a state in which we are maintained, ready for whatever comes along.
JT We refuse or throw off things that cause disease, in that way, but where this state is non-existent, we are not ready to meet such things, and we become damaged.
JSt How is the state produced in us?
JT The beginning of it is the presentation of Christ to our souls. “Believe on the Lord Jesus ...” You receive a clear presentation of the Person, who is to be the object of your faith. Possibly the jailor had never before heard the Name. Now it was presented to him in a beautiful, feeling way. Then the word of the Lord was spoken to him and to all in his house. The apostle sees the opportunity to open up the mind of the Lord, to open up the truth to him. The point is to be in the state of faith and thus within the range of the word of the Lord. The next thing is what move you yourself make, because faith worketh by love (Galatians 5: 6). Faith being a living thing, there are works. The doing of these is sustenance in itself. “He laid the table for them”. It was not just that he saw that the servants did it, but it was an act of love on his own part. Then he “rejoiced with all his house, having believed in God”. The state of faith continues.
HWR Of the courtier in Capernaum whose son was sick, it is said in John 4, “the man believed the word which Jesus said to him, and went his way”, and in verse 53, “The father therefore knew that it was in that hour in which Jesus said to him, Thy son lives; and he believed, himself and his whole house”.
JT That shows the thing growing. He was confirmed in his faith. He had taken notice of what the Lord said, he had noted the time when the Lord spoke,
[p. 133] and marked how the recovery had transpired exactly as the Lord had said; so his faith was nourished. It is nourished in us continually by subsequent things. The point is to be ready. When the servant brought the message, it was a confirmation to faith. Light comes in, but faith must be sustained — “for by faith ye stand”, 2 Corinthians 1: 24.
JHH Would you say more as to the house coming under the benefit of this faith?
JT What a benefit it was to the jailor’s house! He rejoiced with his house. The word “house” here involves the household and the believer’s faith in relation to it. He would not be an irritable, complaining father, and thus there would be nourishment of faith; a soil in which the children will grow according to God. Mark 16 is searching to our hearts, for it gives us to see how prone we are to be unbelieving. The most valued of the Lord’s disciples are here, and all are marked by unbelief, Mary Magdalene among them. The best are liable to it, and we must not think that others only are meant; it is for us all; the tendency in us is to be unbelieving.
JSt The substance of their conversation had been of an unbelieving character.
JT Questions are useless, when the thing to do is to look. “Who shall roll us away the stone?” They were not looking. The stone was rolled away. There was no gain in that particular talk. Conviction should have been by the position of the stone, and then by their going into the sepulchre.
BT We are apt to raise difficulties that are perhaps not there.
JT There is no difficulty if you go the whole way, not expecting other people to go and return to tell you. You should go yourself and see. Brethren of course are glad to tell you, but why do you not go yourself? You might, as it were, be staying at home, discussing it; you do not know a brother who can roll that stone away.
[p. 134] But the stone is no longer there and you will discover this if you go to the sepulchre; you get light there. They look and “see that the stone has been rolled away”. Those women were honoured in the journey they took. It is Peter and John who go in, according to John’s account, not Mary of Magdala at first. But here in Mark, they go in and see the young man. That is remarkable. When they are looking for the Lord, they see a young man, and he is peculiarly clothed. He has cheering words for them, and knows what he is saying. He is a young man, but saying the right things, clothed in white, suggesting purity in service. He is there to impress you. Before you see the Lord, you see this person.
CCE What does that signify to us?
JT The Lord is not here. There is no suggestion here of an immediate meeting. The message is “go, tell his disciples and Peter, he goes before you into Galilee; there shall ye see him, as he said to you” (verse 7). I think what is presented in the young man is to have its bearing during the period until you see the Lord. For each of us the application is that I am to be that young man, taking the Lord’s place here in testimony. The Lord has definitely risen (verse 6). It is a fixed matter. The young man is a person who can testify and tell you about Him. There is with him definiteness and purity. If you are prepared to give a message, these are necessary attributes. The dispensation is set on foot, not in the old, but in the young, and that is because it is to go on.
JSt He was the vessel of testimony for the moment.
JT I think he represents the dispensation. “There shall ye see him, as he said to you”. He told you. You should know. You did not pay attention. There is adjustment in all this. “But go, tell his disciples and Peter, he goes before you into Galilee”. It is not that He will see you as He says in John, but that “there shall ye see him”. That is, we are left here in a scene of responsibility, of heavy responsibility. The place Galilee is a good way off. Things are not made easy for [p. 135] us, but what we have before us, how glorious and how, great! How worth the while to go in definitely for it!
HWR Mary’s message in John conveyed a wholly new thought to them. This in Mark was what was mainly already known to them, but not received in faith.
JT There is no distance to travel in John’s account, nor in Luke’s. Here in Mark what is stressed is that it is an important matter, involving sacrifice, but how worth while, for we see the Lord there! It is a peculiar garb in which the young man is seen, and he is on the right side of the sepulchre. “They saw a young man sitting on the right” — the place of power. This is to be understood by the levites, by those who are to serve. We begin by marking what is presented to us in that young man. There has to be both purity and definiteness in service; we should be able to answer questions accurately, clearly, and in purity.
JHH David brought the age of the Levites down to twenty, emphasising this same idea of youthfulness in service.
JT Yes, in Numbers 8 the Levites are presented to Jehovah. Twenty-two thousand there are, and they had been told what to do. “This shall be the service of the families of the Gershonites, in serving, and in carrying”. It was all in the sovereignty of God. Chapter 5 had dealt with the leper; “both male and female shall ye put out; outside the camp shall ye put them”. And in the woman and her husband, (verse 12), we have the thought of the Lord’s jealousy introduced, His holy jealousy in love. Then in chapter 7 the princes indicate the richness and unity that marked Israel. It is then that the Levites are brought and presented to Jehovah, and He is so pleased with them that “Jehovah spoke to Moses, saying, This is that which concerneth the Levites: from twenty-five years old and upward shall he come to labour in the work of the service of the tent of meeting”, Numbers 8: 23, 24. God made the age less, evidently because the Levites were pleasing to Him. The Levites had been [p. 136] offered to God and He found them so acceptable to Him that, as it were, God says, I would have more of those. God is calling to the young, but on His own terms, of course. Then as our brother has mentioned, by David’s last words the age of the Levites for service was further reduced — there were to be still more of them. The position of Solomon, one young and tender, the son on the throne, bore on this. There was no jealousy with David. He was not an old man saying in effect to the younger, You must wait until I die. But he would say, Come and have part with me in this service. Yet, in those young Levites, there would be subjection to, and respect for age. God wants the service distributed as widely as possible.
JHH The colt and foal are mentioned in Matthew.
JT Only in Matthew are they mentioned, for that is the assembly gospel, but although the young are to work with the old, they must not seek to supersede them. The women at the sepulchre represent the aspect of feelings, the affectionate side. What is presented in the young man is correct position, and then purity and definiteness in service. He would rely on the power of God; this is seen in his being on the right side. That is the principle of our service. The empty sepulchre speaks to us of God’s power in resurrection. “The surpassing greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of the might of his strength, in which he wrought in the Christ in raising him from among the dead”, Ephesians 1: 19, 20. This dispensation was inaugurated in power and in youthfulness. The disciples became old, but they began young. Paul was called when he was a young man, though there came a time when he wrote of himself to Philemon, “I rather exhort, being such a one as Paul the aged”, Philemon 9.
CCE Nearly all distinguished servants of the Lord begin when young.
JT I have often thought of that. They are taken [p. 137] according to foreknowledge and the specified levitical age shows that God would use them in the prime period of their lives.
JS What does the Lord’s appearing (verses 9, 10), bring out in effect?
JT The ineffectiveness of the efforts of these women to reach the truth is brought out in the first part of this chapter. In spite of the message they had received, in spite of what they had seen in the sepulchre, look at what Mark has to tell us of those women! (verse 8): “And trembling and excessive amazement possessed them, and they said nothing to any one, for they were afraid”. That was the state in which they were. It was not faith. There could be no testimony to God from those in such a state. All that had preceded had not been effective in their souls. A brother does his best, but the general state of a given meeting is such that it requires the Lord’s own hand to put things right. When you come to a point like that in a crisis, it is best to admit it. You find things not nearly what you had thought they were. Because of strong leadership and spiritual ministry, things go on well outwardly, but in a crisis you are surprised to find how persons are governed by what is false, and by fleshly feeling. Here are these women — could you get any like them in devotion? Yet look at their state! They are no longer free people, but possessed by amazement. That is their general state.
CCE Surely when the young man sitting on the right and clothed in a white robe spoke, that should have allayed their alarm! His words should have encouraged them, but it was then that excessive amazement possessed them.
JT We get carried along by ministry, but unless it affects us morally, when a crisis arises uncertainty and confusion will ensue, whereas if we are with God, profiting by what He ministers to us, we shall see “all things clearly”. The absence of this clearness of vision is one of the most distressing symptoms as troubles [p. 138] arise. It is disastrous in brothers who are in the position of leadership. Instead of judging by the facts of a difficult case, which the law of God’s house requires, we are governed by our personal relations to, or knowledge of the persons involved, or what others tell us of them.
BT The devotion of these women was not in question.
JT But what a state of unbelief! Am I characterised by these things in a crisis? Does darkness lay hold of me? The Lord allows difficulties to arise to expose our state. Acknowledging our weakness, we shall all say, if we are wise, The only One who can put the matter right is the Lord; and He will come in as in verse 9. Even His movements seem for a while ineffective, the unbelief is so great. Nevertheless, ultimately He secures His end with them. He brings us there to the point of realising that we thought we had more spirituality than we really had. We might as well come to that point and turn to the Lord about it. Some critics say that verses 9 to the end should not be included in the chapter, but they are Scripture. They strikingly show how the Lord effects complete victory when things seem to have gone to the wall.
CCE It would have been a terrible calamity, surely, for the gospel to end at verse 8!
JT I have often thought that. Mark says, “he appeared first to Mary of Magdala”, as if He had selected that particular person. She had been among the others, but she shows up better by herself. The practice of sisters getting together does not help; it is a wrong principle. They should keep with the brothers. Mary went to the brothers at once. She ran to them, according to John’s account.
CCE I am concerned about sisters meeting together in a crisis, it does much harm.
JT I have seen it. Let the sisters keep by the brothers. The head of the woman is the man; and of the man, Christ. That is the divine [p. 139] order.
CCE I think we have proved by experience what you have said.
JR What is there for us in the fact that Mary was the first here to be recovered?
JT She represents what God usually has in such circumstances — one who is true and hence easily adjusted. She had been the subject of a great work of the Lord. It is mentioned of her — “out of whom he had cast seven demons”. The Lord had so wrought in her that their position had become untenable — a striking fact. It was her state. John’s account follows this up particularly. Here Mark would set out the truth as to the leading brothers. That is what we need to keep before us; and that in spite of the facts stated He made them trustworthy, confiding the testimony to them.
HWR Here, it looks as though the women did not carry the message at all.
JT Of Mary it is said, “She went and brought word to those that had been with him, who were grieving and weeping. And when these heard that he was alive and had been seen of her, they disbelieved it”. Those who had been with Him! They disbelieved such a testimony! “Neither did they believe them”. There is nothing to be said for the leading brothers here. When the Lord takes up the matter He brings the state of unbelief to an end. Mark says, “And after these things he was manifested in another form”. What grace! His love would go the full length, even to the extent of taking another form. He will never stop till He reaches His end with us. Though it looks hopeless, the Lord is not giving up.
HWR Each case needed the Lord’s own personal intervention.
JT Some of us were noticing in Luke 22 the Lord’s power in dealing with every situation that can arise. The disciples were asleep while the Lord was praying in agony. He says, “Why sleep ye? rise up and pray that ye enter not into temptation”, Luke 22: 46. That [p. 140] was the word for that situation. To Judas the Lord said, “Judas, deliverest thou up the Son of man with a kiss?” That settled his case morally. And Peter smites the servant of the high priest. “Jesus answering said, Suffer thus far; and having touched his ear, he healed him”. That word was intended for the whole dispensation, to settle such a matter. The Reformers missed that bit of instruction, although it was there for them. The chapter is a great array of the power of the Lord to deal with any and every situation that arises. To the captains of the temple He says, “When I was day by day with you in the temple ye did not stretch out your hands against me”. They were acting unfairly, as enemies do, and that word settled it. Peter denied the Lord, and the cock crew. “And the Lord, turning round, looked at Peter; and Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how he said to him, Before the cock crow thou shalt deny me thrice. And Peter, going forth without, wept bitterly”. In principle he is restored. There is no matter that He will not settle. There is never a difficulty among the saints that is settled but by the Lord coming in. It is settled by His hand of power. In verse 14 the Lord has to reproach them “with their unbelief and hardness of heart”. This is a challenge to all, “Because they had not believed those who had seen him risen”. We are not to depend on more instruction, it is a question of state. The Lord takes it up with them. How quickly He sets them right! “And he said to them, Go into all the world, and preach the glad tidings to all the creation”. That follows on directly. It is wonderful that He could say that immediately. He knew exactly the potentiality of each of the disciples. His knowledge of us is exact. Peter said, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest”, John 21: 15.
NG We need faith in a living Christ. These were unbelieving, thinking only of a dead Christ. They would have kept on mourning.
JT They were full of sorrow, but after all it was in unbelief. Although the Lord would value their grief on [p. 141] account of Him, what is the outcome of unbelief cannot help. Faith should permanently mark the believer. We read of “a believing woman”, and again of “the unfeigned faith which has been in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and in thy mother Eunice”, 2 Timothy 1: 5. Faith in thee — the thing is there characteristically.
Ques Would “Go into all the world” apply today?
JT Here the point is to “preach the glad tidings to all the creation”. “Go into all the world” is that the preaching is to go on in spite of opposition. Man had a link with God as His creature. The world referred to thus is the place of the preaching, but it is in opposition to it. The preaching is to the creatures of God.
Rem We need faith for that.
JT All that follows is to encourage the servants. “And they, going forth, preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word by the signs following upon it”, Mark 16: 20. There is spiritual power which follows us when upon this course. The Lord is here tonight helping us. The whole course of things in view here in Mark 16 is supported, and signs followed; all is realised in the realm of faith.
CCE The Lord is at the right hand of power to carry on to the end.
JSt The idea of power specially belongs to Mark. The young man was in keeping with it.
JT He represents Mark’s view. There is no giving in, even in the worst situation that can be thought of. The Lord stands by us in power, as we stand by His testimony. There is nothing too hard for Him.
SS In what way do we get confirmation by signs today?
JT There is what corresponds. There are evidences of the Lord’s power in this room. You see the saints getting on in their souls. It is evidence to faith that God is here. There is no shadow of doubt as to what is going on. The signs are public. These, of course,
[p. 142] were literal miraculous signs, of which we have no need today.
All our operations are to be carried on in the faith of the Lord’s session at the right hand of God: “And they, going forth, preached everywhere, the Lord working with them”. That is the position until the end, from the standpoint, not of the assembly here, but of the levites.
Ques Must you have the breaking of bread before the preaching?
JT The assembly existed before the preaching at Pentecost, but generally the preaching is needed to procure people to break bread. Peter did not preach before the assembly was there. Nevertheless, “Philip, going down to a city of Samaria, preached the Christ to them”, Acts 8: 5. There had been no breaking of bread at Samaria.
CCE It looks as though the disciples went further afield than did the apostles themselves.
JT Yes, after Stephen’s death, “all were scattered into the countries of Judaea and Samaria except the apostles” (Acts 8); then later Peter and John came down to Samaria, (verses 14, 15). We do not get details of others, but those scattered at the time of Stephen’s death went as far as Antioch, and preached, and many turned to the Lord.
HWR Can we count on verse 18 now?
JT It has to be understood spiritually; yet, as in christendom, we are certainly kept from terrible things so that we may carry on the preaching and service of God generally. What deadly things have existed in the professing body through the ages! Now we have the Lord accompanying the word with power. The Lord opens up the position to us. It is Christ at the right hand of God. “The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem”, Ecclesiastes 1: 1. Wherever we are, we can count on Christ at the right hand of God to support us as in His service.