GOLD, WHITE GARMENTS AND EYE-SALVE
[p. 463] GOLD, WHITE GARMENTS AND EYE-SALVE
One has a measure of confidence that this is a word in season, being addressed by the Lord to the assembly in its closing phase, and I believe it brings out in few words the characteristics of those who are in the testimony, and who are qualified for personal intimacy with the Lord. It is to be noted that the Lord’s counsel to buy of Him gold and white raiment and eye-salve comes before His appeal to open the door to Him. There could be no possibility of mutuality of intercourse between any saint and the Lord save as the saint was furnished with what the Lord had supplied. No one would open the door to Him except as having acquired gold and white garments and eye-salve from Him, because His supping with the saint, and the saint with Him, implies that there is no sense of distance or disparity. The saint has what the Lord can enjoy, and the Lord makes the saint welcome to enjoy His own blessed portion. This could not be if every moral question had not been divinely settled, and these questions are all settled by obtaining from Him what He alone can supply.
Gold as a symbol in Scripture represents the best that God can give; it speaks of that which has the highest value. It is the first metal mentioned in Scripture and also the last. Before sin came in, the land of Havilah was spoken of, “where the gold is”, and we are told that “the gold of that land is good”. I have no doubt it was a prophetic intimation that God intended to have a place on earth where He would be known. The assembly was in His mind as a land where the gold is — that which makes truly rich. Then when God would have a sanctuary to dwell in, He provided that gold should be the most prominent thing in it. There were two things [p. 464] wholly of gold, the mercy-seat and the candlestick, and it was from above the mercy-seat that God spoke with the mediator of all that He would communicate to men. The Lord in speaking of gold purified by fire would have in mind what had been suggested symbolically and typically in the Old Testament. He would refer to God as He can be known after taking up the question of sin, and providing for His own glory in connection with it. It is God as He can be known by those who have come under sin; it is only as knowing Him thus that sinful creatures like ourselves could know Him at all.
When the Lord counsels to “buy” of Him, He suggests that He can supply the things mentioned. It is not intended to convey that we can pay for them by giving equivalent value, which we should have to do if He used the word “buy” in a commercial sense. Turning from the world and the flesh may be necessary if we are to have divine wealth, but it cannot be considered a price in return for which we get God’s precious things. Obtaining from divine Persons must always be on the principle of “without money and without price”. But buying from the faithful and true Witness means that these precious things may be obtained by a personal transaction with Jesus.
“Gold” suggests divine wealth possessed as substance (see Proverbs 8: 21). This raises the question as to how far we are truly rich as being possessed in a definite way of that knowledge of God which was expressed in the Lord Jesus here as full of grace and truth. He now lives to impart it to those whose hearts are moved to have personal dealings with Him. Every word and act of the Lord when here was really a speaking from above the Mercy-seat, for it was all founded upon His death. Not one gracious word that the Lord spoke, and not one gracious act that He did, could have been said or done if He had not come to bear the judgment of sin on the cross. Those who heard the words did not know this at the time, but He knew it. All that God is as symbolised by the [p. 465] gold came near to men on the ground that sin would be absolutely judged in the death of Christ. The gold has been purified in the furnace of Calvary. We read of “the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God has set forth a mercy-seat” (Romans 3: 24, 25). That was written after the redemption was accomplished, but the grace of it was set forth in Jesus when He was here. The way in which God would be known by those who were under sin and death was set forth in Jesus.
So that the gospels are the most wondrous part of Scripture, and what is set forth there will be our wonder and praise throughout eternity. It is all really gold purified by fire, and as we come into personal contact with the Lord, He causes it to become divine wealth in our souls. We know what the Lord is at the right hand of God by what He was here, but now God has glorified Him so that His pleasure in what He was here may be universally made known. We only read the gospels aright as we read them in the light that we are reading about One who is now glorified at the right hand of God. God has covered the gospel record with divine and permanent radiance by glorifying the blessed One who was here in humiliation. The glorifying of Jesus brought into evidence what was there before, just as the glorifying of God adds nothing to Him, but brings into evidence what He is. We read of “the radiancy of the glad tidings of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God”; God was imaged in Him when He was here, but now He is glorified so that the radiancy may shine forth, like the sun, for all, though there may be many blinded to it by the god of this world. In proposing to impart to us “gold”, the Lord is making available for us that which is surpassing in its excellence.
There is another side of things which is the necessary counterpart to the knowledge of God, and that is that He also secures that believers have a place before Him which fits them perfectly for His presence. The place that is [p. 466] secured for us by the grace and calling of God is seen in the same blessed Person in whom God is made known to us. And we might say that there is only one Man who fully knows our place with God according to His calling, and that is Christ Himself. On our side we know in part; we await the time when we shall see face to face, but on His side there is perfect knowledge of the place that is assigned to us in the thought of God. He knows it perfectly because it is fully expressed in Him. In the Person of Christ we see Man beyond sin, beyond death, beyond Satan’s power, holy and without blame before God in love, accepted in the glorious place of sonship. And all is founded on the fact that He has borne the full judgment of everything that had come in on our side that was contrary to it. Our place with God is seen radiant in Christ, and we may say that in it we also see “gold purified by fire”. As seen in Him it cannot be made more perfect, or added to in any way. On our side there is the possibility of increased apprehension, so that in that sense, spiritual wealth can increase.
I have no doubt that in the apostles there was increase; I doubt whether Paul could have written the epistle to the Ephesians when he wrote the epistle to the Galatians. His personal enrichment in the knowledge of God increased, so that his choicest ministry came out in the prison epistles at the end of his days. Of course what he wrote, whether early or late, was by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but there is a great difference between the character of inspiration as known in Old Testament times, and its character as known in the writers of the New Testament. In Old Testament times, God inspired men to write what they themselves did not understand, so that when they had written it they had to enquire and search diligently as to what it signified. But the New Testament writers knew all the precious things which they wrote about, they wrote about them as things well known to themselves. We find in the epistles how the personal exercises, and even the personal infirmities, of the [p. 467] writers come out in a touching and affecting way. And no doubt there was increase by the Spirit of God in those blessed men of God. If we have “gold”, we might well be concerned that it should increase.
Then there are also “white garments”, which bring in the answer to another exercise. If one has become conscious that the shame of one’s nakedness has often been made manifest, there will surely be a desire to be “clothed”. The exposure of what the flesh is becomes a real grief to one born again, and eventually we learn that help as to this must come from outside ourselves. The Lord puts the whole truth of deliverance in a very simple form when He says, “I counsel thee to buy of me ... white garments, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness may not be made manifest”. He says, “Buy of me”; the whole secret lies in having to do with Him. There was perhaps a time when we thought we could get deliverance by studying the books that are written about it; we thought it was a question of apprehending doctrine; but we had to learn that a living Person is needed. The man in Romans 7 is brought to a point when he says, “Who shall deliver me ... ?” He can then get the value of what is stated at the beginning of the chapter, “So that, my brethren, ye also have been made dead to the law by the body of the Christ, to be to another, who has been raised up from among the dead, in order that we might bear fruit to God”. It is in being to Another that we are freed.
If I bring forth fruit to God, there is something appearing that is not the flesh, and it is the result of being to Another. “Buy of me” is the same thing put in another way. When young believers are tempted, and the devil seeks to make the flesh manifest in them, if they turn at once to the Lord they will come out in white garments. That is to say, they will manifest the moral characteristics of Christ. No doubt something of Christ comes out in every believer who has the Spirit, but we ought not to be content without being completely “clothed”. The Lord Jesus is able to set us up as completely invested with “white garments”. What a “shame” it is if the flesh comes out in us; at such times we discredit the testimony. We learn what the “white garments” are by learning Christ. Referring to how the Gentiles walk in Ephesians 4, Paul says, “But ye have not thus learnt the Christ”. He is the perfect contrast to all that comes out in the natural man, and His moral features are now to be our clothing.
I fear that many of us are like the young man in the garden of whom it says, “And a certain young man followed him with a linen cloth cast about his naked body” (Mark 14: 51). He was not really “clothed”, and therefore when there was a likelihood of his having to suffer by being in company with Jesus he just slipped off the linen cloth and ran away naked. But the divine thought comes out in the young man seen clothed in a white robe on the right of the sepulchre in Mark 16. He had deliberately taken up his place as identified with Christ’s burial here, for he was sitting in the sepulchre. But he was “on the right”; he is figuratively seen as in power that is equal to the demands of such a position. The sepulchre itself was now the witness of divine power, for the One who had been put in it was now risen. In the same gospel we read of the kingdom of God coming in power on the holy mount, and it is said of Jesus that “his garments became shining, exceeding white as snow, such as fuller on earth could not whiten them”. I think we may say that it is His own garments that He proposes to furnish us with in Revelation 3: 18. Being instructed in Him involves our having put off the old man and having put on the new. Such come out in a new garment, and it is not loosely cast about them, for it becomes, we might say, part of themselves.
Thus we are clothed for the testimony; the white garments appear on us outwardly. Is it not a great proposal that the shame of our nakedness should not become manifest? I [p. 469] believe the apprehension of the calling involves exercise as to this; it produces the feeling, I must now be morally suitable; I cannot go on with the flesh or carry the marks of the world; I must come out distinctly as one in relation to God. A person in white garments would always be distinctive; there is a suggestion of what is suitable to heaven in it. When the Lord says of some in Sardis, “They shall walk with me in white”, it evidently conveys the thought of suitability to Him as He is now in heaven. What could be more attractive? But the “white garments” are to be on us here while we are still in a defiled and defiling scene. What a triumph for God that His people should come out thus as a result of their having dealings with Christ His beloved Son!
Then there is “eye-salve to anoint thine eyes, that thou mayest see”. It seems to suggest an intelligent exercise, that we know how to use the eye-salve when we get it. The Spirit in this particular character is indispensable in the last days, when the profession generally is marked by spiritual blindness. If we want to escape the innumerable pitfalls and snares and bypaths, it is essential that we be able to see. The saint who loves the Lord’s counsel will assuredly be exercised to have the Spirit in this particular way. How can we move intelligently here as governed by divine light, whether personally or assemblywise, if our eyes are not anointed? Earnestness and devotedness are not sufficient; we need spiritual vision. The assembly, as such, is a company of persons with clear vision; that is, as it is written, they are “intelligent persons” (1 Corinthians 10: 15). Characteristically they have got the eye-salve, and know how to apply it. There is the thought in it of a healing application. God does not set the mind aside; He retains it as an organ of perception and communication; but it needs to be brought through intelligent exercise under the healing of the Spirit so that we no longer think of things, or reason about things, on the line of the natural mind, but on the line of a mind that has come under divine healing so that it can think intelligently and spiritually.
[p. 470] In the assembly it is most important to act intelligently. I ought to be able to give account of why I do certain things, why I give out a certain hymn, or anything else that I do. Spiritual vision enters into the matter. Then the whole range of Scripture requires spiritual vision if we are to understand it aright. Think of the Lord’s parables, and of the marvellous wealth of the types which has been brought out so fully in recent times. I believe that clear vision as to these things is the result of obtaining eye-salve from the Lord. Would we not all like to have it so that we might see much more of what is in the Scriptures than we have ever seen yet? The Lord would not have us to be altogether dependent on what others can see for us, though valuing greatly the help we get in this way. Why should we not see something for ourselves?
Then we need to be able to see our way in regard to our pathway in times which are said to be difficult. We are in the midst of Laodicean lukewarmness: many do not care about the difference between light and darkness, between truth and error, between God’s way and man’s way. It is manifest that the majority of people do not care for what has true value, and we are all in danger of getting into that state if we do not heed the Lord’s counsel. We are part of the christian profession, and we are all liable to the dangers which are abroad, so that it is most important to have eye-salve, and to anoint our eyes with it. We must understand how to bring our minds under the control of the Spirit, as recognising the Spirit as the only source of capacity to see, and then we shall get divine light. There is no finality to this; we shall constantly need increased capacity to discern spiritual things as they are more and more unfolded in ministry. Of what avail is spiritual ministry if we have not spiritual capacity to discern its import? There is much in Scripture that the mass of believers have never seen. What do believers generally know about Paul’s prison epistles? They speak of things which can only be really seen in the vision imparted by the Holy Spirit.