"THOU ART MINE"

F.C.Mutton

Isaiah 43: 1-7; Philippians 3: 12; 2 Timothy 2: 1-4

These three passages bear on the saints as being divine property. I think it is a very great point we are to arrive at that, as Paul says to the Corinthians, "ye are not your own", 1 Cor 6: 19. This is a tremendous matter in soul history; not that one would in any sense make it formidable, but it is something very real to be arrived at, that I am not my own. A brother referred in the reading to our natural selfishness. It is a thing that, in a way, is admired in the world, a selfmade man who is determined at all costs to forge his way forward and reach his ambitions and aims; but not so in Christianity; I belong to Another. Another, the Lord Jesus, has a supreme right to me on many grounds. What a happy day it is, and I was going to say a restful day, when I arrive at it that I am no longer my own but I belong to another, I am divine property.

In this scripture in Isaiah Jehovah is appealing most affectingly to Israel. I suppose at the beginning it is Israel as a nation, but where we finished it comes down to every individual - "my sons", "my daughters", "every one that is called by my name and whom I have created for my glory". I would that this may lay hold of us; in it lies the answer to the greatest questions of life . Many complicated issues and problems are resolved when we come to it that we are no longer our own. Paul says "whose I am and whom I serve" (Acts 27: 23) - what a clarifying principle that is! The old hymn says, 'We've now to please but One'. As we look at those of whom we spoke in the reading, men like Paul and Timothy and those who so walked that the saints had Paul for a model (see Phil 3: 17), you see this thing displayed; they had one Man before them; every element of selfishness had been removed from the motives of those men. No doubt that is why Paul addresses Timothy as a man of God; he was a comparatively young man but he had reached this milestone in his history that he was here for God. He was not living just for himself as a young man might naturally do, thinking about his own course and planning it; he was a man of God, a title of immense moral distinction; he was here on God's behalf in relation to God's will, God's service, God's testimony.

So in this scripture in Isaiah we have brought before us the grounds upon which the believer in the Lord Jesus belongs to Christ, belongs to God. In one sense, of course, it applies to all men: "Jehovah, that created thee ... that formed thee"; on the ground of creation I am divine property. It links with the expression in the Revelation: "for thou hast created all things, and for thy will they were, and they have been created", chap 4: 11. We need to think about creation. Who gave me being? It was God who created me, giving me existence and personality, for His own pleasure. One's mind often goes to that remarkable expression in Psalm 139: "My bones were not hidden from thee when I was made in secret, curiously wrought in the lower parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my unformed substance, and in thy book all my members were written; during many days were they fashioned" (vv 15,16). That has its application to the assembly but it also has its application to the individual. It would give us an impression of God's extraordinary interest in you and in me, even before our birth. May these things lay hold of us! "In thy book all my members were written; during many days were they fashioned" - my members. There is something quite inscrutable about that, relating to the omniscience, the supreme knowledge of God of everything, that before I had existence my members were written in His book. What does that mean? It means they are to be used for His pleasure; the members that He has given me are to be used for Him, His service; to be held sacrificially and willingly for His will. He certainly did not write my members in His book that they might be used for sin and in self-indulgence. So it says here, "thus saith Jehovah, that created thee". I need to sit down in the presence of these things and consider how I regard myself and hold myself, and whether I am yielding willingly, happily, obediently, to God the rights that He unquestionably has to all I am and all I have.

Not only that but, "Fear not, for I have redeemed thee"; there is the supreme claim of redemption. As Peter tells us, we have been redeemed not by corruptible things such as silver and gold but by precious blood, the blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot (see 1 Pet 1: 18). Oh the price of redemption! It was not that God's rights over us in creation were ever relinquished, they remained; but sin having come in, the great divine operation of redemption has been completed, involving the work of Christ in all its many glorious aspects, including the shedding of His blood, so that we might be set free from every encumbrance to be for divine pleasure. "I have redeemed thee": what an affecting thing this is that God looked upon me in the light of all the ravages of sin and ruin! If I might use an illustration, you might look at a property in a ruinous state, it has been open to the weather, there is rot and damage, and you say, I will take that property over just as it is, with all its encumbrances and all that needs to be invested in it. It is a poor illustration, but redemption is that God takes up the whole situation of my moral wreckage and debt, my sinful state and my sins, and through the work of Christ secured me on the basis of redemption, the blood of Jesus being the evidence of the price paid in order that He might have me exclusively for Himself. May we answer to the claims of redemption!

It leads on to "I have called thee by thy name"; that is the call that reaches us in the gospel on the basis of redemption, and then He says "thou art mine". I trust this finds an echo in each of our hearts; "thou art mine", I belong to another. The implications of it are immense; not that we are to be daunted by them , but let us face up to them and start from this point, that we belong absolutely and exclusively to God, to the Lord Jesus. If that single impression remained with us this occasion would be worthwhile. I might have all sorts of things before me - and when we are young that is perfectly understandable. We have to think of the future, if the Lord leaves us here, we have to be educated, we have to get a job, all perfectly right and legitimate in its place, but let every matter be considered and every step be taken in the light of this supreme fact that on the basis of redemption God says "thou art mine". He says it in His love, His jealous love, for us. Can He ever regard lightly that which has been secured at such a price, involving the death of His Son? What that meant to Him! We were reading recently as to Abraham offering up Isaac, the knife and the fire; "Take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest", Gen 22: 2. Let us think of what redemption meant not only to Christ but to God, to the Father; and in the light of that He says "thou art mine".

There are wonderful promises that follow immediately, as if God would encourage us, as only He can encourage us, as we are prepared to answer to His claims over us in love. "When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee; when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned ... For I am Jehovah thy God". The Christian path is not easy; we are called to a path patterned on that of Jesus which was one of suffering, loss and obedience even unto death, but there is a wonderful ministration of divine comfort, strength and reassurance if we commit ourselves to Christ and to following in His steps.

I was reading a letter recently from a brother who had been to East Germany and he was greatly affected by a certain simplicity of life among the saints there. There is a diminution of career prospects; young people have to take what we would regard as inferior, lower paid, jobs; but he spoke of the obvious joy and love amongst the beloved brethren and their committal to the Lord. Dear brethren, how precious that is in the sight of the Lord! And let us be prepared, when the rights of God are involved, to suffer rather than sin, to suffer rather than be worldly or earthly, in the thankful recognition that we belong to Him. We have this divine promise: "I will be with thee"; we have it in the Lord's own words: "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you", (Matt 6: 33); that is, what is necessary materially will be supplied. Let us set our course by this compass: "thou art mine" It is like the north point on the compass, and we navigate now in relation to that. Let "thou art mine" govern every decision, every step, every purpose of heart, and we shall be safe, we shall be kept on the Christian course for God's pleasure and glory.

God is here gathering, or about to gather, His people Israel. May there be some gathering done today, even in this occasion. "I will bring thy seed from the east, and gather thee from the west; I will say to the north, Give up; and to the south, Keep not back: bring my sons from afar, and my daughters from the end of the earth, every one that is called by my name, and whom I have created for my glory". Maybe someone among us is away in the west, the east, the north, the south; God is claiming His property; Give up! He wants us free from every element that is holding His property in bondage. "And to the south, Keep not back": is anything keeping us back, holding us in its grip? Satan would use a thousand things to hold us, but God would set us in the holy liberty of committal to Himself in answer to the claims of the love of Christ - "the love of the Christ constrains us", Paul says, and he goes on to say that "they who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who died for them and has been raised", 2 Cor 5: 15. That was the simple principle that governed Paul's life; he no longer lived to himself but to Him who had died for him and had been raised. O that every day one's life might be thus simplified, to live day by day for Christ and to Him. How simple in that sense Christianity is - "to be to another", Rom 7: 4. It is very affecting; "my sons ... and my daughters"; how God values what He has made, formed and redeemed in boys and girls, young men and young women, and older men and women, "every one that is called by my name, and whom I have created for my glory".

So now we see glory coming in; we are to be here for God's glory. Can we doubt that God was glorified in those of whom we read earlier like Paul, Timothy, Enoch, and Abraham? There was moral glory and worth under His eye in those men who lived simple lives of committal, love and obedience to Him, who walked with Him and walked before Him. "Whom I have created for my glory: I have formed him, yea, I have made him": how wonderful these expressions are! The enemy would form us according to the world but we are not to be conformed to the world but to be transformed, to be the subjects of divine formation, and that will always be formation according to Christ. O, may our ideas of what is really worth while going in for be transformed, that we may be delivered from man's thoughts as to personality, success and progress, and be subject to divine formation. "Yea, I have made him"; the Lord made people; He made His disciples, His apostles; wonderful products they were. We love to look in the Acts at those beloved and morally great men; it would be no exaggeration to say they were the finest product of the human race as taken up on the basis of redemption - Peter lifting up his voice announcing the glorious news of Jesus and the resurrection; then Peter, with John, saying "Look on us"; there never had been such a spectacle apart from what was unique in Christ on earth. There are no apostles now, I need not say, but there are men and women formed according to Christ; that is morally the greatest thing that any of us could have part in, and God has given His Spirit that it may be so, that Christ might be formed in us.

In Philippians 3 Paul uses this remarkable expression: "I have been taken possession of by Christ Jesus". It hardly needs commenting on, it is so eloquent. You see a house with a board outside: Vacant possession. You can buy that property and have it exclusively; there is no encumbrance, there is nobody else living there. Paul had been taken possession of by Christ Jesus; every corner, every crevice of that man 's being had been possessed by Christ. The word used here means 'seized', 'taken hold of', and that is what the Lord did when He laid hold of Saul on the road to Damascus; you might say He gripped that man. I wonder if He has you and me in that same way?

"Taken possession of" is not the same as being converted, though it follows that; it means full possession by Christ. It meant a lot for Paul, as this chapter shows us. If we may use that illustration of a house there had been a lot of rubbish in Paul's structure, a great moral spring cleaning had gone on to make room for Christ. He had gone through all the things that were filling the rooms in his structure such as "Hebrew of Hebrews" and a "Pharisee", and now he says "but what things were gain to me these I counted, on account of Christ, loss" (v 7). In that moral spring cleaning things went right out of the house so that Paul, in the most real and practical sense, might be taken possession of by Christ Jesus. Of course, the moment he was converted he belonged to Christ, but now in an experimental sense the man in his mind, his affections, his motives - his whole being - had been taken possession of by Christ Jesus. What a fine thing! I would like to raise this question, first of all with myself, an exceedingly searching question: To what extent have I been taken possession of by Christ? To what extent am I insubject or have reserves? May each of us work this out. Here was a man who exclusively, without any qualification, had been taken possession of by Christ Jesus. Christ filled that man, his mind, his affections, his soul, and governed his motives, and I say very simply, I see no finer spectacle than a man taken possession of by Christ, secured by Him and wholly committed to Him, sacrificially devoted, and thus richly available for the furtherance of the interests of Christ.

In our last scripture it is a different picture; here we have a soldier, this is military. The Lord Jesus has soldiers, good soldiers, because there are very precious things here that need defending. You find that in the Old Testament; in Exodus and Leviticus you get exceedingly precious things relating to the whole tabernacle system. Then you come to Numbers and there has to be an army for its protection, and people are numbered for the army. Here Paul says "No one going as a soldier entangles himself with the affairs of life, that he may please him who has enlisted him as a soldier". You are on the record now; your name is on the list among the soldiers of the Lord. Is your name on that list? Is mine? These questions are very searching indeed. We all know what being a soldier involves. At a moment's notice you could be called upon; you are wanted in Londonderry or Belfast. No question, no objection, you have to go; you are under command, under orders. I am not giving any impression, I trust, that the Lord is harsh or arbitrary, but there are most precious things which need defending, need good soldiers. There are precious things in localities that need defending, and they will not be defended unless there are good soldiers of Jesus Christ. I want to ask you, having asked myself: Are you on this list? There is a list: "him who has enlisted him as a soldier". This is not a list of people who are converted and are going to heaven, though they are all converted and going to heaven; but these are soldiers who have committed themselves to the will of the Lord because they want to be devoted to the protection of what belongs to the Lord Jesus on earth. He Himself is not personally here as He once was, when every divine interest was so perfectly safeguarded by Him, but in His absence He has good soldiers, and may you and I be deeply exercised to be among them, because the most precious things, I say again, require defending, protecting.

So let us not entangle ourselves with the affairs of life. It does not say we have nothing to do with them, because we have a lot to do with the affairs of life; we have family responsibilities, business responsibilities; the point is do not get entangled in them; that is fatal. The enemy will seek to entangle us but "No one going as a soldier entangles himself with the affairs of life" . Many things that are quite legitimate in their place become a most serious entanglement as they get out of place and hold us in a way that is not legitimate. The Lord would give us grace to hold things in their place, so that the claims of the 'army' - you will not misunderstand me - are paramount. May we commit ourselves in this way. The Lord committed Himself absolutely, even to death, facing suffering untold that every right of God might be upheld and every purpose of God established. May that spirit be in us for His glory.

MAIDSTONE

23 December 1978