THE PRISONER IN THE LORD
[p. 46] THE PRISONER IN THE LORD
Ephesians 3:1; Ephesians 4:1; Genesis 40:1 - 23
JT I have been thinking of the idea of a prison as connected peculiarly with Joseph, and of the way in which the thought appears in the New Testament, especially connected with Paul — the greatest light emanating from it. The idea peculiarly represents limitations — sufferings, of course, but limitations; and in the two persons mentioned we have the acceptance of the limitations as from God. The apostle, as we may notice, regarded himself as the “prisoner of the Christ Jesus” in chapter 3, although outwardly in the hands of the Romans. In chapter 4 he is “the prisoner in the Lord”, meaning that he is there in relation to the Lord, not simply that the Lord has made him a prisoner, but he is there in that relation. The emphasis laid in Genesis on the king’s prison will be noted. In chapter 39:20 it says, “Joseph’s lord took him and put him into the tower-house, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined”, and the others were imprisoned “into the place where Joseph was” — that is the setting.
DLH What are you gathering from the distinction between the king’s prison and where Joseph was?
JT That they were placed where he was was the advantage for them; all was under God, but correspondence with Joseph’s position involved light for them; it involved the solution of their exercises.
JS Do you mean that our own apostle addressing that letter of the greatest light from the prison would indicate that we should accept limitations in accord with where the voice comes from?
JT That is the point he makes in writing to Timotheus — that he was not to be ashamed of the [p. 47] testimony of our Lord nor of the apostle as His prisoner.
JS That would lead to the maintenance of the light; otherwise it might be lost or diminish.
JT There should be correspondence with the apostle’s position. Timotheus, although not actually in prison, would be in correspondence with Paul’s position; it is in that connection the light shines and the solution of all our exercises comes about.
DLH Was not Timotheus himself in prison at one time? “Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty”, (Hebrews 13:23).
JT He was indeed, though not when Paul’s letter was written; the apostle emphasises his position in the prison in writing to him. He was bound, and it was in relation to the testimony of God, but the word of God was not bound; his imprisonment was not an accident or the outcome of any misdemeanour on his part. He suffered ostensibly as an evildoer, but it was on account of the testimony of the gospel; (2 Timothy 2:9).
PL Do you get that thought in regard of Joseph in the psalm, “They afflicted his feet with fetters his soul came into irons”, but then it says, “the word of Jehovah tried him”, (Psalm 105:18,19). Was the word of the Lord in that sense not bound?
JT Yes; his education was also in view, of course, “until the time when what he said came about”; that is, I suppose, the light he had from God, as recorded in Genesis 37. In that chapter he was seventeen years of age and he had light from God which alluded to himself, that he should become an object of reverence to his father and mother and to his eleven brethren, that is to say, he had light typically as to Christ’s resurrection and His ascension. In the interval, until that came about, the word of the Lord tried him; he had his own needed education. What comes out in this chapter is that he is in the place where the king’s prisoners were kept, and those that needed interpretations are put into that prison; it was to their advantage. What I mean is that the mind of God is contingent on being in accord with the position of the vessel of the testimony, wherever the government of God has placed it. If it be in limitation we have to accept that, and our non-acceptance of it means our being deprived of the mind of God, whereas our acceptance of it implies that we shall have the mind of the Lord in that position. “Consider what I say; and the Lord give thee understanding”, (2 Timothy 2:7). 2 Timothy is a question of regulation (I mean that is involved in it); it is a question of where I am in relation to Paul. The government of God has affected Paul — he is limited; the special vessel of the testimony is seen at Rome limited, and it is wisdom to accept that. The endeavour to ignore or break away from the limitation involves loss.
JS How do the limitations apply to us?
JT In the government of God, the vessel of the testimony is greatly limited and restricted.
Ques Do you regard the vessel of the testimony today as answering to Paul’s position in prison?
JT Yes.
Ques In what way, other than general limitations?
JT Well, we are suffering under the government of God from several things. The Spirit of God is greatly hampered by the general breakdown of the public body, and He accepts it.
Ques Is there any loss spiritually on account of this?
JT Well, there is; there is loss. We have not got what they had in early days; our meetings are nothing like what they had; all that can be said now is “thou hast a little power”, (Revelation 3:8). The restriction, the limitation, is called attention to there, and that a door had been opened. “I have set before thee an opened door”, not an open door, but an [p. 49] opened one, that is one that had been shut. The Lord has moved and opened a door; that, I think, points to the limitations that had existed.
Ques Do you suggest that there was gain to the prisoners through Joseph being in the king’s prison?
JT Of course there was; it was to their great advantage that they were put there. That is how it is stated in chapter 39:20, “Joseph’s lord took him and put him into the tower-house, the place where the king’s prisoners were confined”, and he was there in that prison and Jehovah was with Joseph there. Then it says in the next chapter that the other two prisoners were put “in custody into the house of the captain of the life-guard, into the tower-house, into the place where Joseph was imprisoned” (chapter 40:3); that was to their advantage.
Ques Is that the setting the apostle has in view in Ephesians 3, where he tells them not to faint because of his tribulations, for it was their glory?
JT Just so. And he was the prisoner of the Christ Jesus for them, he says; that is no small matter; it was for the nations, so that those of the nations came into the gain of his position.
Ques Do you suggest that to get the gain of Joseph’s service we must not look at him as one of the king’s prisoners?
JT But he was one of them; he was there, he was where the king’s prisoners were kept. Paul was in a like position at Rome, and he received all who came to him; it was a question of coming to him. He was not free to carry on his apostolic service as he was wont to, but he received all who came to him.
PL “Onesiphorus ... was not ashamed of my chain but ... sought me out very diligently”, (2 Timothy 1:16,17).
JT Quite. That was the gain of it. You may depend he got something that day; he did not go there for nothing, that seeking out was not for [p. 50] nothing; the apostle would have told him something worth while.
Ques Is Onesimus an example of a serviceable vessel born in prison?
JT I should say so. He is a contribution to the assembly begotten in the prison; he is sent back as a “brother beloved” — one of the best contributions. You can hardly conceive of a better than that — that a brother beloved should have been sent to any locality out of the prison where Paul was; and his own child; he says, “my child”, Philemon 10.
PH “Whom I have begotten in my bonds”. The brightest features of the truth have often come from prison, have they not?
JT Yes, the very brightest. Take Colossians, Ephesians, Philippians, Philemon and 2 Timothy, are they not all a witness to us of what issues forth when the limitations are accepted? I do not know that the apostle accepted the limitations fully on the ship, for we have no record of anything in the way of light coming from thence during the time of his voyage to Rome. It was in the definiteness of his acceptance of prison conditions that there was result.
PH Conditions from which in his case he was never released.
JT As far as we know.
PL Were the prophets, as vessels of light, very much on that line? Ezekiel accepts the conditions: “I was among the captives by the river Chebar”, then he says, “the heavens were opened, and I saw visions of God”, (Ezekiel 1:1).
JT That is very good indeed.
Ques I suppose, whether actually or morally, the prison plays a great part in the history of God’s testimony here, does it not?
JT The thing is to accept the conditions of limitation. In accepting them the light comes. It was well that Onesimus, as we have been hearing,
[p. 51] should come into contact with Paul in those circumstances. I suppose you could find nobody like him as a product, one that should be Philemon’s for ever; for we have to live with the brethren, beloved, we do not want to part with them for ever.
Ques Are you feeling that there is a hesitancy to accept the limitations?
JT I am sure there is.
PR It needs faith.
JT Well, yes, and it needs reduction, for there is reproach attached to a prisoner’s chains — to governmental limitations.
PL Do you see this in John, too? He is in the isle that is called Patmos in connection with the testimony of Jesus, and he gets the mind of Christ as to the whole situation in regard of the assembly.
JT Quite, he accepts the banishment. He was “in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ”, (Revelation 19). But then, he not only accepted the position of limitation, but he had power in his soul to take up his privileges, he was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day — he had power in his soul. We see in the prison at Philippi a similar experience; the limitations were accepted, but there was power inwardly. At midnight, that is to say, when one would be weakest physically and seeking rest if possible, they prayed and sang praises to God; in the limitations there was power inwardly. Now what you get in Joseph is that he was not at all under the pressure of things. He was given to serve these two men, and he might have been perfunctory in the service because it was a menial sort of thing, and he was conscious of being there unrighteously; but he was sympathetic with them. It says, “Joseph ... looked on them, and behold, they were sad”, and he said, “Why are your faces so sad today?” (Genesis 40:6,7). Being sympathetic with them, refers to the buoyancy, the inward power, that the spiritual man has, so that,
[p. 52] although he himself is in limitations, he is with God and able to help others. He had said, “Why are your faces so sad today?” He need not have said that; all he had to do was just the ordinary duties, but he was sympathetic with them. I have no doubt that any drooping saint turning into Paul’s hired house would get set up. There is a certain sister well known to many of us, and it was told me that if any of the saints got down a bit and went to see her they got lifted up — and she is in prison, having been bed-ridden for about fifty years! But there is power inwardly — that is the idea.
MWB Your word is of great encouragement to those who are limited, for so many are on sick-beds or in circumstances of great limitation, but what you are bringing before us may be an opportunity for the spread of the testimony.
JT It is an opportunity. One knows many who are limited outwardly, but not inwardly; they are enlarged inwardly.
Ques Was the little maid in Syria a typical case?
JT Yes, indeed! She was a captive. I think of her as representative in a concrete way of the teaching of the previous chapter (2 Kings 4). There we have the whole truth from Romans to Ephesians brought out in a typical way, and I believe that she embodies this, because, although a captive, and in most menial circumstances, she is buoyant and full of spiritual feelings. “Oh, would that my lord were before the prophet that is in Samaria!” (chapter 5:3). She is full of the thing and she has no question about it; she knows the virtue that is with the prophet.
Ques Would she eventually glory in the limitations?
JT She might well do so, if she knew that you and I would be talking about her here.
Ques Was what we have been speaking of the result of Joseph cherishing the testimony in his heart?
JT Quite. “His word” was what he saw in his dreams and this regarded himself. He saw wonderful things as to himself — his brethren bowing down, and the sun, moon and eleven stars making obeisance to him. He was buoyant as possessing such light, and the more the pressure on him, the more the light shone. I think it is very remarkable that he noticed the countenances of the two men; the one who has done no wrong becomes the servant of those who have. We should be sympathetic with people in need, instead of being down under the irksomeness of things and, it may be, complaining — being buoyant in the light, the wonderful light there is that belongs to us, that has reference to ourselves — the light of the calling of God — and sympathetic also with the need, the suffering, that exists.
MWB Sometimes we find that the prison is the fruit of failure in some way, not only with individuals but perhaps with meetings. A prison condition exists, great limitation, an evil report, it may be, in the district as to the gospel. Would you still apply the thought in such cases?
JT I should. I should say that under all circumstances there is gain in accepting whatever limitations there may be. If you accept the limitations, God will help you in them. I am sure you have found that.
MWB It is a wonderful principle you are bringing out which applies to us, not only individually, and which is most essential, but which applies also to districts which are under the government of God, where it is obvious that prison conditions exist — that there is hope in the acceptance of them.
JT That is the point. The acceptance of the condition brings God in; He never denies us when we accept them.
PL You spoke of buoyancy. When Jehovah turned the captivity of Zion, it says, “Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with rejoicing”, (Psalm 126:2). There had been that inward buoyancy which now breaks out.
JT Quite, they had accepted the limitation. They refused to sing the songs of Zion in a strange land; that was intelligent; those songs belonged to certain settings.
Ques When you speak of the ‘king’s prison’ do you suggest that the Lord may designedly put us into certain positions that we may get the light that is there for us?
JT I think so; even though the enemy may have had a hand in it, as with Joseph, yet it is God. In David’s case, in one record we read that Satan moved David to number the people, and in the other record, Jehovah moved him to number them. In either case it was God, He wished to bring about conditions through which He could meet David and bless him; these conditions were necessary. There was a design on the Lord’s part on account of what was there for the help of those who accepted it.
Rem The apostle speaks of the thorn in the flesh as the messenger of Satan (2 Corinthians 12:7) and speaks of glorying in his infirmities. Would that have a bearing?
JT It would. “For this thing I besought the Lord thrice”; then he left off, because he saw it was a fixed limitation. There are temporary limitations, but there are also fixed ones, and the prison at Rome was, I suppose, a fixed one, but then he was buoyant in it; he received all who came to him there.
Ques Would you say Joseph did not look on his as a fixed limitation?
JT No, for he asked to be remembered so as to come out of it, and he did come out of it. God took him out in a remarkable way, He took him out in the way he meant to be taken out, for the butler remembered Joseph, although in a forced and tardy way.
[p. 55] Ques Would you say those who accept the prison conditions are the ones who really remember Joseph today?
JT They are indeed; they do not forget Him.
RB If the prison conditions are accepted, the light is assured; we see that in the addresses to the assemblies; (Revelation 2, Revelation 3).
JT I think that is the point; we are enabled by them to discern where we are. There is an opened door, and it is a question of discerning just where we are and what conditions apply, and it is in the humble acceptance of them, I believe, that the greatest light will come out.
Ques Do you connect the limitations in a broad sense with the path of separation set out by the Lord?
JT I am speaking more of things which the Lord has allowed to happen, and for which we are all responsible. Whatever has happened in the public body is a question for each one of us to face; these things cannot be altered.
In imposing those conditions God’s wisdom is seen, because in accepting them we gain through the discipline involved and we hold the truth more firmly. It is in discerning what God is doing in that way and bowing to it, that light comes in. We see what there was here. These men were where Joseph was, and they found a sympathetic touch with him. He had himself more cause for complaint than they had, but he is not complaining; whereas they were sad, but their sadness was caused by the light beginning to operate. So the dreams are told, and you get the unfolding of remarkable things in the interpretation of them.
JS You seem to have in mind the heavenly position a good deal.
JT What we are at is to show that the acceptance of the limitations owns the hand of God. You own [p. 56] the hand of God in them. Paul, I believe, came thoroughly to it, so that he says, I am here the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you. I would have gone to the Jews, but I am here for you. He accepted it. And then in Ephesians 4:1 he is the prisoner in the Lord; he is perfectly restful in it now. It is not ‘of the Lord’ but “in the Lord”. There is nothing on his conscience at all, he has arrived at the thing thoroughly, and so the light is streaming forth from him in those circumstances. Here in Joseph’s case they tell their dreams, and he says, “Do not interpretations belong to God?” he is connecting them with God. He was conversant with visions; but he says “interpretations belong to God”. You see thus how thoroughly he is with God; Jehovah is prospering him in these limitations. If anyone has a difficulty, God can meet him; God is doing it. There is thus a beautiful testimony to God in the prison.
Ques Would you say that God interpreted Joseph’s limitation in that way in the psalm where it says, “He sent a man before them: Joseph was sold for a bondman”, (Psalm 105:17)? Paul interprets his imprisonment in that he says he is the prisoner of the Christ Jesus for the gentiles.
JT Yes. Here they say, We have dreamed a dream, but there is no interpreter of it; there is the acknowledgment of their poverty. That is the case with thousands of people; they do not know how things are; ‘There is no interpreter’, they say. It is well when people come to that. They have the dream, but it is no use to them, “an interpreter, one among a thousand” (Job 33:23) is the one they want. Where is he? He is in those limitations. Why? He is there of God; it is the place where the king’s prisoners are. He is a man, a man of sympathy, but he is an interpreter.
Ques When that sympathy is mentioned the prison is spoken of as “his lord’s house”. Would that [p. 57] suggest the sympathetic interest and affection with which he viewed the prison?
JT No doubt. Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God?” that is to say, he diverts them from any idea of a specialist. We must not look for specialists; the specialist will not always hold, but God will not fail us.
Ques Did the prophets feel the need of an interpreter?
JT Well, it was revealed to them that the things they ministered were not for themselves but for us; they were set right about that.
CCE Have we not found that people who have not really accepted the limitations you have referred to have, in a general way, lost light in the history of the testimony?
JT I think they have. And I will tell you what I think the people of God have suffered from — specialists, men regarded as specialists on certain lines; that diverts you from God, does it not?
CCE Quite.
JT So he says here immediately, “Do not interpretations belong to God?” but then he adds at once, “Tell me your dreams”. He is not advertising himself as an interpreter; he is not that. It is not the time for assuming to be anything; but anyway, tell the dreams. If God is interpreting dreams, there is no knowing whom He may use. The thing is to connect those in need with God.
Rem And Joseph was ready.
PH We ought to be able to help our brethren on this line. You were referring to an interpreter, one among a thousand.
JT You see how this principle comes in in Job, which is a book of limitations. God puts Job in prison, so to speak, and the instruction comes out in that connection. The interpreter, one among a thousand, is one who is “full of matter”, first of all;
[p. 58] and one who can wait till his elders have finished speaking — that kind of man. He is certainly no advertiser, no specialist; he is waiting till others have spoken.
PL Certainly he has a good deal of buoyancy; his belly “is as wine which hath no vent”, (Job 32:19).
JT Yes, exactly, and he is full of matter. We often hear persons taking part in the meetings because they have something, but this man had not only something (and it was powerful in him), but he was able to hold it till his elders had spoken.
Ques What do you mean by the term ‘specialist’? There are different gifts.
JT Well, there are those who have had a recognised ability for certain things, but they fail you. We must move on with God, for the man who has helped you today will not necessarily help you tomorrow.
Ques Have you in mind difficulties arising among us in various ways?
JT Well, whatever thing has to be solved, God will do it; it is His province.
Ques Does the key of David come in on that line?
JT It is the Lord who opens and shuts; but how great a thing it is to turn to Him! to turn to God in the recognition that He has things in His hand. In turning to God in subjection to Him, and to one another, the difficulty will be solved.
Ques Would Daniel and his three friends answer to that?
JT Quite; Scripture abounds with evidences of what we are saying.
Rem I thought Daniel and his three friends turned to God and then God was able to make known Nebuchadnezzar’s dream to him, and he said, God would give him an answer.
[p. 59] Ques Does Paul bring God before us? “If in anything ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you”, (Philippians 3:15).
JT Exactly. We must not force things. As time is given God will surely make His mind known. “God shall reveal even this unto you”.
Ques What is the distinction between “prisoner of the Christ Jesus”, and “prisoner in the Lord”?
JT I think the Christ Jesus is the One who has done things for God; He is the anointed One, and He has the apostle now where He wished him to be — among the nations instead of among the Jews.
Rem So the mystery, the assembly, is revealed under those conditions.
JT That is what he goes on to say; and he wished them to know that. Then “in the Lord” in chapter 4 means there is nothing on his conscience he is not a felon, but under the Lord in the prison.
Rem Chapter 4 has more to do with walk.
JT Yes; and the authority of the Lord. The next thing is Joseph says, “tell me your dreams, I pray you. Then the chief of the cup-bearers told his dream to Joseph ... and I took the grapes, and pressed them into Pharaoh’s cup”. It was as if the mind of God was that the precious life of Christ should be seen in those circumstances — the vine, the branches, the blossoms and the ripened grapes, all in the order of nature, and the grapes pressed into Pharaoh’s cup which was in the hand of the cup-bearer. It seems to me that in those circumstances the light that shines is the beautiful life of Christ pressed out at the end for God — the life of Jesus.
Rem The true vine.
JT Yes.
Rem Very much like Aaron’s rod that budded.
JT Well it is, in the sense that the fruit developed in its own order, but here it is pressed out instead of ripened almonds, the latter denoting faithfulness and [p. 60] watchfulness. Here you have the result for God; it was into Pharaoh’s cup they were pressed.
Rem You can well understand the remembrance of such an one.
JT Then in the baker we have the opposite to that, where instead of Pharaoh getting the bakemeats, the birds got them. There was no ability to keep things for God — really, you might say, marking the history of the assembly. There is that which is for God, corresponding with the life of Jesus, and there is that, alas! which is for the enemy which should be for God.
DLH There is a passage which seems to correspond very much with that: “We are unto God a sweet savour of Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that perish: to the one we are the savour of death unto death; and to the other the savour of life unto life”, (2 Corinthians 2:15,16). God got His portion, and then there was blessing. On the one hand some got life, and found the testimony to be life unto life; but on the other hand, there were others to whom it was death unto death. I suppose that is true still.
JT Just so. In 2 Corinthians the apostle enlarges on that thought as to the life of Jesus, speaking of bearing about in his body the dying of Jesus — what it was for God.
RB How beautifully the Spirit of Christ is seen in those words, “The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage”, (Psalm 16:6). That is what you mean, is it not? Limitations were accepted fully by Him.
JT Quite.
Rem So that if we accept the government of God — the prison conditions — there will be light, and there will be something for God — the grapes.
JT Yes. There can be no doubt the first dream alludes to that, to the life of Jesus coming out in measure in the saints. So in 2 Corinthians the apostle [p. 61] is able to bring himself forward in this connection — how he corresponded with the life of Jesus; but in them the enemy was getting what belonged to God. The Corinthians were wonderfully endowed by God, but it was not intended that these endowments should be used for themselves or the enemy; but the enemy was getting the very things God had enriched them with; they were being used for their own glory.
Ques Would that be through lack of watchfulness? The butler says, “a vine was before me”; he was not going to lose anything; but the baskets were on the baker’s head.
JT Quite, the head was the difficulty; that was the trouble with the Corinthians, and as sure as possible if we rely on our natural ability, the enemy will get an advantage. We may be possessed with what is of God, but the enemy will get it.
Ques Would you allow the thought of suffering in connection with this? If the life of Jesus is reproduced in the saints, there would be suffering.
JT Yes, it is in the suffering the grapes are pressed. You see the care with which the cup-bearer follows the thing up; there is no lapse, the grapes develop, and he uses them as they ripen; whereas with the baker the enemy is allowed to take away the things that were for Pharaoh.
PL Does not Abraham keep the birds away in the vision he had? (Genesis 15:11).
JT He did; he was watchful. You see in Protestantism the ‘tree’ in which the birds of the air have a roosting-place, whereas in Rome the birds of the air are in a cage — it is “a cage of every unclean and hateful bird” (Revelation 18:2); they are caged, but nevertheless they are hateful.
Ques What is the experience today that would answer to giving the cup into Pharaoh’s hand?
JT I think it is following the thing up; whatever there is, you see to it that it is for God and that God [p. 62] gets it. There is the vigilance with which the butler follows the thing up.
Rem So it is not enough to have a personal appreciation of the life of Christ, but it should be presented to God.
JT Quite. The cup-bearer was thinking of Pharaoh; the other carried the bakemeats in a loose, unprotected way.
ER That was the butler’s entire business. I think it is very important to recognise what our business is and to be set for it.
JT Yes, quite; to follow the thing up. Fruit comes in its order, and then, when it is ripened, we must see that God gets it.