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THE SANCTIFIER AND THE SANCTIFIED

Reading with C. Hammond

CH What is in mind is the securing of a sanctified company, perhaps we might say, a company of sanctified ones. The height of the truth is in the last scripture read, but I thought we might see the divine road to it. It is not just a matter of light—“for both he that sanctifies and those sanctified are all of one”—but of spiritual experience. Our hymn (No. 104) contained references to the Lord’s reproach and suffering, and I thought we would begin there. I think we would recognise! that the principle of separation, whilst basic to any right position according to God, is not necessarily an end in itself, but is in view of something else.

What links these scriptures together is the truth of sanctification, an expression used in 2 Timothy 2—a sanctified vessel meet for the Master’s use. That is more the external, of owning the Lord’s name and departing from iniquity, which is an essential thing at the present time. But I chose the Hebrews 13 scripture because it is personal to Christ. It is not just a matter of principles, though it involves principles, but you go out to a Person. What is more, whilst we have to dwell a good deal on going without the camp, what really provides the basis is the blood that is taken into the presence of God; then the body is burned outside the camp. But first, the blood is taken in.

GWB Am I right in thinking that that was on the day of atonement?

CH Yes; it is the basis of all blessing, the basis not only of righteousness, but of holiness, for God has been propitiated in regard of sin.

FCM Is that the blood in relation to the purpose and counsel of God to have men in His presence?

CH That is right; and to have them there in holiness. The first thing is to get a sense that every holy claim of God involved in the incoming of sin is met by the blood that is taken into His immediate presence. I think we shall see the value of that later in our enquiry. It says that of those beasts whose blood is taken in, the bodies were burned outside the camp.

GWB In his first epistle John refers not only to the blood but to the Person. He says of Him, “He is the propitiation for our sins, but not for ours alone, but also for the whole world”.

CH So there is a very wide and extensive basis that God has established in the blood being taken in to His immediate presence, in the type.

GWB Does that mean that, whatever happens here below, His glory is met?

CH Yes, and it includes not just the sins or the state of persons, but God being given a righteous basis to continue with a collective testimony here, because it stands over against

“the camp”. The camp, according to the Hebrews setting, is the religious profession, which perhaps we do not feel sufficiently, the dishonour to God at the present time in what outwardly professes His name.

BES In Leviticus 4 it is in connection with the sin of the priest, or of the whole congregation, that the blood was carried in. In the case of the prince or the common person it was not. Does that connect with what you have been saying?

CH Yes; because I think it is the priestly company that is in mind; it is with those who presume to draw near to God that the greatest sin has occurred, as with the two sons of Aaron. The sanctification is by His own blood, and gives God a warrant for going forward with His original intention to have a sanctified company here on earth. There is an immediate connection with the Sanctifier, according to chapter two, an order of humanity that is after Christ

P.N.S. Does the immediate connection between the blood and the holy of holies, both in this chapter and in chapter ten, underline what you are saying as to holiness being requisite for the service of God?

CH That is the comparison with 2 Timothy 2, so often quoted in recent years, and this chapter which emphasizes holiness, and holiness enters into sanctification. It is a question of our being committed wholly to God.

AAB It says in Revelation 22, “He that is holy, let him be sanctified still”. There is a fixed condition of things contemplated in that passage. Mr. Taylor used to speak of it, suggesting that we are in that time now.

CH I am glad you recall that. He said it is fixed, for good or for evil; “Let the filthy make himself filthy still … and he that is holy, let him be sanctified still”. It is a question of the character of the service that is to be rendered to God in a day when the love of the most grows cold. The profession itself is a perversion of the truth.

ECB Could you say something as to what distinction there might be between being sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, and sanctifying the people by His own blood, and whether those two things together would not bring the Supper into our mind.

CH That is exactly what is in my mind, because it links the two chapters; both enter into the Supper. Do you think the Supper in that respect is the means by which practical sanctification is sustained amongst the saints?

ECB Would it provide weekly a point to which we rally as the sanctified company? It is not that these two scriptures refer directly to the Supper, but the references to the offering of His body, and “by his own blood”, would immediately remind us of the loaf and the cup, would they not?

CH That is my thought in suggesting these scriptures, which, I think, shows that the Spirit of God is with us now in seeking to get at this immense truth, that God is after a company of sanctified persons. I think it settles the question of whether we should use the term “position”. Those who go outside the camp, and accept the reproach of the Christ, are on the way to sanctification. I doubt whether there is any real sanctification apart from accepting the reproach of Christ; and that is not just in the world as such. The slander and misrepresentation that has occurred recently makes you feel increasingly the departure of those who profess, in which we have to own our part. But the blood going in is the assurance that God has the answer to every moral question.

ECB I am sure that is right. The blood is sprinkled around the altar, before the altar, and so on. I wondered whether “sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ”

extended our minds to the bodies that were burned outside the camp. There is more in it than that, but wondered if it linked with the reference in chapter 13 to the bodies, the allusion being to something in relation to the death of Christ. I wondered whether the scriptures do not link together, as if the apostle in writing had been drawing on the same sources all the way through.

CH That is right. He starts with God’s highest thoughts. In the Corinthians Paul starts with God’s highest thoughts, but the way we approach the truth is delineated afterwards.

GWB There is an element of reproach in connection with the bodies that were burned outside the camp. I am wondering how it bears on what Mr. B. was just saying.

CH I think it involves a full committal to the position of reproach. I do not think we shall escape reproach until the Lord comes. If we do, I think it will mean we have not taken our position here in relation to Him who suffered outside the gate.

EOPM Does this link at all with what we were considering on Lord’s day afternoon in 1 Corinthians; the presentation there of the Supper, the emphasis on the body and the blood, but “in the night in which he was delivered up”?

CH I think there is a link. What I am concerned about in this particular setting is, “therefore let us go forth to him”. However broken the day, however great the unfaithfulness among those who confess His name, you can still take up this position, you go forth to Him without the camp.

BWW A little earlier in this chapter His unchangingness is emphasized. It is the same Person all the way through.

CH The Person is the same. What God is at is not just to indicate our course in any difficulty that may arise, but to go out to Him without the camp, bearing His reproach. We have to make sure that the reproach is not on our account, because the way we act at times is not in accordance with the truth we supposedly hold, or stand for; but, nevertheless, the fact is that it is the reproach of Christ that is upon those who are seeking to pursue the truth at the present time.

GWB Paul speaks about the scandal of the cross. Is that a similar thought? He boasts in it, does he not?

CH He does.

RET The life being in the blood, does that give the basis of God maintaining His righteousness?

CH And His holiness—sanctification involves holiness as well as righteousness. But it is “to him”. The Lord is still the gathering point and I think we want to be sure that, after the usurpation that we had to suffer for so long, the Lord is still the gathering Centre. We go out to Him, bearing His reproach. It is outside “the camp”, an organised system of things that professedly owns him, but in fact denies Him.

AJE You were speaking about a collective position. There are two references to “us” in this portion we read; scripture confirms that there is that. There are some that we walked with recently who strenuously affirm that everything is individual. We have to take the position one by one, but we find company, that is “us” and “we”.

CH That is outside the camp, and that comes very close home. We can condemn the blatant errors that there are in the established systems, but “outside the camp”, I think, involves anything that has been an affront to the declaration of God in the blood and the body of our Lord. He suffered without the gate, and “we have not here an abiding city, but we seek the coming one. By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise continually to God”—that is, the service of God is in mind.

FCM It seems that there is a continuity—it is the same Person to whom we go out by whom this continual service of praise is maintained, in that position.

CH That is so, and I think the Supper has a very great part in this. When we break bread we do so in the wilderness, and the wilderness supposes the acceptance of the reproach of the Christ. But, inwardly, it involves being in touch with One who ever was, and ever will be what He was, God over all, blessed for ever. There was a time when One said to Another, “Thou hast prepared me a body”. The spirit of revelation is in Paul’s quoting Psalm 40. David seems to rise to a type of Christ. The veil is drawn aside as to what transpired between the One that we know now as the Father, and the Other, the Son. It illustrates what Mr. Darby says, that we do not speak of divine Persons as having the same mind or the same will; it is one will, but several willings.

GWB The Lord speaks of Himself, when He was here, as meek and lowly in heart. We often speak about being humble—we appreciate the need of it more than ever—but the bearing of the reproach would produce that.

CH That is right. The only safe attitude is not to assume to any position; the Lord is the gathering Centre, and we are to go outside the camp, whatever that may involve, and seek Him. What do we come out to? A system of rules again? An enlightened view of what separation means?—though we need that, too. The centre, it seems to me, is that you go out to a Person and you accept His reproach; and that same Person, as Mr. M. has said, is the One who is the Leader of the praises, as Hebrews 2 shows.

ECB It is not only that it is the same Person. It is the same Person in the same position publicly. It is still so. That is to say, the sacrifice of praise offered continually to God by Him is not done inside the camp.

CH I hope the brethren have got the significance of that remark, because immediately we speak of any official position we have lost the real meaning of the scripture.

ECB Yes, I think it is essential that we should be continually reminded that we go forth to Him; but the reproach in this section is not, for instance, the same as in the last chapter of Galatians, is it?—where Paul glories in the cross and he is crucified to the world, and the world to him. This is reproach from the public profession—not reproach from the world.

CH That is exactly what is in my mind.

DER So Peter says, “If ye are reproached in the name of Christ, blessed are ye”; it is in the name, not for the name.

CH Well, it is a great thing to have the sense that the Lord is still the gathering Centre. If we have got that clear, we can go to chapter 10 and see that what lies behind this is that, “coming into the world”, that is, with that in view, the Lord said, “Thou tookest no pleasure in burnt-offerings and sacrifices for sins. Then I said, Lo, I come (in the roll of the book it is written of me) to do, O God, thy will”. It is a question of a body prepared for Him—“Thou has prepared me a body”.

The writer of this epistle could give a spiritual meaning to what is written in the psalm, which was doubtless the result of David’s experiences. Paul, as we assume, puts his own interpretation on it, not just “ears hast thou digged”, but, “Thou hast prepared me a body”.

References to both the body and the blood being brought together at the Supper, link us with the occasion that sustains us in the sense that the Lord is the gathering Centre. But what lies behind it is the mystery of the incarnation. I expect that is why the Lord said, through ministry, that in relation to the cup the element of worship should enter into our thanksgiving.

Who was it who filled out the will of God here?

AAB Peter addresses the saints as “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. Do we have there another veiled allusion to the truth of the Supper? “The obedience” is connected with what was effected in His body. One was feeling the need of getting to what lies behind the externals. It is that which is going to hold our hearts in fidelity, is it not?

CH I believe so, and the sanctification of the worshipper is a settled matter in this chapter—it is established in perpetuity. It is contrasted with the worshipper approaching, and then the high priest dies, the thing is not continuous; but now the position of the sanctified is a settled matter; it is established according to the will of God. But behind it was the mind of One of the Persons of the Godhead to come—“Lo, I come”.

AAB We need to appropriate this more, “This is my body, which is for you”. It has in view that we appropriate the spiritual side of this matter. It would build up a constitution to stand in the testimony.

CH It seems that the Supper is the great occasion for sustaining the saints in this, because it is a time of feeding upon Christ, for seeing what was, and is, in Him; and I think the mystery of the incarnation comes into it. This scripture is, we might say, a conversation between two of Them; One willing to come, and the Other preparing a body for Him, and that was the body in which the Lord was found, and in which the will of God was filled out perfectly, so, “By which will we have been sanctified”.

GWB So the sanctification by the offering of the body reflects the blessedness and the holiness of the body, “Thou hast prepared me a body”.

CH Yes; then the fixity of that acceptance, before God, is an established matter. It can never be broken into because the One who gave His body has settled the matter once and for all.

GWB How much more liberty we should have if we understood that! Why is it that we do not take it in?

CH Perhaps we do not give ourselves sufficient time for contemplation. I think we rely on knowledge, which is limited anyway with many of us; but we are to contemplate this Person, who could say before the incarnation, “I come to do, O God, thy will”, and in Gethsemane He says to His Father, “Not my will, but thine be done” (Luke 22: 42). It is submission, subjection, and devotion in perfection in a Man. Who is He who could declare God? This enters into the cup, I believe. There is a depth and fulness in the cup that involves what we have said—the apprehension at least that the One who came to fill out the will of God is none less than God Himself, but in manhood.

ECB Do you think that some of our insufficiency in the service of God may relate to our stopping at no longer having any conscience of sins, but that sanctification is something that is then positively entered into and provides a basis for entering fully into the service of God in the sanctified company?

CH That is good. That is what we have here, no more remembrance of sin. It does not say, ‘no more consciousness of sin’, but, “no longer any conscience of sins”. That is, the conscience is clear by this wondrous sacrifice, so that we approach in the liberty that has been established in the giving of the body of Christ.

ECB I think Mr. Stoney has things to say on the point that if we are just occupied with the fact that our sins are forgiven even occupied with the fact that we have no longer conscience of sins—we may not proceed very far in the service of God. What is needed is the additional sense of what it is that He has achieved through sanctification—so that He has secured the praises of God in a company who have, if we may say so, left the question of sins behind. They are now on ground that does not include it.

CH That is right.

AAB To extend what Mr. B. was saying as to the additional thought in Hebrews 10 of the burnt-offering, you referred a moment ago to our acceptance, and the liberating power of that in our souls in the service of God. That is connected with our apprehension of the burnt-offering. I was thinking of the stupendous character of the thought of the will of God, but the Lord Jesus provided everything that was called for in connection with the will of God; going beyond the meeting of the exigency that had arisen through the incoming of sin, to the establishment of every divine purpose.

CH That is right; and that enters into the cup, does it not?

RET I wondered if it would be right to hold in our minds the distinctiveness of the loaf, speaking of the body, but yet holding the cup in a distinctive way too, the will of God in the body, but the liberating power that the cup should bring in. Would that be right?

CH I think so. The cup relates to what the Lord accomplished for God particularly, but the effects of it are still, according to 1 Corinthians 11, “for you”. What is effected for God liberates Him to come out in the fulness of what is in His own mind.

ECB Does not that remark amplify for us the significance of the new covenant, attached to the cup? I was thinking of what you were saying, that it would be the thought of God’s disposition towards us. God is free to make Himself known in the personal way in which He has revealed Himself, and His whole disposition is known to us in that. We understand the new covenant in the cup.

CH And we are not thinking of the new covenant as a matter of terms, but we come to the Ark of the covenant at the Supper; the One who is the Fulfiller of every thought of God; the fulness of it is there. It extends, of course, as the service proceeds. But it seems to me that it brings a liberating effect; for God anyway, and it should be for us. We are moving towards the understanding that God has sanctified ones, according to His will.

GWB So in that way the Supper becomes a fresh invitation to take that ground of being sanctified for His service; and it practically leads to that.

CH Yes, it does.

WJRB I was thinking that Moses in Deuteronomy, when he places the covenant in the ark, says, “There they are”—it is fixed.

CH We have come by means of Christ as the Ark of the covenant to the God who covenanted. It seems to me a most liberating thing that it was in God’s will that we should be sanctified, “by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all”. That sacrifice has not to be repeated, so the position from God’s side is established. Whether it is so from our side would be a question of our apprehension of it.

GWB It is most important, what you are stressing now, because if there is any failure with us individually, we tend to forget this and our liberty is hindered.

FCM In Chapter 8, in connection with the covenant, one of the effects is that “all shall know me in themselves”.

CH Yes, “in themselves”, so that the brother who gives thanks for the memorials is not just moved in his mind, but in his spirit, because it is a spiritual matter to understand that “by which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all”. There is no break in that. If we could see the position from God’s side I think it would help greatly in liberating us, because we so often take a subjective view and are limited according to the state. But we are to rise above that to what is established in God’s sight, that it is in His will that we should be set apart. It is not separated from; it is sanctified to something. We are committed to the service of the blessed God.

HRB The Lord says, “For where two or three are gathered together unto my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18: 20).

CH That is right; that would bear upon administration. What I am trying to get, for myself anyway, is this great thought of sanctification. All that the saints have passed through, the sorrow and the distress, should have had a separating effect from what is unholy, not only from what is not right. Now that in itself has a sanctifying effect. But there is a divine basis, “the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all”. God is not going back on that, and we are to be liberated in our spirits to proceed with the remainder of the service at the Supper.

ECB Would it be right to think that sanctification has a dignifying effect? It has been in my mind lately as to whether our exercises as to separation that have been pursued have altogether had that effect. My impression is that a christian is a person who moves with dignity. I think sanctification should have that effect, so that, while what we are saying bears directly on the service of God, sanctification has an effect all through the week.

CH I have no doubt it has. That leads really to our last scripture in Hebrews 2, “He that sanctifies and those sanctified are all of one”. There is a dignity about that, because it is an order of things that is patterned after Christ. There is no discrepancy between the Sanctifier and the sanctified. It is a dignified position, so that we can be before God in suitability, so that the Lord can take occasion, by the place He has amongst us, to hymn His God.

PC So it would be the Sanctifier we should follow, and as following Him we surely will be, by being occupied with Him, sanctified persons. Our sensibilities increase all the time.

CH Occupation with Him who has established everything for God has a most sanctifying effect, it seems to me; as Mr. B. said it is the dignity of our position—that is really what is in this passage. How it was accomplished is not so much the point. It is predicated of certain persons that they are sanctified ones.

AAB Does John 17 have a bearing on this? The Lord ennobles His, own there. “The glory which thou hast given me I have given them that they may be one” (John 17: 22). Then as to the daily matter, He speaks to the Father of sanctification, and then of sending His own into the world, as the Father had sent Him into the world.

CH And in that section of John 17 He addresses the Father as “holy”, “Holy Father”.

Later on, when it is a question of God’s selection of certain ones, it is “Righteous Father”; He is perfectly righteous in what He has done in His selection. But when it is a question of their being preserved from the world He says, “Holy Father”. That bears upon this. What Mr. B. says has confirmed in my mind that it is the dignity of the sanctified ones; they are available now to Christ in relation to the service of God, “In the midst of the assembly will I sing thy praises”.

RET J.T. said in Newcastle as to that reference to “Holy Father”, it was only the Lord who could say that and understand what He was saying.

CH Oh; surely! it is recorded for us. I have often wondered about the way things are recorded. Think of the Spirit of God recalling through John this prayer for us today, nearly 2,000 years later.

FCM Does John 17 lead on to John 20, “My Father and your Father”. Is that the sanctified company?

CH That is right. It is the dignity that we arrive at, and arrive at, I think, realistically; that the Sanctifier and the sanctified are all of one. That is, the Lord has a company now serviceable to Him as He takes over in the service of God.

DER It is wonderfully liberating that we are of the same order, stock, and lineage as Christ Himself; that He the Sanctifier, and we the sanctified, are all of one.

CH Yes. It is the order of humanity.

GWB Would it be illustrated, in part at least, by Aaron’s sons and their father’s service? Of course, the antitype is much greater, but it is very impressive to view them as they are presented in the scripture. The dignity that has been referred to was certainly theirs as well as his.

CH Yes, indeed.

FNS If we carry forward the truth and the reality of the Person who gave effect to the will of God would it not give us a sense of the dignity of the whole order of things, and that He has the place in the midst of such an assembly as this?

Would it not help to keep in our minds the dignity and the glory of all that God had in His thoughts, that has been established in this way?

CH That is right. That is what has been in my mind in suggesting this line of truth, that it might promote with us a sense of what God has established in one blessed Man, and that Man is God. To me, that enters into our apprehension. We speak of the mystery of the incarnation, and of course it is; we cannot penetrate into One who, for instance, in John 3: 13, could say, “The Son of Man who is in heaven”. You just bow in worship.

ECB Both these expressions, “those sanctified” and “the assembly” here, would be all-embracing, would they not? But then is it not a question of who is ready to be available?

CH I think that is the point, and the way to it is in chapter 13, it seems to me. It is for all. The truth is all-embracing; it includes all saints in the mind of God. But it is a question of our arrival at it, and that is in the acceptance of the reproach of Christ, and as to anything connected with “the camp”, we are not having to do with it.

Barnet
13th January 1973

AAB A. A. Bellamy, Buckhurst Hill

ECB E. C. Burr, London

GWB G. W. Brown, Barnet

HRB H. R. Butcher, Redbridge

WJRB W. J. R. Brodie, Ealing

PC Cooper, Redbridge

AJE A. J. Ellis, Barnet

CH C. Hammond, London

EOPM E. O. P. Mutton, Redbridge

FCM F. C. Mutton, Redbridge

DE D. E. Remmington, St. Albans

BES B. E. Surtees, Buckhurst Hill

FNS F. N. Stickland, Redbridge

RET R. E. Turner, St. Albans

BWW B. W. Ward, London

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