EXTRACT

Here is the seal written on both sides as it were, “the Lord knoweth them that are his”. How many of us carry this seal about? It was in the power of it that the great revival came about from which we are all benefiting now, and it remains. “The Lord knoweth them that are his”.

There is not one of them in the whole world who is not perfectly known to Christ; and if the Lord know those that are His. He never withdraws His eyes from one of them ... Then the other side is, “Let every one who names the name of the Lord withdraw from iniquity”. We have this seal in our possession on moral grounds—the power of representation. Although God is falsified on every hand, there is in those who hold the seal and act on it, a representation of God, and it means deliverance, for a true witness delivereth souls. There is no other way out, it is divinely appointed representation of God, in a day of general departure. He has opened up the way, and so the Lord says, “I have set before thee an opened door”—not an open one, but an opened one; the Lord has done it. He has the key of David; as He says, He opens and no one shuts, and He shuts and no one opens; and so “I have set before thee an opened door”. How it became opened I think is explained by the seal. We have the way opened for what I may call a little bit of collective representation. I think the Lord has great delight in the return to the collective thought; hence He says, “I have set before thee an opened door, and no man can shut it”. So that there is a way open to us, dear friends, a door opened by the Lord in which we, having a little strength as He says, may represent Him.

He says, thou “hast kept my word (it is in that that representation lies) and hast not denied my name”. How can those who take on another name represent Christ? It is misrepresentation; whereas this church—Philadelphia—affording a green spot for Christ, had not misrepresented Him; she had kept the word of His patience, and not denied His name.

She had a little power. The Lord appreciates a little collective power, and I think the fact that He does so should be treasured in the keenest way by us. There is no pretension attached to it; it is what the Lord sees and treasures. No misrepresentation; she keeps the word of His patience and does not deny His name.

J. Taylor, New Series Vol. 20, pp. 79–81

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