SPIRITUAL GROWTH
C. F. Dadd
1 Samuel 1: 26–29; 2: 18, 19, 26; 3: 19, 20; 1 Chronicles 4: 9, 10; 1 Timothy 4: 1, 2, 10–16
I have read these scriptures as having in mind to direct our thoughts toward the, subject of spiritual growth. It seems to me that it is a subject which should interest all of us. Young people here are growing physically, but the thought is that we might get some impress of the necessity of growing spiritually; growing in our own links with Christ and making greater room in our hearts for the Spirit of God.
I have read about these three personalities, Samuel, Jabez and Timothy. Samuel is well known to us; Jabez maybe is not so well known; Timothy is often the subject of consideration amongst us and rightfully so. I could not help but be impressed in the readings we have had, especially today, with the challenge that has come forward as to what our testimony is, and whether we truly manifest the features of Christ as we move amongst men, and as we move amongst the saints. Christianity is to be not only in words, as we have been reminded, but it is to be manifested in us; even our faces have come into consideration. I am sure you will agree with me that when we are tested most is when we are away from each other. While we are with each other we are in a sphere of protection, and we have a certain influence with each other and we understand how to move. Most of us have grown up amongst the saints, so we have had opportunity to observe the older brethren. The challenge that came in at the end of the meeting this afternoon is something we really need to think about. The greatest responsibility of the moment lies with us who are older as to whether the true principles of Christianity are being set out by us, whether we can be looked at and considered to be as amongst those who rightly represent the glad tidings.
It is the intention of the Spirit of God to form in us the features of Christ. In the glad tidings the great end is that Christ should be reproduced in each one of us. If we are falling short of this, it means that the glad tidings are not having their intended effect, because we were reminded of the apostles how it could be said of them that they had been with Jesus (see Acts 4: 13); something was in expression that was like their Master, the One with whom they had spent three-and-a-half years. Paul was not here at the time of the Lord’s public testimony, but when he wrote to the saints at Corinth, where there was much in the way of exercise and concern, he could say to them, “Be my imitators, even as I also am of Christ”, 1 Corinthians 11: 1. Could we say that? Would that be our testimony today? Paul said, “as I also am of Christ”. What a beautiful thought! Saul of Tarsus had been an over-bearing man, one who had brought so much pressure on the saints, casting them into prison, giving his vote when they were delivered up to death, yet he was converted, and the Lord proceeded to work in him, and produced a vessel that was a reproduction of Himself. That is the grace of the dispensation in which we live. It is the same glad tidings; it is the same Man at the right hand of God; it is the same Spirit, so that these things are open to us and they are possible.
Timothy was a reproduction of Paul, because Paul could say that when you see him he will put you in mind of my ways as they are in Christ. What a fine expression Timothy would have been! He was the kind of man to whom the testimony could be committed. The challenge to you and me is whether we can be numbered with the faithful; whether we are here truly setting out the great things that God has in mind for man. We spoke about the glad tidings today. They are the very foundation of things. We want to see to it that we do not let the glad tidings slip away from us. After the Spirit came the first thing that Peter did was to stand up with the eleven and preach the word of God. It was not a long preaching, short, concise and to the point, which I suppose points to the fact that we can be brief yet effective in service.
These are some of the thoughts that were going through my mind this afternoon as we spoke together. It certainly was a challenge to me and maybe to you, as to what kind of a man or what kind of a woman are you? How do you represent the testimony when you are amongst men? We were reminded of what it says in the early part of the Acts, how Peter and John could say, “Look on us”, Acts 3: 4. Could we say that, beloved brethren? What would they see? That man saw something new, he saw something that represented a new power amongst men. The old line of things had left the man lying exactly where he had been for years, the old system had no power to meet his need, but as Peter and John stood there they represented a new dispensation, a dispensation marked by power whereby persons can be healed, they can be given the gift of the Spirit of God, and they can have part in the service of God.
I read about this fine woman Hannah. I am sure we have some appreciation of the value of our godly sisters, their prayers; their labours and their affections amongst us. Hannah was a godly woman. I would commend that to every sister. I would seek to encourage you to have your own links with the Lord Jesus, and develop your own links with the Spirit of God so that you can be a pillar of strength in the locality where you are. I know women like that; as we say sometimes, they are worth their weight in gold, and you can be one just like that. What a woman Hannah must have been! As another has said she is possibly the greatest personality amongst the women in the Old Testament. Why? Because she was in the secret of the mind of God; she knew what was needed for the testimony at that time; a man was needed. Someone was needed to come forward to strengthen the position, to maintain things, to hold
things. She knew that in her own link with God that this was what was needed at that time, and she went through much pressure, sorrow and tears. I appeal to the beloved sisters, that it might be in your own personal link with the Lord you will come to some understanding at the present time as to what is needed in the testimony. We speak about the tests that are amongst us, the exercises, the concerns; the needs are great, and it needs the mothers, women such as Hannah, persons that can carry these exercises into the presence of God. It is a great thing to desire that you might have power with heaven. Brothers stand up in the prayer meeting and seek that we might have power with heaven, and you can go through Scripture and see the women and the men that have had power with heaven. I would like to be numbered amongst them; those that can move heaven. Go into the presence of God and speak to Him, and let God speak to you. What a fine thing! It is open to us by the Spirit. Think of how accessible God has made Himself so that we can go into His presence at any time and speak to Him, make requests of Him, and get our directions from Him. Is this our pattern? God has made the way clear for us to go in and to speak to Him, to speak to Him as His children. Never has there been a time like it! Never has there been a family like the one to which you and I belong! We belong to the family of God, and we belong to it because we have received Christ—“but as many as received him, to them gave he the right to be children of God”, John 1: 12. What nearness! Are we in the enjoyment of this? Beloved, let not our Christianity be just notions to us, or just going to meetings, but may the Lord help us to develop our own personal links with God.
Hannah did that and the result was a Samuel. Samuel comes on to the scene, and she becomes a worshipper. What she herself says in 1 Samuel 2 are glorious words, in the way she worshipped God and the way she could speak to God. You read something like this and it makes you feel very small, at least it makes me feel like that. But this is open to all of us, because as being believers in Christ, and having received the gift of the Spirit, the wherewithal has been provided where we can have liberty with God, and know what it is to come into the understanding of His mind. God wants to share His thoughts with us; He wants us to understand what He is doing testimonially. Take a man like Enoch; Enoch did not live in our day, he did not have the Spirit of God as we have, but he was a man who could walk with God, he was sympathetic with God in what He was doing. This is open to you and me, and this is what Hannah filled out, a woman that knew God and knew how to get into His presence.
So Samuel comes on to the scene, and it says of Samuel that he “ministered before Jehovah, a boy girded with a linen ephod”. I had never noticed that so distinctly as I have today, because we spoke in the meeting about priestliness and this suggestion came forward that young persons can act in a priestly way. Maybe they would not be able to explain to you all the terms, yet they can function in a priestly way. Samuel at this point could not have told us very much, I suppose, he might have been able to tell us that the ephod was a priestly garment. He was just a boy it says, but he wore the priestly garment. Tomorrow morning you young brothers will be coming up to the Supper. How will you come? Will you come fragrant with some impression of Christ and ready to bring it into expression? One of the greatest things we can ever have part in is the service of God, and that is open to us now. We want to bring something for God, even if it is small, typically even if it is just a pigeon or a dove, we would want to come up with something in our hands for the heart of God. I think that is what is suggested in this lad. It says, “Samuel ministered before Jehovah, a boy girded with a linen ephod”. It does not say how old he was, he might have been ten, he might have been less or more, but he was girded with this priestly garment. So we can come up with thoughts that would
be precious to God. Do we realise what is within our range? May all our hearts be released for what is to be for the pleasure of God.
After Samuel ministers in this way it says, “And his mother made him a little coat, and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to sacrifice the yearly sacrifice”. How did she know what size to make it? Every year she brought this little coat it would be bigger than the year before. Something is going on with Samuel, he is growing spiritually, he is being built up. It says of him, “And the boy Samuel grew on, and was in favour both with Jehovah and also with men”. I think it gives the older brethren a thrill when they see younger brethren coming forward in the locality and see the evidence of them growing. They come into the readings with questions and suggestions which would show clearly they have started to read the Scriptures, or they have started to read the ministry.
Nature itself suggests that it is a normal thing that we should grow, and when it comes to spiritual growth it is something we never get away from, or should not, while we are down here. Now there is one school that you never graduate from, which is like the school of Tyrannus (see Acts 19: 9). It would not be an easy school. It is a school that you attend all your life, until the time of your departure, because it is where we can grow spiritually.
Samuel, no doubt, as coming under the effect of the hand of God is growing, and his mother sees this and appreciates it, and she makes a fresh coat every year. What are you mothers looking for? Maybe you want to prepare your children for business, you want them to be able to make a living. That is legitimate, but what is number one on the list? We have to look over our priority list and see what is most important. As you get older you realise that priority number one is Christ and the assembly, because everything else has to go. We have had two burials in the city of New York in one month recently, and you come to a conclusion as you consider this that everything else has to go. We saw a sister in hospital a matter of a few hours before she was taken, and we had a distinct sense as we looked at her that nothing else counts except what represents new creation, the formation of Christ in a believer. In the end nothing else counts, and yet we spend our effort and our time on many things that really count so little. What we should do is to put our investments and our time where we are going to get the greatest return. Do a little reading every day and you will find you will acquire an appetite for it and you will be built up, and like Samuel, you will grow.
Now I want to say a word about Jabez. He is a very interesting character; he is thrust on to the page of Scripture here in these two verses, a man that represents sterling qualities. One of the things that was uppermost in his mind was enlargement. He said, “Oh that thou wouldest richly bless me, and enlarge my border”. Here is a man that wants to grow spiritually. This is what I would like to entice all our hearts over to, that we generate this desire in relation to the things of God. It says of him that he was “more honoured than his brethren”. His mother named him. You say that is normal, but the Spirit of God records that she bore him with pain.
There was exercise behind this man Jabez coming in, and then he himself speaks to God.
Between those few words there is a long period of years, and then he says to the God of Israel, “Oh that thou wouldest richly bless me, and enlarge my border”. I think that is wonderful that here is a man who wants his spiritual border enlarged. God must have been delighted to have a man coming and saying to Him, “bless me, and enlarge my border”; I want to grow spiritually. This is what Jabez is saying. What delight God has in a man or a woman who wants to become spiritual.
He goes on to say, “and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me!”
May that be the desire of every one of our hearts, that we might be kept from evil. It is an easy thing to drop into evil. You are not much different from me, and I know what my heart is, and I know my own tendencies. A brother said to me not too long ago, You put yourself in wrong circumstances, and you see how fast your foot will slip. Here is a man who wants to be maintained in what is right, saying to God, “that thou wouldest keep me from evil”. That is a fine thing that we might be kept from evil. Paul says, “Keep thyself pure”, 1 Timothy 5: 22. Now, this is something that you and I want to think about even as older persons, that we protect our minds. Thoughts will come but be like Abraham who scared the birds away; you do not have to entertain wrong thoughts.
So Jabez says, “that thy hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me!” It is interesting that he says that. He does not say that it might not grieve God but, “that it may not grieve me”. How do we feel about things that are evil, things that are wrong, things that are said that are not right? Do they grieve us? What is our reaction? He is saying here, “that it may not grieve me”. Think of the man’s sensitivity; his own senses operating that he might not be adversely affected and grieved by evil things. I appeal to my brethren along that line. I am not suggesting that we are going on with evil, but I know the tendency of our hearts, and I am appealing to all my brethren that we might be concerned that we stay clear of evil.
So it says, “And God brought about what he had requested”. How delighted God must have been with a man that could come to Him and speak to Him like this. It is like Solomon, God said to him, “Ask what I shall give thee”, I Kings 3: 5. I wonder how that would affect any of us here today if God were to say, Tell Me what you want Me to give you. This is what God said to Solomon. He was thinking of the Lord’s people, he was thinking of how he could administrate as a king, and how he could represent God. So he says, “Give therefore to thy servant an understanding heart, to judge thy people, to discern between good and bad”, 1 Kings 3: 9. We have been given the Spirit and thus are able to judge good and evil; that we might know what is right and what is wrong. Therefore, you and I have little excuse for not being able to arrive at a right judgment. Solomon was a man who had great consideration for God’s people. He was tested right away by two women who each claimed the one living child. How did he get through? He got through by the word of God, he said, “Bring me a sword”, 1 Kings 3: 24. That is the way we get through by the word of God. We have to remember the truth is our bond. Paul exhorts the saints at Ephesus to hold the truth in love, but the truth is our bond, and we want to hold on to the truth at all cost. Our brother suggested that to us today—we do not want to let anything go. The devil is a deceiver, he just takes away a little bit at a time. Beloved, let us not give up the truth.
Whatever it might be that the devil is challenging at the present time, if it is the principles of the fellowship let us not give them up; if it is the principles that govern the house of God let us not give them up, let us not give ground to the enemy.
I want to refer briefly to Timothy, especially to verse 13, “Till I come, give thyself to reading, to exhortation, to teaching”. Timothy was a young man and there are a lot of young men here today. It is good to see them, and to see a lot of young sisters too. You young sisters do not rule yourselves out of this. Let us put ourselves into this “Till I come, give thyself to reading”. He is writing this to an individual; you might say it is Paul giving Timothy instructions how a spiritual man will get through, so he says, “give thyself to reading”. It is a very important thing to lay hold of the Scriptures. Put the Scriptures first on your reading list.
We do not have Mr. Darby with us, we do not have Mr. Raven with us, nor Mr. Stoney, nor Mr. Taylor Snr. These may just be names to some of us, but when you read their ministry you find that you can appropriate what they ministered and you can be formed by it. We cannot read a lot at one time, I realise that, it takes time and we have to develop an appetite.
Some of us who are older would be sympathetic with that. Put the Scriptures as number one on your reading list, then take up a volume of Mr. Taylor’s ministry, or other ministry the Lord has given through His servants, and begin to read a page a day. You will find there is something profitable on each page. I would appeal to all my younger brethren; Timothy was a younger man. Paul said to him, “Let no one despise thy youth”. You know what that means, it means you act older than you are; you younger men act older than you are. You may say you do not want to act like an old man, but you act spiritually as older than you are. What you find then is that nobody can despise your youth.
Titus may have been a little older, so Paul says to him, “Let no one despise thee” (Titus 2: 15), but he says to Timothy, “Let no one despise thy youth”, and I tell you, do not let your youth slip by without getting the most out of it. This is what Timothy is being told by Paul, “let no one despise thy youth”, conduct yourself amongst the brethren in a way that will bring about respect and the brethren will respect you for what you are. I would say above all that you learn to respect the older brethren. If we do not respect the brethren we will not love them. Then Paul says, “Occupy thyself with these things; be wholly in them, that thy progress may be manifest to all”. We have a great legacy that has been left to us; we can have as much of it as we want, and our progress in the things of God can be manifest to all. We have not much time left. Our brother has said this two or three times today and I fully agree with him.
The Spirit is indicating that the Lord is about to return. So, “give thyself to reading, to exhortation, to teaching” desire earnestly the greater gifts, and yet Paul could say, I will show you a way of “more surpassing excellence”, 1 Corinthians 12: 31. He shows us the way of love, and as we work out the way of love amongst the brethren, it results in spiritual growth. As we grow spiritually we become
more like Christ, and that is really the most important thing. May it be so for His name’s sake.
Address at Edinburgh
25 July 1992