SPIRITUAL REFINEMENT INVOLVING WHAT IS LOVABLE
[p. 296] SPIRITUAL REFINEMENT INVOLVING WHAT IS LOVABLE
John 12: 3, 17; John 20: 17, 18; Revelation 3: 7 - 9
My address this evening will be on refinement, spiritual development and refinement, and I selected John’s writings because he has this in mind, he himself being spoken of by himself as “the disciple whom Jesus loved”. If we are to know what is refined spiritually, we learn it from examining the features of the examples of persons who are said to be loved divinely, either by divine Persons or by persons who typically represent divine Persons. For where persons are said specifically to be loved by God, or by Christ, or by those who represent Them typically, these persons are lovable, either potentially or in result. God has an eye, dear brethren, for what is refined, His beloved Son being the infinitely perfect model of it. As we often say to the Father and to one another, He opened the heavens to Jesus and said to Him, “Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well pleased”. That was not potential, that was actual, for every breath of that blessed Person from the time He drew breath, and indeed His life before, every pulsation, was pleasing to God. We take in but little — and I speak for myself — of the humanity of our Lord Jesus, how in Psalm 16 He addresses God as dependent upon Him, and throughout that psalm and others, He expresses His feelings in His own way and in His own language, as to Himself as Man. All these feelings, and all the movements of His heart towards God were delightful from the very outset. So the word as to Himself was, “Thou art my beloved Son;” as to others, “This is my beloved Son;” that was as He “began to be about thirty years of age”. He had grown from infancy to [p. 297] that point and heaven watched everything and expressed itself at the Jordan as He is baptised and praying. Then on the mount of transfiguration we have the same thing, with the added word, “Hear him”. There, dear brethren, we have God’s estimate of perfection of refinement; not that there was any such process in Jesus. He was perfect from the outset, but He was the full expression, as Man, of what pleases God in man, and all the divine counsels and workings from the time of man’s creation and before, indeed from the time of eternal counsels, had in mind to develop this in a race, that is to say, in men like ourselves.
So we find in the types examples of what pleased God, and in every case it is a question of what He anticipates in Jesus. In all the epochs you find some representation of what I am speaking of, and there were many others doubtless not spoken of in Scripture, but existent. We have, for instance, Enoch, who, “before his translation ... has the testimony that he had pleased God” (Hebrews 11: 5). God was so pleased with him that He took him to Himself. I have no hesitation in saying that God has found pleasure in Enoch ever since, and myriads like him whose names are not recorded, but all known up there. Then we find, after the flood, such cases as Abraham, and others, especially in youth, such as Isaac, “Thine only son, whom thou lovest, Isaac” (Genesis 22: 2), and again Rebecca of whom it is said that Isaac loved her. He is a type of Christ in His affection for the assembly, the assembly viewed as answering entirely to His own mind. He “loved the assembly, and has delivered himself up for it ... that he might present the assembly to himself glorious, having no spot, or wrinkle, or any of such things” (Ephesians 5: 25, 27). He is labouring with every one of us. This meeting here even now is to that end, to present us to Himself all glorious. It would be, as I might say, dear [p. 298] brethren, His life in measure, what He shall find in the assembly eternally. And so He is working for the promotion of the best in us, His own ideal, and so we have, “For the perfecting of the saints” (Ephesians 4: 12); the gifts are all to that end.
Then we find with Jacob that his mother loved him. Her love was in keeping with God — a very great matter for mothers if their affections for their children are in keeping with what these children are for God, whether actually or potentially. She loved Jacob, and hundreds of years afterwards we are told that God loved him too. She knew prophetically what was in the mind of God about him and she loved him; she was spiritual. Then Joseph is an outstanding example of what I am saying; as a boy of seventeen his father loved him. Was he not lovable? Oh, he was lovable! The world cast its eye on him typically but he was proof against it, a most striking example for young men and young women. He suffered for his faithfulness but he was proof against the temptation of the world. Then we have David, who is an outstanding case. The first mention of him by name is not that his name was David, but that he was David. You say, ‘What do you mean?’ Well, I mean, beloved brethren, that that young man as described by the Spirit of God as he stood before Samuel to be anointed, was David, because David means Beloved. He was a delightful young man; he represents what I am speaking of; he represents typically, and in a sense, actually, what was delightful to God. There are many other examples, but they all point to the one thing, and that is what the divine ideal is and what the divine workings are to reach it, and how God would impress on each of us that He has this ideal and will keep to it. He is not going to be diverted from it. He has found it in Jesus, and He says, “In whom is my delight”. He does not say ‘All my delight’ — not that I would detract for a [p. 299] moment from what is there, but I believe the Father’s voice had in mind to make room for all of us, for we come under the same heading under the Father’s eye. The Father’s counsels require so many, whether it be many brethren or many sons, they will all be there, and all be there according to the divine ideal. How this will be worked out may be difficult to us, but we may be sure of this, dear brethren, that the divine ideal will be worked out in every one of us.
Well now, these examples of which I have read are outstanding, and I proceed to speak of them in order, first as to what is acceptable or refined in worship, beginning at the top, as it were. It is often well to do this, to begin with the divine thought at its height, and what we find is that it appears, as is usual with John, informally. The less formal we are, dear brethren, the better; not that there should be any irregularity or disorder or unseemliness in anything that christians do, for love never fails, love never behaves itself in an unseemly manner; but it always avoids officialism if it can. Officialism is stilted and awkward if by itself and tends to militate against family affection. So you find Mary of Bethany is a development of a family, all of whom were loved by Jesus. We are told in the chapter preceding this that the Lord loved the three of them, Mary and Martha and Lazarus; they were loved as a family. There are no parents mentioned; it may be a suggestion of what comes about even before headship is known. In truth, the absence of the parents was to make room for headship in its truest sense, that is, to make way for Christ. And so it is in all families that the more spiritual the head or heads, that is to say the parents, are, the more ready they will be to disappear and make room for Christ. Some have cards hanging in their houses to the effect that Jesus is the silent visitor in this house; but He is never silent if He is in the house and there is anything wrong.
So He came into Martha’s house; she doubtless in her mind felt He was her visitor - He was. I am speaking now of Luke’s account in chapter 10. He was on His way, as you will remember in the great parable of the Samaritan, as it is called, to the man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves, and the Samaritan found him and cared for him and carried him to the inn. After that parable was finished, the Lord was moving. You will never find any suggestion of a time without something to be done in the life of Jesus. I mean to say, He is always under responsibility, as it were, there is always something to be done. So He is moving on, and a certain woman received Him into her house. It was a certain village; no doubt Bethany, but we are not told by Luke what village it was. But He is received into the house of a certain woman; doubtless she had in her mind that He was a distinguished Person. Indeed there is some evidence that she knew Him before — her name is given immediately, and the Lord calls her by name — but He is there in the house. Who is going to be head? Is Martha? It was her house, we are told; who is going to be head? That is a question for every parent, as to our readiness to make room for Jesus. Of course, if Jesus exercises headship in a house today it will be through the parents. I heard lately of some parents who spoke pleasingly of spending an hour over the Word in the mornings. Very good! — but then they had allowed their children to go to school, or to business, without any reading of the Scriptures. That will not bring in headship. We must be sure that the Scriptures have their place with the children, that the mind of God has its place with the children, and that the instruction comes to them in the spirit of Christ as Head in the parents. If it does, Jesus will soon become known, and when these children grow up into manhood and womanhood [p. 301] they will take their places in the assembly, and they will understand that Christ is Head of the assembly, for that is where He is particularly Head.
Well now, Martha complained about the Lord, as we know; that was not making room for headship. Had she known who He was, as she did later, she would have made room for headship, she would have said, ‘Oh, what an opportunity for us!’ Think of who He is! It says of another person of whom Luke speaks that he “sought to see Jesus who he was”, and he received Him into his house gladly and gave Him His place in his house, and the Lord said to Zacchaeus, “To-day salvation is come to this house”. He did not say that to Martha; not that He was not salvation, if she would have let Him save her from her naughtiness, from her critical spirit, from her unfairness — for she criticises the Lord too. You may say, ‘I would never do that;’ but the Spirit of God would not record anything discreditable in the saints were it not intended to teach us. Let no one say he would not do that. “Dost thou not care ... ?” she said. It is in those circumstances that Mary first appears and she was embracing her opportunity; she was sitting at the feet of Jesus listening to what He was saying; she was up to the mark as to what governed the moment. A little while before it had been said upon the mount, “Hear him;” it was said to Peter and James and John on the mount. Now Mary is hearing the Lord Jesus, and it is from this point, dear brethren, we get this wonderful development of which I have spoken. Luke does not give it to us; it is left to John to bring out informally the great results of the works of God; he makes more of them, I think, than any other of the evangelical writers do. And so he approaches this great subject very carefully, telling us that the Lord loved the three in the house, and telling us too that it was the Mary who anointed the feet of Jesus and wiped His feet with her hair — that [p. 302] is the one that is in His mind in this inimitable narrative in chapter 11, one of the most remarkable and most touching you can find. The thought is that He is going to bring out the works of God in refinement in one person, in three persons indeed, but particularly in this person. So what you find is that in the verses read the Spirit of God tells us carefully that it was “six days before the passover”, as if slight is being cast on the ceremonialism of that day; and so the Spirit of God slights the ceremonialism of this day. He would bring His people back to reality, back to the Spirit, so Jesus came to Bethany with a definite purpose; it was “where was the dead man Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from among the dead. There therefore they made him a supper, and Martha served, but Lazarus was one of those at the table with him”. It is a beautiful scene; it is depicted by the skilled hand of not only a lover of Christ, but of a “disciple whom Jesus loved”. And it says, “Mary therefore having taken a pound of ointment of pure nard of great price, anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair, and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment”. This is the last of Mary of Bethany as far as Scripture shows, but very far from being the last, for she has a wonderful history in heaven. How she will appear there! Here she is brought before us in this perfect way as presenting what is best for the moment; it shone as the best item in that wonderful scene. It was the best she could get; no doubt it was begun in Luke 10 when she was upbraided by her sister and bitterly persecuted in the presence of the Lord. He defended her there; and now she is persecuted again by Judas and the others, and the Lord defends her again. He knew it was a great incident that should shine on this great and notable occasion: so He said, “suffer her to have kept this for the day of my preparation for burial”. You may be sure that anyone who shines in this way at the present [p. 303] time in the service of God — for that is what is meant, the worship of God — will be defended. Persecuted we may be, but we are to glory in such persecution, in such sufferings; they but refine us, for, in bringing many sons to glory, God has made Christ His Son, our Leader, perfect through sufferings. Those who carry on the service today are those who suffer, and suffering such as this refines us; because you find she makes no retort, no complaint, she leaves it all with the Lord, and how beautifully He defends her, but not in simply rebuking Judas. He could well have done that, in name, but He rebukes him with that beautiful skill of His own, “Suffer her to have kept this”, that is, He refers back to the history of this pound of ointment. It had a history, there was never one like it. It is not a box here; the tribute is to her own purity, her own holiness, she kept it herself without a box. “Suffer her to have kept this”, He says; it is a question of past history, coming on to the moment, to that time — to have kept it for His burial. There she is, a beautiful development of refinement brought in informally in this way, but shining in what she did, fragrant in the whole house. That is what God is aiming at at the present time, to promote spiritual intelligence in the assembly so that the service of God may be continued in increasing perfection and fragrance and in increasing acceptance to His nostrils.
Now I go on to speak briefly of Mary Magdalene. She represents, I may say, refinement in the sense of what is trustworthy; of what can be trusted with the very finest message that can be carried to man. The messenger must be equal to the message. It is no question of gift here, it is a question of a messenger. The word of old by Joab to the young man who sought to run with the message to David, was, ‘You are not suitable;’ “There is no news suited to thee” (2 Samuel 18: 22). The messenger is to be suitable to [p. 304] the message, and Mary Magdalene is suitable to the message. Now, dear brethren, God is ready to send messages to us, and an address delivered in power is not in itself a message. It may be a rebuke, of course, it may be an exhortation, but a message has a peculiar character. It is what it contains, what richness there is in it; what there may be involved for the person to whom it is sent. Is the messenger equal to the message? Not simply the exercise of power in ministry, but to convey messages, divine messages, to the saints. They are all ready, they are there; God is ever ready, the Lord Jesus is ever ready, to send messages — messages of love. The epistles from Rome are all messages. Take Philippians, for instance, what a message it was, and also all the others from that prison, from that suffering apostle, that lover of Jesus and of the saints — they were all messages. How one covets to have a message! Well now, that is what Mary represents, and surely it is something to be aspired to. A sister can carry a message — you see it here. It is a question of the vessel — and what a vessel she was! Think of what she had been. Out of her had gone seven demons; what a vessel of wickedness at one time! I suppose that is what is meant, the wonderful triumph of grace, and, more than grace, of love, for the chapter shows that; it is the skill of Jesus making this woman what she should be to carry a message. I am not saying that is everything about her, for she has a place amongst the saints, but the point here is that she carries a message, she is ready for this, she is a learner ready to take in the Lord’s thoughts. Now He says — that was the finishing word — ‘Do not link Me with anything down here: do not link Me with the garden or with the earth any more — that is all deferred till the millennium. It is what is going on here I am thinking of — I am ascending to the Father’. You know the whole hierarchical system is a question of what is down [p. 305] here. Cathedrals are built as if they are to stand for millenniums. But that is not the thought in christianity; it is what is up there. It is down here in testimony, of course, but not resident here, not, as belonging to the place. So Abraham made his servant swear, ‘See that thou take not my son out of this place; do not take him to Syria’. Jesus is to stay in heaven; it is a question of the heavenly position, and our being brought to Him where He is. That is the point for the moment. So Rebecca is brought to Isaac, and the assembly is being brought to Christ, not on earth but in heaven. That is what is involved in Mary’s message, “Go to my brethren”. There is not a word about Galilee here, as in Matthew and Mark. “Go to my brethren and say to them, I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God”. Of course it was a great thing that He was ascending to His Father, but now, “your Father”, as if to say, ‘You will have a place with Me up there: where I am going, you will go, but, in the meantime, take them the message’ — and she takes it. There is no show or pretension about her as so distinguished. No, she just goes, John says, and tells the disciples. It is very beautiful and all most seemly; she just tells them that she had seen the Lord and that He had spoken these things to her. That was all; what power there must have been in it and how one would love to have heard it!
Now I go on to Revelation to show you how this refinement goes on in spite of the breakdown of the public assembly. The assembly that is presented by John in chapter 21 of this book, is no remnant. It is a city, it is “the bride, the Lamb’s wife”, descending from God out of heaven. God works out His thoughts in spite of the breakdown of the public body, and you see the great result in this chapter. How glorious it is! There is not the slightest suggestion of anything wanting, no imperfection in it, and [p. 306] after a thousand years, the assembly comes down again as a bride; there is no old age, there is no thought of anything effete or disappearing; all is in continual freshness and beauty, in that chapter. But still, as regards the public position, as in Israel of old so it is today, God has to work in difficult times. Instead of fair winds, there are contrary winds; broken days always involve this. The pristine days of the assembly involved a fair wind, a sound from heaven was heard of impetuous blowing and the Holy Spirit came in power, but in these times it is a contrary wind. But God works in spite of the contrariness, and He calls upon us to have part in what He is doing. Now Philadelphia comes in after Sardis. There are four assemblies, as you will remember, spoken of in chapter 2, ending with Thyatira, and there are three in chapter 3. Philadelphia is the second one in chapter 3. It is, as many of you will know, the presentation of the work of God in the midst of general departure, Sardis being Protestantism in its sterile state; and in a dead state of things, God indicates prophetically, as coming in in Christ, something for Himself. That is the point — and it has come about. We are not told here how this beautiful state of things actually came about; we have to go elsewhere to get the history. The types help us, and 2 Timothy helps us, and indeed all the later epistles help us, they help us as to how, in spite of the great general departure from God in the history of the assembly, God has effected something for Himself at the end. Has He not done it? It is not that anyone would call attention to himself or those with whom he walks; it is a question of viewing the thing as a whole as representative of the assembly, for the Lord never for a moment loses sight of the assembly. In His breastplate on high every member of it is there constantly and interceded for, “Always living to intercede for them” (Hebrews 7: 25).
[p. 307] Think of that, as if He were not doing anything else but making intercession for us!
He says, “To the angel of the assembly in Philadelphia write”, and He calls attention to Himself as the Holy and the True, as much as to say, ‘You understand what I am speaking about;’ that is a feature of the revelation, that the faithful understand. So Daniel says, “None of the wicked shall understand; but the wise shall understand” (Daniel 12: 10). That is what is in mind here — the wise understand; Philadelphia understands, she understands who “the holy, the true” is; the Lord knows it and He presents Himself to her according to her intelligence, and He says, “I have set before thee an opened door, which no one can shut”. I have alluded to this already tonight; we are here together because of it: were it not for the mighty hand of Christ opening the door for us, we would not be allowed to be here tonight. Let us rejoice and be glad in what the Lord has done for us and make the most of it. He says, “I have set before thee an opened door, which no one can shut” — what a word that is! It is a door into the purpose of God, a door to evangelise too, a door into anything that the divine will requires. The way is open to us and the Lord keeps it open that we might enter into the divine thoughts and the divine requirements, that the service of God as revived should go on and go on, and become more and more acceptable to Him. So He goes on to say, “Behold, I make them of the synagogue of Satan who say that they are Jews, and are not, but lie; behold, I will cause that they shall come and shall do homage before thy feet”, — not ‘My feet’, but “thy feet”. Just think of that, how Jesus will compel the enemies of the assembly (for that is what is in mind) to come and own her, to worship before her feet, that they may know “that I have loved thee”. What a word that is, that the Lord loves the assembly. The more one understands this the less would one [p. 308] arrogate it to any particular company of christians: it is an abstract view of the assembly, but the concrete thing is somewhere. The Lord is not speaking abstractly only, the concrete is somewhere, even if only in a very few. He is speaking of her keeping His word and not denying His name; that is all very positive and practical, and the Lord is taking account of it and thinking of the whole assembly. The more we think of the assembly and the more we love Jesus, the less we will arrogate Him to ourselves. The exercise of every lover of Christ is to get all the saints. The Lord knows them, they are His, He knows where they are; and the more we are with Him the more we shall know where they are, and the thing is to get to them. He says, “Behold, I stand at the door and am knocking”. Well, He is doing that through His people: that is what is going on, and every lover of Christ wants to be used by Him to knock at the doors of the saints so that they will let Him in to sup with them, and they with Jesus. That is, that He might come into the assembly, into that realm where the service of God goes on, where Christ is known as the “Minister of the holy places and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man” (Hebrews 8: 2).
That is all I had to say, and I think you will see that Philadelphia answers to the thought — He says, they “shall know that I have loved thee”. They may traduce the saints who are true to Christ, they may malign them. This synagogue of Satan will do its best to overwhelm those who love Christ, but He says, “I will cause that they shall come and shall do homage before thy feet, and shall know that I have loved thee”. What a word that is! And moreover He says, “I also will keep thee out of the hour of trial, which is about to come upon the whole habitable world”. That is a promise every one of us should count on and pray about; as we see the antichristian [p. 309] tide of evil rising, we have that promise to plead before the Lord. He will always honour it, “I also will keep thee out of the hour of trial, which is about to come upon the whole habitable world”.