WATERS TASTED BY BELIEVERS
[p. 363] WATERS TASTED BY BELIEVERS
Exodus 15: 22 - 25; Exodus 32: 20; Numbers 5:16-18; Numbers 5:24; Judges 7: 4 - 7
JT These four scriptures suggest waters that need to be tasted by us. The first alludes to judgment in a general way on account of sin; not any one person’s sin, but sin generally. Then chapter 32 refers to our actual guilt, the actual guilt of the persons who are caused to drink, the consequences of the actual guilt, and what is applied; we are made to realise it. Then in Numbers it is what death is as before God. Death is the penalty of sin, not only death in a general way but as it is before God. Then finally we are tested as to the use of God’s creatures, whether we can partake of them, and at the same time go on with the conflict involved in the testimony, whether we can use the creatures of God without interfering with our part in the conflict.
The brethren will gladly join in; these points are very practical. The first alludes to judgment. We are made to realise experimentally God’s judgment of sin which Christ bore. We may taste it. He tasted death for every thing; we are to taste it too, not in any vicarious way, but from experimental knowledge, so that we might judge sin. It is not simply death, but death in the sense of God’s judgment on sin, in which we all have part: “Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned”.
WW Why is the drink question raised first in the wilderness?
JT I suppose the drink is a test in an acute sense. The Lord takes account of it. The test is a very acute one. “Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea, and they went out into the wilderness of Shur; and they went three days in the wilderness, and found no water. And they came to Marah, and could not drink the waters of Marah, for they were bitter; therefore [p. 364] the name of it was called Marah”. That is the point in it, the bitterness of death as the judgment of God.
JS-t This is in the history of young believers here. New spiritual tastes have not been formed yet, and what used to be enjoyed in Egypt is given way to, but Marah arises and I make flesh suffer instead of gratifying it, and the appreciation of God’s judgment falling on Christ makes Marah sweet.
JT I think that is right. The three days in the wilderness brings the need up. It is acquired taste. We are to learn how to taste and value what is of God — “Taste and see that Jehovah is good”.
AEL Would it correspond with Romans 7 at all?
JT I think it does; Romans 6, too. It begins with the question of baptism, that is, I think, what is in mind, to come into correspondence with Christ’s death. It was not an ordinary death, but death as a penalty for sin in its general character, in an extended way. Death has passed upon all men.
AEL “Who shall deliver me out of this body of death?” is what I was thinking of.
JT Well, that is your own body, of course, what you are; but I think we have to begin with the idea of baptism. The Red Sea is baptism as a figure. Baptism is death in a sense, the Red Sea features it, but the question of our state is involved in taste. It is not simply sin working in us, but what the judgment is that God meted out to sin, in Christ, what that was, the kind of water that is involved, the judgment that the Red Sea typifies — water in a very extended way.
AEL This is the other side of the Red Sea, is it not?
JT The point is that there was a wall either side. They must have to do with it now, and taste the thing. A believer comes into the good of the death of Christ by faith. Christ bore the penalty, but what kind of a penalty was it? He tasted death vicariously for everything, but God would have me taste that.
It is God’s judgment as regards sin; we are not speaking of all this objectively, He tasted it.
AEF The Lord Himself tasted the bitterness of death — in John 19: 28. It says, “Jesus ... that the scripture might be fulfilled, says, I thirst”.
JT I do not know that that would be exactly the thought of Christ tasting death. He was tasting physical suffering. It was to bring out how real His humanity was. He went through it in a human way and felt everything that others could feel in that sense in the physical state of what He was enduring. Tasting death, I think, goes beyond that. He had to die. The point is to taste the waters of Marah; they are the same in principle as the waters of the Red Sea. What He underwent, we taste. We are brought into correspondence with Him, understanding experimentally what judgment of sin is, what a judgment is meted out in regard of it.
JS-t “Moses brought Israel” to this point; it is intended we should come to it and learn it.
JT Yes, Moses is typically the Lord here. Now it is deliberate; it is under divine authority that we should go through.
WW Do faith and divine teaching go along together as we are brought through the wilderness?
JT Faith takes you into this position, but not to be in it merely in objective truth. You are not going out of the world as you were before, but you taste what the judgment really meant, what Christ underwent. So you begin to build up a constitution in that way. You know what He thinks of sin.
Ques Does the opening verse of Romans 6 show the need of going out of the world? Then we have the question of baptism raised.
JT “As many as have been baptised unto Christ Jesus, have been baptised unto his death”. That is the point, it is unto His [p. 366] death.
WW You made an allusion at the conference to the teaching of death. Is this the way we first begin to learn it?
JT We see what it is. Death reigned from Adam to Moses. That is, from Adam to this time, the passage through the Red Sea. Christ has gone under it, tasted it as the judgment of God. We are to taste it after He has gone through it.
JS-t Is the thought that when the soul realises that the treatment of the flesh is painful, it suffers, for it wants these things, but as seeing what Christ suffered it becomes sweet?
JT Christ has been into it. Romans 6 is that we “have been baptised unto his death”. Baptised unto Christ, baptised to the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, then we are baptised unto Christ’s death. That is the point in Romans 6, that we taste the thing. We reckon ourselves dead to sin; our old man is crucified with Him. All that we are entered into that. It is not at all objective, the thing has to be tasted, what it really meant to Him that we might be brought into correspondence with Christ. Moses “cried to Jehovah; and Jehovah shewed him wood, and he cast it into the waters, and the waters became sweet”. This in a sense corresponds with the Red Sea. Jehovah showed Moses Christ. The wood was there but he had not seen that side of the matter before. Many do not see it; Romans 6 is to call attention to that side — Christ died.
HAF Does the tasting of the water help us as to the naming of it? “The name of it was called Marah”.
JT That is the idea. It is called Marah; I suppose they called it that because they tasted it. It is a point that is made, before we get all the history, “Therefore the name of it was called Marah”.
JT-y Do you think Naomi helps us, “Call me not Naomi — call me Mara”? She had learned [p. 367] lessons of death in regard of her husband and two sons; the grace of Boaz would be the sweetness to her after the bitterness of the discipline.
JT That is good. Who of us has not had death rolled in as Naomi? She would have her name changed, but in accord with this passage. God shows us Christ in a new way — Jehovah showed him the wood. Some think it is the cross, but it is not the cross, it is Christ. He has been there.
JS-t It would answer to, “Are you ignorant that we, as many as have been baptised unto Christ Jesus, have been baptised unto his death?” (Romans 6: 3). We see the value of His blood, but may not have seen this.
JT God showed them something more. In one instance after another we have Christ brought before us, phases of His death; we do not see it at the start. He cast the wood into the waters. It does not say Jehovah told him to do that; Moses acts intelligently. When Christ is shown in that way, he knows what to do. As soon as you get light you know what to do. God causes us to see a thing, we move accordingly. He cast it into the water, as if Moses understood that it happened to Christ. “The waters became sweet”. With us, in truth, it is that we are changed. The work of God operates in us according to what is presented to us. Naomi, as has been said, accepts that. She is to be called Mara, because she was experiencing the thing.
JT-y Is Romans 6 the bitter waters and Romans 8 the sweet?
JT Well, quite. What follows is, “There he made for them a statute and an ordinance; and there he tested them”. Young believers come into things as in Romans 3, Romans 4 and Romans 5, but now what have you come into, and how has it been effected? We learn something.
WW Is it so, that until we have tasted of it in this way we will not desire to be called Mara?
JT [p. 368] The name would be out of place unless you have tasted the thing. Every christian is brought to it at some time. We may shrink from it and of course not drink it, and fail in the experience of apprehending Christ. But if this is accepted — and there is such a thing as fixed principles of God, of which this is one — what is bitter to you naturally takes on a different character altogether, and you gladly come into the idea of the boards of the tabernacle — fit for the fellowship.
PL This is found, is it not, in “He that has suffered in the flesh has done with sin”? Peter confirms that side. Christ once suffered in flesh.
JT So that we live no longer to it, but live the rest of our time to God.
The next point is that I have actually had to do with something in opposition to God. In chapter 32 there is a gross sin against God in the people. Now we are dealing with something that we are personally responsible for, and God would teach us the consequence of that. We are enjoined, as little children, to keep ourselves from idols, but if we allow God to be displaced in our hearts He causes us to realise the consequences of that. Moses came to the camp and “he took the calf that they had made, and burned it with fire, and ground it to powder, and strewed it on the water” (I suppose a brook ran there) “and made the children of Israel drink it”. What authority and power!
JS-t More serious here, his anger burned.
JT Very serious! No one escapes this matter.
Ques Would it seem by that they had not the good of Marah?
JT They had turned away from God. God in His mediator is displaced in their hearts, so they make a calf. Moses “took the calf that they had made, and burned it with fire, and ground it to powder, and strewed it on the water”. God sees to that. We [p. 369] come to it. If He is displaced in our hearts He will make us realise the consequence.
Ques What does the golden calf suggest?
JT It is an idol. “They made a calf in those days”, Stephen says. These were days of apostasy in which we are now. The thing was in their hearts, you know. Moses had gone, they said they did not know where he was, but in truth they did not want to know. The Lord’s supper is to keep the Lord before us. “This Moses, the man that has brought us up out of the land of Egypt, — we do not know what is become of him!” Certain appearances are kept up both in Aaron and the people, but they did not know where Moses was.
Ques Has it a bearing upon current religion?
JT They say to Aaron, “Up, make us a god”, (or gods. There is a plural thought showing it is completely in their minds. They want the full thing really — we go the whole road) “who will go before us; for this Moses, the man that has brought us up out of the land of Egypt, — we do not know what is become of him! And Aaron said to them, Break off the golden rings that are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them to me. Then all the people broke off the golden rings that were in their ears, and brought them to Aaron. And he took them out of their hand, and fashioned it with a chisel and made of it a molten calf: and they said, [p. 370] This is thy god, Israel, who has brought thee up out of the land of Egypt!” Now look at that; they have already said Moses has done it. Now it is Christ; they are really displacing Christ entirely.
WW Would that be that we are using the truth for our own ornamentation?
JT That is right. Carrying on idolatry. It says Aaron fashioned it. They did not ask him to do that. He “fashioned it with a chisel”. “They said,
This is thy god, Israel, who has brought thee up out of the land of Egypt!” That is a course of religious assumption. “And Aaron saw it, and built an altar before it”. He went the whole way. “And Aaron made a proclamation, and said, To-morrow is a feast to Jehovah!” We have got what we want, our own creed and the like.
BWB We can understand Moses dealing with the calf, but why does he shatter the tables?
JT That is another thought, a question now of how Moses regarded the law. Why did he do it? We cannot blame him and yet we cannot justify him. Christ did not shatter the tables, He underwent the claims Himself; Moses could not do that. Why did he shatter them, could nothing else be done? We have just got to leave that. It is not a time to blame Moses, but a question of the state of the people. You put Christ where Moses was; the matter is settled because He was made a curse for us. Moses was ready to be blotted out; he interceded for them. What he did was to make them realise what they did. If He is to save us at all we must realise what the thing is. They are ready to give up what they should have kept for the tabernacle.
Ques What is your thought about it being a calf?
JT Both here and in Jeroboam’s case it was a calf, of special use in idolatry. Stephen says, “They made a calf in those days”, so that from his point of view and the prophet’s, from Amos 5: 25, it would seem that God did not give them credit for anything.
Rem It is a challenge to our hearts as to how we continue; they had had the covenant in chapter 19, “I have borne you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself”.
JT He makes them to drink. He burned it with fire — that would reduce it; then ground it to powder — made it more soluble still, so that it could be drunk.
[p. 371] It must enter into our inwards, and we realise there what we have done.
HVS Is the apostle at Corinth grinding this powder?
JT Well, yes. We have to taste things. Whatever one is really personally responsible for, it is the question of having to taste what the consequence is as before God. They are made to do it authoritatively.
Ques Would Deuteronomy 9 give you the peculiar suffering, the suffering of his spirit?
JT He speaks earlier of God being angry with him on their account, but here he is going through the thing; he is acting for God. There does not seem a voice lifted up against him. What power a man has when he stands up with God against evil, going the full length of the mind of God as to evil! You taste the thing and then deal with it.
ECF Tasting the thing is the only way to recovery.
JT That is what comes out. God would have you to realise what you are guilty of. It is not simply a superficial confession.
In Numbers 5 we have the trial of jealousy. Here the water is called holy. Not waters of the Red Sea, not the waters mixed with ashes of the calf, but holy water, water actually called holy. This is the only place, I think, where you get the expression in Scripture. Rome has it, but it is only used here in Scripture; the water is mixed with the dust of the floor of the tabernacle — what is before God. There was no actual floor in the tabernacle; so that it was the dust of death. It is death in that peculiar position. Wherever the tabernacle was set up God was there. As entering into us it will either produce a curse or exonerate us to bear fruit for God. There is no escape in this at all. The sin is supposed to have been done secretly, but there is no escape. God is reminding us that our sin will find us out.
PL [p. 372] Does the Nazarite govern this chapter?
JT That is the idea. The holy water is intended to cleanse us for service. Added to that is the dust of the tabernacle — what death is before God.
Rem That makes it bitter.
JT Well, that is the thought. If she is innocent, there will be fruit for God, but the history of the assembly shows that she is not innocent — the whole body, generally speaking, is unfaithful.
WW Where does this operate now?
JT I think where God is operating, the priest is active. If anyone is clear there is something for God, “If the woman have not been defiled, and be clean, then she shall be clear, and shall conceive seed”.
Ques Is it progressive? Does it involve the development of divine sensibilities?
JT I think so. The assembly is in mind, set up here as a chaste virgin to Christ.
JT-y Do you think the end of John has any bearing, where the Lord tests Peter as to his affection, “Lovest thou me?” Peter says, “Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I am attached to thee”. He comes through the test and then gets his commission.
JT He appeals to the Lord twice: “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I am attached to thee”. There are two words for ‘know’, and the last time it is objective, that is, Thou hast a testimony: Thou hast seen that I love Thee. Peter is calling the Lord’s attention to something in him that showed that he loved Him. If a brother is under discipline, he may say, The Lord knows my heart; others do not, but the Lord does. And if there is testimony he can appeal to that. Let there be some evidence that you love the Lord.
HVS The woman is not afraid of the water.
JT It is not optional; she is brought before the priest. We are set up again to bear fruit for God.
[p. 373] Rem Although christendom at large is disloyal, there is that which is loyal.
JT How solemn it is for the whole body — “I will kill her children with death”, she will not repent.
WW Do we have to taste amongst us the working of these things, in relation to what is local, where we live?
JT Going through the thing in the sense of travail. Someone says, ‘This is a sorrowful thing that has happened, God will bring something out of it;’ but in truth it is better to say, ‘I am going to bring something out of it’. The travail means what I bring out of it, what the brethren bring out; whether there is a result. God brings it in as we feel things.
Rem We can only do that as we go through.
JT In 1 Samuel 4: 22 Phinehas’ wife died, but she said, “The glory is departed from Israel, for the ark of God is taken”.
PL Is the issue in Numbers 6 the Nazarite? You have the brightest and best beyond all that God commanded. One would speak pre-eminently of Christ.
JT And the blessing is secured at the end.
Rem So you could only reach chapter 6 by facing the exercises of chapter 5. The priest sets the woman before Jehovah.
JT It is a question of what happened in the camp really. The chapter begins with that, “Command the children of Israel, that they put out of the camp every leper, and every one that hath an issue, and whosoever is defiled by a dead person: both male and female shall ye put out; outside the camp shall ye put them, that they defile not their camps, in the midst whereof I dwell”. That is what is in mind all through, things are to be kept right. We have the dust of the floor of the tabernacle, and in Numbers 6: 23 - 27 Jehovah says to Moses, “Speak unto Aaron and unto his sons, saying, On this wise ye shall bless [p. 374] the children of Israel: saying unto them, Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee; Jehovah make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; Jehovah lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace. And they shall put my name upon the children of Israel; and I will bless them”.
The passage in Judges 7 is to call attention to the use of the creatures of God — how we use them, whether we use them for personal satisfaction and gratification, as an object, or just as a divine provision for us. Well, let us go on in the conflict. That is, we deny nature, mere natural gratification in the use of the creatures of God, and go on in the conflict.
Rem Gideon was in the good of this, “Look on me, and do likewise”.
JT There is no evidence that Gideon had any regrets that the number was reduced. He was in keeping with the test — he would say, ‘I know my men can be trusted, they will not turn aside, they will keep on in the testimony;’ so that they went on their own.
PL The acid test as to the conflict will come to light in a very simple test.
JT Yes, in so many ways. Getting married, going into business, buying a business — in so many ways we show where we are. Is it just an object to many?
JS-t It has been said, If you lap like a dog your eyes are never off the conflict.
JT The refreshment is there, you give thanks for it, but your god is not your belly, you are thinking of the testimony of God, you go on with it. Conflict requires spirituality.
PL Would it be like the difference between Timothy and Mark? To Timothy Paul says, “Drink no longer only water, but use a little wine on account of thy stomach and thy frequent illnesses”. “But youthful lusts flee”.
JT-y Is it in your mind, Mr. L., that “No one going as a soldier entangles himself with the affairs of life, that he may please him who has enlisted him as a soldier”?
P.L. Quite so!
Ques Is that why they are called men? They are previously spoken of as the people, but the three hundred are spoken of as men.
JT “By the three hundred men that lapped will I save you”.
PL Do you think there is something of force in the word ‘three’? It is like the idea of death and resurrection entering into the warp and woof of our spiritual being.
JT How prevalent the idea of three is in Scripture! I believe it runs in every book.