POWER FOR SPRING IN THE SAINTS
[p. 432] POWER FOR SPRING IN THE SAINTS
Acts 3:7 - 9; Genesis 24: 64; Joshua 15: 18, 19; Deuteronomy 33: 22
These Scriptures, as no doubt most will have observed, speak of persons leaping or springing, and I have put them together so as to speak of this matter, of the power of spring in the saints. It appears early in the christian dispensation, and it is recorded with such detail as to leave on the mind the impression that it is to be a main feature in the dispensation that there should be the power of spring, which of course, implies the Spirit of God. Peter and John, as we have often noticed, go up together to the temple, and the lame man is, as usual, at the gate. It is said that he had been lame from the outset of his being, but it is also said that he was carried to this spot. A similar incident is recorded later in this book, a gentile incident, far away among the nations at Lystra; the man is spoken of as not having walked at all. Nothing is said about any assistance rendered to him, he was just there: he never had walked. In the fact that no one is spoken of as assisting him, we are no doubt reminded that there was no real assistance in the gentile world at all spiritually, whereas there was some little consideration in Israel, even as it was, the Spirit of God being ever ready to acknowledge whatever there was to be acknowledged among God’s ancient people. For it was a question at that time of saving them, and everything that would prejudice them unnecessarily against the gospel was avoided; everything, however small, that might encourage them spiritually was brought forward. So that the man was carried by some, whoever it was; someone cared for him to that extent, and laid him there; not indeed that they expected the temple or those in it [p. 433] to help him in a spiritual way, but that those who went in by that gate might be moved charitably. And then what is stated of Peter and John is another touch. Nothing was being said about the barrenness, the poverty, of the temple; indeed these two great servants were going up to it; there was no thought of disparaging it then, but gently they hint that there was something else — “Look on us”. These are levitical touches that we should note in our service so as to gain the most possible, or if by any means to save some. The difficulties are increasing and hence the need of levitical skill in those that would serve. And then Peter gives the man his right hand. Here we are in the presence of the beginning of a wonderful dispensation and the kind of service that marked those who had part in it, how, as in this instance, they would say, We will do our best for you. There were no half measures, no laziness, in those days; the right hand was there. In the gospels, especially in Mark, before we have the appointment of the apostles, the right hand of the man which was withered was healed, as if the Lord would say, These men that I am about to appoint are to understand that their very best is to be employed. And so, whilst God did everything, of course, “The Lord working with them”, yet great stress is laid on how they did things, that God was not at any disadvantage in employing them for the best that they had was available. Their appearance in relation to one another, their countenances, their outlook, would all be involved in the direction to the needy man. “Look on us” — there is something there. No disparagement formally of the temple, the Beautiful gate is mentioned, whatever there was is there mentioned, but there is something else. There is nothing in an outward way; there was no prejudice to anybody in suggesting, “Look on us;” it gives no unnecessary offence, there was something to look at. Perhaps no [p. 434] two men like them ever appeared together in this way before. We have twos, of course, and threes, operating in the service of God throughout the Scriptures — Moses and Aaron, and many others in that way; but I am sure that no two men ever appeared like these two just in this way before. And Peter uses his right hand, and speaks of the Nazaraean, no eloquence, no bringing forward of the great immortal, invisible, or anything like that, it is “Jesus Christ the Nazaraean”. The position is equal to that. There is no need yet of these great titles which we get later; they have their place, of course, and we love to use them, and indeed the Lord would put it on us as to whether we are using them, what we are saying about Him. But here it is, “Jesus Christ the Nazaraean”, in His name this man is to rise up and walk; but notice, it is not the mere word, it is the right hand of the servant — he is able to do something. So that it is “the Lord working with them” — they are doing it, they are doing what is being done, but the Lord is there; things are well done, not only were they worth looking at, but the way they did the thing was worth looking at. So we have this result that he walked and leaped and praised God.
Now this is the great general thought I have in mind and it is found in this particular setting as bearing on the whole dispensation to the end of which we have come. It is written for us, dear brethren, so that there might be something to look at in the sense of spiritual formation and attractiveness, and that there might be something in the way of ability to work the works of God. The Lord says of a blind man that he was blind just so that the works of God should be made manifest in him, and that is the position, it is a question of the works of God. But the works of God are to be done by workmen who enhance them, and that is what we get here. So that we have a spring in this man; it was not simply [p. 435] that he sprang up, like the man in chapter 14, but he was walking and leaping and praising God; he is seen that way. That is another thing to be noticed, that what is effected is manifest, he is seen in this way, he is seen by the people as a testimony, walking and leaping and praising God. I have no doubt that these three words, walking, leaping, and praising God, are in their proper order — of course they are. Walking is balance, that we are sober, as the apostle says. As regards man his testimony was sober, balanced, but to God, he says, “I speak as being beside myself”. The power that we have by the Spirit is affected by environment; the more we are in assembly where every whit says, Glory, the more effective we are as spiritual. It is a living scene, it is a glorious scene, and we are not to detract from the glory but to add to it. Leaping, I think, alludes to excess or increase of spiritual power under certain conditions, that is, where it is seemly. And praising God is the final thought. I believe the Lord is working very effectively in this way among His people so that there should be something of this kind, praising God. Whether or not this man used the psalter, whether or not he used hymns I cannot, of course, say, but he praised God, that is, there is further excess; praising God is a further thought of spiritual power, not in mere words but in attitude. The Old Testament is constantly helpful as illustrative of what we are called to. So you find that with the sweet psalmist of Israel, the leader of the praises of God: he danced mightily, with all his might, before the ark. That is a real thing, not mere sentiment, but a real movement of the person before God.
Well now, that is what resulted from these remarkable incidents recorded, what was to be seen and what was to be heard, in connection with Peter’s right hand. The name of the Nazaraean, that which was under reproach in the world, was already taking on glory in the spiritual realm. This is the beginning [p. 436] of matters, and it is intended to cast rays all down the ages to ourselves. Spiritual matters are not brought down merely by books written, but by the real presence of the Spirit of God in the assembly. So that we get, for instance, in John 14: 26, the beautiful reference to the Spirit bringing things to remembrance; the Lord says of Him, “The Comforter ... whom the Father will send in my name” — the Father would send Him in the Son’s name and He would bring to remembrance whatever the Lord had said. It is the Spirit that brings to our attention what we need; He brings to our remembrance. The thought of His having come in the name of the Lord Jesus fits in with these last days when things are peculiarly done in His name as over against other names; so that He says to Philadelphia, “Thou ... hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name”. The Spirit of God, dear brethren, is bringing things up constantly in all these meetings through one and another, bringing things to our remembrance, so that there should be what God intended there should be in the last days, what there was at the beginning, in some little way. Here it is walking and leaping and praising God, a real spring in it, and it is to continue. It is a remarkable thing that there is very little in the early chapters of the Acts about the service of God in the assembly; it awaited the full thought of the assembly for that; but here is the idea; there is the material for it. How lustily a brother like this would take part in the assembly meeting, spiritually formed, how he would join in with heart and voice in the praises of God.
Now I want to show you briefly from Rebecca how the thought works out, for Rebecca really fits into this chapter; she is the assembly brought into this position. She was, of course, a failing creature, like all of us — alas we have to own that! — she was just a woman of like passions with ourselves; so that,
[p. 437] whilst we honour her as a woman of faith, and she is a type of what I am speaking of, we must remember that in all the scriptural narratives it is a question of the Spirit of God selecting that which is needed for what He has in mind. How much is left out who can say? It is just His own selection of incidents and His own way of putting them together that makes them speak to us. And so Rebecca is just, as you might say, what we get in this chapter. Sarah’s tent is in view in the history of Rebecca, but Isaac comes into view. That is, before you can have Sarah’s tent or Rebecca in it, Isaac must come into view and he must be recognised. Here Peter calls Him the Nazaraean, that is the Christ. How much more He was to this man! We can understand how readily this man, who walked and leaped and praised God by the power of that Christ, would listen to anyone who could tell him more of that glorious Person. God had His man ready for that a little while after, that is Paul; but Peter and all the others could speak wonderfully of Christ. You can understand how this man would be ready for any additional thought about Christ. And so Isaac is just Christ in this particular narrative in Genesis 24. He is out in the field coming from the well Beer-lahai-roi. Why was he coming from that place? He was coming from having gone to it indeed, as it should read; he had gone there. He did not despise the well because Hagar had had to do with it. It was a well, it was a spring. Whatever there was in Israel the Lord Jesus took it up and made the most of it. Meditating in the field, he is alone. We sometimes sing. ‘No longer now alone;’ how worthy He is of companionship suited to Himself! Now you can see, dear brethren, how this man would answer to all this in so far as he could at that time, walking and leaping and praising God. Rebecca draws near on the camel and she sees Isaac; he was meditating in the field. She saw him and she [p. 438] asked about him. What a figure he was, I mean spiritually. How often it is the Lord comes into our view in one way and another. We say, What was said was very nice; but what about the enquiry as to this Man? It is a question of the assembly coming into view in each of us. What about enquiring as to this Man? Who is He? Well, she is told who He is; the servant said, “That is my master!” — not, ‘my master’s son‘ now. It is Christ. Here is a man ready for that; you cannot say too much about that Person, Jesus of Nazareth, to this man. Zacchaeus wanted to see Jesus who He was. You can understand that thought would be presented in a living way in that lame man now able to walk and leap and praise God in the power of the name of Jesus. So it is said that Rebecca, having enquired, sprang off the camel. There is a real movement. That is what one would look for in Christ being presented to the saints, presented as He is in Isaac, that there is real movement, real response of heart. She took a veil and covered herself too in a seemly way, a beautiful feminine touch; there is seemliness. But then, there is the power of spring: she sprang off the camel. What enters into all this passage is that it is the testimony that is in mind. It is what is to go on and what is going on here up to this present time that is in mind in this passage. It is briefly stated but it is typically, dear brethren, what we are enjoying at this very moment, the testimony that goes out from a risen glorified Christ to the assembly viewed in this way with a spring in her and seemliness marking her in the position. No pretence, no gold or artificial beautification with her, as it is said in Peter — I mean that is the idea in the New Testament — it is what is spiritual, and how beautiful that is as the Spirit of God depicts what He intends to convey to us. He depicts such facts as He intends to create an impression in us as to what the assembly is; and, of course,
[p. 439] Rebecca is but a type of ourselves. And so she is leadable now; one has often referred to that, but it is a very practical thing: he led her into his mother’s tent and he was comforted. It does not say he was grieved about his mother’s death, as it does of Abraham when Sarah died; it is the release from grief that is noted; it is to bring out what Rebecca is, the satisfaction that the Lord finds in this one, one who has the spring and who puts on the veil, and who is leadable. Many of us are not leadable, you know; she is. He led her into his mother Sarah’s tent. It does not say he loved her until she was there; that is, it is the assembly in the place of testimony that is lovable to Jesus; it is not yet the assembly in heaven. He loved her there in that position.
Well now, you can see that Rebecca fits into Acts 3, and the type in Acts 3 is brought down to us by the Spirit even to this very moment, so that there may be some little correspondence with the Lord in us in this way of spring. There is a remarkable reference in the types in Leviticus to the creatures that are clean and the creatures that are unclean. Creatures that crawl upon the earth, although they may be four-footed, are unclean. I may listen to all the ministry and speak of it, and yet be on the earth; I have never got the idea of spiritual power to leap off the earth. So in Leviticus 11 there is a difference in this particular case, there are certain ones that have legs above their feet by which they spring up from the earth. There is nothing much to say about them, they are more or less characterised as the others are, but still it is that which saves them that they do have power to leap up sometimes off the earth; there is that relieving feature about them. And so it is that the Lord would remind us that it is not what we hear, or appropriate even, for we may hear things and assimilate them too, like chewing the cud, and [p. 440] yet not be clean, for the reason that there is no rising from the earth: we just stay there. When we are in the assembly we are away from home. You understand me, I do not say we can stay very long together; it is not so, because God considers for us: addresses are to be short, prophets are to speak only two or three. The idea is you are perfectly at home while you are there. Do not make it appear that you are away from home while you are there, but that you are enjoying the thing, you are satisfied, you have been made to drink into one Spirit.
Now I think from what I have said you will see that Rebecca fits into the chapter in the Acts from which I have read and that it is the position of the assembly all the way down. The Lord has brought us back to it in some little way, and what I am speaking of now is the spring, that, in respect of Christ, there is a real movement at all times, as soon as He is presented. I have no doubt that Beer-lahai-roi, being the first mention of a well, although it was connected with Hagar, was God’s provision, and the Lord would say it is all a question of the Spirit in this matter; He had gone there and He was coming back from there.
I go on to Achsah, a well-known figure too, another type of the assembly, but not as in Sarah’s tent; she is in the inheritance. Sarah’s tent is not the inheritance of the assembly, it is another side of the position. The Spirit is the earnest of it and the Father “has made us fit for sharing the portion of the saints in light” (Colossians 1: 12). So that now it is a question of ability to occupy the inheritance, not merely in words or mental assent, but in a real living way that I can leap, I can spring. It is a question of Caleb, the great inheritance man; he is another wonderful type for us in this sense, a man that steadily went on year after year patiently enduring maybe the jibes of Israel at times, but he went on day in and day out [p. 441] with the inheritance in mind. He knew it was a good place; he had tasted it, and he knew that the Lord delighted in him — “If Jehovah delight in us, then he will bring us into this land”, he said. Let us not expect to be brought in unless the Lord delights in us. Is He going to fill heaven with persons who do not please Him? No, beloved brethren, He will have persons whom He delights in, and Caleb understood this. The cumulative wealth of truth that comes down to this moment is seen in this remarkable man, the appreciation of the inheritance of God. There are people who do value the inheritance, maybe very few, but if you come in contact with them they deserve all the respect you can give them, and, if you gave them respect, it is because you value what they value. So we have here a true daughter of a man who valued the inheritance, so she moved her husband to ask her father for a field, but in his presence she seemed to have more encouragement and more liberty than she had earlier. The nearer we get to God, dear brethren, the more liberty we have; you will always find that. You may go to the meeting for prayer, or to your closet with the thought of asking for something, but the nearer you get to God, the more liberty you have; you will ask for more than you thought of asking. So she asked for springs of water and he gave her the upper springs and the lower springs. That is, she had the thought that this position required the power of spring. She already had the power of spring, but how is it to be sustained? It is in the springs of water, the upper springs and the lower springs. We do not know how many. I suppose the plural word shows that it is a continual supply of that which supports us in energy and power in this wonderful position. How can we live in Ephesians, dear brethren, in the realm opened to us in that wonderful epistle? Some of us were saying lately that the apostle Paul had gone to [p. 442] Jerusalem about four years before he wrote this epistle, for he was a long time at Caesarea and two years at Rome. Could he have written this epistle at Jerusalem? The environment would have been against him, but he had gone through much and now the whole vista of the inheritance of God is opened up to him by the Spirit. How can we live in these things? Only by the Spirit, and by the Spirit in this plural way, the upper and the lower springs; it is the variety, the unsearchable riches that are involved; there is no slackness in it. See the variety there is even in our little way in these days, how the Lord is helping us. He will help every one of us. It is a question of seeing the need; you are brought into this wonderful position, and you want to be in it in a suitable way. Not simply a field, she was emboldened to ask for what she really needed, springs; and she got the upper and the lower springs, which would fit her down here in regard to the inheritance and which would enable her up there, typically, to enjoy the full liberty and dignity of her portion in Christ. That is what Achsah means as I understand, and we can easily follow that; it applies to each christian here. We are brought into this and we need to make room for the Spirit, not only to keep us here but to enter into and enjoy the great things of God, things which eye hath not seen nor ear heard and which have not come into man’s heart to conceive, but which God has prepared for those who love Him.
Well now, I finish with Dan; he is a lion’s whelp, we are told. It is a very brief comment on Dan, but a great relief from what is said in Jacob’s blessing. He leaps from Bashan. The allusion, I think, is to persons being, it may be, in an inferior spiritual position, or even a wrong position. Bashan is not to be despised, it is divine territory, but it is not Canaan. Now I am not here to criticise, but to state facts.
[p. 443] There are many of us who are well content with the other side, the wilderness side, of Jordan. Is there power in our souls to get out of it? As we come together in assembly (one never tires of alluding to the collective side for it is there that the concrete thing is worked out fully) is there sufficient power in my soul as I sit down to partake of the Lord’s supper, which is a wilderness position, to leave the wilderness? It is a question of where He is, not where I am. Christ is away, but is there power in my soul, as I apprehend Him in the emblems, to get out of the wilderness for the moment, to spring from one position into another? A right position, it may be, certainly the position in the Lord’s supper is quite right, but it ceases to be right if I stay there and others are enabled in the power of the Spirit to go further, to go over Jordan in spiritual power. I want to be with them, to move on, and I think that is what is meant here by the brief comment on this remarkable man Daniel He is able to leap from Bashan, to leave one position for another with a spring and a leap. That is what I had in mind, that we might finish with that and be concerned that, as we come together in assembly, we might be in power and that we might understand what enters into the assembly, what possibilities there are as this idea of spring is laid hold of, as we avail ourselves of it. “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God” (Romans 8: 14). That means I have laid hold of the power; the Spirit of God is leading, I am leadable, and I am marked off as one of the sons of God. Now I think that Dan as capable of leaping from Bashan would come under that heading, fitting in with the glorious outline of the tribes as presented by Moses the man of God.
May God bless the word.