THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS
I wish to speak, dear brethren, of Jesus. You remember that in Revelation 19 we read that John fell down to do homage before the feet of one who was speaking to him, and he was told not to do so, that the speaker was his fellow-bondman and the fellowbondman of those who had the testimony of Jesus. And it adds further that “the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus”. Now it is a great thing to realise that we are in the company of those who in past generations have had the testimony of Jesus. That testimony is still going on. It commences, I suppose we may say, with Abel, for we are told that “the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus”, and Abel was the first of the prophets, as the Lord says, “the blood of all the prophets ... from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zacharias”, Luke 11: 50, 51. He was the first, I suppose, in whom the testimony of Jesus was set out. He maintained the truth for the moment, the truth that had been committed to his parents when God clothed them with coats of skin, indicating that there could be no righteousness for man, no means of his approach to God, save on the basis of the death of another, the death of Christ. Cain, who was of the wicked one, initiated a way of his own, what Scripture calls “the way of Cain”, and as to those who are in it, Scripture says, “Woe to them!” Jude 11. He initiated a way that entirely ignored the light for the moment, the light in which God was known at that time. Therefore it raised an issue at once as to what his brother Abel would do, and his brother maintained the testimony of Jesus; he really maintained the truth even though it cost him his life, even though his brother murdered him. He brought an offering to God of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat, and in that way he maintained the truth for the moment. He became the first one to suffer for the sake of the truth. He initiated the testimony of Jesus, for his action in maintaining the truth at the cost of his own life was a foreshadowing of that which would be fully set out in due course in Jesus Himself. So the testimony of Jesus has been of long standing, and we are in it, dear brethren. What a privilege to be in the testimony of Jesus! “The spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus”.
Now it is striking that all the gospel writers constantly speak of Jesus. They say Jesus did this and Jesus said that. Luke sometimes says, “the Lord”, and I am not suggesting it is not right to speak of the Lord, and the Lord Jesus, for certainly it is. The expression “the Lord” brings in a testimony to His rights, and in this world where His Name is disowned it has great moral value to speak of the Lord and the Lord Jesus. “The Lord Jesus” is, of course, assembly language, as Paul says, “I received from the Lord, that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus ...” 1 Cor 11: 23. It is the combination of reverence and affection that befits the assembly. But as I say, the gospel writers nearly always say that Jesus did this and Jesus said that. Luke, when he begins his second treatise, says that he had written before as to all the things that “Jesus began both to do and to teach”. I only mention that, dear brethren, because it may be that we are to learn to use the name Jesus by itself a little more, to be more simple in it and more reverential in it, always bearing in mind that the name Jesus involves the truth of His Person; it is Jehovah the Saviour. The name Jesus enshrines a great deal, but I think it may well be that as the end draws near the Spirit of God will help us to be more simple and more constant in its use, especially as we have read in the last chapter of Revelation that that is the light in which the Lord finally presents Himself to the assemblies saying, “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things to you in the assemblies”.
Now, as we know according to Matthew’s gospel, the angel came to Joseph and said, “and thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins”. Joseph being a man, represents the side of responsibility. Of course, if the question of our responsibility is raised, the answer to it is obviously Jesus. The only answer to all that is involved in our responsibility before God is Jesus and His precious death. How much is involved in the death of Jesus! You remember how in John 9 we read of the Lord spitting and making mud of the spittle and applying it to the eyes of the blind man. The spittle speaks of the virtue in the Person, but think of that being combined, if I may use the word, with the mud, with what was on the ground. It speaks of the wonderful coming in of Jesus in holy humanity and all that would result for man and for God from that.
So the angel says to Joseph, “thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins”. “His people” is a kingly expression; people are those who own His rights, acknowledging His claims, and it is they who become saved from their sins: “he shall save his people” means not only save them from the consequences of their sins but save them from the sins themselves. It is a very important matter for the young people, and for us all, to be saved not simply from the consequences of our sins but to be saved from our sins themselves; that is to say, you do not go on in sin. “Whoever abides in him, does not sin”, 1 John 3: 6. “These things I write to you in order that ye may not sin”, 1 John 2: 1. We are not to think lightly of sin just because through grace we have received forgiveness of sins, and in the Spirit are set apart from all that we were as in flesh. We are set apart to God in Christ. We are not on that account to think lightly of sins. “These things I write to you”, John says, “that ye may not sin”. Mary was also approached by the angel, and Mary, being a woman, represents the side of affection. Joseph represents the side of responsibility; Mary represents the side of affection. So when the angel says to Mary, “thou shalt call his name Jesus”, he does not say to her ‘for he shall save his people from their sins’. What he says to her is, “He shall be great”, Luke 1: 32. That is to say, when Jesus is presented to the affections the message is immediately that He shall be great. And that is what God intends, dear brethren; if we think of Jesus we should take time to think of who He is in His Person and of all that He has effected for God and for us, and of all that He is going to bring in and give character to eternally for the pleasure of God. The more you begin to think of these things the more you will understand that He must be great. The angel said to Mary, “thou shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great … the Lord God shall give him the throne of David his father ... and of his kingdom there shall not be an end”. That is what is connected with the presentation of Jesus.
Now coming to the passage in Peter we read that we are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. You will notice from the note that the thought of Jesus Christ connects both with the obedience and the sprinkling of the blood, and we are elect according to the foreknowledge of God unto that. You might say it is not as high ground as Ephesians. Maybe not. In the epistle to the Ephesians, we have been chosen “in him before the world’s foundation, that we should be holy and blameless before him in love”. I might say in passing, dear brethren, that that has not in mind the future simply; it has in mind the present, that now we should be “holy and blameless before him in love”. God has in mind He should have pleasure in the saints now, and He has chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world with that in view. Here according to Peter we are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. That shows what a great matter obedience is in the sight of God. We know that “by the disobedience of the one man the many have been constituted sinners, so also by the obedience of the one the many will be constituted righteous”, Rom 5: 19. That is the obedience seen in Christ, but then God wants that character of obedience reproduced in the saints.
You remember when God brought His people out of Egypt, they went three days in the wilderness and found no water. Then they came to Marah where the waters were bitter; and Jehovah showed Moses wood. Wood no doubt points to the humanity of Jesus, that kind of humanity. It was cast into the waters and they became sweet. Now take time to contemplate the humanity of Jesus and what marked it in moral excellence in the smallest detail of life. We may find, especially young believers, that the will of God goes counter to what we ourselves would like. We find that the waters are bitter in that sense. We do not altogether appreciate the waters, but then God is not going to alter the waters as we might think; He will alter them by the casting in of the wood which He showed to Moses so that they become sweet. It is really that we become changed through contemplating the wood shown to Moses by Jehovah and cast into the waters. What does that mean for us? One thinks of the humanity of Jesus, how perfect it was! Think of Jesus coming in as a Babe! What an extraordinary, remarkable expression of dependence is set out in a Babe! And that was continued, but then what marked Him as He grew up in childhood and manhood was obedience. The Father’s will was what determined His course in everything. He did not desire anything other than the will of God. He could say, “My food is that I should do the will of him that has sent me, and that I should finish his work”, John 4: 34. He said that after He came out in public service.
But think of the years up to the age of twelve when it became apparent that His one thought was to be occupied in His Father’s business! Then think of the eighteen years that followed, eighteen years of which we are told practically nothing; eighteen years spent by Him, I suppose, in Nazareth in a carpenter’s shop, working as a carpenter! Is it not wonderful, beloved brethren, to think of the One who created the heavens and the earth, and who even now is upholding all things by the word of His power, working as a carpenter, content to go on day after day, day after day, for eighteen years after He had expressed that His desire was to be occupied in His Father’s business? Is it not wonderful? Was there not obedience in its moral excellence portrayed before God in every detail of every day of the life of Jesus in that period? Think of it! Think of Him having all the will of God in His heart and yet content to go on in that way in obedience and simple obscurity, waiting for the time that the Father should appoint!
You can see how morally excellent obedience is when you see it portrayed in Jesus. That is what we are sanctified to: “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit”. The Spirit is the power for it, of course, but as appropriated and used by us. I have spoken of the wood cast into the waters and that is what makes the waters sweet. After that incident you will find that God enunciated the principle of obedience as the principle which was to govern His people, and if it was so He would lay upon them none of the diseases that He laid upon the Egyptians. The Christian who is characteristically obedient has a much happier time than the Christian who is disobedient or lawless. The one who is disobedient and lawless may think he will do his own will and take his own way, but he will find he is beset with all sorts of difficulties and the diseases of the Egyptians; discontent, miserableness and all that sort of thing will become his portion in full measure. Whereas the Christian who is content to go on quietly in the obedience of Jesus Christ will find himself supported and abundantly blessed too, and not only so but will have the sense of divine approval, because we are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father ... unto the obedience ... of Jesus Christ”. So as I said, after the wood was cast into the waters God established a statute and an ordinance for them which was that He would prosper them as they moved on this principle of obedience.
The next chapter in Exodus gives us the manna, that is to say, on what line is this spirit of obedience to be maintained? Well, there was the manna. It was given every day, not a month’s supply at a time, but every day. It was small and round like hoar-frost on the ground. How small, just think of hoar-frost! They would have to stoop to pick it up. How humbling in a way manna is and yet how sustaining. It is just the life of Jesus here in the spirit of obedience to and contentment with His Father’s will, so small that it easily fits into any circumstance in which you may find yourself. That is the beauty of the manna. If it were given in great big pieces it would not fit into many circumstances, but it is so small that it fits into every circumstance you can possibly take account of. We are told that God fed them with the manna that they might know what was in their heart. There came a time when they despised it, when they even said “our soul loathes this light bread”, Num 21: 5. You might say: ‘Is it possible for a Christian to say he loathes Christ?’ Well, he loathes the kind of thing that was seen in Christ. I would not say that he would loathe the Person of Christ but he can loathe the kind of thing that was seen in Jesus. “Our soul loathes this light bread”, that is what they said. Yet God fed them with manna that they might know what was in their heart, and for what? To do them good at their latter end, Deut 8: 16. Is it not good for us, dear brethren, if we become conformed in any way to Jesus, to His moral excellence? Is it not worthwhile? God is working with us to that end. Do not let us put it off and think it is going to be done in a moment in a miraculous way by the power of God. No doubt He will complete His work in a miraculous way in the twinkling of an eye, but He has in mind to carry on His work now and He wants us to be with Him in what He is doing, intelligently and sympathetically, as having our own hearts trained in the appreciation of the moral excellence of the obedience of Jesus Christ. We are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience ... of Jesus Christ”, but also “unto the ... sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. That, I believe, refers to the way God claims us for Himself. It is a most affecting thing. We have referred in these meetings to Exodus 24 and how the youths of Israel offered burnt-offerings of bullocks before Jehovah and they put the blood in basons, showing the quantity of it, and then the blood was sprinkled upon the people. “Behold the blood of the covenant”, was what Moses said. It is God claiming us for Himself in virtue of the precious blood of Christ. We know we are elect now. It is a position that goes back to past eternity, “the foreknowledge of God the Father”. Think of our present position being a matter of the foreknowledge of God the Father! Have you ever thought of it? You may think of your eternal blessing as a matter of the foreknowledge of God the Father, but what about our present position according to the fore knowledge of God the Father? It says, “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by sanctification of the Spirit, unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. Well, dear brethren, I venture to say that if these things are taken up by us thoughtfully, they will have a great effect on us. They will have an effect on the young people; they will begin to realise that they are not here to do their own will. But God is not exacting; He is not demanding, but He is putting forth His claims to us on the ground of the blood of His Son. He would claim us, and He says, I want to set you apart practically through sanctification of the Spirit from all the wretchedness that the first man is capable of, that you should begin to increase in your heart’s appreciation of the true moral excellence of obedience in Jesus, and you will take it on as you give your mind to these things. You will take it on and you will find the Spirit will support and confirm you in it.
So we read in Hebrews 12 that among the things we have come to is Jesus. It is what we have come to in Christianity. We have come to mount Zion, that is the great principle of God’s sovereignty and mercy in which He loves to move. “God, being rich in mercy”, it says, Eph 2: 4. I hardly know anything more affecting than the way God, so to speak, puts His foot down and asserts His right to show mercy. He says, “I will shew mercy to whom I will shew mercy, and I will feel compassion for whom I will feel compassion” (Rom 9: 15), as though He says, ‘No one will prevent Me from showing mercy!’ That is the attitude of God. And the mercy-seat, how glorious it is! How God loves to set forth Christ as a mercy-seat through faith in His blood, to show that He has a righteous ground for showing mercy, for nothing can stand if it is not founded in righteousness. God will never found anything on any other principle than that of righteousness. “Righteousness and judgment are the foundation of his throne”, Ps 97: 2 . How magnificent is the thought of the mercy-seat! It is the point from which He speaks to man, and that on the principle of showing mercy in an absolute way founded in righteousness so that it cannot be controverted in any way. We have come to mount Zion. I cannot go over all these things we have come to. “Ye have come to mount Zion; and to the city of the living God, heavenly Jerusalem; and to myriads of angels, the universal gathering; and to the assembly of the firstborn who are registered in heaven”. Think of our dignity, all of us firstborn ones; registered in heaven, our names are known there!
“And to God, judge of all”. What a comfort that is! You say, ‘I do not see much comfort in the thought of God being the judge of all’. I think it is a very great comfort; God will have the last word and He will bring everything into judgment. He will have to say to every nation on the earth; He will have to say to every individual on the earth. He will have to say to each one of us; He will bring every work into judgment whether it be good or whether it be evil, Eccles 12: 14. We may as well understand that and let it be in our minds; we want to come now to the same judgment about things that God has about them. He has a judgment about things; let us then see that we have a judgment that is in accord with God’s judgment. It will save us from a lot if we see things as God sees them. We have come “to God, judge of all; and to the spirits of just men made perfect; and to Jesus, mediator of a new covenant”. Now the word there is ‘fresh’. It is not the usual word employed for the new covenant; the word here is a fresh covenant. I think it directs our minds to the first day of the week, the freshness of it, as we take the loaf and especially as we take the cup. We have come to Jesus, Mediator of a fresh covenant.
Everything is fresh and living in Christianity, and it is living because it is brought to us and made effective in Jesus. We have come “to Jesus, mediator of a new (or fresh) covenant”. It is a beautiful way of putting things; thus it is not just a term with us, nor is the breaking of bread a ritual, but we have come to Jesus, Mediator of a fresh covenant. It is a question of the Lord personally entering into the matter every first day of the week and bringing home to us afresh something of the blessedness of what is involved in His precious death. There is the loaf speaking to us of His holy manhood. How wonderful is the manhood of Jesus! The more you think of it the more wonderful it becomes. The cup, the blood, is the expression of divine love expressed in Jesus. As we sometimes sing, and it puts it so aptly—
Love that no suff’ring stayed
That is the love of Christ—
We’ll praise—true love divine
—that is divine love. That is exactly what we come to in the cup. It is the love of Christ but it is divine love expressed in Him, and you drink into it afresh. You drink into it in the sense that the Lord, so to speak, is near at hand. We have come to Jesus, Mediator of a fresh covenant, and then it says, “and to the blood of sprinkling, speaking better than Abel”. The blood of Abel called for vengeance, and I suppose we may say rightly so, but we have come to the blood of sprinkling. How God would give us a sense that He claims us! He has gone to such lengths in the death of His own Son, as it says, “God, having sent his own Son” (Rom 8: 3), and again, “He who, yea, has not spared his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not also with him grant us all things?” Rom 8: 32. That is the God with whom we have to do. We have come to the blood of sprinkling, as though He would say, ‘I claim you for Myself’.
Let every one of us allow His claim freshly to affect us! We want to be delivered from every form of lawlessness. I do not say we are much in danger of the world; perhaps we are, perhaps we are not. I think in the main the saints who are going on in the truth have been delivered from the world, but maybe there might be a danger of the things that are in the world. You might have come out of Egypt and yet still there is a certain danger from the things that are in the world. We might bring them into the Christian circle; we need to watch against that. “All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world is passing, and its lust, but he that does the will of God abides for eternity”, 1 John 2: 16, 17. Why should we not be on the line of the will of God? The Lord has led on that line. “I come … to do, O God, thy will”, Heb 10: 7. He came on that line, delighting in it. “To do thy good pleasure, my God, is my delight”, Ps 40: 8. I suppose that is the force of the ark of the testimony of which we read in Exodus and Numbers; the ark, with the testimony inside it, typifying Christ with the will of God cherished in His heart. He came to give effect to it, but not only to give effect to it but to bring into being, by the work of God, a generation of those who have learned to love God’s will as He did. Well, that is a great matter, that in Jesus there has been testimony to a Man here who loved God’s will and lived by it, and now He is great enough to bring to pass in the saints correspondence to Himself in that respect. So it says, “the blood of sprinkling, speaking better than Abel”. That is what we have come to. Let us see that we yield ourselves to it! God would assert His claims, “the blood of sprinkling, speaking better than Abel”.
In this last chapter of Revelation, so well known, the Lord addresses Himself to us. He says, “I Jesus”. Until now He had not spoken in this personal way. He had in the beginning presented Himself as marked by a good deal of distance, and I suppose even the angel may possibly suggest a measure of distance. You know that when He first presented Himself to John, John fell at His feet as dead and the Lord laid His right hand upon him, and said, “Fear not; I am the first and the last, and the living one”. Read Isaiah 48 and you will find that “the first and the last” is a title of Deity. “I am the first and the last”. And it was a Man John saw, “I am the first and the last, and the living one: and I became dead, and behold, I am living to the ages of ages”. What a presentation of Christ to our hearts! You get something similar in the way He presents Himself to Smyrna, “the first and the last, who became dead, and lived”. What a glory that is as the Lord comes in on the first day of the week! He can speak to us in that way, “I am the first and the last … I became dead”. He came in manhood in the glory of His Person to deal with this whole matter of death, and it was not possible that He should be holden of it. Death must give way before Him. Just as the waters of Jordan had to flee when the feet of the priests bearing the ark dipped in the Jordan; so as the Son of God came in and went into death, it was not possible that He should be holden of it. That is the light in which He presents Himself to us on the first day of the week.
He presents Himself to Smyrna in this light. Smyrna and Philadelphia, as you know, are the only two out of the seven assemblies with which the Lord finds no fault, and it is interesting to notice how the Lord presents Himself to Smyrna and then how the Lord presents Himself to Philadelphia. To Philadelphia He says He is going to make certain ones come and bow down before the feet of Philadelphia and to acknowledge “that I have loved thee”. To Smyrna He presents Himself in the glory of His Person as having entered into death and overthrown its power. Then to Philadelphia He presents Himself as loving the assembly. I just mention these things, dear brethren, because they are worth weighing over. I think you will find that they may enlarge before your minds as you think of them.
Now here He says in this last chapter, “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things to you in the assemblies”. He wants all the assemblies to come to the same point. Remember how when He addresses the seven assemblies, He has something particular to say to each of them in regard of the particular conditions He found in each, but having said what He has to say to each assembly He adds, “He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies”, in the plural, that is, He wants every local assembly to come into line with the universal voice of the Spirit to all the assemblies. That is an important matter. It is like the voice of the Shepherd. The Lord says, “I have other sheep which are not of this fold: those also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one flock, one shepherd”, John 10: 16. That is the universal position: one flock, one shepherd, and one voice for the whole flock. And that is what the Spirit of God would bring about with us, that we should all be governed by the same voice, the voice of the shepherd.
In chapters 2 and 3 of Revelation it says, “He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies”. Here the Lord says, “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things to you in the assemblies. I am the root and offspring of David”. All that David was as a man after God’s own heart was, you might say, derived from Christ. He was the root of it all. All the rights of David, his throne, what the angel spoke about to Mary—they are all His. They all belong to Jesus. They are all going to be taken up by Him. “I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star”. And now what is the answer? The Spirit is ready, dear brethren. Are we ready? The Spirit is ready with a suited response. Are we ready? “The Spirit and the bride say, Come”. As has been remarked before, we do not say, ‘Come quickly’, we say, “Come”. “Come” means come now. The Lord says, “I come quickly” because He is giving us just a moment of time to get right, as it were. “I come quickly”, He says. But our response is, “the Spirit and the bride say, Come”, and that means come now. That is the kind of answer that the Lord is looking for, and He would present Himself to us in this way in order that we might come into accord with the moral excellence in manhood which has shone in Him, because there certainly is to be correspondence in the assembly with Christ. There is to be no disparity between Christ and His assembly, no disparity in the bride as compared with the bridegroom.
“I am the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that hears say, Come. And let him that is athirst come; he that will, let him take the water of life freely”. Then again in verse 20, “He that testifies these things says, Yea, I come quickly”. Now the answer is, “Amen; come, Lord Jesus”. Not come quickly, but “come”; come now. It is a test to us as to whether we can say, “Come”. That is what the Spirit is labouring to bring about, and there is no reason why we should not say “Come”, meaning come now, meaning there is nothing I have to put right first; I am ready to answer immediately. That is what the Spirit of God would bring about. I think perhaps He would bring it about by means of enabling us a little more to contemplate the Person of Jesus, and perhaps to become a little more accustomed to thinking of Him in that name and speaking of Him amongst ourselves in that Name. I am not ruling out the Lord Jesus or anything of that sort, but it is a striking thing that all the gospel writers say that Jesus did this and Jesus said that. I think it is an evidence that that is the way the early believers spoke to one another of Him. May the Lord help us in these things to be ready for His coming, for His Name’s sake!
ROCHESTER NY
13th June 1964
From Ministry of the Word, 1965
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