JUDGMENT

E. C. Burr

1 Corinthians 11: 29–32; 5: 12, 13; 14: 26–29

I would like beloved, with the Lord’s help, to say a word about ‘judgment’. I trust that it will be in the spirit of our beloved brother’s prayer that glory may come into the time—we would seek never to be together without some fresh experience of the glory of God. Nor do I speak of judgment in any way to suggest that speaking of grace needs something later said to balance it. We touch the truth and because of our limitation we touch only one aspect of it, but the truth never needs balancing—the truth is the truth; and persons having the Spirit of God are competent to take to themselves, and as we shall say later, to judge, what is said in ministry, and to hold it in themselves in the light of the Spirit being in them, so that He relates the particular aspect of the truth that may be touched to every other aspect of the truth; but the truth is one. It is a mistake to think that truth ever needs balance; truth is itself a balanced thing.

Nor do I speak of the judgment of God against sin and sins. That grace has dealt with. The state of sin in which we are naturally, in which we are born, and the sins we have committed, themselves merit the judgment of God. It would be right for God to judge those sins by condemning both the sins and the persons who have committed them, and as a result of condemnation, to bring them under eternal punishment, and that will be the portion of those who do not believe the gospel; but grace in the giving of Christ has met that and I do not, in speaking of judgment, speak about that. I want to speak about the discriminating judgment that is to be in daily exercise individually and in the assembly. I think the Lord would help us in this because we go on day by day in the testimony, in the recovery, and the service of God, and we can never afford to leave aside the experience and activity of discriminating judgment, in relation both to ourselves and to matters which may arise in the assembly. God has Himself ordained by the Spirit means by which these things are to be carried on. History shows that we are easily diverted from this, and the Lord operates to recall us to means which He has Himself established for judgment.

Now if we speak of judgment, inevitably we all have to begin with ourselves. It is an interesting fact, I think, that the idea of self-judgment is one that peculiarly belongs to those who walk in the light of the truth. I think that if you went into the Church of England and preached on self-judgment, you would be described as having touched things perhaps psychologically or something like that, because they are unfamiliar with the idea of self-judgment; and if you went around amongst other groups and denominations in christendom, you would find that it is not an idea that is familiar to them. It is interesting that it is in the area of the recovery that the Lord has particularly helped individuals as to the very idea of self-judgment. This is, I think, because God has seen the need for an operative principle amongst those who have the greatest light, and access to the greatest glory experimentally and in His service, that would keep them consistent with the truth that He has given to them.

There therefore rests upon us, beloved, an obligation to maintain ourselves in self-judgment according to divine standards. It is very easy to examine ourselves in relation to one another, or to examine ourselves in relation to our own standards. Paul says in the second epistle that some “comparing themselves with themselves, are not intelligent” (2 Corinthians 10: 12), and that is to show that persons not having an adequate standard before them are adopting a wrong standard for their judgment of themselves or, for that matter, of one another. But the context in which Paul puts this expression “if we judged ourselves, so were we not judged”, is that of the Lord’s supper.

Now the Lord’s supper is a time of very great privilege. The Lord has recovered peculiar light as to it in the history of His dealings with christendom. In the recovery, as we speak of it, the Lord has peculiarly recovered light as to the Supper. He has therefore peculiarly charged those who seek to hold the Supper rightly with the responsibility of judging themselves. We touched on this a little at the end of the reading, as Paul says, “Let a man prove himself, and thus eat of the bread, and drink of the cup” (1 Corinthians 11: 28), as indicating that this was not merely the negative dealing with things that are unsuitable, but also the positive preparation for the service which lies before us. The first thing that the priest had to do before his garments were put on was to wash (see Exodus 29: 4) and I think that that suggests the thought of “if we judged ourselves”. This bears on us in quite a lot of detail, because as we approach the Supper we are going to have to do, in the emblems, with the body and blood of the Lord; and having to do with them provides for us a standard in relation to which we are to judge ourselves. Paul is not saying that the Corinthians were to judge themselves by any special ethical standard, or even by the standard of his own ministry, or the standard of commandment which the Lord gave him (although all that would be relevant to their judging themselves), but he puts the judging of themselves in the context of the Lord’s supper, I think that this would say to us, beloved, that the exercise of self-judgment is to maintain us all the time in a condition in which we could immediately take the Lord’s supper.

In the history of the Lord’s dealings with His people in the progress of the two thousand years since He ascended and the Spirit came, the Supper has been placed on the Lord’s day, on the first day of the week, and rightly so; but let us understand that all the time we are going to the Supper, and there should be that state of moral preparedness with us that at any time we could go directly to the Supper. Now, if we judged ourselves in that light, what things would we leave aside? What things would we not do? One thing that it would lead to would be very much greater self-control.

That is I think the first aspect of a man judging himself, that he has self-control, I know that is set out in Galatians 5 as the last aspect of the fruit of the Spirit, but the first evidence that a man is judging himself is his self-control, that is to say, he regards the authority of the Spirit in him as greater than the authority of his own will, and he therefore subordinates everything in him, and every natural inclination and tendency, not to what he would do, but to what the Spirit of God would do. A person who is thus self-controlled would clearly be readily able to go to the Supper at any time. It is interesting to reflect that although, as I say, self-control is put at the end of the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5, if self-control is there by the Spirit, none of the aspects of the flesh really gets an opportunity to develop itself.

If a believer is maintained in self-control in the Spirit, how does malice ever get a foothold in him? He controls himself so that that is excluded. How does envy get a footing in a person who is under the control of the Spirit? It does not get ground to grow because in the self-judgment which is related to self-control by the Spirit, that aspect of things is kept in its own place; that is to say, one says to it all the time, ‘Thus far and no further’, and the ‘Thus far’ is that it shall not rear its head above the ground. How do other things spring up if the capacity for self-control in the Spirit is held amongst us, held in us (that is, individually) as that by which we judge every other tendency in ourselves? It is perfectly clear that if you are going to the Supper and to the service of God, you are to be in self-control in the power of the Spirit, because that occasion is peculiarly not one for the expression of what man is in himself.

We speak, as I say, a good deal about self-judgment. The important thing is that we should carry that judgment through to its conclusion, and that if we see and are aware of things or characteristics developing in ourselves (on which I do not need to touch in any extensive way), we are able not only to express a judgment on them, but to carry that judgment into effect. That is the necessary extension of self-judgment, that the judgment is carried into effect. Nothing would be wrought in the courts in this country if the judge, with all the authority of the Queen and the State behind him, said, ‘I sentence you to fourteen years imprisonment’, and then nothing further was done about it—the man was perfectly free to go on as he had before. The end of self-judgment is that we carry out the sentence on the thing that we are judging, so that it does not rear its head in us again. This may be thought to be an idealistic view of what is possible by way of self-judgment, but the habit of self-judgment is the best means towards the eradication of tendencies in us which militate against liberty in the service of God. Romans 8, indeed Romans 6, will teach us the means by which these things are to be put in their own place. The Spirit is on our side in self-judgment, and Paul says, “If we judged ourselves, so were we not judged”; but he goes on to say, and it is interesting what he does say here, “being judged, we are disciplined of the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world”.

Now I find that very interesting in its context because it seems to me that what Paul is saying is that not only have you to judge moral characteristics in yourself, but to judge the characteristics that are in the world as in yourself, because the world is going to come under judgment, and if you judge yourself you will be disciplined of the Lord so that you are not judged with that order of things. Therefore, it is very important for us, beloved, and in speaking of this I go back in my mind to having sat almost from childhood under ministry and teaching—local, in fellowship meetings and in other meetings—as to the necessity for believers who seek to walk in the truth having a clear judgment of the things that mark the world; and this present day is one in which, no less than in earlier days, we are to judge ourselves in relation to the things that mark the world. If not, then we are exposed to be condemned with the world—not that a believer will come into judgment, but God’s condemnation on the world’s system has been expressed in the death of Christ, and it remains, and therefore each of us is to be vigilant that things that mark the world and that please the world are not finding roots and opportunities for expansion in ourselves.

The disposition of the believer should be to judge worldliness and condemn it in himself at any time, and also to be willing to express condemnation of it to others who may be marked by it. One of the means by which tendencies spread amongst companies of believers is by the feeling that it is not polite to remark to somebody else on something by which they are marked but which is actually tending towards characterising the assembly by elements of worldliness. Mr. Stoney, in discussing what the world is, says the world is what the world is to you. If you like art, then that is the world to you; but, beloved brother or sister, you do not want to be condemned with the world of art, do you? One examines oneself and finds in oneself a disposition to like art and that kind of thing. I shall give some practical illustrations.

You see exhibitions of paintings, for instance, and say to yourself, ‘I would love to go there’; but then you say, ‘But have I judged myself in that respect?’ I can be quite practical about this; I like paintings, and at the moment at the Royal Academy there is a large exhibition which has quite an attraction to me. But, beloved, can you go? Is it the kind of thing that you would expect the believer to be characterised by? Would you expect to find me there? Or would you say, ‘He has not judged himself’? If the world of art is the world to you, then you have to judge yourself in respect of the world of art.

Is the world of music the world to you? Then, beloved brother, young or old, you have to judge yourself in relation to the world of music; and if I may say a plain word on this point, there is a tendency for the world of music to find an inlet amongst us at the present time, and I venture to say that it needs to be judged—and not only that it needs to be judged, but, as it were, to be sentenced and the sentence carried out. I would like to see that tape recorders amongst us are kept, if at all—if at all—for the purpose of recording meetings so that they may be reproduced and not for any other purpose. The tendency to go into the market and buy cassettes of what is called sacred, or even worldly, music is debilitating to the moral fibre amongst young people and old; and I feel that it would be right for a determined stand to be taken against this kind of thing. These things have been judged amongst us when the technology was different from what it is today, but advanced technology has not altered the character of the world save to make it more easily sinful.

Therefore, beloved, let us be perceptive as to our judgment of these things, and judge in ourselves the desire which gives rise to occupation with them. I think it was Mr. McBride who said that you do not have to mortify cricket what you have to mortify is the deeds of the body. You have to judge yourself so that you are not judged, because the Lord sees everything. Nothing escapes Him, nothing escapes His attention. I believe that the Lord has given us light, He has helped us; He has allowed us to go a way of our own in distorting principles of separation, but the Lord has not set aside the principle of separation. And that is one evidence of the Lord’s care for His people, that He insists on separation from evil, and the first place in which He insists on separation from evil is in you and me internally. The Lord would graciously encourage us to judge ourselves so that we are not judged, and that we submit ourselves to His discipline so that we are not condemned with the world.

I touch these things, beloved, because it often needs practical illustrations to bring home to us the necessity of applying things which otherwise might seem abstract. Someone might lose his temper, and it is very easy to judge yourself for losing your temper. After all, every believer, as soon as he cooled down, would know that that was wrong, and he would know that he ought to be repentant about it; but other things have not that rough edge to them. Other things are much smoother, but they still belong to the world with which we do not want to be condemned.

The hymn that we sang (284) became rather hackneyed amongst us, because people like to practise the tune—very great disadvantage is done to hymns by using them to practise tunes on but the substance of that hymn, beloved, is precious. ‘Out of the world to Thine own blest abode we follow our Forerunner to His God’. Is that the way you see yourself going out of the world? Or do you see yourself going out of the world into some kind of small, exclusive company who are an apology even for what they once were, and who do not seem to represent very much? No, ‘we follow our Forerunner to His God’, out of the world. Beloved, let these things affect us, so that we may consciously take on the determination not to be condemned with the world, by judging ourselves, so that we are submissive, not to judgment, but to the discipline of the Lord which is always in our favour.

Now in chapter 5, from which I read, we have brought before us in the context of 1 Corinthians and in the state of things which existed at that time, the directions given to a local assembly in regard to judging matters that arose inside it. Paul says, “What have I to do with judging those outside …?” Then he says, “Those without God judges”; that is to say, that as far as carrying out judgment of that kind is concerned, we may leave what is outside to God.

We may have our own judgment of it, but the carrying out of judgment rests with God. Let us bear that in mind, even in respect of those with whom we once walked. I suppose, in a sense, we have to regard them now as amongst those ‘without’, (Of course, in 1 Corinthians they were outside the assembly of God, and we would be careful not to entrench upon the right doctrine that all believers having the Spirit are a part of the assembly of God—where they walk is another matter) but we may leave judgment of them with God; what we would pray for is that He will bring judgment into their own consciences so that they might deliver themselves.

But matters arise in local assemblies which are unfitting for the glory which is intended to characterise the local assembly. Rarely do matters arise amongst us of the kind that arose in Corinth. Thank God for that! What damage would be caused in any local assembly if the things that happened in Corinth happened there. Thank God, too, that in these days very little happens of the kind of thing that happened in Galatia. We have not for some time had to contest doctrine that undermined the gospel. Thank God for that! Thank God that there is amongst the saints a general adherence to the truth and to right doctrine. But things do arise, beloved, in which assembly judgment is called for, that is to say, persons are doing things, or are committed to things, which are inconsistent with the fellowship of God’s Son. The assembly has to take cognizance of these, and unless the person clears himself in relation to them by the process of self-judgment which is alluded to in chapter 11, then the assembly has to clear itself of matters which are inconsistent with its being a vessel of glory to God unto all generations of the age of ages.

Now this truth remains truth for those who seek to walk in the light of the assembly. As is often said, we could not find the assembly today if we looked for it. If you had posted a letter to Corinth and addressed it to the assembly of God in Corinth, the postman would have known where to take it. If you wrote to the assembly of God in Buckhurst Hill today, I think the letter would probably be ‘returned to sender’, and the Post Office would write on it, ‘Insufficiently addressed’. The fact is, however, that the ability to deal with things in the light of the assembly remains for those who seek to walk in the light of the assembly; and you could not claim to be walking in the light of the assembly unless you maintained assembly discipline. Two things cannot go together; you cannot claim to be walking in the light of the assembly if you do not maintain assembly discipline. The giving up of assembly discipline is a token that assembly ground has been abandoned. Therefore, beloved, let us hold to this, let us see to it that we are committed to it. Let us act all the time in self-judgment and in care for one another, so that occasions for assembly judgment do not arise amongst us.

There is a long process of discipline before assembly judgments are come to. There is “reprove” (Matthew 18: 15)—that is discipline—“Convict, rebuke” (2 Timothy 4: 2)—all these words are part of a disciplinary process. They are all intended to have the effect that the assembly does not have to judge things as in 1 Corinthians 5. There is the possibility that you might have to go and see a brother. You might then have to take one or two besides. Then the matter might have to come to the assembly; and if the matter comes to the assembly, the assembly has to judge it. There is a great deal, beloved, in our maintaining what we have, I might say, been brought up in, that when matters come to the assembly they come so that they can be presented concretely and definitively, so that what is at issue is plain. Then scripture is read which bears on the matter at issue so that everybody there is convicted. If the person who is attached to the sin is there, then he should be convicted; if not, and in any case, the rest of the saints should be convicted. Assembly discipline, properly carried out, is not only the means of maintaining things suitable to the glory of the Lord whose assembly it is, but a means of edification and thus of protection for the rest of the brethren.

Now what the Lord has done is to place responsibility for discipline of this kind in the local assembly. It has been long taught amongst us that the Lord has capacitated every local assembly with all that is needed to deal with every matter that arises in it. Not every locality has a brother with gift local in it—very few localities have actually a brother with gift—gift is rare. Some of us serve in meetings like this and in other meetings, but gift is rare.

Nevertheless, the Lord has provided every local assembly with what it needs to deal with matters that arise in it; and this makes the local assembly competent. The Lord has made it competent. The Lord makes local assemblies competent to deal with their own matters; and the Lord, I think, is jealous of that. The assembly of God at Corinth was not the assembly of God in Colosse or Thessalonica or Ephesus—it was the assembly of God in Corinth, and it had capacity to deal with all the issues that arose in Corinth. We might say that the issue that was before them was a simple one once attention was drawn to it. For someone to have his father’s wife, you would have thought would have promoted activity in divine jealousy straight away. It did not, but Paul rallied the saints. But there were other things that happened in Corinth—those spoken of for instance at the end of 2 Corinthians 12—and the local assembly had the capacity to deal with all those matters; and I believe the Lord is jealous of what He has charged local assemblies with and He will uphold local assemblies in their dealing with matters within their own boundaries.

Now I may not like what a local assembly does, I may even be able to point out that in this respect and in that respect it was wrong. What I am more likely to say is that it cannot have been right, that ‘for this reason and that reason it cannot have been right’. What do I then do?

I wait on the Lord who has His own relations with the local assembly; and He may allow things. Sometimes, I suppose, the Lord even allows a mistake to be made in order that, in the process of His own time, we may learn fresh lessons from Him in relation to the matters which arise and may be protracted; but the Lord is jealous in relation to local assemblies.

Beloved brethren, I am jealous about local assemblies too. I have responsibility in one local assembly—so for that matter have you—responsibility in one local assembly, I suppose I might, if I heard of something coming up, say to a brother in another assembly privately, ‘What happened in this case?’, and ‘Could you just tell me a bit more so that I may understand?’

And if someone seeks to understand what is done in a local assembly, the local assembly is not to be criticised for telling him. One thing that the Lord has done in the present time is to reduce things to such dimensions that the whole of the saints available for the testimony are compassable within the minds of any one of us, and the number of local assemblies is such that what happens in one is compassable within the minds of all; not to make them interfere, but what happens in one local assembly is at least to be explicable to other local assemblies; and if means are taken to explain this, persons are not to be criticised for setting out facts so that others may at least understand what transpired.

But for me to set London to criticise what was done in, say, Bromley, would I think be impinging on the jealousy of the Lord in relation to His rights in another local assembly, and I am as jealous in that respect, if I may use it illustratively, of Bromley’s rights as I would be of London’s rights if someone came and told us how we ought to have dealt with such and such a case; because we come very near, beloved, in that case, to saying who may break bread in another meeting. Once the matter is put like that, we can see how offensive it is to the whole course and order of things in the recovery; that I, or indeed the brethren in London, have no right to say who shall break bread in another place. We may carry exercise—brethren may carry exercise about us—but the Lord in His care for local assemblies is fully able to bring things according to His own mind, so that the truth is maintained.

In the end the truth will prevail; there is no question about that. The history of the 1960’s ought to show us that in the end the Lord will make the truth prevail. But, until the Lord has worked things out in His own time, let you and me maintain things in the jealousy that the Lord has for the way He has constituted any particular assembly, and of His own rights there.

It is as much an offence for me to intrude in another meeting as for me to walk out of my own meeting; that is an offence to the rights of the Lord. I am saying by it that I no longer recognise that the Lord is exercising rights in that place, and I will provoke the Lord to jealousy and I am not stronger than He.

Of course, from time to time, beloved, we all err in the spirit in which we do things. We err in it personally. Sometimes it is a surprise to us that we could have offended a brother at all, or that there are brethren who actually do not like us. (After all, most of us think that we are pretty easy to get on with. I have not yet spoken to a brother who said, ‘Well, frankly, in my locality I really am difficult to get on with’). But we do give offence to one another, and what is needed then is that we judge ourselves and that we submit ourselves to the discipline of the Lord, whether individually or collectively, because the discipline of the Lord is calculated to remove the abrasive elements in you and me, or, if we have allowed them to develop, in the local assembly.

The local assembly is never really characterised by abrasive elements, but sometimes the characteristics of individual brothers and sisters come too near to the surface; but the discipline of the Lord will deal with all that. Let us, beloved, be revived that the prime thing is not what you do or what the nearest city does in any matter—the prime thing is the view the Lord has of His rights in local assemblies This I believe is cardinal, and, if it is not cardinal, we shall soon have a system of universal interference in which local assembly responsibility is ultimately subordinated to the will of the strongest brother in fellowship. I think you can see how that course of things would develop if local assemblies were to be subordinated to one another. We carry exercises that proceed in other countries as burdened before the Lord, and I think we are thankful that the Lord has not allowed things to be forced to an issue; the Lord will use time so that His own rights may be seen to prevail and may have opportunity to prevail, and the Lord, as He exercises His own rights, will exercise the right to gather to and for Himself everyone who seriously desires to walk in the light of the assembly and not be condemned with the world in the present day.

I just add a word on chapter 14 because an important principle of judgment remains there. It is perhaps fitting that I should speak of this point last. We have almost finished two days of ministry together, two days in which there has been speaking; and while no doubt this reference is to what we speak of as the ministry meeting, I think it has a general bearing.

Certainly Mr. Taylor (and we respect what the Spirit gave through him—let us not, beloved, confuse our own minds by making more of the men who were the Spirit’s vessels than of the Spirit who spoke through them) said that all ministry is subject to judgment. What we have had in the last two days here, beloved, is subject to judgment. One feels that one is in the presence of intelligent persons and they are capable of judging what we have had, not judging little trifles where we all make slips but being able to judge the truth and substance of what has been said.

Now, in my impression of 1 Corinthians 14, this is mandatory. You as having been here (and we will take the meetings we have been through as an illustration), have no escape from judging what you have heard. Do not just go away and forget it; do not go away and say, ‘We had a good time’ or, ‘Well, I feel there was a measure of help’, or whatever other expressions we use; but judge. Beloved brother and sister, judge. A great deal of quality is contributed to the constitution of the assembly by the capacity of sisters to judge what has come out in ministry: (I think we have seen in the 1960’s again that there was a discerning capability in sisters that the brothers did not always express). “Let the others judge” is mandatory, that is, it is compulsory, it is not optional; it is not that you can do it when you have time, but you are to take and weigh what you have heard, and discard what is not of God, but get the prophetic bearing of what God actually had to say in this time.

Mr. Taylor, to refer to him again, directly linked the ministry meeting with eternity. The link is that “God is indeed amongst you” (1 Corinthians 14: 25), joins with “God … all in all”, 1 Corinthians 15: 28. But you have an obligation to judge what you have heard. You have an obligation to judge what I have said in this address. I would urge brethren to take it and judge it. Let the truth prevail. Let the truth as to self-judgment, let the truth as to specific matters of worldliness, prevail as “the others judge”. If you think that I have said something tonight on a practical point in which I have gone too far, the Lord will show in time; but judge, and judge as before the Lord. Do not judge as before the brethren, or before your friends, or before your girlfriend, or something like that—judge as before the Lord, but judge.

If I have said things as to the local assembly and its responsibility, and the Lord’s jealousy as to it, judge, and the process of judgment will establish you in the truth. As I reflect on what I have said, it would establish me in the truth. But the purpose of these meetings is lost if there is not, consequent upon them, establishment in the truth in a greater degree in those who have been present. If the characteristic of judgment of ministry is set aside, I think that we open the door to unorthodoxy, leading to heresy. Let us be grounded in the truth. Let us “have an outline of sound words” (2 Timothy 1: 13); it provides the framework within which anything else may be judged; but “Let the others judge”. The principle of the judgment of ministry is not calculated only to secure the rejection of what is not according to God, but it is one of the most direct means available of building up the saints in the present truth.

Therefore, beloved brethren, “let the others judge”. We shall be with one another in our homes, and receiving the hospitality of the beloved brethren in this locality and its neighbours—it is very interesting how Mr. Taylor’s ministry in regard to links between local assemblies is worked out in these parts—you can see that they have ‘beckoned to their partners in the other ship’—and we shall talk about many things (we do not need to go home and pretend to be extra spiritual by having a kind of further reading in the evening), but we shall be in a situation where what we have had is able to settle in our minds.

Now the result of the settlement, beloved, should be, not that there is a sediment to be rejected, but that there is a sediment of substance, and above that there is a vessel of translucent light. That is what happens when you make wine, although in that you reject the sediment. But out of these meetings there should come a body of substance deposited in the brethren, and above that, a vessel of translucent light. That is what ministry is intended to produce amongst us, that is what you get as things ferment among the saints; it is arrived at as “the others judge”.

Well, beloved brethren, I commend this thought to you, that the others should judge. We do not lightly receive ministry, although we are not lightly critical, but we take it in the sobriety of those to whom the Lord has given the capacity to judge. First, to judge ourselves—that is always the primary thing—then capacity if matters arise locally to judge them locally. He has also given us the capacity to judge what is said, so that progress towards the divine objective may be maintained, and the glory of the system may be maintained both in the individuals and in the companies. Well, may the Lord help us in these things, for His name’s sake.

Address at Buckhurst Hill
28 December 1974