THE ASSEMBLY AS AN OBJECT OF AFFECTION

W. McKillop

Ephesians 5: 25–27; 2 Timothy 2: 10; Philippians 2: 19–21, 25, 29, 30

These passages present to us persons to whom the assembly is an object of great affection.

First of all the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. You will notice it says, “the Christ also loved the assembly”. The Christ, referring to Him as the One who is doing everything operationally for God, that He loved the assembly. In 2 Timothy 2 we have the apostle who presents himself as suffering all things for the sake of the elect. It is striking that the apostle does not say, for the sake of the assembly. In, terms of love, he would not put himself on the same level as the Christ, so he says, “the elect”. The assembly and the elect of this dispensation of course are equivalent thoughts, but the apostle would maintain the pre-eminent distinction of Christ as the Lover of the assembly. He writes to the Philippians about Timotheus and his genuine feeling about a local assembly, the Philippian assembly. He says of him that he has no one like-minded who will care with genuine feeling how ye get on. If Paul were present among us would he say about me or about you that, as regards our local assemblies, he has no one like-minded who cares with genuine feeling how our local brethren are getting on? Epaphroditus is in the apostle’s mind in that same section because of the way in which he sacrificed himself for the sake of his local brethren, the Philippians; drawing near to death, showing the extent to which the love of Epaphroditus for his local brethren would take him. We do not speak much about Epaphroditus. If the brethren will search their memories you will not remember many occasions on which anybody spoke about Epaphroditus. Yet he stands out in the apostle’s mind because he says of him, “my brother and fellow-workman and fellow-soldier”.

Beginning where I read, the great dominating thought in regard of the assembly is that “the Christ also loved the assembly”. That led to something on His part, He delivered Himself up for it. That would not only be His death, but would also include the way in which the Lord, in His infinite love, is devoting Himself currently to bringing about in the assembly a state that answers to the purpose of God. The Lord is active, intensely active; He delivered Himself up for it, in order that He might sanctify it. That He might set it apart from everything else; the old man, the first man, the flesh, the world, even the flesh and blood condition ultimately, that He might have it, a new creation, in accord with the purpose of God. You will notice where we finished reading it says, that it might be holy and blameless”. That takes us back to chapter 1, that we should be holy and blameless before God in love (Ephesians 1: 4). The Lord’s unsearchable love for the assembly has led to unceasing activity on His part so that the assembly might become what it is according to the purpose of God, and that He might present the assembly to Himself glorious. He is going to do it! In the type in Genesis 2 Jehovah Elohim brought the woman to Man. In Genesis 24 the Spirit in type brought Rebecca to the heavenly man, Isaac. But according to Ephesians the Christ is going to present the assembly to Himself; He is going to do it. That implies His Deity, because only a divine Person could present such a glorious vessel to Himself. In the meantime this service of love has gone on almost two thousand years; the Lord has been active sanctifying it, purifying it by the washing of water by the word. It is not the blood here, it is the water; what is in view is practical purity and holiness. The Lord has been active, ever since the Spirit came down, to bring about this sanctified and purified state in the assembly which He loves. That service, beloved brethren, is going on currently with regard to you and me. It went on in the service of the twelve, it went on in the service of Paul and it has gone on for almost twenty centuries.

As one generation after another has been brought into the testimony, the Lord

has been active in love because He has had this great vessel in His affections, and He has served unceasingly that at the end of the dispensation He might present this vessel to Himself glorious, having no spot, or wrinkle, but that it might be holy and blameless.

What a conception, speaking reverently, the Christ has had before Him! What love has moved Him that He has delivered Himself up to service of such length, of such magnitude, unceasing service, to bring about something that is wholly compatible with Himself, and can be brought out in display as the fulness of Him who fills all in all. Has it really come home to us that we are part of a vessel that is the counterpart of Christ, and that after He presents it to Himself He will bring it out and display it to the universe as His fulness? What Christ is sanctifying and purifying is shortly going to come out of heaven and amaze the universe by its magnificence, because it will descend out of heaven. John saw the holy city descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God (Revelation 21: 10). That is what the Lord has before Him. In any little service that we may render, let us keep the objective of the Christ before us. His wondrous service in love will bring about a vessel that He can present to Himself glorious, having no spot, or wrinkle, or any of such things; but that it might be holy and blameless. It will be holy, indeed it is called the holy city more than once in Revelation 21, “the holy city, Jerusalem”. There will be a substantial, eternal answer to the service of love of the Christ in this dispensation. What joy it will be to the heart of Christ to have such a vessel, such a counterpart, the fulness of Him who fills all in all.

Paul says about his own labours, “For this cause I endure all things for the sake of the elect”. How that dignifies our local brethren as we think about them, “the elect”. And not only our local brethren because it includes all the elect of God, all that are brought into the assembly during the whole dispensation. But the apostle here is thinking about those that could be identified as the elect during the time of his service.

So we are thinking about those currently living on the earth who can be identified as the elect of God. He says, “For this cause I endure all things for the sake of the elect”. That word endure means to go through suffering patiently. We are in the time when we are called upon to suffer patiently; although there have been those who have suffered martyrdom. Those saints proved that Christ was a merciful and faithful High Priest! But generally, in the western world, we are not in a time of widespread persecution; we are in a time that calls for endurance to go on day after day after day suffering patiently, but doing it for the sake of the elect. At one point when Mr. Darby was under attack he wrote a letter to one of his attackers and stated his position as to the truth, and then he said, It is for this that I labour and suffer reproach. He was thinking about the elect.

I would encourage us, beloved brethren, to think about the elect. The world is full of its dignitaries and some are in positions of authority set up by God. We pray for them in our prayer meetings and our household prayers, and we should. They have dignity because of the positions that God has given them, the authority they have from God. Even the Lord recognised a certain dignity with Pilate in saying he had authority which was given him from above. Yet morally Pilate was a contemptible, cowardly man. But the elect are persons who are worthy of our respect and affection, and of our suffering for their sake. You go on in your locality, which is small as is ours, and as is Plainfield and many others, you maintain the service of God, you suffer reproach, you suffer loss in a material sense, you suffer in other respects—it is for the sake of the elect! That dignifies our suffering and encourages us to go on with suffering patiently. It is day by day, day after day. But we must remember that He said, “Yea, I come quickly”, Revelation 22: 20. The suffering will not go on for ever. We shall not always be visiting brethren in the hospital, we

shall not always be burying saints, we shall not always be watching one another growing old, and in some cases feeble and decrepit. The day is coming when all that will cease because the Lord will descend with an assembling shout and He will change us. We shall have the body of glory. Our body of humiliation will be transformed into conformity to His body of glory.

In the meantime it is a time of suffering patiently and the apostle is a great model for us in this respect. But he had an objective—“that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus”. Now that is not just the forgiveness of sins; the salvation which is in Christ Jesus involves eternal life. The saints, for whose sakes we are suffering patiently, the elect are obtaining the salvation which is in Christ Jesus. The fulness of it will be that our bodies will be changed, that is the fulness of the salvation which is in Christ Jesus. And then he adds,

“with eternal glory”. That glory will be the full actual glory of sonship. The Lord Jesus said,

“the glory which thou hast given me I have given them”, John 17: 22. That, in a certain sense was anticipative because the disciples about whom He spoke were still in flesh and blood and they are now all with Christ, they are out of the flesh and blood condition. But they are going to come into this real condition of sonship which involves the body of glory. The apostle had that objective in suffering patiently. He is no doubt alluding here to his time in the prison,

“that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory”.

I refer now to Timothy and Epaphroditus. It is not now a question of suffering but of genuine feeling and of being like-minded with Paul. You might say, Well, Timothy knew Paul, he was with him so he could be like-minded. We can be like-minded, too, as we love the saints.

We can be like-minded with Paul as we regard the saints as the elect. What marked Timothy was his concern about the Philippian brethren. The apostle says, “I have no one like-minded who will care with genuine

feeling how ye get on”. One would covet to be marked more by this genuine feeling about not only my local brethren but also brethren in every locality. Timothy was not local in Philippi, else the apostle would not have said, “I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timotheus to you shortly”. Timothy was elsewhere, but the apostle said, He cares about you in Philippi, he has genuine feeling how yet get on. As we think about the localities where the saints are with whom we are privileged to walk, do these genuine feelings rise up in our hearts about every locality? That would have a real bearing on our prayer meetings. Genuine feeling would mean we are thinking about the saints in every locality and we are thinking about how they are getting on. And I would say with some concern that what we want is to hear how the saints are getting on, not how somebody is not getting on. It is astonishing that we can hear so quickly about a difficulty somewhere, and usually what we hear is largely misinformation, but we do not hear a great deal about how they are getting on. That was the concern of Timothy. If you asked him about Philippi he would not say, Well, they have not ministered to Paul for a while. No, he would say, They are marked by suffering, they are marked by fellowship with the glad tidings, they are marked by the descending mind. If you attend any of their meetings, you will be impressed with the fact that they are heavenly minded. I think that is what he would say about the Philippians. Paul says, “For all seek their own things, not the things of Jesus Christ”. Nothing is more destructive of genuine feeling about how the saints get on than seeking my own things. Now I am not prepared to say what those might be, it is for all of us to search our hearts as to it. Are the things that I am seeking, the things of Jesus Christ?

Paul goes on to speak about Epaphroditus. Here is a man who was sick, sick close to death. It was not because he caught some infection or something else. It was Epaphroditus acting in the calculation of love for the Philippians and for the apostle, “he drew near even to

death”. You can see why Paul said of him, not only my brother and fellow-workman, but my fellow-soldier. A soldier is under orders, and he may have to draw near to death as under orders. Those of us who have been in military service, not of our own choosing but in the ways of God, know that often you are in circumstances where you are near to death. It is a very real experience. But this brother was a fellow-soldier of the apostle and it was in the work of Christ that he drew near to death. He says, “venturing his life”. He was like the apostle who said you remember, “I make no account of my life as dear to myself”, Acts 20:24. I suppose what Paul meant by that was, if my life is not being laid down for the brethren of what moral value is it? Solomon says, “If a man beget a hundred sons, and live many years... and also he have no burial” (Ecclesiastes 6: 3); that is what we need to come to. We accept burial as regards what we are naturally in order that in the power of life out of death we might venture our lives for the sake of our local brethren and for the sake of the brethren elsewhere.

No doubt Paul was very sympathetic with this, because you remember that he himself was stoned and they drew him out of the city supposing him to be dead (Acts 14: 19). Paul would know what the feelings of this man were because people thought he was dead. But when the disciples encircled him he rose up and entered into the city. Here is a man who is so governed by affection for the saints and so governed by affection for the apostle that “for the sake of the work”, the Lord’s work, “he drew near even to death, venturing his life”.

Love leads us, as John tells us, to lay down our lives for the brethren (1 John 3: 16). I remember a servant of the Lord who said, the form our suffering takes is largely in making long arduous journeys to serve the saints. I would encourage all the brethren in this city, as I encourage my local brethren, to get to the three-day meetings in other localities, so that you might have part in the flow of the Spirit of God universally among us in spiritual ministry.

Paul says of him, “Receive him therefore in the Lord”. This man was worthy to be received by the Philippians in the Lord. He adds, “with all joy”, meaning that they would be delighted to see such a man, one who ventured his life because of love for them. Then he says, “hold such in honour”. Beloved brethren, if we know any persons who are venturing their lives for the sake of their local brethren or for the sake of the saints in general, let us hold such in honour. It is not that we are going to make a great deal of them, but we will hold them in honour. We cannot help but think of the beloved servant who was in this city for so many years. Mr. James Taylor, who really on many occasions ventured his life to serve the saints; it was for the sake of the work.

And we could mention others earlier, especially Mr. J. N. Darby. Think of a man of over seventy writing that he was returning through the woods by lantern light at eleven o’clock at night, after serving the saints in a place, to go back to where he was staying. We may not know much about that practically. But to the extent that we can, let us commit ourselves to the work, for love of Christ and for love of the saints, and let us sacrifice ourselves for the sake of the elect that they may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.

Address at New York
29 April 1995