GOD'S SOVEREIGNTY SEEN IN GIFTS SET IN THE ASSEMBLY
GOD’S SOVEREIGNTY SEEN IN GIFTS SET IN THE ASSEMBLY
1 Corinthians 12:28; Matthew 10:2; Acts 3:1-11
I have in mind to say something about the sovereign pleasure of God as seen in His service and testimony. The very suggestion of it reminds each one that he, as a believer, is to hold himself for the divine disposal, and to see to it that he is qualified to have his part in keeping with the divine pleasure.
I conceive that in this first letter to the Corinthians the apostle had in mind that there should be in Corinth a vessel in which God would set out His service, in which He would set forth His testimony; indeed, I believe, the creation as we know it — the physical creation — was intended for this very purpose. It was to be a sphere in which God would make Himself known. I suppose also that the angelic creation or order was intended for the same thing, as a vehicle through which God could display Himself. Very little indeed is revealed to us as to the angelic hosts, but enough to show that it was a creation marked by order — divine order, and that the idea of rank entered into it; we read of Michael the archangel. There can be no doubt that the Spirit of God in Ezekiel alludes to that order, when He speaks of the king of Tyre as “the anointed covering cherub” (Ezekiel 28: 14). He is presented as one distinguished in rank and in service, for he is spoken of as “the anointed covering cherub”.
Then again, he was adorned with every precious stone, for the idea of adornment necessarily enters into all that which God would use as a means by which to display Himself. A list of nine precious stones which appear in his covering is enumerated, but the number was short of the divine thought, it [p. 296] was short of completeness; it was short even of the idea of responsibility — of administration: but nevertheless these stones were ornamental. So, too, the material creation — I mean the earth as we know it — was wonderfully ornamented as it came from the hand of God and as it was completed. I might also speak of the heavens, but I speak particularly of the earth as that sphere in which God sets out His service and testimony. He planted a garden, we are told, eastward in Eden. It was for His sovereign pleasure; He indicated thus His sovereign right in that which He had created to have a special place for His own pleasure; and so it is there, in that garden, that He sets up him who was to be His representative here. The idea of representation is a great thought with God; so He creates man in His image after His likeness that he may represent Him. It was that he might be here for the representation of God that He made him in His likeness; he was thus morally qualified to be the representative of God, and as such he is placed in the sovereignty of God in the garden.
Well, that was broken in upon, as we know, but God, as we have often remarked, never relinquishes a thought — never. The resources of God afford one of the most interesting studies in Scripture. So He acts to show that He can maintain and carry His thought into effect. He has resources by which He can carry out His thought, that His service and testimony may be maintained in the presence of evil — evil having come in. Satan — that anointed covering cherub — who knew what God had in His mind to some extent, for he had unquestionably a great place in the divine service, had found a way into the creation and had wrought havoc, and brought in ruin, but God was not diverted in the least degree from His thought, and when the man fails to represent Him, He takes up a family.
“The God of glory”, Stephen says, “appeared [p. 297] to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia” Acts 7: 2. It was not simply a question of light now, but of an appearing. An appearing signifies that God reveals Himself in some sense so that He may be apprehended in men’s minds, and it is as the “God of glory” He appears, and that refers to the service of God, and that service carried out in a family. In appearing to Abraham, He had in mind to take up a family. God says, “I called him when he was alone, and blessed him” (Isaiah 51: 2), for, in order to use us, we must be blessed. The glory was to find a resting-place, and God had designed that it should be in the family of the man to whom He had appeared. Abraham is the first person, according to Scripture, to whom God appeared. He had spoken to others, but an appearing means an impression conveyed as to the being, as to the nature of God. So on the basis of that, in that family — the family of Abraham — God develops a priestly service.
Now when we come down to Moses and Aaron we have a pattern shown on the mount — the mount of God — as to that in which He would display Himself, that in which He would be served, that in which He would set forth His testimony. I connect all that with 1 Corinthians, and I hope to be able to make it clear so that all may follow, because the divine thread runs right through. Corinthians contemplates the tabernacle in the wilderness, that is to say, it contemplates an order — a system of things set up here in the presence of evil, and in spite of evil, in which God is to be served, in which His testimony is to be set out, and in which His testimony is to be enhanced, so that an unbeliever coming in is so impressed with the presence of God, and by His glory, that he falls down upon his face declaring, “God is indeed amongst you”. Wonderful conception! There is that, as I said, set up in the presence of the evil, and in spite of the evil, in which God will set forth His glory — that [p. 298] which is sufficiently powerful as wrought of God for Him to set forth His service and His testimony, that in which His glory has a place; as He said of the tabernacle, “it shall be sanctified by my glory” — nothing less than that. What a wonderful design has come to light, and how wonderful that we should be called to have part in that system!
So the epistle to Corinthians is intended to build up step by step, inch by inch, as I may say, the material of this structure, so that each part will be in its place in the divine organisation; “that there be no divisions among you”, that there should be an organism “fitted together;” as he says, “so also is the Christ. For also in the power of one Spirit we have all been baptised into one body, ... and have all been given to drink of one Spirit” (1 Corinthians 12: 12, 13).
The vessel is there; now such is the divine thought. When the apostle says “so also is the Christ” the allusion is to the saints, that is, to the assembly, as set up, bit by bit, part by part, and anointed by the Spirit in a public way and designated as “the Christ” — a vessel in which God would act and display His glory, in which He would present His service and His testimony in such wise that an unbeliever entering into that company would fall down as convicted of God, and acknowledge that God was there. It is not only that the light was there, not only that the Spirit was there, but that God was there. The Spirit is God, to be sure, but God Himself was there and there to be blessing to men.
Well, now, I want to show how, having such a vessel, God would set out His sovereign choice of gifts. My appeal in this respect is to every one present, because each believer has part in that one body. Every member has its function, and everyone is under the anointing; the figure of the human body is employed to show this. Then the Spirit of God, through the apostle, changes [p. 299] from the thought of the body to that of the assembly (see 1 Corinthians 12:27,28). Now the body is an organism, but the assembly is constructed; it is composed of intelligent persons — persons with a judgment, for the word suggests intelligence. Approaching this subject, the apostle says, “I speak as to intelligent persons: do ye judge what I say” (1 Corinthians 10: 15). It is for the saints to judge in regard to what is said in the assembly. So we read, “God has set certain in the assembly”. He has the vessel, He has that in which He can set out His sovereign choice, and what I want to show is, that this sovereign choice is set in the order of one, two, three; “first, apostles; secondly, prophets; thirdly, teachers”. God makes no room for man’s will; that thought you will find throughout in His instructions here. “The stranger that cometh near shall be put to death” Numbers 1: 51. How much, alas! there is of that character at the present time in relation to the things of God — the stranger — that which is not anointed intruding itself into divine things; whereas God, at every step in the detail of His instructions, rigidly refuses every such intrusion with the most relentless penalty attached.
What then is to become of the huge system around us? Is God to let His word fall to the ground? No, beloved; it has yet to come under His public disapproval and disavowal. It is a most serious consideration, and I speak of it now in a practical way, that God will not make any room for man’s will; whatever man may design to bring into His house God will surely thwart it; nothing is suffered there but “the good pleasure of his will” (Ephesians 1: 5). And so Ephesians, which gives the highest conception of these things, speaks of that; it speaks, too, of the counsel of His will, and of the mystery of His will. He is working out now the mystery of His will; nothing can stand in the way of the will of God; by and by it will be manifested; but we have to learn [p. 300] it now, and we have to learn, too, that the smallest way in which we may introduce our wills into the assembly it will be brought down; God will thwart it. It is God’s will only that has place there.
Now that will shows itself in the order of first, secondly, thirdly. It is no question of accident here, it is a question of the will of God; “God has set certain in the assembly” — He has set them there for His will. In Ephesians it is a question of gift; Christ has gone far above all heavens as Man and He has received gifts as Man for men, and He gave some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists and some shepherds and teachers — it is a question of endowment. The church was wonderfully endowed by Christ; there it is a question of gift. But in Corinthians it is not exactly gift that is prominent, but the will of God. It is not that He gave the assembly apostles and prophets, but He set them there: just as He set the stars in the firmament of the heavens, so He has set certain in the assembly, as it has pleased Him — according to His sovereign choice. I do not suppose that there is anything that man quarrels with more than the sovereignty of God, and yet the sovereignty of God provides for the love of God, for His love is sovereign, so in quarrelling with the sovereignty of God we quarrel with His love.
It provides, too, for the power of God, and the wisdom of God, so if we find fault with His sovereignty, we find fault with His power and with His wisdom. So in accordance with His sovereign will He has set certain in the assembly.
There is no such thought in Scripture as gifts being set in localities; bishops and elders are set in localities, but gifts are for the assembly — the whole church of God. If there are too many gifts in a locality, the question is raised at once whether the will of God is allowed its full course, its full sway.
[p. 301] If I find myself in the way of another, depend upon it the will of God has not had its full sway, for there is room for all in the assembly. At one time it was quite evident there was too much gift in Jerusalem, and because they would not move out, God resorted to Stephen; He resorted too, to the deacon Philip and sent him to meet the Ethiopian eunuch. Then Paul is raised up and sent forth to the nations. The apostles had remained in Jerusalem, while others were scattered.
Sometimes in the government of God He has to scatter. It is a very solemn thing to come under the governmental dealings of God, and have to be scattered. Any clinging to national ideas or metropolitan ideas is sure to bring in the governmental dealings of God — the scattering of God. Was the scattering for nothing? No, indeed, we see how the light reached the gentiles through the scattered ones. How humbling for the apostles! It was humbling that it should have come through the scattered ones, but such is the government of God.
Well, gifts, as I said, are set in the assembly, for the good of the assembly; where they may be geographically is another matter. My geographical position is a question of the government of God; the government of God is concurrent with the service of God, and it is intended to support the service of God, but one’s gift is not a question of the government of God, but of His will. One is set definitely in the assembly and one’s position is fixed by the sovereign will of God, and each one should know it. God intends that it should be known; He intends that each gift should be known, and that its position should be known, so it is set in the assembly, not in any locality; its domain of service is the assembly. But then I want to show that the order is one, two, three; “first, apostles; secondly, prophets; thirdly, teachers”. According to this passage, the evangelist [p. 302] is omitted. There is no room, as I said, for the will of man. If God is pleased to give another a greater gift than He has given to you, you must bow, it is the will of God which is perfect. He knows His selection. So Matthew (who alone, I think, gives this) in giving the list of the apostles, says, “first, Simon, who was called Peter” — was it an accident? Not at all. Peter was morally the first, and for this reason, amongst others, that God apparently had expended the greatest care on Peter. God whose sovereign will designed him to be the first, saw to it that he was the first. God works in us according to His sovereign will. If He selects Peter to be the first, He qualifies him to be the first, and hence the severity of his discipline.
Anyone who is to be the first in the service of God must be prepared for the severest discipline. Paul says, “I think that God has set us the apostles for the last, as appointed to death” 1 Corinthians 4: 9. He has set them that way, “first apostles”. And why? Because they were first in suffering; they were the first morally, but they were the last outwardly in the sense of reproach and in the sense of suffering — they were appointed to death. And so Peter presents the one man, I suppose, in the New Testament who underwent the greatest and most humiliating discipline, that he might be fitted for his place as first among the apostles. His discipline was extremely humiliating, but it was necessary if he were really to be conformed to the sovereign will of God for him; that is to say, that he was the first, as Matthew presents it. Matthew presents the apostles in pairs, and the first is Peter; Mark presents them singly. I suppose Matthew has in mind the service of God in the form it took in the early days; he had in mind that God intended to present His best to men in His service; and so I have read that passage in the Acts because I understand that [p. 303] chapter (chapter 3) to be a question of sovereign selection.
Now what you will find in the Acts is not so much what God told the apostles to do as what they did. I am not denying that they were told to do the things, far from it; I am perfectly certain that Peter was constantly in prayer to God about every movement of his in His service, but the Holy Spirit does not tell us about that in the early chapters of the Acts, He presents to us Peter with John going up to the temple to pray; it was a public thing. What Peter was publicly was undoubtedly the result of what he was with God privately, but in the Acts, God is presenting the public side of the testimony; and that is what I am seeking to present to you tonight — that what God is looking for in every locality in which the people of God are found is correspondence with the anointed vessel: that there should be that publicly to which God can commit Himself and which He can employ as dignified for the setting forth publicly of His service and of His testimony.
So in each locality He will have His way, and He will make His selection, and He will use whom He will. He works privately in their souls, He disciplines them and fits them by His work in them, and when they move publicly, their movements justify God in His selection.
Well, these are very simple thoughts that I think everyone should understand. “Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, which is the ninth hour” — they went up together. It was the loveliest sight morally, I suppose, under the heavens. They were masterpieces of God’s work, the greatest pains had been expended upon them. If you look at the gospel of Matthew, you will be interested to see the way in which Peter is introduced and the various connections in which he appears personally. Think of the introduction of Peter to Jesus; He says to him, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4: 19). He is to be a learner. See him again as he walks on the water. “Lord, if it be thou”, he says, “command me to come to thee upon the waters” (Matthew 14:28). What a lesson there is to be learned in that! He is a typical learner — a disciple; he shows in that incident that he is learning, but he has not quite learnt, he is just a pupil, because he begins to sink. He will have to try again.
We all have to try again. The fact that we have to try again is humiliating, but it is wholesome, it is part of our education. Peter, in due course, learnt morally how to walk on the water, but he had to make a try, and he did. I say that for young ones; we have all to learn, and more, we have to learn how to learn. We learn by our very blunders, even as Peter did.
Peter’s history is known to most of us. In Matthew 18: 21 we get there another item in his education. He asks one of the finest questions a learner can ask. He says to the Lord, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? until seven times?” He is just a pupil at school, he is a learner; he asks questions.
We have to learn, and one of the greatest things in learning is to ask questions and to put them to the right person. The Lord’s answer to his question is, as I may say, the finishing touch for Peter in relation to the assembly: “I say not to thee until seven times, but until seventy times seven”. How Peter needed that instruction! To learn how to forgive is a great item in our instruction; we cannot be like God, beloved, unless we learn how to forgive — we have to learn how to forgive, and the Lord taught Peter how to forgive; later on he himself had to be forgiven, for he denied the Lord. In what a wonderful way he learnt the grace of forgiveness then! To learn how to forgive is one of the greatest lessons to learn; I can never forgive according to God unless I learn [p. 305] forgiveness from God. And so Luke, who would emphasise this feature — the grace of forgiveness — tells us that when the two disciples from Emmaus returned to Jerusalem, they found the eleven, and those with them gathered together, saying, “The Lord is indeed risen and has appeared to Simon” (Luke 24: 34). I can understand them saying to one another, ‘How remarkable that He should have appeared to Simon’, for had he not just denied Him? Yes, not once, but thrice, but the Lord had appeared to Simon, for He would impress him indelibly with His grace, and we cannot, beloved, be in the assembly according to God save as impressed by His grace; we cannot convey grace unless we are the subjects of it. Simon was the recipient of this marvellous grace that would forgive even his denial of Christ. What a wonderful example of grace!
Well now, having said so much about Peter, in regard to his discipline that he might be morally ‘first’ among the apostles, I just want to finish by calling attention to him in this remarkable passage in the Acts. He and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, which was the ninth hour — an hour, I suppose, that would be fresh in their hearts. What memories would arise of that hour! How fresh would be the remembrance of what took place in that hour! It was a moment of peculiar preciousness to them, and they went together at that hour to the temple. It was the hour when Jesus died. Doubtless they would recall His words on the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23: 34). As I said, these two men were, I apprehend, at that moment the most beautiful spectacle under heaven; they were the product of the grace of God, of the work of Christ, and they were together — they were moving together in brotherly affection. God would enable us in our localities to move thus together in brotherly affection, in brotherly [p. 306] intelligence, in brotherly understanding of grace, and of the dispensation of faith in which we have part. How attractive they were as they moved thus to the temple!
But, beloved, if we are the subjects of the work of God we ought to be attractive to souls. Is it so? Peter says with John to the lame man, “Look on us”. Suppose in any of our localities we invited people in it to look on us, how humiliating a spectacle we should present! It is well to face the thing as it is, and to see how far away we are in present circumstances from what was at the outset. And Peter here says to the man, “In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazaraean rise up and walk”. He speaks in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazaraean. We may claim to do that in principle in preaching the gospel, but speaking in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazaraean involves complete identification with Jesus in His humiliation and rejection, and also the renunciation of all natural resources — “Silver and gold I have not” — there is nothing of that which men have to offer at all: what we have comes from heaven, or it is of no value. In the power of this, Peter took the lame man by the right hand and lifted him up; the man was helpless apparently, but he had a right hand — there was something there with which Peter could link himself.
We see thus how the work of God is carried on, and how God is presented to men. God had thus that with which He could operate; He could commit Himself to what was there. “Look on us”, Peter says. These men were not merely two Jews. Ah, there was much more there than two Jews; there was more there than there is to be presented in the archangel Michael. These two — Peter and John — were heaven’s best, as the fruit of divine workmanship. They were the work of God, they were men who had been taken up by God and had been wrought [p. 307] upon, disciplined, taught and brought into conformity with Jesus, they were like Him; they were heaven’s best upon earth, and it was evident God can commit Himself to such. Peter lifted him up by the right hand, and the man never forgot that grip. He was brought into touch with Peter’s hand and Peter was in touch with Jesus — in touch with heaven, and the man was thus linked up with the divine system, with that which God had established; he was linked up livingly with it. Peter took him by the right hand.
Might I suggest, that to take needy ones by the right hand is a great service. Give them every advantage; whatever is latent there will come out as you take them by the right hand and lift them up; it is some touch of encouragement that sets them going. Of this man we read, “immediately his feet and ankle bones were made strong. And leaping up he stood and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God”. God was operating through His best, for Peter was first, then John. This man is a typical product of service rendered; there is a perfect result according to God in the service rendered through these vessels of grace.
Then we read he held Peter and John. While Peter had taken him by the right hand, and, as I may say, his right hand brought him into fellowship, yet the man himself would be identified with them. This is a specimen case indicating the kind of work carried on at the beginning by those whom God put forward — Peter and John. Now they have got a man with them. “He held”, it says, “Peter and John:” that is to say, he had light in his soul evidently as to the divine thought. Peter and John were representative of God, they were representative of Christ, and he would be linked on with them. How wonderful for him! to be linked on to that [p. 308] which God was putting forward — these two men! Their names will shine in the heavenly city, and they will have their place in the precious foundation of it.
There are twelve manner of precious stones in the heavenly city (not nine) — the full, the complete divine thought is there, and these two great vessels will shine there; they represent, as I said, the sovereign choice of God. He was putting them forward: and so it is now, and everyone in the meeting in any locality has to recognise that God will put forward whom He will. It is a question of His will, and, if we are subject, we shall ratify what He does, we shall be with Him in what He does, we shall pray for those whom He puts forward. He is putting them forward for the good of the testimony, He is putting them forward for our good, He is putting them forward in His sovereign wisdom, and in His sovereign love, and we must not quarrel with it. He will carry on His ways with us, and we shall see the results in the future in the heavenly city, and it will be the perfect justification of His sovereign choice. He will then have the vessel in which His glory will be seen, for she will come down from God out of heaven, and her light will be like unto a stone most precious. Corinthians gives the assembly of God now, and God sets the gifts there as it pleases Him. He sets certain in the assembly — it is a question of God: He sets.
May God bless the word.