PRAISE IN THE ASSEMBLY
[p. 397] PRAISE IN THE ASSEMBLY
1 Corinthians 11: 17 - 26; 1 Corinthians 14: 15 - 17; Ephesians 3: 14 - 21
JT What the Lord had in mind when He said, “In the midst of the assembly will I sing thy praises” (Hebrews 2: 12), enters into these scriptures, particularly as referring to the assembly. The Lord had said, as hanging on the cross (which is calculated to touch us peculiarly), “But thou art holy, O thou that inhabitest the praises of Israel” (Psalm 22: 3), alluding to what God had in Israel, that He inhabited their very praises, whatever they were. And then He says further, after He is heard (He contemplates being heard from the horns of the unicorn) that He would declare His name to His brethren and praise Him in the midst of the congregation. He would have in mind what really did not exist in Israel, namely, the assembly. The word in the psalm is “the congregation”. The New Testament quotation uses the word “assembly”, which would mean that the application is to the present time. It may have application to the future, too, to earthly praise in Jerusalem, but Hebrews makes it apply to the present time. And it points to what the Lord had cherished, that He would have the assembly as the vessel of praise. It comes to one’s mind that these scriptures, particularly 1 Corinthians 11, introduce the thought in a formal concrete way, they introduce the assembly as standing in relation to divine service; and chapter 14 shows, we may say incidentally, how that in that service there would be praying and singing and blessing, three features of the service of God that we are accustomed to. And Ephesians shows that the assembly is to be the vessel of praise eternally, the vessel of divine glory, glory to God — not simply His glory shining out to those in the universe, but glory to Him in it.
[p. 398] I thought that perhaps the Lord would help us to work out these thoughts from these scriptures; it may also be remarked that praise as seen in Scripture is spontaneous. The first great expression of it is in Exodus 15, after redemption is accomplished typically; and the ritual of Leviticus is really in view of spontaneous offerings. It is for anyone; if there be such a spontaneity, God intimates that He would seek to have order in it. It is so throughout the ministry of service. The service of God under David had the character of spontaneity; although David rises to a type of Christ in the way we are speaking of Him singing in the midst of the assembly, yet it is all on that line, not what is demanded, but what is furnished, all from the love of God. And so in the New Testament, one is struck with the little that is given as to the procedure in relation to the service of God, that is, the procedure in the way of praise and worship, yet the idea runs through the New Testament, even into the book of Revelation. It would seem that God is honouring His people in leaving it open and yet giving us enough, as we might say, incidentally, as to what He would like in our service. I think that these scriptures, particularly 1 Corinthians 11, furnish us with something as to order and procedure in the service of God; it seems as if the Lord would help us on these lines.
PL Would the banks of the river, so to speak, stand connected with the prescribed order, leaving the spontaneity of life more in relation to the flow of the river?
JT That is the sort of thing, I think. God is honouring what is in His people. “The living, the living, he shall praise thee”, Isaiah 38: 19. I believe that the instruction as to life in Genesis 1 and 2 helps in that way, that life was there. Adam was given the garden to dress and to keep and to guard, that is, that the life was to be regulated; but it [p. 399] is honoured, that is the principal thing; it is the living that praise God. So that Luke is the link with the books of Chronicles, which carry on the testimony, the account of the testimony, and open up the service of God. Luke in the New Testament links on with that and carries it forward from the public side; what he furnishes and what we get in the epistles is largely a question of spontaneous response to God, outgoings to God; whereas John brings in what God is, tells us what He likes, what He seeks: that is, He seeks worshippers. Luke is concerned more with the spontaneous results, and with how these are to be regulated.
JFS Would Luke be in line with what we have in Exodus — that every man is prompted in his heart to give in connection with the tabernacle?
JT Well, I think that is how the truth stands in Exodus. It is the outcome of what is there in the people; and then God introducing the thought of the priesthood is practically so that His son should serve Him. As in the wilderness and in view of conditions, He says of Aaron and his sons, “That they may serve me as priests”, Exodus 28: 41. It was not simply as sons, but as priests, meaning that He is concerned that the outgoings of love should be regulated by what is becoming to Him, so as to run in holy channels. We should be intelligent, too, as to what we have in the verses in 1 Corinthians 14.
JC-S You refer to the assembly becoming the vessel of praise. Is there anything in the fact that the first reference to the vessel is made by the Lord Himself to Paul? It was a suffering vessel. Do you think that the assembly’s ability for praise lies somewhat in the suffering side?
JT Well, I think that if we take Psalm 22 as showing the depths of thought in the heart of Christ, that is, the thought of praise and the depths of it in the Lord’s mind and heart, we shall see that the [p. 400] vessel of that praise must be in accord with Him, a suffering vessel; it must be formed in suffering, which would give it tone and quality.
EBMcC Would the vessel of praise be seen in the Father’s house in Luke 15, the music and the dancing marking it?
JT Well, there is a suggestion of it there, though it is more a state of happiness and merriment there than actual praise Godward; still it is the idea. Luke would keep before us the assembly, or the saints who form it. They are buoyant spiritually; they are not to be under pressure; they are not to be held by external things. I think the music and the dancing would indicate the spiritual buoyancy inside, a matter of great importance for young Christians.
CHH Would the Supper as before us in chapter 11 have the effect of setting the saints together so that the service would be in harmony?
JT Well, I think we might say that. The Supper stands, the institution stands, as it were, at the threshold of the assembly, and is calculated to tone us, to touch the chords of our hearts as nothing else does. I thought that in Luke we have a remarkable instance of spontaneous praise to God in such persons as Elizabeth and Mary, the mother of our Lord, and Zacharias (the first thing he does when his tongue is loosed is to praise and bless God), and Simeon, and Anna, and the Lord Himself, and the angels — the Lord Himself particularly as rejoicing in spirit, giving thanks to the Father; and then the saints, after He has led them out to Bethany, return to Jerusalem, themselves in spiritual buoyancy, and are continually in the temple praising and blessing God. That is how Luke presents the truth of the service of God. So that when we come to 1 Corinthians, we really link on with Luke. Luke’s account of the Lord’s institution of the Supper evidently has Paul’s special presentation of it in mind, so that there is a remarkable [p. 401] linking up of the testimony from Chronicles through Luke to Paul.
JC-S Is it not significant that the only glimpse we get of the Lord in His boyhood is given by Luke in the temple setting?
JT Well, quite so. There it is a question of His Father’s business which included the service of the temple, although he does not state it there.
CC Would your reference to the different songs, commencing with Exodus 15, suggest the spontaneous character that is to mark praise, and would Chronicles suggest a great development in the ordering of it in relation to the service of God?
JT Yes, Chronicles is typically headship, because divine wisdom enters into the service, the order of the service; but 1 Corinthians does not go as far as that; really you might say it is confined to lordship, to authority. So that we begin rightly with that; then the question is raised as to how we come together in assembly, whether there is that which attracts the Lord; how we leave our houses, how we are in our houses, how we move on to the meeting-room and seat ourselves, how we regard each other, whether the anointing is there, whether it is attractive to Christ; all that enters into His coming to us.
PL Would the fact that He loves the gates of Zion attach to that thought of public order, whilst the service within, David in the presence of the ark, would be the full spiritual elevation of it?
JT Yes, David introduces the inwardness of it; as you know, he built inward. Moses’ side is the outward side, corresponding with 1 Corinthians.
JC-S The apostle in approaching the subject here raises the question as to how they are together. Do you think that is in view of clearing away the difficulties that might hinder the praise?
JT Well, I believe that is what is found in the whole passage. He says, “But in prescribing to you [p. 402] on this which I now enter on, I do not praise, namely, that ye come together, not for the better, but for the worse. For first, when ye come together in assembly, I hear there exist divisions among you”. Now we can see that, although they are owned as coming together in assembly, the conditions would not make them attractive to Christ.
FS In the end of Luke’s gospel, that you quoted, it says, “He led them out as far as Bethany”, Luke 24: 50. Is there a moral link there with what we have here, that that sets forth the kind of conditions in which we should come together?
JT You see how they were leadable according to Luke. The Lord had come in amongst them and adjusted them and opened their understanding. Then He leads them out as far as to Bethany, meaning they are leadable to a point. We are discerning enough to see the point to which the Lord would lead us. And then what they do afterwards shows the state they were in. They worship Him, we are told, and return to Jerusalem with great joy; that is, there is a state of buoyancy. Luke leaves us with that wonderful picture. They were in the temple daily, praising and blessing God, understanding what was in the Lord’s mind at the time. It still remained for them to continue in the temple for the testimony.
JC-S What the apostle calls attention to here would not be attractive to Christ. Do you think that the Lord stands by and allows us to embrace one another before He comes amongst us, so to speak?
JT That is the idea, I think. These verses show that what prevailed at Corinth could not be attractive to Christ. Of course His interests were there, but conditions were such that they had to listen to Paul before there could be any thought of His coming. The point in Corinthians is what we are doing in His absence, what the assembly is in His absence, and whether the way we come together is [p. 403] attractive to Him. I think that is a point of the very greatest importance now, because we are prone to think only of the Supper itself and the celebration of it; whereas there is that which precedes the celebration of it, the conditions amongst us.
AMH Does he bring in “the night in which he was delivered up” in order to have a sobering effect upon us, tending to draw us together in sympathy?
JT I think that is what the word would convey. He first dwells on the state amongst them, the conditions amongst them; he owns that they came together in assembly, that is, he owns the thing in word, but what were the actual conditions? Were there “body” conditions? Were there assembly conditions? The facts show that there were not assembly conditions, that they presented a very ugly appearance; there was nothing of the anointing there.
JC-S Will you say a word on verse 19: “For there must also be sects among you, that the approved may become manifest among you”?
JT That is brought in as incidental to the main thought. The main thought is to call attention to the ugliness of the position and of their gatherings, that they were void of the anointing. Then another thing comes in that is incidental, namely that in the government of God these divisions were allowed to bring out the approved, that a testing process was going on, “that the approved may become manifest among you”. It was what would take place among them.
CHH In chapter 11 is it not of immense moment what we are doing with one another and to one another?
JT It is a matter of the greatest interest to see what is going on in the houses of the saints, and then how they issue forth to the gates of Zion, as it were, the gates of Zion in Psalm 87. “Jehovah loveth the gates of Zion more than all the habitations of Jacob”. It is not that the dwellings of Jacob are not loved — [p. 404] they are — but it is a comparison. The “gates of Zion” is the supreme thought — holiness. How do we issue from our dwellings? Is the anointing there? The Lord watches our movements and the way we sit down together. The Song of Solomon is very largely to bring to our attention what He thinks of the saints, how He regards them under these circumstances, how attractive they are to Him.
AMH On the other hand, these unhappy conditions you were speaking of correspond with the wall and the lattice, which are in the way. He appears behind the wall, behind the lattice, as if there were some hindrance to prevent His coming over to the bride.
JT Well, I think that is how the epistle stands. The Lord in the abstract recognises the assembly there, that they indeed did come together in assembly — He uses the word — but, as you say, there was something between Him and them. So you cannot bring in headship here properly; headship does not apply where there are such conditions.
JC-S You spoke of the praise being spontaneous. Are you now dealing with what is compulsory in order that certain things might be disposed of so that the vessel of praise might function?
JT Yes, that is it. He is endeavouring to point out what made them ugly. Of course it was evil there. I am only using these words to suggest what the assembly is to Christ in its normal conditions and how changed it is when there are the conditions we get in Corinth, although it has not lost its status; it is still recognised and there is hope in it, but there are conditions repugnant to Christ. And how can you expect a visitation? How can you expect the service of God to proceed under these conditions?
CC Would you help a little as to the suggestion of the service of God in relation to the lordship of [p. 405] Christ, as in contrast to that which is developed in relation to His headship?
JT Well, it is lordship here. When you have divisions, the Lord comes in and He will deal with these conditions; He cannot ignore them. He will make the most of what is in the meeting, but He certainly cannot ignore what is contrary to His mind. So that you cannot say it is headship; it is a question of authority, or it may be a question of priestly grace, to help us to judge ourselves as we are sitting together. I believe that is why the Supper is brought in, as has been remarked, in such a touching way. “I received from the Lord”, he says, “that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus, in the night in which he was delivered up”; it was in the night in which He was delivered up. Now Acts 20 tells us that they came together to break bread and Paul spoke a long time, but we are not told what he said; here we are told what he says. There really can be no breaking of bread according to Christ unless we observe what Paul says here. It is not simply what I have heard from the others, what is carried down by the twelve; it is what the Lord has told Paul, so as to make it authoritative.
DM Is that why, in Luke’s gospel, following the Supper, the Lord adjusts certain matters before they go to the mount of Olives?
JT You have adjustments in Luke, you mean, which you have not got in Matthew and Mark. We have no adjustments in Matthew and Mark between the Supper and the mount of Olives; all that intervenes is the hymn and then they went. But in Luke, we have adjustments; it is a matter of the disciples being adjusted before they went to the mount of Olives. That is an important remark.
JC-S You referred to self-judgment. Is it that we examine ourselves? I suppose our dwellings would raise questions, perhaps, and when we come together [p. 406] these would be faced in a searching way in self-examination.
JT Well, I think that is it. I think the divisions amongst us are generally bred in the houses; they are products of the household, very largely.
AMH That would make it very difficult to bring out the two wave-loaves.
JT Quite so. That is very apposite; the two wave-loaves are brought out of the houses, showing that things are right. Sin is regarded as judged, because they are baked, and yet there is leaven there. Leaven is admitted to be there, but it is not active. What one would like the brethren to come to is what the assembly is to the Lord, even the initial idea of it. So that if the conditions suggested in Leviticus 23 of the two wave-loaves being brought out as baked with leaven are present, then the saints moving to the assembly are pleasing to the Lord, every one of them — we might say “the footsteps of the flock” are delightful to Christ. And then there is a sitting down together; there is nothing to adjust. So that in Acts 2 they were all together in one place, with nothing to adjust. The Spirit came, a sound from heaven is heard, a mighty rushing wind filling the house. It is like the glory filling the house; then the Spirit “sat upon each one of them”; that is, every one of them is under the eye of heaven as pleasing. Sitting means that there is restfulness; there is nothing there to disturb the Spirit.
JC-S Would you say that the fact that it is still in the night of His betrayal would produce a common bond of sympathy amongst us so that we are really one in our feelings?
JT That is what is meant, I think, and then what the Lord did as over against what was in Corinth, what was current in Corinth. How beautifully the apostle Paul outlined what happened! A lovely picture of what happened! Who could write [p. 407] it save one whose heart was in it? How it was enhanced, too, in the fact that it passed fresh through the Lord’s mouth, as it were, again! He Himself recited to His beloved servant what happened on that night. What feelings there would be in the communications! Paul says, ‘I received it from the Lord’, showing that it was a feeling matter. He had evidently delivered it to them as he had received it, and now he goes over the ground again.
EB-d It is remarkable that the Lord, in giving it from the glory, did not see fit to add anything to it.
It was as He had inaugurated it. How perfect it was!
JT Yes, because the instruction, I suppose, belongs to the wilderness. It is definite instruction from heaven, or from the Lord as glorified, but not a fresh thing; it is simply the same thing handled over again, fresh in the sense that it is passed through His hands again.
FS Would the way in which it is brought in here in this chapter (the question of remembrance being brought in in both the bread and the cup) seem to indicate that the Lord was not in view as He should have been?
JT Well, He was not in view at all in what they were doing. The divine thought is ‘for a calling of Me to mind’. The word is, I think, almost confined to this passage and Luke 22. It is a strong word for remembrance. If He had been at Corinth, the Lord would have dealt with things; He would come in Himself, but He had to use the apostle to do it. What they were doing was not calling to mind at all; it was not the Lord’s supper. There is really no calling to mind of Christ in a divided state of things; it is impossible.
JC-S Would you say that if division exists, we cannot possibly eat the Lord’s supper?
JT That is what the apostle says here, “It is not to eat the Lord’s supper. For each one in eating takes his own supper”. It was a selfish thing; what they were going on with was selfish.
JC-S This is very solemn for us.
JT It is indeed.
CFI Do you mean that to have the body functioning, the saints must be together in unity and affection?
JT That is right. You cannot have headship functioning without the body. What is there to be used by the Head? The Head is not there, He is in heaven. His operations are through the saints, that is the idea.
JFS Would that be on the line of love? You speak of authority in connection with lordship; would you say that we have the line of love connected with headship?
JT That is right, and wisdom, too, so that in every assembly meeting, if headship really has place, you have an increase in wisdom too. Experience and wisdom, the all-various wisdom of God, is worked out in the assembly.
EBMcC “We, being many, are one loaf”?
JT Well, that is what he points out — “one loaf, one body”. We are all partakers of that one bread; we are professedly one body. Therefore it is a question of consistency.
JFS We should not take anything for granted, merely because we are together, if the moral conditions are not there.
JT Well, exactly. It says here, “namely, that ye come together, not for the better, but for the worse”. Better not to have such meetings at all.
AW In an assembly where there are divisions, would you say it would be better to stop breaking bread?
JT Well, that is a very pertinent question. It brings out grades, how much the Lord can put up with. He does not tell them here to stop breaking [p. 409] bread. What He is saying is to correct what they are doing, to lead them to give up what they are doing, and take on what they are professing to do, to partake of the Supper in the true sense.
CHH “Let a man prove himself, and thus eat”.
JT Yes, there is no thought of giving up the thing. It is going on; but the point is adjustment. Why should we not be adjustable? This passage contemplates that the saints are adjustable. It was not that they should give up eating, but that they should do it as the Lord had directed.
Ques Would you say that as one and another begin to be marked by self-judgment, the process gathers force?
JT It is always a question of leadership. Things will go on amongst us. It is a question of leadership. If one goes the right way, the Lord makes a way out in that way. The way out is always by death, out of every difficulty. The Lord’s way was shut up as regards the Jews; they surrounded Him, but He went out by death; one Man died for the people.
EBMcC How would that apply?
JT Well, it is a question of one showing the way. It is suggested here in “the night in which he was delivered up”. He was acted upon. If I am acted upon, it is not my will, it is the will of someone else; so that I bear to be acted upon, to suffer.
MB Do you take it that “the approved” are “manifest” when all are together in such circumstances?
JT Well, that is what is stated here. “There must also be sects”. That is another matter that he introduces, a sorrowful matter, but it is a needed thing. God is governmentally working out something else in these conditions. It is that He is bringing out the approved ones. He cannot bear to see them mixed up with the others, with the disapproved. He loves them too well. It is an incidental thing, a collateral [p. 410] thing. The main thing is the Lord weighed what they were doing and how different it was from what He had instituted!
AMH This matter of one dying for the nation, going out by accepting suffering ourselves, is a difficulty in many minds. The Lord went out, as you say; He gave His body to express the fulness of His love, but He did not yield an inch of territory, did He? He retained everything for God. Could you say a little more as to how that is to be done practically amongst us?
JT Well, the great thing is to show that that is the line you are on: “the night in which he was delivered up”, it says, that is, He was being acted upon; He was suffering. If I am contending for myself in any way in these matters, in any crisis, it is my will. That is not the leadership of Christ; that is not being delivered up. Being delivered up is that I am acted upon. As the Lord says to Simon, “Thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and bring thee” (John 21: 18), that is, one allows oneself to suffer.
JFS Do we see the feature of it coming to light in the apostle himself in that he is willing to be poured out, in that the more abundantly he loved the less he was loved?
JT Well, you see it right through these epistles. He carries it right through to the last chapter of the second epistle. He says in effect, ‘Whatever ye think of me, do what is right. Whatever they may say I am, even if I am reprobate, do what is right’, that is, he allowed himself to be traduced, provided they did what is right. And that is how the thing is maintained, as you were suggesting. We cannot let go anything of the truth in surrendering. We are allowing ourselves to be persecuted; we must maintain what is right. The apostle is ready to suffer, but ‘You do what is right’, [p. 411] he says.
AMH It is the spirit of the man that comes into evidence in a test like this. They see that he is moving in love to Christ. That would appeal to those that are adversely affected, would it not?
JT Well, he is ready to be a sufferer. The Lord says, “Before I suffer”, and here, “in the night in which he was delivered up, took bread”, that is, He was a sufferer. That spirit must be present at the Lord’s supper.
AMH It did not stop Him. Although it was the night in which He was betrayed, He moved on in His affections for His own. Is that what you have in mind?
JT Quite so, in such a way that it required the assembly to enshrine these affections. He had the assembly in mind. What is in the upper room is not the assembly properly, but He had it in mind. The greatness of the affections and thoughts set out required the assembly; they required such a vessel to enshrine them. That is what was missing in Corinth. If we get that thought, what the assembly is in the Lord’s mind, how pleasing it is to Him and how He loves it, we shall be more concerned that what answers to it should exist even in some little way.
GC Would it be right to say that in all our movements in the assembly we should be actuated by the Spirit and be under perfect control in that way?
JT Well, exactly. The assembly is to be the vessel to express Christ, that in which His wisdom is seen working out, so that there must be perfect correspondence with Him; and I believe the bread was intended to bring out how He was here entirely for the will of God. To be in the body, that is the first thing to accept, to be for the will of God. So that there is correspondence with Christ. And then that we are together in love; we come together with affection, we regard each other sitting together with [p. 412] affection; we are clothed with affection. That is the condition that makes room for headship.
EBMcC The assembly at Antioch would be different from the assembly at Corinth, because at Antioch they were known as Christ-like ones, bearing the features of Christ.
JT Yes; they had had a year’s education — to use a figure, a regular university course. It says that for a year Barnabas and Saul taught a large crowd in the assembly. Remarkable phraseology! That is the idea, the assembly was there and the teaching went on in that connection. They were called “Christians”. That must carry with it the idea of Christ, what Christ is; and so in this epistle we have, “So also is the Christ”, alluding to the saints. There is perfect expression of Christ as the Anointed here in the saints in the assembly.
CC Are those the conditions in which they ministered to the Lord?
JT Well, that is what comes out at Antioch. It is stated in a very incidental way, but it is significant. There were certain there, in the assembly at Antioch, and they were ministering to the Lord; inferring that if those conditions were there, that was a state of things that pleased Him. The service of God had extended out amongst the gentiles far away in Syria, in Antioch; there it was. What in type is presented in 2 Chronicles is there. How pleased heaven was! And so the Spirit says, “Separate me now Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them”, Acts 13: 2. So the introduction here of what the apostle received from the Lord — what indeed he had already delivered to them, but now puts in writing, is to impress them with Christ, what He was on that night, the night of His betrayal, and what happened.
CHH Do the orderly conditions, when the adjustment has come in, produce the spiritual sensitiveness that the Lord may take notice of?
JT [p. 413] Well, that is what happened. It is a “body” condition; the body is an organism. As our bodies are responsive to our heads in a wonderful way, an inscrutable way, so the body of Christ in a large universal way moves under His direction. No wonder it is called a “mystery The mystery of God”, it says.
Chapter 12 is the organism, as we have been saying; chapter 13 is the love, the more excellent way; and then chapter 14 brings out the indications of these conditions. I thought it was interesting to note that what we have got, we may go on with in these verses — first, “I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray also with the understanding; I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing also with the understanding. Since otherwise, if thou blessest” (which I suppose would mean a brother speaking to God on the part of the assembly) “with the spirit, how shall he who fills the place of the simple Christian say Amen, at thy giving of thanks ... ?” So we have praying and singing and blessing and giving of thanks. These evidently enter into and give character to the service of God in the assembly, but the point is the understanding, that things are done with the intelligence.
JFS Does “the spirit” suggest that here? It is a small ‘s’.
JT Well, it is your spirit; it is not the Holy Spirit here. It is the person’s spirit, that my spirit is in the thing. But then my spirit might carry me beyond my understanding. The understanding is the regulating faculty; I believe that in these verses we may introduce the service of God in its most exalted character; that is what leads on to the heavenly. The apostle is only touching on what controlled him; he does not give us at all what was said. It is a question of praying, or singing, or blessing, or giving of thanks. That is the phraseology that we use constantly in the service of God, and rightly. The [p. 414] point is that they are all real, that my spirit is in them, and that I am regulated by my understanding.
FS Is it similar to verse 32: “And spirits of prophets are subject to prophets”?
JT That is right. It is the prophets’ spirits, their own spirits.
CHH Is the thought that in the praying, or the blessing, or the giving of thanks, the one who is doing the service carries the assembly with him?
JT Well, he is governed by understanding. Of course, it is understanding such as you would get after the Lord had opened their understanding as in Luke. It is more christianity that is in mind, a christian instructed in a spiritual way, so that you would preclude all long prayers and redundancy in what you are saying, vain repetitions — very often painful; the understanding being in charge dominates everything, regulates everything. So that you are not carried on beyond what everybody can follow and can say ‘Amen’ to.
CHH I was thinking in that way it would produce a response and the brethren would love to say ‘Amen’ to it.
JT That is right. One loves to hear the ‘Amen’, too. I think what may be said here is that one has noticed that there are very few hymns in our assembly meetings lately. But I believe that the hymn, the song, brings all the saints into the service actively; their voices are all in it. It expresses more the divine idea of praise than any other thing, than speaking by a brother.
JC-S Some have discouraged the idea of too many hymns, regarding it as a sign of weakness.
JT Well, let anyone look through Scripture on this subject, and I believe he will be impressed with the fact that singing is the leading thought in the service of God. I think God delights in it, the voices of His people, and the first song is by brothers and [p. 415] sisters. It is very noticeable in Exodus 15 that the sisters are specially mentioned in the service.
FS So that singing is mentioned here in these verses?
JT That is why I thought it was worth while suggesting them, because you have here praying in verse 15 and singing, and then you have blessing in verse 16 and giving of thanks, and then the ‘Amens’.
FS Is the ‘Amen’ apart of the service?
JT Well, it brings all into it.
JFS It is mentioned in Chronicles.
JT Yes, “All the people said Amen!” 1 Chronicles 16: 36. And at the end of each of the first four books of the Psalms it is prominent, “Amen and Amen”.
AMH You would not limit the ‘Amen’ to the end of the thanksgiving, would you?
JT Well, I certainly think it can be used at any time, showing a collective spiritual sympathy, as it were, concurring with what is said. It creates unity, I think, not that you would like to see it too prominent.
JFS It comes in at the end of Ezra’s speaking “All the people answered, Amen, Amen!” Nehemiah 8:6.
JT Well, that seems to be so throughout the Scriptures. Of course, the Amens are not the service, what is being said is the thing, but the ‘Amen’ brings all into it.
JC-S Do you think that sometimes the ‘Amens’ are not heard because there exists a state of feeling and division?
JT Sometimes, that is so, alas!
AMH On the contrary, the bringing in of the ‘Amen’ in a measure should extend during the thanks giving. Does it not give a sense of a flow of life in the company?
JT Well, that is what I was thinking. You feel the saints are with you.
WJB Is it suggested that the giving of thanks should incite to [p. 416] song?
JT Well, they run together. The song is the highest thought, I think. It is refinement, spiritual refinement. So David, the great type of Christ, the sweet psalmist, leads the praise of his people. He is said to play well; his musical powers are stressed at the very outset.
PL Would you say that the fact that in Chronicles David alludes to psalms in part, peculiarly bearing on what is engaging him in the service of God, would suggest in regard of the giving out of hymns, discrimination as to any particular verse or verses which peculiarly bear upon the theme in hand?
JT Yes, I think that is very suggestive. We have spoken of it elsewhere. What you refer to occurs in 1 Chronicles 16. After the ark is brought to Zion, David inaugurates the singing of the singers and it says he “delivered first this psalm”. It is a psalm formed of parts of several other psalms, illustrating what you say, that a knowledge of the hymn-book would enable us to make selections proper to the moment. One verse out of the hymn may be just right for the moment.
PL Do you not think that the hymn-book may be abused; we may really have but one verse in mind bearing upon the theme, and find ourselves committed to the whole hymn?
JT Well, yes. It requires skill and a knowledge of the book to select a verse. It has been said here recently and I think it ought to be observed, that the hymn-book is really not used to its fullest extent. But think what it affords for the service of God! One might mention a path running through the book — a few hymns that are given out almost everywhere, and others are neglected entirely, whereas I am sure the Lord would help us to use what there is in the fullest measure.
I thought now a word as to Ephesians might finish the subject for this time. The thought of the assembly [p. 417] is carried through into Ephesians. Not the local assembly, Ephesians does not deal with local companies, but the assembly in its heavenly and universal bearing. Not that Ephesus has not a local character, because it has. The assembly at Ephesus is spoken of in Revelation, but the address in the epistle is not to the assembly, but to the saints, to the faithful at Ephesus. What is in mind is to develop among other things the assembly in its heavenly character, and the service of God is alluded to in “to him be glory in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages”. It is really, you might say, an outburst of worship on the part of the apostle. “To him that is able to do far exceedingly above all which we ask or think, according to the power which works in us, to him be glory in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages”. The idea of glory attributed to God eternally is constantly seen in the Scriptures, but here it is in the assembly and the link is very strong between this passage and 1 Corinthians 11, because the service of God begins with the Lord’s supper.
AMH What is your thought of glory here? Is the thought of praise and worship connected with it?
JT Well, I thought so. It is to God.