LET US GO FORTH
[p. 133] LET US GO FORTH
Hebrews 11:22; Hebrews 13:12-14
These verses contain the thought of “going forth” in keeping with the teaching of the epistle to the Hebrews, from which I have read, in which Christians are largely regarded as having settled down in earthly circumstances — in general, religious ones, but still earthly; that is, settling down short of the heavenly calling. The Lord is said to be seated in heaven, although at the same time ready to serve; Stephen saw Him as “the Son of man standing at the right hand of God”, Acts 7: 56. The heavens were opened to him, and according to this epistle they were opened to the Jewish believers of that time. Hebrews has been called ‘The book of the opened heavens’, so that the writer tells us in chapter 2: 9 that “we see Jesus... crowned with glory and honour”. The Jewish believers at that time had the greatest opportunities in such ministry as the twelve afforded, men with apostolic authority and apostolic ability, the Spirit coming in and leading them on, so that they ministered in such power that even the Spirit Himself depicts the result, not only in Acts 2 but later. The ministry was maintained, and these Hebrew believers are enjoined to remember their leaders who had at that time spoken to them the word of God. Then there were others still continuing the same holy service, whom they were to obey. So we have these significant words in chapter 11 as to Joseph: “By faith Joseph when dying called to mind the going forth of the sons of Israel”. “The going forth” — the phrase is to be noted as characteristic of Hebrews, which is spiritual enlargement, illustrated in many phrases such as, “Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling” (chapter 3: 1). So that faith is addressed in this book,
[p. 134] and we are directed back to Joseph, who was one of the sons of Israel, specifically called that. He was one of the children too — a wider expression numerically; “the children of Israel” is a phrase or designation that is very common in the Scriptures, alluding to the generations; to the family, too. But the sons are distinctive.
I am speaking thus to make an application, the application being directly to ourselves. The Spirit is constantly pressing upon us the importance of spiritual dignity, and the dignity I am speaking of belongs to us. Peter says of the prophets, “To whom it was revealed, that not to themselves but to you they ministered those things... by the Holy Spirit, sent from heaven, which angels desire to look into”, 1 Peter 1: 12. So the coming into Egypt mentions the sons of Israel: “And these are the names of the sons of Israel who came into Egypt”, Genesis 46: 8. We get their distinctive names, that is, the names of the tribes. They had become very numerous; the land was full of them, we are told, and in their great increase they would somewhat lose the distinctive character that marked them in their incoming, although Jehovah would maintain them in it and He would have the king of Egypt know of their dignity. He said to Moses, “And thou shalt say to Pharaoh, Thus saith Jehovah: Israel is my son, my firstborn”, Exodus 4: 22. There are none like them — Jehovah’s son, Jehovah’s firstborn. And, He said, if you do not let him go, I will kill your son, your firstborn. So the matter is put on a very high level in that address to Pharaoh, they are regarded collectively as God’s son, God’s firstborn. This would be cumulative, adding to the earlier statement, “sons of Israel”, which they were as coming into Pharaoh’s kingdom. By the average Egyptian they would be looked at very differently, abominated by some of them because of their very calling; what they were [p. 135] accustomed to do made them abominable. They were shepherds, and all shepherds were an abomination to the Egyptians; yet these shepherds were coming in as the sons of Israel. They had twelve names, tribal names, family names; but they were also sons of Israel. And Jehovah would make them stand although they had spread abroad and filled the land, as Pharaoh said, so that he had to take measures to restrain them and to reduce them, most drastic measures. It is being done now too, but they will stand, they will come out: the sons of Israel.
Well now, you can see how Joseph would have all this in his mind. He “called to mind the going forth of the sons of Israel”. It came to his mind. We are to have with us a means of reminding ourselves; indeed Joseph himself inaugurated that idea; he said to Pharaoh’s butler, “Only bear a remembrance with thee of me when it goes well with thee”, Genesis 40: 14. We must never forget the Jews, but it is a question of Christ, not of Joseph himself. Joseph did not forget them, he did not forget his brethren, in his greatest glory they were in his heart. So it is with the true Joseph; His brethren are in His heart tonight, and woe be to them who deal with them adversely! They have a place in the heart of Christ, in the heart of the Messiah; He is watching over them. So it is with Joseph; he called to mind the going forth of his brethren, that is, of the sons of Israel. He was one of them, his name is given as one of them; the Lord Himself was one of them too, made in the likeness of men as one of them. He carried on a conversation with a Samaritan woman and she intimated that He was a Jew, which He did not deny. “Ye worship ye know not what”, He says; “we worship what we know”. He says “we”; He was one of them outwardly and really. Real value was there, infinite value in a Person [p. 136] known as a Jew and accepting that position. Presently ten men shall “take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, We will go with you”, Zechariah 8: 23. That time has not come yet, God is not with them today; He is with them governmentally, watching over them, but presently the Lord will be apprehended among them, coming back to them, as it says, “Whom heaven indeed must receive till the times of the restoring of all things”, Acts 3: 21. And again, “This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven, shall thus come in the manner in which ye have beheld him going into heaven” (Acts 1: 11); and still again, “Thus the Christ also, having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall appear to those that look for him the second time without sin for salvation”, Hebrews 9: 28. So that there is a great time ahead for them, and as the apostle Paul says in Romans 11: 26; “And so all Israel shall be saved”. That does not mean every Jew that is alive today, far from it. “All Israel shall be saved”, says the apostle, but that is the real Israel in all its tribal heads; all its tribes. Paul says, “To which our whole twelve tribes serving incessantly day and night hope to arrive”, Acts 26: 7. James, as we have often remarked, writes to them, so that they are in some sense existing. Maybe some of them are here tonight, real Jews, that is, converted to God: “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly... but he is a Jew who is so inwardly... in spirit, not in letter”, Romans 2: 28, 29. There are such, the apostle Paul brings himself forward as one; he is represented in that, “one born out of due time”, he says. They are “a remnant according to election of grace”, Romans 11: 5. It is a question of sovereign selection; they will all be on that footing.
I have digressed a little as to that, but it is an important matter to have before us, because what [p. 137] is in the heart of Christ should be in our hearts. If you look at the epistle to the Romans, chapters 9, 10 and 11, you will see how Paul reflects the heart of Christ in what he talks about: “My brethren”, he says. Now you can see how Joseph would have all this in his mind when he called to mind the departure of the sons of Israel. That is to say, they went out gloriously. They came in gloriously too, though it says, “A perishing Aramaean was my father” (Deuteronomy 26: 5), and it is well to take that into account. But they are not to be in an eternity of blessing on that line, they are to be there on the line of divine purpose and formation so that Christ will not be ashamed of them. Joseph was not ashamed of them when they came into Egypt; he took five of them and presented them to Pharaoh, and his father blessed Pharaoh. It was a great day for Israel in Egypt when these things happened. We want to get the spirit of Israel and of the sons of Israel and of the Israel of God, and to see how we are immutably established as part of the divine purpose. And so I referred to this, that Joseph “called to mind the going forth of the sons of Israel”. We have a very brief record in Exodus 13 and 14 of how things were as they went out; Moses himself recorded it afterwards, and with great accuracy. You wonder how he had time to do so much in the wilderness; to write Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; and to write a song as he was about to die. He wrote a wonderful song in Deuteronomy 32 ere he went up to die. He was entirely in God’s hands, he lived in the divine realm; he lived, we may say, with God; he had access all the time to God. It was not so with Aaron. Again and again we have, “The Lord spake unto Moses, saying...”; all that refers to his entering into the holiest to hear the divine communications. What times he had! Forty days with Jehovah on the mountain,
[p. 138] too. How Jehovah would press upon him what His people were to Him, to God! And as I said, he depicts the facts.
So the people drew near to the Red Sea; the time had come for them to go forth. It is a question of how they went forth and of how Joseph called to mind that they should do so; what details entered into it and how the Spirit of God tells us about Joseph’s bones in the midst of all those details. They were pursued by Pharaoh and his host, but the cloud appeared before them and then came behind them; Jehovah was in the cloud and there they were under His protection. In Jehovah’s mind they were the sons of Israel, and they were going forth. And so, dear brethren, Hebrews 13: 12 - 14 which I read brings that phrase into our circumstances in a peculiar way. It calls attention to the glory that attaches to the people of God in their going forth. Our presence here tonight would indicate that we have come forth. We have been elsewhere; hardly anyone here would not admit that he has been elsewhere in his history, in different surroundings from these, unhallowed ones. There is much ado made about today, this very day, the date, so-called, of the birth of the Messiah. He was certainly born, but it is a poor foundation people are on; all that is being done to celebrate this day is not in keeping with the sons of Israel. There is nothing hallowed in it. One is only thankful for the day because by governmental authority we have it free. But all of us who are here have doubtless been saved from something. Had we remained in our houses, in our families, the natural would certainly have had much more scope than it has here at this present time. In a certain way we are in a divine sphere, where Christ’s birth has, of course, its place, but where His death and His resurrection have their place too. We are sons, not literally of Israel, but of the resurrection.
[p. 139] Let us take these things in, dear young people; we are sons of the resurrection, and accordingly we are sons of God, sons of God because we are sons of the resurrection. That is how we emerge from the lesser into the greater. So through the idea of being sons of Israel we emerge into the thought of sonship to God. We are sons of God! It is a great emersion; why not avail ourselves of it? The heavens are opened to us, it is a question of going there. We are welcome, it is our place, it is our calling, — “the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus”, Philippians 3: 14. So that, as I said, the idea of the sons of Israel develops into that of the sons of God, Jehovah’s sons. That is a collective thought; God sent the message to Pharaoh on collective grounds: “Israel is my son, my firstborn. And I say to thee, Let my son go, that he may serve me. And if thou refuse to let him go, behold, I will kill thy son, thy firstborn”. That was the message, most solemn, and of course every word of it absolute truth. But then they are also called sons of God in the Pentateuch. I am speaking of all these things for ourselves, because it is ourselves that is in mind in the Scriptures, in their application. When it comes to fellowship, what is said of the lower creatures applies to us; there are clean ones and unclean ones and we are not to eat unclean ones. The Israelites were not to eat unclean ones. Why? Because they were sons of Jehovah, not only sons of Israel. And so it challenges us as to the associations we have, because in the types the idea of eating is fellowship, and we may eat creatures clean or unclean. That is, you may be appropriating the society of some young person because you like him or her naturally; you are dropping down to the level of an unconverted young man or young woman. The types show you are dropping below the proper [p. 140] level, to say the least. There are more severe things to be said than that, but that at least is true. If the Israelites were to avoid eating certain creatures because they were sons of Jehovah, for the same reason we are to select the right companions. This is one of the most vital matters we have to deal with in the assembly, the selection of companions for the young. The antitype is, “Wherefore come out from the midst of them, and be separated, saith the Lord, and touch not what is unclean, and I will receive you; and I will be to you for a Father, and ye shall be to me for sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty”, 2 Corinthians 6: 17, 18. These are very solemn words as to the company we keep and how the dignity of the saints is to be maintained. Instead of dropping down to the level of the natural, taking on of its character, we are to keep ourselves clear of it.
And so this passage in Hebrews 13 says, “Let us go forth to him without the camp”. The Israelites were not directed to go out of Egypt to somebody, but we are; we are going out to Someone — there is Someone outside. We are going to heaven, to be sure, but more than that, we are going to be with Christ. We are going to Christ, we have a Person before us. They had not; the type of Christ was in Moses, and in Aaron too, but they were with them. There was no one in Canaan to be looked for; there was no one set before them, no object for their affections. It was a question of the land. The “going forth” was in view of that. God brought them out in order to bring them in, but the “going forth” does not imply the going in, it was a question of leaving Egypt; that is the primary thought in chapter 11, dear brethren, whether you have left Egypt or not. But chapter 13 contemplates a Person. It is not only heaven; Hebrews is the book of the opened heavens, and we are partakers of the heavenly calling; but it [p. 141] contemplates a Person, it is full of that thought. It presents us with a Person. “God having spoken in many parts and in many ways formerly to the fathers in the prophets, at the end of these days has spoken to us in the person of the Son, whom he has established heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds” (chapter 1: 1, 2). The first chapter is just full of the glories of Christ. He is worthy of your heart’s affections, that you should go forth to Him bearing His reproach. “For we have not here an abiding city”, it says (chapter 13: 14). We must be very guarded as to anything that refers to our national position, but these are scriptural facts. We have no continuing city; there is no one in this whole country with all its millions who can deny this fact. They may say, We have a city and a capital, But is it a continuing city? Far otherwise! There is no such city except the city which has foundations, “of which God is the artificer and constructor”, Hebrews 11:10. This is the city the Christian looks for and of which he is part. He seeks it; “the coming one”, chapter 13: 14. He has gone forth to Christ without the camp, having the heavenly city in view.
“Therefore let us go forth”! The writer accompanies this injunction, this exhortation, with the most touching references to the Person of Christ, the circumstances He has been in. He says the bodies of those beasts whose blood was carried into the holiest by the high priest were burned without the camp. It refers to the great day of atonement when Aaron offered up the sacrifices for the sins of the company, those who form the assembly, or who then formed Israel; that is what the apostle is alluding to here. The bodies of those beasts whose blood was carried into the sanctuary on the day of atonement were burned without the camp. That refers to Jesus. Think of that! How it should touch our hearts! “Wherefore also Jesus, that he might sanctify the people by his own blood, suffered without the gate”. He suffered. Let us not modify that word. He suffered without the gate. He was an outcast. As noted, the world is glorifying Him today, but He was an outcast; that is just what He was. He suffered without the gate. They carried Him without the gate, He was crucified outside Jerusalem, hung up on a gibbet there. And now what is the logic or deduction for us? “Let us”. That is one of the “Let us” expressions in Hebrews. We are going to heaven together, so do not lag behind. There was no collective idea attached to it when Jesus went forth, He suffered alone. It is intended to touch our hearts and soften them. Our hearts naturally are just as hard as the stones on which the law was written; but God says, “I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh”, Ezekiel 36: 26. That means impressionableness, that we are impressed by the sufferings of Christ. He was hung up by wicked hands; Peter says that by wicked hands He was crucified and slain. That happened without the camp. Then the appeal is, “Let us go forth to him without the camp”. You say, What is the camp? It is what Jerusalem was then, the centre of man’s religion. Judaism had become just a human belief, and there in Jerusalem they crucified the Son of God. That is what Christendom has become; it has the word ‘Christ’ written over it, but what is underneath? Then let us go to Him “without the camp”, not, of course, in a literal sense, because we cannot leave the physical world, but the point is to be outside the religious organizations of men, having a judgment about them.
So Joseph “called to mind” the going forth of the sons of Israel; and the Lord’s supper is a “calling to mind”. “This do in remembrance of me”, or for the “calling” Me “to mind” (see note, 1 Corinthians 11: 24). We have no word as regards the date of the actual [p. 143] birth of Christ; we are told where it happened, but the date is not stressed at all. A supposed day is now taken on and made something of; it is a convenient name for men and their religious pretensions, that is all. It is most solemn to have to say that. But “without the camp” is all outside of that; that is simply Jerusalem as the centre of religion, human religion. Christendom has dropped down to the level of human religion, beside heathendom, Mohammedanism and Judaism. This is a most solemn thing, but it is a fact; God would say things to us about that too. But the apostle says, “Let us go forth to him without the camp, bearing his reproach: for we have not here an abiding city, but we seek the coming one”. This book makes a good deal of the city, the writer is telling us to look for it; not only that, but he says, We seek it. He will not admit that the thing is not true abstractly, however weak we may be about it. “We seek one to come”, he says, and I want to be amongst those who do so, one who is known to have here no continuing city. In your inward feelings and outlook it is not yours at all; you are not claiming it, but “we seek one to come”. And it is coming; it is not that it is likely to come, it is really coming, in fact it exists now. I may go further and say it is composed of people. The most marvellous thing in the whole universe outside of divine Persons is that great cube of persons called “the assembly”. Its height and depth and breadth and length are equal — it is a cube (see Revelation 21: 16). It is solid, it is substantial in holiness as Christ was substantial in holiness. There never was a babe before that was substantial in holiness, nor a man; but Christ was such, and the assembly is composed of persons that are substantially holy. These are great facts for us.
So it says, “Let us go forth to him without the camp”. It is a Person to Whom we are called to go [p. 144] by the Spirit of God in this wonderful epistle. The name of the writer is left out, but we can discern him to be Paul; there can be no question but that it is Paul. He speaks of his brother Timothy; it is undoubtedly Paul, our apostle. He wrote to the Jewish believers who were in danger of going back and he says, “If he draw back, my soul does not take pleasure in him”, chapter 10: 38. It is the expression of the feelings of the heart of Christ. How can Christ have pleasure in one who goes back from Him? He said in the days of His flesh, “Will ye also go away?” John 6: 67. It is “also”. What a challenge! Alas! for those who turn away from the truth. Do not leave the saints out; if you turn away from them you are turning away from Christ; as the Lord said to Saul, “Saul, Saul, why dost thou persecute me?” So that you not only turn away from the truth, but you turn away from Christ and the saints. But the word now is, “Let us go forth”. There is no continuing city here; we seek one to come. We have a long outlook, we see it in the distance as Abraham did, and he saw the glory of Christ too. That is a beautiful touch in John 8 where the Lord is in close quarters with the devil and is triumphant in conflict. John 8 is full of that, it is like the mighty man of David who went down and slew a lion in a pit on a snowy day. The Jews bring in Abraham, they say, “Abraham is our father”; but the Lord says in effect, Do not claim Abraham! The natural cannot lay claim to the spiritual; do not you claim Abraham! He says, in effect, Abraham is not your father, the devil is your father — a terrible thing! They had descended so low. They are reprobate Jews. He says, “But now ye seek to kill me this did not Abraham”. Abraham is a great model for us negatively in that statement; “this did not Abraham”. There are millions of Jews who have been slain by wicked hands, but these Jews were ready to slay Christ. He says, “This did not Abraham”. No, he did not do that! That is a negative thought about Abraham, but his generation after the flesh were seeking to do it then. In a little they crucified Christ by wicked hands. But they insist still, “We have one father, God”. The Lord says, You have not God as your Father; He is My Father. It is a hand-to-hand matter between the Lord in lowliness and holiness and the devil, who is surrounding Him with his instruments. God is His Father, God was not their Father; the devil was their father, an awful thing! They had come down so low. The proof of it was that they would murder Christ, and that was really the devil; murder of that kind is from the devil, he is the destroyer. It is remarkable that the name given to him in Revelation 9 has the sense of Destroyer. In that chapter there are two words used for him, one from Greek and one from Hebrew, Apollyon and Abaddon, meaning Destroyer and Destruction. These children of his crucified Christ, but He says, Abraham did not do that. Then they claimed that God was their Father, but the Lord says, No, you cannot say that either; “Abraham exulted in that he should see my day, and he saw and rejoiced”.
In truth the real Abraham is our father, the father of us all; you have to understand in the context what is meant. God is our Father, of course, but then Abraham is our father. It is wonderful how he is spoken of in the Scriptures, and of course it is because he reflects God. The Lord says of him, “Abraham exulted in that he should see my day, and he saw and rejoiced”. He was able to see the glory of Jesus, the day of Christ, he rejoiced to see it; he saw it and was glad. You can picture the patriarch — and the Lord spoke exactly the truth about him — he was glad when he saw the day of Christ. You say, What did he see? That is a good question.
[p. 146] What did he see? He saw someone delighting in Isaac as he was weaned; it was a great time in Abraham’s house when Isaac was weaned, that was when Christ got His true place in Abraham’s house. Has He His true place in my circumstances, my house, and all my affairs? Isaac had his place in the house when he was weaned; Abraham made a great feast. Is it not evident that he saw Christ in some sense? He saw and was glad; he rejoiced in Isaac. “In Isaac shall a seed be called to thee”, Genesis 21: 12. Abraham rejoiced in that, it was Christ. And so the Lord goes further, because He must have the last word in conflict with the devil; He goes the full length as to His Person, and that is, “Before Abraham was, I am”. Wonderful! Whatever is said about Abraham is only to reflect what God is and what Christ is. There are three divine Persons and only three. So the Lord says, “Before Abraham was, I am”. The verb is changed to the present; it is “was” in regard of Abraham; but “I am” is present, eternal existence. Let us bow our hearts before the Lord Jesus. He is worthy of our worship. “Before Abraham was, I am”. What a triumph in close quarters with the devil! The Lord did not have to say, “Get thee hence”; no, not there. In the presence of the I AM there is no room for Satan. If we make room for the I AM, there will not be room for the devil. He must go. The matter is settled there in what He said: “Before Abraham was, I am”. Would Abraham reason? Would he not bow and say, Amen? He would say that in the presence of Jesus. He is a saint of God, as we all are, I trust, and it is for us to say that from the depths of our hearts. Jesus is the I AM, as He is said to be “Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen”.