THE SPIRIT'S IMPORTANCE TO THE BELIEVER
THE SPIRIT’S IMPORTANCE TO THE BELIEVER
Numbers 21: 16 - 18; Esther 2: 5 - 11; Genesis 24: 1 - 9
S. McCallum There would be with every one of us, I am sure, an increasing sense of the need of the Spirit - I speak to those who have the Spirit - and I have in mind to speak tonight of the importance of the Spirit from the divine viewpoint - I mean the importance from the divine viewpoint - having in mind that we might be affected by it, especially the younger brethren, to see what, according to the type, divine Persons think and have in mind in relation to the presence of the Spirit with us and in us.
So I have repaired to the types, which the minister always can do, because of the advantage they afford in elucidating the truth. You feel for those who do not see the value of the sacred letters as we have them in the Old Testament, written for our learning as they have been, for they are lit up with divine glory all the way through. The Lord Jesus, in the book of the Acts, in the first chapter, shows the importance of the Spirit from the divine standpoint as He was to come in and characterise the dispensation in the way in which He does, the day of the Spirit. So that it is said of the Lord Jesus that He charged the apostles by the Holy Spirit that they should tarry at Jerusalem in relation to the coming of the Spirit.
In these passages that I have selected we have reference to the great resource that we have in the Spirit as a result of the word of the lawgiver, and then we have got in Esther the great care of the Spirit, the protective care and interest of the Spirit in type in the reference to the custody of Hegai, and then latterly we have got the prime importance of the matter we have in hand in relation to the Spirit in Genesis 24 in the oath of Abraham, “my oath”, as he speaks of it.
The brethren will immediately see the prime importance of this great matter of the Spirit, for the lawgiver typifies Christ, Abraham typifies the Father, God in His parental interest in the wonderful relation of Father, and Hegai brings on to our view the great personal interest of the Spirit Himself in the care and protection of what is to be for God and for Christ and for the testimony in a scene where the enemy’s power is known and felt. I am sure that if we consider these thoughts carefully we shall see the necessity of knowing the Spirit better and for making greater room for Him, of entering into the blessedness more of communion with Him. It is important that our acquaintance with the Spirit should grow. You will remember how the Lord Jesus brought in the word in the way of solace and comfort to hearts that were disconcerted as they contemplated being bereft of His presence, He said He would send another Comforter. He referred to Him as One whom the world neither knows nor sees, but “ye know him, for he abides with you, and shall be in you”, John 14: 17. The Spirit is thus a Person to be known and to be acquainted with as taking the place of Christ here in the assembly at the present moment, Christ having died out of this world and gone into heaven at the right hand of God.
We have been engaged with the glory of Christ and it would be obvious to the most of us that if we are to become greater lovers of Christ and to grow and develop in our apprehension and appreciation of Him we must necessarily make greater room for the Spirit. It is a wonderful thing to take account of Him, so near to us, indeed He is with us in a way that no other one could be in this world, having first-hand knowledge of our minds and hearts and all that is within us, our bodies being His temple, His shrine. What great thoughts these are, dear brethren! With what dignity we should take account of ourselves as thus indwelt by the Spirit, as James 4: 5 refers to Him as taking up His abode within us. Think of that, a divine Person, co-equal with the Father and the Son, taking up His abode in believers, in persons like you and me, young and old. What a sober and yet what a glorious matter that is, and therefore we need to be conscious of His presence, we need to know the blessedness of being on easy terms with Him, of having Him with us and in us in an ungrieved manner and way. How many things we allow perhaps unjudged that grieve Him in His sensitiveness, but which He would help us to take account of and to judge and to set aside in our hearts, that we might have Him in an ungrieved way. He becomes a Friend, as we often allude to Him, without compare in the path that we are treading at the moment through the wilderness with a view to meeting Christ. He is a real Person, young brother and sister, to be known and to be loved and to be communed with, and the measure of our development spiritually and our growth in relation to Christ, the measure of our spirituality, flows out of the measure in which we make room for Him at every turn of our path. He knows all about us, He knows our make-up, He knows our tendencies and our proclivities, but He is with us and in us to work out as He can, the great divine Agent for all subjective operations in this present dispensation. He can work out despite the adverse circumstances in you and me, our pride naturally, our independence, our wilfulness, it may be. He can work out as way and room is made and left for Him, the great wonderful operations that in their consummation will have us completely conformed to Christ in glory.
So I began with Numbers 21, where, as a result of the administration of Christ, the Spirit is brought on to our view typically in the well, as a great resource for the believer in the path that in life leads right into the inheritance, into the choiceness of that realm where all is of God in Christ and which God has marked out for those that are the subjects of the counsels of His love before the world was. What a resource the Spirit is in the well, as typified in its springing up as is contemplated, over against the dark background of Numbers. The Spirit is viewed in Numbers 21 in the light of the antitype in Romans 8, as the great resource of the believer, as becoming all to the believer until he reaches Christ in relation to Colossians where Christ is everything and in all. But it is a wonderful thing to take account of this fact in the light of Romans 8 and Numbers 21 in the type, that the Spirit is to be everything to us until we reach that point - not that He leaves us there, for we shall always need the Spirit, not only now but through all eternity we shall know the blessedness of His indwelling as no other family will in the same manner and degree. Numbers has in mind this great resource coming to light over against the dark background of the eruptions of the flesh. The book of Numbers opens to our view the vastness of divine resource, that in a world that is arid and devoid of resource for the believer. God can furnish that which is adequate to carry him through and maintain him in the most adversative circumstances. But despite the manifestation of divine provision we have to learn, as it is important we should learn, the incorrigible nature and character of the flesh. It is a bitter lesson but it is a necessary lesson and an important lesson to learn. Over against divine interventions, over against the shining of the glory definitely marking out where God is in His sovereign dispositions, in His sovereign selections, we have in the midst of it all how the flesh in its incorrigible nature erupts to challenge and question the rights of the God, who in the wealth and abundance of the grace that wrought in our deliverance from Egypt and the power of Pharaoh, has brought us to Himself. What a God we find in the desert, in the wilderness, over against the flesh and its breaking out, and the marvellous thing in Numbers is that it breaks out and erupts in great and small, in brothers and sisters, in princes, yes - and I speak soberly and guardedly - in the great man Moses. We are reminded thus that we can look for nothing from the flesh, we have to come to it in our souls experimentally that the flesh is enmity against God. You cannot change it, you cannot improve it, it is incorrigible, unchangeable. Yet in the midst of all that in this book you get the bright rays of Nazarite devotion, of princely dedication and wealth attached thereto, augmenting the great system in which God is known as in the antitype in the assembly, and in the great thoughts that come out later in the book in the bread of God’s offering and the like. God reminding us, dear brethren, that we must go on despite the adversative circumstances, showing us what God can do despite the circumstances, despite the incorrigibility of the flesh. But we have to come to it in the light of deliverance in Romans that we are not only delivered from the world as in Romans 6, viewed as a sin system out of which Christ has died, we are not only delivered from the law as referred to in Romans 7, but we are to know the blessedness of deliverance from that incorrigible state that is linked with the flesh, so that the believer, according to the truth of the glad tidings, as he reaches deliverance in Romans 8, is able to take account of himself as no longer in the flesh but in the Spirit, as God’s Spirit dwells in him or her. How wonderful that is, and Numbers 21 has in mind that, prefaced by the great thought of the brazen serpent, God’s judicial dealing with the flesh, the only thing He could do with it was to condemn it. It is difficult to come to, for we hang on to it and we do not dissociate ourselves from it as we should, and bitterness and murmuring and complaining all result in disaster. We murmur with God’s choice, where He has put us and where He has placed us; we murmur about the provisions He has made in such wonderful grace, we may quarrel with His sovereignty in relation to a Moses and an Aaron, as is evidenced in the great band of Korah, and we are found in these circumstances not any different from Israel, we may say, for these experiences are very real, and we are to learn from them the incorrigible nature of the flesh. We know not where the flesh may erupt next if room is made for it, if way is allowed for it, but God wants to fasten our attention on the lawgiver and as I might speak of Him, the Lord Jesus Christ wants to fasten our attention on this great matter of the well, that we are to see the advantage of having the Spirit, that the Spirit is going to be everything to us, that what the flesh was in us as the source and seat of murmuring, complaining and discontent and finding fault with God and with His provisions, the Spirit is to become to us as the Source and seat of all that is pleasing to God and all that is helpful morally and spiritually to ourselves.
So in the brazen serpent, we need to learn, as feeling the bite, what sin is in the flesh, from this viewpoint. We need to feel it and to look, and get a view of the cross, get a view of the Son of Man lifted up, and see God’s judicial dealing with this state out of which came murmuring, rebellion and discontent. God would show us how He has met it. Oh! the sufferings of Christ, dear brethren, do they not touch our souls? These difficulties that break out in our localities, these discontented conditions, and murmurings and rebellion, they come up from time to time. What do they spring from? They spring from that state that God could only deal judicially with, and He dealt with it in His Son. Think of it! Think of what it meant to God! We are to be affected by that. The result is that at the word of the lawgiver the well is digged, as if through the wonderful administration of Christ in the supreme place of authority as bringing to bear upon us the supremacy of the will of God - in that very place where that is known and enjoyed in our souls there is to be this wonderful provision, as it says, “Israel sang this song, Rise up, well! sing unto it: Well which princes digged, which the nobles of the people hollowed out at the word of the lawgiver, with their staves”. That is, the Spirit now comes on to our view in type in the well and in actuality in Romans 8, as the great Resource that is to lead us forward in this pathway that lies ahead, leading across the Jordan, right into the inheritance, for it is not in mind that we should stay in Romans and the scene which Romans contemplates. It is in mind that we should go on to the great thoughts of God, to what He has for us in relation to Christ and the assembly, and the wonderful thoughts according to what was in the divine mind before the world was. He wants us to move into them and the Spirit is given, and from this point onwards - I am going over old ground but the younger ones need to be reminded of it - from here on there is no mention of the tabernacle, and the cloud is not referred to as it has been referred to before. So that as we have in Romans 8 we get the leadership of the Spirit. The believer now has a great Leader by which he is led subjectively in this path of life, in which he is to know no death. What a path it is! For the first time they acquired territory, as you will notice later in this chapter. Israel took all these cities. Immediately the Spirit comes on to our view in this way, in this light, in type in the well, and in the antitype in Romans 8, we have territory acquired, not permanent territory, as we have had pointed out, but provisional territory, in which we are to live for the moment in view of passing over. So that Israel took cities. They had never taken them before, but it shows the great resourcefulness that is linked with the presence of the Spirit and His leadings in this relation. So it says in Romans 8, “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. For ye have not received a spirit of bondage again for fear, but ye have received a spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father” (verse 14, 15). Think of that territory, dear brethren, as soon as the leading of the Spirit is referred to we get that choice bit of territory referred to on the wilderness side of the Jordan, yet in actuality belonging to the other side of the Jordan, so that the believer moves into it, the known and blessed relation of God as Father, “Abba, Father”. Think of the benefit and gain of the Spirit thus known. Instead of waiting to come to the meeting to get a little spurt and a start - thank God we do - we come to know a sure resource of sustained help and support all the way through. The tabernacle led before, and the cloud, the divine presence, as we have had it in these meetings, leading, but then we go back to our localities and are we going to get down, are we going to get under circumstances, under the weather, in our localities, or are we to go back in the conscious gain and knowledge of the Spirit’s leading, His great subjective power and resource by which we are sustained in freshness, in strength and power to complete the wilderness way?
Now I come to Esther and I want to refer to this expression, “the custody of Hegai”. It is a beautiful touch, dear brethren, it is one of those gems that are hidden in the many settings that we have in the Old Testament. Custody, as you know, brings up the thought of care and protection. I would say,
dear brethren, we are only safe from this viewpoint as in the hands of the Spirit. We are sure to come to disaster if we get out of the hand of the Spirit. We never read of Vashti being in the custody of Hegai, and the result was that Vashti came to disaster, as we all will come to disaster. The great preservative from the exercise of our own wills and our own minds in the holy realm of God’s supremacy as is contemplated indirectly in this book, in the great kingdom that is displayed in the wealth of it, the only safety is in being in the hands of the Spirit. What will the Spirit not do? What did not Hegai do for Esther? She pleased him and he gave her the best and he gave her everything she required, and I might also perhaps suggest, more than she required. And oh, what the believer becomes to divine Persons, whether we view the spirit of Christ in Mordecai operating in the advancing of Esther into the wonderful favour into which she is advanced as in association with the king, or whether it be the custody of Hegai. We need to know the custody of Hegai in a world where so much is made of human strength and human resource and human ability, we need to know what it is to be under the hand of Mordecai, typifying the spirit of Christ among the brethren that would put us into the position of most advantage, the custody of the Spirit. Young brothers and sisters, what a thing it is to get into the custody of Hegai, what possibilities, what advantages! Think of how Esther advanced! The marital relation comes on to our view in this book, she is advanced to the position of the queen, royalty. Think of the regality thus linked with the position, think of what the Lord would do for us, think of what the Spirit would do for us, as we come under His protective interest and care, watching over us with these various spices given, so that we should grow and develop in the spirit of Christ, which would be in mind. Think of the unselfishness of Mordecai.
I would challenge our localities, dear brethren, as to whether the spirit of Mordecai is in them. We may speak about the young people and how they act and where they go, the tendency to drift into the world, but where is the spirit of Mordecai in our localities that will take on the Esthers and hand them over to the custody of Hegai? You may want to put them to the universities, you may want to put them in the best position they can get in the world, and they may be perhaps permanently crippled and damaged for the assembly. They have to be educated, and they have to learn so as to make their way, especially in these days when we have to know what it is to be kept clear and free of unholy associations, but let the prime thought in our minds be in regard to our children and our young people how they will advance in spiritual greatness. What does it matter if they reach a place of advantage and power in the world if they are permanently crippled for the assembly, spoiled for God and for Christ by the god of this world? Surely not, dear brethren! We would have the best thoughts in mind for our children and for our young people. Think of Jacob as we were alluding to it the other day, when he comes to Dan in Genesis 49 - he goes over the features of the different members, he is not sparing, he does not issue plaudits or say wonderful things about them that are not true, he faithfully goes over the ground, pointing out how their tendencies and their propensities to evil and their addiction in certain relations to evil, he faithfully faces it in his house, and when he comes down to Dan, what does he do? His heart turns to God, as if when he comes to Dan he virtually says, Well, my only hope, my only resource is God, “I wait for thy salvation, O Jehovah”, Genesis 49: 18. Think of the priestly turning of that heart to God! Jacob, who had spent the best years of his life making money and getting every advantage there in Padan-Aram,
but now recovered and looking out upon the great potentialities for the testimony, the great thought of God’s number, the twelve, when he comes to Dan he does not know what way things will turn out with Dan, but he says, “I wait for thy salvation, O Jehovah”. We need to have that spirit, dear brethren, priestly power with God in relation to the preservation of what is necessary to carry on the testimony and complete God’s number.
So that Esther is committed to the custody of Hegai, it says, “keeper of the women”, and it says, “the maiden pleased him”. I wonder, dear brother and sister, if we please the Spirit. We speak of pleasing God and pleasing Christ, but do we please the Spirit? When we go down into the world and have to do with things in it, young brother, young sister, when we go to the store, to the shop, do we allow our eyes to drift on to things that defile us, that impart impressions to us that incite the passions and impulses of the flesh. That would not be pleasing to the Spirit of God, pleasing to Hegai. Oh, the advantage of being in the custody of the Spirit, in the care and protection of the Spirit! He will be everything to us that we need until we completely get out of the wilderness where Christ is everything and in all. It says, “he removed her and her maids to the best place”. Young people, you want to get on, we all want to get on, I want to get on and you want to get on. What is the best way? is the common question asked. To get on spiritually, I say humbly and soberly, let yourself be given into the hands of the Spirit, let yourself be given into the custody of Hegai, who will do the best for you in concert with Mordecai. Mordecai is watching over the whole matter. The spirit of Christ among the people of God is watching over this matter, and the holy consort is very interesting between Mordecai and Hegai. It says, “Mordecai walked every day before the court of the women’s house, to know how Esther did, and what should become of her”. What about that in our localities, dear brethren? Are we day by day watching over the nurturing and care and development of this great feature of the work of God, as I may refer to it, in Esther, that is to come into the testimony at the crucial moment and work out for the salvation of the people of God over against the terrible spirit of the rival to Christ, Haman, who is always with us as long as we are here, seeking to, as it were, set down all that is of God and of Christ? What need there is for the spirit of Mordecai, so that we as believers should be kept in relation to Hegai and the custody of Hegai.
Now just a finishing word, dear brethren, as to the oath of Abraham. We see in this chapter in the type the whole Godhead, all the Trinity, are engaged with the prime importance of the Spirit as it bears upon believers, as it bears upon the assembly. So it is very affecting to one that this oath should enter as it does into Genesis 24 in relation to the matter of the servant going forth to secure Rebecca for Isaac. It is no ordinary matter, dear brethren, that the Spirit has come from on high, sent from heaven. Divine faithfulness enters into it, divine pledge enters into it. The oath is to bring out in the parental setting here divine committal to the whole matter, and it involves in the working out of the chapter that we should be ready to yield the Spirit what is justly His due, to make full room for Him as He would take us out of things here, detach us from all that is material and all that is natural in its influence upon us but hindering, to conduct us to Christ so as to be the joy of the heart of Christ in the testimonial setting which is viewed in type in the end of the chapter. Think of this matter, as it says in verse 6, “Beware that thou bring not my son thither again. Jehovah the God of the heavens, who took me out of my father’s house, and out of the land of my nativity, and who has sworn to me, saying, Unto thy seed will I give this land - he will send his angel before thee, that thou mayest take a wife for my son thence. And if the woman be not willing to follow thee, then thou shalt be quit of this my oath: only, bring not my son thither again”. You see, it is the emphasis on the heavenly position, that we cannot bring Christ into things here. If we are going to reach Christ in the light of Isaac we must reach Him in His own realm officially as He is the heavenly Man, and be united to Him there. Are we prepared to go? You have a good business, a nice family, you do not want to leave, they are your life; it may be, all your attention focussed on them. Think of the divine oath lying behind this great matter, that the Spirit should come into this wonderful position in the type, to lead us out of all these things into the blessed attachment to Christ, indeed union with Christ, that the end of the chapter contemplates.
May God help us to see the value of the Spirit and to make greater room for Him and to know the joy of communion with Him all through the desert path until we reach Christ and see Him face to face in glory, for His name’s sake.