THE SPIRIT
[p. 225] THE SPIRIT
In John 4 the Spirit springs up to everlasting life; in chapter 7 the effect is that rivers of living water flow out. We get the glorified Man in John 7, and here in 2 Corinthians 1, we get all the promises of God established in Him. The Spirit is the witness to the glory of Christ, and in that way we are in connection with all that is living. We have to do with the living God, and the Son of the living God, the Spirit of the living God, the church of the living God, the service of the living God. We are in the apprehension of all that is living in virtue of the well of water springing up, and the result is that rivers of water flow out in a scene of death. People take very little account of death, but death is here. The living God is connected with all that is of life; christians may die as to us, but all live unto Him. He is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob; it is not that He was their God, but He is; they live unto Him.
In John 7 we have Jesus glorified and the Spirit given. Jesus glorified means that every promise of God is established. In the Old Testament there were promises, but there was no man in whom they could be taken up; that is the subject of Stephen’s defence in Acts 7. The patriarchs had all died, but Stephen looked up to heaven and saw the glory of God and Jesus; he saw the Man in whom everything was established, and he could rejoice amid the trial which surrounded him. We might say of Stephen, that out of him flowed rivers of living water; his testimony was, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God”.
The infidelity of the present day is against the Man. In this country the existence of God would generally be admitted; there are few atheists; but the infidelity is [p. 226] against Christ — against the Man. It is exactly the spirit of the liar and the antichrist which we get in 1 John 2, “Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son” (verse 22). People are in a way content to acknowledge God; they satisfy their consciences by doing so; but the point is that there are promises which have been given from time to time, and how are these to be fulfilled? They are all taken up in Jesus glorified. The patriarchs, to whom the promises were made, all died, but they will come out in connection with Jesus glorified. What would have been the gain of the Spirit to man if there had been no Man in heaven? The Spirit could not have been here to set up the flesh, and therefore He would have been no gain to us if Jesus had not been glorified. He comes as the Spirit of Another Man; He is “the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus”.
Everything must come out from the right hand of God, and as bound up with the glory of God; that glory required a Man according to itself; otherwise it could not be displayed, except as withering man up. A Man has come who can stand in the presence of the glory, and being Himself the righteous One, He could take up man’s liabilities. We can only be in the presence of God’s glory as being of Him, that is, as being partakers of the Spirit of that Man. The glory of God is connected with the heavenly city in the future, and the world will get the gain of it through the city. The heavenly city is in accord with the glory, and becomes the medium of that glory, so that through it the earth will be filled with the glory of God.
The first great thing in the passage read is that all centres in the Son of God. The whole of the promises are to be enjoyed in the church; they have their confirmation — their Yea and Amen — in the Son of God, and are centred in Him, but they are brought to pass in the church; and so it is “unto the glory of God by us”. All promises are taken up in the church; it is what we get in Ephesians 1, “In whom also we have obtained an inheritance”, that is, in Christ. The promises were not made to the church; God made promises to Abraham and to David, but they had reference not to Abraham nor to David, but to the Seed of Abraham and the Seed of David, that is, to Christ; but then they are taken up in the church, for the church is “the Christ”, it is His body.
The idea connected with the bride is that she comes into all that belongs to the Bridegroom. Christ “loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing”. It is according to Himself, and fitted in that way to the glory of God. The bride shares all the glory of Christ; what the Bridegroom comes into the bride will come into.
We can see how all the promises will be fulfilled; we see the Man in whom they can centre. Redemption is accomplished by the Son of God, in whom the promises are established, and in whom they centre; but then there is the bride and the friends of the Bridegroom, and they come in to share these promises. We come into it now in the knowledge of that Man. I cannot conceive anything more wonderful than that there should be a Man who can abide in the full blaze of God’s glory; is the effulgence of God’s glory. He is the righteous One, and we are of that Man. Nothing can go into the holiest except what is according to God’s glory; to enter there we have to be outside all that is unsuitable to that glory. In the measure of the Spirit’s work in us we are according to God’s glory. If we can divest ourselves in mind of all that is not according to God in us, and take account of ourselves according to the work of the Spirit, then we are according to that glory. It is a great thing to bring saints into the consciousness of being according to God’s glory. “He that hath wrought us for the selfsame thing (that is, for glory) is God, who [p. 228] also hath given unto us the earnest of the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 5: 5). If I think of myself as a child of God, I regard myself as down here, where I may come under discipline, because I am not according to that glory; but if I could take account of myself according to the Spirit’s work in me, and exclude in my mind all that is not of the Spirit’s work, then I should be according to that glory. To exclude in our minds what we are as after the flesh is the practical difficulty. In resurrection bodies we shall take account of ourselves only according to what we are in connection with the Spirit’s work. There are not many moments in our life when we come to that, but it is possible. We may be so absorbed in the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus as to exclude all that is not of the Spirit’s work, and thus realise what we are as according to God’s glory. Stephen did not enter the holiest, but he saw it; Paul saw it and entered it. When Paul was caught up it was to heaven; that was not the holiest. The idea of the holiest is to be in the presence of the secret of God, in the light of what is a secret to all the universe — the secret of God’s ways and His wisdom. The mercy seat is there; the ark of the covenant is there. Entering the holiest is a question of state; we do not enter by the mere fact of coming together in assembly. The holiest is not a place; it is a question of state. Entering heaven is entering a place, and all believers will enter there.
It is as risen with Christ, and quickened together with Him that we enter the holiest; in our minds we put off the body of the flesh, and divest ourselves of all save what is the Spirit’s work in us, and then we enter. The holiest is a symbol of moral ideas, not a type of heaven. We have the antitype of the holiest now; in the world to come it will be no more a secret, God will come out in all the glory of His ways. The Corinthians did not know what it was to enter the holiest; they were not in a suited state for doing so.
Christ comes to us in assembly, and we go to Him;
[p. 229] we cannot go to the right hand of God, so Christ comes to us and we go to Him. We leave all that is connected with the court of the tabernacle, and our everyday life, to go to Him. The holiest is the apprehension of all the secret of God; we worship God in the sense of the profound wisdom of His ways. Worship has for that reason a peculiar character at the present time, different, I think, to what it will be in heaven.
While the Lord comes to us, you must remember that you have to leave your place of responsibility as in the world in order to reach Him; you have to join Him where you can be on common ground with Him. When the disciples went to the upper room they were on ground where they could meet Him. The Lord intends the Supper to be the meeting-place; we meet Himself there. Then in the midst of the assembly He sings praise to God, and we are associated with Him, and He leads us into the sanctuary. Aaron’s sons had to be in accord with their father. If Christ is to take the place of Aaron, He must be surrounded by those who are of Him, and according to Him; no stranger could be there.
To be quickened is not merely to believe that you are alive, but to be consciously alive. The disciples called the Lord to mind in a way that we could not, for they had been with Him; we could not call Him to mind in the same way.
“Beholding ... the glory of the Lord” is more connected with the covenant than with the holiest. In the holiest you come into the presence of the Man in whom God can approach man, and with whom God will fill the universe. The principle of christianity is that you get what you are prepared for; if you seek, you will find; if you ask, it will be given unto you. People get what they want; it is all a question of asking and seeking. We pray for many good things; the question is, Do we want them? If you really want things you will get them. When any one came to the Lord Jesus, He answered the man rather than the man’s question.
If we had a true sense of the ruin of the church it would have a great effect upon our prayers. If we had the sense of what the church is as the vessel of testimony, and how the testimony is obscured, it would have a great effect upon us. We learn divine wisdom in the holiest, and the effect is that we praise and worship. We go into the holiest for the service of God.
What Christ offers, according to Hebrews 8: 3, is the two wave-loaves; He presents His brethren; I do not think it is praise and worship.
The anointing is connected with intelligence; it gives divine teaching — the teaching of the Spirit.
Ques What is the force of, “given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts”?
It is “out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water”. The best instance I can give of this is Stephen; he “looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God”; and then in testimony he said, “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God”. God is hidden now behind a veil of providences, but He will put aside all that, and come out in display. Angels will in that day ascend and descend on the Son of man; when He was here on earth angels were attendant upon Him, and I suppose they will manifestly be so in the world to come.