Christ, the Test of Men ................................................... 60
The One who tests our hearts more than any one else could, or has a right to, is the One who cares for us more than any one else does or could. All His searchings of my spirit and yours are the extension of the activities of the 50
same love that moved Him to lay down His life for us. How often one has spoken of the love of Christ! He gave Himself for me. But did He give Himself for me that I might have links with Himself in view of eternity only, that when time is past, and the testings and dangers connected therewith are over, I should be with Him there when all else is gone?
No! He gave Himself for me that in time, and in view of eternity, He might have His own place with me; that I might be His in the testings of time; that I might be His while here in all things and always. I do not wish to leave an impression that the blessedness of those eternal links are undervalued in their wonderful reality, but I am concerned, at the moment, as to the place the Lord has in our souls now; so I have alluded to these scriptures, these two examples of faith, Samson and Jephthah, and I want to speak very briefly and simply about them both.
Samson was brought on the scene at a time of very peculiar necessity in the history of the people of God. What was called for at that moment was separation. There can be no doubt that the condition among the people of God was very sorrowful; they were in bondage to the Philistines. It was not that they were held by grossly evil things, for I do not think the Philistine represents that; he stands for the power of the enemy in what professedly belongs to God here in this scene; he is within the pale of what professes His name. The people of God were in great bondage to the Philistine power, and God brings in a deliverer for them of a very peculiar type. He brought in a Nazarite. You may say, But he did not live up to the standard. That is so, but my present concern is what is the standard, and are we in the light, and in the presence of Him in whom the standard is set forth, and who did live up to it. We are set in the presence of Him who in His pathway here set out the divine example of the true Nazarite, the One who came in from God’s side apart from all that marked the people in their bondage; He came in according to Hebrews as made “a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death”, Heb 2: 9.
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In Samson we see a Nazarite provided by God. We see what he did, and one would take account of it, but his great snare was the sight of his eyes. The feature that the Spirit of God would make clear to us is that a Nazarite must never walk by the sight of his eyes; if he does his Nazariteship is gone. We must walk by faith, not by sight.
If we walk by the sight of our eyes, Philistine objects will engage us, and Philistine works will lay hold on us, but if we walk according to the instincts and the judgments of faith, and in the presence of the preciousness of the claims of Christ, then we shall judge for Him, and receive the present compensation of the company of Christ. It is better to be with Christ at loss in regard to our circumstances here, and better to have the compensation of His company than anything else beside.
So Samson was raised up of God as a Nazarite. I touch on his movements as from God’s side. The first feature of his power as a Nazarite is the slaying of the lion—
a young lion roared against him, and he rent him as he would have rent a kid. The Spirit of God tells us, moreover, that he had nothing in his hands. In human judgment and feeling such a course would be folly, but in faith it is power.
All the things that you or I might bring in to meet the situation would become a snare to us.
Supposing in my circumstances here the question is raised with me as to my allegiance to Christ, as to the extent to which I am prepared to follow Him. I might say, Well, I shall be with Him where He is in eternity! That is a very sweet hope, and one would not be without it; but I need something else in the meantime. It may be my present circumstances are in jeopardy; if you only knew my circumstances, how dependent I am on individuals! But you are to be dependent on one Person alone, the living Lord; and to be dependent on no other. You may say, But the actual facts of my circumstances have to be considered.
It was the blessed Lord who enlightened you and gave you 52
to see your soul need and met it, and you must leave your circumstances also in His hands; meet the situation with nothing in your hands, with no natural resources! But you say, Surely Samson was a type of Christ when he slew the lion with nothing in his hand. I have no doubt he was, but I am not now looking at him as a type of Christ, but as a man of faith, as one who met the most peculiar difficulty, the threatening of death itself, with nothing in his hands.
Ah, you say, he was Samson, he was a Nazarite! Yes, but that is a feature of faith that the Lord would establish in every one of us. When do we get on to the line of being Nazarites? It is when the heart in separation from the world and from what is natural makes room for Christ, when we begin to consider more for Christ and for those who are His than for our own interests, and when we begin to love Christ more than we love ourselves.
What marked Samson was affection, but he let his heart go in the wrong direction; he saw a Philistine woman and she pleased him well, and all the sorrowful consequences of it failed to turn his heart from that direction. And then he looked upon another, and he loved her too. I do not know the thing that immediately tests you, but we all need much correction. You may have a certain judgment about things, but if you are lukewarm in relation to the Lord, you may be ensnared by these very things. I can only meet the things as having seen the Lord; it is only in the known preciousness of Christ that the heart can steer clear of being caught.
We have thus seen Samson when Jehovah was his only object. The Spirit of God speaks much to us of what we love and what we hate. There is a marked difference between the conduct of Samson on one occasion and his conduct on another. What a contrast between the burning of the standing corn of the Philistines to avenge himself, and the slaying of the Philistines with the jawbone of an ass! In the one you have the consequences of the way he had taken; 53
in the other case you have the outcome of power and faith.
I love to think of the faith that marked his soul as a Nazarite—called by God to be a Nazarite—born a Nazarite!
The Spirit of God would greatly exercise our hearts, I believe, as to Nazariteship—to be entirely separated to God.
And some things are more difficult to be apart from than others—human ties, for instance; things that ask for the first place in our hearts, and would fain claim Christ’s place in our affections. I believe the Spirit of God would exercise our hearts in regard of Nazariteship.
If the Lord asked us what we desired most, should we hesitate? Samson desired much; he saw a woman who pleased him well; his eyes were not where they should have been. Was there not a woman amongst his own people who could have pleased him better, that he should “take a wife of the uncircumcised Philistines”, Judg 14: 3? But the eyes of his soul were blinded in that direction; what he desired most was this woman who pleased him well. That, however, was the last bondage he was to be under; Samson came to a moment when he found he did not need the sight of his eyes; the man of faith does not need the sight of his eyes.
He turned to the Lord and presented the situation to Him, and he slew more Philistines when he was blind than when he saw. What was in his heart was the deliverance of God’s people—poor, blind, and broken as he was, and being made a sport of by the very element that his eyes had looked upon and coveted. “If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out”, Matt 5: 29. Things would not weigh with us nearly as much as they do, if we knew the love of Christ better. I say, He died for me! Yes, and I might put that fact back two thousand years, but it should be a present and abiding fact, controlling my heart. He “loved me, and gave himself for me” (Gal 2: 20); He “loved the church, and gave himself for it”, Eph 5: 25. He loved us and died for us that we might be wholly His, that His glory might be the glory that lights our hearts constantly, and increasingly, and that His 54
present claims and His thoughts for us in regard of eternity might hold our souls now.
The Spirit of God has drawn attention to Samson at the end; He does so as a warning so that in passing through this world I may not make my links with it. If I do, I become defiled, I suffer spiritual hurt, I am hindered from the joys of Nazariteship, and who can tell to what extent? How many have been turned aside from the path of testimony because they let their affections flow out on the things of the world!
It was so with Demas; the apostle Paul says to Timothy, “for Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world”, 2 Tim 4: 10. It was this that ensnared Samson. There are the Philistines, there is their power, their subtlety, their wisdom and their attraction, hence in the New Testament these principles are exposed, and the Lord makes Himself the test.
Now I wish to make a few remarks about Jephthah.
Jephthah was a man of peculiar experience; what marked him was his judgment in regard to things. It has been sometimes said of him that he was very harsh in his judgment. But let us examine the circumstances and see if there were any moral reasons for his judgment.
When the elders of Gilead came to him, he said, “Did not ye hate me, and expel me out of my father’s house?”
They did. He had been hated by them; and yet he yielded to their appeal to help. They had been the means of his discipline, but he did not refuse their request; they had caused him suffering, but he was prepared to serve them.
He was on the line of the apostle Paul, “though the more abundantly I love you, the less I be loved, (2 Cor 12: 15); and he won his point in the end. Love always does, “Love never fails”, 1 Cor 13: 8. You may say, But Jephthah made a great mistake. I would suggest that you look at him from another standpoint. The Lord speaks of loving and hating.
Samson fell because of what he loved, because he did not hate what was hateful to God with sufficient spiritual 55
intensity. The Spirit of God speaking of Christ says, “Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity”, Heb 1: 9. He loved what God loved; and He hated what God hated; and these must be the features of our faith if we are to move rightly on the line of God’s pleasure. Samson loved with peculiar intensity; but he did not hate with like intensity.
The difficulty was that he loved what God did not love, and he did not hate what God hated. Had he hated the Philistine rightly, he would never have loved the woman of Timnath; he would never have been ensnared, nor lost the sight of his eyes.
But to return to Jephthah. Jephthah had been the object of hatred in a way like the Lord, “And they have rewarded me ... hatred for my love” (Ps 109: 5), but the time came when God opened the way, and he put the people of God first. It was a day of small things, but as the opportunity offered he looked on the people and said, It may be true that they are few and broken, and there are reasons for it, but I am going to be of service to them. May be there is some one here who has a precious opportunity of serving the saints within the compass of their circumstances. I am not thinking of teaching, or any public service, but of being at the disposal of those who are precious to Christ, and perhaps of bringing comfort to their hearts. In preparation for that you might find your heart much under pressure and the soul may be tested by it. At the close of Hebrews 11, the Spirit of God enumerates wonderful things that were done in the power of faith, and then He comes to a peculiar thing on the line of suffering: others “were tempted”, Heb 11: 37. Is it not one of the most precious things that is said about Christ, “For in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted” (Heb 2: 18), and “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin”, Heb 4: 15. There is more suffering in temptation than we think. Temptation may be intense suffering, it may be going on in the soul and unknown to any one; it may be with you in the home or in business, or 56
in connection with the Lord’s things, and no one be aware of it. It may be that you are tempted in regard of the claims of Christ; perhaps you have never looked at that as being tempted, but it is temptation.
The Lord may be asking some soul what it is going to do about His interests, about His claims, whether it is minded to seek what is pleasing in His sight; if that consciousness is with any soul, I pray you to give the Lord His place. It will be your safety; you cannot otherwise be safe; none of us can be, save as we give the Lord His place.
We are so hesitant, we give such place to other interests, persons, and purposes, and give so little to Himself.
Jephthah’s judgments were pronounced. Note how he answers, chap 11: 9.
If you regard the death of Christ merely in a historical way, you will not ascertain your true place in this present evil world; but if you see it as in the sight of God, an unchanged reality, and as separating as when it happened, you will be exercised as to your present pathway in this world. I am not occupied with what is sinful, but with what is natural. It cost Jephthah something!
What marked the pathway of Jephthah so peculiarly was the fact that he hated what God hated. His love was much tested—his love for his brethren, his love for his virgin daughter, his love, too, for those with whom he had links in Israel, but he put God first; and so may you and I.
I now refer briefly to Luke 9. As the Lord went up to Jerusalem He sent messengers before His face, and coming to a village of the Samaritans, they refused Him because His face was towards Jerusalem. Perhaps you deem it necessary not to be so definitely pronounced in the expression of your feelings in regard of Christ; you may find it easier to be silent than to speak; although you may desire to retain the light of Christ in your heart, to have His preciousness to yourself, yet you do not want the matter put to the test publicly, or in your family relations. You may 57
have found that to put Christ first has caused you loss in business, and you therefore think the best way is to say less about Him. The Samaritans refused that blessed Person, because His face was turned towards Jerusalem. His disciples would have commanded fire to come down from heaven and consume them, but Jesus turned and rebuked James and John and said, “Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of”.
Now I pass on to other features. As He is on the way one comes to Him and says, “Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou goest”. And Jesus said unto him, Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head”, Luke 9: 57, 58. Have you ever known what it is to be spoken to by the Lord in that way? I think I have. What words of searching they are in regard of our thoughts as to His Person and claims: “The Son of man hath not where to lay his head”! Do you say you cannot follow in such circumstances? It depends on the nature of the links, it depends on what you are following after; it is not the things you are to follow after, you are to follow a Person. In whose company would you rather be? I would rather be where Christ is. “Where I am, there shall also my servant be” (John 12: 26)—here in the circumstances in which He finds His place now, and there at the end in the place that will be all His glory in the presence of God. Better to be there than anywhere else!
Better to have Himself and His things than anything else!
Then the Lord Himself speaks and says to another, Follow me. And this one says, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. The Lord replies: “Let the dead bury their dead” (Luke 9: 60), He says, as it were, You follow Me; get your eye on Me; get your mind away from dying and dead things; there is no death where I am going, no sorrows there.
There are testings in the pathway; there are, but you will get compensations. I would rather suffer the losses to find the compensations, than never to suffer the losses at all.
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The Lord would thus encourage our hearts in following in the direction of the realisation of living hopes. Let the dead bury their dead; put Him first.
Then the Lord speaks a third time. Another had said,
“Lord, I will follow thee; but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house”. He wanted a reputation for courtesy. He did not think it right to leave them without bidding them farewell. And the Lord says to him, “No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God”, Luke 9: 61, 62. If the Lord is speaking to any soul here in respect of His claims, I beseech you to see how you answer. It may mean a great deal to you, but the simple solution in felt weakness, and in the searchings and tests is, get to the Lord, and tell Him that you love Him and desire to give Him the first place; tell Him your difficulties too, and He will settle them all for you. No soul ever went to the Lord with difficulties, and put them before Him in simplicity with a deep desire to be separated to all that was pleasing to Himself, but the Lord answered them.
May God help us with regard to these features of faith in the presence of the One who loved righteousness and hated lawlessness. Anything, beloved friends, less than Christ, is lawlessness.
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GOSPEL ADDRESS
Probably all here are quite clear as to the doctrine of the resurrection. There are very few in this Christian country of ours, who make any profession at all, but are quite clear as to this truth. But I am not going into the doctrine of the resurrection now; what I want to speak to you about is the question as to how far your life is affected by the great fact that you have to give an account of yourself to God.
There are several records of the conversion of the apostle Paul in the book of the Acts, and in every one of them, while the main facts recorded are similar, yet there is a peculiarity in the way the tale of grace is rehearsed in each instance. In the one that I have just read, this is very noticeable, in that it is the only one in which you have the question of the resurrection raised. The great point of the apostle Paul’s testimony of his conversion in Acts 26 is that he brings very forcibly to bear upon those who listen to him the great fact of the resurrection; indeed he does so, in such wise that they were brought face to face not only with the questions connected with the testimony of Christ on earth, but with the great question of their eternal relations with God.
I often think that the carelessness of people in regard to the glad tidings is explained by the fact that, in the preaching, the question of their eternal relations with God is not sufficiently raised. When people listen to the preaching, the idea in their minds often is that it would be a very good thing if they believed it, but that after all it is not so very serious a matter if they put off believing it to suit their own convenience. But I venture to say to you that the 60
real question raised between your soul and God in the preaching of the glad tidings is that of your eternal relation with God. That relation may be for blessing, or it may be for eternal loss.
Now as to the character of your life as you are living it at the present moment, I cannot go into the secrets of your life; I have no knowledge of them; but what I desire to bring before you in all tenderness and affection in regard of the Lord Jesus is this: Is there in your life what God can raise for His pleasure in the resurrection? Have you anything in it that, in the day when God will judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, will stand for the glory of God? When Paul speaks to Agrippa here he speaks for himself. It is always interesting when people speak for themselves. That the apostle was supported by the Holy Spirit, and by the grace of the Lord Jesus, there can be no question, but an interesting feature of his testimony is this, that he defends the faith of his soul, the character of his life, his whole position, for himself. The way in which the secrets of the heart are all brought into the light when he spoke for himself is very remarkable. What he had in his soul was the purpose to be here for the pleasure of God. Everything in the detail of his soul’s exercise was in the sight of God.
He took his judgment from God; God was the ruler of his soul.
Now I want to shew you how very real this was with the apostle and the divine interest attaching to this in regard of his conversion. He brings before Agrippa and the Jews who listen to his testimony everything in regard of his past life. From his very earliest days up to that moment everything about his life was known. I have no doubt that he carried secrets in his heart, secrets which he would not have disclosed to any, and which it would not have profited any one to know, but there were all the facts of his life which could be both ascertained and proved, and in which he is found testifying for Christ. He shews how from the 61
beginning of his life he lived after the strictest sect of his religion a Pharisee. If it had been a matter of human judgment, the life of Saul of Tarsus was one of the highest examples of what human religiousness might produce in man; but while that was all true, while his life would have brought nothing but credit and honour from man, yet according to God there was nothing really in that life which was enduring and pleasurable to God.
Paul then goes on to shew that such was his animosity to Christ, that every one who bore His name was a subject of the bitterest hatred; so bitter was he as a persecutor that despite his human education and religiousness, even his natural sensibilities were sunk in his indignation against Christ, and so no matter whether the Christians were men or women he haled them to prison and to death. He was a very notable example of bitterness against Christ, you say; surely there are not many such in the world to-day! Well, perhaps not; but at any rate this is an outstanding example of the grace of the Lord Jesus, for even in such a case it overcame the breathings of threatenings and the spirit of slaughter. But when it is a question of our soul’s relation with God, it makes very little difference whether our bitterness be a bitterness of this sort or the ordinary bitterness of indifference to the Lord Jesus.
I can safely say this, that when it comes to the examination of the human heart in the presence of God, it is either a case of bitterness against Christ, or the sweetness of Christ Himself. Now, after all, if Christ is not in the heart, if the heart has not learned to treasure Christ and the grace that brought Him down from heaven to earth for your blessing and mine, what real difference does it make whether it is ordinary indifference to Him or bitterness against Him? It is the appreciation of Christ that brings blessing and sweetness into the soul.
Now here, as I have said, the apostle refers to the same facts as he does elsewhere, but there is this 62
peculiarity in this testimony, that he uses the fact of his conversion to bring home to those who listen to him the great and solemn fact that they have to do with God. The question raised in the chapter is that of the resurrection.
He challenges all his hearers as to why it should be considered a strange thing that God should raise the dead.
It is God’s right and title to raise the dead. But in John 5
we read that it is not only God’s title to raise the dead, and that He will raise all the dead, but the resurrection is brought in in relation to Christ, and the question that God is raising with souls at the present moment in the glad tidings is as to their attitude towards Christ.
I feel, beloved, as I speak, how unable one is just to present it in all its force and simplicity, but I would earnestly desire that what I say might have the effect of creating in your soul an inquiry as to how you stand in relation to Christ. What do you think about Him in your own heart? If it were all brought out into the light, would there be anything found of the preciousness of the Lord Jesus Christ?
Well, here is Saul, garbed in all his religiousness and in all the human glory that attached to him, and as God looked down from heaven upon him at that moment, he would seem to be at the very apex of his position as regards his hatred of the Nazaræan and against those who bore His name. God looked right into his heart and He detected all the breathings of his soul against Christ—all the tumult, and hatred, and animosity, and pride. What a wonderful thing to think that what was uppermost in the heart of the Lord Jesus was the most tender and direct compassion for that man—Saul of Tarsus! There was not in the heart of the Lord Jesus the smallest reflection of the heart of this bitter persecutor. I feel that what we really need is to have brought home to us, that no matter what the nature of the human life may be, the great test which God submits every heart to is as to its attitude towards Christ.
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Now in John 5, we find the Lord Jesus speaking, and I should like you to notice the way in which the Lord brings the truth to bear upon souls. He takes His stand on the foundation of the blessing that had been accomplished at the beginning of the chapter. As the Lord passes the pool of Bethesda where there “lay a great multitude of impotent folk, blind, halt, and withered”—all in great extremity—He saw one man. You may say, Why did the Lord pass by all the others? You will find, as you read the gospels, that the grace of Christ made no exception in blessing, but in this chapter, I take it, the purpose of the Holy Spirit is to shew the activity of the grace of Christ and the discernment of Christ. Here is one who had lain thirty-eight years at the pool, and there was no blessing for him; and the reason was just this, that he had no power in himself to put himself in the way of blessing, and there was no one sufficiently interested in him to take and put him in the way of it when the occasion of blessing came. But as the Lord passed by He looked on him, and knowing that he had been a long time in that case He spoke to the man, and I want to point out to you that that example of blessing gives the foundation for all the rest that is in that chapter. This man who was the subject of the Lord’s blessing in this remarkable instance was the proof of the Lord’s ability to come in, in divine power, where there was moral death. It is a proof to us that the Lord can take the soul out of the place of moral death and put it in the place and power of spiritual life. It is not merely the proof that the Lord can raise the dead, which He will, but it is the proof to us that He in the power of His own word and grace can penetrate into the indifference, and deadness, and distance of the soul, and bring it in power into life and being according to God.
I feel what a great mistake people make in confusing knowledge concerning divine things with what is really of value to God. I suppose most of us here have had Christian training, and could begin at the beginning and go right on to the end and tell the terms of the glad tidings, but how 64
very poor all that is if Christ has no place in the heart. If the heart has never found out its own extremity, the need of the saving grace and power of the Lord Jesus, all the knowledge concerning divine things only makes its case the more serious, and its extremity the greater. But now this is the interest of the Lord Jesus. He touches this case of need.
In all the records of the conversion of Saul, there is not a single word that would indicate that the desire of his heart was toward the Lord Jesus; it was all against Him, but in grace the Lord oversteps that opposition.
In this scripture we find that the Lord in grace and power makes His own inquiry in regard to the need of this person, and the interest He manifested in his need is the interest which is really in the heart of Christ in regard to every one who is at a distance from Himself. The One who measures the nature of our need is none other than the blessed Person who manifested Himself in grace to the man at the pool of Bethesda, and according to His grace to Saul of Tarsus. You may say, My heart is not opposed to Christ; I have no consciousness of opposition, or of feelings of hostility. We shall leave that aside for the moment, but let me inquire whether you feel your need of Christ or not. Do you feel that you are in a case of extremity and need the saving grace of Christ? Do you realise that you have no power to get near the Lord? that you cannot even put yourself in the way of blessing, and that unless the Lord come near to you in the grace and love of His own heart you must remain where you are? As one looks around on the world, how very great the needs are! There are many things which men and women reckon they need which they do not really need at all; they spend themselves in seeking things for human enjoyment, but it is a great thing when the heart comes to the understanding that what it needs most of all is the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now the Lord Jesus knew, both with regard to Saul and the man at the pool of Bethesda, just what the need 65
was. What comes to light in regard of the latter case is that it is a matter of helplessness and hopelessness; if he had all the desire in the world to get the blessing of God, he had not the power to attain it. In Saul’s case not only had he no sense of his need of Christ, but his heart was filled with hatred to Him. There are the two extremes. I do not know where you stand between these two. You may have no real sense of need; you may have no active opposition in your heart to Christ, but whatever your case is, you need Christ.
And I venture to say this with all confidence, that if you but knew how much there is in the heart of the blessed Lord Jesus for your spiritual and your eternal welfare, you would lose your indifference, if indifference possesses your heart, and your opposition to Christ would be broken down, if opposition reigns in your heart.
There is one thing I can say with all confidence, with no fear, and with no hesitation, that there is no heart in all the universe like the heart of Christ. There is much I do not know, there is much I am very ignorant about, but I know something of the heart of Christ, and I earnestly desire for you to get the impression, above all other impressions, that there is nothing in the heart of Christ towards you but the deepest desire for your blessing. He wishes you no ill, but not only that, He desires for you all the good of God, He wishes you every enduring blessing. Whatever your station or your experience in life may be, there is one thing you can rest assured of, that the whole safety and security for your soul for time and for eternity lie in realising what is in the heart of Christ towards you.
Now the Lord’s words in John 5 are extremely solemn. One feels that they search our hearts. When the Lord speaks, He speaks not only of grace, but of the certainty of divine judgment, of a moment “in which all who are in the tombs shall hear his voice, and shall go forth; those that have practised good, to resurrection of life, and those that have done evil, to resurrection of judgment”, 66
John 5: 28, 29. I am not going into the detail of how and when both these things are accomplished, what I want to bring to bear upon your mind for the moment is the absolute certainty of it. Were it in your mind to avoid these direct dealings with God, you could not accomplish it. You might evade your responsibility now, you might live a life in defiance of the righteous claim of God, and you might remain for your lifetime indifferent to the grace that had given Christ for your salvation; you might live indifferent to the grace of the heart of Christ towards you personally, but there is one thing you could not evade, and that is giving an account of yourself to God. Your own conscience tells you that it cannot be avoided, but when the question is raised between your soul and God, it will be raised in relation to Christ.
Some one may say that they do not believe that all the things in a person’s life will be taken into account.
Scripture is very clear on that point. From the book of Revelation it is plain that with regard to those who stand in that solemn case, every detail of their lives will come under the review of God. Direct dealings with God is what you find at the great white throne, and direct dealings without an atom or an element of grace. But I want to say this, that besides the question of the detail of your life is the great question of the attitude of your heart to Christ. I feel that what explains the carelessness of the human heart in regard to Christ, and in regard of God, is just ignorance of what is in the heart of God and in the heart of Christ towards you personally.
Let me say to you in closing, that what I feel is desirable above all things is that you should know that in the heart of Christ there is absolutely nothing but the deepest desire for your blessing. May the Lord convince us all of it, for His Name’s sake!
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THE THREE GREAT FEASTS OF THE LORD
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THEIR SPIRITUAL IMPORT
I desire to speak to you simply of what God’s desires are in respect of His people, and one feels the need of special grace in doing so in order to be preserved from presenting things merely on the line of intelligence or theory. It is often possible to be clear in one’s mind as to certain ideas in Christianity, but it is not one’s clarity of mind that is so important, but the measure in which our affections are in spiritual exercise.
I read these scriptures so that we might dwell a little upon the love of Christ, the sufferings of Christ, and the way in which the Lord delights to take account of conditions amongst His people. It is interesting to consider how graciously God expresses Himself to His people in the Old Testament when giving them communications, and how pleasurable it was in His sight that there should be response from them to Himself.
It is a very searching word for each of us—that we have to beware that we do not present ourselves empty before God. We may be greatly concerned as to the importance of doing right things, and that our conduct should be blameless, without flaw, and yet we may appear before the Lord empty; but I venture to say that the heart that loves Christ will never be found empty. Some may think that it is our want of intelligence that is the root of the trouble. Instruction is provided for us, if we need that, but what lies at the root is that we are spiritually deficient. But the more the heart resides in the presence of the glory of Christ, the more do we grow in the appreciation of Himself, and we shall not then be empty.
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In referring to these three feasts one would desire to consider the way in which they are brought before us in these two scriptures. For the sake of the young, I would say that it is not with us a literal appearing before God three times in the year, or a matter of keeping actual feasts, whether the passover, the feast of weeks, or the feast of tabernacles, but it is a question of spiritual response. I want, therefore, in a simple way, to bring before you how there can be with us in the power of the Holy Spirit what answers to these feasts. The first, the passover, presents what is moral; the second, the feast of weeks, what is spiritual; and the third, the feast of tabernacles, what is divine.
The Holy Spirit has furnished for our spiritual instruction these definite lines of divine teaching, so that we might increase spiritually. As I said, it is not a matter of keeping actual feasts. In 1 Corinthians 5: 7, 8 we read, “For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us: therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness; but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth”. If we are careless or indifferent in respect of the passover, it will result in our going back in spirit to what is in Egypt. The passover is kept in the wilderness. It was to be the means of preserving God’s people. He would have the sense of what was connected with the passover ever kept before them; during the whole course of the year He would have them in continual remembrance of the month “Abib”. We often say, I think it is time we got beyond that point; but I should pity the soul that gets beyond the passover. It was observed in the wilderness, and was God’s means of preservation for the people from what was Egyptian and hostile to God. But it also had to be observed in the land. They were always to be solemnised in their spirits by the fact that their place in the land was entirely due to their having been covered in the passover.
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In the epistle to the Colossians, the apostle presents to the saints at Colosse the wonderful outlook, presented on the heavenly side as risen with Christ, and in doing so he reminds them of the fact that they had been reconciled to God “in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight”, chap 1: 22. That is the way the position was brought to bear upon the Colossians; it was presenting to their affections the sphere of things on the other side of the Jordan. He encourages them to pass over, but they could not be there on the line of the flesh, but as secured by the offering of the body of Christ.
It is very easy to get occupied with what is Egyptian.
Often our associations, which are perhaps full of apparent value to us, are the hindrance, and we feel we have not the power to free ourselves from them. That should be a most serious consideration for us. If we are desirous of being free from what is Egyptian, are our hearts tied or held by what is contrary to God’s rest? When Moses, the leader of God’s people, recounts the passage of the children of Israel from the land of Egypt, he says they “removed from Rameses”, Num 33: 5. Moses had the opportunity of being the greatest Ramesian that Egypt had. If he, that chosen vessel of God, had made his position in the opposite direction to what he did, he would have been the greatest head that Egypt ever had. Rameses denotes all that is great on the Egyptian line; and Moses measures their pathway from that point—the place where the Egyptians buried their dead.
Many a heart has gone out of Egypt at the start in the enthusiasm of evangelical conditions, and afterwards it has begun to feel that in leaving Egypt it had left what was living instead of what is dead. Egypt is a giant burying-place; their occupation that of burying their dead. What a solemn sight in the eyes of Moses was the thought of his heart in bringing it afresh before the people of God at the close of Deuteronomy! How have we left Egypt? Have we left it with 70
regrets, with any lingerings in respect of its things? You will recall the incident of the children of Israel murmuring in Numbers 11: 4-6. They said, “Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish, which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlick: but now our soul is dried away: there is nothing at all, beside this manna, before our eyes”.
The Spirit of God challenges them as to whether there had ever been any time that they had been in trouble when He had not come in for them.
How solemn to forget “Abib”, the beginning of months! Moses makes express mention of this in Deuteronomy 16: 1-3; he says, “Observe the month of Abib, and keep the passover unto the Lord thy God: for in the month of Abib the Lord thy God brought thee forth out of Egypt by night. Thou shalt therefore sacrifice the passover unto the Lord thy God, of the flock and the herd, in the place which the Lord shall choose to place his name there. Thou shalt eat no leavened bread with it; seven days shalt thou eat unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction; for thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste: that thou mayest remember the day when thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt all the days of thy life ”. How well might they and we remember the month “Abib”. It is to be held in spiritual recollection. We must not always abide by the forgiveness of sins, we must make spiritual progress. But is it spiritual progress to forget the month Abib? Is it spiritual progress to go back to the things from which God has freed us? If we do forget it, we shall begin to long for something of Egypt. We need never be empty, we need never be spiritually deficient, or feel the slightest need of turning to the world. No heart ever found a void filled by turning to the world! We may have been disappointed because we have had a feeling that we have not been loved or cared for enough, or that others have not been sufficiently interested in us. If this has been so, there is need to get to the Lord, for Him to come in for us. There is enough in Him to satisfy 71
our hearts; but unless God be our object, disappointed we must be. One has heard of those who had a little feeling that they were not loved enough, but let me assure you, there is warmth enough in the Christian circle; there are comfort, sympathy, and tenderness to be found there if we are prepared to keep near enough to feel it.
When God took the people out of Egypt, He thought of them as one man, as was predicated of them by the Holy Spirit through the prophet Hosea, “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt”, chap 11: 1. They came out in that one identity, as one under God’s eye, both in discipline, and as to blessing. As they had been similar in trials and testings, so they were to be similar in the purpose of God, in that great end to which He was bringing them—“What hath God wrought?”, Num 23: 23.
And what possibilities there are when God puts out His hand in divine blessing and touches the soul; it is the breaking forth of the green leaf! What does God intend to do? To bless us in His own way as those in whom He has wrought, and to establish us by the discipline and trials through which we may be called to pass. But we must be free of Egypt; there must be no entanglements; we must not forget the gain of discipline and the end God has in view in allowing us to go through it.
Much of God’s discipline is exercised to get us free of entanglements. He brings us out in the power of His blessings, and sets us up richly supplied for ever. We may not get the sense at the outset that every step of our way is a matter of divine interest, but there is not a step of our goings that God is not interested in—not only at the beginning and the end, but also right through the whole journey.
You say, My pathway has been so vacillating. But if I told you mine, you would be amazed. That is not the point really. What is God’s view? The end will be, “What hath God wrought?” I do not know anything about you or what 72
your path has been, but if you have got blessing from God, how comforting it is to know that from the first moment you got blessing, God was interested in you in regard of every step of your entire pathway. The passover is connected with what is moral. We keep the feast together. What is our mind? We are here in the world where there are many objects before men, but God’s object in bringing His people out of Egypt was that He might set them free from bondage—He did not do so by dealing with the character of things in Egypt; He did not bring down the political and human greatness, but He broke its power that He might let His people go free. He has brought us out of the world of human greatness, and pride, by the power and grace of the Lord Jesus, His Son, come down from heaven. The greatest thing in our hearts is the grace of Christ. Is there anything then in the world that appeals to us? The greatest thing that has ever been seen in the universe has been the down-stooping of the Son of God, “who, subsisting in the form of God, did not esteem it an object of rapine to be on an equality with God; but emptied himself, taking a bondman’s form, taking his place in the likeness of men; and having been found in figure as a man, humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, and that the death of the cross”, Phil 2: 6-8. That is how we came out.
It was the blessedness of God Himself that drew Moses’ heart away from human greatness, and Egyptian pride. What has brought your heart out of the world? Has it been because you found certain troubles attached to things that are seen? The power of the plagues did not bring His people out of Egypt, but the knowledge of Himself did.
What filled the heart of Moses when he came out of Egypt?
It was by faith he kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood. What moved the heart of Moses in connection with the deliverance of God’s people was the keeping of the passover, and the sprinkling of blood. And for us, dear friends, to be detached from the One who has loved us so much should be intolerable to our hearts. If you had 73
spoken to Paul of the many great things in the world, and asked him if he would not have been a much greater man in Egypt, he would have no doubt agreed as far as the things of the world are concerned, but as a spiritual man he reckoned it all as dung and dross. The greatness that had captivated his heart was the grace of Christ. What is the humanity that God is occupied with now? It is before His face—the Man Christ Jesus! Jesus glorified as man! The apostle says, “I knew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such an one caught up to the third heaven. And I knew such a man, (whether in the body, or out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) how that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter”, 2 Cor 12: 2-4. What a vision was his, to be caught up to such a place! Higher than Rameses and the Sphinxes of Egypt! and enough for his heart! Oh, that one had seen earlier that God’s first touch had in view that ever afterwards we should be in the knowledge of His interest, instead of only seeing oneself as a sinner saved by grace, and the interim left insecure!
But you will tell me that on the Lord’s day morning we do not come together to be occupied with the passover; that may be, but we come together in a state that has been secured by the passover; we come together in moral conditions that have been produced in that way. The passover represents the death of Christ. Everything in Christianity connected with the death of Christ can be brought under that heading—the passover. The apostle said, “Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus”. That was the moral obligation of the death of Christ; it is the great divine negative applied to all that is fleshly and that would interfere with the operations of the Holy Spirit. “Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body. For we which live are alway delivered 74
unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh”, 2 Cor 4: 10, 11. The great moral power of the death of Christ applied to the path of the believer makes room for what is spiritual. May we keep in mind the month Abib! so that nothing that is Egyptian may have any hold upon us.
Art thou weaned from Egypt’s pleasures,
God in secret thee shall keep,
There unfold His hidden treasures,
There His love’s exhaustless deep.
Now let us come to what is spiritual. The antitype of the feast of Pentecost—the feast of weeks—was to begin with a wonderful message to the nations of the Holy Spirit. Why should such a place be given to the operations of the Holy Spirit? Because the issues are so tremendous. The end with God is so great and glorious! What a place has been allotted to the presence and operations of the Holy Spirit!
“Seven weeks shalt thou number unto thee: begin to number the seven weeks from such time as thou beginnest to put the sickle to the corn”, Deut 16: 9. That is the bringing to pass in the power of the Spirit in the souls of the saints what Christ died to secure, and what He suffered to bring about—the glory of God.
He suffered in respect of everything that was offensive to God. He endured and felt it all. How can we speak of it?
But the Lord would have us to consider it—His atoning sacrifice; He who knew no sin was made sin for us. One feels how little we have understood it! How easy it has been to say it; how often quoted; and how often preached from!
What marvellous words! “He hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin”. Never had He had the slightest touch with it! When the Spirit of God speaks of His sinlessness, He is speaking of His perfect, holy Person—Him who knew no sin. Oh, the depth of it! And it was “that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”, 2 Cor 5: 21.
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The Spirit of God has come to us in virtue of Jesus being in the presence of God—He has come from the glory.
He was in the divine majesty of Godhead glory—deity, before ever the world was! But the glory that the Spirit of God has come from is the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
Stephen saw it; and he saw the blessed Person: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of man standing on the right hand of God”, Acts 7: 56. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. He has come that He might be with us, to dwell in us, and to be with us as comfort and power, also as teacher to lead us into all the things that pertain to that sphere that has been brought into being through the death, resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus as man. So in the feast of weeks we find the great reality of not only what is moral but of what is spiritual. What is spiritual rests on what is according to God. The Spirit has come to us. What are our links? They are spiritual. What a sphere of divine comfort and blessing is ours! The Spirit of God has come to us, as the apostle says in Ephesians 1: 13, “In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise”.
He has come to us believers, not only to deliver us from what is contrary to God, but that He might form us in features that correspond to Christ. The Spirit of God fills out the whole interim from the moment Jesus went on high. The truth as to the Spirit is illustrated in that incident of divine beauty in Rebekah being brought to Isaac by the servant.
When she inquired what man is this? he answered her, It is my master. She gets down from the camel and walks towards Isaac; and then we find the account that the servant Eliezer renders of his service. “The servant told Isaac all things that he had done”, Gen 24: 66. What a rendering at the end of all the service of the Holy Spirit! We are in the feast of weeks—the Spirit’s day; but we must not forget the month Abib. Let us never forget that Christ our passover has been sacrificed for us. If we have forgotten the 76
month Abib and lost the fresh sense of the sufferings of Christ and their import, may the Lord recover it to us! The apostle says in 2 Corinthians 4, “For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us”, vv 5-7. And again in Philippians 3, “For our conversation [or citizenship] is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself”, vv 20, 21. May we give room to the Spirit! Every discipline is intended to make room for the Spirit . No discipline ever fully yields its fruit until what is spiritual has been built into our souls.
Now I come to the feast of tabernacle. In considering what the import of that is, we must not think only of certain occasions of coming together. Sometimes in getting clear as to different ideas we are in danger of putting them into little pigeon-holes of divine truth. The truth of God will help us to distinguish one truth from another. This feast is not a matter of occasions—three times in the year. The Lord is caring for us every step of the journey. Do we touch what is divine? If we touch what is spiritual, we must touch what is divine. How often is it so when we come together? The Lord would have us then in the inside place with Himself.
Blessed be God, there have been times when we have touched divine realities! It does not satisfy the heart of God that we pass along the outside, so to speak. He would have us within with Him. There is a great difference between what is inside and what is outside. This feast of tabernacles is the type of God’s rest. We are hastening on to it, but we who believe do enter into God’s rest. There is a rest 77
remaining for the people of God—remaining in all its entirety and greatness.
We are moving on to that end. And the Spirit of God is moving. The proof of it is that the Spirit of God has been bringing to bear upon the hearts of the saints what would make them spiritually ready—the power of the grace of the ministry of Christ—what really answers to Christ. And how tenderly the Lord comforts us! God comforts all those who are cast down. But besides comforting us, He would give us spiritual confidence that what is divine is being built into our souls never to be removed.
The feast of tabernacles is at the end of their wilderness labours—harvest labours—and they dwell together. “The tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God”, Rev 21: 3.
Oh, what a blessed end to be arrived at! And God is building the church to that end now! May the Lord help us! I would seek to encourage my own heart and yours to remember that everything that has come to us is heavenly—
forgiveness of sins has come from heaven; my justification is from heaven, and the Holy Spirit who has come to us has come from above where Christ is. Everything is heavenly for us before we reach God’s end. He is building the heavenly into our souls. John shews you what is abiding, and says: “greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world”. And, “whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?” 1 John 5: 4, 5. The apostle is not here applying the passover to those to whom he is writing, but the faith of Jesus as Son of God.
May the Lord in His grace help us in the consideration of these few thoughts together, for His Name’s sake!
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THE SUPPLY OF THE SPIRIT OF JESUS
CHRIST
I think you will understand the feeling of hesitation I have in bringing such scriptures as these before you. There are some here a good deal older than I am in spiritual experience, and they will have proved what gain is to be derived from being devoted to what is pleasing to God. I have proved for myself the gain of seeking to be devoted to the testimony; and the youngest can get gain from doing so.
I am not now speaking of those in a special position, marked off as ‘ministering brethren’, as we speak, for to be addicted to the ministry is the privilege of all who have known the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. In people’s minds ministry is often only what is public, something spoken or written, or preached, and of course that is true, but in the New Testament the thought of ministry has also the thought of living ministry—the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Phil 1: 19), the object of it being the promotion of the people of God.
It should encourage our hearts that all can have part in that ministry, and rest assured, if we do not go in for that ministry, we shall be going in for some other. There is the ministry connected with God, and the ministry connected with man, and we must be going in for one or the other; hence it is important to understand the situation, to understand our privileges, and that which may fashion our whole life perhaps, so that every difficulty, every exercise, only leaves us enlarged spiritually. All who love the Lord can testify that the ministry is more precious to them now than it was at first.
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I should like first to draw attention to the spirit in which this exercise is taken up. You may handle divine things either by the Spirit of God or in the spirit of man, but you can bring in nothing to help but what is of God.
Wisdom like Joab’s in the chapter we read can go a long way, but it can only bring in what spoils or what nullifies the work of the Spirit of God.
The first passage I read in chapter 13 is a very solemn passage—a peculiar situation—presenting the spectacle of one putting distance between himself and the city of the king as fast as he can, fleeing because of his own offence, and endeavouring to put distance between himself and judgment. We may think this does not mean much to us.
Let us remind ourselves, that naturally we are all Absaloms, and until we accept this, we shall bring a wrong spirit into things. I am not speaking now of Absalom as a very bad brother—I know he was a very bad brother—nor of him as a sinner and how a sinner is recovered for God; my point here is to shew that apart from the mind and spirit of Christ the ruling spirit in man is the spirit of Absalom. My desire is to shew you the mind of Christ Jesus. We need not go into Absalom’s case. I believe myself that his action would be justified, speaking according to man, by the circumstances. The most serious departures are those which would be justified by human judgment, but human judgment is no good in Christianity. I want to shew you the import of the mind which was in Christ Jesus. So Absalom, leaving the consequences of his sin behind him, goes away to Geshur, a place where one can find room at a distance from God, and there he abides three years. I do not doubt he went through much down there, one can go through a great deal in three years, but he did not come to God’s point of view. Everything is judged by its sequel, and it is that which makes me say he never came to God’s point of view.
He was gone a long time; he had fled, and had sacrificed everything that had given him glory. He was a 80
prince and yet he was banished. You may imagine him weighing up all this and much more, but the balances he used were not the balances of the sanctuary. He was actuated by human judgment; he was governed by the spirit that had slain his brother. The mind of the world is not the mind of God, and the conclusions it reaches are not according to God. Joab was one whose naturally shrewd mind saw that the king’s heart was towards Absalom.
David’s heart went out to Absalom. We read, “And the soul of king David longed to go forth unto Absalom”, chap 13: 39. David’s action here was not perfect; his actions as a man were misguided, but the heart of David was affected also, although his affections were right. Joab takes account of the breach. It was solemn in the eyes of all. The son of David, as Absalom was, yet David is in Jerusalem and Absalom is at Geshur. What kind of effect can that have at Geshur? What do they think of Jerusalem now? What a reproach it is to Israel! The sooner it is put right the better.
Yes; Absalom must certainly be brought back. Joab looks at Absalom in Geshur, and determines that at all cost the rupture must be bridged. So he sets his mind to work. But he forgets the solemn fact that unless the spirit is touched, unless the heart is reached, there can be no real reconciliation effected. The only thing that will conquer the natural mind is the mind of Christ. You may bring me up among all the privileges of Christianity from babyhood, yet if there is nothing wrought in my spirit, the only thing that will come out, sooner or later, will be the spirit of Absalom.
We all know the doctrine, and possibly we use the doctrine sometimes, alas! to cut one another in pieces. Beloved, the flesh is no good. But on the other side we see the Spirit of Christ. Joab ponders over the matter and he makes his plans. He sends for a wise woman, but it is the wisdom of this world; Joab tells her how to approach David, he even puts the words in her mouth. She follows Joab’s instructions to the letter and gets David to commit himself.
It is the human wisdom that acts in the letter of things. The 81
parable used is of two brothers; as far as outward circumstances go, they are together, they keep the peace to shield one another, but alone, in private, you find there is rupture, they are really at enmity. Although for the sake of their own reputation they go about as brethren, yet the spirit that rules them is a spirit that leads to spiritual poverty. Those who go in for the ministry will be tested by the ministry, and the Lord wants workers who are prepared to take up the burden in His own spirit and mind.
So Joab by dint of his scheme prevailed, and Absalom was brought back, but he was prevented from going back to his privileges at once. The test came—whether he was seeking restoration, or seeking distinction, or, as we should say, whether he was seeking Christ for Christ’s sake, or only for his own advancement. He was allowed to return, but he was not allowed to see the king’s face. But we see in him that there are further lessons to learn—that everything we have done springs from a mind which is contrary to the mind of Christ, and that the only cure for self is to come under the Spirit of God, under the influence of the mind of Christ. So Absalom remained two years outside the king’s presence. There was opportunity for exercise afforded. For two years the matter stood, and then Absalom sent for Joab.
Now Joab was the wisest man in all Israel as after the flesh.
Step by step his wisdom carried him; one solemn test after another was passed; he stood the test of Absalom, only to fall at last under the test of Adonijah, 1 Kings 1. Had he turned to God, it would never have happened. God walled Absalom in, the question at stake was his motive, but the question was not settled, for Absalom, without turning to God, turned to Joab.
Now in a crisis Joab always withstood David. His wisdom was absolutely opposed to the spirit of David. David was continually opposed by Joab and his brethren, the sons of Zeruiah. Who were they that would have smitten Shimei when David was fleeing from Jerusalem? The sons of 82
Zeruiah, 2 Sam 16. Who would have put Shimei to death when the king came back? The sons of Zeruiah, 2 Sam 19: 22. Now Absalom trusted Joab, and he committed himself to him when God had closed him up. Have you never felt what it is to be closed in? But God does not give these exercises to damp our spirits or desires. He does not wish to break our spirits. He would give us the mind of Christ.
He would form our desires, our affections, after the mind of Christ. It is God’s controversy with all men.
Well, Absalom sent to Joab, but Joab would not come, and a second time he refused to come, so Absalom set Joab’s field on fire. When he cannot get a hearing, he will make himself heard. It is a spirit that will be heard, even if it be in a way that causes commotion among the people of God. He set the barley on fire. The enemy always attacks what is living, what is connected with Christ, what stands in resurrection. You may ask, Did Absalom think of all this? I do not say there was any such thought in Absalom’s mind, but the destruction was done and as recorded in scripture carries its own significance. Have you ever seen destruction wrought among the people of God through self-will? I do not wish to arraign any one, but what but self-will can bring in such confusion, can break the peace more among brethren, or can more hinder the saints of God, and hurt and harm what is of Christ ?
You remember in the law, if when men strove together they hurt a woman with child, what severe punishments were laid down. They had no intention of hurting another, their strife was all that occupied them, but they had done the mischief and must suffer—eye for eye ... burning for burning ... stripe for stripe, and so on, Exod 21: 22-25. How was the matter to be adjudicated? Not as to whether they meant to do any harm, but on the facts of the case—that what was due to Christ had been injured. And so the destruction of the barley was more than Joab’s loss. A mind bent on distinguishing itself will go so far as to handle divine 83
verities to that end, and you cannot check it. So Absalom sets a field on fire, he introduces the element of destruction to make himself heard, and he does make himself heard.
You may think he was a very bad brother. Yes, he was, but remember that is your heart and mine. Nothing subdues that spirit but the mind of Christ.
So at last Joab came, and he did as Absalom told him. Absalom is introduced into the presence of David, he is restored to his place in the king’s house, but how deep is his restoration morally? According to human judgment the open breach is healed, but what about Absalom’s next movements? The very next verse shews us Absalom preparing chariots, and horses, and fifty men to run before him. No sooner was he restored to apparent favour, than he commenced to steal the hearts of the men of Israel. He intercepted those coming into the city who were on their way to lay their case or grievance before the wisdom of the king, and he was prepared to flatter them, and took ways and means to gain influence with the people by ingratiating himself into their favour.
A proud spirit never holds the saints together. It can only re-create in its own likeness, and the only way to be among the saints to do good is to be in the mind of Christ.
That is why I read part of Philippians 2, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus”; it was to bring you to admire the Lord’s blessed steps, so that you should have the mind in you that was in Him. It will never make much of us, except in the way of bringing glory to God. Do you give people your hand to kiss on this line? No, you go down.
But that was not Absalom’s way: he came to Jerusalem and stole the hearts of the men of Israel, and if you—no, I will say it of myself—if I am in the mind of Absalom, I shall steal the hearts of the saints in view of my own importance. Only one thing can come of the mind of Absalom; it can only bring in its own thoughts in what should belong to Christ. Only one thing can proceed from the mind of Absalom, and it is 84
what is destructive to the saints. God would have us enter on all that Absalom was entitled to in the city, but in the mind of Christ. There are needs to be met, not natural needs, but spiritual. If we come together in the mind of Christ, we may be very little, very few in numbers, but if brought together in the mind of Christ, only two or three perhaps joined together in the love of Christ, there you will find what can only be found in God’s world. You will find a heart and mind that will bring in glory to God. James saw those who had the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons, James 2. Beloved, there is nothing so impoverishing.
We have only one Lord and Master, only One who is entitled to our homage and reverence, and adoration, besides being the revelation of God to our souls. Absalom had been restored, his holding was regained, but his mind was contrary to the mind of Christ, and all the savour and sweetness of his position had gone out. His spirit resisted, and was hostile to the Spirit of Christ, and he stole the hearts of the men of Israel. God grant we may be set for one another’s affections in such wise as at all cost to safeguard the saints for Christ. I would appeal to you, young brother or young sister, stand together according to God, and seek grace to come closer to your brethren than human links can bring. Looking back over my pathway, I see what hindered me was that I touched others on human lines, more than on spiritual lines, and I sought grace to be able to touch others on spiritual lines rather than on human lines, and that is, I understand, how we become set for preserving our holding.
I turn now to say a few words on the verses I read in 2 Timothy. The apostle there shews that not only was that maintained which was from the beginning, but what was more wonderful, the brightest light shone at the end. When Paul’s public testimony was over, when he himself was a prisoner, when there was no active service he could do, he 85
was willing to be poured out as a drink-offering (v 6), perhaps alluding also to Phil 2: 17. It is not the thought of water spilt upon the ground, which cannot be gathered up again, but it is a libation poured out, a fragrance which moves our souls to this day. The spirit of the man is in it; that is the wonderful fact; there he was, the mind of Christ in him, and yet a man of like passions to ourselves. Like Absalom he had been kept in ward, but he had learned his lesson. The One whom he had opposed had broken him down on the road to Damascus, and had sent him into the desert, Gal 1: 17. He could say, “For me to live is Christ”
(Phil 1: 21); his whole course was that, and when that course was finished and he has no more to do, he was ready to be poured out as a libation on the sacrifice and ministration of the faith of the Philippians. These are not the words of a young convert, but the last communications of the apostle Paul.
Then the apostle goes on to speak of his companions in chapter 4. Right at the very end Demas breaks out in the spirit of Absalom on the line of the revolt of Adonijah. You will find that Absalom and Adonijah were born about the same time, although not of the same mother, 1 Kings 1: 6, and 2 Sam 3: 3, 4. As I understand, Absalom is in contrast to the humiliation of Christ, and Adonijah is the denial of the power and authority of Christ. Christ at the right hand of God is the same Person as Christ in His humiliation down here. It is the same Jesus. Now Demas went out. He left the sphere of the testimony. He did not leave it because he had committed some sin, but because the spirit that prevailed was not to his liking. He loved this present world, and the sphere he left was ruled by Christ. He endured it as long as he could, but in the end, he went because he could endure it no longer; he was not prepared for the mind of Christ.
But Paul goes on to give Timothy a charge: “Take Mark, and bring him with thee: for he is profitable to me for 86
the ministry”, v 11. Now Mark was one who had gone astray, Acts 15: 36-41. I think Mark must have had great personal charm. Barnabas evidently thought much of him.
You remember that Absalom was renowned in Israel for his beauty; from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head he was without blemish (2 Sam 14: 25), and when once a year he polled his head his hair weighed two hundred shekels after the king’s weight. It is very remarkable that the Spirit of God should record the weight of Absalom’s hair, the long hair being really a mark of effeminacy. Nothing that is of the mind of Christ makes for effeminacy. Then, too, he used the king’s weight in weighing his hair, which is not suggestive of the mind of Christ. May I ask you a question, Have you ever weighed your hair? Have you ever weighed up what is naturally to your advantage? When you come to divine things, you must revise the calculations you have made of your own advantages. When you weigh things for God, the value they have undergoes great revision. You find, too, that you value what you did not value before. Now Mark was put in ward, and he was allowed to go to Geshur.
He went with Barnabas, and with Barnabas he went outside the testimony. Perhaps you do not think he went very far; may be he did not, but he went outside, and outside is not inside, even if only a wall and a gate separate. If I were to use an ordinary human illustration, this room has not a very thick wall, yet you and I are inside, and a man standing outside is still outside, even if he is standing with his back against the wall. So Mark went with Barnabas in the power of his own effeminacy, and he went to Geshur, but he came back under the Spirit of God through the instrumentality of Timothy. How came Mark to be in Timothy’s keeping? I think all Timothy’s service is hid until the day when Christ will reveal it. He hid all he had done, but he let at least this be known, that he that had been lost was found; and you can imagine him letting all the brethren know that he had just had a letter from Paul, and had been enjoined to bring Mark when he came, as he would be useful to Paul for the 87
ministry. There is only one thing worth troubling about, and that is the ministry. Is it nothing to you? God has taken us up to be here for the ministry, for that is what is here that is pleasing to Himself.
Now, may the Lord give us grace to put these things together. The strife between Paul and Barnabas was between the line of the supply of the Spirit and the line of human judgment. There is only one way to prosperity in the things of God, only one way, and that is to let the mind that was in Christ Jesus be the mind in us. That mind does not come into us against our will, and the mind in us naturally keeps Christ out. Let it be our exercise to let Him in.
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DISCIPLINE IN VIEW OF SPIRITUAL
ENLARGEMENT
My desire is to speak of the way in which the discipline of God is used for enlargement. We must all feel at times how small we are as to spiritual stature, in spite of the fact that we have been wonderfully endowed with knowledge as to divine things in general. The Lord of necessity has often to allow this feeling to come home to us, but it can be explained most sweetly by the fact of the Lord’s unfailing love for us. If He did not value us as being so precious, there would not be sufficient explanation for the testing and pressure through which His own are called to pass. It is because of the tender love of the Lord that we are tested as we are. One would refer for a moment to the gospels, where it is evident, in the Lord’s handling of His disciples, how He watched over their spirits. The pride of the world doubtless pained the Lord’s own spirit as He considered for God, but it never moved Him to interfere with its course; He left the world alone, but any trace of its spirit in His disciples was never passed over. Because He loved them so much, nothing was allowed to pass that was contrary to His own mind and spirit.
The Lord took His own up; He moved to secure His disciples; it was not they who moved first to attach themselves to Him. That there were deep and tender feelings of attraction there can be no question, but one would be reminded of the way in which the Lord speaks of the foundation of their ties to Himself: “Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you”, John 15: 16. The divine ties that bound their hearts to Him were those God had formed, and they had answered to the Lord with joy and tenderness of spirit, as is the case with every one who loves Him. One would, therefore, cover our considerations to-night with the sense of the Lord’s fidelity. If He allows us to come into the 89
dealings of testing which, if the Lord tarry, must increase, it is because of the greatness of His love for us. That we are coming out with Him in the day of glory is a wonderful outlook for every one of our hearts; that we should come out like Him and with Him in the day of glory is a wonderful prospect, but it would be impossible for us to reach such an end without testing. If we are to “come forth as gold” (Job 23: 10), we must be purified, and we are purified by way of testing. It is with a view to our being partakers of God’s holiness that we are tested. “No chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous; nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby”, Heb 12: 11. I would refer to the fact that there is the positive side of ministry. The Holy Spirit has come as the Comforter to present to us the things of Christ, as the Lord Himself refers to Him anticipatively,
“I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter” (John 14: 16)—One who would be here in place of Christ personally—One who is identical with Christ in all His movements and feelings. The Lord spoke of Him as an additional Comforter—another Comforter—and the Lord enlarges on His ministry. There is this positive side of ministry, and I refer to that for a moment so that what is before us might be kept in its proper balance. Discipline of itself does not build anything into the soul, but under the good hand of God it makes room for what is to be built.
On the positive side of ministry, the Holy Spirit being with us, there is the taking of the things of Christ, and the shewing of them to us. Things shewn by the Spirit are shewn to prepared affections. There is a movement of the Spirit which is sovereign and not dependent upon the preparedness of affections. I was in darkness when the light first came to me from God, and even the very misery that comes to a soul when first touched by God is of God’s own sovereign movement. While we should not forget the sovereignty of the Spirit in the sense that He is above all human limitations, nevertheless the Holy Spirit, as 90
Comforter, ministers Christ to prepared affections—
affections that want Him. Hence when it is a question of the Spirit’s ministry of the truth positively, there must be antecedent to that a line of divine working which prepares our hearts for the ministry of the things of Christ. I have often found (one is speaking in a sympathetic atmosphere tonight) that I had more truth (little as I may have) than there was room to place it in. Much of my knowledge, when put to the test, was not formed in the place of secured affections, where the Lord would have had it; hence the need of discipline, that there may be a place in your soul and mine for the truth, and that we may be weaned from the things that would hold us to the detriment of the Lord’s interests.
There is a great deal of discipline (I would speak to you to-night in a comforting way) which does not belong to the aged; indeed, we have in scripture a principle as to discipline that I would encourage my younger brothers and sisters to consider: “It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth”, Lam 3: 27. The throwing off of discipline in the days of our youth may affect us in a serious way later on in our histories. Discipline is not altogether dependent on human circumstances, but rather upon the way in which our spirits are moved according to God. You may find discipline in circumstances that are not in any sense extraordinary as men would regard them. We may never be called upon to sacrifice what could be spoken of as a very great deal for Christ’s sake, and yet Christ may have a large place with us. Hence the work of God is not dependent on human circumstances. The most ordinary human circumstances may shut Christ out from a heart, and in the most ordinary circumstances of life Christ may have a great place in the heart. Far better be ordinary as to our circumstances than extraordinary, as men would judge.
The higher men get in what is called the social scale, the more they are exposed, and the closer they come to things opposed to God and His Christ. But I would never apply the 91
thought of being ordinary to one who loves the blessed Lord.
Every one who loves Christ is extraordinary. The very attention of heaven itself is focussed on every one who loves Christ. The saints are of such interest to God Himself that they are coming out with Christ in the day of His glory in likeness to Him, fashioned as He is; but greater than coming out, there is what they are to be for divine Persons when the world to come gives place to the eternal state.
What a sweet explanation of all the testing through which we are called to pass! If it seem that things are taken from you, I would say again it is that Christ may be more precious to your heart; that is why the disciplinary element comes into your circumstances. “All things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose”, Rom 8: 28. What Job had to learn was that God had much to do in him; he was to be enlarged for a day when man’s things and man’s thoughts would exist no more, when God Himself would rest in all the results of the discipline and in the results of His own positive ministry and work. When the world to come is ended and the eternal state is being introduced, God speaks from the throne—the place of power—and He says, “Behold, I make all things new”, Rev 21: 5. What is so comforting is that the end reached according to divine purpose and by divine ways is through the line of discipline. We are formed for that day in the power of the Spirit’s ministry, as the result of the Lord’s tender care and interest, and as the result of the Father’s dealing in a disciplinary way that has made our souls to be partakers of His holiness. In Luke’s gospel the transfiguration is on the eighth day. The eighth day is the end of all that has been gathered up and done during the seven preceding days; it is an eternal day—
eternity not looked at as introducing a new day, but eternity looked at as the end of the ways of God and the sufferings of the Christ.
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These Old Testament scriptures are wonderfully sweet if read in the light and spirit of the New Testament.
Job had not the Holy Spirit as indwelling, yet his movements, expressions, and feelings are wonderfully recorded by the Spirit so that we who have the Spirit might get the gain of that through which Job passed in his soul history. I believe there is a soul history connected with every truth made known to us. If the statement seems hard, I will seek to explain it. What should we do with any truth apart from soul history? There was a time when I was made to feel this, and I am not without the feeling of it now. There are times when we may have been refreshed by ministry, and had a deepened sense of the Lord’s preciousness and glory, and almost immediately discipline seems to follow.
Why? That there might be soul history connected with the truth. Where are we in that regard? There is great encouragement in these days in regard to the truth in the simplicity with which the Lord is bringing it to our hearts.
The youngest soul who loves the Lord has a soul history.
That history commenced when the light came to you from God, when the eye of your heart was brought to see Jesus in His beauty; and whatever still remains to be learnt, your soul history commenced when you were linked livingly with the Lord, and received the Holy Spirit.
All that is made known to you as you grow in the knowledge of divine things is made known in the Spirit’s ministry and is centred in Christ. Everything that tests you in regard to the preciousness of Christ is discipline. You need not get into extraordinary circumstances to be tested.
You may be tested in the office, in business life, or among your relatives. Even with the young the test is brought to bear as to the preciousness of Christ. It is the sweet and simple setting of discipline. Our discipline is due to the fact that we have been enlightened by God and we love God, we belong to Him, we are linked with Christ and have the Holy Spirit. The Lord’s own blessed words prove it: “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world”, John 17: 14.
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Did the disciples rightly appreciate it? Had it been measured by their judgment, that statement would never have been made, but He who measured it rightly made the statement: “They are not of the world”. We have to handle things that others handle, but we handle them differently, because we love the Lord, and there is nothing in the world that loves Him.
However difficult the path may seem, “We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose”—called for a world in which, when God’s end is reached there will be nothing save that which makes everything of Christ. You are called out of a world where there is nothing that answers to Christ, yet you are left in it, that you may learn how to make room for the preciousness of that Person, and you are enlarged and formed in view of a day of glory, when He will be everything.
I sometimes wonder if in our companies at times there is not more soul distress as to discipline and circumstances than we know of. Are there not sometimes thirsty souls with us? Do we judge rightly in thinking that the thirst is only with those outside? Are there not hungry souls with us? Is the hunger only to be found outside?
Some of us have known what it is to be with the saints, and know the truth, and yet be thirsty and hungry. Some of us have known what it is to be acquainted with the truth, and yet have experienced a lack of joy. Job looked forward and backward, on the left hand and on the right hand, but there was one way Job had not looked; he had not looked up. He was being tested by God, and he gives utterance to a statement of such intensity and character that only God could have produced it: “when he hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold”. That is the end for every one of us, but in Job’s utterance there is a sense in which he speaks as if he thought there was no dross in him, although there is a strain right through the chapter which makes one feel that 94
Job had to learn from God’s own side that there was plenty of dross in him.
Discipline does not only concern itself with the dross.
I recently visited a sister in peculiar circumstances of testing (she lives some distance from here, so one may refer to it); she said to me, ‘In regard to my discipline, I have got a little bit shattered, and I am wondering if my conduct has not something to do with it’. I said, ‘It is a matter you can only speak to the Lord about, but what I have noticed with great encouragement is that when the Spirit speaks of conduct in regard to discipline, He speaks of the conduct of God: “God conducts himself towards you as towards sons”‘, Heb 12: 7. That brings God near to our spirits in His disciplinary care. He is the Father of spirits. Take your circumstances from God, and wait upon Him in regard to them. Do not measure God by your circumstances. God will come near to your spirit in regard to your discipline.
Job had to learn God as the Father of spirits. You will remember that peculiar moment when in the depths of his soul searching he says, “What is man that thou makest much of him? and that thou settest thy heart upon him?”
I can understand some one saying, I have been taught that God does not make much of any one. That is a mistake.
God does make much of His people, but not always in the way they expect. God makes much of His people in what makes much of Christ. “What is man, that thou makest much of him? and that thou settest thy heart upon him?
And that thou visitest him every morning, triest him every moment? How long wilt thou not look away from me?”, Job 7: 17-19 Then he comes to this, that God is the “Observer of men”. What does that mean? The Father of spirits looks in upon the heart; He knows what the heart is set for. The Holy Spirit is deeply sensitive as to how much we are really desirous of giving place to Christ. I say again, the Spirit ministers Christ to prepared affections, not prepared so 95
much in the way of information as in the way of desire. We may have as much of Christ as we are really set for.
Job was in circumstances without light. There was a sense of darkness on his spirit. No discipline need cause darkness with us if we turn to God. In the Lord’s testing, as we see Him here as a man for the pleasure of God and see Him waiting upon God, there was no sense of darkness on His spirit; even at that moment in the garden of Gethsemane, when taking the cup from the Father, there was no darkness on His spirit. The darkness in Job’s case was the darkness of misunderstanding as to God’s intentions. He had not the light of God’s lamp over his head.
He refers to it later, chap 29: 2-4. He says, “Oh that I were
... as I was in the days of my youth”. How often God uses discipline to recover us to our freshness. Our hearts are taken back to a moment when Christ was a blessed living Person to our souls. I would encourage and exercise any who have known what it is to lose their freshness and joy by the thought that the Lord has never relinquished the value of that, and never will. When Israel forgot it, He remembered it for them. He said, “I remember for thee [not only ‘I remember thee’] the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals”, Jer 2: 2. Jehovah always cherished the remembrance of that moment. Discipline recalls to freshness.
Do we look for united testing? I believe, if the Lord tarry and we are left here, we shall have to learn to stand very much closer to each other than we have ever stood before. There has always been the necessity for it, as far as spiritual links are concerned. God’s thought was that His own should stand closely together. We have been bound together, and we must be bound together in the experiences of our discipline and testing. There was doubt on the spirit of Job, because the light from God’s own side as to his discipline was not with him. Our preservation will not be through immunity from discipline, but in discipline rightly 96
taken. I believe that, without presuming, we shall realise that God has so much to do in us that a great place must be made in our souls. Oh, that the Lord would greatly encourage our hearts in this! I would speak to the youngest who love the Lord; He has reached you from His own side.
There is that ministry from His own side, and a place must be made in your soul for all that Christ is going to form in you. It is not that I would occupy you with yourself, but that your heart might be drawn out to Christ, and as He becomes your object, whatever is needed to make a place in your soul will be accepted, without doubt or gloom, in the light that shines from Him. “He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life” John 8: 12. We need to keep the freshness of youth. Does that mean that we are not to grow up? No; but why not grow up retaining that freshness? Why treat the thought of spiritual growth as if it means getting away from what is youthful and fresh? Why not grow up in it, with it, and carry it with us. Did Caleb lose his youth? Caleb draws attention to the fact (Josh 14: 11) that he still had the strength of his youth when he was eighty-five years of age. He had not become faint by the way. The object of divine glory had been set before him, and it carried him into the land where God intended all His people to be carried. Even in human things, while of course we must grow old (we cannot change that), yet there is a proverb that the way to keep young is to be with the young. When we come to divine things, we have been given to stand together, and to grow up together. I do not believe there is a person who is a greater help to the young than one who has kept the freshness of youth spiritually. That does not mean that such a one has not grown. We grow both up and down; yes, and we increase in girth—we become enlarged in regard to divine things:
“rooted and grounded in love”, Eph 3: 17. The Lord would have every one of us to go on, hence I press upon our hearts, from the least to the greatest, the necessity of a place being made with us in which to put divine things.
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We may often feel a lack in that way. You might go into a house where there are many things of interest, but you get an impression that there is not a place for them all.
There is a place for everything that God makes known to our hearts in Christ. Job learnt it, and the time came when he lifted his heart to God, and his conclusion was this, that God’s way was the blessed way; that God was going to make much of him, but in a way that was contrary to the way in which he had been making much of himself. Job refers to his testimony, his preaching, to his place with the brethren and to his family setting, and he learned that in all these things God was going to make much of him as one who had found his centre in God Himself. I see many young here, and I would encourage such that with purpose of heart they may be kept with the saints and the testimony to the end.
The Lord Jesus is a living Person as surely to be proved as ever He was, and as surely to be depended on as ever He was at any moment, and He will be so to the end. God made much of Job in the presence of his friends, and he came in for a very great store; he received presents; that is all indicative of spiritual possessions, and there was a place for them.
What we read in Hebrews 12 was all set out in the Lord Himself. It is comforting to one’s heart not only to have the saints and God’s way with them in view, but to see everything centred in Christ Himself. Of how many of us could it be truly said that we are characterised as those who run a race? Of how many could it be said that there are the marks of real spiritual earnestness, energy, and devotedness? Do not think I am speaking critically. I am speaking with a sober sense in my own spirit of the need of the Lord’s grace to carry each one straightforward. When I think of the running of the race, I am not thinking of its being pursued so much in a correct way, but of what is marked by distinct energy and desire, and by the laying aside of every weight. You could not lay anything aside for me, and I could not lay anything aside for you. It is an 98
individual thing. You may see in me things that would far better be removed than allowed to remain, but the laying aside must come from a heart set upon Christ, and deeply, tenderly, and earnestly desirous of reaching Christ where He is. No person can run a race in the dark. If there be darkness in your spirit you cannot run the race; you may speak of the race and have plenty of information connected with it, but darkness upon our spirits in discipline, and running the race towards the Lord Jesus Himself cannot go together. If our hearts are enlightened and free before God, and we take up things in regard to His divine and gracious purpose as the Father of spirits, then we can run the race with patience to the end. The Spirit delights to bring before the hearts of the saints the One who has gone right through,
“Who for the joy that was set before him”; that is the secret joy which lies before us in running. Job had not got that joy; there was darkness on his spirit; he felt himself oppressed on every side. He had known what it was to have the lamp of God shining upon his head, but darkness came on his spirit. Think of the Lord, “Who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame”, Heb 12: 2. I delight to put myself into that little word joy,
so expressive of divine feeling. One of the things that carries the heart on with increasing tenderness is that I have no link with the blessed Lord that was not secured through His suffering, and my every link with Him is a part of that joy that lay before Him. That He might have me, He suffered for me. We speak of His death, but let us draw near to the truth and see the immeasurable fulness of it. The tremendous reality of the sufferings of Christ can only be measured by God Himself. He suffered for the joy that was set before Him, He “endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God”.
In closing, I would say that what you know the worth of, you carry as treasure, and only what you have learned the worth of is treasure to you. What has come easily to you is not yet treasure to you. What comes to you in 99
connection with soul history is treasure to your spirit; you value it, and there is a place made for it. May the Lord encourage us in this, for His Name’s sake.
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SUPREME PLACE IN OUR HEARTS
John 12: 23-33; 16: 8-11; 17: 13-26
What is before me to speak of is the place that the Lord desires to have with us personally. There is great comfort in knowing that above any exercise or desire in regard to the Lord on our side, there is the sweet and blessed fact that His desire is towards us. At times when one may have been conscious that there was diffidence or coldness in one’s spirit, it has been a comfort to the heart to realise afresh that the whole foundation of my blessing, the divine acceptance upon which I stand, and the whole future outlook of divine glory, are based on divine desire.
We can rejoice together that we have become attached to the Lord, but the movement of attachment did not begin from our side; it commenced with the Lord Himself. There was a divine movement which intercepted our course, so that we might be attached to Himself. It was He who spoke; it was we who heard. It was the voice of the Son of God that we heard.
Right through John’s gospel we find that the Spirit of God would impress upon our hearts that the whole system of divine blessing originated with God Himself. One feels encouraged in the thought of the Lord’s desire in respect of the place that He would have with us personally. We see His tender movements towards His disciples, particularly towards the close of His ministry, when the moment of His departure was drawing near, and when all that was connected with it was beginning to come in on His spirit, as if to ascertain from themselves how He stood with them.
One would speak reverently, not forgetting that the Lord was omniscient, and needed not that any man should testify what was in man, and yet, knowing all as God, there was the desire with Him to know as from themselves where He stood in their affections.
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There is nothing more testing, and yet more comforting to the heart, than the question as to how the Lord is with us in our affections in regard to His personal worth, for the reason that He who tests the heart so deeply is the One who is set for the thing that He seeks above all other things. There is nothing that is of such preciousness to the Lord as affection that centres on Him for His own sake. Were we able to labour ten thousand times more than we do, we could not provide the Lord with one atom more of pleasure to His heart than what we are as loving Him. That we love Him, own His glory, and own His worth are of infinite preciousness to the heart of Christ.
I believe the great aim and object of the Lord’s ministry, as it searches our hearts, is to make evident how He stands with us in personal affection. It is not only what we know in regard to Himself, but where is He in our affections? That we love Him is more to the Lord by far than that we preach Him, although if we love Him we shall most certainly preach Him, but, alas! we might preach Him far beyond our love for Him. Hence the Lord does not judge by the measure of our preaching; He goes beyond the appearance of our labour, and tests the heart as to where He stands with us for His own sake, for His personal worth and beauty.
We find in John’s gospel, as I have said, the most tender movements on the part of the Lord Jesus in regard to His own. In the opening of the gospel when the Lord comes upon the scene, you will remember how John the Baptist looked upon Him as He walked, and said, “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world”, chap 1: 29. It was no limited sphere of blessing that was going to be effected by the coming of Christ as the Lamb of God; it was not that He came to bring in blessing in a partial way. He came to take away the sin of the world in order that in the power of His sacrifice He might bring in a world of divine pleasure.
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Let us look for a moment now at the type of David in the Old Testament. David came in at a time when God’s earthly people were labouring under the hand of God governmentally; they had chosen a king for themselves.
Saul had been chosen according to man’s judgment, for his stature, human beauty, and for his greatness, but they suffered under their choice. The government of God had come upon them, and yet while God in government was searching their hearts because of their choice, the grace of Jehovah was seeking deliverance in another man. God’s grace was above His government, and is always so. In His faithfulness God must search the hearts of His people because of their choice of Saul, yet He had made provision for them in His own choice of David. The pride of man chose Saul, but those in distress and in debt appreciated David; those embittered in spirit or sorrowful gathered round him.
That is God’s way in Christ. It is figurative of the grace of God that has come to light in the Man Christ Jesus—the Son of the Father, the sent One of the Father. “The Father has sent the Son as Saviour of the world”, 1 John 4: 14.
Was it for a few that David was given? No; it was for all.
Was it only upon a section that the burden of Saul had come? No, it had oppressed and impoverished all. In John’s gospel we see the Lord as the Son of the Father, as the sent One of the Father to bring in blessing in the widest possible measure, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”, John 3: 16. David is but a feeble type of Christ, yet the illustration is most appealing to our hearts. Every soul that was added to David was added to him because of the value of David himself. Before there was a kingdom in power, and even while Saul was still king on the throne, their hearts found the true kingdom in David. Before ever his throne was established, they found love, liberty, and peace in David himself. We find all these things in Christ. How infinitely we have been supplied by God in Christ. We have had relief for the heart, relief for the 103
conscience, joy in the power of the Spirit, peace to the mind, and freedom from fear: “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind”, 2
Tim 1: 7. What wonderful things we have received in the Person of Christ!
But again one makes the inquiry, What is He in His own Person to our hearts? What is He to us? That in us, whether collectively or individually, which is most precious to divine Persons is what Christ as the Son of the Father is to us. “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world”, John 1: 29. Every heart that followed David must have followed on that line. They saw in him the power of suffering love that must fill the sphere, cleared by his power in suffering, with every element of divine goodness.
“Behold the Lamb of God! And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus”, v 36, 37. They followed a Person because of His preciousness, and when the Lord knew that they were following Him, He said, “What seek ye?”
Do you think He did not know? Was He not omniscient?
He well knew, as much as He knew when Nathanael was under the fig tree; He was as completely Master of the situation with these two as with Nathanael. Why did He inquire? Because His heart was set upon being the centre of their affections. “They said ... Master, where dwellest thou? He saith unto them, Come and see. They came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that day”. He would have them follow Him, v 39.
Does that not explain to us what most of us have felt?
We have had knowledge, we have had the scope of the scriptures, yet at times when we have inquired into our own hearts in private, we have had to confess that much that we knew we did not enjoy, and for the simple reason that we had not followed the Lord into it. You will enjoy everything in divine knowledge that you have followed the Lord into. If it be knowledge that has carried the mind onward, then the mind may be far ahead of the affections, but the heart 104
follows a person. It is wonderful and yet so simple. When God made man at the outset, He made him with affections that would never be satisfied without a personal centre.
Things were never intended to hold the heart of man apart from God as a centre. God never intended man’s heart to be held by any single item that had not Christ as the centre.
Where is Christ with us? You say, we are in a mixed condition. I know we are, but we need not be in a confused condition. We are in a mixed condition in the sense that we carry with us a heart that, apart from the operations of the Holy Spirit in us, would ever turn on a line adverse to the pleasure of Christ and our own good. We get a touching word in the epistle to the Ephesians: “that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”, Eph 3: 17. There is no complexity there, no confusion.
I would suggest this line of inquiry as to how our hearts are moved in regard to Christ. I am not speaking now so much on the line of privilege as on the line of the Lord’s grace to our hearts. There is the privilege side.
Hearts that learn the Lord in privilege must follow Him in testing. The Spirit of God, even in His ministry, does not always operate sovereignly. Our affections need to be prepared for His ministry. He ministers Christ to affections that are centred upon Him for His own sake, hence one would seek to indicate the line upon which our souls may travel individually and as walking together.
I know of nothing so encouraging to a young heart as the sense of being under the Lord’s personal knowledge, care and interest. Whether young or old, there may come a feeling of formality and a sense that our souls are not making progress. But the youngest may have a sense of the Lord’s personal interest and care. He cares how we stand in our affections. I would say to the youngest who loves the Lord, you will never conceive the measure of the Lord’s desire to be supreme in your affections. It is not because of what you are, but He seeks a great place in your heart. It 105
is not that He wishes to be supreme so that you can be much in testimony; you can be much in testimony when Christ is supreme, but He wishes to be supreme, because the assembly is His supreme possession. He has suffered on the line of testing; He has suffered rejection. “Disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious”, 1 Pet 2: 4.
“Unto you therefore which believe, he is precious”, v 7. He is supreme to the heart of God, and God would extend to our hearts the peace and joy of His supremacy.
David was supreme. You may say, He was not so at the first, but the truth is he was so from the moment that Goliath fell before him, but not wholly so to Jonathan, as after results solemnly proved. The time of his public glory was another matter. So many do not understand the Lord’s supremacy. They connect it with the future; they look forward with genuine desire, which one would not undervalue, to the moment when He will be publicly supreme. But He is to be paramount now. Far better have Christ supreme in your heart in a day when He is disallowed of men, than to wait until the day of His glory. It is now that He is finding His place with us. Our affections are being enlarged now. Discipline helps us. Our trials and adversities help us, if we learn that they are on account of the value we set on Him. Jonathan desired to make a place for David in the system of Saul, but God had decreed in regard of that system that it was all to perish and pass away. God had chosen His man. He had brought in one whose supremacy had been declared when Goliath fell before him, when he took the sword of the giant and cut off his head. He was supreme as the one who had power over death. The supremacy of Christ is in His own Person; He is peerless; there can be no rival to Him. Jonathan was misguided. He would have persuaded David that Saul was not seeking his hurt, but David knew that was not so. As we have read, he said, “There is but a step between me and death”, 1 Sam 20: 3. That word should have gone right through to the very depths of Jonathan’s heart and brought 106
him out. Jonathan should have gone out, and made one man’s room in the world that hated David. There may be a heart here to-night tested as to Christ, and labouring in the vain hope that they can bring Christ into something that makes little of Him. How much better to step out for Christ’s sake, and leave one man’s room in that which is making little of Him, and peradventure others may follow.
I do not want to put into scripture what is not there, but have you ever considered what possibly might have arisen in regard of Jonathan’s brethren had he stepped out after David? You may say, We cannot tell. No; but this I can tell, that Jonathan should have stepped out after David, and if that be true, I am not unwarranted in thinking of what might have happened had he done so in the simplicity and power of David’s attractiveness and followed him.
Jonathan had said to David, “Whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do it for thee”, v 4. What did David’s soul desire most? I believe he desired Jonathan personally. In John 17 we see how the Lord follows His own. We do not hear Him speak of their service, though we know He speaks of their word; He speaks of those who would believe on Him through their word, but that chapter is engaged with the disciples personally. Had it been a question of man’s valuation of those persons, how small would have been their value. Wherein lay their value? That they loved Christ; in spite of all their weakness, their hearts were centred on Him.
I have no doubt that Jonathan loved David far more than he loved any one else. David himself said of Jonathan,
“Thy love to me was wonderful”, 2 Sam 1: 26. He loved David as his own soul, but what he lacked was in not loving him more than his own soul. A little more love would have brought him right out to David. He did not understand that with all his supposed power, he had no power to make a place for David in the system of Saul; the truth was it had no place for him; God was going to bring in another kingdom 107
around the man who was after His own heart. Had Jonathan only understood that David wanted him far more than anything he could have done for him, he would have turned his back upon everything, and followed David through all the testings and greater sorrows that David up to that time had not yet experienced, for David’s greatest testings came at the end just before Saul’s kingdom perished. Jonathan never expected that Saul’s kingdom would perish in the presence of the Philistines. But God had withdrawn His face from that system; it was all to perish and pass away because God’s man was rejected there.
“If any man serve me, let him follow me”, John 12: 26. I do not wish to make little of the possibilities of your service (I would assure you that I would make much of it; every heart that loves Christ would serve Him), but notice the last two words: “If any man serve me, let him follow me ”. Jonathan was quite willing to serve David, but did he follow him? There were two who might have followed David, but they did not. Michal might have followed him. She let him down from a window, and made an image and put it upon a pillow of goat’s hair; she preserved his life in that way. You may say, It was no place for a feeble Michal to follow David. Then it was no place for a feeble Abigail to go to him. If Michal did not follow him, Abigail did. Jonathan might have followed David. I would not say it was unfaithfulness on Jonathan’s part; I believe it was a misunderstanding of the whole situation, because he did not see that he was confronted with a system that would exclude David.
“Now is the judgment of this world; now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me”, John 12: 32. There never was, and never can be another object for any heart such as the object of a glorified Christ who has suffered to go where He is. Eternity will stand on the value of His 108
sufferings. When time is past and our limitations have all gone, we shall be able then, without a shadow on our spirits, to appreciate in a full way the value of the sufferings of Christ—the One who was the corn of wheat, who could have remained alone, but who went down into death that He might bring forth much fruit. Oh! that our affections were rightly secured for Christ!
What is being wrought into our souls by way of testing relative to the work of Christ is going to abide with us when time has gone? “If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am , there also shall my servant be”. What infinite sweetness! We need not assume to be prophetic in saying that if the Lord tarry, there will be greater testings for the saints than have ever come to them before. I am not thinking of martyrdom; I do not know what may come, but I feel that if the Lord tarry, we shall know what it is to be tested more than we have ever been tested before. Does your heart take alarm at that! Listen to the infinite sweetness of this: “If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there also shall my servant be”. Not only does the Lord pledge Himself to be with you where you are, but He pledges that every one who follows Him for His own sake will always be where He is.
I would refer again to the figure in David. In that last interview between David and Jonathan they wept together
“until David exceeded”, 1 Sam 20: 41. Jonathan’s tears were stayed first. David’s was the supreme sorrow—he overwept Jonathan. Jonathan might have followed David to Keilah when Saul tried to slay him, and when David in his sorrow turned to Jehovah and asked Him, “Will the men of Keilah deliver me up?” Jehovah said, “They will deliver thee up”, 1 Sam 23: 11, 12. Think of the treachery of that city which had been safeguarded by David, and yet those people were prepared to deliver David up to Saul! Let our hearts be simple and honest, where would we rather be, 109
speaking in a figure—with David in that testing or with Saul in the city? Surely we would rather be with David.
The apostle Paul says in writing to the Corinthians who had become careless in their walk, haughty in their hearts, knowing so much of the truth and yet so lacking in love, “I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed, took bread”, 1 Cor 11: 23. Whenever a heart inclines to trusting things here, the place of Christ as supreme in the affections is in jeopardy. “Where I am, there also shall my servant be”. Jonathan might have been in Keilah and seen the beauty of God’s man shine in a way he had never seen it shine before. He might have seen his glory too when Ziklag was destroyed by fire. He would have seen his power in a priestly way when he turned to God; he would have seen his endurance, and patience, and his kindness to the poor Egyptian who fell sick by the way and was forsaken by his master; he would have seen David in the hour of his supreme suffering had he gone out and followed him. There is much in Christ to hold our hearts. The Spirit of God Himself has come to declare the glory of Christ in the preciousness of His own Person.
I will refer now briefly to John 16. In verse 9 in connection with the Holy Spirit the Lord says, “And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment”, John 16: 8. I would call attention to the Lord’s own explanation of those words: “Of sin, because they believe not on me”. If Christ is to be supreme in our hearts, we must learn to turn away from things here not only because they are defiling, but because however good their outward character may be, they have no place for Christ. You know what it comes to in natural ties and affections; it is then that you begin to learn how much there is that is against Christ, and how deeply your heart may have to be searched in order that Christ may be supreme. How close it comes home to the soul in 110
connection with your links in nature—with those dear to you! There are obligations, and the Lord would give grace so that you might maintain all that is due to the persons involved in those ties. How it searches the heart to find in the links of nature, sin and unbelief! Then the Lord continues His further explanation, “of righteousness, because I go to my Father”. Why do we turn away from things here? If Christ is to be supreme in our affections we must turn away from things here because Christ is not here; He is with the Father. “Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged”. We must turn away from all that makes little of Christ. “I pray not for the world” (John 17: 9) the Lord says. In John 17 we get the Lord’s own sensibilities, and feelings, expressed in such a way that one feels one must draw near that scripture with unshod feet; you cannot approach it carelessly; it is such an unfolding of the tender desires of the Lord: “I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine. And all mine are thine, and thine are mine”, v 9, 10. Were we to speak to-night until we could speak no more, we could not add an iota as to the meaning and preciousness of those few words: “For they are thine, and thine are mine”. That explains all the Lord’s ministry, all His faithfulness, all His tender dealings with us. May the Lord help us so that we may be assured on this line!
As the Lord looks upon our hearts we need resort to no dissimulation, no covering; He knows us perfectly. May we say to the Lord, Lord, above all things, above all hopes, above all possessions, above all persons, Thou art the object of our hearts. We shall be with Him where He is, because we are His, and He would be with us now in the power of His own preciousness in the ministry of the Spirit, and He will never be less than supreme. Think of the infinite tenderness of the Lord! He bears with us, ministers to us, instructs us, and even rebukes us—“As many as I love , I rebuke and chasten” (Rev 3: 19)—but all is in view of His being supreme in our hearts.
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PERSONAL LINKS WITH THE LORD HIMSELF
Malachi 2: 11; 4: 4, 16-18
2 Corinthians 5: 14-16; 11: 1-11
In regard of these scriptures, possibly to all appearances unrelated, I trust the Lord will enable us to see their spiritual connection. One’s simple desire before the Lord at this time is to seek to indicate a little how we are privileged, not only to depend on what the Lord ministers in the way of help and care, but upon the Lord Himself.
Oftentimes we depend upon what we find amongst the saints, and I do not deprecate that, provided we are really dependent upon the Lord; but if we depend only on what we find when together, and if our hearts are not actively engaged in a spiritual way with the Lord Himself, we shall become formal in what we enjoy together. So I wish to present a few considerations in connection with this important matter, in order that we may raise with ourselves the question as to whether our links of spiritual joy and affection have been maintained with the Lord personally as He would desire.
There is a good deal that goes on in our hearts that others may know nothing at all about. We may become disappointed, for instance, without others knowing; we may become anxious, and the anxiety be known only to ourselves, and we may become proud, as I have proved, and yet attempt to appear otherwise. So you see it is quite possible for what is unworthy to have entered the heart, and for the spirit to be defiled, and thus the Holy Spirit be grieved with us, and yet our brethren not be aware of it; nevertheless all passes under the Lord’s eye, and is a matter of real concern. I am not careless, I trust, in respect of my brethren. Everything that is spiritually hurtful to me is spiritually hurtful to them. If I am careless as to my own conduct, motives, or objects, I am certainly careless as to the spiritual good of others. But while I should encourage 112
every one to take the utmost possible account of the exercises of their brethren, I would add this simple expression of opinion, and I trust it is a spiritual opinion, that with all deference to the exercises of our brethren, we should always be assured that our relations with the Lord are right. The opinions, the judgments of our brethren may be right, but if our links with the Lord are not right, and we take our guidance only by the exercises of our brethren, we miss the full spiritual good and gain that the Lord would have us to receive. So now we shall look at these scriptures together, and see how very peculiarly and preciously the person of the Lord Jesus is presented to us.
I referred to the passages from the book of Malachi, but it was not on my mind to speak about defilement. For that I might have gone to other scriptures in the Old Testament, some of them in their terms much more serious than those which are used in the book of Malachi. But defilement is not my subject, but rather the Person of the Lord Jesus in His grace to maintain us free from defilement.
But in order that we might be rightly dependent on the Lord, light is granted to us, light in the scriptures of truth, and light in the person of the Lord Jesus Himself, by which we can judge as to the real character of things. I read from the last book of the Old Testament, which presents in a very precious way the sweet process and power of recovery at a time when everything had become defiled. At your leisure you may read the book of Malachi, and you will find how very seriously everything had been corrupted by the people.
In their very offerings to Jehovah, instead of going zealously through their flocks in the appreciation of His goodness to them, and bringing therefrom the best to present to Him, they brought the lame and the sick and the blind—that which was defective. That was the result of their having become spiritually blind. Want of spiritual vision is one thing, but it is always the outcome of defilement; if the heart becomes corrupted as to its objects, spiritual vision is immediately affected; it may not be totally lost, but there are 113
defects in it that very seriously affect the soul. If we get the eye of the heart off Christ and on other objects, our spiritual vision becomes perverted.
So the state into which the beloved people of God had fallen in Malachi’s day was very serious indeed, and God was deeply grieved because of their sin and departure. But His heart had not changed; they were still as precious and as greatly beloved by Jehovah as ever, as He says elsewhere:
“I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn thee”, Jer 31: 3. His was a love that could not change by their defection, for it was founded typically on the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ; it was there it had its basis. The people had been brought to God on the basis of redemption, of divine righteousness and of holiness, so that the question of God’s faithfulness could never be raised; and they had been brought to God because He loved them, because He had set His heart upon working out, in and through them, the good pleasure of His will.
Now, that is what is true in Christianity; but as we look at things around us, we see that the holiness, the purity, and the perfection of it are gone. It is distressing indeed to the hearts of many of the Lord’s people to look out on the sphere where the name of Jesus is acknowledged, and to find there what is so defiling and dishonouring; and to many the recovery of truth to souls and souls to the truth must seem well-nigh impossible. But in Paul’s second epistle to Timothy, where he speaks of those naming the name of the Lord separating themselves from iniquity, he does not speak of coming into a path where things are enjoyed in diminished measure, or into a reduced inheritance, but he looks at them in connection with the faithfulness of God; “Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure”, he says, “having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity”, 2 Tim 2: 19. That 114
is the sealing of things on the line of divine faithfulness.
You might say, Well, if the Lord knoweth them that are His, that is all right; but if a link of heart with the Lord Himself begins to work in power in the soul, then necessarily it must view things from the standpoint of His pleasure.
So we find in 2 Timothy the great question raised of our link with the Lord Jesus. What an encouragement to the heart that loves the Lord in a day of weakness to know that “the foundation of God standeth sure”. You may say, What about the structure? God’s structure is a spiritual structure, and there is no hindrance to prevent His having His pleasure there; and if we are prepared to walk according to the truth of God, we shall be supported along that line.
Therefore souls are found walking together. Do you find them following ecclesiastical opinions or mere doctrines?
You find them following the doctrines of divine truth, but not the doctrines of divine truth as treasured up unalterably in the blessed living Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. The principles of that epistle are unalterably connected with the person of the Lord Jesus. To follow opinions is disastrous; were the opinions ever so scriptural, they would fail us, and we should fail them. But, beloved, we are following a Person, a Person who leads. It is a touching feature in Mark’s gospel, where the Lord is set forth in all His perfection, in His purity, and in His unblemished service to the Father, that when you come to the mount of transfiguration the Lord leads His own: “Jesus taketh ...
Peter, and James, and John, and leadeth them up into an high mountain”, Mark 9: 2.
It was not an act of power or the sovereignty of His own selection as in Matthew. In that gospel when they got to the mountain top they saw His divine glory shining out: