THE PERFECT SERVANT
(Continued)
Exodus 4: 22, 23; Mark 1: 1; 16: 19, 20
There is another point: in His manhood He was morally with God; as a Servant He was so. How very wonderful it is!
The very first sphere of His service was in that synagogue where the scriptures were read every sabbath day; the letter that kills was there, and the man with the unclean spirit passed muster every sabbath day. The Son of God came where he was, and there was exposure. He brought such power with Him, that the man who passed muster with the people, who had the letter, was so exposed that he cried out, “what have we to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth?”, Mark 1: 24
What we want to cultivate is to be with God. The beloved apostle of whom we have spoken presents it very beautifully at Philippi. He was very grand there. He finds only a few women going to pray: he had discernment to see where God was, with the excellent of the earth. “By a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women”, Acts 16: 18. All true service is carried out in patience, and patience is the proof of power. He knew where God was and where Satan was. He refused Satanic influence, and he went with the praying women because God was with them.
How we lack in this, and it proves our condition: we ought to be exercised about it. You must answer to the testimony morally yourself, it must be so. It is difficult to speak of it, because one feels how faulty one is oneself; still one speaks of it with the desire that there may be with us such personal, close, secret exercise, that we are answering ourselves to what we say.
The spring of His service lay in conscious sonship in communion with His Father, He was never fevered in His service. How wonderful to see Him there! He went out and prayed all night. Peter was a feverish man; he loved the Lord, and his blessed Lord was sought after. It gratified his heart that his Master was sought after - “All men seek for thee”: ‘Why are You out here in this solitude when all seek Thee?’ The blessed Lord said, “Let us go into the next towns”, Mark 1: 37. He was not elated by success, nor depressed by non-success. How perfect He was in it all!
Someone has said that the blessed Lord was never flattered into a wrong judgment, and never slighted into a wrong judgment. He was superior to flattery and superior to slight: He was absolutely with God. How often we are flattered into a wrong judgment or slighted into a wrong judgment. He never was, He was absolutely perfect. His service was perfect because it was the result of the communion in which He dwelt.
Then another thing, He looked up to heaven. The gospel closes for us with our headquarters. The true servant's headquarters are in heaven, and the gate of heaven is found in the assembly; that is very important.
The heavens were opened to Him in a way they could not be opened to us; the heavens are open to us, and He is our Object in heaven. That is realised in the assembly; keep that in mind. There is such a thing as personal communion and personal direction, but to know the mind of the Lord you must come into the assembly. You will get your subjects and your direction when you are with the saints, as you will not get them in your closet.
Pardon me if I speak of myself. I once went to a place, I felt I ought to go, and I did not know the line I was to take there. I thought, I will go and break bread there, and I will look to the Lord to indicate the line I am to take during the visit. The whole line was mapped out for me in the morning meeting.
I had got half way through it when an aged brother came to me and said, ‘Some of us had private prayer before you came, that you should take the line you have taken’. I only refer to that because I feel the deep importance of it.
We cannot be independent in such a thing as this. A man who goes on his own line independent of the assembly will come to grief. We are to be subject to each other. If a man is called to a certain line of service, he must keep in mind that he belongs to the assembly, and he is amenable to the discipline of the assembly.
My third point, then, is that heaven is our headquarters, and the gate of heaven is found in the assembly, as is shown in Acts 13. The Holy Ghost said, “Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them”, v 2. That is a happy principle there.
We are in days of ruin, but we have to keep to these things. If we want to be in the leading of the Spirit we must acknowledge these principles. Barnabas and Saul were sent out from the assembly.
I believe in the laying on of hands. I do not believe in a man getting up and disregarding his brethren; not that he is to be guided by his brethren, but he has to be confirmed, and confirmation is given in the assembly.
Then there is another thing: we must have private victories. The Lord was with Satan and the wild beasts at the beginning of this gospel. All public triumphs follow private victories. When David came out he knew the strength of Jehovah with the lion and the bear. Here is your drill ground, here you go through your discipline. We have to go through things with God in secret history before we can be distinguished publicly.
I think there would be unfolding of gift in the assembly, as the candlestick teaches us. The branch is dependence, the knob is distinctness, and the flower unfolding. There must be dependence on Him, and then there is distinctness.
We are all servants, the sisters too. It says, Phoebe was a servant of the assembly at Cenchrea, and there are others spoken of as helpers with the apostle. We are all called - to be servants; some may have a special line. There would be distinctness, some taking one line and others another.
We think too much of preaching. I would like to see brethren so exercised in the assembly that they may take lines of service which would commend themselves to the brethren. And let us wait on what we are called to do, and there will be the unfolding of it.
God orders our circumstances; He knows when we are born, and He knows what He has for us to do. Sometimes we get irritated by everyday life, and want to work it off, but you may depend upon it, it is your drill ground.
Peter was fishing and John was mending. The Lord said to Peter, You come from your fishing, and to John, You come from your mending. They had to leave father, and brethren, and boats.
It indicates the line of service the Lord was going to bring them into. John always mends the net; his ministry helps to keep up your communion.
God ordered the way of the Apostle Paul. He says, “who separated me from my mother's womb”, Gal 1: 15. And God is over all your circumstances too. God has His eye upon us for a certain purpose, and it is a very great thing to be exercised with regard to it, and to find it out.
May the Lord in His great goodness be pleased to bless these remarks, and may we not forget the first principle, from which everything takes its character, that every bit of true service is rendered in conscious sonship, and has its blessed spring in these words, “I love”. Amen.
Be Thou the Object bright and fair
To fill and satisfy the heart;
Our hope to meet Thee in the air,
And nevermore from Thee to part :
That we may undistracted be
To follow, serve, and wait for Thee.
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From ‘The Believer’s Friend’, 1919