READINGS ON THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS, CHAPTER 11
READINGS ON THE FIRST EPISTLE TO THE CORINTHIANS, CHAPTER 11
You were speaking yesterday of many not apprehending the Lord’s supper in relation to the assembly; what is the relation of the Supper to the assembly?
Well, I think the relation of the Supper to the assembly, is really the relation of the Lord to the assembly. I thought the prayer this morning expressed what we are called to — the sanctuary — and to come to the sanctuary we must come the right way. Chapter 10 is a crucial point; it is where the great bulk of saints fall in the wilderness, that is, they never come to the sanctuary. Chapter 10 is brought in for deliverance, and you do not come to the sanctuary except in deliverance. A fleshly man may claim liberty, but is all the time in the most abject bondage himself.
Then by deliverance you mean complete deliverance from the first man?
I think from anything and everything in which there is the recognition of the principles of this world; that is the idea of chapter 10. Of course evil had the form of idolatry then; it is not exactly that now, but the great idea is deliverance from the world, from all that in which the power of Satan is recognised.
Was all that was opposed to them left behind — speaking typically — at the Red Sea?
[p. 81] Yes, that is what chapter 10 brings in; the real way of freedom is fellowship in the Lord’s death, it is very much akin to John 6, eating the flesh and drinking the blood of the Son of man, only that in 1 Corinthians to the idea is founded on a recognised act of fellowship. A great many take the Supper, but they take it individually, not in connection with the assembly. The great point to which we come in chapter it is the convening of the assembly. It was very well expressed in prayer as coming to the sanctuary. The Lord’s supper lies at the threshold.
What is the sanctuary?
The sanctuary is the assembly come together with the Lord in His place. The Lord’s supper is the way into it. It is the introductory act into the assembly. I look upon the Lord’s supper as being the rallying point of the assembly normally; it is not as in chapter 5, the sounding of an alarm. The Lord’s supper brings the assembly together normally.
We need to appropriate His death in order to be in company with Him outside this world.
People do not touch the assembly if they do not break free from everything here, the great world system.
Is not chapter 8:6 important for us? “To us there is one God” (1 Corinthians 8:6), etc.
Quite so, you do not recognise any other. The point for us is, there is only one; it is most important that in every detail we refuse any recognition of the power of the god of this world.
If you recognise the flesh you recognise the prince of this world. If the flesh is allowed it recognises him, if you recognise the world you recognise its prince; it is of all importance to see that the death of Christ has altered the aspect of everything here. Christ has been presented to the world and rejected, and Satan has definitely now the place of the god and prince of this world. The very same thing which closes up [p. 82] what we have escaped from, opens the door into all we have come into according to God’s purpose.
I think there has been a little misunderstanding as to the breaking of bread — the meeting has been limited to that. There has been the getting the breaking of bread over early and then two or three speaking, so that the character of the meeting has been lowered instead of its going on into worship.
You will find that the Lord’s supper properly apprehended and carried out, has the effect of putting saints in touch with Christ and with one another. In assembling together, each coming from his engagement and home, saints are not for the moment free in spirit to enter into what is proper to the assembly, but they sit down for a while and partake of the Lord’s supper, and so get in touch with Christ and with one another; they are thus brought into the spirit and tone of the assembly, and are as different as possible in mind and spirit from what they were at first.
You mean that thus after the breaking of bread saints rise up spiritually, not drop down; but I dare say you have known ministry taking place directly after.
It only shows how little power there is for worship. We too often go through the meeting without getting into the sanctuary at all?
It is a great thing to see the right way; but I think I have entire sympathy with a brother well known, in the way in which he presses deliverance. If you come to know much of people you see that is the crucial point. If they do not accept the death of Christ as the way of deliverance, they do not enter into the sanctuary; that is the secret of there being so little worship; people are not free.
It is one thing to talk about it and another thing to be in it.
That is as good a thing as has been said. If you are in a scene where Satan has immense power, it is not [p. 83] an easy thing to be free, there are so many subtle things with which you are mixed up.
Holding the doctrine is not being delivered; that by itself is a poor thing.
The heart is in a new region if there is deliverance. And there will not be deliverance unless the heart is there. The doctrine shows the ground on which it can be had. In the Old Testament they had no real claim or ground laid for it, now you have.
The ground being thus laid, why is it souls do not enter into it?
They are not eager enough. If really the sanctuary were more tasted there would be more eagerness after it. The apostle puts the wisdom of God before them as a kind of bait. There are wonderful things to be unfolded to you, but you are so hampered the difficulty is not in unfolding them but in yourselves. I do not know whether you have ever spoken to an audience not in sympathy with you; you feel shut up. It makes all the difference when your audience is in sympathy.
Deliverance is not quite a thing once for all, is it? It has to be maintained. John 6 shows that eating Christ’s flesh and drinking His blood is habitual. There is a time when the soul enters upon that ground, but then it has to be maintained in the soul. When a person is converted he is set free from bondage to sin in God’s sovereign grace; that is initial, then his deliverance has to be maintained, that is why Romans 6 comes in.
I suppose it corresponds to getting through the Red Sea, they had deliverance in a way?
Then comes the important point, how it is to be maintained. You are not taken out of the scene of sin; but how, being in a scene of sin, you can be kept free from it. The Israelites ought to have sung the song of deliverance all the way along, they were not under the power of sin when singing that song. We may say they did not enter into deliverance experimentally [p. 84] until the brazen serpent; speaking of it as a type.
Deliverance is not maintained without continual surrender.
The great thing is that you are in concert with Christ’s death. He has come into death, and that brings you into company with Him. He has come into death and entirely changed its character. You desire to be in concert with His death, death was your true place down here, as things were. When Christ came into death, He only came into man’s true place. Man was already in death. Christ’s death did not make men dead, it proved they were dead, but His coming into death has altered its whole character, and every right-minded saint would say, I would like to be in concert with His death. That is the fellowship of His death; and it meets us at every turn, every temptation is to make us swerve from it. There is a good passage in Proverbs, “When thou sittest to eat with a ruler, consider diligently what is before thee: and put a knife to thy throat, if thou be a man given to appetite. Be not desirous of his dainties: for they are deceitful meat”, Proverbs 23:2. You have to stick to your line, to what is before you and to take care of the ruler’s dainty meats. His effort is to divert you by them; put a knife to your throat, you are in the way of temptation. Having a purpose in view you have to consider what is before you, that is, your purpose, for he knows how to lure you. Where is the man not given to appetite? “They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh”, Galatians 5:24. I do not think it is sufficiently seen that when a person really has taken the Lord’s supper, he has accepted the place of death. Many take the Supper merely as individuals, though in remembrance of Christ. I used to myself, and you can go on at the same time with many things in which there is the acknowledgment of the prince of this world.
Why is there the introduction of the relative place [p. 85] of the man and woman, between chapter 10 and chapter 11?
I think the apostle is coming on to the ground of devotional exercises, and takes up that point in connection with Christ the Head of every man. He is not setting aside the order of God that man is the head of the woman; God has not set aside that, and the woman has to accept it. The assembly does not come in until verse 17. The first part of the chapter does not refer to the assembly.
I think we must take up these four chapters in conjunction, that is chapters 11-14. I venture to say one word with regard to chapter it, that it brings in the Head, the real bond of unity. I think it gives the Lord His own proper place of pre-eminence: the Supper gives Him His proper place in the pre-eminence of love; the Supper comes before us as the expression of His love, and everybody would recognise His pre-eminence in love. He said, as it were, in establishing it, My love is not abated one bit; I cannot remain in your company, but I do something greater, I give Myself for you. When you come to the Supper you recognise the proper pre-eminence of the Head. He is pre-eminent in love.
Does it carry authority with it?
No, I do not think that is the idea.
The absent One has shown His love.
Yes, but still He is present: the first time the Supper was taken He was present; the first time was on the night of His betrayal.
You were speaking of the traitor; it was immediately after the going out of Judas that these words were spoken.
Yes, but that is another account, you do not get the Supper brought in in John’s gospel. All association with Christ after the flesh was broken up. At the first there was a complete company, that is twelve, but after the treachery of Judas there was an end of that [p. 86] association morally, the whole company was affected. All possibility of association on that ground was over. Christ would give Himself for them. He shows that His love was unabated. He would do even better than remain with them, He would give Himself for them.
Does ‘Remember Me’ connect itself with the sufferings at all?
It is calling Him to mind.
You call Him to mind being absent, He is absent and you remember Him.
Yes, but the instant you call Him to mind, you call Him to mind as a living One. It is the Person. The bread and the wine set before us death accomplished, not accomplishing. One would be slow to make limitations to prevent the heart travelling over all His sorrows, but we must have the heart set in the right direction.
We call Him to remembrance who accomplished redemption; but He is called to mind in that which is the expression of His love to the assembly. We remember Him as those who are in the fruit of His death. We are all conscious of the immensity of that which has been given for us, but who can enter into it? The perfection under the eye of God of the living Christ down here is that which has been given for us.
Is it not in the sense of His love for us, not as giving Himself for sin?
It is Himself pre-eminent but pre-eminent in love. I think anyone can take up His death in its symbols, but I do not want it as a mere fact. I want to get behind the fact, and when I do I find love, and that is Himself. The Lord’s supper brings the saints into the sense of being in His company. It is not a question of debts paid or of circumstances gone through, but He gave Himself.
Is it what He is to the Father we think about?
[p. 87] You must know what He is to yourself first, then you may be led into something further.
It is very important that much that has prevailed amongst us should be avoided, we have had many times first an hour of open meeting, and then reaching the point for which we are gathered.
I think we are getting out of it, the danger will now be the other extreme.
I do not know whether the end for which we are gathered is always reached; it seems to me that the sense of being really of His company is hardly known at all.
There are two things by which we are hampered, one is the state of the whole church, and you cannot help being affected by it, and another is, that in the hymns we have a collection, many of which were written by people who had very little light, pious men but with little light, and hymns are a great expression of where people are, hymns very often throw the meeting back.
The praise and worship greatly depend upon individual state. If you can affect the state of saints you can affect their worship. People do not see the place and meaning of the Supper, if they did they would reach it early in the meeting; of course, it assumes a spiritual state, at any rate in those who take part. There are a vast number who have a certain sense of what is right, they may not be intelligent, but they get the benefit of what passes. I do not like to see the breaking of bread forced on, for one great thing in the meeting is consideration of others. Saints come together, and many from under considerable pressure, it may be very easy for you and me to get to the meeting in time and free, but there are a large number not so situated, and you have to give them a little time. It says, “Tarry one for another”, 1 Corinthians 11:33. Chapter 13 would put that all right. You may say eleven o’clock is late to come together, but many are up late on the Saturday [p. 88] night, under great pressure in shops, and then there are mothers of families, nurses up all night, etc.
Chapter it gives us the Head, and chapter 12 the body; that which is here in the power of the Spirit. There are two things in chapter 12: the manifestation of the Spirit and the one body. “Head of every man” (1 Corinthians 11:3) in the beginning of chapter 11 is wider than “Head of the body”, Colossians 1:18; it is the place which Christ has as last Adam. The idea of headship is pre-eminence. “That in all things he might have the pre-eminence”, Colossians 1:18. He claims the pre-eminence of the body not in the way of authority, but in the way of love, it is the sort of pre-eminence no person could resist; you cannot resist the pre-eminence of love.
Do you think that is the force of headship in Colossians?
Yes. Chapter 12 is brought in to check the tendency to clericalism. The state of things at Corinth was that they were rallying round teachers. It was not literally Paul and Apollos, but local teachers. The apostle brings in chapter 12 to show that in the sanctuary you cannot have clericalism, you cannot have pre-eminence in the body, that is in the Head: no member is pre-eminent, and everyone is indispensable. When you go to the assembly you should go like a blank sheet of paper, and not with any preconception or purpose of doing or saying anything. If a man is lecturing he is addressing people on his own responsibility, but he cannot take that place in the assembly. All those who are there have to see to it that they do not encourage confusion by hanging on the word of some favourite teacher, or else the Lord is not pre-eminent. There is no pre-eminence in the body; my head or my eye does not claim pre-eminence over my hand or my foot, and every member is indispensable.
Suppose a man lectures, is that as a member of the body?
If a man lectures it is not on the ground of the [p. 89] assembly, but on the ground of gift. The gift has its own proper sphere of exercise, and premeditation before an address is quite right.
Manifestation of the Spirit is not quite the same as gift.
Whatever form the manifestation takes, the great point is that it is to be for profit, not to make much of the man. What can we be in the presence of the living Christ? The source of the manifestation is the Spirit. The manifestations are in contrast with their formerly being led away to dumb idols. The manifestations may not be permanent, but that is as the Spirit sees fit?
What about gifts of healing?
The chapter takes up the manifestation of the Spirit in a very wide way. I think we have a little limited the truth in this chapter to the manifestations in the assembly when convened. It is the general effect of the Spirit’s presence. We have the light of it given to guide us when together, and if we do not act upon this light what light have we? We are now in a time of ruin, and how much we have to suffer because of it, no one can tell.
What is the force of the verse, “So also is the Christ”, 1 Corinthians 12:12?
I think the next verse explains it.
Does it mean the Head and the body?
It says, “For by one Spirit are we all baptised into one body”, 1 Corinthians 12:13. I doubt if this goes outside of what is in the baptism of the Spirit. There seems to be an analogy to the two sacraments, ‘baptism’ and ‘made to drink’, the latter referring to the cup; it does not go beyond that.
What is the force of drinking into one Spirit?
I think it is much greater than any mere outward bond, it is not merely the fact of being baptised by one Spirit into one body, but inwardly we have been made to drink into one Spirit. It is inseparable from the
[p. 90] Spirit, which forms us into one body. I think the apostle is referring to what is here in the power of the Spirit, and he uses the human body as an illustration of it.
You could not bring Christ into that?
I think I have heard you say that you do not get the Head in Corinthians?
Yes; but the baptism of the Spirit makes one body, one Spirit cannot make two bodies. It is really what is in the power of the Spirit and all in view of shutting man out so that he should have no prominence. There is nothing about the mystery here.
What relation have the gifts to the body?
The gifts are in the church: I used to think that they were in the body, but Scripture is wiser; they are in view of the edifying of the body, but we read: “Ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular” (1 Corinthians 12:27), then immediately: “God hath set some in the church” (1 Corinthians 12:28) not the body. The fact is the Corinthians were not in a condition to enter into the truth of the mystery.
Chapter 13 is most important, it is the measure of each one in the assembly, it shows how a man is properly measured, it is how you take his height, his spiritual calibre.
Has every christian love, in some degree?
Not every professing christian; if you have not love you are nothing. I venture to say that what fits a man for the assembly is not the possession of the Spirit, but the work of the Spirit forming him in the divine nature. That is love. It is not gift or knowledge. This is one of the most lovely chapters in the Bible; everything is corrected by love, every tendency of the flesh to make much of itself or offend others; love is the great corrective, it practically displaces self. If we have not love, the gifts are evils, they do harm to one’s self. If you have not love you are nothing, it is a poor thing to be nothing.
[p. 91] Is that why chapter 13 comes between chapters it and 14?
Yes. The apostle’s way was to correct things not in righteousness but in love. You have to look after yourself. I have given up correcting others, I have enough to do to look after myself. One could not be in the assembly properly, that is efficient for it, except according to chapter 13 formed in the divine nature; one is not otherwise suitable for Christ or for the saints. The Corinthians were making much of gifts and so of themselves. That is the force of the word in Romans. “If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his”, Romans 8:9. The Spirit really is love. This chapter is brought in here in connection with gifts between chapter 12 and the carrying out of the principles in chapter 14. After all, a man may get up and give an address, but it is love that gives unction to it. It is not only what a man does but how he does it, as we see in Romans 12:8, “He that giveth, let him do it with simplicity; he that ruleth, with diligence; he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness”. What marked the Lord was the way He did things, not simply the things He did but how He did them. The fact is that everything in Him was divinely perfect, and that is where love comes in.
Love is the uniting bond of perfectness.
Yes, that is it. Love abides, all else passes away; that is intelligible because it is the divine nature. You grow into it in the assembly. It is an interesting and important point to see that chapter 13 is brought in that you may learn your proper place in the assembly. I very much doubt whether a saint shut up entirely alone would get on much. I do not think there would be much growth, it would be retarded by the isolation. Growth comes in, not simply by being in contact with the Lord, but also with one another, by being in the sanctuary where Christ is, and there we come in touch with one another. He has connected us not [p. 92] only with Himself but with the home of love where He is. The assembly is the home of divine affections down here before you have the home up there. “We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren”, 1 John 3:14. One grows in that home.
In the assembly gathered together?
Yes, that is where you find it, but I do not think the assembly ought, in a sense, ever to be apart; there is only one assembly meeting, and it ought to go on all the week long, if it were possible, which it is not down here.
When does it terminate?
The first day of the week we begin again, that is God’s order. We shall have a long first day of the week in heaven.
That will be the eighth day.
The state of the assembly is the state of the persons composing it; we ought to be individually in touch with the Lord and with His love. We must realise the love of the Lord before we can touch the assembly.
Yes, that is where the Supper comes in. Chapter 13 is intensely individual and subjective. I have been greatly struck by the saying of another: ‘What is presented to you in testimony becomes the power of life in you’. The way in which God makes Himself known becomes the power of life in you. We see it in the case of Paul, the revelation to him became the power of life in him. Light becomes life in us. That is what I understand by the word being living and powerful, it is living in the saints.
It is being perfect as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
You have the light of your Father, and that is the result of it. The Holy Spirit works in that way; He makes it life in us.
Is not the word living in itself apart from the work in us?
The word of God is the revelation of God, and the [p. 93] revelation of God is life in our souls; it is in the saints that it is living, if you take the Bible it is the letter. Christ is the expression of God to us. I do not know a surer verse than “Whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected”, 1 John 2:5.
Will you say a little more about only one assembly meeting?
The assembly is convened by the Lord’s supper, it is the normal rallying point, you come to that once a week. No other meeting of the assembly is apart from that, it is a continuation of it, but it must be really a meeting of the assembly. J.N.D. refused the idea that a prayer meeting was a meeting of the assembly; as a matter of fact I do not know that I should wish it otherwise. A prayer meeting brings together those who have at heart the burden of things. I would rather have it on that footing. If you have got the whole company together, unless they all felt the burden of things, you would not be quite so free. There are often special and peculiar things to bring before the Lord.
If the assembly comes together during the week it is important to keep the link with the ‘first day’ meeting, to really view it as a continuation of the Lord’s day morning.
I do not think we ought to exercise discipline without a special calling together of the assembly.
As to the prayer meeting, it ought to have a special character, and not be with a view to pray for everything. It is on the footing of Matthew 18:19. “If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask”. I think there ought to be a special meeting of the assembly for discipline, that is what the apostle calls for. No one can call an assembly meeting; it is not just for one to do it, it is called on adequate testimony, and for that you must have two or three.
To connect discipline with the Lord’s supper, seems to me to mar the Lord’s supper. It is more an alarm; the Lord is virtually saying, There is sin amongst you, and I will not go on with you, if you do not put it out.
In chapter 14 you get the height of the assembly, God is recognised as being there. In chapter 13 you have the measure of each one, but what comes out here is, that a man coming in ought to be so affected by what he sees, everything so completely exposed, that he is compelled to own that God is there.
That man is supposed to be an unbeliever.
Yes, but I think an unbeliever under exercise. It is not likely a man not under exercise would come in. He was capable of being affected, and he is compelled to own that God is there. That is the result of prophesying. It was in the presence of God and in the power of the Spirit. Where the Lord is, there God is. If you have the Lord, you have Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You cannot separate divine Persons. “In him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily”, Colossians 2:9. It is that which makes up the sanctuary. “Ye are the temple of God”, 1 Corinthians 3:16.
God is there, you are the temple of God. Where the Spirit is God is, the Spirit is prominent in chapter 14. Everything is regulated by the Spirit down here. In the sanctuary God is known. The Spirit is the great regulating power; you get no miracles now, because the Spirit does not see fit to give them.
What is verse 26? What sort of a meeting have you in this chapter?
It is the continuation of chapter 11 only for edification, whatever the Lord might lead to. There is no such thing as revelation now, but the principles of the assembly hold good for us; if you do not act upon the principle given here, you have no light at all, you might as well have minister and people.
[p. 95] In Acts 5 it is plain that Ananias and Sapphira had lied unto God and not unto men; the presence of God was so real in the assembly.
I do not know at all whether we have any sense of the greatness of the sanctuary. The Holy Spirit is always here, but that does not give you exactly the idea of the sanctuary.
Do you think what you say goes further that Matthew 18?
The Lord gives that to two or three: of course it is true for the assembly, but specially given to the smallest possible number.
Does verse 26 sanction open meetings? What about those meetings we have at holiday times?
I should call them meetings to help and edify the saints.
You act on the ground of chapter 14, do you not?
I do not know, but I think that what we call open meetings have been made a bad use of, quite a refuge of radicalism; that is what I have seen sometimes. I do not think we could regard open meetings as assembly meetings. I judge they are usually arranged so as to afford an opportunity for two or three to speak instead of one to lecture. In coming together to read Scripture, as we are now, there is no restriction as to liberty, we speak freely to one another, which of course we should not do if we were in the recognition of the Lord in the midst; when that is the case, I should not like to see one brother speaking to another.
You mean then that we should sustain the meeting through the week, and if for necessary things we have to go home, when we come together it would be a continuation?
What begins on Lord’s day morning goes on through the week.
What lines are open meetings upon?
[p. 96] I do not know.
Take the meetings at Q-, they are called open meetings.
They are open meetings in the sense that there is not the setting up any one person to speak. The meetings at Q- are not meetings of the saints at Q-. You could not regard them as assembly meetings.
Some think if you have a lecture it is an indication of serious degeneracy.
I think we must be guided by circumstances. You should think of what will best secure edification. I do not think for instance, last night where we had 400 persons present, and many among them strangers, that what is called an open meeting would have been appropriate.
What is meant by “Let the prophets speak two or three”, 1 Corinthians 14:29?
Saints do not seem to rise to the goodness of God. Few can take in more than what two or three give out. It is His consideration which would hinder more. Although some of our meetings are not assembly meetings, not quite on the ground of chapter 14, yet you have the light of this chapter to guide you. I remember four speakers at one meeting; the fourth did not speak to profit.
This gathering is not strictly an assembly meeting?
We have not strictly the assembly anywhere now, we can only at most act in the light of it. Matthew 18 is specially for prayer, not reading. The Lord gives us an outlet in that way and says, I will be in the midst. If you have matters of difficulty and come together I will be with you.
What about reading meetings?
Do you think we could talk to one another as we have this morning if the Lord were in the midst? I think the Lord is with us, but not as in the midst.
[p. 97] People, alas! do in our assembly meetings what they would not do in a church. I think there should be the fullest deference given to His presence.