THE WALL AND GATES OF THE CITY

James Alex Gardiner

Revelation 21: 11-14, 21, 22; 22: 14, 15; Proverbs 31: 23; 2 Samuel 19: 1-8

It is in mind to speak about the wall and the gates of the city and how this bears on the local assembly. The gates are universal and every local meeting is to administer according to the principles of the house of God. The great and high wall is in evidence in Peter as he says, “why has Satan filled thy heart that thou shouldest lie to the Holy Spirit … Why is that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord?”, Acts 5: 3, 9. Governmentally they die. I am not saying that that is going to happen today, but the great and high wall is to be in evidence amongst us. It is not a low dyke that you can jump over or sit upon; it represents the principles that belong to the house of God. You know they are there if they are there in function, and consequently you know that you are safe and comfortable, surrounded by this great and high wall. Of course if you did not have a wall you would not have gates, which they normally had upon the wall. What is in mind in the gates is access, access; into the greatest things. So it says, “having twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels”. This is for the day to come, although angelic support, angelic help, is continually towards us at the present time. The apostle says in the epistle to the Hebrews, “are they not all ministering spirits” – all of them – “sent out for service on account of those who shall inherit salvation?”, Heb 1: 14. We do not really realise and perhaps we may not believe the greatness of what God has surrounded us with in the protection and development of this family. We come, amongst other things, to the universal gathering; that is a very wonderful matter. Then on the gates are the names of the twelve sons of Israel. I am sure the apostle carried this in his affections when he was giving testimony as to his conversion, speaking as to the twelve tribes serving day and night. We need to carry these thoughts of God with us; they are proper to the family. You see the great mediatorial system here in the assembly and the closeness of our links with Jerusalem that is upon the earth and the mediatorial system where the diffusion of divine light and love is so very evidently manifest.

It goes on to tell us that on the east there are three gates, and on the north three gates, and on the south three gates and on the west three gates; all these gates would be the same. And in the next verse we read there are the names of the twelve tribes. I suppose in a way that is the nearest we come to Paul in the city as it is manifest here. But you think of the universality of the gates; the universality of the administration. One gate is not different from another gate. In the function of the gates there is a manifestation of the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace – how blessed that is. Your gate where you come from is not to be any different from the gate where I come from. The character of administration is to be the same in every gate because it is the working out of love, it is the working out of the divine nature. The devil is doing his very best to stop the functions of the gates; to introduce principles that I can only say are characteristic of Bethesda. There is the east gate, the north gate, the south gate and the west gate. You say, well in my gate this is what we do. Is it in accord with the principles of God’s house? Is my gate in accord with the principles of God’s house? You say, well, it is all right, that is what you do, and you go ahead and do it. That is open, you know, that is not the house of God. How much help we need in this, beloved.

See that great and high wall. We cannot be assembly persons if we are not kingdom persons; it will not work. So the gates, each gate is a pearl. There is the standard, the pearl. I do not have to refer to Matthew 13 for the brethren to know what the pearl is; the merchant came seeking beautiful pearls. Think of the beauty of the assembly administration as heaven looks on and sees love operating in its divine ways to enhance the glory of what has come out in the revelation of God. Beloved, is that the standard in my meeting, is my gate a pearl? This is important and sobering and we need to be before the Lord about it. We were in Toronto a few months ago and a brother said to me, it seems to me that there is a different standard for some places than others. I tell you there is no different standard. The standard remains. The truth of the assembly, the light of the assembly remains and the function of it is to be in the gate. This is not only the care meeting; we may think it is, but it is not. We come to the opening up of the truth in the readings, for instance, today, the gate was in function, the brethren were trading, that is the gate, and if anything comes up that is not in accord it is looked into. The evaluation of it is thought about. I remember Mr Lyon saying we take stock and we may have to write down some of the stock; that is true. It is important that the idea of the pearl marks the gate, the light and truth and glory of the assembly, because Christ has sold all that He had, the Merchant sold all that He had, He reserved nothing. And there is the pearl, it is complete, and beautiful. It is a wholly divine entity, the assembly from that point of view, it needs no adjustment, it needs no working on. The treasure does; take the treasure out of a field, the gospel, we need to get cleaned up and the gospel does that. But the pearl is a wholly divine entity and that is to characterise the administration in the assembly. Then somebody will say we are not the assembly. We have heard all this before and nobody claims to be the assembly, but as having been brought into the light of the truth in these days of recovery we operate and move in the light that is characterised by what is due to Christ and due to the assembly.

How important this is because the next section I read has to do with our robes. I link this with sonship in my own mind. “Blessed are they that wash their robes”. I remember Mr. McCallum saying we say we need to lay hold of sonship; he said, why not let sonship lay hold of us and move in the light and glory of it. That is the robe, the best robe, it comes out in Luke 15; there is the Father’s house, there is the family, there is the enjoyment, there is the merrymaking, the dancing and testimony to it. There is the unity of the Spirit in that place in the uniting bond of peace, and we need to maintain that. You say the best robe does not need washing, does not need cleaning up. Of course it does not but we need cleaning up, we need to be maintained in freshness and vitality so that we prove our right and enjoy all that the best robe sets out. We go happily into the city. Think of the street of gold:

Where the saints in glory thronging,

Where they feed on life’s blest Tree (Hymn 206)

Christ is the centre of your heart, He is the centre of your thoughts, the centre of your affections. It says of the street and of the river – in the midst is the tree of life on this side and that side (see Rev 22: 2). It has been said, Christ is as great in the hearts of the saints, He is as great in the heart of the assembly, as He is in the heart and mind of the Spirit. That is in the setting of Revelation. You go into that street of gold and throng with the brethren in the holy liberty and blessedness of sonship. They are as free as a bird not with just certain persons but with all the brethren. And the tree of life is producing fruit, every month fruit and the leaves of it, for the healing of the nations. I have linked this in my own mind, and the brethren can help me, with “he also who eats me” (John 6: 57) – “As the living Father has sent me and I live on account of the Father, he also who eats me shall live also on account of me”. How blessed that is! Think of the fruit of the tree of life – Christ the centre. This is all symbolic. Somebody once tried to make out that it was material, but it is all symbolic right up until the section in chapter 22. But how great and how wonderful it is. Well, I have to ask myself, what do I know about Christ as the Tree of Life? I have certainly had experience of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and I do not think there is anybody in this room who has not. Eve got things out of centre. She said it was the tree that is in the midst of the garden they were not to eat of. See how important it is to see things rightly. The man in John 9 came seeing, he saw things for what they were. And we need to do that if the gate is to be in function. Conditions have to be such that the Lord’s Supper can be celebrated without any doubt in the minds of the saints and the service of God goes on in power and freshness and vitality. So we need help to judge ourselves, we need help to prove ourselves; he says, “and thus eat of the bread, and drink of the cup”. That is the way into the service of God. It is all available to us.

When that is the case I thought the scripture in Proverbs would be very applicable; “Her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land”. We have no doubt that the Lord was in this or that. No, “her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land”. Administration is always very restful according to God. Absalom stood beside the way of the gate. What can we say? The Lord is in this in our place. Can I say He is in this; this is how He would have it done. Is this in accord with the pearl? He says, I sold everything to secure it. You would have to ask yourself, I would have to ask myself. I do not think that He is speaking in any condemnatory way, because there is an abundance of grace and help for every single person to make way for what is right and what is true and what is proper to the function and the maintenance of the blessedness of the house of God. These are great matters, and I would seek to encourage every heart in relation to it. So that “her husband is known in the gates”. Yes, the Lord is in that, yes He was in that, and we grow in our knowledge of Christ. We know a good deal, in fact we are inclined to say we do not know too much, but we know plenty, but I am not sure as to how much I personally am acquainted with Christ. We know how to do things, we know now to conduct things, but as Mr. Darby says:

To walk with Thee below,

And learn Thy holy ways (Hymn 69)

How blessed that is! So that when the Lord comes in on Lord’s Day we know Him, we are acquainted with Him, “her husband is known in the gates, when he sitteth among the elders of the land”.

I read this section in Samuel – poor David, his affections were misguided. When that is the case the gate is left empty. Why did Absalom have so much power? Why did he get so much influence? Where was the rule, where was the government? David takes him back without him being repentant. These are very solemn considerations. Two years in Jerusalem and he never saw the kings’ face. He steals the hearts of the men of Israel. Let us beware of the subtlety of the devil; Paul said we are not unaware of his devices (see 2 Cor 2: 11), because he has in mind to divert our affections from what is real and true. At the moment, in the area of conflict I think what marks Bethesda is what he is seeking to introduce into the assembly – I tell you it is not order. The victory here is turned into mourning, how sad that is. How much sorrow, how much suffering, how much concern for the truth has gone before us in the recovery. We need to carry that in our spirits and see that the victory and the spirit of the victory is maintained with us, and the victory is maintained with us in a rule of grace in the application of the holy principles that govern God’s house so that the rest of God is secured amongst us. That is, God can move in the Spirit free in holy complacency and the Spirit can be free to glorify Christ. Somebody once said there are persons who are happy with a Christ of their own imagination. That is a solemn thing to say. We are surrounded by them in Christendom, especially in this country; persons commercialising the glad tidings, how awful it is, and persons are being deceived by it. Let us beware that we are not diverted from a pure and strong link with the Lord Jesus. We are to call upon Him out of a pure heart; and a pure heart, beloved brethren, is the creation of God. You cannot create a pure heart because your heart, as mine, is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. But look at the situation here. He is going to lose the support of the brethren, there is going to be deception in the family. Even an unspiritual man like Joab knows this as he goes to the king and he is saying, “My son Absalom! Absalom, my son, my son!” I know how strong the ties of flesh and blood are and so do many of the beloved brethren who have lost families, some whole families, yet they have maintained steadfastness and faithfulness and fidelity to Christ and to the truth and God supports them and blesses them. This is practical and real.

So Joab goes to him and he says to him, it seems to me that if Absalom was alive it would not matter about the rest of us, the rest of your family; how awful that would be! Now he says, “arise, go forth, and speak consolingly to thy servants; for I swear by Jehovah, if thou go not froth, there will not tarry one with thee this night; and that would be worse to thee than all the evil that has befallen thee from thy youth until now. Then the king arose, and sat in the gate”. Things are coming back to normal. The responsible element now is taking up its responsibility and sitting in the gate where it should sit. “And they told all the people, saying, Behold, the king is sitting in the gate. And all the people came before the king”. Every single person in every locality is a responsible person. There are those who are more responsible, they are the elder brethren, they have been in fellowship all their lives and they should know how to do things, how to rule. Mr. Taylor said a very wonderful thing when he said rule is by influence, and that is what it will be in the day to come. Rule is not by laying down the law, although that may be needed – you know in your own family there are times when you have to lay down the law – but the influence of grace and the power of grace, those are the principles of God’s house and of the truth and of the kingdom which are maintained amongst us and they need to be. We do not need to fear in the application of them because the Lord supports persons who are concerned about the maintenance of what is due to Him and due to God. The Spirit is in that. The local meeting is a habitation of God in the Spirit and the gate is to be held and maintained in such order that persons can go in by it into the city. How wonderful that is!

Let us be careful that we do not have misguided affections. Let us be careful that we are not in our localities pursuing something that is different from what is normal, and I say that to myself. This is not a time, standing up here, to get at people, it is a time for the opening up and the speaking of the truth so that what is conveyed has to be measured by Scripture. If you do not believe what I say go and look at the Scriptures. Be like the Bereans, search them, and find out if these things are so. And if they are not so then come and tell me, because I may need to be adjusted in relation to them; but go to God about it, pray about it, and find help about it. I have said this before, younger brethren need to be more assiduous in reading the ministry and in praying, and older brethren need to be better examples of expressing what they have read and what they purport to be. I am not getting at anybody; somebody said the greatest room in the universe is the room for improvement, we can all manage that. May the Lord bless the word.

ORMOND BEACH

20 December 2002