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“FOLLOW THOU ME”

A. J. E. Welch

It would be clear that God’s work of formation necessarily proceeds in us individually, as individuals whom God works upon and who stand related in the assembly to others. God’s work in this sense is a most remarkable matter and we would find grace, I believe, to become more alert in seeing God’s work in souls, especially these with whom, in wonderful grace, we are called to walk. It is not outside the divine thought that individual saints, brothers or sisters, may bear particular distinctions in the history of God’s testimony. God knows where to place distinctions. He loves to bring in adornment of what delights Himself by the distinctions that He makes. He would have us to appraise those likewise, yet understand that they belong in the body of Christ. They stand related to the single, momentous, thought of the body, His body, which is the assembly.

We are not to be afraid of distinctions if God makes them. If He raises up gift, that is His matter. It helps us to recall remarks in past ministry in which the gifts were related to the adornment, for God’s pleasure, of what He has for Himself in the assembly. God loves what is distinctive in a living way. The creation itself is expressive of that, in that distinctions occur in life. Some distinctions are more evident than others, but the distinctions are there nonetheless, and as we understand them in the assembly we see the wonder of God’s work under Christ, and in the Spirit, and are made to realise how we need one another. We can rightly delight in God’s work in one another, as contributing to the No. 26, Jan 1975 whole great thought of the assembly as the body of Christ, energised in life, and directed under Christ in His glorious place as Head of His body the assembly.

But as we receive the truth, even on a propitious occasion like this, it is needful for us to understand that it must affect us individually. As we enter upon the experience which the truth provokes, the experience which the Lord’s own touch of glory and love upon His saints brings about, we have to realise that that experience is a matter entered upon by any one of us individually. We may, in one sense, share it with our brethren, and such experience as we have confirms that that is normally the case. But the experience touches us, and affects us, individually. I may have a like experience to you; you may have a like experience to me; but your experience is yours and my experience is mine. And so we have the Lord responding to Peter’s question, marking out John in certain ways, and saying to Peter finally, “If I will that he abide until I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me”. It is, a very terse, pointed, word from a risen Christ, belonging in its character to the order of things that is christianity.

The Lord had appealed to Peter earlier in this chapter in most remarkable ways, questioning Peter as to his love, pursuing His questioning, and bringing Peter by the right persistence of His questioning to a full issue as to his relation to Christ. How skilful the Lord is! How skilful He is in dealing with any one of us! It says in verse 15, “When therefore they had dined. Jesus says to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?” It is after they had dined; it suggests (and the word is not mine) the sumptuous provision the Lord had made for His lovers. He had provided a meal for them of a sumptuous character. And, you know, we have occasions like that, beloved brethren. Dining in the sense of this verse is not outside of recent experience among lovers of Christ. It is in accord with what I am saying that we would each need to examine just what our experience of it is, but it is a matter of recent experience that we know what dining is.

But then something comes in after the dining that is to attach Peter’s heart yet more strongly to the One whose provision he had enjoyed. And how often that point comes up, does it not?

We enjoy a meeting, whatever character the meeting may have; we find grace working and divine supply operating, and the wealth of divine supply is proved, but the Lord would say,

‘There is something arising out of this that is to be singularly formative in yourself’. So He speaks to Peter. He raises matters very pointedly with him, and He carries Peter through a remarkable line of searching which bears fruit, and He takes it up with Peter in relation to the full extent of what He has, saying to him, “Shepherd my sheep”, “Feed my sheep”. That is, Peter is to know how precious the saints are to Christ, to shepherd them and to feed them.

Peter is to find his true place in the company of the disciples. Using Pauline language, which I think is fitting at this point, Peter is to find his true place in the body and function in it.

The Lord Jesus is working with Peter to that end. He is spending time on Peter to that end.

The Lord spends, if I could use the expression not without reverence, a great deal of time upon us. How patient He is; but in His patience He goes on, having in mind that we reach a 2

settled end in our souls from His touch of love upon us. The Lord is not exactly hurrying this case of Peter; He is conducting it in divine skill to reach a distinctive end with him in the knowledge he has of the Lord’s assessment of him. That is where Peter showed a certain slowness in apprehending the way things were going on, and the Lord’s hand upon him.

Do we really understand that the Lord knows us absolutely? That must be so if we are to know the skill that would form us after Himself and according to the truth. He knows us absolutely. He is not to be kept out. May I put this simply for the youngest here? He is not to be kept out of any corner of that heart of yours. He knows you absolutely. He knows me absolutely. He knows what you need, He knows what I need, but in knowing the need He is always ready to answer the need by meeting it in you or in me, or in whoever it may be. As we realise that, and as the truth is brought to bear upon us, as the word of God comes, as the energetic action of the Spirit is proved in our gatherings together—as, thank God, it is proved—we are made to realise the immensity of what the Lord is doing. I do not know how many there are in this room at the present time, maybe sixty persons, but the Lord is able to take on every one of sixty persons in this room. By such a meeting as this, as He is with us—and we say this humbly and not to call attention to any persons other than Christ and the Spirit—He is able to work out something in the skill of divine formation with every one.

One impression may reach me, another impression may reach you. We may all speak together of certain items of the truth—certain elements of the truth which we need to go over together, but it meets my need in one way, and perhaps it meets your need in another way—but the need is met anyway. How marvellous the activity of the Lord is; how marvellous the actions of the Spirit are. He has to say to us as gathered company-wise, though, thank God, we gather in the light of the assembly—not claiming to be it, but gathered in the light of it and proceeding in the light of it. How much is happening; we need to realise how much is happening, and to seek, every one of us, that we keep in the course of those happenings, and in no sense elect ourselves out of them.

Peter would remember this experience, fitting, as it did, into the precious aggregate of experience that he had under the hand of Christ. What a man he became! The Spirit of God in Scripture shows us, particularly as to Peter—which is by divine design—the way in which the Lord adjusted him from time to time. Some of us have peculiarly had to be adjusted as to many things. Many of us here today would present a witness of divine grace in bringing about adjustments, that we might continue together in the light of all that is established in Christ and sustained in the Spirit, in view of the soon coming moment of the Lord’s own appearing. But His work is going on.

Yet in spite of the touch of blessing that Peter gets, in spite of the Lord leading him through to a reliable issue of soul in this questioning, in spite of bringing Peter through to stable ground as to how he stood with Christ, and what his understanding was to be as he continued to serve the Lord. Peter starts thinking about John. John was a man to be thought about, in one sense; a man to be greatly respected.

The Scripture itself intimates that to us—“The disciple whom Jesus loved … who also leaned at supper on his breast, and said, Lord, who is it that delivers thee up?”, and Peter in that episode had remarkably profited from the place that John had in the bosom and on the breast of Jesus. Peter had made a sign to John to secure what was for the moment the outstanding point to be elucidated, “Who is it?”, John 13: 25. Affinity between Peter and John at that time was manifestly very close, but Peter is now beginning to think of John. In one sense it was right for Peter to think of John, or to think of James and the other apostles—right for Peter to think of any of the saints of whom he had knowledge, indeed, according to the grace given, to think of any of the saints of whom he did not have knowledge in detail. But Peter was thinking of John in a way which the Lord’s penetrating gaze disclosed to be not just right.

That is to say, Peter, in the spirit of the way he was enquiring was, to a degree anyway, infringing the singular rights of Christ to have John just as He would have him.

That is something to think about, dear brethren. It is right for us to carry our brethren in our affections and in our prayers and in our respect too; but how do we think of them? Do we think of them questioningly? Do we think of them without regard to the right the Lord has to secure in one and another what is after His own order, and delightful to Himself, to bring in the elements of choice, heavenly distinction that are a delight to heaven itself? Am I jealous of any one? Am I envious of anyone?

Are there any feelings in my heart, in respect of any of those with whom God has called us, that would not come under the Lord’s scrutiny without rebuke? What are our mutual relationships? What is the character of them? It may be carry burdens as to a brother, burdens which are determined by the fact that what relates to faithfulness to Christ is not being followed that is another matter. Such burdens are right burdens, the kind of burdens that Paul carried that he would have carried, for instance, in respect of Barnabas or John Mark, who had abandoned the way in which the Lord was proceeding. Those are right burdens, rightly carried, rightly brought before God in prayer. That is another matter.

But what are our mutual relations? And how do I individually stand in those mutual relations with those with whom God has set me? That is the kind of question that Peter’s case awakens, and the Lord speaks to Peter. “Jesus says to him, If I will that he abide until I come, what is that to thee? Follow thou me”. That is, the Lord is going to use Peter, as He intimates in this section. His charge to Peter as He questions his affection, and the depth of his affection, would relate to the kind of service that Peter was to render—shepherding the sheep, feeding the sheep, nurturing the lambs. How vividly Peter speaks of “the chief shepherd” in 1 Peter 5: 4, as if he had taken on the lesson of this through which the Lord passed him. Peter was to be a shepherd. I suppose, in a sense, the shepherdly service, linked as it is in Ephesians 4: 11 with teaching, is one of the most necessary things at the present time, “shepherds and teachers”. We need that side, dear brethren, and that side brings forward the urgency of our mutual relationships being right.

The Lord in this context would have to say to each one of us in respect of those mutual relationships. It is not sufficient to be able to say that the meeting at so and so is a happy meeting and the brethren are happily together. Thank God if that is so—may it be so in every place, increasingly—but if I belong to that place what are my relations with each one of those dear brethren? And do I understand that the Lord has His own right in respect of each, and has His own right in respect of me, and would use all that is proceeding in me in this gracious, powerful work of formation in me?

We should recognise as we go on, especially those of us, perhaps, who are a little older, the need of lending ourselves to the formative touch of Christ and of the Spirit—to what end?

That we are brought out like Christ; and brought out in the gain of all that is here in the Spirit in the assembly. The work of formation has that in mind. So the Spirit of God gives us this remarkable word as to Peter, which the Lord uttered to him, “Follow thou me”. The Lord was on the way to the Father. He would not be here with Peter much longer after this incident, but, even so, Peter was to follow Him. I would understand that to mean that Peter was to have an appreciation of all that came out in Jesus and follow in the same steps, bringing out something of the glory of the manhood of Jesus through that which was formed, after that, in himself—“Follow thou me”.

Peter had a good deal of active service ahead yet, as the history of the Acts would show. I do not know for how long, or exactly how much,

because the Acts does not give us the whole extent of the history in detail; but the Lord was to use Peter yet in the most distinctive ways, and use him in the midst of opposition, in the very place in which the Lord had stood under questioning. He was to maintain what was due to the Lord in that very place, a singular matter for Peter. The Lord would sustain him in that, but He says, “Follow thou me”. That word, if I understand it aright, flows right down this dispensation of the Spirit to the present time. The Lord is to be followed. Whatever the departure, the Lord is to be followed. Whatever may beset me, maybe in inward exercise, moral exercise before God, whatever may come up in my history, the matter is to be carried through on the basis of following Jesus.

We might say, ‘The times have changed’. In certain outward respects the times have changed; but the time of the Spirit is yet, continues still. Christ is exalted, the Spirit is come and is to be known here in the assembly, and the great pattern of everything is in the manhood of Jesus—the heavenly manhood of Jesus. So He says to Peter, “Follow thou me”. There is no pattern of formation according to God in man, outside of Jesus. He is the glorious Pattern that governs everything. He was so on the very day of Pentecost, when the Spirit came. He is so, and continues so, until He Himself comes and takes all His own to be with Himself. The great Pattern of formation in manhood in the day of the Spirit is in Jesus, is in Christ. Whatever the departure may be, whatever the character of the times may be in the public relations of saints, the point stands—the Pattern of formation is in that glorious Man.

So He would give us to enter into this, as remarked, individually, and yet Peter here is among the brethren. They had dined together and that, as I remarked, is not an experience unknown to us. I trust, in some sense, it is current, even today, in different parts of the world. There is a 5

dining going on, but as we come into the gain of the sumptuousness of this provision, which He would in no sense withhold or qualify. He would say, ‘I want to bring you to something; I want to establish something in yourself. I want to bring you to something that you did not come to before!’ In His skill He leads us, severally, as He led Peter in this remarkable appendix to the gospel, as it has often been called, to a certain settled result which would govern him in his relations with Christ, and in his relations with his brethren, and in his relations with those among his brethren with whom he was called into the service that led so gloriously into this time of the Spirit.

Now Timothy, on the other hand, relates to the days of departure, impending departure, or real, eventuated departure. Now we have one who was commissioned by the Lord, and that from heaven, as an apostle, addressing one person, and that person a younger man. He is addressing that younger man in view of his part in the continuance of a testimony which was already established. As the Lord spoke to Peter the establishment of the testimony in the time of the Spirit was yet ahead, although very near; but in the way in which Paul addresses Timothy we reach a later point when the Lord had brought into view one through whom He effected what is elsewhere spoken of as the completion of the word of God. That is, as Paul is before us, the divine truth is all out, in the sense of what is disclosed from God’s side. Now the question is the continuance in it and the maintenance of it at its height. The appeal as to that comes in a very potent way to us severally;

and yet the context of this at once involves that we move together in what is being set on, as this second epistle says, “with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart”, 2 Timothy 2: 22. Thank God for such with whom, according to God, we can walk together in dark days such as we are in.

But the word is keen, as is the way it comes to each of us, as to how we fill out this relation to the testimony of God. It is a glorious testimony! Think of the way Peter spoke after Pentecost. As he addressed himself to those Jewish leaders he presented an exalted Christ; he spoke of the reality of the coming of the Spirit, and the reality of what was proceeding in the Spirit. We would have to say as we read that, ‘What a magnificent testimony!’ It is the same testimony still—just the same—the same Christ, the same Spirit, the same assembly, the same end in view, the same coming of the Lord in power and glory, closer than it ever was—the same things, just the same things. The public conditions have greatly changed, but, mark you, the change that has taken place is fully anticipated in these very scriptures. Let us not think that times of breakdown are times which have not, in the perfection of God’s wisdom, been not only anticipated, but provision made for them in the most powerful and wealthy way.

You younger people here, you young lads and young girls, take courage! It may be a difficult day; you may find your school life very difficult; you may find it difficult to get going in a job, and so forth. All these things enter into the realities of the time, but all these things are divinely provided for. The stresses are real; they turn us to the Lord. None of us, I suppose, is without them in some sphere. With some it is bodily weakness and frailty; with others difficult circumstances in their employment; maybe with others the reality of bereavements, bereavements actually, through death, or bereavements of another kind through some turning away. These things are very real, but they are to be productive, they are to be formative; and the Lord would remind us that there is nothing outside of His capacity to provide that which brings about, through all that is taking place, something in God’s work in ourselves, as we go through things with Him, which is to eventuate in what shall soon be fully displayed. We have to wait for the display.

It is the time of suffering in one way, as this epistle indicates to us, and as Peter’s epistles particularly would indicate to us. It is a time of suffering, suffering for Christ’s name; not suffering on account of unrighteousness, but suffering for Christ’s name. But every tinge of suffering, every agony of suffering, whatever it is, is treasured up as faithfulness to Christ is in it; and the gain of it is going to shine forth in its true glory in a day that is soon to come. It may test us to wait, but the truth of God would instruct us that this is the time of waiting, and the time of reward is very, very soon to come. But we are to continue in the same precious testimony. You notice in these scriptures that it is insisted upon that Timothy is to continue in what he had heard from Paul. We have it in 2 Timothy 2: 2, “And the things thou hast heard of me in the presence of many witnesses, these entrust to faithful men” and where we read in chapter 3, “Abide in those things which thou hast learned, and of which thou hast been fully persuaded”. He had heard them from Paul. He is to maintain, could I call it, the continuity of this wonderful time of the Spirit and not to be without respect for what has gone

before in the course of the Spirit’s gracious activities. That may be a challenge peculiarly to us at the present time. Where did diversions come in? The Spirit is able to point us to just where they came in.

I believe it to be urgent that we understand how the testimony has come down to our time, how the truth of God was disclosed to Paul, in the sense of completion, and was laid out, no doubt, in many occasions in which Timothy was with Paul. He is enjoining Timothy to stand in that truth, not to allow any incursion, any intrusion, of what is not according to that truth, “The things thou hast heard of me”, 2 Timothy 2: 2. Well, that has its application to our time.

God wrought wonderfully, and that in the element of distinction, one hundred and fifty years ago. He raised up a man whom he signally used; not that that man is in any way given a place among us as a man, but he is one that was used of God in respect of recovering saints to divine truth, and a certain succession according to God has followed upon that. That is to say, the Spirit has operated to assure saints in the close of the dispensation that the truth is available to them. It is not that any of us are claiming the thing, but the precious fact is that God has come in from His side to assure those who love Him that the truth is available, and available especially in the sense that the Spirit of truth is here. The Spirit of truth, His service and His support, and His adjusting touches, are to be known by us in our assembly relations, but each of us has to continue in this course.

The word to Timothy, the faithful character, the affectionate character, of the apostolic instruction to him, is to preserve us individually among the saints who seek what is due to God, in a way that is to be fruitful for Him. It is to be noted, I believe, that in each of these two epistles to Timothy Paul refers at the beginning to his apostleship, as he says, “apostle of Jesus Christ”. We might wonder at that because Timothy particularly would have known that Paul was indeed an apostle, but he reminds him that he is an apostle. It is as if he would say that though there was the deepest affection and respect between them, as a father and child in relation to the truth. Timothy was ever to realise that what was in Paul was apostolic. There was to be no setting aside of the Lord’s appointment in respect of His servant and the truth which he had been used to unfold. So that authority enters into the assertion, and the maintenance, of the truth, and runs down from the time of the apostles to our time, in which, as in the custody of the blessed Spirit (if I could use that word), the truth is here.

God has come in in the last century and a half in wonderful mercy and love for His saints to assure to them that the truth is to be available until the end. But we have to come into that, dear brethren, as these epistles would plainly open out to us, in an individual way, and yet to come into it, and to stand in it, and faithfully to maintain it, as individuals, as conscious of the links we have—deeper and deeper as they are becoming—with those who, in every place, call on the name of the Lord and seek to walk “with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart”.

Well, may the Lord work with every one of us to strengthen, to consolidate, to enrich for Himself, what there is in every place as His work appears in every individual who belongs in the local assembly and finds a place and part there, for His name’s sake.

Address at Southend-on-Sea
22 June 1974

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