THE ADMINISTRATION OF DIVINE BOUNTY (6)
THE ADMINISTRATION OF DIVINE BOUNTY (6)
JT I have on my mind that we might pursue the subject of administration, connecting it with the glory of the Lord as in 2 Corinthians 3. It occurred to me that what I have suggested would link on with what has gone before. We might be able to compare the glory of the Lord with the glory of the Son of God — the former having reference to the public or official position of the assembly here, and the latter having to do with the family which links on with eternity. These are two thoughts that are obviously of immense importance, and, although very intimately co-related, they are, I think, distinct. They bear on each other during the period of testimony, but the official part will cease; the Son hands over the kingdom to the Father. The position of the Lord as administering what is of God officially is in Acts 2, and then it is worked out, as one may say, doctrinally, in Romans 5, which chapter is entirely taken up with what comes to us through “our Lord Jesus Christ”, Romans 5:1 as the statement is; but this chapter is the continuance of that line, only that it is confined to the covenant. The covenant, coming in on the line of administration, and being that which refers to God’s love for us, represents what we may call the higher part or feature of the Lord’s administrative service, so that the spirit of the covenant is said to be the Lord — “the Lord is that Spirit”. It does not say, ‘the Spirit is the Son of God’, or ‘the Spirit is Christ’, or ‘the Spirit is Jesus’, but it is “the Lord is that Spirit”. It is because the apostle is emphasising the administrative side in which he himself had part subordinately to Christ;
[p. 252] indeed, every one who ministers carries on the ministration and the Spirit has part in this ministration. It is in the benefit of this that, as we may say, we enter the assembly. We cannot be there in a public way as representative of God here apart from knowing the love of God, so that there is holy liberty; hence the change — We all, with open face beholding the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image as by the Lord the Spirit. It is that which brings about the change.
JCS Do I gather from what you have said that the Lord, as mediator of the covenant, connects with the provisional, official, and mediatorial order, and that this is in view of the eternal order of things; and that we must travel that road before we can really come to the assembly in the eternal relationship into which it purposes to introduce us?
JT Yes; I think that the mediatorial service of Christ must come first.
LDB Would you remark a little further about “the Lord the Spirit”. One does not quite understand that.
JT We may illustrate it by referring to Moses as he descends the mount after having received the tables. On the first occasion he was told by the Lord what existed in the camp, and Jehovah said to him that He should be let alone and He would destroy all the people and make of him a great nation. But Moses said, ‘No, that won’t do; that would never represent You; You will never be known in that’; so he says, “Blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book”, Exodus 32:32.
Now, there is the spirit, as I understand it, of the new covenant. It was a question of God being known — the heart of God being known; and Moses says, ‘That could never be if You blot them all out — if You destroy them; rather blot me out of Thy book’. That is, in principle, he was prepared [p. 253] to be a mediator, even to the extent of being blotted out of God’s book, which, of course, in Christ, means atonement. Moses could not effect atonement — he could not take up the sin question; all he could propose was that God should blot him out of His book. But the Lord Jesus, the anti-type of Moses, undertook the obligations of the broken law, and was made a curse, as it is said, “He was made a curse for us”. Galatians 3:13. There is the principle of the Lord being the Spirit — that one, in love for the people of God, should sacrifice himself entirely, so that they should be preserved. From that point onwards Moses rises morally. He goes into the camp and power is with him. No one could raise a voice against him in the camp. He takes the tabernacle and pitches it outside the camp as a new gathering ground, recognising what is due to God; and Jehovah came down to him and spake with him face to face, as if to honour him for so fully representing Christ. It was the Spirit of the Lord, because Moses represents the Lord. God honours him in speaking to him as a man speaks with his friend; and then he pursues his intercession. God says, ‘You go up and take the people, thy people, with you; My angel will go with you’. ‘No’, Moses says, ‘that won’t do, for they are Thy people; they are not my people’. You see how Moses entirely surrenders himself for the people. He was prepared to die — to be blotted out for them; and now he is not going to take over the ownership of the flock of God; they belonged to God. The spirit that he shows there would save us from seeking the leadership or dominance amongst the saints; they are the Lord’s. And then he says to Jehovah, “Show me thy glory”. Exodus 33:18. He was not thinking of his own glory at all. He had a great opportunity. No man really had a greater opportunity to become a great man than Moses, because God says, “I will make of thee a great nation”. Exodus 32:10. He would make of [p. 254] Moses himself a great people like Israel. But he would not accept that. It was a question of what was due to God, of Him being made known. So he intercedes further for them, and God accepts him. He says, ‘How shall Thy people be distinguished save that Thy presence go with them?’ Moses could not distinguish the people, great man though he was. What distinguishes the people of God in this world is the presence of God with them. So he goes up to the mount and receives the covenant the second time, which, in principle, was the new covenant; and now he comes down with his face shining — he is like God. He carries down among the people the glory — it is the glory of the Lord. As yet the veil was on their hearts. But there it was as far as Moses was concerned, the glory was shining; and it is on that line that they are brought into Canaan; on the ground of a man surrendering himself, content to be wiped out provided that God’s people are preserved; for God is to be known in His people. You consider for God and His people; you want God to have all His people, and to have them like Himself. So, the Lord Jesus, the anti-type of all this, went into death in order that God should be known in His people, that His love should be in their hearts. He takes up the position of administration, so that that love should be brought into our hearts, because aside from the love of God being in our hearts God would not be known here.
LDB It is very helpful to see the illustration in the Old Testament of truth in the New; it emphasises the truth so blessedly.
JT When Paul was amongst the Corinthians he carried on his ministry on these lines. To be a new covenant minister one has to be in accord with the death of Christ, because that is how the new covenant has been effectuated. He is the mediator of the new covenant and in order to [p. 255] effectuate it He had to die, and that is the line we have to go on in order to be new covenant ministers.
JCS So that as we behold the glory of the Lord, that spirit that you have outlined in Moses is really transmitted to us. As we behold the glory we imbibe the same kind of spirit, we become like Him.
JT That is how it comes out. Mark, it is the “glory of the Lord” — the way He has gone to bring in the love of God. It is contemplating Him in that way, I take it. Joshua is an example, he would see the glory shining in Moses’ face more than any of them, because he was a witness of all the private relations between God and Moses. He would have a better understanding of intercession than any of them; he was with him all the way.
JCS Do you think that would be his qualification for succeeding Moses?
JT Yes, I have no doubt he was trained in that way. He appreciated what Moses did. He remained, a young man, in the tabernacle; he remained there.
LDB So also the apostle Paul — he saw the Lord; he would be like Joshua in that way.
JT Yes, quite. Paul makes a great point of what he was as a minister. He said that he had sent Timotheus, his own child, so that the Corinthians might know what his ways were, Timotheus amongst them being a representative of Paul’s ways as they were in Christ.
WJP Would that bring in “always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be manifested”? 2 Corinthians 4:10.
JT Yes. The next chapter brings that out. It enlarges on the thing in Paul, as he says, “Having therefore this ministry, as we have received mercy, we faint not”. 2 Corinthians 4:1.
JCS As we see the glory of the Lord Jesus as Mediator of the covenant we acquire His feelings,
[p. 256] and that works out in a practical way, so that we are free from self-consideration, and are here considering for the people of God.
JT Well, I think that is the thing. They are all God’s people, every one of them, and we cannot afford to lose any of them. You die for them; surrender — that is the principle; and one taking that course usually effects far more than he imagined he could have effected; and he is in the lead now. That is how you lead. Leading is going down, and others by this example quickly follow.
SF I was thinking, how interesting it must have been to God to find Moses in such a state that he could even suggest this; that it was so necessary to make known in this way, that His people should be helped, and so continue right through the wilderness.
GRG Do you think the various proposals God made to Moses were tests to bring out the features of Christ?
JT I am sure of it. God knew what was in Moses, and He would bring it out.
SF For our benefit.
JCS There seems to be a strong moral connection between this and what we had yesterday afternoon as to the preparatory conditions in view of the Supper.
JT I thought so. This is all before us in the emblems. The first thing mentioned in I Corinthians 10 is the ‘cup’. That is not the regular order of the Lord’s supper; but the passage begins with God. You begin with God, for Corinthians makes a point of that. “The head of every man is Christ, the head of the woman is the man, and the head of Christ is God”; 1 Corinthians 11:3 and “All are yours, and ye are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s”. Moses had made intercession, but then he breaks the tables. Sometimes one questions the meaning of that. He was [p. 257] not told to do it, so far as Scripture goes. It was intelligence. On the one hand he could not take them into the camp, and on the other hand it was the admission of his own impotency; he could not be a mediator; he could not take on himself the sins of the people. The Lord does not break the covenant; He did not break the tables; He put them in His heart. “Thy law is within my heart”, Psalm 40:8. That is His glory. The idea expressed in the ark was that the covenant was there, it was therefore called the glory.”He delivered his strength into captivity, and his glory into the enemy’s hands”, Psalm 78:61. Jesus took the law into His heart, and rather than that one jot or tittle should be broken He died. The will of God must prevail, and in the will of God prevailing He secures a people. If God had wiped them out with a stroke it might, in some sense, have vindicated His righteousness, but He never could have revealed His heart; for what would there have been to love, had they been wiped out, for “God is love”; 1 John 4:18, 1 John 4:16. He loves and would be loved. The Lord Jesus said, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets”, Matthew 22:37 - 40. The Lord had that before Him, so that God might have a people to love, and a people that would love Him. Jesus, instead of breaking the tables, died; He became a curse for us.
MPM What the apostle Paul is bringing out in the first epistle to the Corinthians is the Lordship of Christ, so that they might be ready to take up the covenant.
JCS So that the “glory of the Lord” is that He made known the love of God.
JT Yes, He has made that effective. [p. 258] He has attested the love of God in His death, and then He has brought in a people for God to love; and in order that they should be loved, they are to be made lovable, and they are made lovable by the love of God being brought into their hearts. That is His glory. It is wonderful! He can take us up and make us lovable by bringing the love of God into our hearts.
JCS The love of God shone out; but now there is a different thought — the people love God.
GRG In the presentation of the cup, do you get the source of it — of the love of God?
JT That is it. It is really the anti-type of all you get in the Pentateuch — meaning the result for God; publicly the result in this world of the work of Christ. He has attested the love of God, and brought in a people whom God can love. It is a great thing to get into your soul that you are to be lovable — not only to be loved, but to be lovable. That is the idea, they are a lovable people.
JCS How does that come about — by beholding the glory of the Lord?
JT Yes, exactly.
MPM It is the answer to the writing.
JT Exactly. “Not on stone tables, but on fleshy tables of the heart” — impressionable tables.
Ques Have we not got a wrong idea as to glory? Is it not that it distinguishes persons — they become attractive because of what they are?
JT Yes, quite. Think of the change — “changed from glory to glory”! We have often had our attention called to that metamorphosis, a complete change; that is the idea here — a complete change from one thing to another, and the process is by beholding the glory of the Lord; that is how it is brought about.
JCS So that it is continuous?
JT It is “from glory to glory”.
LDB Referring to the way he brought it about, would you mention how that took place in the Lord? “He gave his strength into captivity and his glory into the enemy’s hand” Psalm 78:61 — what do you think that alludes to in the Lord?
JT It alludes to Gethsemane. The strength was there; it was God’s strength. The Lord had undertaken the whole burden, and now the pressure is brought to bear upon Him in Gethsemane. I think it is so in Matthew and Mark; the whole pressure was brought to bear on Him there anticipatively, and the power that was there (the latent power in Christ) came out; that at all costs He would do the will of God. That has to be undertaken if one is to be strong in the pathway here. It is by doing the will of God. It came out before Judas came into the garden with the band. But before all this happened, what Jesus was had come out in the temptation in the wilderness — His entire adherence to the word of God. Man was to live by every word — not the will so much, but the word; that was the point that was settled in the temptation in the wilderness. But now the enemy comes back again. He had left Him for a season. As He says, “The prince of this world cometh”. John 14:30. There is where the test was; so, anticipatively, the Lord goes through this with God, His Father. He prays three times saying the same thing: “Not my will, but thine be done”. Luke 22:42. If the cup is to pass — if it were God’s will it should pass — He would have it so; but “Not my will, but thine be done”. He works it out thus, so that the power of God is there, the pressure of Satan is there, tempting Him to surrender — to avoid the awful cup that is about to be put into His hand, but He refuses the temptation and says, “Not my will, but thine be done”. That comes out before Judas comes into the garden with his band.
[p. 260] Satan could not touch Him till that moment. God lifts His hand and allows Satan to take Him. “He gave his strength into captivity, and his glory into the enemy’s hand”. Psalm 78:61. God did that, and the Lord henceforth is the Victim. He makes no effort at all to escape; He delivers Himself up. And now, what will they do? What comes next brings out the perfection of Christ. Whatever they do to Him He makes no resistance. He is “as a lamb being led to the slaughter”. Isaiah 53:7.
Rem Does Hebrews 2:10 come in there? He was perfected through sufferings.
JT Well, quite. God, in “bringing many sons to glory”, makes the captain of our salvation perfect through sufferings.
WJP Do we look on that with unveiled face?
JT Yes; we take account of the Lord all the way through in the way He has made the love of God effective. He has attested it first in dying, then on high, making it effective in our hearts by the Spirit. He proposes thus to bring everyone of us together as lovable. It is a great thing to inquire of one’s self as to whether one is lovable. The Lord is bent on this in the administration of the love of God in our hearts.
JCS This chapter brings in all the facilities for making us lovable. I think you spoke of it in connection with the public character of things; I suppose the emblems would speak of that. His people have been brought into accord with Himself.
JT So that He says, “By this shall all know that ye are disciples of mine, if ye have love amongst yourselves”, John 13:35. How are we to have it among ourselves unless He first brings it in? He has brought it in administratively; that is His glory. We contemplate the glory of the Lord.
AES It is not anything we can adopt; [p. 261] we are changed.
MPM The way we are changed is in beholding the Lord’s glory.
Ques Is “accepted in the beloved” Ephesians 1:6 connected with that?
JT Well, yes; but that is Ephesians. That is divine counsel. The covenant is more what God is toward us, while reconciliation and new creation are on the line of what we are towards God — “that we should be holy and without blame before him in love” Ephesians 1:4; but God would have the glory here in His love being shed abroad in our hearts — the “shining forth of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ”. 2 Corinthians 4:6 Would the idea to be developed in connection with the covenant be perhaps more generally what is connected with the glory of the Lord, but when you come to the glory of the Son of God something is being opened out which is unique?
JT I think so. It is for God an entirely new order of things outside this world. We may have an opportunity of developing this further in connection with the glory of the Son in the afternoon, but there is a very practical thing in this as to our moving on together beholding the glory of the Lord as that which changes us, so that we are lovable to one another.
AES Moses said, “We will go with our old and with our young”. Exodus 10:9.
JT Yes; and you think of others in order to help them. It works out when difficulties arise specially. We think of this, “Beholding the glory of the Lord we are changed”. You see how He did the thing.
Ques “Where the Spirit of the Lord is”, is that the kind of spirit?
JT That is the kind of spirit. Really the spirit of going down in order to help others; bringing God to [p. 262] them The apostle had that spirit when he said that God had made him a competent minister of the new covenant, “not of the letter, but of the spirit”.
JT God had made him that.
SF The apostle could assure them of his continued love; though they loved him the less, that would not turn him aside.
JT It helps us to pursue his way. He emphasises what he had been amongst the Corinthians; what Timothy was; and how he left it for them to decide whether he should come to them with a rod, or in love, so that instead of going to them he wrote to them. With all the skilfulness of love he was set for their recovery, and was prepared to do anything — “Though we be nothing”, he says, “everything is for you”. Everything was working for them.
JCS So he was really a minister and witness of the spirit of the covenant.
JT He was. Think of the great apostle of the Gentiles saying to these refractory people at Corinth, “All things are yours; whether Paul, or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, or things present, or things to come; all are yours;” 1 Corinthians 3:21,22. He would lie down at their feet in order to gain them — a door mat for them, as he says, “though the more abundantly I love the less I be loved, but be it so”. He did not expect the children to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children. He takes the onus of all upon himself.
SF He brought about true restoration, both for the individual and the company.
JT One has to disrobe oneself of personal dignity in moving about amongst the saints. You are to expect all kinds of indignities. Whatever comes, or whatever the cause, you cannot avoid it. It is what the Lord Jesus accepted.
MPM When you come to chapter 10 he is able [p. 263] to place himself alongside the people and say, “The bread which we break”. 1 Corinthians 10:16.
JCS So where the spirit of the covenant is being diffused, where the Spirit of the Lord is found amongst the saints, it would be a preservative element amongst them; there would be no room for difficulties to come in.
JT It is not only what one says, but what he is. He suggests to the saints his spirit and manner; that is the result of beholding the glory of the Lord. I don’t suppose anybody with opened eyes could read Exodus, Numbers and Deuteronomy without being affected by the moral greatness of Moses; and he says, “Yea, he loved the people” (that is God). Deuteronomy 33:3. It might have been said, “Moses loved the people”, and so he did; but that was not the point. The point is, God loved the people.
MPM Is it because the writing is on our hearts that we behold the glory of the Lord?
JT Yes. The heart is impressionable, and a complete change takes place.
JCS Going back to what you said as to the bearing of this on local difficulties, perhaps if one were able to get to the bottom of things it would be found oftentimes to be wounded pride or personal dignity that has been touched; but the apostle seemed to be entirely free from all that, because God loves the people, and he is prepared to serve them.
LDB The passage says, “All his saints are in thy hands”. None is left out. In viewing the Lord’s people we would remember this.
SF Ephesians exhorts us to walk in love, and what has love not accomplished, and what is love not able to accomplish? It never fails.
SHB It would seem that however great the difficulties may appear to us, if we consider first for God the way out would be made.
[p. 264] JT And you see here how our sufficiency is of God; how the apostle brings in that. Even what he was, was from God; none of us has anything inherently; it is what we have received. He goes on to say in chapter 4, “Having had mercy shown us”. 2 Corinthians 4:1. It is an encouragement, because the reverses he had may be ours.
SHB So the difficulties, if taken up under the hand of God, may largely help in the formation of the spirit of Christ in us.
JT Souls in a difficulty expect this and that from others, but the thing is to turn to God, so that one may be like Christ He will do this for us, as it says, “our sufficiency is of God”. This is exactly what God would do — to make a brother, or any number of brothers, like Christ; He will do it for us if we turn to Him.
EBMcC Verse 18 would bring that out: “Looking on the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face, (we) are transformed according to the same image”.
JT “Even as by the Lord the Spirit”. The Lord keeps on working. As you keep looking He keeps on working; the ministration goes on constantly. As we keep looking in an objective way, the work goes on “even as by the Lord the Spirit”.
SHB Do you think the Holy Spirit is the power to enable us to contemplate the Lord in that way?
JT Just so; Well now, if the Lord Will, we will consider the “Glory of the Son of God” at our next meeting.
JCS You get the covenant with the cup. Would it be a fair inference to say that when we are drinking together out of the one cup we are drinking into the spirit of all this.
JT Yes, we are, if we drink aright.