"PRECIOUS IN THE SIGHT OF THE LORD"
I (i) Robert Taylor
Ephesians 4: 1-7; Revelation 14: 13
Our brother whose death and burial is the occasion of our being together today lived the last twentysix years of his life in very severe limitation, but there are few who enjoyed more their heavenly part. He was ever ready to speak of his heavenly portion and his Saviour in spite of the severe restrictions in his body. The testimony today is in circumstances of limitation but in no way should that hinder the enjoyment of our heavenly portion. Indeed, I would say that the acceptance of the limitations gives us a door into the enjoyment of our heavenly portion. Undue regard of the limitations may hinder at the present time our enjoying what is the hope of our calling.
Paul here is writing as the prisoner in the Lord. It is remarkable that he should write like that, but I think he does so to appeal to us, as our brother appealed to us. His body, speech, walk was an appeal to us as to the acceptance of the limitations as a door into the enjoyment of spiritual things. Paul perhaps had a chain as he wrote this. "I, the prisoner". Think of him writing the letter to the Ephesians as a prisoner in the Lord! You say, Paul you have been denied your liberty; you could have been a great man in the affairs of men. Well, he says, I have been "blessed ... with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ, (chap 1: 3). The prison was no restriction for Paul. Indeed, his richest ministry, you may say, comes from the prison in the acceptance of the limitations.
Now, each of us is called to the acceptance of limitations if we are going to be in the testimony today. So many have kicked against them. They have sought an easier path, sought a way where they could express themselves and their natural abilities and their own way of life, but Paul is appealing here to us in bringing himself forward, to accept the limitations of the testimony as in reproach. The day of display will soon come, but as rejected in Matthew's gospel, the Lord calls the disciples into Galilee, where he says, "I am with you all the days", (Matt 28: 20). That includes today, these were the days of our brother's life as he felt the limitations of his body, that is the days in the testimony when there are great sorrow, having to part from many, perhaps being restricted in our employment: all these things are part of the limitations that lie on the saints in the testimony today, and Paul is encouraging us "to walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called". That cannot be as going hand-in-glove with the world. That cannot be as allowing worldly influences to dictate my way of life and how I spend my time and where I go and what I do. Paul is saying, "walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called". It is like the cloven hoof. As these clean animals trod their way, there was a mark left on the desert sand that was not like the others. There was a separate walk, a separate path, and our brother, I think, was an appeal among us as in the acceptance of limitations to accept them, not chafe under them, but to know the Lord who has placed us in these limitations and, as I say, come through that doorway into enjoying our heavenly portion.
Paul is expanding on that in the epistle. He says, "with all lowliness and meekness, with long suffering". These are the features of the testimony: in the midst of the confusion of the day and man's pride and arrogance, there is the lowliness of Jesus. Where is lowliness and meekness? Where was it introduced into this world? Not in Adam, not in any man, but it was introduced in Jesus, the "meek and lowly in heart". He says, "Take my yoke upon you". That is the acceptance of the limitations. "Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me". It is these that we learn from Him, day by day, hour by hour, step by step - "learn from me" meekness and lowliness and long-suffering, "bearing with one another in love". The passage is very rich and Paul is using his own personality, his own position as a prisoner, to encourage the saints to walk thus under the Lord, "prisoner in the Lord". He had been taken captive. His Lord meant everything to him, not whether he could do this or do that, but the Lord's word meant everything to him. He went where the Lord would dictate, where the Lord would be. In the confused circumstances he would find where is the Lord, where is the Lord leading, where has He led? As I say, our brother exemplified this and his very presence, his very body, was an appeal to us to accept the limitations, to come into the joy of the Lord.
The passage in Revelation says, "Blessed the dead who die in the Lord". Our brother went all the way. When circumstances arose, he did not say, Well, that is enough; the rest of the time for myself. No! He died in the Lord. A simple explanation of this passage is to die in harness. Our brother did that. Only a few weeks ago he gave us a word in the ministry meeting in his limitations. He spent the last hours among the brethren in supreme happiness. He died in the Lord. He died in harness. How will we die, dear brethren? How will we finish? Will it be in the path of the Lord's will? Will it be in the acceptance of the limitations? Will it be in the enjoyment of His love because it is in the acceptance of the limitations that His love is enjoyed. "I am with you". He said that to the saints because they went into Galilee. Had they not gone into Galilee, they would not have heard His word. May we accept the position! May our brother's life, his manner of life, the way he has conducted himself, leave a fresh appeal to all our hearts, to be in the path of the Lord's will under limitations, but in the enjoyment of the Lord's presence! When His presence is known, the limitations are gone. That will soon be. It is for our brother already - "with the Lord". The hymn that we sang encouraged me to speak these words, written by a man who lost his most prized possessions. He wrote:
Whatever my lot Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well with my soul (Hymn 238)
He had something in his soul, the things of this life or even death could not rob him of. He wrote in that hymn of the Lord's comfort following deepest sorrow, and the hope of His coming which he awaited. And that is what these passages speak of, "the dead who die in the Lord". How will it be with us, dear brethren? Die in company with Him? That is what is meant, that you are in the yoke, treading alongside of Him. Precious words you would get as you walked alongside Paul. I think of Onesiphorus going to visit him in the prison, the prisoner in the Lord, and Paul telling him all about the epistle of the Ephesians, maybe writing it when the visited him. He has left us that beautiful legacy of these epistles, a man in limitations, but he is writing of his heavenly portion which is ours to be enjoyed as we come into these limitations under the Lord. May we all do it and may it be the portion of every one of us that we die in the Lord, for Christ's glory and praise for His Name's sake!