WHAT GOD LOVES
J.Lovie
I would like to say a word as to what God loves. In the gospels the Father's delight is in the Son. The epistles bring out that His delight is in the assembly. We begin with the gospels because, in the four gospels, we have conveyed to us by the Spirit, who is the author of Scripture, the life of Jesus, Luke particularly bringing out the moral excellence of that humanity in the path from the manger to the cross, in which the will of God was so perfectly done. There was a Man here in conditions of flesh and blood in whom the Father found His perfect delight. There had been in the old economy various types which suggested how God looked on to what He would find in Christ. The Old Testament looked forward to what would come into view in the excellence of that humanity in Jesus. You get glimpses, in certain persons in the Old Testament, in the way that they appear as types of Christ, but when you come to the antitype you come to the fulness of things, to the great standard of what God looked for from man, and what He found in His beloved Son. The gospels bring out the Father's delight in Jesus. There was the settled disposition of God's love as it rested on Christ in an unchanging way; the Lord enjoyed that - "The Father loves the Son and has given all things to be in his hand" (John 3: 35); that is a reference to love in its settled disposition. "The Father loves the Son and shews him all things which he himself does" (John 5: 20) is love which was drawn out because of what was lovable in the object. Not only did the Lord Jesus enjoy the settled disposition of divine favour but He drew out the Father's love in the way He moved as in manhood -- "On this account the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it again" John 10: 17. The Lord was doing that in the place of obedience as in manhood. He says "I have received this commandment of my Father", John 10: 18. The Lord was acting, in the laying down of His life, under the Father's commandment. Therefore in Him it was an act of implicit obedience that drew forth the added wonder of the Father's pleasure as it rested on Him. We should feed our souls on the four gospels because there we find the standard of Christianity as set out in Christ.
The teaching of Christianity is in the epistles, the standard and example of Christianity is in the Man of the gospels. Wonderful to dwell on Him! Oh, let us dwell more on Him! In days of breakdown all around in the assembly publicly, among the nations and among men, breakdown in every relationship in society, let us feed our souls on the kind of man that never broke down, in whom the Father's pleasure centred. As coming up from His baptism, "Jesus having been baptised and praying", the lowly dependent Man, heaven opened upon a praying Man. God loves to find this feature of dependence in you and me. How perfectly He found it in His Son, but He loves to find this feature of dependence, this feature of prayer. Let us not weary in it, dear brethren. Let us not get lax and casual in our relations with God. The enemy would get at us often, to seek if he can to make us casual in our relations with God, but it is upon a praying Man that the heaven is opened: "the Holy Spirit descended in a bodily form as a dove upon him; and a voice came out of heaven". So that the Trinity is before us in this verse, glorious in love's arrangement, the way God has come so near to men in a Man, expressing His thoughts for men in Christ, but then finding an answer to what He looked for from man in Christ. Not only was there everything from God manward in Jesus, as among men, but there was everything from man Godward, in what the Father found in His own beloved Son. How excellent, how unique He is!
So, as we said, some of the types bring forward certain features of that pleasure and delight. David is brought forward in the New Testament without breakdown. You do not get any reference in the New Testament to failure in David - "a man after my heart" (Acts 13: 22), suggesting that God's affections were bound up with him. David was ministering to God 's delight. He was not only a king but a priest. Not only does he fit into Matthew which presents "the city of the great King" (chap 5: 35) but he fits into Luke; "the Lord God shall give him the throne of David his father", chap 1: 32. What excellence is seen in David, as a king and a priest who gave delight to God, "a man after my heart". When you think of David you think of Zion, you think of Jerusalem; you think of God's rights in sovereignty as Zion suggests, His rights in mercy. When David was established on the throne and the kingdom became established under his hand – his cabinet was there and his kingship was in evidence - immediately you get "Is there yet any left of the house of Saul", 2 Sam 9: 1. Mercy and blessing are flowing out in the administration of the gates of Zion, in loving kindness to those who need it. Proverbs reminds us that "the throne is established by righteousness", chap 16: 12. That would be David in Matthew's gospel. It is the legal way, the righteous way in which God's thoughts are coming into expression. Then you also find in Proverbs that the throne is upheld by mercy (see chap 20: 28). Wonderful! Once you get it established by righteousness you find it is upheld in mercy. Luke shows the extent of divine grace, how mercy is coming out. The Lord God has given Him the throne of His father David and it is exercised in mercy. Think of how God finds His delight in that, for He loves the gates of Zion. There is what God loves; there is also what God hates (see Rev 2: 6) and we would be exercised to love what God loves and hate what He hates. One of the things that God loves is the gates of Zion. He loves the ad ministration of the bounty of mercy. The bowels of the mercy of our God have reached out to us of the Gentiles. That is Luke, coming out in the excess of grace where need was so manifest, coming out in the display of what God is in His mercy and upholding His throne by mercy. So that a Mephibosheth can come in, you and I can come in, we can come in on this line, the extension of this line of things in which God finds pleasure. So that we do well to feed on and ponder the Man of the gospels, the Man of Psalm 1, the Man who in His own uniqueness and excellence gave pleasure to God and through His precious death brought in a generation in which God would find His delight. As He speaks about the saints, the excellent that are on the earth, He says "In them is all my delight", Ps 16: 3.
I would like to refer now to Isaiah 62. It is not said here that My delight is in Him but "My delight is in her". I would like help, dear brethren, to speak about this, that we should be attracted into the order of things in which God is finding delight. There is a system of things that is His, that is ministering to His pleasure. God has His system, a glorious system, a system that involves Zion and Jerusalem. Jerusalem is the greatest thought. Someone was reminding us in the interval that you come through Ziklag and Hebron to Jerusalem. Come that way in soul history, you young people. Come that way in your experience with the Lord. Know that at Ziklag He recovered all. It is the Roman epistle, how the glad tidings are coming out, and that God has a new Head for men in Christ in whom He is retrieving the race and recovering men for Himself and for His pleasure; that is Ziklag. Hebron is the Colossian epistle; it is not related to this world at all because it was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt. It is God's world and Christ is the centre of it. Jerusalem is the capital, the city of the great king, the assembly in that relation as a city, involving what she is administratively. So that in Revelation the holy city is viewed as coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Wonderful will be the display! Wonderful will be the place the assembly will have with Christ in the world to come! Wonderful the place she will have in eternal conditions! God's delight will ever be centred on what He finds in that family as patterned after Christ. So that this section deals with Zion and Jerusalem, and says what Jerusalem is to be; "a crown of beauty in the hand of Jehovah, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God". Then you come to this expression, "My delight is in her". I think that is the epistles. Paul is bringing out the attractiveness of the assembly femininely in the epistles, bringing out how attractive the assembly is in her relation with Christ. Think of what she is as the pearl, the one pearl of great value. I think that is Paul's ministry; so that the epistles develop this thought of how attractive the assembly is. How wonderful, dear young people, to know that we who have a link with Christ as our Saviour, who have been given the gift of the Spirit, belong to this vessel in whom Christ is finding delight - "My delight is in her". Think of what she is as the object of Christ's affections! Think of what Rachel was to Jacob! We can reach that experimentally through the understanding of what Leah represents as being hated: "And when Jehovah saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb", Gen 29: 31. What an answer that was! "For now my husband will love me" (v.32). Through the exercises of being in a hated position, knowing what it is maybe to be ostracised and in the position of being hated publicly, God is adding; and Leah says "Now my husband will love me". That is, you reach what is most precious to the heart of Christ through this experimental way, coming into it in our local assemblies. I think Paul had in mind that the Corinthians should reach that, a chaste virgin for Christ. He espoused them in that way. He says, This is what you are going to be in the local meeting at Corinth. Corinth was a city, according to man, of terrible wickedness (Mr Darby says that the wickedness at Corinth was proverbial), a city of man's architecture and learning, and Paul goes in there and stays with Aquila and Priscilla because they were tent-makers. The whole trend of the city was offset. Paul was labouring in the appreciation of what was precious to the heart of Christ, not to build up what was already extant at Corinth but to build up assembly affections, assembly interests, assembly consciousness, assembly characteristics and features, to build that up in the local meeting at Corinth, so that the Lord could say "My delight is in her". "I have espoused you unto one man, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ", 2 Cor 11: 2. That was the brethren at Corinth and that was Paul's labour as an apostle, and his yearnings that this feature, "My delight is in her", would come into expression practically, and it did.
Here she is no longer to be termed forsaken or desolate but "Thou shalt be called, My delight is in her". If you go over the epistles you find that Paul is labouring at this; "My delight is in her". In the Philippian letter Paul is exhorting that their love would abound more and more (see chap 1: 9). You cannot reach a point of saturation in the expression of love; there is always room for more. The Philippian letter presents heavenly men on earth. Someone once said that he had met a lot of persons going to heaven but had not met many people coming back from heaven. But there have been some heavenly persons; we have known some. Oh, that we might be more like them, as we find our life there, and come out down here in relation to every interest that Christ has in the gospel and in the assembly. "My delight is in her" - you go over the epistles, dear brethren, and find in each of them rich suggestions as to the delight that God finds in this vessel that is for Christ's glory in the day of His appearing. It says "when he shall have come to be glorified in his saints, and wondered at in all that have believed", 2 Thess 1: 10. That day is near. Think of what it will mean for Christ when the universe is in wonderment, for He is to be glorified in His saints and wondered at in all that believe. It is how the assembly will come out in headship with Him to the universe administratively. What Jerusalem is, as a city set up to function administratively, will shine. The moral and spiritual features of what Jerusalem suggests will be there in her beauty, because it will then be the time of display. Now it is the time for testimony sufferingly, in this world, and that, I think, is the Corinthian position. We come through it sufferingly but what has been produced is a chaste virgin for Christ.
So it says "As a young man marrieth a virgin, shall thy sons marry thee". Let us espouse the local assembly. Let us find in the local meeting that there is an expression of what is proper to the whole. The assembly is not sectarian, it is not a segment, it represents whole and complete thoughts. The assembly is not a remnant, although we are in remnant days, it is the full thought involving every believer who has the Spirit. But it is possible to find the expression of it in saints who walk in the light of it. That, dear brethren, is what the Spirit would help us in at the present time, to walk in the light of this vessel that is soon to radiate Christ's glory to the universe in the day of His manifestation. Even now there is a vessel for His heart - "my assembly", according to Matthew (chap 16: 18). There is even now a vessel in which the praise of God is sustained, in which Christ sings the Father's praises. It is wonderful that the assembly exists and that you and I form part of it as having the Spirit. How dignified the saints are as belonging to the assembly! How wonderful they are as drawing forth in their testimony here the delight and affections of Christ; "My delight is in her"! The woman of worth at the end of Proverbs is drawing out this delight, this confidence, this trust, this satisfaction, because her husband knows that his interests are being cared for in his absence and he is confident that they will be. He is delighting in that. "She doeth him good, and not evil, all the days of her life ", Prov 31: 12.
I commend the contemplation of this further to our affections, the gospels bringing out the excellence of Christ and His uniqueness, - the Man of the gospels, 'My delight is in Him ' - and the epistles bringing out the excellence of the assembly as a creature vessel, but a vessel that ministers to the delight of divine Persons. Young people can commit themselves to it - "As a young man marrieth a virgin" - young people can commit themselves to what God has nearest to His heart on the earth at the present time. The assembly is nearest to Christ's heart. God is not building up any other family at the present time. There will be other families, as we know, named of the Father, and every one of them will, in some way, come into the enjoyment of sonship. God will put His stamp on every family; He is the Father of every family. But what is being formed at the present time is this vessel, this creature vessel, that is to minister to the delight of God eternally and is even now in testimony and in assembly service ministering to His pleasure, while we await the fulness of the condition of sonship which will be our bodies of glory. May the Lord help us to espouse this in our affections, in the places where we are. Maybe some meetings are very small, maybe just a few meeting in a basement; nevertheless there can be the expression of what is proper to the assembly in which God's heart delights. Let us pursue this line and find the satisfaction of soul that such a pursuit would bring us into, the sense that we are near to God and near to Christ, and near to one another in assembly affections and relationships, in the local places where the Lord has set us. May He bless the word!
GRANGEMOUTH
19 April 1975