GLORY TO GOD IN THE ASSEMBLY
[p. 410] GLORY TO GOD IN THE ASSEMBLY
Reading, Revised by F.E.R.
Ephesians 3: 1 - 21 There is a question I wanted to ask this morning, and that is how you take the expression “life” in Romans 8? Is it a question of enjoyment and power?
FER I think the Spirit takes that place in the christian till he is quickened. Quickening is not spoken of in Romans as present; and therefore till we are quickened the Spirit is life in the christian in view of righteousness, that is practical righteousness down here. Of course this is important and you must take it in connection with Romans. Romans does not properly bring you over Jordan into the scene of life. You are not said to be quickened in Romans; but in our state down here the Spirit displaces the flesh, and takes the place of life in the christian, in order that practical righteousness should be accomplished.
JT Is it life in virtue of what the Spirit effects in the believer?
FER The Spirit is life, so that you find your springs in that sense in the Spirit. It says in Galatians, “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit”. In Colossians and Ephesians you get a step further, and that is “you ... hath he quickened”, but you must understand that in a limited, not in an absolute way. Quickening comes out as to the actual sense of it in 1 Corinthians 15, “As in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive”. It is at the coming of Christ we are quickened; only it is anticipated in Colossians and Ephesians in a limited way as the work of God fitting us for the assembly. Romans does not go so far as [p. 411] that.
GR So in Romans it is “shall also quicken your mortal bodies”.
WM In that sense Ephesians anticipates the world to come.
FER Quite so. Both Colossians and Ephesians anticipate actual quickening, hence the statement in Ephesians 2 expresses what will take place literally, at the coming of the Lord; that is, we shall be quickened, and raised up together and made to sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In that chapter it is viewed as anticipated.
WM Would it be that the saints are made to live in the life of Christ now?
FER I think so. They have reached that point, as far as I understand it, in connection with the assembly. I think we are very slow to rise to the thought of God in connection with the assembly.
JP It is so difficult for us to get away from the individual thing.
WM When you say the assembly, do you mean the assembly in the character of the sanctuary?
FER I mean in its own proper character as the body of Christ; that of which He is the Head; not simply as the house of God.
WM Because we are often distracted in the mere outward company.
FER It says in the first chapter of Ephesians, “gave him to be the head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fulness of him that filleth all in all”.
GR The church is wholly for Himself, it is not a question of our blessing or privileges.
FER If Christ builds the church He builds what is for Himself.
GR Does it not come out in Matthew 16, “My church”? Just as a man might say ‘my wife’; that woman is wholly for himself; I suppose that is why we are so slow to [p. 412] get to it.
FER So you get He “loved the church, and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish”.
JT I think you intimated this morning that there is that in the church which goes beyond eternal life. Is that implied in “raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places”?
FER I was not speaking of that but of what comes out in the passage we read, that is, the church looked at as the vessel of God’s glory.
FL Particularly the last verse of the passage.
FER But also the passage in its whole extent.
JSA Looking at the assembly as you are now, it is not persons, as we see them, but that which is of Christ; and that is a difficulty we have very often; it is only what is of Christ in us that properly forms part of the assembly.
FER Exactly.
GR Is it expressed in that word in Colossians, “the body is of Christ”?
FER Quite so, you get this statement even in a passage such as that in Galatians, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus”. If you look at saints abstractly as in Christ, you cannot introduce these distinctions; if you look at the church as in Christ, you must look at it apart from distinctions which exist in flesh.
JC Do you speak of the church being in assembly?
FER You come together in assembly.
JC Does that comprise the whole?
FER It contemplates all believers in any given place coming together; it is local.
RSS That is, they come together in that character.
FER [p. 413] I use the expression which has been frequently used, it is the assembly in function.
WM And that leads to the sanctuary.
FER Yes, that is to a large extent a question of the apprehension of the calling; and it is in connection with the calling that we see the glory of God in the church. It is in all this that you see that the church is more than the question of eternal life.
WM Could you discover the connection between eternal life and the body apart from John’s writings?
FER I think I can see it in Colossians, in saints being quickened and risen together with Christ.
WM But John helps you in it.
FER The epistle to the Colossians and John’s first epistle are pretty much parallel.
WHC Is it in that verse, “Your life is hid”?
FER Yes; it has been said that eternal life comes out in John in order to recover the saints to the truth of the church; that is, they had lost the church as Paul set it up, and the truth of eternal life came in to recover them.
JSA That is, John comes after Paul to restore those who had fallen away from the truth that Paul brought out, not in an ecclesiastical way, but in the moral elements.
FER Yes, that special ministry of John came in after the church had failed and departed, to restore the saints to their proper place.
WM One mark of this failure was, the church had become a system instead of being in the Spirit’s power.
FER Yes, man got a place, and the Spirit was practically shut out.
RSS Was the calling of Abraham not connected with life evermore, is not our calling connected with eternal life?
FER Not our calling; we get eternal life incidentally, the greater includes [p. 414] the less.
JSA That is, if our calling is higher, it does not exclude anything that anybody else had.
FER Abraham is waiting for the world to come, and so are we; but we come in for a great deal more than that.
RSS What is our calling?
FER Sonship; as we see in the first two or three verses of this epistle.
HF But Abraham had earthly promises, we have not.
FER Quite so, special promises connected with this scene.
JT But the thought of eternal life goes back further than Abraham, “In hope of eternal life which God that cannot lie promised before the world began”.
FER God had all His ways before Him. God was not taken aback by sin. Sin came in, but sin existed even before the world; the devil sins from the outset. God put the first man on the scene first, but His purposes were in Christ before the first man. God had everything before Him. It is a mistake to suppose that He brought in Christ as a remedy. When the responsible man had failed God brought in the Man of His purpose; but all His ways and purposes were ever before Him. Eternal life was not an afterthought with God, though it has now come out in contrast to death which came in by sin.
HP Neither was any of God’s truth an afterthought; it was all fulfilling His counsels and purposes.
FER Quite so.
HF But was eternal life in connection with Abraham?
FER I think the blessing of Abraham will be eternal life. It was the purpose of God to set death aside; death was there on man, and in blessing Abraham, God indicated His intention of putting man outside of death. The confirmation of that is that the blessing of Abraham is confirmed in the Seed [p. 415] when figuratively raised from the dead; we have in Genesis 22, “In. thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed”.
JT So then you make the blessing of Abraham to be eternal life?
FER You get it, I think, in Psalm 133: “There the Lord commanded the blessing, even life for evermore”.
JT From what you said a moment ago, we must not say that the words ‘life’ and ‘eternal life’ are always equivalent.
FER No, you cannot read Scripture in that verbal way, else you might construe it by a concordance.
WM Romans 4 sets forth that Abraham believed in Him who quickeneth the dead.
FER That is a very important point; it is a clear case, there was a link between Abraham and God who quickeneth the dead.
HF But it does not say Abraham apprehended that.
FER But it says he believed God in that light. I would not say much about Abraham’s apprehension.
Ques Would you say eternal life is any part of the purpose of God itself?
FER I think God intended to bring it in, and we get it on the road, but God intended some greater thing for us, that is, sonship, and that is what comes out in the church.
WM Did you not say the four items of truth, the kingdom, the covenant, reconciliation, and eternal life, are all connected with God’s earthly people?
FER Yes, they are all intimately connected with earth.
HT Why does the Lord connect eternal life with the flock in John’s gospel?
FER It simply says, He gives unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish. The solution of [p. 416] eternal life comes out in connection with Christ and He gives it to the flock; but the flock is never seen as such in heaven; a flock is upon earth.
WM So they never apostatise?
FER No. “They shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand”. In other words they will be kept and none will pluck them out of the Father’s hand.
HF Do you not think it includes that they will not go to hell?
FER I doubt if that is the idea of the passage.
JSA If they are already Christ’s sheep the question could not arise.
FER It is in contrast with what is spoken of Judas, “None of them is lost, but the son of perdition”.
Rem The same sense as in 1 Corinthians 10, perishing in the wilderness.
FER Quite so, but they will not perish.
WHC Was it not spoken to the enemies concerning the sheep? Did they not think the man in chapter 9 had apostatised?
FER Yes.
Ques “They shall never perish”, is not that heaven secured for them? I thought that was the bearing of the passage; it was salvation.
FER I do not object; they will be kept and none will pluck them out of Christ’s hand, but the Lord goes further and says, “My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all, and [p. 417] no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand”. It is the security of the sheep, that is the point, they are placed beyond the reach of evil both from within and without. Perishing has reference to evil within and plucking out to evil without.
JA Was it the mind of God for them?
FER It certainly was the Father’s mind, “and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. I and my Father are one”.
JA I was thinking this morning of the word ‘hath’, and the scripture in Genesis came to my mind; the steward of Abraham, speaking about Isaac, says, “unto him hath he given all that he hath”. The mind of Abraham was toward Isaac, but Abraham remained in possession; it seemed to clear up the difficulty which was raised about the word ‘hath’.
JT That is, Abraham had not turned over the thing to Isaac but it was his mind toward Isaac.
FER This prayer in Ephesians 3 is wonderful. Supposing such a thing conceivable as that the church had remained in its first estate, you would not have wanted the Scriptures.
HF Will you explain that?
FER Because the mind of God which is in the Scriptures is found livingly expressed in the church, that was the divine idea.
JT That is evidently very important.
FER It shows the place the church had in the mind of God. I suppose it was not possible that the church should abide in that place, but if it had you would have had the church filled unto all the fulness of God. Two things were to be realised in the church, that is, intelligence and love; there was the comprehension with all saints of the breadth, and length, and depth, and height, and the knowledge of the love of Christ which passeth knowledge. God’s mind was to be livingly expressed in the church; that is the thought.
GR Would you not say that what is seen in the church as the heavenly city, in Revelation 21, all that shines out there, is morally true today? It is manifest there, but it is fulfilled morally now.
FER Quite so, in that day they will not want [p. 418] the Scriptures; the nations do not walk in the light of the Scriptures but in the light of the city.
WM I suppose it is a kind of humiliation now that we have to send the Bible to the heathen.
FER It is because the church has lost its place; if it had not been for that, a Bible society would not have been wanted. You send the Bible to the heathen because they cannot see God in the church.
GR Is not the idea in the millennium that the living waters flow out of the heavenly Jerusalem?
FER Quite so, God is in the church and there is glory to Him through the assembly.
Rem If I get the thought rightly, when the church was in its first estate, the New Testament scriptures, as we have them, did not exist, and yet the church was in a position to show forth Christ, which it has never been in since, because everything was in order, and the Holy Spirit had full sway there.
FER If you could have had the prayer of the apostle fulfilled in the saints (the hindrance was not with God or the apostle), then the mind of God would have had its perfect expression livingly in the church.
HT Is not that seen in the verse in Acts, “Then had the churches rest ... and were edified; and walking in the fear of the Lord, and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit were multiplied”?
FER There was the power of it coming out there.
FL Is that what you would term the glory of God in the church?
FER I do not know any better word than His effulgence shining out in the church.
GR There is a word in the passage Mr. H. T. quoted just now, “Then had the churches rest ... and were edified”; you get the multiplying afterwards; so that if the edifying had gone on there would have been no trouble about the multiplying.
FER When the church is in ruin and the latter [p. 419] days have come in, then the apostle presses on Timothy the importance of the Scriptures; and that he has fully known the apostle’s doctrine; but that is after the corruption had come in. The church had lost its place.
HF Was it not the Old Testament scriptures that the apostle was speaking of?
FER Yes, but he combines the Old Testament scriptures with what Timothy had learned from the apostle himself.
JSA And christianity was not set forth in the Old Testament scriptures.
FER But you see the importance of the Scriptures when decay had come in.
HT You say christianity was not revealed in the Old Testament scriptures.
HF Why does the Lord Jesus Christ say that they contained the things concerning Himself?
FER They spoke of the things which were to be public, that is, of the sufferings of Christ and the glories which should follow; they did not speak of christianity.
Rem What we have spoken of seems to give immense significance to the departure of Ephesus, as addressed in Revelation 2.
FER I think it enables you to understand what the Lord says, except it repented He would take the candlestick out of its place. If it did not answer the mind of God it was no longer light.
WM Is it true that the Scriptures are for the man of God, the individual?
FER I think the importance of the Scriptures comes to light when departure has come in as to the church.
JT Although the church has gone to ruin, would you say whatever light there is in the world is in the church?
FER The church is the pillar and ground of [p. 420] the truth, but the truth is not livingly set forth in the church.
JT But there is light here, you would say?
FER The church is the pillar and ground of the truth, and the gifts are there; and if there is any maintenance of christianity at all, it is in the professing church.
JT As to the Bibles being sent out, whatever light there is is not seen by the heathen in the Bibles, but livingly in the saints.
FER It is no good sending out Bibles if there are not preachers.
HF Do you say then that God would not use the Bible to a man’s soul without a preacher?
FER It is difficult to put it that way because God is sovereign; but the general principle is ‘How shall they hear without a preacher?’ The divine way undoubtedly is preaching.
HF You think that could not be applied to the Spirit of God?
FER I think the apostle is defending his own preaching to the gentiles. The fact is, the time may come that God may have to speak through an ass, when things get very bad indeed; He might use anything in a day of decay and ruin.
HT One of the most interesting of Spurgeon’s sermons is on the text, “He sent his word and healed them”, and in it he showed that nothing in anybody’s sermons was ever blessed to a soul except the word itself.
WHC I suppose that is why it says, “Preach the word”.
Ques When the church lost its first love, is it ever contemplated that it will be recovered?
FER The Lord holds it responsible, but as a matter of fact it never is restored. God never restores a thing which has once failed. He may bring it out in a different way, like the heavenly city, but He [p. 421] never restores it in the same way. Israel will be restored, but not on the same footing. The prayer in our chapter was addressed to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, “That he would grant you according to the riches of his glory to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith”. You have a kind of description of what the Scriptures are morally. It is of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ that every family in heaven and on earth is named. The strengthening with might is by His Spirit, in the inner man; and it is in order that Christ, who is going to fill all things, may dwell in their hearts by faith. That is what, in principle, the Scriptures are. They are the revelation by the Spirit of the purposes of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which are to have their accomplishment in Him.
JSA And the Lord is that Spirit, the Spirit of Scripture.
FER Yes, and so the purposes and counsels of the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ revealed by the Spirit are centred in Christ. That is what you get in the church; so that you get the saints filled unto all the fulness of God.
HF You would not be satisfied to take the teaching of any man without comparing it with the Scriptures.
FER In a day of evil it is of the utmost importance to prove all things and not accept the dictum of anybody.
WM Only would it not be right to receive it, because the Bereans, before they searched the Scriptures, received the word?
HF But they did not accept what they heard until they read the Scriptures. What would be the purpose of searching the Scriptures otherwise?
WM To get confirmation. It says, “they received the word with all readiness of mind”, and then they “searched the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so”, to get confirmation.
HF If I had accepted a thing I would not go to look for proof of it afterwards. If I had heard what I supposed was true, I would like to know if it was true and would do as the Bereans did, get it confirmed from the Scriptures.
JT But you would say there are things in the New Testament which are not confirmed in the Old Testament.
FER One thing is certain, they had to take things on trust in the early days. The only safeguard they had was that the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets.
WHC That is the force of “they received the word with all readiness of mind”.
HT What about the case of the Thessalonians, where they were in doubt as to whether the first epistle agreed with what the Old Testament scriptures taught?
FER I thought the point in the first epistle was they had a doubt as to whether those who had fallen asleep would have part in the kingdom.
HT I thought it was they did not understand meeting the Lord in the air and that His feet should stand on the mount of Olives.
FER I thought the mistake had regard to those who had died, that they would have no part in the kingdom.
JT In 1 Thessalonians 2:13, the apostle says, “For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe”.
FER They had to accept it on trust.
JT And then it is, it works effectually in [p. 423] you.
HF Could such a testimony be said to be received from any but an apostle?
FER But the truth is in the church. The apostles had the truth, but they did not keep it to themselves, they communicated the truth. Paul communicated the truth to Timothy, “the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also”. You get there four generations, the apostle, Timothy, faithful men, and others. It was in that way the truth was to be transmitted, that is what the apostle contemplated.
Ques If I rightly understand the thought, had the church maintained its first estate, the truth would have been maintained there in its purity?
FER The church would have been the living expression of all that was in the mind and heart of God.
GBM Would it be proper that we should, like the Bereans, receive the word in all readiness, and then go home to prove it?
FER Our day is an evil day and there are antichrists abroad; and therefore God has given you the Scriptures that you may have a standard of truth, and you have to look that the standard is not transgressed. I was saying elsewhere that the scripture is the limit. I do not think people learn exactly from Scripture, but from the Spirit of truth, but the more familiar people are with the scripture the better; because a man’s mind is thus continually pulled up in its tendency to go beyond the limit. In regard to certain things which have come out in this country as to eternal life, the difficulty was that the limit of Scripture was transgressed; the moment you get beyond the limit of Scripture you are a transgressor. I would be content to be pulled up if I went beyond the limit of Scripture.
HT Scripture is the sword of the [p. 424] Spirit.
FER Quite so, my word or any other man’s word is not authority; Scripture is authority.
JT Would you say that Scripture is the sword of the Spirit?
FER The word of God is the sword of the Spirit.
JSA I think we have used the Scripture as an equivalent for the word of God.
HT What distinction do you make between Scripture and the word of God?
JT I thought the word of God was the expression of God in Hebrews 4; it is not simply scripture?
FER Evidently so, because it says all things are naked and open unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. People do not see the intimacy of the connection, hence when God really came in He became His own testimony. That is the idea of John 1. He had spoken by law and prophets to a certain extent, but when He makes Himself known, He becomes His own testimony, “And the Word was God”.
JC Would you say the Scripture was the written word of God?
FER Quite so.
Ques Do we not get in the gospels, “the people pressed upon him to hear the word of God”? They came to hear Christ.
FER The word of God is the expression of God. Christ is the Word, and hence it is that God became His own testimony. He came Himself; that is what the presence of Christ meant.
JSA He has spoken to us not by law and prophets, but in His Son.
FER That is the character of the moment.
RSS What is the difference between the prayer in this chapter and the prayer in the first chapter?
FER The prayer in the first chapter is that you may apprehend what is for you. The prayer in this chapter is that you may know what is above you. It [p. 425] has regard to you subjectively, that you may be “Strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God”. Now what more can Scripture give you? You have in a sense got a great deal beyond Scripture.
JP You have got to the fulness of God. What could be beyond that?
FER I do not know; the idea is that God might be fully expressed in the assembly; it is glory to God in the assembly.
RSS Of course before that could be you must grow in the knowledge of God.
FER If you are strengthened with all might by the Spirit of the Father in the inner man so that Christ may dwell in your heart by faith, you have certainly the knowledge of God. You have the Father and the Spirit and the Christ all connected with the saints; it is impossible that you could have more than that. Then it is you apprehend, with all saints, you are filled with divine intelligence, you see what is the breadth and, length and depth and height and know the love of Christ; that which is going to fill all things.
Ques Is this reaching the point of the Lord’s desire, that they may “know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent”?
FER Quite so.
JSA If that is God’s thought about the church, it shows not only how much it has departed from it, but also how little it was ever realised.
FER I doubt if it was ever realised; but it is important to see the divine thought in the church.
Ques What is the special importance of our apprehending this [p. 426] now?
FER The first effect would be that your heart would be set upon it; it may be unattainable, but I refuse anything that is not according to it. One would sacrifice everything to walk in that direction. You do not settle down to ease in the world. The result will be that you will be a pillar in the temple of God when the kingdom is displayed; you will be conspicuous then because you have been faithful now.
Ques Does the Lord in addressing the seven churches appeal to the overcomer on the ground of what you get here, to bring them to the consciousness of it?
FER Yes; I think you would desire to be in the place of an overcomer. You do not want to be swept down the stream, you would stand against the current even if you had to stand alone.
GR You certainly will not help another if you cannot stand yourself.
FER In a day of evil you must be prepared to stand alone.
JSA Though in the goodness of God it rarely happens that you have to stand alone.
FER I quite agree with that.
JT Would you be free to use this prayer yourself?
FER I hesitate only because of the feeling that I am not up to it, but I have a great delight in the prayer in seeing what the divine mind was.
JT I asked the question because you said it was unattainable.
FER I doubt if it was ever attained, and I am quite sure it cannot be attained now. What I mean is that, in the ruin of the church, the mind of God as to the church can never be attained.
GR Because you require all saints.
FER You could never attain it in any small company, for when you comprehend “what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height”, the mind must take in all saints. You could not be limited to any small area [p. 427] or circle.
Rem On the other hand, there would be nothing superfluous.
FER Being strengthened in the inner man involves that you abstract yourself in mind from the outward man.
JSA By the term outward man you understand that which has to do with things about us.
GR So that publicly you might not be very big.
FER Quite so.
JT No doubt the stronger one is inwardly, the smaller one is outwardly.
FER That is very likely.
WM The apostle was the off-scouring of all things.
FER The great thing is that although the restoration of the church down here is unattainable, yet all God’s mind will come out. It is impossible for God to be diverted from His purpose.
JP It will be reached in actuality.
FER Yes.
HC It will come out in the heavenly Jerusalem.
FER That is it.
Rem It is blessed that God has given us, in the closing up of christianity, a sight of what the church will be for Him.
FER The church is first taken up to heaven, in order that it may come out from heaven, and that is as the expression of the glory of God. The glory of God is there, and every bit of God’s mind is answered there. I have no doubt whatever, there is the apprehension of the length, and breadth, and depth, and height, and the knowledge of the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge. The city will be filled with it. They do not need the light of the sun, all natural light is completely eclipsed.
JP So the last verse will be eternally true?
FER Quite so; to Him be glory in the church throughout all ages. It may be obscured for the moment, but it will come [p. 428] out.
JT I suppose that after the declension, the most that ever could be said of the church in the way of approbation is said of Philadelphia, “Thou ... hast kept my word and hast not denied my name”.
FER It is because it has returned in a sense to the truth of the church; I look on Philadelphia as representative.
JT So that what is said to that company is said to the church.
FER I think it ought to be the ambition of everybody to be in the truth of it without anybody assuming to be it.
WM Does this expression mean the church is adequate to display all the fulness of God?
FER I think so.
WM In your address the other night you spoke about the light being modified, do you mean that it shines through the city?
FER I think the world could not bear it in its brilliancy and therefore the light is modified in being presented in the church.
GR So that it does not say that the nations walk in the light of God, but they walk in the light of it.
FER Quite so, the church is the full expression of God. But then all in the city are in the full light of God; there is no temple.
JT That shows the capacity is greater in the city.
FER They have been formed for it; that is going on in the interval.
RSS So when it says in the second chapter, “That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace”, would it not be rather love there?
FER No, the millennium is the reign of grace, and God’s public witness to the universe is grace in the church. Love is what is known in [p. 429] the church.
WM Is it that the church was the object of His grace?
FER God shows it forth there because the church is acquainted with the exceeding riches of His grace. The people that crucified Christ come out as the heavenly city. Paul, the very man that would have blotted the name of Christ out from the earth, comes out in the heavenly city.
JT That is, the identity remains in the city.
FER Yes.
GR Where does Paul come in in the city?
FER He is not mentioned in the foundations, for while the twelve were laying the foundations, Paul was persecuting, but he has a large place in the city in forming the affections of the saints inside.
WM It is more the inner part.
FER And so you get two thoughts as to the church in Hebrews 12, the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and the church of the firstborn which are written in heaven.
RSS So what the church really knows is love, before she is the display of grace.
FER Exactly.
Ques “The fulness of him that filleth all in all”, who is that?
FER It is Christ who fills all in all, and the church is His fulness. Eve was taken from Adam and was in a sense the fulness of Adam.
JT “The ages to come” here do not refer to the eternal state.
FER I do not think so; all is in view of the millennium. Very little is given to us about the eternal state. Scripture carries you on to that, but to show you the complete and final solution of the question of good and evil.
JT So that what comes out then is for testimony [p. 430] more.
WM I suppose there was no great end to be gained by developing the eternal state.
FER The solution of the question of good and evil has been God’s purpose from the outset, and you cannot get that until you come to the eternal state.
HC When the former things have passed away.
FER Exactly, all the mixture is dissolved, and evil and good each find their own place.
Rem As the chemists say, everything resolved to its original elements.
FER Quite so. To begin with, you have new heavens and new earth in which righteousness resides, and then the tabernacle of God is with men, and God will dwell with them, and there will be no more sea, and tears are wiped away; there is no more death, all things are made new. That is not a bad end.
JSA And grace supposes the need for it; but in the eternal state there is no question of evil raised.
FER I think everything in that day will be filled with love; God will be all in all.
WM When you say Eve was the fulness of Adam, is it that she displayed what was in Adam?
FER I think she was adequate for it. No beast of the field could be the helpmeet of Adam, and therefore God took from him a rib and built it into a woman, and she became the glory of the man. The mischief of the present day is that the woman wants to shine in her own glory; she aims at being as good as the man. It is a sign of the times, and it is, too, a picture of the defection of the church.
JT Referring to the expression “unto him be glory in the church” throughout all ages, is that what is displayed or what God derives from the church?
FER It is, I judge, what God derives. Love works for its own satisfaction; you cannot say the same thing in regard to grace. In grace you are the object, but in love God Himself is the object, and that is right. God could not make the creature an [p. 431] object.
HC You get a glimpse of that in the prodigal son received into the father’s house.
FER Quite so. God can show grace to a creature, but He cannot make the creature an object, else the creature would be as great as Himself.
HF Would you consider that God’s glory is the same as God’s satisfaction?
FER I think God’s glory is that He as known becomes the great Centre of the universe, the object of all love; and it is in that way He is glorified.
WM The principle of attraction is restored.
FER God becomes like the sun to the universe.
JSA If that is God’s thought about the assembly, it becomes pretty clear it is the one thing to go for, and all service ought to be in view of it.
FER I think it is a most wonderful thing that you can pursue a thing which you know to be unattainable here. It shows a man’s courage. Very few men in this world will pursue an object if they do not think it attainable.
WM But if it is not attainable here, it will all come out by-and-by.
JSA It must have laid hold on you pretty strongly.
FER But God will be with you in it. You will get the answer to it, for you will come out as a pillar in the temple of God.
HF Do you think there is any progression in it?
FER I think it takes hold on people more and more. I find that with myself, and you become more and more prepared to surrender things here.
RSS Is that all what Paul meant when he said, “I press toward the mark”?
FER Exactly; he went on himself anyway. The goal was the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus. I believe this refers to all the saints, not simply to Paul; but while his mind embraced all saints, I do not think they were all in the truth of the calling.
[p. 432] Ques Where does Philippians come in?
FER I think it comes in as marking out the individual path of a man who is in the light of the calling.
Rem That is when he has the apprehension of what we have had before us this afternoon in this chapter.
FER I think so. Depend upon it, we very much fail in our apprehension of the church and the divine thought in the church. Every thought of God’s ways in regard to the world to come, the kingdom, the covenant, reconciliation, eternal life, the glory of God, are seen in connection with the church. The church does not pass by anything; everything has its place in it. Many of these things in their proper connection apply to earth, but then they must have their place in the church, because they are part of the ways of God.
JSA You have spoken of the church and the place it had and that all the mind of God ought to be set forth in it, but you do not mean to give the church the place of a teacher.
FER No, the church was a witness, not a teacher.
WM Individuals are teachers.
FER Individuals according to gift.
HF Is not the Holy Spirit of God the Teacher?
FER I think so, really.
JT Another thing; would you say the church’s place is properly on high? “The calling on high of God in Christ Jesus”. You only get the true idea of the calling in Ephesians 1.
WM A prospect is very different from the top of a hill than from the bottom of it.
FER Quite so; Ephesians begins at the top, and then you get a much larger survey.
Rem In the epistle to the Ephesians you begin at the top, and gradually come down to what is here.
FER Yes, you come down for conflict.