Divine Love Makes No Mistakes
DIVINE LOVE MAKES NO MISTAKES
John 11: 5, 11, 20, 23, 32-34, 41- 43
The Lord being among us as He is, dear brethren, something must happen; there must be some increase resulting from these circumstances which we all feel and are affected by, as in this chapter, a chapter of death and sorrow, a chapter of depletion on the side of nature and human relationships. How many beautiful things come out in it. How rich it is, not in death but rich in glory. So I would say a word about the way the Lord loved the three. It means that nothing can go wrong, if He loved the three then nothing could go wrong. Doubts may arise in our hearts but love would answer the doubts, nothing could go wrong. There are no mistakes, everything is calculated rightly by love. It makes way for itself and for glory and makes way for endearment to Christ. How the Lord loved the three! What rich results there are when He becomes more endeared to us in the circumstances we go through. How worthy He is, because if we get attached to Him we get attached also to the assembly. We might say something has gone wrong. One taken so early, so needed in the family and in the locality. One who has been through so much, so much has gone into her life, it would seem that something has gone wrong.
But, dear brethren, everything is perfect, everything is for the promotion of the divine glory. May it be so, may it work out in this locality in this way. Maybe somebody has not got the gain of these circumstances, maybe some are not committed in this very locality to the testimony. This should affect them. Someone has suffered, weak in body and yet those strong in body have not entered into it. The Lord would challenge us at this time as to whether we are prepared to take things up for the promotion of the interests of Christ and the assembly in an immediate way. The locality should be better immediately as a result of this sorrow. The Lord is able to come in immediately to give the answer, because it means so much to Him to have assembly life in our localities and response assembly-wise. So He says, “Lazarus, our friend”. John does not use terms extravagantly, so when He says our friend, it must be very touching. “Lazarus, our friend”, what a thing it must be to be a friend of Christ—a friend of God. If anyone loves the world he is constituted enemy of God. But there are those in His confidence. Our sister must have been in the confidence of the Lord and of God to have gone through what she went through.
She would have the honour of being named like that—“Lazarus, our friend”. Well, we can see our sister was a friend of Christ and of the brethren. One who was friendly not for herself but that Christ should have a greater place. May the Lord be able to say that about every one of us.
Martha comes. How beautiful that we all have part in the relations of Christ. How beautiful the family of God is. We cannot take another’s place, we can only be in one place in the family of God. No one else can have the place she had and yet she filled it out. We should be set for good relations in the assembly with Christ so that when He comes in to take up relations in the Supper we may be all ready to take it on. Martha has her place in the assembly's affections. The Lord knows how to deal with each one of us. May we be conscious of that. How He can deal with each one of us. What He had in mind was that Martha should be better. Better to-day than yesterday, better this week than last. So the Lord knew how to handle Martha.
Mary does what Martha did not do. She falls at His feet. What a place she had in His heart. The Lord is affected by that, so we would desire to be those who can affect the Lord. He knew He was going to raise Lazarus but His sympathies were not shut up. We may have thought the Lord would go immediately and call Lazarus, but He went with them through all the circumstances in His perfect humanity. Those sympathies flow out to-day. How affecting it is that it speaks of the Father, how rich the chapter is. How rich every chapter is that supplies our needs. Supplies come in to-day so that all our hearts may be lifted up and may come into it in a greater way. It says Father, not God, but Father. We know what the name of Father means—full of affection and grace. We see the Lord's relations with the Father—how pure they were, never out of communion with Him. May we never be out of communion but more in it. These circumstances have increased in our souls how essential communion with divine Persons is.
He comes to the tomb, the voice is heard, “Lazarus, come forth”. Did Lazarus answer? He must do. Death must give way. How we rejoice that the Lord’s voice will be heard in the domain of death and our sister will hear and know it. What it will be in the divine vocabulary we do not know but she has her name, her own personal relations with Christ, and she will be called out of the domain of death. Death is a mighty power but He Himself has been into it. Death will have to go. Everyone that has died in Christ will be raised and changed. What triumph there is in our souls as we are sobered in the presence of death; while our sympathies flow out to those who need them.
Love makes no mistakes. May we trust more in that love and be set more and more for His glory and praise in the assembly.
Egham
23rd October 1962
Word given at the burial of a mother leaving a husband and three young children
THE GLORY OF CHRIST AND THE ASSEMBLY
I read these passages partly because they have already been quoted, which usually indicates that the Spirit of God is thinking about a certain matter. He would be thinking about a certain matter now in view of Christ, for Christ would be affected by this occasion and by others elsewhere too, no doubt, reminding Him of the assembly, His bride, and reminding Him that everything that really matters is there in her. All that order of things which will yet be public will extend out from that. So we love to feel with Him in the time of His absence and patience. How He goes over what the assembly is, like Isaac in his meditation would go over what that vessel would be that the servant had gone to secure for him. When we get into this circle of things we find how great it is, how precious, too. What a great area we get into when we begin to think and speak about Christ and the assembly; we get caught up in what is so great and glorious! So Isaac would think about what his bride would be like, and he would be sure she would have all the features that would just suit him. He typifies the heavenly Man. It would require somebody very dignified to fill her place alongside Him as the heavenly Man. He would want one who could be alongside of Him in regard to the heavenly affairs He has to see to and who would have heavenly affections and character. Then the Father would be in mind, too, and the Father's order of things. We can bring that in because it is all involved in the service of God and in the current operations of Christ; the Lord amongst us now would be thinking like that.
These two passages bring out something of the glory of Christ and the assembly, which immediately comes before us because of the circumstances that have been arranged; that is, that our brother and sister should sit amongst us, not to be the object of the meeting, but to set on something that would relate to Christ and the assembly. We would see something in our sister, the bride, that would reflect what Christ is about to have in the assembly, and our brother, the bridegroom, would suggest to us something of the glory and eminence of the blessed Man, Christ Jesus. We have the greatness of Christ presented in this passage in Ephesians 1, so that we can rest and find much peace and tranquillity of soul in that there is none above Him. The official glories of Christ are all available for us to explore, and on that line, too, we find that there is no one above Him no one greater than Christ. He is given “to be head over all things to the assembly”, but He is also “above every principality, and authority, and power, and dominion” whatever you can mention, whether in relation to what is heavenly or what is earthly. Christ is above all, the blessed Man exalted! He is ready for the world to come. In Revelation His wife, too, is ready for the world to come, for the great affairs of that world. In this passage we have read, however, it says that He is given “to be head over all things to the assembly which is his body”. Everything is put together that we should not miss out anything. “His body” is a very affecting reference; it is where all His feelings are and where all His feelings can be given expression to; it is Himself. Then the assembly is to share with Him in His headship and glory in the world to come, just as our sister would be with her husband in all his affairs. He is glad to take her into all his affairs because she is equal to him; he finds in her a ready counterpart to take up and share with him in all his affairs, to say at every turn, ‘I am with you’.
These relationships and these spheres of headship bring such power into the assembly! They are patterned after Christ and the assembly; the relations of husband and wife are not only patterned after Ephesians 5, but after chapter 1, too. Ephesians 5 brings out that they are one, one flesh, so that a husband loves his wife because she is his flesh. We are to love our wives. We need to check up with Ephesians 5, especially if there is any doubt, so that the flow of love is free between husband and wife, because if not it will not flow down to the children or out into the house. The mainspring is in the husband, then the wife has her part, and we always have to check up to see if things are flowing rightly—whether warmth is always there, and how we affect our children. We are to affect our children as the Lord affected His disciples whom He called children. We want to love our children into the truth and show them there is nothing better—not just tell them there is nothing better—than these relationships in which we are moving.
So it says He is given “to be head over all things to the assembly, which is his body, the fulness of him who fills all in all”. How great these things are, dear brethren! Our sister will share with her husband in his headship and in his glory, because he will have a certain glory. Every man is to have a certain glory, and his wife shares with him in it. It comes out in all the arrangements in the house, for every head arranges things differently because of what springs from himself, from his headship. There are great resources in headship and the wife shares with her husband in it and helps in it, as the assembly will be a help to Christ in the world to come and will participate with Him in everything which will arise. You might say that in one sense He does not need a vessel, but, in another sense, as Man He does need a vessel and He rests in her as He exercises His headship in the world to come.
In Revelation everything is looking forward to the world to come, although not all know it. But we know it and so we are able to interpret every sorrow and every longing; we know that all points toward the world to come. In Revelation 19 there is great exultation. It is a day of rejoicing today, for our brother has his wife and our sister has her husband; our brother has a bride and our sister has a bridegroom. That is a cause of exultation, and this day is a day that has been looked forward to. There is no question about that; much has been prepared for it, not only materially, but morally. Our sister has been preparing herself for headship—otherwise it will be sprung on her. It would be a poor thing to have anything sprung on us. But our sister has been preparing for the headship of her husband. She has known before what the headship of Christ was, and no one who is single need be without the knowledge of headship, because they can get it from the Lord, from their relations with Him. Our sister has known what it was to have her brother and no doubt in principle subjection to him began to operate. Our brother would be concerned, now that he is going to carry more responsibility, to be a greater man; he must be a greater man if he is going to carry more responsibility, having a wife in his care and exercising headship in relation to her.
All these things have been going on secretly, and now the day has come when our sister has a husband and our brother has a wife. We know our brother and we do not expect him to go out of fellowship, or get cold, or go wrong. Similarly with our sister and the more so since she has a husband who is capable of headship. The great One who is capable for headship is Christ; He is Head over all things to the assembly and He does not fail her, nor she Him. He has a wife and she makes herself ready and it is a great occasion for universal exultation. What is here today is just a symbol of the universal exultation there will be when the marriage of the Lamb is come, a great occasion which will have great repercussions. The world to come is just on the threshold and Christ does not enter into it alone but with His wife, one who is able to share His headship and glory and be with Him in the arrangement of all the great events that are on hand. It tells what her clothing is, and it is distinctive.
I suppose all our sisters should be pronounced as brides, not for the sake of themselves, but for the sake of Revelation 19. How pronounced the assembly is and will be with Christ! There is no difficulty about where she is and where she sits on the day! Everybody will know that distinguished person, the Lamb's wife. There she will be arrayed. How long it has taken to complete her attire! The first stitch was at Pentecost, and it has gone right on since then; we can trace it all through. What a robe it will be—wonderful! How well she will be attired!
May the Lord help us and enlarge our affections and understanding in relation to Christ and the assembly, so that we may see what great things are on hand. Today is just a tiny reflection for Christ’s sake of what He is about to have.
Dublin
12th October 1963
From ‘Ministry of the Word’ 1964
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