“DO NOT HINDER ME”

P. Martin

Genesis 24: 54–60; 45: 8–15; 2 Timothy 4: 9–13, 19–22

I read these scriptures having in mind to say a word, as the Lord may help, on this reference in Genesis 24, “Do not hinder me”. The time is short, and whether the spirit of urgency is sufficiently marking us, or sufficiently marking me, I would doubt. If we feel that the time is short, how much more the Spirit of God feels it. We know that in one sense there is no need to look outside to conditions in the world as a witness of it, although they are an abundant witness. I think we can say simply that there is an answer in the affections of the saints which is a witness which is greater than the witness in the world—that the time is short. Would that we were increasingly sympathetic with the feelings of divine Persons. This reference here, typically to the Spirit, is one which I believe should impress us. The Spirit has been on a mission; He is on a mission; He has

come out as having been sent by both the Father and the Son; He has an object in view and is intent on completing it.

In this section we might say, speaking typically, He is well on His way to the completion of it. What a moment, dear brethren! I believe this cry has gone out through the whole of the dispensation, “Hinder me not”¹. Here we are, nearly two thousand years since the Spirit came; how urgent that cry is today—“Hinder me not”. It may be that what is legitimate may be put forward to seek to cause Him to pause for a moment; “Let the maiden abide with us some days, or say ten” just “some days”. It may be that that is the attitude of someone’s heart here. May the Spirit of God stir us up today that that should not be the attitude of any of us, that we should not put other things in front of the service of the Spirit and His intention in going away to His Master.

Let us just ponder for a moment what it will be when the church is taken, when He who restrains has gone, when He returns back, we might say reverently, to the One who has sent Him. Think of what it will mean to the Spirit. We often ponder what it meant to Christ to have been received up in glory after those thirty-three years, but let us ponder what it will mean to the Spirit to be received back, if I might speak carefully, after nearly two thousand years. What power and urgency are in His feelings; how He has laboured unceasingly and untiringly, never a moment having gone by when the Spirit has ceased to labour throughout the whole of the dispensation, and His cry would be to us at the moment—“Hinder me not”.

Let us put nothing in the way of the hope that is before us, and the object, we might say, that is before the Spirit—our departure to be with Christ, the bride complete, and His return, having completed His work here, to the One who sent Him. What a moment that is going to be!

Yet there was somebody here who said, “Let the maiden abide with us some days, or say ten”. O, dear brother and sister, there is not a day to waste; the Spirit’s service is almost complete, and He is, as it were, saying to us afresh, Let Me go to My Master. From His side, He is ready to go; the willingness is there and the power is there, but from our side is the willingness there? Is Christ everything to us? Has the service of the Spirit made Christ everything to us? I think we can say He has become greater to us as we have continued in our short period of history. It says of Isaac that he became greater, until he was very great (see Genesis 26: 13). May we press on for that moment, dear brethren, that Christ may become greater and continually greater, until He becomes very great.

Think of the limitless character of the greatness of Christ, the One who has ascended up that He might fill all things, filling the heavens through which He has passed, filling the heart of the Father, and filling the hearts of those who are here in testimony. He has ascended up that He might fill all things. Think of the glory of such a Man! No one else could have filled what Christ has filled—“that he might fill all things”, Ephesians 4: 10. The Spirit is intent that in such a moment as we are in Christ should become so great to us that our desires should merge with those of the Spirit as He says, “Hinder me not”. It says, “Do not hinder me, seeing Jehovah has prospered my way; send me away, and I will go to my master”. Would that I could leave some impression of the Spirit’s feelings today. We might say His way has been prospered—we speak reverently and carefully—and yet it is true, dear brethren, His way has

been prospered. Think of how powerfully He has operated right down through the whole of the dispensation awakening an answer in the recovery of the truth; think of how prospered that way has been, and now the cry is, “Hinder me not”. May we put nothing, therefore, before Christ. I say this, and I shall be searched by it more than any, but may we put nothing in the way of Christ, may He become our all. The moment of Christ’s reception of the bride to Himself means so much to the Spirit, and He says, “Hinder me not”.

“And they called Rebecca and said to her, Wilt thou go with this man?” That is, I think, one of the calls of the Spirit at the moment, “Wilt thou go with this man?” Are we willing just to go with the Spirit? She left all else, her father’s house and all that she could lay claim to naturally; she left all that she had lived in relation to, and she found her own part as typically going with the Spirit in relation to Isaac. “Wilt thou go with this man?”—I would appeal to you young people here, as being one of you, Will you go with the Spirit? You say, Life is before me. It may be, dear young person, that life is before you, but Christ is to be before you; He is to be the object in view—“He died for all, that they who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who died for them and has been raised”, 2 Corinthians 5: 15. Is that Person before you, the One who has died for you that you might live to Him? The Spirit is working powerfully that you might know what it is to have Christ continuously before you, and that your life might be governed by the power of the Spirit in His powerful operations, that you might know what it is for your affection for Christ to increase. Would that that was so of me and all of us, dear brethren, that our affection for Christ increased.

What is going to give power to the present testimony? Is it the light of the truth only? We need the light of the truth, we will come to that a little later, but what gives power to it is affection for Christ and the indwelling of the Spirit as forming what is after Christ for His own pleasure. That is what we desire. May we all know what it is for the Spirit to make the glory of Christ greater in our eyes. Rebecca says, “I will go”. I say again, dear brother, Will you go? Dear sister, Are you prepared to go? The time is short; the Spirit is urgent; “Hinder me not”. The servant was waiting for this answer from Rebecca. But the Spirit may be waiting for it from you.

In Genesis 45 Joseph had been made lord over all the land of Egypt. Think of the exaltation of Christ, the Father loving the Son, and everything being in His hand, but He wants to bring all into the enjoyment of it. The brethren had been through deep exercise as to their part in Joseph’s rejection but they come round to the knowledge of who was there, and we come to the knowledge of Him into whose hand the Father has put everything. What a Man He is!

Joseph’s brethren are coming round to this; Joseph is still there and he says, “Haste and go up to my father, and say to him, Thus says thy son Joseph—God has made me lord of all Egypt”.

I think this should give colour to our testimony. He says later, “And tell my father of all my glory in Egypt ... and haste and bring down my father hither”. The local company should be a place in which there is urgent activity so that the One who has been exalted above all should have His place of prominence and supremacy. We each have our part in that. ‘Go up and tell my father’; what a powerful witness that was, what a powerful testimony to Jacob. And there is power in the Spirit, as operating in each one of us in our day,

to cause that the work of God, wherever it may be, rallies to the recognition of the One who is supreme. Joseph was to become supreme to them in a way in which he had never been before.

What a moment we are in, the time of the supremacy of Christ in the hearts of His own! The Lord would say to us at this moment, as it were, “Haste”. In our conversation together, in the home and in the local meeting, let us be urgent that Christ should have His place, that He should come into the place which is rightly His as the One who has been made Lord over all the land of Egypt. Think of the glory that belongs to Christ, and yet there is something for us to do to spread that glory at the present time. Therefore in the working in the local meeting, and in the body as we have spoken of it earlier, let there be the bringing out of the supremacy of that Man. There is no other man to exalt; every other man has been tried and removed. He has come through as supreme. O, dear brethren, let it be Christ. What is seen in the local meeting? Is it Christ? What is seen in the ministry meeting, with maybe two or three words?

Let it be Christ, let it be that the exaltation of that Man fills the hearts of the saints. Those of us who take part in any way are responsible that the brethren receive living impressions of Christ. Joseph says, Haste and go up to my father and tell him all that you have seen.

Have you not seen Christ exalted? You will not be effective in testimony amongst the saints, or wider, until you have seen Christ exalted. “Haste, and go up”; may we commit ourselves to it in the places in which we have been set, that Christ should be exalted in all that we do.

Finally, we come to Timothy. It is a broken day; Paul is almost alone, “Luke alone is with me”. And in the moment in which we are the testimony is

in reproach. Is Paul discouraged by it? It does not seem like it. Are we discouraged by outward smallness? Let it not be a source of discouragement; the Lord can turn it to the praise and glory of His name. We feel the outward departure, and it is intended that we should, but let it not be for our discouragement; let us go on. Paul is going on here; he has certain needs and Timothy is to meet them when he comes. You might say, Well Paul, you are at the end of your days, the testimony is about spent, what need have you of a cloak, or books, or parchments? Paul would say, The testimony is going on. In writing to Timothy Paul speaks of the public testimony having gone to pieces; the shipwreck has taken place; but, dear brethren, there is that which is going through. I think the fact that Paul asks Timothy to bring certain things when he came is a witness that in Paul’s affections Christ was everything, and the testimony was going through.

He says, “I have combated the good combat, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.

Henceforth the crown of righteousness is laid up for me, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will render to me in that day; but not only to me, but also to all who love his appearing” (2

Timothy 4: 7, 8). Paul was reaching out, you might say, even to the present day—“to all who love his appearing”. He was writing when there was but one with him, “Luke alone is with me”, but there was in Paul’s affections that all who love His appearing should be maintained through to the end.

It is a wonderful moment that we are in; I wonder if we really value it. Outwardly the assembly has been attacked, and Christ has been attacked more than any. You can drive round this country and see the castles that have been attacked, but you know the assembly has been attacked more

than any, and yet it has stood; there is that which stands. Whilst in its public aspect all may appear to have gone to pieces, there is that which stands. Let us have faith for it, and let us be in it on the basis of moral conformity to Christ wrought in the power of the Spirit. Unless that is so in me, I am not in the testimony at all; there is no testimony if Christ is not supreme. Let us weigh these things soberly. Paul, a man in whose heart Christ was everything, says, “That I may gain Christ”; think of that! Paul had so much light and so much entrance into the truth, yet he pursued that he might gain Christ. Let us pursue that we might gain Him, dear brethren. Paul says here to Timothy, You do that. Paul’s ministry is a ministry of the exalted Man, the Man who appeared to Paul out of the glory; think for a moment of that, the Man who appeared to Paul out of the glory; and Paul was also caught up to the third heaven and heard things it was not allowed to man to utter. Paul’s ministry was of Christ glorified, and what was precious to Him here in His body, the saints. That is what the enemy has attacked at every possible point.

“Use diligence to come to me quickly”; the need is urgent to attend to Paul’s ministry. “The cloak which I left behind ... and the books ... especially the parchments” bring when thou comest. What was involved in that? I think it is the setting out of all that had been delivered through Paul. We had reference earlier to the Lord’s own words in the gospels and no doubt that would be involved in it. You might say they were old, Paul had had them a long while, yes, but they were still good. There are many things with which the enemy would occupy our time in reading, but there are these books and the parchments and they are for our instruction and edification. Paul says, When thou comest bring them. Dear brethren, there is much

that has been delivered to us. Thank God for the opening up of the truth; let us keep near to it.

Let us not in any sense lose sight of what the Lord has brought right down to our day, the books and the parchments. Are we able to carry these things, not just in our minds but in our affections? I am not wanting to be sentimental, but how careful Timothy would have been about those things that he was taking to Paul. How careful are we in carrying the things that have been delivered to us in the truth? You can understand Paul saying they were urgent.

The enemy is busy, dear brother, but on the other hand everything is for you. Are you prepared to commit yourself unreservedly, using diligence to come to Paul quickly? “Use diligence to come to me quickly”, Paul says. Think of what that must have meant. Paul was an old man here and Timothy was to use diligence to come to him. The time is short; there is still a certain amount to be done; we still have our part to fill; Timothy had his. Some had fallen away from the work, one had fallen sick, and Paul says to Timothy, “Use diligence to come before winter”. Let us commit ourselves, dear brethren. We say the time is short, very short; who of us knows how long it will be? but we are to use diligence in the time that remains that there might be an answer to Paul’s ministry at the end of the dispensation. And we are to work towards the end that Christ may have His place of supremacy—“and gave him to be head over all things to the assembly, which is his body, the fulness of him who fills all in all”, Ephesians 1: 22.

Is He our object, dear brethren? He is the Spirit’s object, and I think the Spirit would say to us today, “Hinder me not”. There may be much as to which we would say. Well, I have just got to see to this, or, I have just got to do that, but—“Hinder me not”. There is only one object that is worth

having and that is Christ; there is only one object to work to and that is Christ, and the Spirit would stir our affections .I believe in a sense of urgency—“Hinder me not”. May we therefore be ready to go with Him and be workers with Him until the Lord comes, for His name’s sake.

Address at Gillingham
29 August 1981