JERUSALEM AS A TYPE OF THE ASSEMBLY
D. B. Robertson
Isaiah 37: 33–35; Jeremiah 51: 50; Revelation 21: 9–17
I have in mind, beloved brethren, to say a word about Jerusalem, bearing in mind that it is used as a type of the assembly. It is a wonderful thing for us to have light in our souls about the assembly; many beloved Christians do not have that light. When you think of the situation today, I mean in its vital sense, you have Christ enthroned in glory above and the assembly down here. The centre of God’s interests above is Christ, the centre of God’s interest below is the assembly, and what one would desire for oneself and for my brethren increasingly, is that we might have these matters as the centre of our interests too. It is a wonderful thing to have the Man above enthroned in our affections, that as Paul says, “the Christ may dwell, through faith, in your hearts” (Ephesians 3: 17), that is that God’s interest above is our interest. It is precious to realise that at this very moment Christ is delighting the heart of God. God’s heart is full of Him! How full is your heart, how full is mine of Christ? But then God’s interest here on earth at the moment is the assembly. He has great thoughts for the earth but they are all, as it were, held in abeyance for a future day. What God is proceeding with is the assembly. As a direct result of Christ’s enthronement, the Holy Spirit is here, a divine Person, and what He is doing is securing material to build into the assembly.
I wanted to say a word, as the Lord helps me, about Jerusalem as a type of the assembly. First of all I want to speak of how God protects her. He always has protected the assembly and He always will. The attacks against the assembly have been numerous and they will not cease; as long as the assembly is here there will be attacks against it and against those who hold the truth of the assembly. Therefore this is a very precious word here in Isaiah that should comfort each of our hearts. There was a threat against Jerusalem from Sennacherib, the king of Assyria. Assyria represents in Scripture the arrogance of man, it is an arrogant power. As you read in the chapters leading up to this, you will see that he takes a place even in rivalry to God, and questions the ability of God to defend Jerusalem; to use our own terms, to defend the assembly. Think of the presumption of that; think of the power that persons arrogate to themselves, an assumed authority, because, let us remember, that power only belongs to God. Persons may assume authority but the only authority that is really effective is the authority of God, and these Assyrians questioned the ability of God to defend the city. I do not go into all the detail of it but there is a definite word of God in answer to it all. It is a very interesting section; it says, “Therefore thus saith Jehovah concerning the king of Assyria”. He had heard it all. God had taken account of it, and you can be sure, beloved brethren, that wherever there is an attack against the truth of the assembly God is taking account of it; He is taking note of it and He will answer it. He will answer it in His own time and in His own way.
Initially He says, “He shall not come into this city” (he had threatened to come into it), “nor shoot an arrow there, nor come before it with shield, nor cast a bank against it. By the way that he came, by the same shall he return”. God has the power to frustrate every effort of the devil in his attacks against the assembly. Let us be encouraged by that. He says, “I will defend this city, to save it, for mine own sake”. Think of God saying that; God acting for His own sake to preserve the assembly, and then He says, “and for my servant David’s sake”. I suppose that is a type of Christ, because Jerusalem was really David’s city, and the assembly is the property of Christ. He says, “my assembly”, it is His assembly. I believe the Lord is very jealous as to anyone assuming any authority to try and overturn the truth of the assembly. He will defend it, He will save it, it is the divine word. It is as true today as it was here. One thing that has encouraged me of recent days is that the love of the Lord Jesus for the assembly is as much today as it has ever been and as it ever will be. The Lord Jesus does not love the assembly less today than He did at Pentecost; He loves the assembly just as much, and He will defend it, and God will defend it.
I believe that is a word of comfort for our hearts because, especially in the period of the recovery, there has been attack after attack against the assembly, and it continues and it will continue. The devil is relentless in his attack against what is so precious to God, but we have this word of assurance that God will save it “for mine own sake, and for my servant David’s sake”.
When it comes to Jeremiah it is Babylon. The great power of Babylon was menacing the saints in that day, and what a menace it is today. It is not only a frontal attack from Babylon, but it is the side of what is corruptive, it is what is imitative. I say this feelingly, but it is very easy to fall into the snare of Babylon and we need to guard against that, we need the Lord’s help to preserve us from it. The people here were feeling the situation but there is a word for those who escaped, “Ye that have escaped the sword”. Well we have escaped, God has seen to that, we have escaped from the great principles of Babylon. We have understood the meaning of 2 Timothy 2, our charter, we have found a way out of it all. What a mercy it is that God has provided us with such a chapter in the Scriptures so that those who have found a way of escape as naming the name of the Lord would depart from iniquity. In that sense we escape the sword because God’s judgment is coming on Babylon. There is nothing that God judges more severely than He does Babylon. If you read the chapters leading to Revelation 19, they are very solemn chapters. It says, “her smoke goes up to the ages of ages” (Revelation 19: 3), as if there is an eternal testimony to the judgment of God against that great city, that great system. At the present time He is seeing all the attacks against the assembly, the attempt to corrupt it and overthrow it, and God will meet the whole thing.
What I want to bring in is a word for us, a prophetic word in the midst of such conditions. We read, “Ye that have escaped the sword, go, stand not still—remember Jehovah from afar”. I suppose the word “afar” would refer to the distance they were in as in captivity, but Jehovah was still available, and God is still available today. What a blessing that is that we can call and remember Jehovah from afar. Then this word is imprinted on my mind, “and let Jerusalem come into your mind”. Beloved brethren, may it be that the Holy Spirit will stir up real exercise that we might be preserved in our affections for the assembly, that Jerusalem might come into our mind, that it might govern our thoughts and our attitude to things; that it might govern the way we live, the way we are in our localities, the way we are among the brethren, the way we see matters proceeding; to let Jerusalem come into our mind. You may say, How does it affect me or how does it affect other persons, but then how does it affect the assembly? I think it is a very precious word. I tried to find some ministry that might have helped me but there is nothing in the books, so I am just saying what I am saying from scripture, and that is the appeal that I would make to you. I believe it is a wonderful exhortation from God, “let Jerusalem come into your mind”.
Through divine mercy, and through the sovereignty of God’s operations in grace, we have been given light as to the assembly. Let it be in our minds, beloved brethren, let it have its place in our affections. May it be that we are persons of whom it can be said that we are assembly-minded persons, and that we resent any intrusion into the principles that govern it; that we resent it, and are able to meet it and thwart it, as having some moral power with God.
As we feel the captivity, as we feel the darkness all around, as we feel the distance it has brought in, a terrible matter (the breakdown of the church publicly is the greatest breakdown of anything of God that has ever been), but God is available to us, the power of the Holy Spirit is available to us. And I think God would exhort us with this simple and yet telling word, “let Jerusalem come into your mind”. May it be in our daily thoughts as we seek the Spirit’s help regarding God’s thoughts about the assembly, and may Christ’s affections for the assembly be constantly held in our minds and be precious there.
I want to conclude with a word as to Revelation 21. All that was in my mind in reading it was the testimony of the great cumulative work of God in the dispensation. It is not always going to be breakdown. The Spirit’s work is perfect and will be completed. Mr. Darby has a very beautiful thought; he said that Babylon will fall from its glory to its eternal ruin, but that the assembly will rise from its ruins to its eternal glory. That is what this chapter speaks about.
The first few verses refer to the eternal glory of the assembly, “prepared as a bride adorned for her husband”. In the verses I have read there is the setting out of what will be displayed in the world to come. What will be displayed is the completed work of God in a vessel that really reflects every feature of the humanity of Christ. I want you to take note of that.
I believe the formation of the assembly involves that there will be no feature of the humanity of Christ that is omitted in the formation of that vessel. No individual believer is great enough for that. We may take on a few features, we may take on some feature in some measure, but the assembly will reflect complete correspondence to the humanity of Christ. That is God’s perfect answer, that the fruit of the Holy Spirit’s work in the dispensation will result in a glorious vessel in display to the universe. That is the full answer to what has been already seen in the perfect manhood of the Lord Jesus. Think of all those qualities that have shone so brightly and purely in Him and they are still there; it is the same Jesus. There is no difference in Him where He is, to when He was here, except in condition. O the wonder of it that there will be a vessel that will manifestly bear in substantial quality the features of that blessed Man, because they have been formed there by the Holy Spirit!
Think of a vessel having the glory of God; that is what she is substantially, she has the glory of God. The glory of God was in Christ, and the glory of God today is shining in the face of Jesus Christ where He is, but here is a vessel of whom it says that she has the glory of God.
Then it speaks of her shining. There is nothing dark there, everything is in blessed perfect transparency, “crystal-like jasper stone”. Think of that, a glorious light-bearer to the universe in the day to come. What is seen in the assembly is that she is formed in the divine nature in its fullest sense. It has been said this is the answer to the prayer of the apostle in Ephesians 3, where he says, “that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God” (Ephesians 3: 19). The fulness of God was and is in Christ, and the assembly is filled to it. What will be seen in the world to come is a vessel that is able to dispense that fulness in light and in glory to the whole universe. What a masterpiece! I believe the assembly in this setting really is the acme of every thought of God, the crown of all His work; there is nothing like it.
I could say much more about it, there are so many details but finally there is a measure. “And he that spoke with me had a golden reed as a measure”, that is that it is a divine measure, and what was found was absolute perfection, “the length and the breadth and the height of it are equal”. The length and the breadth are operational measurements; think of the patient toil of the Holy Spirit. The breadth of it and the length of it are the extent of that patient toil, but at the end of the day what is seen is that these operational measurements are equal to the vertical measurement. “The length and the breadth and height of it are equal”; the height of it represents God’s purpose, God’s thoughts. It is well called the holy city. I think it corresponds to the “holy thing”, only I would need to guard that because the “holy thing” was intrinsically pure. As belonging to the assembly, we are formed morally in purity, but the great thing is there is an answer to the “holy thing”. It is substantial, you have the “holy thing” and you have the holy city, and the holy city is the product of the Holy Spirit’s work. Beloved brethren, we have part in it.
There is nothing dark in the assembly, it is a vessel of light. There is plenty of darkness in the world, and alas, sometimes the darkness comes very near to ourselves. Each of us would know that, we have constantly to judge ourselves in the light of the cross of Christ. The Lord went into the darkness so that we might have a moral basis to judge it in ourselves, so that we might be clear and transparent, and have a part in this holy city. No unholy thing can be there, we see that in Revelation 21: 8, “to the fearful and unbelieving, and sinners, and those who make themselves abominable, and murderers, and fornicators, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their part is in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone”. There is no place for that kind of thing in the holy city, but there is place for those who are redeemed by the blood of the Lamb, and who are brought in by the Holy Spirit of God.
The Holy Spirit indwells us, and He is working in us to produce the features that will shine in completeness in this wonderful vessel, the assembly, the holy city. Babylon is called great, but it will fall in one hour. God says, “Rejoice over her, heaven, and ye saints and apostles and prophets; for God has judged your judgment upon her”, Revelation 18: 20. We need to have a judgment of Babylon and be kept from the darkness of its counsel. It has no part in the assembly, but what has part in the assembly is the purity, the stability, and the solidity of the work of the Holy Spirit. May God bless the word.
Address at Glasgow
22 February 2003