PRACTICAL DELIVERANCE FROM THE WORLD

PRACTICAL DELIVERANCE FROM THE WORLD

Psalm 78: 40 - 54; 1 John 2: 14 - 17; 1 John 4: 4 - 6; 1 John 5: 19 - 21

J. McKay We cannot estimate the value of the impressions that have been left in the hearts of the saints in our considerations these two days, for they are many and varied and wealthy. They are impressions that belong to another world; they belong to what is eternal; they belong to the Father’s world. We must have felt - every loyal heart must feel - the need to come practically into the exercises that make for the consolidation of these expressions in our hearts. In that connection the world in which we are stands so directly opposed and hostile to the divine realm, for it is Satan’s great system by which he holds men, and, alas, holds many believers; and what I would like to speak about this evening is practical deliverance from it, for we must have noticed, as the Scriptures have come before us, that all we have been speaking about in connection with this economy of love lies entirely outside the world as such, and that our access into it, and the opening up of the Father’s realm, is on the basis of this world being overcome; the Lord Jesus saying, “Be of good comfort; I have overcome the world.” This was His last word before, in heart and mind and affection, He turned to the Father. Indeed, there are many passages that speak of this holy movement out of the world to the Father, and I am sure that our hearts have been allured and attracted - perhaps as never before - by the glory of what is unseen and yet so blessedly real, in the knowledge of divine Persons.

And yet this matter of our being in the world remains, as the Lord Jesus said in speaking to the Father: “I am no longer in the world, and these are in the world, and I come to thee.” We can but feel how the saints in the world are the subject of the most tender affection, and not only of tender affection but of infinite power to keep them there, just as long as it is desired, for the Lord Jesus is the One who is in entire control. As we were being so happily reminded, everything goes through according to the divine plan, and yet He says, “I do not demand that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them out of evil.”

There are many allusions to the way we are to be kept. We think of the Father keeping. What that means! Consider the Father - the greatness of that Person in His tender consideration - and yet in His sovereign power keeping the saints, keeping them. Indeed it is a title of God, “unto him that is able to keep,” and we would derive comfort and peace and holy joy from the knowledge that the Father is keeping us here. Then we think too of the Lord Jesus, the apostle in opening up the word to the Galatians saying, “our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins, so that he should deliver us out of the present evil world.” Then we are reminded of the word as to the Holy Spirit: “Greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.” So that, beloved brethren, there is every occasion for peace and joy, and indeed thanksgiving. It should all enhance the worship of divine Persons to us, as we think of Their ability to keep the saints in the world without loss or harm.

But then, in the wisdom of God, there is the practical working out of this matter, that not only are we said to be kept and delivered, and not only have we this wonderful indwelling of the Holy Ghost, but we are to overcome the world and thereby acquire a constitution. We are left here not only for testimony but with a view to our acquiring a constitution, and so our very being in the world is to serve this great end, the Lord Jesus saying, “I am no longer in the world, and these are in the world.” What a wonderful consideration that in that sense the saints are to continue what was here seen in Jesus in that blessed way. One would trust that the consideration of such a momentous matter should profoundly affect our hearts.

And now as to our being here in the world, this world in which we are, though it be the very scene of divine operations, remains in its dreadful hostility to all that is of God. Indeed it is the great obstructer, “the prince of this world,” the great system which in its entirety and totality stands over against all that divine Persons have brought in. I am impressed, beloved brethren, by the fact that the whole world is spoken of in its entirety as being opposed and standing over against what is of the Father.

So the word in John’s epistle comes with peculiar appeal, surely, to all our hearts. “I have written to you, young men, because ye are strong, and the word of God abides in you ... . Love not the world, nor the things in the world.” Let us understand, beloved brethren, that there is no point of conciliation between the world and the divine system. What belongs to the Father is in complete separation from all that there is in the world. And so the word of the apostle John. What a man he was in the consciousness of divine affections! He knew the Persons of whom he spoke. He knew the Father, and he knew the Son of God, and he knew the Comforter. What holy conscious knowledge was there in the one who now makes this appeal and gives this word of exhortation to the young men; and one has a concern, dear brethren, that the generation that is growing up - and God deals in generations - should have constitution and experience and maturity, and John with deep feeling says, “Love not the world, nor the things in the world. If any one love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.”

The Spirit of God would help us to get a right impression of the world. I am not speaking now, for a moment, as to our experience, but rather viewing it abstractly as a system in which all the lusts of the flesh find release and indulgence. He would, so to speak, describe it in spiritual terms, that we might be free from it, and concerned to be free from it, for, as he tells us, there is no reason for not being free from it, for “greater is he that is in you than he that is in the world.” Then, as if to conclude the whole matter for us, he would say, “We know ... the whole world lies in the wicked one.” If we have any doubts, if we have had any points of compromise, let us be challenged, dear brethren, by the words of the Spirit of God from the beloved apostle, that “the whole world lies in the wicked one,” and outside of it, we may say, totally and entirely outside of it, subsists this system of living affections - the Father, and the Son, and the Comforter, and the saints. All these blessed and eternal relationships shall never deteriorate, shall never cease; they are all entirely outside of this world; this world standing, as it were, as the great obstructer to the divine realm, and hence the Lord Jesus saying, “I have overcome the world.”

How many references there are in John’s writings to this world! It would seem that the greater the truth brought out, the more this world in its composition, and moral texture, is thrown into relief, and the more we are to beware of having part in it - save only in testimony. Thank God for the opportunity of remaining in it for testimony. We have been touched by the exalted nature of the testimony in this world. How great and how blessed to be here - here as bearing witness to the truth, the truth set out, not in terms but in one blessed Person, the true light coming into the world, this life. And so we would covet to be in it, shall we say, as we should be, and yet free from it in a practical way.

I have read from this most remarkable Psalm, which is a review by a spiritual person, by a man of God - a review of the history of things beginning, we might say, with the question of being delivered from this present evil world. So right at the beginning of this Psalm we have the question of generations to come being fully acquainted with the truth, and it would imply that we are to learn the truth in a living way; that not only should we have ministry, and what is written, but that we should learn the truth as it is in persons. Paul could speak of Timothy reminding the saints of his ways as they are in Christ.

So the Psalm opens up with the provision made for the continuance of the truth in the generations that are to come. It must be a concern that the generations to come should have the truth as borne witness to in persons and as learned livingly; so that, right at the outset, the blessed God was careful to have the truth in Israel in such a way that it could be taken account of. We were reminded on the past night of what was substantial, and it would seem that right at the outset God ordained that the elders in Israel should come into the matter of this great truth of deliverance. In Exodus 3, Moses is told to take with him the elders of Israel to Pharaoh, as though He would bring into relief the question and importance of the truth being set out in experienced persons amongst us, that there should be scope and opportunity for all to learn directly from persons, that they might tell it to their children, and so on, to the generations to come. Think of God having generations who have learned the truth, beloved brethren, and in whom, so to speak, there are no moral defects!

I feel the importance of the younger brethren learning the truth, not only learning about it, but as coming into it in a very vital kind of way, and hence the obligation on the elders that it should be there set out. The reference to the elders is not to give them precedence exactly but rather to put upon them the obligation of the diffusion of the truth in Israel. We read in this first reference to them that they were to be with Moses at his interviews with Pharaoh, so that they should understand what was in hand as to the great thoughts of God in the deliverance of His people. Then too, as speaking of the passover, special word was given to the elders that what was said in the initial commandment to Israel might be augmented and amplified, so that it should have weight and so that it should be there by example in what was done. The word as to seizing the lamb, and the blood in the basins implying what could be handled, and the use of hyssop, would all indicate what is to be seen and taken account of by way of example in the elders. Later, in Exodus 17, the word speaks of the elders being with Moses at the smiting of the rock. I am sure, beloved brethren, the Spirit of God has in mind that these great truths should be held in gravity and moral power amongst us, so that the smiting of the rock was not to be a mere doctrine. It was not to be a matter simply understood as making way for the gift of the Spirit, but the very importance of it, the solemnity of it, all that it would mean in the sufferings of Christ, was to be present with weight, finding residence, we might say, in the elders of Israel, all with a view to what was formative in the generation that was springing up.

We might just for a moment refer also to them as being taken up into the mountain, so that they should have impressions of what was heavenly. I believe there is a sense in which these divine truths are only conveyed by spiritual means, that no one from mere reading could exactly get an impression of the heavenlies. It says of the elders that “they saw the God of Israel; and there was under his feet as it were work of transparent sapphire, and as it were the form of heaven for clearness,” Exodus 24: 10. That was a matter that was to be the property, the inheritance, of Israel, as an impression of the God who had delivered them. So that, beloved brethren, we are to be concerned that things should be substantial amongst us and that truth should be known in persons and held at its own proper level in those who have to do with God. So that our scripture in the Psalm, a marvellous review by Asaph, brings into poetic distinctiveness all that was true, implying the significance of the truth. What is poetic is not merely the transcription of what is true and divine. Hymns are not merely the putting into rhyme of what is in Scripture; they are a theme. They show that the truth has been arrived at in the soul, and that distinct, definite impressions are made known to the soul as hymns are composed; and so we come to this section which implies that there was a lack of understanding of what was involved in being delivered from the world. It seems to bring us right back to what is fundamental in the very early stages, we might say, of our experience. Previously there had been in the Psalm certain touches as to the deliverance. We may say that in the first part there is what would refer to the Exodus setting, what God had done “He clave the sea, and caused them to pass through; and made the waters to stand as a heap; And he led them with a cloud in the daytime, and all the night with the light of fire. He clave rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of the depths, abundantly.” Exodus would give us, so to speak, the way God not only delivers from the great world system but the marvellous grace in which the believer is set up as independent of it; so that the manna is given profusely and the water is given abundantly, as out of great depths, as if God is countering in His grace every thought of Egypt. He would bring them into the sphere of His own gracious provision for them, and give them an impression of how much greater were the things they had come to. The manna from heaven rained down upon them, it says. How profuse God is! How abundant His supplies in the wilderness, to strengthen the heart in its having left this great world system. But then, in the working out of it and in the waywardness of the flesh, there are further experiences, and we might say that we get a Numbers setting in the verses further on, where it says, “And he rained flesh upon them as dust, and feathered fowl as the sand of the seas. And he let it fall in the midst of their camp, round about their habitations: And they did eat, and were well filled; for that they lusted after, he brought to them. They were not alienated from their lust,” Psalm 78: 27 - 30. A very sorrowful matter, beloved brethren, and one that is to be considered and gone into, that though positionally delivered they were not alienated from what really belonged to the world system. It found a counterpart in their hearts, and hence the discipline of God that this matter of deliverance should be complete and vital. So the section we read would bring us back, we might say, to the day when God began to operate in Egypt, and perhaps we need to give consideration to this, beloved brethren, that before God would take His people out of the world He would expose the world in every detail and He would give His people to be of one in their judgment of it with Him. It is said that “they turned again ... they remembered not his hand, the day when he delivered them from the oppressor. How he set his signs in Egypt, and his miracles in the field of Zoan.” God has a glory all His own, beloved brethren, and we are to learn God in the way He delivers His people, the way He has delivered them, as it says, “How he set his signs in Egypt.” They are there, so to speak, permanently, that so long as this world system lasts, there stands in it all that is of God in this way, signs that would indicate thorough and complete exposure of the world system, so that the saints should not be held by it. I am sure that if we are to understand the signs in John’s gospel we must first of all understand the signs in the field of Zoan. That would mean that every feature of the world is examined, so to speak, and judged, and left.

God does not write the world off, so to speak, at one stroke. He allows it - indeed He ordains - that it should be exposed and that the saints should judge it, for having judged it, leaving the world becomes a simple matter. I would encourage the brethren to read the signs. It may mean that we should come into closer contact and into the presence of what challenges the rights of God here in the world, and that we should not hesitate to go forward and to be in the truth initially.

God does not exactly begin His people with the paschal lamb. He begins here, right in the presence - in the stronghold, we may say - of the great world system, and He begins there first to expose and to judge the very source of it, the streams of it, and, having passed judgment upon the stream, to show what emerges from it in all that is unholy and all that is unclean. And by these means God would prepare His people for the passover. He would prepare them for it, hearts prepared and ready to leave, so that the word which speaks about eating the passover in haste, with loins girded, with staff in hand and shoes on their feet, would all imply a prepared people, ready to leave. The question would therefore arise, beloved brethren, as to whether we are ready to leave and whether we have this moral history on our side, that would strengthen us and find us in these conditions of preparation.

And so we have to learn God. God has His own way of exposing things and of weakening things. He does not use the military might of nations in Egypt. It says, “he gave their increase unto the caterpillar.” That is like God, to use the things “that are not to bring to nought the things that are.” How things are brought down in the power of God by means that leave no glory, so to speak, to men! “Their increase unto the caterpillar, and their labour unto the locust.” Small things, we may say, but the great world system impoverished, reduced, brought down, so to speak, until it is just a matter of leaving it.

It goes on to say that “he smote all the first-born in Egypt, the first-fruits of their vigour in the tents of Ham.” How encouraging it is, beloved brethren, to find a man who can clothe the operations of God with thoughts like this! “And he made his own people to go forth like sheep, and guided them in the wilderness like a flock; And he led them safely, so that they were without fear; and the sea covered their enemies.” What a challenge to us, beloved brethren, as to whether we are in the practical gain of deliverance! We may have the knowledge of it judicially. Thank God if we have light in our souls as to being delivered judicially, that God has in Christ dealt with everything, but then as to our souls, are we in deliverance, for it goes on to say, “And he brought them to his holy border, this mountain, which his right hand purchased.” It would seem that this moral course, this pathway, is a divine necessity, that He should bring them “to his holy border” - His holy border, not exactly to theirs but to His holy border, “this mountain, which his right hand purchased.”

And so, beloved brethren, that brings us to the point that we have been speaking of, where divine Persons are able to effect all that They have undertaken with the saints, but there is a moral way, a moral process, an education and an experience essential to us on this line of practical deliverance if the great things of the economy are to be entered on and enjoyed. So the word comes afresh, “love not the world.” What a word it is to us, beloved brethren! Let us reflect upon the glory that divine Persons have been presenting to us these two days, impressions that perhaps we have never had before. How great a favour to be in the presence of the truth as it relates to divine Persons Themselves, with the ability of the Spirit to leave something permanently upon the heart. We have come, we may say, “to his holy border, this mountain,” the great system of living affections, and we are becoming increasingly acquainted with this great system of love, the love of the Father as over against the love of the world. “If any one love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” Might we not earnestly consider, once, and for all, settling our accounts with the world and every feature of it, so as to be, we may say, ready to embrace in its entirety, in its infinite blessedness, all that lies in the knowledge of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

John would enlarge on this. Whilst he presents the highest things to us, yet he is the most practical and the most simple. The way he speaks of the world and the way he speaks of divine Persons would mean that he is practically in the truth, and he would have the word come into our hearts in all its practical force and bearing, so that we should be freed - free in our spirits, free in our affections, free in our minds, for further apprehensions as to the glory of divine Persons Themselves.

May we be found ready, beloved brethren, for further holy impressions of this great system of love, for His name’s sake.