THE SPIRIT MAKING US CONSCIOUS OF THE LOVE OF CHRIST

Song of Songs 2: 4, 5 (to ‘with apples’); 2 Corinthians 5: 14–17; Ephesians 5: 25–27; 3: 19–21

DBR Our brother spoke of the Spirit making us conscious of the love of Christ, and I brought these scriptures forward suggestively. The first one here has a typical bearing, “He hath brought me to the house of wine”. I thought that might suggest joy in the Spirit, “And his banner over me is love.” And then I thought, “Sustain ye me with raisin-cakes”, would involve the sweetness of the love of Christ. In 2 Corinthians 5, “the love of the Christ constrains us”, we are under its influence. We are able to judge especially as to what has been brought in for the pleasure of God in a new order. Then in Ephesians 5 I think we get the great object of Christ’s love, the assembly. Then I thought in chapter 3 we are “to know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge”. It came to mind as we proceeded what beloved Mr. James Taylor said as to that, it is our anchor. Our anchor is really in an eternal sphere.

WMcC There is always spontaneity in love.

DBR The Spirit operates in that way. He would lead us and guide us, do you think? This is one feature of the Spirit’s service that He would make us conscious of the sweetness of the love of Christ. You spoke of this, do you have something more for us?

APD What is the thought of the banner?

DBR I think it is the victory of love. What do you say about it yourself?

APD I wondered if that would be the suggestion.

DBR I think that “He hath brought me to the house of wine”, involves the Lord’s delight in transferring our affections and our minds to an order of things which is altogether according to the purpose of God. “Sustain ye me with raisin-cakes”, would be how we are sustained by the sweet influence of the love of Christ.

DBB I was thinking when it was read he brought me. It is as if it is the compelling power of love that brings us. I cannot say very much, but it is like the drawing power, is it not?

DBR That love that we owe so much to. All that has been effected by Christ in love to redeem us, to secure us and to hold us. We sang of that in the first hymn this morning. It is love that holds us. When He comes in at the Supper there is a sense that He would bring us into this great realm, the house of wine. I think it is joy in the Spirit. It is not natural exuberance, we are delivered from that, it is spiritual joy, do you think?

DBB And in a certain sense, I do not know how to describe it, but it is beyond the moral question. That has all been met but now we are being brought in in love to this wonderful sphere.

DBR Well that is good what you say. It takes us far beyond the moral question. Thank God that it is settled. We have peace because of that. Everything is settled, settled finally for God and for us. But then this is beyond it. I think of that scripture that says, “For both he that sanctifies and those sanctified are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren” (Hebrews 2: 11). Mr. James Taylor said if we carried on in the moral line we would have something to be ashamed of (Vol. 33, p.281). We are beyond it all, it has all been dealt with.

DNS It is interesting how the song starts, is it not? This song starts very early in the thought of “thy love is better than wine” (Song of Songs 1: 2), then it goes on when He brings us into His chambers, “We will remember thy love more than wine. They love thee uprightly”, Song of Songs 1: 4. What a blessed thought that is, that His love is supreme.

DBR Yes. His love is supreme and we ourselves are the product of that love. Mr. J. N. Darby says in his hymn, “O Jesus, Lord, who loved us like to Thee?” (Hymn 249). As fruit of His work, we can take account of one another in that way, and it draws out respect for one another. Unless we have that we cannot proceed very far.

PR What you bring out is good. I was wondering as to the house of wine, and the joy which we enter into by the Spirit, that we get a sense of Christ’s own joy and what He has entirely for Himself, where He would rest and have delight in His own heart.

DBR Yes, that is good. Mr. Stoney served us well you know, and you find in his ministry that he often exhorts us to learn what is the Lord’s chief joy—the assembly. That really, I think, is the kernel of Christianity in its inward sense, that we are consciously related to what is supremely for the heart of Christ.

MS There is a banner here. Is a banner not something that is carried? A flag flies but that is normally in a static position. Is it a banner because it is something that is carried and would suggest movement?

DBR Yes, I think that is good so we are not overcome. We have a sense that we proceed with something that is in the line of victory. God has overcome the whole matter of evil—met its challenge. All that has been left behind, and now we in an area that has been secured, not only for our blessing, but for God’s pleasure.

APG In John 2 the wine was deficient, but the Lord brought that joy in did He not? It is greater than any natural joy.

DBR Well I think that is good. It is beyond natural joy.

We have certain things that give us natural joy, the marriage tie and so on, and how God sustains us, but this is beyond it. I think by the Spirit we are made conscious of the love of Christ and what it brings us into.

APD I think that the best wine is what characterises the present time. It is really John’s ministry. It brings us into the family and the best things, does it not?

DBR That is good, involving nearness to divine Persons. The idea in the family is that they are brought near.

APD Yes, “my brethren”, John 20: 17. That is the best wine. I thought that it is not just left in chapter 2, it really goes all through the book. The climax is in chapter 20—the best wine.

DBR That is right. It is a wonderful chapter. We read it in the home this morning, “go to my brethren”, John 20: 17. And then the breathing into them, impartation of His own life. I remember getting a touch from Mr. James Taylor’s ministry, that Christ infused life into them (Vol. 1, p.439). What an infusion! And I think as the Lord comes in at the Supper there is a certain sense of an infusion of life. It touches your inward being.

HTF I was thinking of what you brought before us yesterday as to the inner circle, I wondered if this was love’s secret within that? The headship of Christ is known in that area, and an orderliness and spontaneity, finishing with, “Refresh me with apples”. It seems to me that we are sustained and left refreshed in that area.

DBR That is very good. It is a refreshing experience and one we need too. We tend in our spirits sometimes to be a bit jaded, and exercises and circumstances have to be looked at; that all tends to jade us, but here is an experience, “Sustain ye me with raisin-cakes, Refresh me with apples”. It is the sweet influence of the love of Christ. That brings us on to 2 Corinthians 5. I think it is the question there of the influence of the love of Christ, “For the love of the Christ constrains us”. I think judgment here is something that we arrive at under the influence of the love of Christ.

PH What you say is helpful. I was wondering when the passage was read, whether it is really what is positive in relation to judgment. Positive— having judged the things that are more excellent.

DBR Yes, just so. It is a positive thing and I think the good teaching has said it is the highest form of judgment. It is judgment arrived at under the influence of Christ.

APD I think what has been said about the judgment is good. It is not penal judgment is it?

DBR It says, “having judged this: that one died for all, then all have died”. You read the note there, it is the fact that the Lord went into death that proved everything was under death. When He died there was no response God-ward. I believe that is the teaching, there was no response God-ward. Everything had to come out freshly. A new order of things had to come to light. That has only been brought to light as a result of the action of the love of Christ in death, do you think?

APD When He was raised by the glory of the Father everything was brought into life was it not? Without saying much about it you could read into it that a whole world, you might say, spiritually came into life for the pleasure of God.

DBR That is just it. So it says that it brings in life immediately, “that they who live should no longer live to themselves, but to him who died for them and has been raised”; a new order of life.

HTF I was just thinking before the song is ended, love is strong as death (Songs of Songs 8: 6). It really links with this does it not? but actually He came through it and endured that.

WMcC Yes, it is a wonderful realm because it brings you into the feelings that are involved in the divine nature. It is something to be enjoyed.

DBR Well, that is what it is for, just to enjoy the house of wine. It is to bring us into the feelings of the divine nature. John brings us into the family where we are near. That is the great idea that we become acquainted with the feelings of divine Persons—so that the influence of Christ’s love is the area that it would direct you to. That gets you away from the world—that can never satisfy—and directs your mind and affections into another order of things altogether.

DNS Man could not naturally love God but I am thinking about this new creation, in a new condition where persons can respond to the love of God. The divine nature could be formed in them.

DBR So if any one be in Christ there is a new creation. It struck me recently that we speak about the ‘in Christ’ position, and we say that is status, and so it is, but it is more than status, it is new creation. “So if any one be in Christ, there is a new creation”. The Authorised Version says, “if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature”. That stops short of the idea. The real meaning is that the person that is in Christ is an integral part of new creation. Wonderful thought. I think the love of Christ would influence us towards that great realm. As our brother says, a realm where the feelings of divine Persons are understood and responded to.

HTF All things are new there, are they not? I just wondered if it took us on to an impression of the eternal realm. We antedate that, do we?

DBR Exactly, and all things are of the God who has reconciled us to Himself. It is one of the passages that helped me as to what Mr. Raven said, that reconciliation was according to the purpose of God. It is all according to the purpose of God. It says here, “who has reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ”. That is the way that He operated to bring it about. Nevertheless it was in His purpose to do that.

RMcC I was thinking earlier about Ruth. She says to Boaz, “spread thy skirt over thy handmaid”, Ruth 3: 9. Really what came in was more than that was it not? She was brought into this relationship.

DBR That is a good illustration. It was more than that. You see the great object of Christ’s love here—the assembly. He “also loved the assembly”. He loved other things too. He loved the disciples as individuals, He loves us as individuals too. I think it is a fine touch this, that “Christ also loved the assembly”.

APG That is how we think of the death of Christ at the Supper. Not so much for our need, but it is death in view of having the assembly for Himself, is it not?

DBR “This is my body, which is for you”, 1 Corinthians 11: 24. The ‘you’ there is the assembly. Is that how you understand it? It is right to think of the body of Christ, and His devotedness, how Christ held that body for God. Then you see He also loved the assembly. As a Man here, all the will of God had to be accomplished. He loved God in that sense, but He loved also the assembly.

DBB Would you say something about, that He might present the assembly to Himself glorious?

DBR Yes, there is a touch of dignity in that. Well I can only tell you what I have gleaned I trust substantially from the good teaching that, in Genesis God brought the woman to the Man, but Christ presents the assembly to Himself. A touch of His deity is involved in that. He has the ability, the power, to present the assembly to Himself. It is not a question of God bringing the assembly to Christ here. He is God and presents the assembly to Himself.

What dignity is in that. We constantly need our minds elevated to the glory of Christ and the assembly. That is the great line of God’s thought for the present day. The great secret of the present recovery is Christ and the assembly.

DBB The answer is love is it not? Well the presentation is that He already loved it. Does the presentation bring in the fulness of that love towards the assembly?

DBR There is also His present service that “he might sanctify it, purifying it by the washing of water by the word”. That is the present love of Christ, to remove anything that may becloud the beauty. The priests had to wash the inwards of the burnt-offering, not to remove defilement, but to bring out the beauty of what was washed. I think there is a touch here as to that. The constant action of the word amongst us is that our own thoughts might be purified to see the beauty of the assembly. It is altogether like Christ Himself, here is a vessel that corresponds to Him. There is the beauty of Christ and the beauty of the assembly. There is no disparity between Christ and the assembly, or between the assembly and Christ. So He presents her to Himself. The assembly is equal for it, the product of the love of Christ.

DBB The servant said, “That is my master!”, Genesis 24: 65. It was not, ‘That is my master’s son’, and it was Isaac that led Rebecca into the tent, and it says he loved her.

DBR Just so, he loved her. As we are together on a Lord’s day morning we find the love of Christ is active. We are made conscious of it by the Spirit. In chapter 3 we “know the love of the Christ which surpasses knowledge”. How wonderful that is.

APD Why is it ‘the’ Christ here?

DBR Well we know that is generally the One who does things for God. I think too it brings in the beauty of the anointing—the Christ.

APD That helps I think, it is marking Him out in a sense as distinctive, is it not?

DBR We know it as being in it. In one sense it is beyond knowledge, but you prove it as being in it. You are embraced in it, you prove the value of it, “to know the love of the Christ”. And then as we have also been taught it is a great anchor. Things are proceeding here, it is really eternity, and we find that we have an anchor, the love of Christ.

APD That is what sustains us in the presence of the glory. It is an immense thing to be in the presence of the glory of God, but then it seems to me that the love of the Christ sustains us there.

DBR Exactly. “Sustain ye me with raisin-cakes”. The sweetness of that love that we have known sustains us there in that great realm.

APD We are creature vessels are we not? We will never be anything else. We will have to be sustained eternally, do you not think?

DBR Exactly. I think it is important to see that. Some question has been raised as to that great matter, but we will need Christ and the Spirit eternally. Not because of any moral need, but because of the simple fact that we are creatures.

APD We have that reference to the Spirit in Revelation, “the fountain of the water of life”, Revelation 21: 6. I think Mr. J. N. Darby said, ‘The mighty spring to maintain us in spiritual freshness throughout the eternal day.’

DBR Yes, that is wonderful is it not? So we will always be man, never beyond a creature, even the assembly is a creature vessel, but the mediatorial economy will subsist eternally. Not to meet need, in a moral sense, but to sustain us in the freshness of the knowledge of God. Is that how you understand it? I think the love of the Christ here is in that line of things.

WMcC What would be the difference between “love of the Christ” and “love one another as I have loved you”?

DBR Well, that brings in a high standard of things. It eliminates the idea of mere sentiment. I think loving one another involves deep affection. I think it involves a settled disposition too. We love the work of God and what is of Christ in one another. I think the fact that we know the love of Christ becomes in a sense the standard of our love for one another.

APD Another word that is used is ‘phileo’, meaning that we are loveable. That would be an exercise would it not? It is the love of a settled disposition, but it is something that draws out your love.

DBR That is right, it draws out your affections. We can take account of the brethren and what they have gone through for the testimony’s sake. These are all features that would draw out our love for one another.

APG Depth comes in here. Would that suggest the love of Christ and depth too in our links with one another?

DBR What do you say about the depth?

APG Well there are four dimensions here, and in other scriptures there are just three dimensions, depth is added here. I wondered what you would say about it.

DBR Well, “that ye may be fully able to apprehend with all the saints”, then it brings in these dimensions. Where are you when you take account of four dimensions? At the centre. That is where we were this morning. We were at the centre of things. We need to be built up in the importance of these occasions. We are there, right at the centre, to take account of the length and breadth and depth and height.

APD You look around at the whole sphere of glory from the centre.

DBR From the centre. That is exactly what I thought. And as being there we are sustained by the love of the Christ, and no doubt by the power of the Holy Spirit. Then there is this wonderful matter, “to him be glory in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages. Amen”. I have often said that “the assembly in Christ Jesus” is not only the vessel of response, it is the vessel of residence where God dwells.

APD In meetings in New York, I think, you said that in Ephesians 1 the assembly is the complement of Christ; in chapter 5 she is His helpmate; and in chapter 3 the assembly is God’s residence.

RMcC I was just going to ask what it means “that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God”. Could you open that up a little please?

DBR The assembly is a creature vessel but it has this capacity. No other family will have this capacity. There will be other families in eternity, both in the heaven and on the earth. It will be a relative position, all will be related to God in the way in which God has been known by them. But the assembly is in the full shining of the revelation of God in Christ, and there is a full answer in the assembly in Christ Jesus to that revelation. So that I think being filled even to all the fulness of God is that the assembly, that vessel, has the capacity as such to be filled even to the fulness of the way God has been revealed in Christ. A wonderful thought. I think the fulness of God here involves the full scope of revelation.

HTF I wondered if the depth shows that this is a spiritual realm. If it was three dimensions it might be on the earth but this is a difference, a ministry where it is spiritual matters alone that hold.

DBR Just so and I think it brings out the wonderful capacity. It is a Spirit filled vessel, and has the capacity to be filled even to all the fulness of God, and to bring in the response that that requires. I understand that is the fulness of revelation, God known as the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It would connect with 1 Corinthians 15, “God may be all in all” (1 Corinthians 15: 28). That is the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (J. N. Darby ‘Collected Writings’ Vol. 32, p.274). That is God as we know Him. It is the fulness of revelation.

Reading at Grimsby
11 October 2009

KEYS TO INITIALS

D. B. Bodman	Hutson	D. B. Robertson
A. P. Devenish	R. McClean	D. N. Smith
H. T. Franklin	W. McClean	M. Smith
A. P. Grant