THE WILL OF GOD
[p. 487] THE WILL OF GOD
It is laid upon my heart to say a word in regard to God’s will, feeling that it becomes the test to men, and hence to us. One feels especially encouraged to call attention to it in view of existing conditions, for it is the question really raised at the present moment amongst God’s people: that is, Is God’s will or man’s will to rule? What is noticeable in the passage I have read is, that all that is contrary to God’s will has to be removed; whereas, on the other hand, he who does the will of God abides for ever.
John does not here raise the question as to where he is to abide, but he habitually refers to the sphere created by God for man, and he thinks of it as a sphere of blessing, and a sphere in which God’s will is to be paramount. Evidently, if God creates a sphere, He creates it for His own pleasure, and He intends that it is to be dominated by His will; and all who are not at agreement with His will have to go, for God will not brook any disagreement. It is well for people to make their minds up as to this. God will not admit of any divergence from His will.
I think you will find if you trace it in Scripture that this is so, and what specially marked Christ was, that in becoming Man He recognises the principle of absolute submission to God’s will. He came into the sphere designed for man, and that was His first object; He would at all cost recognise God’s will. As we have been seeing already, He found the law, which was the expression of God’s will, disregarded; but He says, “Thy law is within my heart”. Psalm 40:8. In a way I know of nothing that brings out the faithfulness of Christ, and what He was as a perfect Man, more than that. He had in His soul before God the idea of what man’s place was, and that is, that man was to be subject to God.
[p. 488] Hence He thought so much of God’s will and of His law that He had it in His heart.
Not only did He keep the law Himself, but He brings in a generation who keep it also. I think if there is one thing more than another that brings out who Christ is, it is that He is capable of bringing into God’s world a generation of people who love His law. You remember how that directly He begins to teach His disciples He taught them how to pray, and what He had in view was the production of a race which should be according to Himself, loving the will of God. He says, “pray ye, Our Father ... thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven”, Matthew 6:9,10. The Lord was perfectly cognisant of what existed in heaven. God’s will was not contravened in heaven, but it was on earth, So His thought was to form His disciples in accordance with God’s will, and hence their petition was to be, “Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven”. Matthew 6:10. And I think that this desire is what the Spirit of God produces in us. But I will come to that presently.
I was saying that if you search the Scriptures you will find that in every new departure in God’s ways there was something that indicated His will, and whatever it may have been, it became the test for the moment. It takes a very little thing to indicate what God’s will may be, and it takes also a very little thing to indicate that it is man’s intention to disregard it. You find this at the very outset. Eden was designed for man; it was a garden of delights, in every way representing the goodness of God; but there was one element there that was a testimony to God’s rights; God planted one tree there, which was a witness to His rights. He planted another, a witness to His counsels; the tree of life was a witness to His counsels, but He also planted a tree there which was a witness to His rights, the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and what was a testimony to God’s rights placed man under responsibility. So that in result the conditions were simply this, that God had formed a sphere which was in every way in accordance with His nature as revealed, and that sphere was to be dominated by His will. It was very simple. The will of God for the moment was set forth in a negative way. It was a question of what should not be taken. It was negative, but it was sufficient to become a testimony to God’s rights. It indicated that the sphere in which He placed man was to be dominated by the will of God, and hence Adam was placed under responsibility.
Now you see that what the apostle John states in the passage I read is fully verified in what took place. Adam did not “abide for ever”. He was driven out because he did not regard God’s will, and so it is, that unless there is recognition of God’s will in any given sphere of blessedness (and there is at the present time a sphere of blessedness ordained of God) those who do not recognise His will must go out. It is not a question of what your brethren may think of you, but of the unalterable principles of God’s government. Adam was driven out because he did not recognise God’s will. And this we find all through the Scriptures. You will find that in every departure in God’s ways, in every new phase of the testimony, there was always some thing that indicated that God’s will must prevail.
We have been speaking of the law given to Moses, which was in an especial way the testimony on the part of God to His rights. It was not a negative law like that given to Adam; it contained positive requirements. It was one of two testimonies. There were two great witnesses in the Old Testament first, the law, and secondly, the prophets. I do not know if we have considered them much in that light, but it is clear from the New Testament that these are the two great witnesses to men in the Old Testament.
“The law and the prophets”, the Lord says, “were until John”. Matthew 11:13. I take the law to be a witness to God’s rights, and the prophets to be a witness to His patience.
It is remarkable that there were so many prophets. I have often wondered why there were so many. You would think Isaiah said so much, and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, that these three would be sufficient, but it is very interesting to see that there are so many, and there were a great many more prophets than those who have written. There were prophets who spoke, whose words are not recorded. The prophets have a voice. I believe the voice of the prophets, in one respect, is the patience of God, God’s long-suffering. It tries a man to get up early. God states several times, in figure, of course, that He rose up early to send prophets. It does not say this as to the law, but He rose up early to send prophets; a striking testimony to His patience. The people departed from Him and from blessing, and hence He recalls them. He gets up early to send prophets to them to recall them to what was a standing witness to His rights. The permanent testimony to God’s rights in the Old Testament is the law. We were saying that Israel did not keep it, and hence God made an ark in which to treasure it so that the ark was the depository of His law. The ark is a most remarkable type of Christ in many ways, but especially in this, that it is the treasury of God’s law, that in which God’s law was preserved when men could not keep it.
But what I want to say, as briefly as I can, is that the Lord Jesus Christ has taken up the testimony, He has taken up the law, He has treasured it in His heart; He came to fulfil it, and that one jot or tittle of it should not fail. Moreover, what He proposes to do is to bring in a generation of law-abiding people. We were speaking about the Son [p. 491] of man, and I think the Son of man recovered humanity for God, but how? He recovered man in the law-abiding condition. That condition is set forth in the Lord Jesus Christ. He treasured the law in His heart; He was here for God’s pleasure, and He is raised up on high and given a place in heaven. That was the place for the ark of the testimony for the moment, but there is now a place for it on earth. He treasured that which was the most precious thing on earth, the will of God, and He goes to heaven. What you see is that the Lord intends to bring in a generation after His own pattern. It is just that which I would like especially to make clear. The disciples asked Him to teach them to pray. I think it were well for us to be stirred up in regard to God’s will, and directly you become exercised, what marks you is prayer.
Now I would say one word in regard to prayer, and that is, that God does not always answer prayer immediately, because He puts your heart to the test as to whether you really value what you ask for. As an example, Jacob requested from Jehovah in Genesis 32 that He would reveal His name to him. He says “What is thy name?” Genesis 32:27. God had asked Jacob for his name, and he told Him that his name was Jacob. Jacob in turn asked God for His name and God says, “Wherefore is it that thou dost ask after my name?” Genesis 32:29. It is well for us to have our interest aroused as to something of God that we are not acquainted with, because directly our interest is awakened as to something we do not know, we ask. God does not answer Jacob’s request until Genesis 35. He waited until then, and in that chapter God answers him in His own time.
We must never think that we can control God in any way, even by prayer. God reserves the right to answer, and He chooses His own time and place to answer. In regard to Jacob, the place where he got [p. 492] the answer was at Bethel, and the time was when Jacob arrived there. Bethel is God’s house. That is where most things are disclosed to you. You may ask for things from God at home and He answers in the assembly. I do not say it is so in every case, of course, but the assembly is the oracle really, and if you are in the assembly in heart, all your difficult questions will be answered. It is in Bethel that God answers Jacob’s question, “What is thy name?” and it is there He says, “I am God Almighty”. Genesis 35:11. That is a wonderful disclosure.
We are accustomed to the term “God Almighty”, but it was a wonderful thing for Jacob to have a God like that, it means that He is Almighty. He is able to do everything to accomplish His counsels, and to do everything needed for our good, and He revealed His name to Jacob in His house. I do not know of a chapter that is, in a way, more helpful to believers than Genesis 35. I think it shows how God directs His people into a sphere in which His interests are, and where His will is paramount. God says to Jacob, “Go up to Bethel”, Genesis 35:1 and directly Jacob crossed its threshold he recognises that God is the God of it; he rears up an altar to God in Bethel and he names it El-bethel. He is now in God’s sphere where God’s will is supreme. God is not the God of Shechem, but He is the God of Bethel. He rules there. If you come into the house of God remember that His will is paramount there. Now Jacob recognises that in his altar, and God answers his question there. He says, “I am God Almighty”, (Genesis 35:11) and He tells Jacob that he would be multiplied, not after the flesh, indeed, but in the power of resurrection. He would be multiplied by God Almighty. The answer to all this will be seen for us in the future on the principle of resurrection. But I do not dwell on that now, I only referred to it in connection with prayer.
[p. 493] The disciples professed not to know how to pray, so they asked the Lord to teach them, and He taught them according to what was in His own heart. He had before His heart the formation of a generation of people like Himself, a people who would adhere to the will of God. Such is the generation that Christ left in this world. He did not find them here. He found the law disregarded by men; there was nobody treasuring it. He took it up and placed it in His heart and He left here a generation of people who love God’s law, who love the will of God. They had been taught by Him to pray that God’s will should be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Now I wish to add a word in regard to ourselves. The Lord Jesus Christ, having gone into heaven, gave the Spirit to those same people; hence their walk should be in accordance with their prayers. Evidently if we pray to God that His will should be fulfilled on earth as it is in heaven, we are inconsistent if our walk is not in accordance with God’s will. Clearly you have to take the path indicated by God’s will, as we are told in Romans 12:2, “that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God”. His will is not arbitrary or irksome, it is good and acceptable and perfect. And how is that brought about? By the Spirit. The Lord Jesus Christ, having gone into heaven, has given the Spirit to His people, and we are told that the righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled by those who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. It is a question of walk, and those who have the Spirit walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
Now it is in that way that a generation of law abiding people, people who treasure the will of God, is continued in this world, and manifestly it is of supreme moment that we should be found such. It is not that I wish to place you under law in the ordinary meaning of the word, but it is evident that [p. 494] God must rule, and that our blessing depends on our abiding under His rule. Present blessing is the result, for as we prove that His will is good and acceptable and perfect by walking in it, we remain in the sphere of blessing. I wonder if you understand what it is to be in the sphere of blessing. If you have tasted what it is you wish to remain there.
You know that God is dealing in a judicial way amongst His people, and if His will is not adhered to people must go. John states it here. He that doeth the will of God abides for ever, but the world passes away. Why does the world pass away? Because it is lawless. It must pass away. But he says, “he that doeth the will of God abides for ever”. 1 John 2:17. And so God would preserve us and keep us in the sphere of blessing and privilege by pressing upon us the necessity of walking according to His will. May it be so! May there be a generation, at least in measure, amongst us now after the pattern of Christ! A generation of people who respect God’s will and adhere to it; who would rather die than surrender one jot or tittle of what God has made known. There must be no deviation from it, for God will refuse all non-adherence to it. All God’s will must be fulfilled, and so today the Spirit of God would maintain in His people a respect and love for God’s will, for all that is contrary to it has to go.
Pages 495 to 516 from “The Basis of the Resurrection World”, Rochester, 1909 (Volume 124).