SEPARATED FROM EVIL AND SEPARATED TO GOD
SEPARATED FROM EVIL AND SEPARATED TO GOD
Numbers 19:1-6; Numbers 19:9; Numbers 19:17-20; Numbers 6:1-6; 2 Corinthians 6:14 (first clause), 2 Corinthians 6:16-18; 2 Corinthians 7:1; Nehemiah 12:27; Nehemiah 12:31, Nehemiah 12:36-40 (latter part, “with ... them”) to 40 (first clause); Nehemiah 12:43
I wish to say a word, dear brethren, on separation from evil, and separation to God. Numbers 19 deals with separation from evil and Numbers 6 with separation to God. The words ‘consecrate’ and ‘separate’ in Numbers 6 are the same in the original; it is a question of a person making a vow to separate himself to God. The great principle of separation is fundamental in God’s relations with man and man’s relations with God at the present time. It came specifically into view when idolatry had established itself in the post-diluvian world, man becoming his own object and his own centre, to make a name for himself. It was then that the God of glory appeared to our father Abraham. He said to him, “Go out of thy land, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, to the land that I will shew thee.” Thus the great principle of separation was introduced in relation to the one who is the father of us all; and when he was called, he obeyed.
I think we can see that in Abraham’s case there was not only separation from evil, but also separation to God; separation to God in such a manner that, when he was tried, he did not hesitate to offer up the supreme object of his affections on earth. God was everything to Abraham, more than anything that He had given him. How easily we make idols of what God has given us! We may make idols of our ability, our skill, our natural relations, our work, our houses. God gives us things; what a recompense it is when we allow such things to come between our souls and Him! That was not so with Abraham. Separated from evil, he was separated to God; God completely commanded his affections. Thus when the word came, “Take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, Isaac, ... and there offer him up for a burnt-offering on one of the mountains which I will tell thee of,” he rose early in the morning to do it. No wonder he was called the friend of God! God can trust a man like that with His greatest secrets. One of the greatest privileges a human being can know is to be trusted by God with His secrets.
In Numbers, Balaam remarks as to Israel, “it is a people that shall dwell alone and shall not be reckoned among the nations,” Numbers 23: 9. You see how this principle is carried forward. Why were the people to dwell alone? Because they were dwelling with God, and God with them. So that while the Nazarite’s vow is called a special one. God looked for it amongst His people. He looked for those who would not only be separate from evil, but be separated to Himself - He Himself everything to them. In his epistle, John speaks of our dwelling in God, and God in us. If that is true of us, dear brethren, as dwelling in love, how could we do other than dwell alone? If we are dwelling in God and God in us, what part can the world have with us? How separated we shall be! Such people must dwell alone, as far as the world is concerned. And so the word to the Corinthians is, “Ye are the living God’s temple; according as God has said, I will dwell among them, and walk among them.” God is the living God, and He is the loving God, and nothing will satisfy Him but full-hearted responsive love from His people. He is a jealous God, because He is love. Think of a God who loves so much that He has come forth from His own place of separatedness where He ever dwells in unapproachable light, and has made Himself known in order to dwell among men responsive to Himself. He has not chosen to dwell among angels, but among men. How it should move our affections toward Him! Furthermore, He has not waited for the eternal state, a perfect condition, but has come down to dwell among us now. “I will dwell among them, and walk among them,” is the present position, the wilderness position. The temple in Corinthians is the temple of the tabernacle (see 1 Samuel 1: 9; chapter 3: 3 and Revelation 15: 5). We are the very shrine of God. What can we have any more to do with idols? How can we have to do with anything that is contrary to God when we realise that the great, the glorious, the eternal God has come forth in love to dwell among us now? He had come to dwell among His people in such a city as Corinth, and, in spite of their state, He had not left them. Their state prevented their enjoyment of His presence, and prevented His enjoyment of them; but He had not left them. “I will dwell among them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be to me a people.” That is the basis of His appeal, “Wherefore come out from the midst of them, and be separated, saith the Lord.” It is His own appeal to our hearts at this time, to be separated from evil, separated to Him, and wholly for Him.
“And touch not what is unclean, and I will receive you.” He is longing to receive us in the sense referred to here. And we need fear nothing, because it is the Almighty God who is calling us out; a God whose almightiness we have to learn first, if we are truly to apprehend it, in ourselves, as Abraham did. The disclosure of the Almighty God to Abraham related to what Abraham was going to experience in his own body. And we learn the almightiness of God, if we learn it effectively, through the power of the Spirit in ourselves, the almighty power of God in the Spirit. And if we have learned it that way, we shall have no fear as regards circumstances. I am not suggesting at all that I am in the gain of this as I ought to be, but I can see that, if we have learned the almightiness of God in dealing with the greatest mountain of difficulty that could face us, sin in the flesh, then it will be simple to trust God as regards circumstances. Abraham learnt the almighty power of God in himself, in a physical sense; we learn it in a spiritual sense.
And so this appeal comes to us, and I want to reinforce the appeal by referring to Numbers 19. We have referred in these meetings, to the cross, and how God’s wrath from heaven was revealed there against sin in its totality; and this passage, one of the most solemn in Scripture, indicates to us what that day of greatest sorrow, that day of unfathomed grief, meant for Christ; “when thou didst taste the horror, of wrath without relief.” I do not think any burning in Scripture is depicted like this one. It says, “one shall burn the heifer before his eyes; its skin and its flesh, and its blood, with its dung, shall he burn” (verse 5). What a burning! All that God is against sin fell upon the Lord Jesus. God made Him to be sin for us; where should we be otherwise? What a burning! And this is to be before our eyes. Paul put it before the Galatians’ eyes. He said, “to whom, as before your very eyes, Jesus Christ has been portrayed, crucified among you,” Galatians 3: 1. We need to consider the cross. If we pass by judgment, we pass by the love of God, as the Lord says. We learn the love of God in the way He has met this terrible matter of sin, and in the awful sufferings Christ has passed through. Christ was the great Sufferer; but how deep the Father’s anguish, and the Spirit’s feelings, too.
We may sometimes overlook a little phrase in Hebrews 9: 13, “The blood of bulls and goats,” would refer to the day of atonement; but it adds, “and a heifer’s ashes sprinkling the defiled.” Do not let us ignore that little phrase “a heifer’s ashes sprinkling the defiled.” We should have no access to God, indeed we could not even approach the tent of meeting, without the death of Christ in this character. The blood of the red heifer was sprinkled seven times before the tent of meeting. It is a type which depicts the death of Christ from our side, what He suffered for us, for our purification. The day of atonement, although it is the basis of all blessing, emphasises what He suffered for God, and what the blood is for God. But this type emphasises what He suffered for us. It should greatly touch our hearts to think that we could have had no part in the worship of the living God, no part, indeed, in the Christian system at all, but for “the heifer’s ashes sprinkling the defiled.” The thought of the ashes should affect us profoundly. The Lord Jesus said in Spirit in Psalm 22: 15, “thou hast laid me in the dust of death.” He has been into the dust of death for us. “Dust thou art; and unto dust shalt thou return,” Genesis 3: 19. He has been into the grave. But the ashes refer to what transpired before that, in those three hours of darkness when, for us, He endured and exhausted the wrath of God. The ashes are the witness that the all-consuming judgment of God on sin in the flesh has been borne. Our true place, therefore, is in dust and ashes, in repentance before God. The water of separation (note the word ‘separation’) was made from those ashes. It was a purification for sin; Numbers 19: 9. It was thus that the heifer’s ashes were sprinkled upon the defiled. The sprinkling is to bring home to us the true force of this aspect of the death of Christ and the awfulness of it, that it might move our souls. God made His soul an offering for sin, and it should move our souls, so that we shall say, “What have I to do any more with idols?” (Hosea 14: 8); what have I to do any more with the unclean thing?
And so it goes on to speak of one who touches a dead person, any dead body of a man (verse 11). We have each and all touched the dead body of a man, we have each been identified with what we are after the flesh, “this body of death,” Romans 7: 24. Nothing that we could do would have delivered us from it, this dead body of a man. Jesus has laid the basis for our deliverance by bearing all the judgment Himself. Nothing is left, as it were, before God, of the man so offensive to God (and now, through grace, so offensive to us) but the ashes. “Who shall deliver me out of this body of death?” The ashes are the witness to our deliverance at such a cost. We are no longer identified with sin in the flesh in the mind of God, but with Him who took our place, and has been raised. But then the sprinkling means that the force of that is brought home to me, so that I no longer identify myself with it. That is the lesson of Romans 7. “It is no longer I that do it,” Romans 7: 17. I see what a deliverance has been wrought, and the heifer’s ashes sprinkled on me mean that I can take my stand apart from that body of death. It is no longer I that do it, but the sin that dwells in me; and I am purified from sin through the death of Christ - the heifer’s ashes sprinkling the defiled. I can say that I delight in the law of God after the inward man and that I myself serve the law of God. Romans, chapter 8, shows how the Spirit makes the deliverance effective. According to Numbers 19: 17, “they shall take ... of the ashes of the purification-offering that hath been burned, and shall put running water thereon in a vessel.” The running water speaks of the Holy Spirit given, on the very basis of these sufferings of Christ, so that we may be in practical deliverance from this body of death. “If Christ be in you, the body is dead on account of sin, but the Spirit life on account of righteousness,” Romans 8: 10. You say, ‘Alas! how often I give way to sin in the flesh.’ Well, the ashes are always available. The water of purification was applied to you once, in the fullest way from God’s standpoint, when you were converted; so that the thing stands from the divine side; but in your experience you may need it renewed. Who of us does not need continually to come back to the force of these heifer’s ashes sprinkling the defiled, which is the basis of our deliverance from the dead body of a man? So that it is one thing to say “this body of death,” and another thing to say the body is dead. If the body is dead, we are delivered practically, in the power of the Spirit. The body is dead, because of sin, and the Spirit is life; and if the Spirit is life, it means that we can present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. As far as sin goes, the body is dead; but as far as its activities go, the Spirit is life. That is a primary application of the teaching of Numbers 19, but it is not the whole matter.
The word in 2 Corinthians 6: 17 is, “touch not what is unclean.” I have to see that I do not touch the unclean thing in myself; if I do, I have to learn to judge myself, which would imply getting back to the meaning of these ashes and purifying myself accordingly. But I am also not to touch the unclean thing around. You will notice that it says of the heifer, in verse 2, “a red heifer without blemish, wherein is no defect, and upon which never came yoke.” Was Christ ever yoked with the world? Not at all. 2 Corinthians 6 has to do with yokes. “Be not diversely yoked with unbelievers.” It bears on this type of the death of Christ, the red heifer. Upon Him never came yoke. He was wholly for God, as we know, from the womb; and separated to God, the great Nazarite of God; separated from evil, of course; we do not need to say such a thing as that; but separated to God. And so it raises the whole question of yokes. We have all been under yokes,
but God has called us out, “Come out from the midst of them, and be separated, saith the Lord, and touch not what is unclean.” Now I want to raise the question of dead bodies; not our own now, not the one we carry about with us, but the corporate bodies of men around us. Anything morally dead is unclean in the sight of God, and any corporate association of men that has not God as its centre, is a dead body. There is no life there, corporately, towards God. Any individual, or any body of men, where there is no life towards God, is unclean, and if you touch such, you become defiled. It is not only that the person touching the dead body is defiled but, what is far more serious, if he fails to purify himself, he defiles the sanctuary of Jehovah (verse 20). Touching, in this sense, involves identification with the dead thing.
But the water of separation is available and we would like, at a time like this, to sprinkle these ashes on one another, that is, to bring this aspect of the death of Christ home to the conscience and heart, so that we purify ourselves from the unclean thing; we refuse to be linked with anything that is dead, where there is no life God-ward. In actual fact, there is only one fellowship of life in this world, only one fellowship that God recognises, the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. That is the position that we need to face, without discrimination as to the character of the association, wherever a diverse yoke is really involved. The point is, if God is not the centre, it is dead. And, because God is not the centre, you will find a good deal of cedar-wood and hyssop and scarlet, all of which, according to this chapter, went into the burning, “The priest shall take cedar-wood, and hyssop, and scarlet and cast them into the midst of the burning of the heifer.” You may say, ‘This association is not like a trade union.’ That may be so. But if you examine it you will find that, whatever its ostensible purpose, it does, in a greater or lesser degree, glorify man in the flesh. The cedar-wood of man’s greatness, the hyssop, of his false humility, the scarlet of his glory, while seen in their most offensive character in what is religious, also characterise men’s associations and their literature generally. But all has gone into the burning; all has come under judgment in the death of Christ. When wrath of God was revealed from heaven, and sin in its totality was judged, everything morally dead was judged.
Now I wish to go on to Nehemiah, because it speaks there about the dedication of the wall. It is dealing with days of recovery and a good deal had preceded. God raised up Cyrus, His beloved, His servant, His shepherd, who opened the door for the remnant to return to Jerusalem, and they went up under Joshua and Zerubbabel, Zerubbabel meaning ‘born in Babylon.’ The first thing they did was to build the altar, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. That bears on the heavenly side of things and that is how the present revival began. It began with light as to Christ as Head in heaven, as to His body here on earth, and as to the presence of the Holy Spirit. It was the feast of tabernacles in principle, the top-note. That is what brought people out into separation. The altar was set up, the Lord’s supper recognised, and the service of God begun. The start of things, according to the book of Ezra, was remarkable. The returned captives must have studied the Scriptures closely, because it says they offered daily burnt-offerings by number at the feast of tabernacles, according to the ordinance, as the duty of every day required; Ezra 3: 4. It means they knew Numbers 29. Later, when the foundation of the temple was laid (chapter 3: 10), they instituted the service of song according to the directions of David, king of Israel. They were governed by the light given to Moses and to David. And that has been a feature of the present revival - the knowledge of the Scriptures and of the whole truth bearing on matters. And it says, when the foundations of the house were laid, the people shouted and “the noise was heard afar off.” Later the house was finished, and they kept the dedication of the house with joy. Many years later, Ezra came up bringing more treasure and more vessels, to beautify the house. Finally Nehemiah came up to rebuild the city, and its wall, and chapter 12 records the culmination, namely, the dedication of the wall.
I believe, dear brethren, this specially links with the present time. What the Spirit of God would stress now, the dedication of the wall. There has been much building of the wall. When Nehemiah first went round, the wall was in ruins, and, if the wall is in ruins, Christians are in reproach, as it says (chapter 2: 17), “I said to them, Ye see the distress that we are in, that Jerusalem lies waste, and its gates are burned with fire, Come, and let us build up the wall of Jerusalem, that we be no more a reproach.” If you have not got the wall, you will escape the reproach of Christ, but you will be in great reproach. I would rather have the reproach of Christ than be in reproach amongst men in the sense that this means that you are despised. Men do not object to the open principle, they will go on with those who hold it and, thus, the reproach of Christ is avoided. Nevertheless men realise that it is compromise. They have an impression of what Christianity ought to be. Christianity involves the reproach of Christ, and if we try to escape it, we become despised by the very people whose reproach we are seeking to avoid. But then, as this book proceeds, the wall is rebuilt against much opposition. There will always be opposition to the building of the wall. But finally it says, in chapter 6: 15, “So the wall was finished,” and in verse 1 of that chapter, the “enemies heard that I had built the wall, and that there was no breach left in it.”
Now what about the wall today? Is there a breach left in it? This is the time for seeing that there is no breach left in the wall. The time came when Nehemiah said that the enemies heard that there was no breach left in it. If we have not got a wall, there can be no administration. Gates are of no use without a wall. Once you have the wall, you can have gates, and true administration. The wall is very attractive, do not think I am saying anything that is not attractive. It is said of the Holy City, that the building of its wall was jasper, and the foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with every precious stone. What a wonderful structure the wall is! Why should we be ashamed of it? And so, if the wall is there, the gates can function, each gate a pearl. The gates of the city according to Revelation 21: 25 shall not be shut at all by day, for night shall not be there. Yet nothing unclean is allowed into the city. That is the idea of administration. The gates are open to receive all that is of God, all that should come into the city, but nothing common, nor that maketh an abomination and a lie, shall at all enter into it. There we have true administration.
In Nehemiah 12, when the wall was completed and the gates were erected, there was the dedication of the wall. It was the culmination of joy. The name Ezra means ‘help,’ but the name Nehemiah means ‘comfort of Jehovah.’ There is no real comfort for the saints until the wall is there without a breach. The city of God is a wonderful, inclusive conception. Among nations of men, the metropolitan city contains all that is most precious, both to the king and the nation. In the city of God everything most precious to God, and to the people of God, is conserved. But we must have a wall to protect it. There can be no comfort if you feel it is exposed. And so the dedication of the wall became the crowning joy of the recovery. It is not simply the shout was heard afar off, but it says, “the joy of Jerusalem was heard even afar off.” God would bring us to this joy, dear brethren.
Now I want to say a word about dedication. There was the dedication of the house earlier (Ezra 6: 16), and now the dedication of the wall. For us it means that we dedicate ourselves. “Whose house are we.” The dedication of the house of God means that we are dedicated to God; and likewise, the dedication of the wall, because the wall is in the saints. The wall today is not a material structure. The dedication of the wall means that I am dedicated, we are all dedicated. Let us be in this dedication. And that corresponds with the vow of the Nazarite, not only separation from evil, but separation to God. We recognise that we belong to the house - “whose house are we” - and that we also form the wall of the city, and we dedicate ourselves accordingly. In the recovery, every person who is vitally in it, is a Nazarite. Indeed, in Christianity, what was special of old is normal; nazariteship is normal. The joy expressed on those occasions of dedication shows that the principle of the Nazarite’s vow operated in that day of recovery of old, because they were not relying on any natural joy, or earthly prosperity, for stimulation. Their joy was entirely related to God, and His house, and His city. That is the idea of a Nazarite. It is not only that he does not touch a dead body, but he separates himself from wine and strong drink. He will not allow anything natural to be his stimulation. God is the source of his joy. The God of the gladness of my joy, the Psalmist says; Psalm 43: 4. And that is what marked these returned captives. May the spirit of the Nazarite mark us! Let us ask ourselves, dear brethren, what is keeping us going? Is it some new foible down here? Do we need such things to keep us going? Or is it God our exceeding joy? If so there will be no difficulty about the wall.
It will be a great joy to us to be in the dedication.
And see how remarkable are the movements of these two choirs upon the wall! Without the wall we could never maintain the service of God; it is impossible. “Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the hill of his holiness.” But you must have the wall. And so, at the dedication of the wall, what service there was - these two great choirs! The first one, with Ezra in front, had the musical instruments of David the man of God. They started at the dung gate, because that is where we must start if we are to fulfil our part in the service of God. “Let a man prove himself, and thus eat of the bread, and drink of the cup.” We start at the dung gate. But it goes on to say (verse 37), “at the fountain-gate, and over against them, they went up by the stairs of the city of David.” In chapter 3: 15 it speaks of the stairs that go down from the city of David, but now the time comes for going up those stairs “at the ascent of the wall, above the house of David, even to the water-gate eastward.” What beautiful suggestions of the Spirit’s power proved in the ascent “even to the water-gate eastward” - suggesting the service of God in full activity, leading to the outflow of ministry and an outlook towards the Lord’s coming. The second choir, in the opposite direction, with Nehemiah behind them, began at the tower of the furnaces, where all the rubbish was burnt. There is a lot of rubbish to burn in days of recovery; we have got to get rid of all the wrong ideas and the tower of the furnaces is available. Then the broad wall, suggesting the scope of the truth; the gate of Ephraim, fruitfulness; and the gate of the old wall, divine principles, going back to the beginning. Then the fish-gate, the tower of Hananeel, and the tower of Meah, even to the sheep-gate; “and they stood still in the prison-gate.”
Until you have got the wall you cannot exercise discipline, but now there is the prison-gate. Sanctions are available to maintain what is due to God. Thus the first choir is the upward line - the service God-ward - and the second choir is the administration man-ward, the fish-gate, the sheep-gate, the prison-gate. And both choirs stood in the house of God, “And that day they offered great sacrifices, and rejoiced: for God had made them rejoice with great joy; and also the women and the children rejoiced. And the joy of Jerusalem was heard even afar off.” What a day, dear brethren! And this is what God would bring us to now. This is the point in the great recovery at which God would have us arrive now.
You may say, ‘If I accept separation in the way you are speaking, my wife and children will suffer.’ But the wives and children were in this, the women and children rejoiced. We were much affected recently to meet a brother with a wife and young children, suffering, having lost his work through trade unionism. They were having to sell their home and we were greatly touched to see the attitude of the wife; the way she supported and encouraged her husband. In spite of all the pressure, they were experiencing something of this joy. “The women and the children rejoiced. And the joy of Jerusalem was heard even afar off.”
Now I want to say one more word. The second choir was going over the ground of administration man-ward, ending at the prison-gate; but it speaks of the tower of Hananeel, and Hananeel means ‘God is gracious.’ We want the breaches in the wall closed, but, let me say a word to the brethren as to the spirit in which we endeavour to do it. It is greatly affecting to see Paul’s spirit in these matters. The Corinthians were in a bad state; how does he address them? In the first epistle he says, “Wherefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.” Idolatry is a dreadful thing. Every association which has not God as its centre is, in principle, idolatrous. But how does he approach them? My beloved, he says.
This is the way to approach our brethren. We need patience and much love. God is gracious. The tower of Hananeel is there before the prison-gate. And so, let us make love’s appeal to one another, “Wherefore my beloved, flee from idolatry,” 1 Corinthians 10: 14. And in the second epistle he says, “Having therefore these promises, beloved, let us purify ourselves, from every pollution of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in God’s fear.” Let us know how to appeal to one another as ‘beloved.’ Love would not lose one person through lack of patience and care. In the representation of God in the living creatures in Ezekiel 1: 10, we have the lion, and the lion roars sometimes, as the prophet Amos indicates. Paul speaks somewhat like a lion at the end of this epistle. He says, “I have declared beforehand, and I say beforehand as present the second time, and now absent ... that if I come again I will not spare,” 2 Corinthians 13: 2. But he is not speaking thus in the meantime; he is entreating by the meekness and gentleness of the Christ; 2 Corinthians 10: 1. There is the face of a man, “the likeness of their faces was the face of a man,” Ezekiel 1: 10. “Now I shall most gladly spend and be utterly spent for your souls, if even in abundantly loving you I should be less loved,” 2 Corinthians 12: 15. What a man Paul was, the face of a man in Paul - the face of Jesus! And then the face of the ox, suggesting patience; love has long patience, is kind. When the time comes the lion roars; but do not let us roar before the time. And when the time comes the eagle swoops. But let us rightly represent God in all these exercises. Otherwise, in our very effort to get things done, we shall lose divine support; we shall allow, in another form, the very man we are seeking to exclude. I just say that, dear brethren, that we might imbibe the spirit of Paul, in the way we apply the truth. Even as to the work of the Lord, in which the Corinthians were very remiss, he said, “So then my beloved brethren be firm, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord.” Let us learn how to appeal to one another on these lines. Should love’s appeal fail, and the sanctity of God’s house and His city be involved, there are the sanctions; they stood still over the prison-gate. But may the Lord help us, so that love’s appeal - God’s own appeal (2 Corinthians 6: 17) may be heeded.
More could be said as to the great heights to which the note of praise rose, once the wall was completed, “Bless Jehovah your God from eternity to eternity. And let men bless the name of thy glory, which is exalted above all blessing and praise. Thou art the Same, thou alone, Jehovah,” Nehemiah 9: 5, 6. What a marvellous note of praise was reached! The title ‘El’ is also brought in (Nehemiah 9: 31, 32). “El” refers to God in His strength, not only physical, but in the strength and unchangeability of His nature and character. God never changes. His attitude to sin never changes. The returned captives come to a very distinct appreciation of El, the unchanging God, who never deviates, never lowers the standard, and yet, would, so long as it is right to do so, wait upon us in patient grace. But I believe the time has now come for us all to be concerned to fill up all the breaches and to dedicate the wall.
May the Lord help us for His name’s sake.