THE ASSEMBLY AND ITS PRIVILEGES
[p. 501] THE ASSEMBLY AND ITS PRIVILEGES
Matthew 16: 13 - 18; Matthew 26: 26 - 30; Acts 1: 4
JT I am thinking of the subject of the assembly in a general way involving its privileges, and what I think helps to simplify it is that Peter, to whom the Lord was speaking in introducing the assembly, says here in Acts, in view of the choosing of an apostle, that he should be one who had assembled with them during “all the time in which the Lord Jesus came in and went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day in which he was taken up”. The allusion would be to instances of experiences such as we have now in meetings. There was the idea of assembling current amongst the disciples from the beginning; it would suggest they had quiet seasons with the Lord and with one another all the time in which he came in and went out. In coming in and going out amongst the disciples there would be the suggestion with Him of the assembly, which He introduced early; for example in chapter 13. He speaks about a treasure which a man found, and of a pearl which a merchant was seeking and found. It is obvious that Peter had in mind that the Lord found enjoyment amongst His own above anything that judaism could yield. It says in the parable that He found the treasure in the field, and He explains that the field is the world: the Lord was looking at these persons by themselves, so to say, detaching them in His mind from the synagogues. The Lord was accustomed to enter the synagogues and preach in them, but Peter alludes to something outside that — “assembled with us”, he says: we could hardly think of synagogue gatherings as assembling with us.
Rem There was something in that company that the Lord would find pleasure in, and there is that in which He finds pleasure now.
JT That is what I thought. The times of refreshing [p. 502] that Peter alluded to later would be apart from the synagogues and the Jewish order of things.
Ques Does it suggest liberty? I was thinking of the going in and going out in John 10.
JT Just so, the disciples would learn how to come in and go out too: the Lord would lead the way in that. The Jewish system was too straitened, too set, for that: it did not afford the liberty that love required. Would you say that?
EM Yes, I think so. I was thinking of David: it speaks of him going in and out endearing himself in that way to the men of Israel.
JT Yes. We can see that the ordered religion of our times does not afford that liberty.
EM Would there be an object in the Lord drawing the disciples a long way away from Jerusalem, with which they had been occupied, to Caesarea Philippi?
JT Yes, the further the better. In fact you get the suggestion of going away in chapter 16: it says in verse 4, “He left them and went away”, the idea is putting a distance between Himself and the Pharisees and Sadducees.
Rem The disciples saw the Lord by Himself. Although He went to the synagogue, He really lived in a sphere outside it; they saw Him withdrawing and they knew He was walking outside that.
JT Yes they did. We read He went to a garden, as was His custom: even at Jerusalem they must have had those meetings. The last recorded is when He was in Gethsemane and He directed some to sit, and others He took with Him — He had them under His hand.
Ques Do we get the thought in Matthew objectively, and are they tested in the Acts as to what they will do when He is not there? He took them out as far as to Bethany; then it is a question of what they will [p. 503] do.
JT Yes. When He was taken up, according to the Acts, they returned and went to the upper room showing they had been instructed in this matter. In the end of the gospel of Luke, they returned to Jerusalem, to the temple, praising and blessing God; but Acts looks more toward the assembly, and is in keeping with Peter’s comment on what they had been doing, “assembling”, before they went to the upper room — not to the temple; then we are told who were in that upper room.
EM The Lord knew what the Father had effected in the soul of Peter, but would He give the opportunity for that to be brought to light?
JT I think so. I believe this method of assembling together had been coming to light before, but now the thing would be confirmed and established, as the foundation in the soul is laid; it was what had been going on before without a name having been given to it. You have the name formally given here in the Lord saying, “I will build my assembly”. Their method of assembling together would hardly be regarded as anything fixed yet and could not be until the Lord died and rose, but it was there in principle. When He spoke of building, He had in mind that He would die and rise, and there would be stones, He being the chief corner stone.
Ques Would not this challenge to the disciples in the Lord’s demand as to His own Person, bring out distinctly that they were apart from men generally?
JT That is what the Lord had in mind to bring out — that very fact, for whilst the truth of the Son of God now is current in orthodoxy, the Lord would challenge us as to what we say; if we are governed in our thoughts by the Spirit of God, there will be something in us which is distinct from orthodoxy. You never can get the truth in a spiritual sense in a creed; it is impossible for a creed rightly to present [p. 504] the truth. It must be a matter of faith; God never intended it to be otherwise.
Rem Orthodoxy would be flesh and blood.
JT Yes exactly; it is the product very largely of what man can bring about by learning, by religious teaching, university instruction, etc. Philosophy has a great deal to do with the accredited creeds of christendom, far more than we are aware of.
EM Is that emphasised in the preceding verses when the Lord rebukes them for their lack of faith, bringing them on to the line of faith in order to apprehend divine thoughts?
JT Just so. “And he left them and went away” — and they were the orthodox men of that day! Then it says, “When his disciples were come to the other side, they had forgotten to take bread. And Jesus said to them, See and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. And they reasoned among themselves, saying, Because we have taken no bread”. Then He says, “How do ye not understand ... ? Then they comprehended that he did not speak of being beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and Sadducees”, that is really the orthodox. Not that the Sadducees believed as the Pharisees did, but that is the thing, for you have accredited things today, and they had them then. The disciples were in danger, whilst leaving them, of carrying the accredited doctrines of the Pharisees and Sadducees with them; and I believe, whilst the Lord has separated the brethren during these last days, the doctrines have been carried on.
Rem All that we have in the assembly is on the principle of revelation, not on the principle of flesh and blood.
JT Yes, and on the principle of faith, too: He said, “O ye of little faith”.
[p. 505] Ques Would taking account of the Lord’s movements in going in and out amongst us help us as to these doctrines and preserve us from the Pharisee and Sadducee element?
JT I think so. You can understand how His coming in and going out amongst His disciples would correct that. The Lord accepted an invitation to Simon the Pharisee’s house and He went in, but there was no liberty there, the atmosphere was not at all suited to Him, but nevertheless He brought the light in: it was a question of adjustment. If Simon the Pharisee had only been ready for it, what an adjustment there would have been. But it is very much like going into the orthodox system now, what can you do? It is fixed, you cannot alter it.
EM Would you see another instance in the Lord going into Peter’s house — his wife’s mother being sick of fever, feverish conditions?
JT That is a very good illustration; what a different house it would have been afterwards! So right through, His coming in and going out would imply adjustment. He would gradually detach them from the Jewish way of thinking.
Rem The very best estimate of Christ in the religious world comes short of the real thing.
JT You can never get a right thought of Christ apart from the Spirit. Divine things are so wonderful! God takes up human terms but He uses them in His own way, and the Lord had in mind in going in and out amongst them to adjust them. Anything they said that was not in accord with Him, He would correct; we have abundance of illustrations of that. The idea of faith is introduced before He questions them as to Himself.
Another thing is the idea of comprehension in verse 12. “Then they comprehended that he did not speak of being beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and Sadducees”.
[p. 506] They have power of comprehension; they would not take up the thought in half measures; they would go all round and see the full force of it; that is a great matter in spiritual things. So when He says, “Who do ye say that I am?”. He has brought them up to the point of it: that is, ‘you are to be different, whatever other people think or say of Me, you are to be different’. What do you say? The thing is not what they thought, but what they said — it is current doctrine that is in view.
Ques Is not that important today?
JT Most important, there is no passage more important than this; the question of the Lord’s Person is in view, and a right understanding of His Person is essential if we are to touch the assembly.
Rem So it is of the greatest importance that all our comings together should be in faith.
JT That is the thing, always be ready for adjustment.
Ques Will you say a little more about comprehending? There are things we can apprehend but not comprehend.
JT Yes. The assembly is a finite thing, and that is what He is leading up to, but the Person of the Lord is infinite; you cannot compass that as the creeds attempt to do; they attempt more than is possible to the creature.
Rem So in Ephesians the apostle uses the word “apprehend”, Ephesians 3: 18.
JT Yes, the depth goes beyond what is finite: it refers to Jesus, to what He experienced. You have the breadth and length and height — those three dimensions are finite; but the fourth, the depth, suggests what belongs to deity. But the heavenly city is a cube with finite measurements.
Rem So faith would preserve us from becoming fixed.
JT That is the idea. The term “faith” in the beginning meant the system of truth as well as what a person might have in his soul. “Contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints”, Jude 3; that is held in the souls of the saints. As we have often heard, for many a day it was not a question of the Scriptures, for they did not have the New Testament Scriptures, but of what was held in the souls of the saints.
Ques If we take the ground of knowing almost anything, are we not on dangerous ground?
JT Well John says, “We know” — of course that is apostolic, but I think it is characteristic, too.
Rem I was thinking of that scripture, “if any one think he knows anything, he knows nothing yet as he ought to know it”, 1 Corinthians 8: 2. The truth is continually expanding.
JT That is quite right, but there is the other side; “whereto we have attained”, Philippians 3: 16; you know something. In the prophets the Lord Himself says to Jehovah that He opened His ear to hear as the instructed; the Lord took that ground. The saints have that potential power or ability; they are instructed to a point, but they need more. We shall know, it says, but we shall “follow on to know”, Hosea 6: 3 — that is the position.
Rem The man in John 9 began with knowing one thing, but he soon got more.
JT That is the idea — we know something: the structure is built up in that way on what we know.
Rem I suppose what the apostle says is important, we know in part.
JT Yes, but we know. Whereas when you come to a fixed system of doctrines there is no progress. There is no room for any; it is fixed.
Ques Could we expect to get this adjustment in our assemblings even as we are at the present moment?
[p. 508] JT It is a continuous thing. The Holy Spirit being here the Lord is continually adding to it if we are open for it: you get new thoughts as you are ready for them. “They comprehended” — that is a very strong word — they comprehended He did not mean mere bread; He meant doctrine. That is the kind of knowledge that is important, so that we can say ‘the Lord does not mean that, He means this’. You are fixed in the thing. “Who do men say that I ... am?” What are they saying about Me? But what He had in mind was not merely what place He had in the mind of men, but what they were saying about Him.
Ques Is it not a very great favour to have a faculty to be able to take in divine thoughts?
JT Yes. “If any man desire to practise his will, he shall know concerning the doctrine”. There is to be a moral element behind it. So that this passage is extremely important just now; it is a question of what men are saying. Some come more or less near the thought, but none get it apart from the Holy Spirit.
Ques Should we pay attention to what men say?
JT I do not think so; if we do we shall go wrong. “Some, John the baptist” — what could be more misleading than that? Some are saying things like that now, and worse things. Then it says, “Others, Elias” — what could be more misleading than that? It is not that these men were deliberately opposed to the Lord, but it is just to bring out what men think and say. Others would say He had a demon; but here it is what men are saying who are not against Him.
Rem It is more subtle.
JT Yes, it is. Sons of light are to take His place and have to be in evidence as He hides Himself. They are persons developed in the thought of light. So that what men were saying — “John the baptist”, “Elias”, or “Jeremias or one of the prophets” — any one of them — shows the impossibility of men, as such, having right thoughts of Christ. There is no thought of a Person come into manhood. It is what we are without the Spirit; there is nothing perfect without the Spirit. They were still really under the law and, although the Lord Jesus came in and was teaching them, yet they had not come into the time of faith. Galatians distinguishes between this and the time of faith when we understand things rightly. They did not understand a Divine Person come into manhood.
Ques Is that the key to the position, as we apprehend that we are linked up with something new, something from heaven, in manhood?
JT That is the position, so as soon as Peter says “Thou art [p. 512] the Christ, the Son of the living God”, the Lord speaks about building the assembly. The Lord is seeking to adjust us constantly that we might come into right relations with Himself. “The Son of the living God” implies resurrection, however little Peter understood it. We see the weakness of the flesh — “The spirit indeed is willing but the flesh weak”. The new state, the state in the Spirit, was not there.
Ques Do we see in these remarks of Peter that he was not equal to the light he really had, that his light exceeded his faith?
JT That is what it is meant to teach us. It is to teach us the great importance of the epistle to the Romans in laying a basis in our souls: “Ye are not in flesh but in Spirit, if indeed God’s Spirit dwell in you”, Romans 8: 9. If I have the Spirit dwelling in me, I have the ability to apprehend divine things.
Ques Why should Jesus charge His disciples to tell no man that He was the Christ?
JT Well. He does not want to impart knowledge to the world that it will use for its own aggrandizement. The parting of the ways had come, and the [p. 510] Lord did not intend to augment that which was rejecting Him. Christendom is a whitewashed state of things: terms belonging to us exclusively are taken up by them, and men are advanced by it.
Rem The need for a creed shows that the truth of the Holy Spirit has been lost.
JT Exactly. Timothy says, “Keep, by the Holy Spirit ... the good deposit entrusted”, 2 Timothy 1: 14, and they attempt to keep it by a creed. The assembly is “the pillar and base of the truth”, it is to be held there, and that is by the Spirit.
Ques With regard to Peter’s confession, would what he said here, though really beyond his actual state, confirm that we might be entitled to speak of things beyond our experience provided we were genuine?
JT That is true, otherwise we should be extremely limited today. We have to “have an outline of sound words”, 2 Timothy 1: 13, but we are entitled to deal with it in that way because we are in it to some extent, there is the foundation with us. So the Lord says, “Thou art Peter”, there was something there. If there was nothing there, it would be simply like Simon Magus — “Thou hast neither part nor lot in this matter”, Acts 8: 21; he had no right to say to these things, whereas a person who has the Spirit has a right, he has a footing in divine things.
Rem Peter’s confession in John 6, “Thou art the holy one of God”, shows how entirely they were outside all that was orthodox.
JT That is the thing. It shows that the element of holiness necessarily enters into christian teaching, you cannot have it rightly otherwise.
Ques In regard to John 6, had they arrived at it so far objectively?
JT I think so: Peter represents the point reached. The Lord says to the twelve, “Will ye also go away?” — there was something there that the Lord could recognise. John’s gospel speaks of sons of light. Christ is hidden now from the eyes of men, but sons of light are here, that is, persons who are developed in light, they understand; so that we have throughout John’s gospel the different features of light, in the sons of it. The woman of Sychar is a son of light, and each one of the signs brings out a son of light. Peter is a son of light in regard to the testimony; because the Lord spoke to the twelve and Peter was one of them, so he represents that side.
Ques The Lord says here, “I will build”, but in 1 Corinthians 3, we are said to build.
JT Well, that has often been discussed, and it is of importance. This is the full thought; it is not, ‘I will build the assembly’ but “I will build my assembly”, to bring out what the Lord has, and will have eternally. He has now in a militant way what stands against the gates of hades. It is invulnerable, “the pillar and base of the truth”: that is the full setting and would include all that is stated in Corinthians, as the greater includes the less. Paul treats of a local service and persons locally having part. He points out that every man is to take heed how he builds: it is not how another builds, but how I build. Paul says, “As a wise architect I have laid the foundation” — I have done the thing well: not that he is eulogising himself, but he brings out the great feature that things must be done well. He did it that way, he did it in wisdom, let every one see that in his little bit he does it that way.
Ques You spoke just now about the woman of Sychar being a son of light. She goes into the city and says, “Is not he the Christ?” John 4: 29. How much further does this confession of Peter’s go than that? It is revealed to Peter by the Father.
JT Well, it is one thing here, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God”, the woman did not go that far, nor did she indeed undertake to say anything beyond, “Is not he the Christ?” — the evidence was that He told her all things that ever she did: she is basing it on her own experience. The way she became a son of light, the evidence of it, is I think that she left her waterpot; a very simple matter but there is a great deal in it as showing what she apprehended, what she knew.
Rem “Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?” 1 John 5: 5.
JT Yes, the two things go together in Peter’s confession. It is one thing to work things out in your own soul by the light that comes to you, and it is another thing to have a revelation.
Ques Do you see the two thoughts in what Paul says, “That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection”, Philippians 3: 10, and then, “I know whom I have believed”, 2 Timothy 1: 12?
JT Quite so. In saying, “I know whom I have believed”, he shows how he advanced in the knowledge of the Lord: but with Peter here, he already had some evidence of the Lord. They had said earlier that He was the Son of God, that was from the standpoint of their experience which may not be always reliable, but what is of the foundation is the revelation. The foundation is not what I have discovered by my experience, that would be too small a matter, but you have something from God’s side, and you have it in its fulness. Some flash of light must have come into Peter’s soul at the moment, that would give him a light of Christ no one could ever have from his own experience. Assembly formation is on the principle of revelation.
Rem We must not base too much on our own experience, though we can thank God for it.
[p. 513] JT Yes, but for foundation to build, we must have revelation; but there is the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the assembly. In all ministry according to God you really begin with what you have obtained by experience or instruction by the Spirit, but as you proceed in ministry, the principle of revelation comes in, and that is what gives it authority; the thing comes out so that there is certainty. The secret of that is the Holy Spirit has had opportunity in the ministry.
Rem I think the young brethren are in danger of being misled by experiences and accounts of experiences which are very interesting in themselves, but they are not establishing in the sense that the truth is establishing.
JT No. The ministry is ministered by the Spirit, but the minister begins with something that he has.
Rem We may expect to learn quickly if we are on right lines and in subjection to the Lord.
JT Something comes in on the line of revelation, not that there are any new things now, but there are new features.
Rem The truth of the Son of God is not dependent on resurrection, though it is declared, according to Romans 1, by resurrection.
JT Yes, from the outset it was there: “This is my beloved Son”.
EM I think you have sought to call attention to the greatness of the incarnation: are we not defective in our thoughts in regard to the greatness of it?
JT I think we are very defective. So God surrounded it with indications of its greatness in the communications to Mary and to Joseph; and then in what comes out in the Lord when He was twelve; then when He began to be about thirty. He was praying, and the announcement from heaven is there to Himself and to others. The fact of His sonship is there, it did not await resurrection; the word in Romans 1 is “marked out”; that is an undeniable thing for any being, whether he be divine or a believer or an infidel. The devil recognises it, he is bound to, this Person is marked out.
I thought chapter 26 furnishes right feelings. We may speak about the revelation and the building, but apart from right feelings we are morally out of it, and that is what chapter 26 supplies. The way into the assembly is through the Lord’s Supper, surrounded by those holy feelings of the Lord, and what should correspond in us. In the Acts the spiritual side comes out, the Lord would show them what the thing is spiritually, how we are to be in the assembly spiritually, how we are to apprehend the Lord in it. How important it is to have right feelings, not to be in the assembly merely in our minds, with high expressions that we have learned perhaps from others, but in it feelingly with a sense of the sufferings: for as soon as the Lord brings out the question of His Person and the building, He speaks about suffering. He says, in Matthew 16: 21, “From that time Jesus began to shew to his disciples that he must go away to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and the third day be raised”. Then in chapter 17 it says, “And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said to them, The Son of man is about to be delivered up into the hands of men, and they shall kill him; and the third day he shall be raised up”, verses 22, 23. We might think the Jews did it, according to Matthew 16: 21, but according to chapter 17, verse 22 men did it; we cannot escape that, we are men; the whole race is brought into it, first in what the Jews did, then in what men did. Then in chapter 26, He is surrounded by murderers; it says, “It came to pass when Jesus had finished all these sayings, he said to his disciples, Ye know that after two days the passover takes place, and the Son of man is delivered [p. 515] up to be crucified. Then the chief priests and elders of the people were gathered together to the palace of the high priest who was called Caiaphas, and took counsel together in order that they might seize Jesus by subtlety and kill him”, verses 1 - 4. Then Judas betrays Him. That is what surrounds the Lord’s supper.
Ques Is the woman in Simon’s house a sample saint who was swayed by holy emotions?
JT Yes, I think she is the exponent of the light that governs the position. If it were Mary of Bethany, we can understand how beautifully it fits. She anointed the Lord in Simon the leper’s house, that is, in a place of reproach, the house of the leper. There this woman shines; she represents the light that governs that position, the time of suffering; she anointed His head.
Ques As we come together to break bread, do we come in the spirit of acknowledging the way the Lord went in these aspects that are mentioned?
JT I think so. I think we ought to be full of the suffering side at the Lord’s supper. The woman here is saying by her action that she is thoroughly identified with this Man. The whole air is charged with murder against Him, but she is with Him, and intelligently she anoints His head; she apprehends the wisdom that is in Him. He is going to evolve a system of worship and service for God, when all this murderous state will have passed away forever.
Rem Paul says, “I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto you. That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took bread”, 1 Corinthians 11: 23. We would come together with the sense of that in our souls.
JT Yes, betrayal involves the most poignant suffering. Then the eating is to build up a constitution such as shines in this woman; she anointed His head. “A bone of him shall not be broken”;
[p. 516] He is going through; but going through in resurrection. All that is in Him comes out in resurrection.
Rem So that “as they were eating, Jesus took bread”, Matthew 26: 26.
JT Yes, it is a question of eating, for the point is to build up a constitution capable of eating this and of going through this.
Ques What is the connection between this and the mount of Olives?
JT I think the instruction is that they emerge from judaism. Luke tells us that at night He went to the mount of Olives; the mount of Olives was His retreat; so that I suppose here it means that we emerge from one setting into another. That is the point in view in Matthew and Mark, there is power to get out of the religious setting of things. As it is said of Dan, “Dan is a young lion; he shall spring forth from Bashan”, Deuteronomy 33: 22. There is power in the soul.
Ques Is that why the Lord says “Whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it”, Matthew 16: 25.
JT Quite so. Power in the soul is the great thing in Matthew, the opposition is so great, so there is the necessity of eating. Then they went to the mount of Olives. In singing the hymn they were in victory, and in power to get out of one position and into another one.
Ques In the passage in Acts 1, does “assembled with them” suggest that God’s end is reached?
JT I think so. The Lord is now restful in resurrection, He has His own, and He is outside the temple and the whole Jewish system.
Rem His name is Emmanuel. God with us, that seems to be realised in the assembly — He assembled with them.
JT Yes.