PAUL'S MINISTRY AND THE SERVICE OF GOD (2)
PAUL’S MINISTRY AND THE SERVICE OF GOD (2)
JT Our inquiry this morning extended to chapter 1:14, so that there are other important points in the chapter to consider. First the apostle’s personal consideration for the Ephesians which, it will be discerned, is important as we transfer the thoughts to ourselves, and we see the need of this personal consideration for brethren; it may be brethren at a distance or those nearby, or consideration called forth by some calamity or trouble. The spirit of Scripture would encourage this personal consideration for brethren. Ephesians 1:15,16 says, “[p. 278] Wherefore I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is in you, and the love which ye have towards all the saints, do not cease giving thanks for you, making mention of you at my prayers”, showing how ministers may become of general comfort through personal interest and solicitations, and it may be through affording physical relief. Hence christianity becomes what is, in fact, never otherwise than practical. The apostle’s mind then runs on to certain features that entered into the moment, features which the Ephesians needed to include in their thoughts; such as the calling, and the power of God working in them, and above all the personal distinction and glory accruing to the Lord Jesus Himself, which must ever eclipse all else. It is especially seen here as the apostle uses such strength of language, as in verse 20, in which you find the work of God. He says, speaking of God’s power “in which he wrought in the Christ in raising him from among the dead, and he set him down at his right hand in the heavenlies, above every principality, and authority, and power and dominion, and every name named, not only in this age, but also in that to come; and has put all things under his feet, and gave him to be head over all things to the assembly, which is his body, the fulness of him who fills all in all”. Ephesians 1:20 - 23.
[p. 275] It seems as if great advantage may accrue to the general fellowship as visiting or ministering brethren take personal interest as moved in affection toward the saints, and also select in their ministry truths needed to meet exigencies that may arise.
PL Would Pad’s house-to-house service at Ephesus illustrate that?
JT Very good. I remember a brother, whom I met many years ago, who had known Mr. Darby in his labours in Canada. This brother met Mr. Darby in the streets of Toronto as he was visiting the saints from house to house, for it was a peculiar feature of his service. There was also a brother in that area who was known for his writings, eventually erroneous writings, but he failed to visit the saints. He was given over to using numbers in the exposition of Scripture, basing everything on numbers, and the comment of Mr. Darby was that he wished he knew the numbers of the houses of the saints.
FJF We would know each other in assembling together if that took place?
JT You are alluding to Acts 1, I suppose, and Acts 20. In Acts 1, it is said that the Lord assembled with the apostles, and in Acts 20:7, Luke says, “we being assembled to break bread”. It is a love chapter in the book of Acts, and it is said that certain brothers from different parts of the field, in which Paul had worked had accompanied him. When they were assembled the apostle discoursed for a long time, till midnight, and then Luke says, that Eutychus, sitting at the window opening, fell and was taken up for dead. All this points to the labours of God’s servants, and how varied their circumstances may be, and the services rendered, at any given time, especially in adversity.
[p. 276] Ques Would the object of such visitations be to bring the level of the generality of the saints to the servant’s own outlook?
JT Well, I suppose so. Seven brothers accompanied the apostle, and evidently with interest in his labours and thinking to help in their results if possible, especially to keep the doctrine right among the saints. The first one mentioned was a Berean, whose exercise would be that there should be no novelties given out in ministry, that the Scriptures should be the test of everything.
Rem It says in Acts 17, that they searched the Scriptures, to see if these things were so, “Therefore many from among them believed”. Acts 17:12. Believing was connected with the Scriptures and not necessarily with the word of Paul. As an example, I was thinking of the question of the Lord’s Person. Certain brethren took the past ministry and the present and said there was some discrepancy, and while they were speaking on these lines the Scriptures were not opened. There is a tendency at times not to go to the Scriptures to confirm the ministry that is presented.
JT Therefore the work of the Berean is needed. So here in Ephesians 1:13,14 “in whom also, having believed, [p. 285] ye have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the earnest of our inheritance to the redemption of the acquired possession to the praise of his glory”. Having believed, the sealing followed, but not automatically, but it followed the believing.
AJG Would you say a word as to what is involved in “the faith in the Lord Jesus which is in you”, Ephesians 1:15?
JT Evidently it is a comment on the state of the Ephesians; they are spoken of, not only in the Acts, but in Revelation 2, by the Lord, as having tried those that were apostles, but were not, and they found them liars. The allusion to “the faith in the Lord Jesus” Ephesians 1:15, which was in them, would imply, I suppose, that the work of God progressed in them, progressed in the sense of [p. 277] the place of the Lord Jesus with them. The Lord is emphasised in the work at Ephesus more than God, both here and in the Acts.
AJG It is one of two features marking the Ephesians which the apostle specially brings forward, as the basis of his prayer for them, and I suppose faith in the Lord Jesus would involve faith of a somewhat developed character.
JT Something in the sense of a personal touch in the Lord Jesus. The words of the Lord Jesus also are mentioned in Acts 20.
JHT Why were the twelve men at Ephesus said to be “baptised to the name of the Lord Jesus”. Acts 19:5 In Acts 10:48 Peter baptised “in the name of the Lord”?
JT Whereas in Matthew 28:19 the baptism is “to the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”. The two references that you make would have in mind the personal touches to the souls of the persons baptised. In Acts 10:44 as Peter spoke the word, it is recorded, “the Holy Spirit fell upon all those who were hearing the word”. They were hearing while he was preaching, and the Spirit acted Himself evidently with personal feeling towards the persons involved, because it was the incoming of the gentiles, and in this the Spirit evidently took peculiar interest. I think it is right to say that divine Persons take peculiar interest in some matters, and I believe it was seen there in the incoming of the gentiles. The baptism carried that thought, I think.
SMcC Do you have in mind in relation to this personal interest and contact between the one who serves and the saints, that the fulness of Paul’s ministry is to be entered upon not merely through an academical ministry, but through ministry allied with this contact amongst the saints, affecting them by what the minister is himself?
JT Well, and how he followed up the work through personal interest, because it is not simply said that they had faith, but that he had heard of it,
“wherefore I also, having heard of the faith in the Lord Jesus which is in you, and the love which ye have towards all the saints, do not cease giving thanks for you, making mention of you at my prayers”. Ephesians 1:15,16. All these remarks involve personal interest, and as you say, it is not simply academical work through words and preachings, and what we may call platform work, but as already remarked house-to-house work, visiting the saints, seeking them out, seeking to find out where they are in their souls, so that they should be grounded in the truth, and that love might be operative there.
Ques The particular place the Lord Jesus has would be apprehended, and as a result there would be fixity in the souls of the saints. Is this not so when things are connected with the Lord Jesus?
JT And especially when the souls of the saints are set on the Lord Jesus and on the great glory of His person as implied in these verses. The wording is really wonderful as to the Lord personally; it is said, that he is set down “at his right hand in the heavenlies, above every principality, and authority, and power, and dominion, and every name named”. Ephesians 1:20,21. What a complete eclipsing of all mere names, and how wholesome it is in us who do seek to serve the Lord and His people when we are ready to disappear that He may be glorified.
TH In Acts 20:35 Paul reminds them of the words of the Lord Jesus and says “I have shewed you all things”. Would that be relative to visiting and personal contact?
JT And giving too; “It is more blessed to give than to receive”; Acts 20:35; that was the word, I would judge it was possibly a phrase that the blessed Lord often used. It was what He Himself said, which is very touching.
WD Is the completeness seen in Acts 20, in the references to the activity or selection of the Spirit, verse 28; the counsel of God, verse 27; and the words of the Lord Jesus, verse 35? He brings in all three of the divine [p. 279] Persons.
JT Well, it was a real finishing point, because they were not to see his face again; it was an epoch in a sense, and affected the saints profoundly, and you wonder whether there is any such love current now as that, especially what is implied in the reference to seeing his face no more, and the personal touches between them.
Rem That surely exists now.
JT Well, I would say it does, but it seems as if it might be accentuated. Of course we do not embrace each other as they used to, and as they still do on the Continent, but anyway the shaking of hand might be more real, and the manifestation of personal interest in each other.
JTJr Paul went up to make the acquaintance of Peter.
JT Quite so, there was a personal matter in it, too. He went up for that purpose, not merely to see Jerusalem, or to see the brethren even, but to see Peter, and he spent fifteen days with him, showing how personal the visit was.
SMcC Do you not think that especially in regard to those that are ministering, there should be those blessed relationships between us in view of the saints being affected rightly.
JT Quite so. So that our intercourse between meetings and between services, should take on a more elevated character, a more profitable character. We have in this very epistle an allusion to that; it is said in Ephesians 5:17 - 21, “For this reason be not foolish, but understanding what is the will of the Lord. And be not drunk with wine, in which is debauchery; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and chanting with your heart to the Lord; giving thanks at all times for all things to him who is God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ”.
[p. 280] And in verses Ephesians 5:3 - 6 of the chapter we are told what things do not become saints, “but rather thanksgiving”. I allude to these matters in a practical way that our intercourse between ministry should be maintained at an exalted level; as also our relations with each other, brothers and sisters, in our houses as well as in the meetings.
ECM The apostle brings Timothy forward on the line you are suggesting; he says of him, “I have no one like-minded who will care with genuine feeling how ye get on”. Philippians 2:20.
JT Well, it is thought well that these remarks should be made to complete the instruction of chapter 1, and then to go on to chapter 2 which alludes to the subjective side as over against the objective in chapter 1. It refers to subjective power of the truth, and again we have you in the first verse.
LPM You made a remark earlier as to the second chapter being love in the presence of adversity. Is it in your mind to pursue that?
JT Quite so, to show that love is seen in the second chapter in the presence of opposition, whereas in the first chapter it is in its own home, love is at home as it were, and there the counsels of God are unfolded, and all the secret glories that are involved. But now we are dealing with the thoughts of love in adversity, in opposition. And so it is said, “You, being dead in your offences and sins — in which ye once walked according to the age of this world, according to the ruler of the authority of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, among whom we also all once had our conversation in the lusts of our flesh, doing what the flesh and the thoughts willed to do, and were children by nature, of wrath, even as the rest”. Ephesians 2:1 - 3. So it is the “great love” (of God) “wherewith he loved us”; Ephesians 2:4; but it is in adversity, in circumstances of opposition; spiritual wickedness in high places in [p. 281] opposition.
PL It is so to say, love’s dip into time, and its triumph there that is emphasised.
JT Quite so. God had come down into time, and into the world in all its characteristics to quicken men, not simply to save them, although salvation is in mind, but here in Ephesians it is a question of quickening, that God would bring us into life in the midst of all that.
Ques Would Joseph going to seek his brethren be love working in opposition with a view to life being brought in later?
JT Very good; it had a long way to go, but it went; when we come to Genesis 45 we find how love triumphed in Joseph, how he embraced his brethren.
PHH When it says, “has quickened us with the Christ”, Ephesians 2:5, are we holding in our minds the great things which are said about Christ, at the end of chapter 1? Thus is His person greatly magnified in our minds?
JT You are connecting the great things said of the Lord at the end of chapter 1, with God having quickened us with the Christ?
PHH Does that serve to magnify the work of God in quickening us with Him?
JT The work of quickening is stressed here. Our being saved is spoken of, but it is the fact that is referred to as is pointed out in the footnote, not the means of salvation, so that salvation is a finished matter here. But quickening is a further thought, and a greater thought really, because we are associated with Christ in it. We are quickened with Him, and it is because of the great love of God. Ephesians 2:4 - 6 reads “but God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love wherewith he loved us (we too being dead in offences) has quickened us with the Christ, (ye are saved by grace), and has raised us up together, and has made us sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus”. We are dealing with great things, not simply with gospel results, although they are touched on, but referred to in the fact of salvation and [p. 282] stating that it is a fixed matter, but quickening going with it links the whole position up with greater heights, and therefore we have a further thought, “that he might display in the coming ages the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus”. Ephesians 2:7. We are lifted out of all the degradation that sin involved, and the wickedness in heavenly places; we are lifted out of the whole realm of the effects of sin, not only into the realm of life but into the heavenlies. It is presented to us now as if God would stress in our minds the greatness of what we are in now, in view of our translation; we are already in the heavenlies.
AJG Does quickening with the Christ involve power in us to take up this position already?
JT Well, that is what I think. We are in the presence of the greatest things in the sense of life; we are raised up together and made to sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, and with a view to the full display in the future.
RB Is the full thought of quickening seen in Ezekiel 37:14, “I will put my Spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I will place you in your own land”?
JT That, of course, is the raising up of Israel. What we are dealing with is an assembly matter. What Ezekiel refers to is a national matter, Israel raised up to life in a national sense.
FJF Do we realise this quickening power in coming together in assembly?
JT Well, that is what I thought. It becomes very practical and blessed in our services in the assembly and the service of God must come up in our minds in all these allusions; it is not simply doctrine, but practical. The practicalness of it in the service of God, would come into evidence after we are in full line with the Spirit in the procedure of the service of God proceeding from glory to glory. It is to enable us to take our place in the heavenlies in the faith of our souls, as it is said in Colossians 2:12, “ye have been also raised with him through faith of the working of God who raised him from among the dead”. It is a question of faith there, raised by faith; that is, faith laying hold of the operation of God as applicable to us in the power of the Spirit at the present time in the service of God.
Ques Would the idea of sitting down, “being made to sit down”, induce the spirit of restfulness?
JT Well, the sitting down would mean that, what we may arrive at in assembly service in the power of the Spirit. We often speak of the glory, the glories that enter into the service of God, and it is really from glory to glory, and the sitting down would imply that we are restful in the light of the position, as completely free from what may be current outside.
EuR That you in the first verse would refer to the saints at Ephesus. He wanted them to leave all sense of locality and arrive at the great thoughts of God for the saints universally?
JT And so in our assembly gatherings we are to rise to the full assembly position in the universal sense. We begin with the local position, but we reach full assembly position, it depends on faith, on the one hand, and the Spirit on the other, because the faith of the operation of God is not simply a matter of light, but of power.
Ques Would that involve state in the saints?
JT Well, it would.
PL So that in spirit we are not thinking of the earth although there physically?
JT Well, we are thinking of where we are in heavenly places, if we have power for it. We have to keep that in mind, that He has made us to sit down in heavenly places.
Ques The apostle has asked in his prayer in chapter 1, “that ye should know”, “the surpassing greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of the might of his strength, in which he wrought in the Christ in raising him from among the dead”. Ephesians 1:18 - 20.
[p. 284] Is this quickening power the power that is to be realised in chapter 2?
JT Well, it would be, in the measure in which it can be said, in this provisional time. What we are speaking of now in chapter 2 is not literal resurrection, but power already realised because of the fact of the Spirit’s presence, the power that lies there. It is a question of the faith we have, and the power we have reached in our souls. It is not literal resurrection, we take the ground of being raised anticipatively, for we are not yet literally in heavenly places.
WD Would this feature “together” be important in view of translation?
JT It is. We love one another now; that is really what is meant, we would move up together; we have no other thought than being with the brethren. If we are to be in heaven we want to be with them there.
Ques Is that shown by the way Paul, in speaking of them says, “we are his workmanship”, Ephesians 2:10, including himself with them?
JT Quite so.
EuR In the faith of our souls do we take up the position of the twelve stones reared up on the land side of the Jordan. It is our association in life.
JT That is what is meant. If we have not the Spirit here, that must fall to the ground, for all this side of the truth involves the Spirit, because we are still in a provisional position, and it is dependent on the Holy Spirit, not simply light, but the Spirit.
Ques Would that be the working out of “the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the earnest of our inheritance”? Ephesians 1:13,14.
JT Just so, and it is very beautiful that it is so presented in 2 Corinthians. “Now he that” “has anointed us, is God, who also has sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts”. 2 Corinthians 1:21,22. That is alluded to in the first chapter.
“Ye have been sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the earnest of our inheritance to the redemption of the acquired possession to the praise of his glory”. Ephesians 1:13,14.
PHH “We are his workmanship”. Ephesians 2:10. Does that mean that we are equal to the heavenly position?
JT I would say that. God is able to present us faultless in the presence of His glory. He is able to do that, “The power which works in us”, Ephesians 3:20, implies that too.
FJF Would there be anything analogous to what you were saying this morning with regard to Paul being caught up, in this of which we are now speaking?
JT Only that he was literally raised up, as far as the third heaven and into paradise.
SMcC “Having been created in Christ Jesus”, Ephesians 2:10; does that allude to what is abstract, or actual now?
JT I think that is more than abstract. The thing had taken place, because it is in view of good works that we should walk in. Of course, that will look forward to the future, but evidently it has a bearing now. It is the character of the thing that is in mind, that there is such a thing as being created now, we know we have part in new creation. “If any one be in Christ, there is a new creation”, 2 Corinthians 5:17, but that implies that someone has part in it, and hence the significance of what Paul says there, “if even we have known Christ according to flesh, yet now we know him thus no longer”, 2 Corinthians 5:16. Already we have come into new creation, we do not know even Christ as He used to be. New creation implies that we have in some sense come into things, because it is a real thing already; there is, of course, a fulness that we have not come in to, because we are not yet literally raised, but there is something, the new creation is already existent, or there would be no christianity.
Ques Is it what we speak of as formation in the souls of the saints?
JT Yes, exactly.
PH [p. 286] H. The whole of the future being anticipated by the fact of new creation having taken place.
JT New creation has taken place. Quite so.
Ques Would the “good works” show that the work of God in new creation is clearly identifiable now?
JT Quite so. It would be a poor thing if we could not say that. There would be really no christianity if there was no new creation.
WSS “If anyone be in Christ, there is a new creation”. 2 Corinthians 5:17.
JT That is a definite statement, not simply that he is a new creation, but there is such a thing. The inference in the context is that the believer is a new creation already.
JHT In Revelation 2, do first love and first works go together. The Lord recalls Ephesus to the first works, does He not?
JT Well, the Lord brings forward the first works, but he does not ask, or suggest that they are to return to first love. There is a tangibleness in first works, but as to first love, the Lord says, “thou hast left thy first love”, Revelation 2:4, He does not say that she should return to first love.
JTS We are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. If the saints are walking in love, “even as the Christ loved us”, Ephesians 5:2, the features of Christ thus coming into evidence in the saints, would that be an evidence of divine workmanship?
JT I should think so, absolutely. Love is the thing, it never fails in all these matters. It becomes the practical expression of God’s working.
AHG Would you say more as to good works? Works seem to be very important here, and elsewhere.
JT Well, we have a very tangible thought here; they are “good works, which God has before prepared, that we should walk in them”. Ephesians 2:10. I am just wondering whether the preparation was not in Christ, in His walk, without there being a direct allusion [p. 287] to it.
AJG Would it link at all with “all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach”? Acts 1:1.
JT Just so; very good. That would be the standard of works.
Ques Paul in writing to the Philippians refers to those things that had been seen in himself and then he says, “these things do”. Philippians 4:9. We are to meditate on certain things, but then he says, Do them. Have you that in mind?
JT Quite so. The exhortations of Paul are practical, and they make the thing real. We are in realistic times as to the working of evil, and God is looking for realistic features of the truth, and so the reference in Acts 1:1, to “all things which Jesus began both to do and to teach”; both to do and to teach. John’s gospel is full of allusions to teaching, and the teaching in Acts 1, according to Luke, is linked up with what the Lord did. If we were to look through Luke to see what the Lord did in ordinary matters, and how much He did in works of grace, the Lord’s gracious works and services, and then the teaching of the Lord going with the works, how great the instruction. In the early chapters of the Acts we learn that the converts “persevered in the teaching and fellowship, of the apostles, in breaking of bread and prayers”. Acts 2:42 These are practical things in christianity.
PL So that Luke treats of the Lord journeying and teaching, the good Samaritan and His good works as He journeyed.
JT “I must needs announce the glad tidings of the kingdom of God to other cities also”, Luke 4:43, the Lord says, showing how persistent He was in working.
HWO Are good works the normal acts of one who has part in new creation?
JT Well, we have to go by what we have here, the good works are said to be prepared that we should walk in them. They are not simply things that we may do in meeting need and the like, but it seems as if God has a standard in the idea of good works. They are already [p. 288] prepared, and I believe that they allude to what the Lord Jesus did.
WSS Are they not presented to us as something positive with which we are to be occupied? The statements here would greatly help us, as we allow our minds to dwell upon them.
JT Yes. Now to come down to verse 11, to get the full bearing of the chapter; we have already alluded to the subjective feature as over against the first chapter, so that he says, “Wherefore remember that ye” (meaning ourselves — the gentiles), “once nations in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision by that called circumcision in the flesh done with the hand; that ye were at that time without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world: but now in Christ Jesus ye who once were afar off are become nigh by the blood of the Christ. For he is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of enclosure, having annulled the enmity in his flesh, the law of commandments in ordinances, that he might form the two in himself into one new man, making peace; and might reconcile both in one body to God by the cross, having by it slain the enmity; and, coming, he has preached the glad tidings of peace to you who were afar off, and the glad tidings of peace to those who were nigh”. Ephesians 2:11 - 17. This section implies, bringing it down to ourselves, that enmity and what results from it; and personal enmity and dislike, are all met and overthrown in what we get in this chapter, and that one body takes the place; that is, two are made one, the two elements formed into one on the basis of redemption and by the subjective work of the Spirit here now on earth. It is applied to the gentiles, and so it runs on in Ephesians 2:18 - 22, “For through him we have both access by one Spirit to the Father. So then ye are no longer strangers and foreigners, but ye are fellow-citizens of the saints, and [p. 289] of the household of God, being built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the corner-stone, in whom all the building fitted together increases to a holy temple in the Lord; in whom ye also are built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit”. These are the results among the gentiles. The Jew and gentile first formed into one new man, so making peace, showing how thorough the work is, that we get in this epistle.
JGM What are the covenants of promise spoken of here?
JT I would say those made to Abraham, particularly those made to the patriarchs in Genesis. There may be later promises, but I would think the allusion is to Genesis. There are no covenants made with us directly as members of the assembly. The new covenant was never made with us. It was made with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, and will have place later. Its place in the Lord’s supper is in the sense of the spirit of it. If we enter into the spirit of it, in some sense, we have some little enjoyment of it.
Ques Is what Paul outlines here illustrated in the book of Ruth? She was a Moabitess, and not entitled to come into the congregation of Israel even to the tenth generation, but on the ground of grace she is brought into union with the man of wealth.
JT All he says here as regards that point is that, “ye were at that time without Christ, aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world”. Ephesians 2:12. He does not imply that even now, through grace, we have a part in the commonwealth of Israel, or the covenants of promise. This epistle means that we are lifted far above all these things, that we have greater things.
Ques Is the christian level, “For through him we have both access by one Spirit to the Father”? Ephesians 2:[p. 290] 18.
JT Quite so. The covenants of promise did not come up to that at all, although the apostle makes a point of it that they were strangers to them, but then he is showing that they have come into greater things.
FJF Do they not disappear with the man to whom they were presented being judged, and disappearing in the death of Christ?
JT Well, every promise of God is, yea and amen, in Christ. We must recognise that nothing has failed, but we are lifted above all these things which pertain specially to Israel, although they are coming into their own promises presently.
WSS What have you in mind in speaking of what is positive here? Is it what comes out in these closing verses, that we have access, and are fellow-citizens, and are built together, there is that which is positive to be engaged with. We are greatly established and strengthened if we dwell upon what is stated positively.
JT Quite so. And moreover, the chapter runs on to the fact that the gentiles are now already themselves built up for a habitation of God by the Spirit, and we ourselves, gentiles, are come into that, far beyond the covenants of promise, and moreover, the assembly grows to a holy temple in the Lord.
SMcC It is striking, that while the whole chapter is speaking of God, verse 18 should be introduced referring to the Father. Would the present economy and what is peculiar to it, be particularly in mind in that?
JT No doubt. We constantly refer to these verses. “For through him” (Christ) “we have both access by one Spirit to the Father”. Ephesians 2:18. It is, you might say, our great charter in the service of God at the present time. It is a present matter.
EuR What is the difference in thought between that and what we have in Ephesians 2:13, “in Christ Jesus ye who once were afar off are become nigh by the blood of Christ”?
JT Well, made nigh by blood, of course, would allude to what we find in the gospel. The blood of Christ is presented in the gospel, and by it we are made nigh to God, but the drawing nigh by the Spirit is more positive, involving life and affection.
HC We are outside the range of the covenants of promise, but we are not outside the range of the Holy Spirit of promise.
JT Well, that is good.
Ques Would you say a word on “form the two in himself into one new man”. Ephesians 2:15. Does that bring out the entirely spiritual character of the workmanship?
JT Well, I think it brings out too the power of Christ’s influence; what it can do in overcoming the terrible feelings. The terrible feelings in the Jews, and the gentiles, as adverse one to the other, but the Lord Jesus has come in and exercises His powerful influence to bring them together in affection.
LPM Is chapter 2 one of the great triumphs of love in that setting? Does that express the great triumph of love in the presence of adversity, bringing things together in this way.
JT Just so; it is a triumph of love in adverse conditions, mounting up to the work of the devil in the heavenlies; we have to contend with that. It is an awful thing, but we have to contend with it, and it is becoming accentuated now in the terrible doctrines that are current.
PHH What is the force of the expression, “increases to a holy temple in the Lord”? Ephesians 2:21.
JT I understand it to be what the assembly will be presently. It is already a temple according to 1 Corinthians 3:16, in virtue of the presence of the Spirit of God. “Do ye not know that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you”? Whereas in this chapter, it is growing to that, and I believe it alludes to what the assembly would become in clarifying the millennial conditions. They will not be as clear as things are to us [p. 292] now, but they will be clarified, I believe, by the assembly.
HC Had Paul in mind the maintenance of love and the truth on a right level, in adverse conditions, when he said to Timothy, “I begged thee to remain in Ephesus”. 1 Timothy 1:3.
JT Just so, likewise the situation at Crete, that Titus had to do with. It was a difficult matter, but he stayed there; the apostle left him there to put things right.
MHT Would love in the two settings in which you have referred to it; that is, in its home, and then in adversity, be seen in the invocation to the ark, in Numbers 10:35, when it moved forward? Moses said “Rise up, Jehovah, and let thine enemies be scattered; and let them that hate thee flee before thy face”, and when it rested Moses said “Return, Jehovah, unto the myriads of the thousands of Israel”. Numbers 10:36.
JT A beautiful thought, especially in its relation to Moses’ wish that Hobab should go with them, to show them the way, to be eyes to them. Instead of that the ark itself acted for Israel; it went out of its place to search out a resting-place for them, taking three days’ journey, involving really as a type, the death of the Lord Jesus.