THOSE WHO RECEIVE THE SPIRIT

^[p. 410] THOSE WHO RECEIVE THE SPIRIT

Romans 7:22 - 25; Romans 8:1 - 9; 2 Kings 4:1 - 7

JT The object in mind in these proposals is to bring out the truth of the Spirit, as the Lord may help us, and to indicate who is to receive Him. It is thought that Romans 7 is intended to identify those who are to receive the Spirit, and so the passage in 2 Kings is read, because it is thought that the vessels to be filled represent believers; that they are to be identified, and the identification should be not simply a verbal confession of having received the Spirit, but some moral indications that the persons have come through the process indicated in Romans 7. It is the day of the Spirit, in that Jesus is glorified. The Holy Spirit is here to be received, but clearly the persons must be morally identifiable, and especially by themselves. So the reference at the end of Romans 7 is to one who can speak of himself as delighting in the law of God after the inward man; he speaks of the feelings of wretchedness, and of thanksgiving to God, as indicating relief inwardly. There is emphatic allusion to the person, myself; the person’s own identification as coming through the process indicated in that chapter, so that chapter 8 comes in as meeting the position.

ETS Does chapter 7 make the empty vessel?

JT Exactly. That is just what is in my mind. There must be something in the relief, as it comes into the person, which causes thanksgiving and then the resolve as to himself. “So then I myself with the mind serve God’s law; but with the flesh sin’s law”. Romans 7:25. There is a great deal of uncertainty and darkness, as to the reception of the Spirit, and what marks His presence, but it seems as if there should be some indication as to persons who have not the Spirit, and what they have to reach in their souls to qualify them for the gift of the Spirit which is God’s prerogative. It is not simply an automatic action of God, it is a prerogative, involving gift from God, involving love too.

HJS The person receiving the Holy Spirit would be marked by thankfulness as against wretchedness.

JT Just so. A clear, cheerful countenance instead of a wretched one. It indicates what is proceeding inwardly; in “the inward man” Romans 7:22, as he is spoken of here.

CG “Making his face shine with oil”. Psalm 104:15 Is that the visible, outward evidence of it, thus confirming what is inward?

JT Quite so; that fits in well. It is the dispensation of the Spirit. The Spirit of God says, in John 7:39, when Jesus was here on earth, that “the Spirit was not yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified”. The Lord would open up to us the truth as to the Holy Spirit, in view of the fact that it is the Spirit’s day, it is His dispensation, in a way, and He characterises it, which would mean that He characterises what is here of God, making it suitable for heaven; that is to say, the translation of the saints to heaven, implies that the Spirit’s work is done in this dispensation.

In the order of the truth, Romans 5 in an objective sense runs along with chapter 8 which is subjective, as we call it and finishes the matter. Chapter 5 is the objective side, in answer to the gospel. Chapter 8 contemplates what chapter 7 suggests to us, agreeing with what was said as to Abraham, “a horror, a great darkness, fell upon him”. Genesis 15:12. He wanted to know how God would answer his exercises and the needs of his soul, because he had no son. God said that Eliezer of Damascus should not be his heir, and He directs Abraham to lift up his eyes to the heavens in order to understand what his seed would be, but then Abraham said, “how shall I know”? Genesis 15:8, and I think Romans 7 is to answer that question as to the blessing of God, how it is to be known, what His purposes are, what His promises are. Genesis 15, I believe, answers to what ^[p. 412] we are engaged with now, only that it is more precise and accurate in Romans, and so the identification, as has been remarked, of the person by himself and then by others; his identification resulting from having gone through the process. It is a process that God is not setting aside, and perhaps the fact that this is not accepted by us explains the somewhat dark situation as regards the Holy Spirit.

HJS So the smoking furnace and the flame of fire which passed between those pieces would rather correspond to the gaze being turned from one’s self to Jesus Christ our Lord?

JT I think so. Genesis says, “the sun was just going down”. Genesis 15:12 It was getting dark, and “a horror, a great darkness, fell upon” Abraham. Through this he gets assurance from God, but the assurance is accompanied by the smoking furnace and the fire, meaning that power is available to us. Power will be available in view of Israel’s position in the future, but it is available to us now, and the power is the Holy Spirit, of course, as in Romans 8. The smoking furnace and the flame of fire, would be just an expression of power, irresistible power, really.

HB As we appreciate it, would we be characterised by the power instead of this weakness and wretchedness referred to here?

JT I thought that we might see that, and especially in view of identification; each identifying himself according to what God has wrought in him. These vessels, in 2 Kings, are the persons available for the action of the Spirit, the oil being in mind. There were limitations then, for the oil was stayed, but still there was enough to show what is in mind. The oil is there, and the woman is to trade with it, and pay her debts, meaning that the righteous requirement of the law would be fulfilled in a christian, as having the Holy Spirit. The debt is there, but there is power to fulfil the requirement, because of ^[p. 413] the Spirit, but there is also the idea of trading, that is exercise in making use of the Spirit.

COB Does the man in Romans 7 take his place by the Spirit amongst those in Christ Jesus?

JT I think that is the way the matter stands. Chapter 8 is a sort of conclusion. “There is then now no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus”. Romans 8:1 This is not the man himself speaking; it is the Spirit of God, the spirit of prophecy, really, in the word. We often find ourselves endeavouring to assure people who have faith, that they have the Spirit, or should have it, that the Spirit is available to persons who have faith, and Romans 8 is to assure them.

COB Inverse 2, does he put himself in that place, or recognise that he is put in that place, in the power of the Spirit?

JT It is Paul saying it, of course, but, as often in the Old Testament, we discern that the spirit of prophecy, the spirit of truth, is speaking, and so here, I think. It is the authoritative pronouncement of God for the believer. If it is Paul speaking, well, we can put ourselves alongside him. That is the way I would work the truth out.

HJS It is stated specifically in Romans 8:9. “Ye are not in flesh but in Spirit, if indeed God’s Spirit dwell in you”.

JT That is the idea, but then the hypothesis is “if indeed God’s Spirit dwell in you”, Romans 8:9, and the person ought to be able to identify himself as to this. If anyone have not God’s Spirit, well, that is most serious. “If any one has not the Spirit of Christ he is not of him”, Romans 8:9, and that clarifies much.

HW What have you in mind as to the process to which you have referred once or twice?

JT The well-known chapter 7. I have heard that Mr. Darby used to say that in his day the brethren would always come to the truth of Romans 7 at every Bible reading. In those days the brethren were more concerned about it than they are now. We are more concerned about the Lord’s supper and other features of the truth, and, of course, they are valuable too, but we are not touching Romans 7 as much perhaps as we should.

HB Is the lack of understanding of this the cause of a good deal of lack of liberty?

JT I think that is right. I think people go on what they hear at Bible readings; that, of course, is very good if they get a right understanding. It is not, however, a process by which we are able to identify ourselves as having the Spirit. I am using the word identify ourselves as expressing what is needed. Later on others should identify us, but we should begin ourselves with the identification that we have the Spirit. “If any one has not the Spirit of Christ”, it says here, “he is not of him”; Romans 8:9; he is not of Christ. It is most important that we should know ourselves.

Ques Was Nicodemus one who was going through a similar process?

JT Well, I think what he needed was instruction. The beginning of the chapter would show that he was really born again, but needed instruction, and the Lord gives him instruction. He furnishes what Nicodemus needed, although he was a poor learner because he stayed in the council, but the Lord takes on poor learners, and makes the most of them. Nathanael was a quick learner, but the Lord is patient with learners, if they are learners at all, and we should be with each other. At the same time there ought to be some authoritative sense as to matters, as to what is what.

AM It says in verses 4 and 5 of chapter 8, “they that are according to Spirit”. Romans 8:5. Is that the thought of the identity? I was trying to gather your thought as to identifying one’s self; verses 4 and 5 speak of those who walk and who are “according to the Spirit”. Romans 8:9. Is that the idea?

JT Well, quite. “What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, having sent his own ^[p. 415] Son, in likeness of flesh of sin, and for sin, has condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law should be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to flesh but according to Spirit”. Romans 8:3,4. You mean that “according to Spirit” Romans 8:4,5 is the thing we need to understand? Firstly as to identification; there is what is going on inwardly in a negative sense, and yet there is what is positive, but without the Spirit. Much is effected and intended to be effected before the Spirit actually begins His formative work in us. The work that brings about our being, as born again, is immediate and sovereign. It is one stroke, but the actual formation that is necessary to go with it has to be considered, and the Lord is instructing us. He instructed Nicodemus as to that, and said to him, “Except any one be born anew he cannot see the kingdom of God”. John 3:3. That is a real challenge to us, as to what we see, or do not see and then the Lord proceeds to say “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God”. John 3:5. And then He says further, “The wind blows where it will, and thou hearest it’s voice, but knowest not whence it comes and where it goes: thus is every one that is born of the Spirit”. John 3:8. We are now at the basic position of a person, covered in the word “I myself”. That is what happens, and each is to understand and to seek out, whether he is in that, whether he has any real knowledge of it, and is not simply depending on terms that he hears.

Ques Is this process chiefly confined to the mind?

JT I think it is “with the mind”, Romans 7:25, because the mind is the faculty that clarifies things. The Lord brings up the question of the mind in speaking to Paul about the Supper. He said it is for a ‘calling of me to mind’. It is more a mind matter than anything else at the time, when the bread is broken. So again, Paul says, “We have the mind of Christ”, 1 Corinthians 2:16, that is, christians characteristically ^[p. 416] have it.

JHM Would you say there is a formative work of God in the person before the Spirit is received? I was thinking of the man being able to say, “I delight in the law of God”. Romans 7:22.

JT There is, and we have to link on what we are saying now with the Lord’s own instruction to Nicodemus in John 3. He immediately brings in the idea of new birth, being born, as it were, from top to bottom. The Lord means that the idea of new birth must pervade the whole man; it is an initial idea, but it is a formation. The whole dispensation is taken up with what the Spirit of God effects in persons, in a formative sense.

CG The man can say “I myself” serve the law of God. Would that be an evidence that the Spirit had been received at that point?

JT I would not say it was. I think much is made in the Scriptures of what is effected before the Spirit comes. The Lord had the Spirit in mind when He went to heaven; He told the disciples much, saying that the Spirit, the promise of the Father, would come, and yet He was in heaven for some days before the Spirit came, and He was on earth as risen, before He went to heaven, for forty days. There was a purpose in that, a necessity for it; something had to be done, not that the Lord had neglected anything in His service, but the condition of the disciples required further attention, before the Spirit should come in, and I think that is a thing to be thought over. The forty days, the difference between the end of Luke’s gospel and the beginning of Acts has to be considered, and how long it was, and what was the reason for it. Referring to our scripture, I think it would be safer to say that the process is still on until we come to chapter 8. He says, “I myself with the mind serve God’s law”, Romans 7:25, but he does not say with the Spirit, because the time for that has not come.

GCS Would these be the exercises of faith which precede ^[p. 417] the Spirit?

JT They would; faith has taken hold, so to speak. The chapter contemplates faith; in fact, there is an overlapping between Romans 5 and Romans 8. The process from the end of the fifth to the eighth chapters is the one that has to be understood, and I am afraid it is evaded to a large extent.

JHM In Galatians it says, “because ye are sons, God has sent out the Spirit of his Son”. Galatians 4:6.

JT Well, that would bear on what we are saying. Galatians 3:26 says, “ye are all God’s sons by faith in Christ Jesus”. It used to be said that it is a faith matter, not a Spirit matter. It is said in verse 25, “faith having come”. There was a time when faith had not come, not indeed that it was not there, for it was there from the outset, in Abel and so on, but the period of it had not come. There was a period in which the people of God were kept in the state of childhood; “the period fixed by the father”, Galatians 4:2. I am speaking in a figurative sense. The house had compartments, we might say; the nursery and the drawing-room, but the nursery is the place of children, and Galatians contemplates that that has ceased, that the nursery has ceased; that we are all sons of God now, on the principle of faith, and because of that the Spirit comes. The basis has been there, so that as soon as the time of faith is reached, then it is the time of sonship, but then the process inwardly has to be gone through by each one; that, perhaps, is where the difficulty lies with many of us. The “period fixed by the father” Galatians 4:2 is finished, and the time of faith is reached; “faith having come” refers, I would say, to the time when the Lord Jesus went up to heaven, “and a cloud received him out of their sight”; Acts 1:9; not that faith was not there before, but the faith period began then. Everything was to be apprehended now on the principle of faith, and therefore “ye are all God’s Sons by faith in Christ Jesus”. Galatians 3:26. The Holy Spirit comes in because you are that; “because ye are sons, God has sent out the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father”. Galatians 4:6.

^[p. 418] It is an affectionate matter, but the mind is more a faith matter.

GCS Would the order be, new birth, faith, and then the Spirit?

JT But we must not forget the great fact of redemption, involving so much, and the Lord’s resurrection and His ascension. There are the forty days before His ascension and ten days after, before the Spirit came; and then the time that ensued before Paul came, before the completion of the word of God. We are coming to the fulness of the results now, only perhaps we have to go through things more, but the time of Paul is the point; the final thing is in Paul. He completed the word of God.

COB Do the empty vessels ready for borrowing indicate a work of God before they are filled?

JT Just so. They were empty, but let us remember they were sons, it is the woman’s sons, they were first called her children, “the creditor is come to take my two children to be bondmen”. 2 Kings 4:1. And then in verse 4, the prophet says, “shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons”. 2 Kings 4:4. I think where you get that term there is more light, more liberty. We are coming into daylight, so to speak, so that the vessels are there, and they were to get all they could.

HJS Before that she had said, “Thy handmaid has not anything at all in the house”. 2 Kings 4:2.

JT Quite, “but a pot of oil”; 2 Kings 4:2; which would mean the Spirit is here in some sense.

JHM Do I understand that Galatians speaks rather of the difference between the two periods, and does not so much affirm things about individuals?

JT I think that is the truth, it speaks of the faith period. The Lord said, in Simon’s house, that the two debtors having “nothing to pay, he forgave both of them”. Luke 7:42. Forgiveness was there; it was the period of forgiveness involving faith; forgiveness runs with faith. It was true there in Simon’s house, and the forgiving period ^[p. 419] was frank and open, but only one got forgiveness, and that one was the woman who had certain other qualities. We may look at it in Luke 7:44. “Turning to the woman he said to Simon, Seest thou this woman”? The Lord turned to the woman meaning that she was in His mind, He was making everything of her, but He was speaking to Simon. He says then to Simon, “I entered into thy house; thou gayest me not water on my feet, but she”, (emphatic), “has washed my feet with tears”. Luke 7:44. These are qualities that run along with the reception of the Holy Spirit, and indicate that the process has been gone through. “She has washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with her hair. Thou gavest me not a kiss, but she from the time I came in has not ceased kissing my feet. My head with oil thou didst not anoint, but she has anointed my feet with myrrh. For which cause I say to thee, her many sins are forgiven”. Luke 7:44 - 46 The Lord is speaking about forgiveness based on love, the real thing, which involves the dispensation. It is a love time; as well as the time of the Spirit and the time of faith, it is the time of love, and so this woman had love, but then she had also faith, and so the word is, “she loved much; but he to whom little is forgiven loves little”. Luke 7:47. That, of course, will explain a lot, where there is no love, or little love. He had been speaking to Simon, but now He said to her, “Thy sins are forgiven”. Luke 7:48. And then the others say something; “they that were with them at table began to say within themselves, Who is this who forgives also sins? And he said to the woman, Thy faith has saved thee; go in peace”. Luke 7:49,50. She was the one that had the faith, not Simon. And that enters into what we are saying as to how we come to identify ourselves, each one of us, as qualified for the Holy Spirit.

HJS If faith is basic it underlies even the love, does it not?

JT It does. So the woman in Kings was a widow, her husband had died and she was in debt, but the prophetic ^[p. 420] word is what meets it, and that is why I was thinking of the importance of the prophetic word, whether we see it in the Old Testament or whether we get the spirit of it in this passage. The word of prophecy is authoritative; this is seen especially in the epistle to the Corinthians, where the prophetic word is so stressed.

ETS Are we likely to get the prophetic word if we realise and confess what this woman did, the barrenness and emptiness that attaches to us?

JT I think so. She knows where to go for it anyway, which is important; she is not turning aside to a person who does not know what to tell her. It is said, “A woman of the wives of the sons of the prophets cried to Elisha saying, Thy servant my husband is dead, and thou knowest that thy servant feared Jehovah; and the creditor is come to take my two children to be bondmen. And Elisha said to her, What shall I do for thee? Tell me, what hast thou in the house”? 2 Kings 4:1,2. He wants to know, and she intimates that he does know in a general way about her circumstances. He represents the prophetic word, and we must have Elisha, throughout all these chapters.

Ques Is it a challenge, “What hast thou in the house”? 2 Kings 4:2.

JT Yes, he is very definite about it, which would point to the need of definiteness in ministry. She says, “Thy servant”, “is dead”, and so on, “and Elisha said to her, What shall I do for thee? Tell me, what hast thou in the house? And she said, Thy handmaid has not anything at all in the house but a pot of oil”. 2 Kings 4:2. Well, that is the thing, that was all that was necessary, there is something we can count on in dealing with these matters, if the Spirit is there. Earlier, of course, it is a question of the work of the Spirit, the new birth, but then if the Spirit is here at all to be received, then we can count on the formation, the vessels. The vessels imply information.

Ques What is the force of having the pot of oil ^[p. 421] in the house?

Does it bear upon the character of the dispensation?

JT Yes, but it raises the question whether there is faith in persons, because we must remember that the dispensation is one of faith; the dispensation of God, it is called, which is in faith; that marks it; and then these other things mark it too, and above all, the presence and activity of the Holy Spirit. And so this person is a type of a believer now, one who perhaps has little knowledge of the truth, and hence she is in debt, but she knows where to go, and to whom to speak, and she can tell him what he wants to know. “Tell me”, he says, “what hast thou in the house”? 2 Kings 4:2. It is a question of the person; what he has, or she has, and what can be worked out from it.

FW Is it a question of our recognising that we are vessels for the Spirit?

JT Well, that is the idea. Elijah had brought in these principles. We very often have two persons involved, in certain lines of truth, Peter and John, for instance, Paul and Barnabas, and many others. Here in this section we have Elijah and Elisha, and we will doubtless have noticed that many things that Elisha proposes in his ministry, have their roots in what Elijah had done. Elijah had already had to do with something like this, the woman of Sarepta, for instance. Elijah went there and he found her gathering sticks. Jehovah had said that He had prepared a woman to maintain him. He found her gathering sticks, and he immediately proposes something that brings out that there was a pot of oil, a little meal in a barrel, and “a little oil in a cruse”, 1 Kings 17:12. So that we can see the link between Elijah’s ministry and Elisha’s ministry, and, of course, that ought to help us all, because those of us who are ministering now have had precedents. We have known those who have ministered, better than we do maybe, and we do well to watch them and follow what they do and say, because that runs right down through the dispensation and on to ^[p. 422] the end of it. And so here we have Elisha answering certain questions in a widow woman, and he wants to find out what she has in the house, and she says that she has a pot of oil. In Elijah’s day it was a little oil in a cruse and a little meal in a barrel; that is to say, at least there were vessels, suitable vessels, and if we pursue the truth and work it out, as the Spirit of God has in mind to guide us into all the truth, we shall arrive at this thought. The woman says, “Thy handmaid has not anything at all in the house but a pot of oil”, 2 Kings 4:2. She had very little estimation of it; it was small in her mind, but the prophet says to her, “Go, borrow for thyself” — notice that, “for thyself vessels abroad from all thy neighbours, empty vessels”, 2 Kings 4:3. They are to be empty for the principle in mind is that of a containing vessel, as the woman said, “a pot of oil”, 2 Kings 4:2. We must understand the idea of a vessel. The Lord says of Paul, “he is an elect vessel to me”, Acts 9:15, and each one of us who is ministering is a vessel, or he is nothing, and, of course, every one who has the Spirit is a vessel, or he could not have the Spirit. We are dealing now with what qualifies a vessel for having the Spirit. The prophet says, “Go, borrow for thyself vessels abroad from all thy neighbours, empty vessels; let it not be few; and go in, and shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons” (notice sons) “and pour out into all those vessels, and set aside what is full. And she went from him, and shut the door upon her and upon her sons: they brought the vessels to her, and she poured out. And it came to pass when the vessels were full, that she said to her son, Bring me yet a vessel”, 2 Kings 4:3 - 6, meaning that she would still proceed, “And he said to her, There is not a vessel more. And the oil stayed”, 2 Kings 4:6. So that the idea of a vessel underlies all this, and it is a question, therefore, of qualification.

Ques What is the significance of the sons bringing in the vessels to her?

JT Well, I think to bring in the idea of suitable ^[p. 423] persons acting at any given time. You get it constantly; there are suitable accompaniments, as for instance, in the case of Abigail, she had five damsels. That was only to bring in the feminine idea, to stress it, and so in other matters, this occurs to stress the thing, to make it fuller, to make the thing complete.

FW Were they previously vessels for the flesh, but now empty and ready for the reception of the Spirit?

JT Well, I think that is the idea, and as to the question being raised about qualifications, I would say, that at the end of Romans 7, in what the person says, we have the suggestion that he is ready. “O wretched man that I am”! Romans 7:24, that is negative. “Who shall deliver me out of this body of death”? Romans 7:24. And then he thanks God, meaning that there is something there of a positive nature, referring to God in thanksgiving; meaning that he would be proceeding on the line of the service of God, in liberty. He thanks God, and says “through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then I myself with the mind serve God’s law; but with the flesh sin’s law”. Romans 7:25 I think he is ready. Then from the objective side, as I was saying, Romans 5 may contemplate that he has the Spirit; maybe he has, and maybe he has failed to use it rightly, because he has not gone through the process. But these verses give us the process, and the next chapter gives us the power, just as Abraham realised the power in the smoking furnace and the burning lamp. The power is there.

ACSP Is there a link between the serving of God’s law and the obedience that marks the woman to the word of the prophet?

JT Quite so; the obedience of faith.

PGB Would the woman in John 4 be an illustration of one who went through the process and then becomes a vessel in view of the service of God?

JT I would say that fully. The woman of Samaria, and what she went through to reach the grand result.

^[p. 424] The Lord intimates what the Holy Spirit, the water that He would give, would be to her, it “shall become in him a fountain of water springing up into eternal life”. John 4:14.

AM Have you anything in mind as to life — “live thou and thy sons on the rest”? 2 Kings 4:7.

JT Well, I think the idea is that the Spirit is life, in view of righteousness.

DJM The Spirit here dwells in you. That is a heart matter?

JT I would say so. It is more than what is merely often confessed as the truth, that a certain one has the Spirit. What about the dwelling? Is the Spirit in me, as it were, at home, because that is the idea? Christianity has that in mind, the dwelling, and Romans 8 opens it up basically, that the Spirit is life; that is not what is said elsewhere, “has eternal life” as John enlarges on it, but the Spirit is life. It is a potential thought.

Ques Does what is of the Spirit respond to the prophetic word?

JT Well, I would say that; hence the great thought of ministry. We might say, Why does not God do everything at once? It used to be said by a certain teacher in America that everything was there before, even before redemption, but that is not the truth. We must have redemption; we must have the new birth, and we must have the gift of the Spirit. These things are necessities, and christianity depends on them.

GCS You said earlier that it is as well to go back to Romans 7. Is that to appreciate afresh our deliverance?

JT Well, to go over the ground. Just as we feel it is necessary in our readings to go through the order of the truth. Undoubtedly from the beginning the twelve were appealed to in all matters of truth, and the believers persevered in the apostles’ doctrine. Matters of truth would be in mind in any appeal to the twelve; but then Paul had not come, and even after he had come there were revivals. Paul’s own introduction into the assembly ^[p. 425] had the character of a revival, and so it is that we need to go over things, and the more we do it the better, because we forget. The Spirit is here in patience waiting upon us, and follows up all these meetings, so as to instil us with the truth and form us in it. I believe that is the way the thing stands.

Ques Would the woman going into the house and shutting the door upon herself and upon her sons be suggestive of excluding worldly influences?

JT I think that is the idea of it. It links on with John 20:19, “the doors were shut”, “through fear of the Jews”. That is, to shut out the legal element, because it interferes with the operations of the Spirit; and so the Lord in that chapter affords us a pattern of the whole dispensation. He came to where the disciples were; “Jesus came and stood in the midst”. John 20:19. Luke does not say He came but that “he himself stood in their midst”; Luke 24:36; they were not ready, but in John it is the abstract idea; the Lord came and stood in the midst, and said, “Peace be to you”. John 20:19. The disciples were not perturbed, but they were glad when they saw the Lord. I believe that is the abstract idea of christianity. As we are together thus it ought to be a time of joy. The Lord says a second time, “Peace be to you”; John 20:19; the repetition is to establish it. Christianity was established, and it is maintained in the establishment of it by the Spirit.

GCS So that the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

JT Quite so. How can you have establishment without righteousness? And that is what we thought of reaching here, “in order that the righteous requirement of the law should be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to flesh but according to Spirit”, Romans 8:4. So that the thing is stabilised, and if God reaches that point, the Spirit maintains things. Even if we are only very few, the thing is maintained, and it will be maintained to ^[p. 426] the end.

AM Does the righteous requirement of the law involve love, and have we any power to love apart from the Spirit?

JT Well, I think that is right. The first fruit of the Spirit is love, Galatians 5:22. We have often remarked as to 1 Corinthians 13, that owing to the absence of love, that chapter is like a picture on the wall, for the love was not evident in persons. The abstract idea of love is detailed, but we have not the persons who love. The Lord is now working on this whole matter, to get us into love, to have love among ourselves, especially in our gatherings that love might prevail.