THE SERVANT
[p. 306] THE SERVANT
I do not know that the moral order of the truth in this epistle has always been clearly apprehended, but it has struck me; and you will find that you really have to learn divine things in the order in which scripture presents them, though you may hardly be conscious of learning them in that order. They have to be put in place in the soul in the divine order, for God knows what we want, and what we are able to take in. He knows better than we do; and, while we may apprehend truth in part here and there, there is a process which goes on underneath, and that is the Spirit of God putting the truth into shape in the believer, that is in its oneness. The apostle says, “Now I know in part”. It is the work of the Spirit in the believer to put the truth into shape, and to make it one whole in his apprehension.
The great importance of this epistle, to my mind, is seen in the second chapter, for there the Spirit of God opens the eyes of the believer to the ruin and confusion of what passes as the church — the great house. When your eyes are opened the course you are to take is marked out, and you find what are your resources; and you must know what your resources are before you attempt your work. The resources you find in chapter 3, and the work of the servant in chapter 4. Timothy is the pattern of a servant in the present day, who continues until the coming of the Lord. Timothy was not an apostle, though I admit that on certain occasions he was employed as a delegate of the apostle. He was not one whom God used to introduce the truth; the work entrusted to him was to stand for the truth when the truth had been delivered. And I may say here that God looks for faithful witnesses,
[p. 307] and not for people who are simply holding the truth in terms. He looks for those who are themselves exponents of the truth. We are of very little use or value here except as we are exponents of the truth we hold; the mere fact of holding the truth is, I believe, in the thought of God a small matter. But I think that by the fact of holding the truth you incur responsibility. It is a poor thing to simply incur responsibility.
I would just say here that chapter 1 is in a certain sense a preface. The point of view comes out in chapter 2, in which the eyes of the saint are opened to the confusion which prevails in God’s house, or rather, in that which has the place of God’s house. But before the apostle comes to that, he refers in this chapter to the gospel according to the purpose of God; and I am convinced that no person is competent to take into account the ruin of God’s house if he is not first established in the truth of the gospel. You may depend upon it, that people are not able to look in the face the confusion and ruin that prevails if they do not know the stability of God’s purpose. Therefore the apostle first refers to the truth of the gospel, that is, that God “hath saved us and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, etc”. In connection with this you have the blessed truth of the gospel brought in, by which life and incorruptibility are brought to light. Not simply a gospel that justifies a man and enables him to walk piously in this world, but the gospel in which is accomplished the purpose of God. The great point here is the purpose of God. God has called us with a holy calling according to His purpose.
Now I desire by way of preface to say one word which may possibly for a moment startle you, and that is, that it is impossible for any person in Christendom to change his ecclesiastical position. That [p. 308] is what I want to impress upon you. I daresay some may not be prepared to accept that; and yet I feel pretty confident that it is right. I suppose a great many here may have the idea that they have changed their ecclesiastical position; but I do not believe that such a thing is possible in the eye of God, though you can do it in the eye of man. As far as I understand it, christian profession — the great house — presents itself as one whole under the eye of God. The Lord in looking down here sees one thing; and if you apprehended that, you would understand that you cannot change your ecclesiastical position. In other words you cannot get out of Christendom; every one forms part of the great house. This cannot be altered until the Lord comes.
I think that ought to be plain to all. Perhaps some may say, But what have we done? The answer is, We have severed ourselves from associations which did not answer to the demand of righteousness. That is, we were mixed up in certain associations from which it was impossible to purge out evil, and therefore we separated from them; but though we cleared our own consciences we did not thereby change our ecclesiastical position in the eye of God. I do not think that is possible. For instance, I have separated from the State Church, but the reason I separated from that was that I saw that there was no possibility of discipline being maintained in the State Church; and if I take the great dissenting bodies the same thing really prevails there. In such institutions it is impossible to maintain discipline, because they are worldly in character and seek to accommodate themselves to men. Hence discipline cannot be maintained in them; the attempt would simply bring into them utter confusion, and therefore they do not answer the demand of righteousness, for if discipline be not maintained, as things are here, you may be sure [p. 309] you cannot have righteousness. I do not feel bound to be identified with such associations; for when evil is dominant in the church and the church has come to be a great house, the first requisite is to regard righteousness. Therefore, every one that names the name of the Lord is to depart from unrighteousness, and we have to “follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart”. Righteousness stands at the head of the list. On the one hand you are to depart from unrighteousness, and on the other to follow righteousness; and in this we are brought into a fellowship, the basis of which is, in a sense, that our eyes have been opened to the ruin of the church, to the confusion which prevails in the state of things around. We avow the principle that separation from evil is God’s principle of unity. This, to a large extent, has been the ground on which we have been brought together.
Our eyes have been opened, and we have seen that things around do not answer to the demand of God. They will not bear to be measured. Do you remember how accurately the dimensions of the heavenly city in the Revelation were measured, and how all completely answered to the requirements of divine righteousness? So it must be, properly speaking, in the church, and I thank God that if I cannot change my ecclesiastical position I am not bound to go on with unrighteousness; and to go on with the great systems around, after we have received light, would be to go on with unrighteousness. I repeat that our fellowship has been founded to a large extent upon this, that our eyes have been opened to the ruin of the church, that is to the confusion of Christendom. Now my point is that you are not really in a position to look that in the face if you are not first established in the truth of the gospel. The apostle urges upon Timothy, “Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner; but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God”, etc. At the time when Paul wrote to Timothy the gospel had come into reproach. The application of that to us is that if you want to go on with the gospel, you must go on with it perfectly independent of all worldly support. You must not look for patronage or support from man; you have to suffer evil together with the gospel. I think that a great many who preach the gospel in the world look to Christendom for countenance. I understand that to mean that they are counting on toleration, they have not escaped from Babylon. Babylon is the great world power; and where there is the effort to court the world and to accommodate our ways to the world, we are not free from Babylon. The apostle foresaw that the spirit of Babylon was coming into the church, and that is what led, I do not doubt, to a good deal which comes out in this epistle. A great point, if you are going on with the gospel, is to suffer the afflictions of the gospel, not to accommodate your means of preaching the gospel to what man may think right. One should be wholly independent of all that, because prepared, if need be, to suffer with the gospel according to the power of God.
I come now to the terms of the truth as stated here. It says, “Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath annulled death, and hath brought life and incorruptibility to light by the gospel”. A great many people think that the gospel is simply the instrument in God’s hands of saving man. I quite admit that it is that, and that [p. 311] man is justified through faith in what is presented in the gospel. If a man believes in the death and resurrection of Christ he is justified in the eye of God, he then receives the Spirit and is to walk suitably in this world. “The grace of God ... hath appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously and godly in this present world”, etc. The gospel brings home to the heart of man the light of the grace of God. He is relieved of the pressure under which he was, and the Holy Ghost is given to him, and he is to walk soberly, righteously and piously here. Many think that to be the limit of the gospel, but if you make that the limit you have not touched the purpose of God at all; and more than that, so far as the believer is concerned, you have never put him off the ground of responsibility. I quite admit that the ground of responsibility is changed; the believer is no longer under law, but he is responsible as being under Christ and having the gift of the Spirit, and therefore he is to walk piously here. This aspect of the truth looks at the Christian as on the earth in Christ’s absence, and therefore in the place of responsibility. But you have not yet touched the purpose of God. It is important to distinguish between the gospel as God’s means of saving man, and as that by which God gives effect to His purpose. This latter you get here. There are two points in it. He has saved us, and called us, not according to our works: that is not on the line of our responsibility at all, “but according to his own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus”. When? Before we had any works at all — “before the world began”. When I talk about man being justified, he is justified in regard to that for which he is responsible. If he were not justified he would have to answer for his works in the day of judgment; and because he is [p. 312] justified God gives to him the Holy Ghost. But then there is behind this the fact that the gospel is the means by which God effectuates His purpose. He has saved us and called us, “not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began”.
I will endeavour to give you an idea of what the salvation and of what the calling is.
What I understand by the salvation is this: it is the deliverance of the soul from the world. It is expressed in what the apostle says to the Galatians in speaking of “our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins” (that is our responsibility, but the purpose of it was), “that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father”. That is what I understand to be really the salvation. God has brought to pass a means by which a man down here, while actually in the world, may be set free from it. If you ask me the way, I think it is not simply in having drunk the waters of Marah, but in being dead and risen with Christ. It is a most important point to accept the fact that death is upon man. Christ died because men were dead, that is the teaching of scripture. “If one died for all, then were all dead”. The fact of His dying for all is proof that all were dead. By His death the bitter waters of Marah have now become sweet; but drinking them is hardly the way of deliverance from the world, this lies in the great truth of our being risen together with Christ. In the power of the Holy Ghost we are conscious of being free from the power and influence of the world. It marked, I think, the fathers in the first Epistle of John; the young men are charged not to love the world; but the fathers had judged the world system, and what we read about them is that they “have known him that is from the beginning”. The great system has been judged, and that is what we must do in the Spirit if we wish to be free. We are risen with Christ out of it all. I think you can understand that a risen man has in spirit done with the whole thing. When Christ rose again, He was wholly parted from all that was after the flesh; and as risen with Christ we are free from the whole system in which the flesh lives. We are over Jordan, really touching the border of the land. The Red Sea brought Israel into the wilderness, and the passage through the Jordan brought them into the land; so resurrection brings us to the border of the land where life is. Scripture identifies life with the land, for being risen together with Christ is coincident with being quickened with Him. The effect is that you are to set your mind upon things above and not on things on the earth. I only speak of it because I think that is the idea of salvation here. Christ died for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world.
Now the other point is, He has “called us with an holy calling”. He has given to us a calling which connects us with heaven, the privilege of which is to know God as He is known in heaven. God has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ. The calling refers to heaven; to know the Father, not simply as He is known of angels, but as He is known of Christ. Christ has revealed to us the Father; and we are brought into the place of sons in the presence of the Father, and Christ is the firstborn among many brethren. There is a hope attached to it, because you are not yet actually in heaven; but the calling brings us into the present enjoyment of heavenly blessings, to know the Father as He is pleased to be known, not on the earth, but in heaven. It is not simply saying, “Our Father which art in heaven”, but it is having to do with Him as He is known in heaven. With God everything [p. 314] originates in love, and you will not understand the things of God if you do not understand that the purposes of God originated in love. It was His purpose to bring many sons unto glory that they might come under the influence of His love, and Christ was to be the Head of this company, the firstborn of many brethren. So He says, “I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it”. Why? “That the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them”. We know something about love in a natural way; how much do we know about divine love, what it is to be loved of God? I know very little indeed of what it is to be an object of the love of God; and yet God has so made Himself known that we might be at home in His love. He has not only saved us, that is, has given us a present deliverance out of this evil world, but He has called us with an holy calling, that we might be in His presence, in the place of sons. He has given us the Spirit of His Son whereby we cry “Abba, Father”. There are many Christians in the world who know that they are justified, and who seek to walk godly here; but there are two things I see about them. On the one hand they have not got deliverance from the world, and on the other hand they know but little about the purpose of God concerning them. They do not see the gospel in the light of its being God’s means of effectuating His purpose, which is the introducing us into the place of sons before Him, that we might be conscious of the love of the Father to be the companions of Christ in the Father’s presence, and to know that we are loved with the love wherewith Christ is loved. I cannot conceive a more wonderful privilege. But then it is not according to our works, but according to God’s own purpose. It is not a question of responsibility, but of privilege. It is what we are called to in common, for it is many sons [p. 315] that God is bringing to glory; it is hence what we are privileged to enjoy in common. It is perhaps a little foreign to the subject; but the eating of the old corn of the land in Joshua 5 is, I think, typical of the common privilege and enjoyment of saints in the assembly. They did not eat the manna in common, that was individual; that was gathered for each house and according to the need of the household. I do not think the old corn of the land is eaten in the same way, but in common. I should say that the old corn of the land is the natural fruit of the land; the children of Israel had not the old corn of the land in the wilderness, they were fed on heavenly bread, expressed in what Christ was down here in heavenly grace. The old corn of the land is Christ according to what He is in heaven, that is in the place which is proper to Him and to which He is proper. It is given to us for our communion and common enjoyment according to God’s purpose in Christ Jesus before the world began. Every purpose of God was in Christ, that is what is found in scripture. If I speak of a believer simply as such, he is justified and has received the gift of the Spirit, and that constitutes his standing here as before God. That is, that instead of being a guilty man he is a justified man, and his body is the temple of the Holy Ghost. But I see another line of truth, and that is the revelation of God’s purpose in Christ, and in Christ I learn what the purpose of God is in regard to Christians.
Now I come to another point. “Who hath annulled death and hath brought life and incorruptibility to light through the gospel”. How do you think life and incorruptibility are brought to light? God has revealed all that He is in His nature, and has also brought to light what can live in his presence as thus revealed. There are the two sides: on the one, all the activities of His love, but when [p. 316] that has been brought to light you must have the other side, and that is, what can live in the presence of God so revealed; and therefore Christ has brought life and incorruptibility to light. I think it is brought to light in His own Person. I see a man who subsists in the light of God according to all that God is; Christ lives unto God as Man, in the light in which God is revealed. And when I come to the application of this to the Christian, we are to reckon ourselves dead to sin because Christ has annulled death, but, alive unto God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
It is, for faith, a most wonderful moment in which we are set, for nothing can be more blessed than the way in which God has been pleased to make Himself known, not simply in righteousness and holiness, but in the activities of His love. He is working to satisfy the pleasure of love. All the activities of God have sprung from His nature, which is love. It is perfectly true that God is light, and that there can be nothing inconsistent with that, and everything is exposed by the light; but “In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him”. You cannot understand what it is to live through Christ if you do not understand first the incarnation of Christ; this stumbles man, for it is so inconceivable to man that a divine Person should become man. But God sent His only begotten Son into the world. It is the proof and expression of the love of God towards man. “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life”. And until you apprehend the love of God you cannot talk about living to God. Can you conceive anything more blessed than to live in the light of God’s love? That is where Christ ever lived, but now He [p. 317] lives there as Man dead to sin, and that is where we are privileged to live.
I will tell you the first thing which the Holy Ghost does in the heart of the believer. He sheds abroad the love of God; He brings home to the believer the truth that the gift of God’s blessed Son is the proof of divine love; and when that is brought home we get the consciousness by the Holy Ghost that God is love, and our part is to live in the presence of that love, to live there as Christ does.