FRIENDSHIP

A. C. Clapham

Genesis 18: 16–19, 22; John 3: 28–30; 3 John 13, 14

It is a very attractive subject that one desires to say a brief word about, beloved, though I feel so inadequate to expound on such a subject as friendship with God, friendship with the Lord Jesus, and friendship with the saints. It is a very attractive and marvellous matter that divine Persons should deign to call us into friendship with Themselves, and should be prepared to have communion and intimacy with creatures—wonderful grace, wonderful privilege!

I wish to say a brief word as to Abraham being a friend of God and on some of the features that qualified him to be this. For surely to be a friend of God there must be moral qualities and moral features. Then the Lord has His friends; “I call you no longer bondmen ... but I have called you friends”, John 15: 15. Friendship would involve intimacy with the Person and the knowledge of the Person. It is a wonderful joy that the Lord has with the assembly, taking the saints, His bride, into His confidence. Is not that marvellous that we should be elevated to have communion, intimacy, and friendship as the bride? It is wonderful to be part of the bride, and to be born in this dispensation. We might have been born in Old Testament times and never have had part in the bride of Christ, but in the sovereignty of God we are born in this dispensation and have the Spirit; we are part of Christ’s bride.

I would like to mention—not necessarily in their moral order—the features that qualified Abraham to be a friend of God. One would be the intimacy he had with Jehovah, another would be the confidence he had in God—a matter in which we all need furthering, to have confidence in the Father’s love and care. He loves to have our confidence, beloved. Job was sorely tried in his confidence in God; what discipline he passed through, but the devil did not win. He was allowed to discipline Job and pass him through severe trials that hardly any other person has passed through, but the devil did not get the victory. Although Job said things that were not quite right, his faith in God was there, and he came through and was blessed abundantly, I would say with the double portion.

Now Abraham was marked by intimacy, confidence, and faithfulness. Would not these be features that God would look for in those called His friends? In the Scriptures three times he is called a friend of God, a wonderful, dignified appellation. The God of glory appeared to him and he answered to the call. The God of glory has appeared to us and called us with a heavenly calling out of this world, out of kindred, house, and country, that we might belong to a heavenly country, and heavenly citizenship. We have been called by the God of glory and that must end in glory, and in the meantime we are learning to have communion with the God of glory, known to us in a special way in the name of Father—what a Father! How blessed to speak to the Father. He is a holy Father, blessed Father, and a loving Father too.

Let us have more intimacy with the Father and cultivate using our own language—He loves you to use your own language. Just speak to God as you know Him yourself, reverently, of course, with titles in keeping with the Scriptures; but He loves you to use your own language in private with Him as you go into your closet. Shut the door on everything else outside, every distraction (not so easy sometimes) and speak to the Father in secret, and the Father who sees in secret will render it to thee (see Matthew 6: 6). What a blessed God He is!

Abraham responded but was detained with his father for a while, but after that he moved forward. We are going to move forward to the rapture, maybe very soon. The God of glory has appeared to us; we have been called by a heavenly calling; never let the devil get you away from that. He would like us to be an earthly people; he would like us to descend to the earth and be earthly minded, enemies of the cross of Christ, and minding earthly things. That is searching, is it not? But Abraham answered to the call, he was obedient. Would not that be one qualification to be a friend of God?—obedience to His call, obedience to His word, and obedience to His will, whatever the cost. He left his country, his relatives, he left everything to answer to the call, to be pleasing to God, and he was thus qualifying to be a friend of God.

He had an altar and was characteristically a man of prayer. I think that to be qualified to be called God’s friend we would need to be marked characteristically by prayer, having to do with God every day. Abraham had a large household, a large number of servants, but he would constantly turn to God. He had an influence over Lot; bringing God into everything, he was able to rescue him; he interceded for Lot, as being marked by prayer.

Obedience would be another qualification—obedience, prayer, intimacy, and faithfulness. I think faithfulness would be a prime quality; whatever the cost, standing by His word, standing by the truth and divine principles. I feel I come short of these features. I am suggesting these thoughts that we may desire to qualify to be friends of God. What dignity!

Fancy a person being able to say of you, ‘He is a friend of God, one that God can confide in’. If God says, ‘I know he will command his household after him’. God had confidence in him. How weak some of us have been! When you go over things with God in private you wonder where the defect has been. You thought you were bringing your children up for the Lord and not for the world, yet when they have grown up they may have gone away. You say, Where was the defect? You are humbled before God. While in one sense it is our responsibility if they go astray, it is sovereignty if our children are brought in, but God says to Abraham, “I know him that he will command his children and his household”. God knew he would not allow worldliness or anything that was not in keeping with God’s house.

When Abraham is pleading with God about those in Sodom he says, “I, who am dust and ashes”, What humility! Would not that be a qualification, beloved? suggesting self-abnegation in the presence of God. It is a real thing to be in the presence of God in a sense of your nothingness. Dust—what is more worthless than dust?—and ashes suggests he had gone through the fire. A spiritual man would judge in himself everything that was judged at the cross. The final test was when he was told to offer up Isaac. Oh how delightful it must have been for God to see that! He was ready to obey His word even to taking up the knife to slay his son, a supreme test, but the friend of God rose to the occasion. It speaks in 2 Chronicles 20: 7 of Abraham being God’s friend and the alternative rendering is one who loves God. He loved God, so he stands out morally and spiritually as a friend of God. May we covet these features of intimacy, faithfulness, and prayer so that God may have confidence in us; He has confidence in the Saints who are faithful.

Now I want to speak a little about John 3. I think the thought of the Bridegroom and the bride is greater than anything that came out in the Old Testament. Abraham is not part of the bride, although, as we have been taught, he will be among the guests at the marriage of the Lamb. So here we have John the baptist a friend of the Bridegroom; what a friend! It says “the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices in heart because of the voice of the bridegroom”. He was near to Christ, willing to be superseded. The Lord says, “There is not arisen among the born of women a greater than John the baptist. But he who is a little one in the kingdom of the heavens is greater than he”, Matthew 11: 11.

So, beloved, what a great thing it is to be in the bride. What qualified John to be a friend of Christ? Separation—he was a Nazarite to God from birth—he was in the wilderness with God; his garment was unworldly; there was nothing worldly about him at all, a man that was absolutely faithful and filled with the Holy Spirit. How the Lord appreciated him! how He felt it when John was beheaded, a man so faithful as a friend that he was prepared to be martyred. John spoke to Herod about taking the wife of his brother and he lost his life—what faithfulness! The Lord valued him.

I want to speak a little of the relationship of the Bridegroom and the bride, for John stands there saying, “Ye yourselves bear me witness that I said, I am not the Christ, but, that I am sent before him. He that has the bride is the bridegroom”. Can you be in the presence of the Bridegroom without rejoicing in Him? I do not think so. If you are in the presence of the Bridegroom it must result in joy, for it is delightful and exquisite to hear the voice of the Bridegroom, to hear the voice of Christ, for He is the lover of the assembly. He has the bride in His embrace; is that not a wonderful conception of Christ and the assembly? The bride is also the Lamb’s wife, now in the scene of suffering. We will suffer now if we are faithful to Christ, denying the flesh and the world, but nevertheless the bride exists and there is no failure with the bride because it is the work of God in the saints and there is no failure with that.

The public side of the testimony, with the candlestick, has failed, but what a wonderful thing that the Spirit and the bride say “Come” at the end of the dispensation. We are right there, beloved, and I suggest to the saints that the Lord is looking for bridal affection. He is looking for it collectively amongst us, in localities, just as Rebecca was a bride and wife to Isaac, in the absence of Sarah, in the tent. It is like the local position, espoused as a chaste virgin to Christ. So let us be marked more by bridal features—chastity, holiness, virginity, purity, separation, a moral loveliness that Christ by the Spirit has wrought in us. The Spirit is serving the brethren to form us in the features of that heavenly Man, because we are soon going to go into the wedding—the public celebration of the marriage.

What a day that will be when Babylon is overthrown with all its vain-glory, vanity, sinfulness, assumption, and idolatry, and when all that has been overthrown then comes forward the marriage of the Lamb. Christ and the assembly will fill the whole scene. The Lord will deal with all that is apostate, all that is against Him. He will deal with it with a rod of iron. He will break in pieces all the opposition of men who worship the beast and its image. We are to be intelligent and know what is going to take place, but we are not to be too much occupied with that. In spite of all the lawlessness, evil, and violence obtaining at the present time, I believe God will keep His hand on this country and preserve it from anarchy because of His people. He has thousands unknown to us who love Him. There are thousands that have not bowed the knee to. Baal nor kissed him; they may not have the light of the assembly, but He has many people in this country.

We are privileged, as having the light of the assembly, to know what the bride is and the preciousness of the bride to the Bridegroom. He loves His assembly, and He enjoys the affectionate responses of the saints, not only when we are together on Lord’s day mornings, but bridal affections characteristically marking us. We desire to be loyal to Christ our absent One. We desire to be in the hands of the Spirit, as Rebecca was typically, and be formed in those features, the adornment that was put on Rebecca and the communion she had; typically, with the Spirit. As she journeyed to the heavenly man, she would more and more get a picture of what Isaac was like. She is described as a maiden, a damsel, a virgin, a daughter; all—these things afford a beautiful picture of—the bride, and that is what the Spirit is working out.

Is it worthwhile, the exercise and a measure of suffering? Surely it makes worthwhile the suffering; the separate path; and a bit of reproach. Surely it is worth it to give this satisfaction to the Bridegroom.

It is lovely to hear His voice. John would say, ‘I do not form part of the bride, but it is grand to be near to Christ, to be in His company, to listen to His quickening voice’. We sing,

‘We’ve heard Thy quick’ning voice’ (Hymn 137). What a voice the voice of Christ is! soon we shall be hearing it without the weakness of the body and the weakness of nature. We shall be hearing it in bodies of glory, spiritual bodies that can more fully respond to Him. John qualified to be a friend of the Bridegroom and may we qualify to be friends of Christ, we who are part of the bride. He is above all; He is heavenly.

Christianity is heavenly, its origin and destiny are heaven; we are a heavenly people by calling. Let us maintain our heavenly citizenship and do not let us drop down to indulge in anything below that level, whether in reading, associations, or anything else. Let us maintain the holiness and chastity of the bride which the blessed Spirit is bent on working out in those who are available to Him. He may not have many available to Him to form in bridal features, but the Lord will credit the whole assembly with what He may find in a remnant in the way of Philadelphian features.

Now in the last scripture it is a matter of being friendly among ourselves. Friendship involves intimacy, as suggested here. John says, “I had many things to write to thee, but I will not with ink and pen ... but I hope soon to see thee, and we will speak mouth to mouth”. That is a beautiful suggestion of friendship, mouth to mouth, real intimacy and transparency, confidence, and nearness. I think the Lord would be delighted with that in our localities, to see us as brethren near to one another, transparent with one another, really friendly, with no hypocrisy; not being with the brethren in the meeting and then saying something different outside, but mouth to mouth, in intimacy. It is said that the saints in New Testament days greeted one another with a holy kiss. That suggests intimacy and friendship. How can you hold anything against a brother and yet kiss him? That would be like Judas. He kissed the Lord, and the Lord Jesus said, “Deliverest thou up the Son of man with a kiss?”, (Luke 22: 48), as much as to say, ‘Do you do this act of betrayal with what is an emblem of nearness and friendship? Do you betray me with a kiss?’ The

Lord felt it. Judas did it with what is symbolic of confidence and intimacy.

So may we greet the friends by name. It is remarkable that we now know practically all the brethren and can greet them all by name. Thus knowing them, we are concerned if one is suffering; there are body feelings; so the suggestion is of family conditions. It is a great thing to enjoy a family spirit of confidence and love where the Spirit is free, and where love is flowing. Where there is unity among the brethren the Lord can command the blessing, like the oil that flowed from Aaron’s head down to the hem of his garments (Psalm 133). We receive the blessing of the Lord as we are together in organic unity. I think “Greet the friends by name”, and seeing them and speaking mouth to mouth suggests an organic unity that is delightful to heaven. May it be so for His name’s sake.

Address at Manchester
24 February 1979