THE WITNESS OF GOD - CREATION, LAW AND PROPHETS
THE WITNESS OF GOD - CREATION, LAW AND PROPHETS
Acts 14:14 - 17; Romans 1:19,20; Matthew 11:8 - 15
JT The book of Revelation emphasises the idea of witness — “the testimony of Jesus Christ”, Revelation 1:2 “the testimony of Jesus”, Revelation 1:9 etc. — and I thought it a feature of the truth that would be profitable for us to consider. The Lord in His address to the last assembly, Laodicea, speaks of Himself as “the faithful and true Witness”, Revelation 3:14 as if He would call attention to the idea of witness. We may be enabled of the Lord to cover in these readings the various features of the witness that God has given of Himself — first, to see the place the physical creation has in it, then the law and the prophets, then John the baptist, then the Lord Himself, then the Spirit, and finally the assembly. The idea of a witness on God’s behalf is connected with all these.
AFM Does testimony suppose that sin has come in, and that God sets to work to render testimony as to Himself in different ways until, finally, you have the great display of all in the city? Is that what was in your mind?
JT Yes, I thought of the expression in the first passage read, “He left not himself without witness”.
AN Do you distinguish between revelation and witness?
JT When you come to revelation, God Himself is before us. I thought that as we reach John’s gospel we may see a relation between the two.
AN [p. 208] Does the knowledge of God go with revelation?
JT Well, the knowledge of His nature involves revelation, but there was that which was “known of God” before. Perhaps you have something on your mind about it.
AN No, I only thought that when we come to Christ we get a distinct advance on witness as it is spoken of in the Old Testament.
JT When we come to John’s gospel we may be able to see that; only the mediatorial question enters into that, which the Lord may help us on at this time. The Lord’s position here involved God’s presence, but in a mediatorial way, so that it is not now any question of any particular feature of God, but of God Himself. It is important to bear in mind that while the Mediator is said to be “the man Christ Jesus”, Romans 5:15. John 1 and Hebrews 1 show that God has approached men in One who is equal with Himself. The previous witnesses were to certain attributes of God; in Christ we have God Himself.
The first passage read (Acts 14) alludes to His goodness. Creation witnessed to His goodness rising sovereignly above man’s sin — “He left not himself without witness”, giving rain and fruitful seasons, filling men’s hearts with food and gladness. There was a witness to His goodness, but then in Romans 1 we have His eternal power, which is another thing.
AFM And divinity — the two things, would there be?
JT But not yet God Himself. In Hebrews 1 Christ is said to be the “effulgence of his glory and the expression of his substance” Hebrews 1:3 — what God is substantially, so to say. The knowledge of that waited the coming in of the Son. I hope we may be able to look at that later.
HG Your first thought is in the main that there is an evidence, a public evidence, of One who is in control, and that He is good and powerful. It is not [p. 209] exactly a question of what He is in His nature, but One supreme, marked by goodness and power.
JT That is what I thought might occupy us in this reading. The Pagans worshipped various deities, to whom they attributed certain things, but Scripture calls attention to God as the Creator, as the Author of the universe. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth”. Genesis 1:1. Moses called attention to that, so that what men enjoyed constantly (their hearts being filled with food and gladness) might be connected with its Author, its Source.
AN I suppose the two testimonies of Psalm 19 would embody your last two points: “The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament showeth his handiwork”. Psalm 19:1. Then it Says “In them hath he set a tabernacle for the sun”, Psalm 19:4 and “There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not heard”. Psalm 19:3 There is also the testimony of the Scriptures, “the law of the Lord”, etc., spoken of in the latter part of the psalm. Psalm 19:7.
JT The testimony of the Scriptures is the second great thing. They prophesied. What is said about them is that “all the prophets and the law prophesied until John”. You do not get any prophesying in the case of the physical things, but nevertheless there is a witness. God had not brought in the whole testimony but He had a witness to Himself, enough to remind men that even in their apostate condition, as turned away from Him, He was good: the rain coming down and the fruitful seasons. The rain coming down denoted His supremacy, and the fruitful seasons denoted the power of life in what is immediately within man’s own range.
BTF Would you say that all applies now?
JT Every witness remains. God has not withdrawn the witnesses; they remain.
HG It is important, although most of us are in the light of the revelation of God, in days like these [p. 210] that our souls should be anchored and established in God, even in His creational power and glory, because today God is being given up universally.
AEH Is witness more to meet existing conditions, whereas revelation was a moral foundation for the bringing in of what was new?
JT That is right. Man was the offspring of God, as Paul cites in speaking to the Athenians, but in order that we should have offspring in a permanent spiritual sense we must have revelation. Revelation is the basis of all that is formative in the new universe, which is spiritual, but God is also connected with the first universe. It is important to bear this in mind. He is the Author of it. It says that He stretched out the heavens and founded the earth, and formed man in it (Isaiah 45:12), showing how the matter stood — the universe created, the heavens stretched out, the earth founded, and man formed in it, man being God’s offspring; so that God stood connected with that, and does stand connected with it. 1 Corinthians brings in the order of it now in that the head of the woman is man, Christ is Head of every man, and the Head of Christ is God. All that stands in connection with the present universe, so that nature teaches us, but in order to have a moral universe we must have the revelation of God.
AFM Do you think that a heathen might observe the heavens and the earth and see in them the expression of the power and goodness of God, and his conscience might even get awakened, but there is nothing formative in that? He would need light, the light of the gospel, in view of what you were saying.
JT Yes. The book of Job is intended to develop specifically what was there in the way of witness for man in the physical system. But there was no “new man”, renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created [p. 211] him.
AL Are not the two points illustrated in 2 Corinthians 4:6. “God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts”? Are these the two things, God in the one case acting in power, and in the other presenting Himself in our hearts? It is not that He causes something to shine, but He Himself shines. Is that the point?
JT Exactly. He has shined Himself.
AL Not simply ‘commanded’ light.
JT In the first instance it was a command and, of course, it was physical light that came in; but now it is God Himself shining, so Hebrews 1 is that Christ is the effulgence of His glory, the expression of His substance.
AL But in 2 Corinthians does it go a little further, in that God Himself shines in our hearts?
JT Yes; and it is for the shining forth of the knowledge of God in the face of Jesus. That is the present time.
GWH-n Hebrews 1 touches the first point: “Thou ... hast founded the earth, and works of thy hands are the heavens”. Hebrews 1:10. That is before revelation.
JB-t Is it not important to see that creation itself, as the work of God’s hands, maintains a witness to God’s goodness, which the enemy has always sought to undermine and overthrow in the hearts of men, and heathendom would be the result of the overthrow of that by the enemy, would it not?
JT Romans 1 shows how that they honoured Him not, but turned to worship the images of men, birds, four-footed beasts, and reptiles of the earth. Satan succeeded in eradicating from man’s mind the true thought of God, but the witness was there nevertheless. It was there constantly before men, and it is there yet.
AFM Referring to Psalm 19 again, this testimony was rendered to the ends of the earth. Speaking of the sun, nothing was hid from the heat [p. 212] of it. It would show the universal character of the testimony of creation.
AN But in Romans 1 the result is more in a negative way: “they are without excuse”. Romans 1:20.
BTF Would you say that this witness speaks now, not only to heathendom, but also to Christendom?
JT Of course, we take account of it, and we give thanks to God. As we partake of our food, we give thanks to God for it, but there was a time when men were wholly dependent on this witness in regard to God.
WB Romans 10 appropriates Psalm 19 in a different way, in regard of the testimony and of Christ.
JT Quite. It makes allusion to the gospel, but when you come to Job — and no one can, I think, understand the bearing of the testimony of the physical universe unless he understands Job — that book is particularly intended to show the bearing of the physical universe as a witness. The three friends of Job make little of it. The first alludes to what he had seen; the second to tradition, and the third to experience, to the importance of learning, “the secrets of wisdom”: Job 11:6 but when the Lord Himself speaks to Job He refers to the creation, and He speaks to him out of the whirlwind.
The position from which He speaks is to be noted. It was directing Job from the things that his friends were speaking of, and what he himself used in answer to them, to the positive thing that was before his eyes every day, and so God Himself goes over the features of the physical creation and He brings Job down. This shows the power of the testimony. God does not go outside the witness He had already brought forward. He keeps to that witness, showing that it was sufficient, lest anyone might assume that God was unfair or unreasonable. He keeps to the witness He [p. 213] had furnished, and that witness convicts Job. It is important to take that into account, for men “charge God foolishly”
AFM The goodness of God leads to repentance. Job lived in a time before the law was brought in, in the time when God was speaking through creation. His goodness was seen in it.
JT God Himself was in measure seen in the witness, because Job says: “I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear; but now mine eye seeth thee”, Job 42:5. It was what could be seen of Him; what was “known of God” was brought to bear on him by God Himself, so it was effective.
GAT There was no other testimony but creation.
JT Not among the heathen. No doubt certain light had radiated from the Jews, but the apostle alludes, in speaking to those at Lystra, to the fruitful seasons — that He was a living God. He was a living God, and He had sent rain and fruitful seasons. I think the rain indicates His supremacy for good. In the deluge it was for judgment, but in this instance it was for good, and the fruitful seasons would testify to the power of life that is in the earth for man’s benefit.
At Athens he cites their own poets: “We are also his offspring”, Acts 17:28. Thus man had in himself, in his own constitution, a witness to God. “Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man’s device”. Acts 17:29. Man represents Him, and men should reason back from their own constitution to what God is.
AFM They began (Romans 1) with an image made like to corruptible man and they descended to reptiles, the very form in which Satan came to Eve, whereas, as you say, if we are the offspring of God, an image of God could not be less than man; He [p. 214] must be superior. And the offspring must be subject to the One from whom he sprang.
BTF Do you regard the covenant made to Noah as the fulfilment of this witness in regard to “while the earth remaineth”, Genesis 8:22?
JT I think so. What he alludes to here is embraced in that covenant, so when God resumes His relations with the physical creation in Revelation 4 the rainbow is around the throne. It is there in the character of an emerald, being, I think, a reminder of the power of life — green. It is as fresh as it was when He made it. He has never forgotten it. “While the earth remaineth, seedtime” — God thinks of what man needs — “and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall not cease” Genesis 8:22, so that covenant, I think, embraces what Paul alleges here, because the rain and fruitful seasons allude to the provision God made for men.
EGMcA Why does God refer Job to the rain coming upon the earth, in the wilderness, where no man is (Job 38:26)?
JT To show the bountifulness of it, I think. “To satisfy the desolate and waste ground; and to cause the bud of the tender herb to spring forth”. Job 38:26,27.
AN In that connection you get the scripture: “He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust”, Matthew 5:45. Whatever may be the moral condition in which man lives, God is always good, is always the same; His sun and His rain are for man’s benefit.
WB There is no respect of persons with God; He is the same to all. In Romans 1 the witness does not go beyond the flood.
JT Because God closed up the first world (the world that then was) in the flood.
WB There was no rain [p. 215] before the flood.
JT The only mention of it before is in Genesis 2:5: “God had not caused it to rain”, but this cannot be said to cover the whole period. What is remarkable is that a mist is said to have arisen out of the earth. All that was necessary was supplied. Everything was inherent in the earth apparently, but in the flood you have the rain.
AFM Was there not idolatry before the flood?
JT Nothing is said about it. The allusion in Joshua 24:2 does not refer to the flood; it refers to the Euphrates.
AFM That would support the thought that the point in the apostle’s mind was what was after the flood.
JT He refers to God as Creator and then speaks of the “nations”; these began after the deluge. He made a covenant with Noah and He had not revoked it. It stood, and that covenant denotes His goodness. “He left not himself without witness in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness”.
AL The attitude of those who received the testimony would be without respect of persons for blessing; when the sun shines there is nothing hid from the heat of it, so we would shine in that way, without respect of persons.
JT Thus the testimony of Creation prepared for what came later. Matthew 17 mentions the Lord’s face shining as the sun, I think to impress upon the hearts of the disciples that they were to be supreme in goodness. This was to mark the assembly’s testimony.
HG Would not the first testimony be that you would bless God? These men in Lystra were offering sacrifice to Paul and Barnabas, and they seek to divert them from that to the living God, to whom alone worship belongs.
JT They were the real priests. The priest that [p. 216] was before the city was a blind one. How terribly blind he was!
AFM You spoke of the witness having various features. Can you tell us what order they come in?
JT What we are speaking of is the first, the creation. Then the law, as we get here, Luke says the law and the prophets were until John, and from that time the kingdom of God is preached, but Matthew says that the prophets and the law prophesied until John. He puts the prophets first. I think they are first in a sense, in that they exhibit the patience of God, but the law taken with them involves His rights — that God has a right to command man’s affections.
As yet you have not got that which would draw out man’s affections fully, therefore I think prophecy, the prophesying power of the prophets and the law, is to be noted; they point always to the One who should become the attractive power for men’s hearts, that man should have an Object. The law commanded love; it did not supply love, but there was a prophetic witness in it. Immediately after the law is given in Exodus 20, you have the “Hebrew servant”. Exodus 21:2. That is where the prophetic feature lies. There was One coming in who would love God, His wife and His children, and who should die, who would not go out free. All the prophets and the law abound with allusions to Christ — they prophesied until John.
AFM That answers the question I was going to raise — in what sense the law prophesied. Your thought is that in the law there is distinct reference to Christ, the One who would fill out what the law demanded.
AN The prophets recalled the terms of the covenant, which the Jews had not kept; on the other hand they led forward to Christ. Whatever man was, he was affected by certain things which bore upon his conscience. If you take Job, who has [p. 217] been referred to, the strictures which his friends cast upon him were the result of their experiences.
JT Yes, only they were judging according to men. What you find about them is that each came from his own place; Job 2:11.
If you come from your own natural surroundings you will never represent God. “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John”, John 1:6. If you come from your own circle, your local, patriotic or other natural feelings will influence you, and so you will not witness for God. You may be sincere but you will darken, rather than enlighten, although you may say many true things. Job’s friends had not spoken of God the thing that was right; Job 42:7.
GAT Their remarks do not affect the heart of Job.
JT They come each from his own place, and they come by agreement. Their links were in nature. They had much to boast in. One had experience, another had tradition, and the other had learning, but none of them came from God. We do not enter into private arrangements to visit anybody. If you want to help another go from God yourself.
AFM It is remarkable that at the end God said that they had not justified Him as His servant Job had done, and He requests Job to pray for them.
AN Many a time we find ourselves, in thinking of another’s troubles, following on retributive lines — that you must have done serious wrong, or this would not have fallen upon you. They had not the mind of God about Job. That is clear.
JT The things they said were in many instances right enough, as with many a learned man today. He has studied the Bible, is well versed in the truths of Christianity, and can say excellent things, but all the time you are conscious that that man has not come from God. His words therefore are not in the right setting and have no force. Elihu was in God’s [p. 218] stead. That is the man you want “an interpreter, one among a thousand”, Job 33:23. Out of ten thousand instructors in Christendom you might not get ten who could give you the mind of God. Christians want the mind of God, not mere learned statements.
AFM I have often wondered why, after Elihu finished his most forceful words, Jehovah Himself began to speak to Job. If Elihu was a type of Christ, why was it that Jehovah Himself spoke?
JT What you get, I think, is that Elihu is in God’s stead, and he discourses to the end of chapter 37, where he touches the highest features of the truth presented. Then God Himself takes up the threads of Elihu’s ministry, commencing to speak to Job out of the whirlwind in chapter 38, “Gird up now thy loins like a man; for I will demand of thee, and answer thou me”.
He is face to face with God, but not God in Christ, not God speaking from the ark of the covenant, not God speaking as we get Him in Luke, but God in the whirlwind — a very different thing. Elihu is indeed a type of Christ, but as Man; then there is God’s side from chapter 38 onwards.
AFM What is the whirlwind?
JT I think it is the active power of God to which the creation witnesses. To Elijah Jehovah was not in the wind; instead there was “a soft, gentle voice”. This points to more intimate relations — the period of the prophets and the law.
AL Is it not remarkable that Job got all his blessings, when he turned to God’s side, when he prays for his friends?
JT When he becomes a priest, because that is the idea to be reached.
AL He had the mind of God in regard to the people who were wrong, and he intercedes for them.
GWH-n He is “shining” there, is he?
JT I think he corresponded with Christ, as [p. 219] Stephen did in greater measure. God always works in us until He brings us in some way to correspond with Christ. When Job prays for his friends, God turns his captivity.
AL He gets all his blessings then.
AFM Going back again to Elihu, would you say that the end of all true ministry is to work up to a point where God comes in Himself, as He did with Job?
JT What can you do if God does not come in and take up the work? There will be no definite result. But if God takes it up there will be definite results. With Job the “end of the Lord” was reached.
EGMcA The prophets prophesying — is that to draw attention to the witness of God set forth in the first two scriptures referred to?
JT The prophesying refers, I think, to Christ, as coming — the true witness. God had in mind that His testimony should take form in a Man, and all the prophets and the law bore witness to that from the very beginning.
WB In Jonah it was a word of destruction, but it led to repentance.
JT But you get Christ in Jonah. He prays out of the fish’s belly. The fish’s belly becomes a temple, as it were, and he prays to God and God hears him. His language is really the language of Christ, and that is where the prophets shine, I think. Whatever Jonah was afterwards, because he was greatly influenced by national feelings, he nevertheless was a type of Christ, and the Lord Himself alludes to him as such. So that all the prophets, and the law prophesied until John.
BTF What would you say about that wonderful statement, “I know that my Redeemer liveth”, Job 19:25?
JT That shows the light he had. There [p. 220] are thousands of men like Job now. They have light, but they are not delivered from themselves.
BTF He was clinging to Him without entering into the truth of redemption.
JT There was some light there. I think it would be well for us to understand Job, because the book is the record of the effect of the testimony of God that was then available. He is only an example; there were doubtless others more or less like him.
AN I thought that was an important principle, that there can be no solution of any question in my soul apart from the way in which God is known in my soul; in the case of Job it was only what was available then that was brought to bear upon the questions that troubled him. I thought that while we now have the revelation of God, Christ having come, there can be no solution of any moral question in my soul apart from the knowledge of God, as He is now known, there.
GAT In the midst of his greatest distress he could say, “Blessed be the name of the Lord”, Job 1:21.
JT Job justified God and sinned not with his lips. Satan is routed — never mentioned again in the book after chapter 2. God knew what Job was capable of, even as undelivered. The work of God in a man’s soul remains even if he is not characterised by it.
AFM At the end they all brought Job rings of gold. That would be suggestive of affection.
JT Quite. A brother is never really restored until he gets the ring.
AL And “a piece of money”. Job 42:11.
JT A piece of money to support him. The ring is a token of affection.
GAT Would you say that Job’s family was a hindrance to him, the affection he had for his family?
JT I should not like to say that, but things were on the line of nature in his family. The gathering was in his eldest son’s house. Fathers have to make up their minds for that if they want to be spiritual; the families may move without them. Job’s family was evidently moving without him, and they were moving on the line of nature (in the eldest brother’s house), but nevertheless Job never ceases to pray for them and to offer sacrifices. He maintained his priestly relations with God for his family to that extent, and God takes account of that. I think it is a great thing for fathers and mothers to bear in mind that they represent God in their house. That is the great moral value of parentage; whatever the children do, the parents remain on God’s side. You see how God has acted toward men. He says: “I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me”, Isaiah 1:2. Whatever the children may do, the testimony you pass on to them is their matter. As you pass it on God has a witness in the succeeding generation.
Rem Authority is in the parents, and as there it is enhanced, for love is there. It is maintained in affection — What you remarked about the heritage passed on is good.
JT Obedience to parents “is the first commandment with promise”, Ephesians 6:2 showing how much value God attaches to it. In giving the law He recognised the value of the parent, and the child’s blessing lies in obedience to its parents.
JB-t Job vindicates God before Satan. “Job sinned not, nor charged God foolishly”. Job 1:22.
JT Another thing that comes out in this connection is the heavenly testimony of the wise men from the East. “Where is he that is born King of the Jews, for we have seen his star in the east”. Matthew 2:2. There was there something that pointed them to Christ and they understood it. They make no allusion to the Scriptures. They acted on the testimony available.
AFM Do you think that character of [p. 222] testimony had been preserved right through in connection with Job, and onward?
JT Yes; something in the physical creation pointed them to Christ — His star. They arrived at Jerusalem and said, “Where is he?” — not the King of Kings, or the head of the human race, but the “King of the Jews”. The Holy Spirit tells just what they said. How they arrived at it, He does not say, but I think He does show that they were ready for the witness that was available.
Rem It was heavenly guidance?
JT Yes, “the heavens declare the glory of God”, as we have noted.
WB I was thinking that in nature there is the very opposite to what we have been speaking of. Such things as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions are very powerful in the way of destruction. They do not testify to the goodness of God?
JT These things, however, testify to the power of God, and men should be warned by them. At Horeb they were intended to remind Elijah of the power God had to deal with Jezebel.
HG And then the destructive power of nature, while it comes very prominently before us, is a minor thing compared with the twenty-four hours of the day of the care, the goodness and the mercy of God. It speaks in one of the prophets (Habakkuk 3: 4) of the “hiding of his power”. Men partake of His bounty and beneficence but do not recognise God in them. It is only when a fearful disaster comes that men turn to God.
AFM Would you mind saying a word as to what followed the law and the prophets? They prophesied until John. What place does John fill?
JT That leads us up to this chapter in Matthew. The Lord takes occasion to call attention to John. He says, “What went ye out for to see?” He appeals to the fact that they had gone out. If you have ever [p. 223] moved at all, God appeals to that. What is the explanation of Christendom — what occasioned all this movement from paganism.
AEH Does the Lord enlarge upon that in the latter part of the chapter?
JT Well, He is raising the question first as to what they went out to see.
AN That was the defeat of the Pharisees, when the Lord tested them regarding the baptism of John — was it from heaven or of men? They failed to see it as a movement from heaven. That is really what tests men. They were afraid to commit themselves. “If we shall say, From heaven; he will say, Why then believed ye him not? But and if we say, Of men; all the people will stone us; for they be persuaded that John was a prophet”, Luke 20:5,6. They were not unbiased; their wills were in it; it is the activity of the will that blinds the vision.
JT The Lord has this opportunity; He appeals to the fact that they had gone out. “But what went ye out for to see? A man clothed in soft raiment? Behold, they that wear soft clothing are in kings houses. But what went ye out for to see? A prophet? yea, I say unto you, and more than a prophet”. They had moved out to John, and there was nothing there to indicate worldly greatness or magnificence, or comfort. The movement was really divine and the Lord wanted to show the nature of the testimony or the witness that was rendered. He says he is “more than a prophet”. There was nobody born of women greater than John.
BTF Would you say that John is introduced here because he was to speak of the One that was to be the faithful and true Witness?
JT The kingdom of God was preached. It was no longer simply prophesied about. It was not a question of prophesying it as in the future; it was already there in principle, the great witness of God’s [p. 224] power that was coming in in Christ. The Lord would emphasise the greatness of the witness. John the evangelist, as I think we shall see later, immediately announces him as a man sent from God.
HG The other prophets, as you said, spoke of Christ, but John actually introduces Him. He says, “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode upon him”, John 1:32. They never saw that.
EGMcA There are two features here in advance of what we had before. John was “more than a prophet” and a “messenger before the Lord’s face”.
JT The witnesses increase in importance, and I think that is why the prophets are put before the law in Matthew. Matthew would indicate the greatness of the witness. The prophets are greater because they bring out the patience of God, of how He bore with Israel. Then the law is brought in. John is said to be “more than a prophet”.
AFM If John was so great, how great was the One he was about to introduce — I suppose that was the idea?
JT So the Lord later says, “Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, which shall prepare thy way before thee”. He is immediately before the Lord. The Lord is at hand — or really there. They were contemporary. Zacharias said of John: “thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways”, Luke 1:76.
EGMcA Are we bordering now on revelation?
JT We are coming up on revelation; we are being prepared for it. Then the Lord says: “Among them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than John the baptist”.
HG Greater positionally, or was he morally greater? It says, “He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother’s womb”, Luke 1:15.
[p. 225] Morally, he was a remarkable man.
JT I think, positionally and morally there was no one greater.
HG I was thinking, in regard to the contrast between the prophets and the law, the law was put on record for all time, but the prophet was a man who stood before God. A very peculiar position was that of prophet; getting the mind of God for the moment he conveyed it to the people.
AN It was an extraordinary moment that was reached in that respect. There had been the evidence of the goodness of God, and there was also His creational power, and there had been the law and the prophets, but now they had reached the point when God was to make Himself known. We value all the past, but we are moving forward to something greater.
GAT Would you mind saying a word on “he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he”? Matthew 11:11, Luke 7:28.
JT Well, John stood connected with the old order of things. The Lord, I think, is emphasising the greatness of the kingdom in saying that. “He that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he”; that would be, I think, positionally. John as a messenger, the forerunner of Christ, was positionally great, and as filled with the Holy Spirit he was personally great. He was personally most remarkable, entirely free from the claims of the flesh, from the claims of nature; but nevertheless, although he announced the kingdom, he was not in it. The Lord always refers to John as representing a different ministry. He was never under the Lord’s supervision, so to speak. He was never regarded as a disciple of the Lord’s; he had a ministry of his own. But a little one in the kingdom of heaven was positionally greater than he.
AFM John had his own disciples. He was a [p. 226] friend of the Bridegroom, rather than being part of the company that makes up the bride.
JT Exactly.
GAT Why was it that he showed the weak side when he was made a prisoner?
JT There you come to another thing, namely, that you get no perfection anywhere but in Christ. The Lord had great sympathy for John and it is at that point that He eulogises him.
JB-t John in prison in a way speaks of the rejection of Christ, that what they would do to His messenger they would do to Him, and in that way he was very highly honoured.
AN Of what family does John form a part? Would it include all the Old Testament saints, or is it in any way distinctive?
JT There are many distinct families, formed according to the light in which they were, so that I think the first family would be formed in regard to the light that Abel had. That is the way I understand it.
Rem As being the first one to die?
JT There was a family before the flood governed by the light vouchsafed, and after Noah there was greater light. Then in Abraham and Moses there was further light. One can understand that the formation would be greater as the testimony proceeded.
AN Hebrews 11 in that way would contain many families.
JT I think it would. John comes very near to Christ. If you take even Malachi, the expressions there come very near to the New Testament. Light is increasing, so that the remnant in the beginning of Luke form a class by themselves. Some of these came into the kingdom, but John did not. He would belong to that family, I should say.
AL “Then they that feared the Lord spake often one to another; and the Lord hearkened, and heard it, and a book of remembrance was written before him for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon his name”. Malachi 3:16.
[p. 227] That company had peculiar characteristics — very like Philadelphia. When it says here “the prophets and the law”, does it refer to the prophets as we look at them, beginning with Isaiah, or does it refer to all the prophets, beginning at Abel?
JT I think this classification would include “all the prophets from Samuel”. The ‘law’, I suppose, would be the Pentateuch.
JB-t That agrees with Luke 24:44.
JT Yes, there it is the law of Moses, the prophets, and the Psalms.
WB Hebrews 11 says, “Samuel, and of the prophets”. Hebrews 11:32.
JT There Samuel is distinct, for he was more than a prophet; but, as remarked, we have “all the prophets from Samuel”, Acts 3:24. In Luke 24:44 the Lord refers to the writings only, whereas the personal ministries of the prophets could be included in Matthew 11:13.