AFFECTION FOR THE HOUSE OF GOD
[p. 126] AFFECTION FOR THE HOUSE OF GOD
Ephesians 2:18 - 22, 1 Chronicles 29:3 - 5
It is before me, dear brethren, to speak about the house — the house of God, bearing in mind that the apostle in his first letter to Timothy specially speaks about it, and of the behaviour that is suitable in it, saying, that thou mayest “know how one ought to conduct oneself in God’s house which is the assembly of the living God, the pillar and base of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:15). The order therefore is “the house”, “the assembly”, and “the pillar and base”. The house involves enjoyment; it involves, of course, that in which God shows Himself in His affections, and in which His order is seen, but it is a place of holy, spiritual enjoyment. The house being said to be the assembly, conveys the idea of intelligent counsel and administrative action, resulting in public support for the truth, this latter involving conflict. I wish to confine my remarks to the house, as such, and in this respect I have also specially in mind the statement of king David as to his affection for it. The word that one would bear in mind as to oneself, and one hopes that all will take notice of it, is the peculiar expression, “affection for the house of my God”. Those of you who are conversant with 1 Chronicles will have noticed that David speaks in chapter 22 of preparing for the house in immense wealth out of his affliction; whereas here in chapter 29 it is in his affection. The comparison of these two words in relation to the house, will help in the understanding of my remarks, for as combined, they present to us Christ, in His affliction and then in His affection.
Before coming to Ephesians, I would remark that the gospels in their four different features present David and Solomon typically, and particularly Matthew, so that you find Christ in the exercise of His service, and [p. 127] indeed in His whole sojourn here, peculiarly in houses in Matthew. He is indeed presented to us in that gospel, as in a house, in His childhood. Luke presents Him in a manger, but Matthew presents Him in a house, as sought out by the wise men of the East. We are told that the star “came and stood over the place where the little child was” (Matthew 2: 9). The place is a larger idea than the house; indeed, that is confirmed in 1 Chronicles in chapter 21:25 where king David buys “the place” in which the house is to be. Now the wise men came to the place as guided by the star. It was the star of “the king of the Jews”, Him they sought, showing how they were in accord with the mind of God, being free from national prejudice. No one can reach the house otherwise; so long as national prejudice is in our minds we shall never really reach the house. They came seeking “the king of the Jews”, implying that they were to be subservient, that they were recognising the priority of the Jews. The Lord, indeed, insisted on this in talking to the woman at Sychar, and the Samaritans themselves later, had to learn that the Spirit should come through the apostles that were sent from Jerusalem.
So the wise men came to the place under the guidance of heaven. They were deflected in going to Jerusalem, but finally the star directed them “to the place where the little child was” — a very interesting and touching consideration — but the star did no more than that. Being at the place, they entered into the house. I would suggest that there is something to be learnt in that, for many are content with the vicinity in which Christ may be, — but they entered into the house; they entered into the house where the little child was. He was under care; He was with the one who would care for Him best under God at that time, as is always so where the need of care exists. Where could care be found to equal that with the parent in the house, for God has provided in the house such care as all stages of His family require. That is how matters stand in [p. 128] Matthew: they entered into the house, and they find the child under care. They saw “the little child with his mother” and they worshipped.
So throughout Matthew we find the Lord signalising certain features of the truth as being “in the house”, characteristically. To illustrate this, in chapter 13, He entered into a house, and His disciples followed Him. That is another thing. He takes up a position in the house, and persons who are followers understand, and they follow Him there. It becomes a place of exposition and of wonderful disclosures. No one can afford to miss these, the holy expositions of Scripture and of the parables and types in the house; and then the disclosures of hidden things, things that were in the Lord’s heart, with regard to the assembly.
Then we find later (chapter 17) the Lord in the house, and Peter would have reduced Him to the level of an ordinary temple taxpayer. Unless we frequent the house in which He is, we shall have wrong thoughts of Him, and shall reduce Him in our thoughts, and words, and ways, to the level of ordinary persons, which the Holy Spirit greatly resents. So that Peter said, his Master certainly paid tribute. But as he came into the house the Lord anticipated him and adjusted him, and brought out the blessed fact that the position was that of sons. “Then are the sons free” (Matthew 17:26). Thus in that house the truth of sonship came out. And so throughout Matthew’s gospel in which also and only there, you get the word ‘householder’ (chapter 13:52). All is to prepare us for the great leading thought, the assembly; that we might be in the world assemblywise. In order to be here in this way we must be in the good of, and enter into the spiritual buoyancy and enjoyment of the house.
So you find the Lord in the house of “Simon the leper”, meaning that the public position may be one of reproach, but He is there nevertheless. Many would avoid being in that house; but if He takes up a position [p. 129] subject to reproach and you avoid it because of that, you will miss the blessing attached to it. You find there the full appreciation of Christ’s dignity and service; a woman anointed His head there.
Then later in Matthew, the Lord sends His disciples, as they enquire where He would eat the passover, to a certain one. He says, “Go into the city to such an one” (chapter 26:18), saying nothing about the man with a pitcher of water, or the upper room, as in Mark or Luke, but simply sending them to convey to the man, that He would eat the passover in his house. The proposal indicated that the Lord would be free in that house, that He could eat the passover there with His disciples in liberty and dignity in the house — not, in Matthew, in the upper room.
Now all that bears on what I have in mind; it prepares us for Paul; indeed, all the evangelists stress the idea of the house. Luke presents it to us in the most attractive way, and I speak now to the young people, because Luke has a peculiar way of gauging the necessities of souls, and he knows that young people love enjoyment. The world knows it too, and strains every nerve to supply the need. So Luke presents the house in chapter 14 as that which is to be filled — “that my house may be filled” (verse 23); but in chapter 15, as the place of enjoyment; figuratively the most delightful things are going on there — “music and dancing”; what is presented in the way of music, what is spoken of in regard to Christ, is so delightful, is presented so perfectly, and with such charm, that everyone dances, everyone moves in response. The elder brother had no interest in it at all.
Then John presents the house as the place in which the Son abides; the Son abides in the house for ever. He abides there. He abides in the house for ever; we shall never be without Him, and there we shall be truly free — a very great fact, especially at the present time.
[p. 130] Then John goes on later to tell us that the house was full of precious odour — “the house”, without saying whose house it was: “The house was filled with the odour of the ointment” (chapter 12:3). The sense of smell is delightfully ministered to in that house; there is nothing corrupt there. You will have noticed that the ointment which Mary used, was not in an alabaster box in John. The alabaster box would allude to the care with which the ointment was preserved from taint, but there is no need of that in John; it is to render tribute to Mary of Bethany, who loved our Lord Jesus Christ in incorruption. That is what you will find in the house in which Jesus is ministered to.
Now all these remarks will help us as to Ephesians, because Ephesians presents things in their fulness; not in a hard forced kind of way, but one thing growing out of another, and all coming out of a heart full, by the power of the Spirit. That is what marks Ephesians. The apostle’s heart was simply full, and words are employed to denote the excessive excellency and greatness of the divine things presented. So Paul speaking about both Jew and gentile having access through Christ “by one Spirit to the Father”, opens up his heart to these gentile believers, as indeed towards all. “No more strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of God”. What a word for us! Some of us have been speaking about the blind man whose eyes were opened (John 9), that he was cast out — a man without a country, without a family, without a religion; as we might say, even his parents undertaking nothing for him. What is he coming into? He is coming into all this of which I have been speaking. The Lord enquires of him, “dost thou believe on the Son of God?” (John 9:35). The Son of God will give him a country, a family, so that he is no longer a stranger and foreigner, but a “fellow-citizen of the saints, and of the household of God” — marvellous statement!
[p. 131] Now the passage goes on to show what this is, because we need to understand what the house is. And so the apostle says that it is “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the corner-stone”. Now look at that, dear brethren. You say the “foundation of the apostles and prophets”, are they in the foundations? Well, according to Revelation 21 they are, every one of them, for there were twelve foundations, and on each the name of an apostle of the Lamb — twelve names. The reference is to the quality of the apostles’ work in founding Christianity. I am not speaking so much of the foundation itself as the foundation of God; that is not exactly what is in view here — that is stated in 2 Timothy, where it is necessary to state it, because things are slipping away; but in Ephesians the apostle is speaking in love, his heart engrossed with the greatness of the divine things into which we are brought; he would convey that the very best is there; you cannot admit of anything better than “the apostles and prophets”. It is the quality here, not only the sureness of the foundation.
Then, after the foundation, he speaks of the topstone, as if the apostles and prophets were so in keeping with Christ in the laying of the foundation that He becomes the topstone of what they lay. So the structure is bound up with the very best in the apostles and prophets, and then the ornamentation and binding influence of the glorious Person of Christ, the head of the corner! Such is the house as Ephesians presents it, and what a place! How one seeks enlargement of heart to take it in, and to have a part in it, for Ephesians is the excellence of the thing, even from the foundation; and then the ornamentation and the binding influence of the glorious Person of Christ as the Head of the corner. The next thing the apostle says is, that it “increases to a holy temple in the Lord”. Though it has the form of a house now, a place of enjoyment for us — “a habitation of God in the Spirit” — it also increases, that [p. 132] is, it looks on to the time when the Lord will be supreme; it increases to a holy temple in the Lord. When He takes up the reins of government in the world, that which we have part in now will be the means in His hands of making His rule intelligible to all, for His reign will not be arbitrary; of course it will be absolute, but it is such a rule as will be intelligible, and acceptable to all. Thus I apprehend the idea of the building increasing to a holy temple in the Lord. When the Lord reigns by and by, He will rule in power, but all will be made intelligible in the temple.
I refer now a little to Chronicles, and what I would draw attention to is the king’s words, “in my affection for the house of my God”. I want to arouse affection in each of us, dear brethren, for the house; it is such a great commanding thought with God that He would have us not only to seek it as a place of enjoyment, but to have affection for it, and, as having affection for it, to come forward, and to make it as joyful and as glorious in a holy sense as we may. So, as I have said already, we have to distinguish between David’s affliction and David’s affection, what he provided in his affliction I apprehend to be according to his might, what he had as king, as he tells us elsewhere. As he commanded the resources of his empire he provided in abundance everything that was necessary to the house. And so, as afflicted, he sets forth, typically, Christ in the gospels. But then in chapter 22, in which he tells us that he provided all these things, mentioning the enormous sum of one hundred thousand talents of gold, and one thousand thousand talents of silver, and iron and brass and wood, and everything that was needed in abundance — in that very chapter you have Solomon. I wish to point out, dear brethren, hoping that the Lord will use it for our instruction, that Solomon in this chapter is Christ as Son as seen in the gospels. It is Christ as the suffering, afflicted David, but He is nevertheless the Son — “young and tender” it may be. I do [p. 133] not mean that Christ was that personally, but it is the way in which the idea of sonship is introduced for our apprehension. We have to learn things from the beginning; and so in chapter 22 David, having reached, not the foundation, but the place, which he purchased, begins to tell us what he had provided for the house, and then immediately you have Solomon. That is a matter that deserves our attention, that an afflicted David and a tender Solomon, his son, combined, is the Christ of the gospels. There is no change in the Person, but you have the combination of suffering and sonship — sonship in its tenderness, but nevertheless sonship. And so the wisdom and the provision and the ordering and the pattern all emanate from David. He represents the suffering Christ, the afflicted Christ. How that touches our heart! We are never to lose sight of that; but then the house is not built under those circumstances; the house is not built by a suffering Christ, an afflicted Christ; for the house was not built until David died. But the two things run together — the afflicted David and the tender son, Solomon, until they are both reigning together, a very remarkable thing; yet there is no foundation of the house laid under those circumstances: the element of war, the element of affliction, the element of suffering, these do not properly belong to the house. The house is a place of holy enjoyment. I am endeavouring to make it attractive to every one here, and specially to the young people. So when coming to the actual structure, and when Solomon acts by himself after David’s death, he represents the glorified Christ. The house is built or constructed, by a glorified Christ — a Son — but the Son in heaven. Think of the Son in heaven! You say, ‘It is the same Person who was on earth’. Of course it is; as to His Person He is “the same yesterday, and today, and for ever”;(Hebrews 13:8) there can be no change in His Person; but a Christ in heaven, is different from a Christ on earth; the Son of God in heaven is different from the Son of [p. 134] God on earth. You understand what I mean by the word ‘different’; the Christ that is in heaven, as raised from the dead went about among His people forty days. Where was He when He was not with them? Who can tell? We are in the presence of His inscrutability when we come to this. We must never reduce Christ in heaven to mere theological terms — never! We have to apprehend the Person of Christ in heavenly circumstances — what He is there, but the inscrutable always attaches to Him. He has gone up far above all the heavens, beyond the created worlds. Who can follow Him there? We cannot follow Him there, but He has gone there. He is Christ in heaven, nevertheless; and as the Christ in heaven He appears as the great builder of the church, the assembly. Paul says, “God ... was pleased to reveal his Son in me” (Galatians 1:15,16). What a Son is the glorified Christ! Think of the enjoyment going on between the Father and the Son! How He loved to dwell upon the fact, that He was going to His Father. He sends the message to His disciples: “I ascend to my Father and your Father, and to my God and your God” (John 20:17). So, He is up there in all the unalloyed enjoyment of the affection of the Father. Their reciprocated affections are enjoyed in their own sphere. Now all that enters into the formation of the house, as in Ephesians “through him we have both access by one Spirit to the Father”. So then ye are no longer strangers and foreigners. That is the idea, dear brethren.
When you come to 1 Kings, David is a weak, old man; he thus ceases really to be a type of Christ. The point in Chronicles is to bring out the greatness of Christ in the time of His sufferings, and as He is now in heaven. So the Holy Spirit dwells with great delight typically on the greatness of the provision for the house and its anticipated grandeur.
Coming back to this question of affection. Is it not attractive, this thought of the house? This place of [p. 135] holy, spiritual enjoyment to which we are called as sons. David says, “In my affection for the house of my God, I have given of my own property” — “my own property”. It was no longer a question of what belonged to him, as the monarch of the empire, in great volume, but it is a question of quality coming out of affection: “three thousand talents of the gold of Ophir” of his “own property”, it was that to which he had perfect personal right, his “own property”. What this is in the antitype I would leave you to explore; what this gold of Ophir is. As we come to the closing moments of our Lord’s life, and His great affection — and then how it is expressed to us through Paul, His chosen vessel — and his great affection, it is no longer a question of volume, but of something very special — “gold, of the gold of Ophir” — of His own property. Think of what Jesus has in this sense, and how He devotes it to the house! And then the silver: Solomon does not make much of silver in the structure, but David does, and I apprehend that it grows out of the death of Jesus. We must ever come back to that. All consideration of special devotedness, of special service, must come back to the love that devoted itself unto death, in view of all this. So there was the “gold of Ophir” — what was so special — but there was also the silver — the “seven thousand talents of refined silver” — referring, I apprehend, primarily to the love of Christ in redemption, and how all has been secured on that principle. So that we have the most delightful dwelling-place as the result of the special devotedness of Christ. He loved Israel, but there is something distinctive here, in the special devoting of what was His own property, in securing the thought of God. It is the best kind of gold and the refined silver. It has the church in view.
Then we have the appeal (1 Chronicles 29:5) which I hope will not be in vain, dear brethren. It is to whoever is ready to come forward for the work. The Lord has led the way for us, and we see in Ephesians how the [p. 136] one specially selected for these things followed Him in devoted energy. In His ministry we get what is special, answering to the gold of Ophir, which David gave. Paul, under the Lord, leads the way for us, in provision and care for the house. So that where God dwells in holy love — “a habitation of God in the Spirit”, is a place of spiritual joy for us.
May the appeal, dear brethren, come home to us so that we may not be wanting in affection for the house.
Pages 137 - 256 “Fixed Principles” Addresses, Britain, U.S.A., Canada, 1932 - 1933 (Volume 114).