THE MORNING STAR
J. Wright
2 Peter 1: 12–21; Revelation 2: 24–29; 22: 16, 17
In Europe at the present time things are happening very quickly. I believe it would show, beloved brethren, the imminence of the coming of the Lord Jesus. It is right to be intelligent as to what is going on in the world, particularly in Europe. John in the Revelation was later told to take the little book; it was only a little book; men have written volumes on the history of Europe. God has condensed it to a little book. So we are not to spend too much time on it, but to be intelligent as to what is happening. When John ate that book it was sweet in his mouth, as the word of God is, but it was bitter in his belly. The working of it out, the implication of it, was bitter to him, and as taking that book he was able to prophesy again. It is good to look into
prophecy; in the early days of the recovery they looked into it. Mr. Darby was certainly helped as to prophecy, as you will see if you look into his writings, but, beloved brethren, he would engage us with the One who is coming, the Lord Jesus Christ.
I want to speak of the One who is coming. These scriptures refer to the morning star. That is the way the Lord Jesus is known now by those who are waiting and watching for Him. He will not be known as the Morning Star when He comes; the time for that, beloved brethren, will be passed. The Morning Star is shining before the day comes; the day is coming, and He will then shine as “the Sun of righteousness ... with healing in his wings”, Malachi 4: 2. I wonder if we all know the Lord Jesus as the Morning Star. It is a way we can know Him now; if we do not know Him in this way now we never shall; we shall not know Him in that way when we are with Him. It is a blessed thing to have the experience of the Morning Star arising in our hearts. That is something that took place when Peter was writing to the saints. I believe it is something that has taken place in the hearts of those who are watching for Him throughout the dispensation, the Morning Star arising in our hearts. It makes all the difference to us. It gives us hope, it gives us a living hope. We are not looking for things in the world to get better. How many people in Europe today are looking for things to get better, through the upheavals in many countries. Will they get better? We thank God if men are delivered from any tyranny; but things will not really get better; they will not get better until the Lord Jesus comes Himself.
The hope of the believer is not that things here will get better; he is looking and waiting for the Lord. The church publicly has forgotten Him; the world has forgotten Him; the world is
asleep. Is there anyone here asleep as to the time? It is time we should be aroused out of sleep; the time of our salvation is near (see Romans 13: 11). The time of the Lord’s coming for us is near. How the Lord will love to have the church with Himself, to have those who belong to Him with Himself. Can anyone doubt the Lord’s love for the assembly, His love for His own? He says to His own in John’s gospel, “I go, to prepare you a place” (John 14: 2); that place is prepared because He is there; He says, “I am coming again and shall receive you to myself, that where I am ye also may be” (John 14: 3). Think of the Lord’s desire in, receiving us to Himself. The proof, the evidence, that we are waiting for the Lord Jesus and watching for Him, is that we desire His company now. Could there be anything more blessed? Particularly when we are younger, we like more company. The very best company is open to us, available to us. The company of the saints is very good; you could not be in a better company than those that love our Lord Jesus Christ, but it is possible to know the Lord’s own company.
Peter could write to the saints as one who knew the Lord’s company. The point came in his history when he left all and followed Jesus. The Lord Jesus had become so attractive to him.
Peter knew what he himself was as a sinner, a sinful man in the presence of the Lord Jesus, yet he was so attracted to the Lord Jesus that he left all and followed Him. I would like to ask each one of us whether we have really come to a point of committal to the Lord Jesus. I have suffered myself through being indefinite, a lack of definiteness about divine things. Many of us have been brought up where the light has been known, our parents have had the light. It is a privilege to be brought up where the light is and where the truth is, where the light as to Christ is. God’s sovereignty and the
Lord’s sovereignty enter into that. We could have been born and lived in a heathen household, but the Lord has seen fit to place us in the environment where the light is known, where He Himself is known, where He Himself is treasured. But you cannot drift into things; if you are to know the Lord Jesus as the Morning Star it involves a definite committal to Him.
You reach that point where you commit yourself to Him. Peter did that. You might say that at times he got away from it. He went off to fish later. There are times, I know, when I have got away from Him, but I know there was a point in my own history when I committed myself to Him definitely, and the Lord brings you back to the point of committal. I would say, beloved brethren, it is essential for each one of us to come to that point; we shall never enjoy Christianity rightly until we do. We shall never find what there is to be known and enjoyed until we definitely commit ourselves to Him.
Peter made this committal, and as a result of committing himself to the Lord he was richly compensated. The Lord will richly compensate anyone who commits themselves to Him in this way. Peter had the privilege of being with the Lord in His public service, following Him, and learning from Him. We cannot go back and be with the Lord as He was here, but still the Lord will compensate us. He will give us a sense of what His company is and what He will lead us into and show us. He will show you things which are well worthwhile, give you a sense of His own glory. Peter was selected with two others to be with Him on the holy mountain. What a rich compensation! The Lord selected those three men. You say, ‘They had a distinctive place’; so they did. It was educational for them to be with the Lord, and it is the greatest education we can have to be in the company of the Lord, to learn from Him—better
than any college, better than any university, to be educated by the Lord Jesus. If we are to fill out our part in the testimony we need to be educated for it; we do not just slip into the testimony and fill out our part without being educated for it. The Lord took great pains to educate these men for their part in the testimony. We have each a part to fill out in the testimony. It would not be Peter’s part; no one could take Peter’s part, and there is no successor to Peter. There are those who tell you there is a successor to him, but he has no successor. He was talking about putting off his tabernacle here; he was not speaking about a successor. You cannot succeed anyone else; you have your own part to fill out in the testimony.
Peter was on the holy mount and he would give the saints what he had experienced. He was like that; in the Acts he said to that poor man as he was going to the temple, “but what I have, this give I to thee” (Acts 3: 6). He had gained something in his own soul as to Christ. This experience he had with the Lord Jesus on the holy mount had grown and matured with him. I would commend to you, beloved brethren, and to our younger brethren, to set ourselves in committal to Christ, to have experiences with Him, in our personal lives and in the assembly too. There is nothing greater than what you can experience in the assembly; you can touch things in your own life with the Lord but there is something even greater in the assembly.
So Peter and the two others were on the holy mount and he says, “but I will use diligence, that after my departure ye should have also, at any time, in your power to call to mind these things. For we have not made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, following cleverly imagined fables”. It was nothing he had made up
in his own mind; it was something he had experienced; he had been an eyewitness—
“eyewitnesses” he says, “of his majesty”. He speaks of the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus is coming. We referred to the kingdom in the reading, and this would relate to that. In Matthew’s gospel it says, “the Son of man coming in his kingdom”
(Matthew 16: 28); the Lord is coming in His kingdom. He is going to be publicly vindicated; His glory is going to be publicly seen in that day. The believer in the Lord Jesus is in the secret of it now, the power and coming of our Lord Jesus. It has been said that for the believer the millennium is now; not in our circumstances, for they may not be very congenial, but you get a sense of the glory of the Lord.
He is already crowned. He has been crowned by the Father; He has been crowned with glory and honour; we see Jesus crowned with glory and honour. We do not see everything brought into subjection to Him yet; everything is brought into subjection to Him according to the mind of God, but not yet publicly so. It will be in that day. He has been crowned in heaven by the Father. It says here, “For he received from God the Father honour and glory, such a voice being uttered to him by the excellent glory—This is my beloved Son, in whom I have found my delight”. Peter had witnessed that and heard that, the Lord Jesus receiving honour and glory from the Father. That glory is going to be displayed in the world to come when Jesus comes, when He is manifested in His public appearing. Peter was in the present gain and joy of it, the realization that that blessed One had received from the Father honour and glory. It is something Peter had in his soul; these things would have stood Peter in good stead throughout his lifetime, throughout his pathway here. That blessed One who
had been rejected by men, cast away. He had received from the Father honour and glory. And the Father honoured Him in raising Him from among the dead and exalting Him. Peter’s early testimony was as to the exaltation of the Lord Jesus Christ. What power it gave Peter in testimony. And He is the coming One. His light is going to radiate in the day to come, in the world to come, but the light from that blessed One radiates now in the heart of the believer who is watching and waiting for Him.
Peter says, “and the morning star arise in your hearts”. Has He arisen in your heart, beloved brother or sister? Has He arisen in my heart? You know, it will deliver us from a lot of earthly things that engage us, and prospects here, if the One who is the Morning Star has arisen in our hearts. He loves us; He is coming for us because He loves us; He loves His own.
He loved Peter. Peter was about to put off his tabernacle; he had the sense of that; he was to suffer martyrdom. The Lord had told him that, and in that death he was to glorify God. But he was sustained in a living hope by that blessed One. He would pass it on to the saints that they too might have this hope. He would stir them up, stir up their hearts, that their affections might be focused upon the One who is coming, who is the Morning Star.
In Revelation 2 the Lord gives the overcomer in Thyatira the morning star—“and I will give to him the morning star”. It has been said that this could have been the darkest point publicly in the church’s history. Thyatira has gone down in history as the dark ages, when men were engulfed in superstition and darkness, and yet there were those who were apart from it even in that day. The Lord speaks here of the overcomer, “he that overcomes”. He presents Himself to this assembly as the Son of God—“These things says, the Son of God, he that
has his eyes as a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass” (Revelation 2: 18). The Lord is taking account of everything, moving in a judicial way. He is the Son of God; He does not cease to be that. Paul could speak of “the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me”, and John would have a sense of that himself. The Son of God takes account of things.
He takes account of their works, “I know thy works, and love, and faith, and service”; the Lord commends all He can commend. Think of that, beloved brethren; the Lord will rightly appraise what He can appraise, what He can value; whatever may be done for Him, the Lord does not forget; whatever you may have done for Him the Lord rightly takes account of. But He takes account of everything; if there is something displeasing to Him, He would draw your attention to it in His faithful love. I believe the knowledge of the Son of God would deliver us from lawlessness; it would deliver us from idolatry too, from anything that would come in between our hearts and Himself.
The Lord would take account of that; He would take account of it in His faithful love, and He would draw attention to it. He would speak of it in faithfulness that we might judge it, that we might overcome it, and enjoy His love in an unclouded way. So the Lord loves those who are with Him as to things. There were those in Thyatira who were with Him, there was the remnant; there was the general body of the church, and there was that woman Jezebel being allowed there, yet the Lord speaks of “the rest”. There were those who were with Him, who were not with what was going on generally. How the Lord likes to take account of those who are not going along with the stream, not going on in that sink of corruption. There were persons who were with Him, “the rest”; they had not known certain things, “as many as have not this doctrine, who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say
I do not cast upon you any other burden; but what ye have hold fast till I shall come”. Hold it fast, beloved brethren; if you have something, in your relations with the Lord, hold fast to it, do not let it go. The enemy would seek to rob you of it; he would do all he can to rob you of it. If you have something in your soul that is precious, hold on to it. “Hold fast till I shall come”. There will be no need to be overcoming when He comes, the need is to be an overcomer now. He says, “And he that overcomes, and he that keeps unto the end my works”—it is not here My words, but “my works”. Think of the works of the Lord Jesus; He went about here doing good; in all that He did exhibiting kindness and goodness to men. He made God known. You see, men may do acts of kindness and goodness, but it may be to magnify themselves, but the Lord Jesus in what He did He made God known.
So, beloved brethren, we are to be here for that purpose; one who is waiting and watching for our Lord Jesus would be on that line. Then it says, “and he that keeps unto the end my works, to him will I give authority over the nations, and he shall shepherd them with an iron rod; as vessels of pottery are they broken in pieces”. The Lord gives this to the overcomer in Thyatira; as we know, it represents a phase in church history that has gone on to the present time when the church has sought to rule, to rule the nations; the popish system has done that.
Think of the audacity of that, to rule when Christ is in rejection. What has happened to men through the abuse of rule has been seen recently in some parts of Europe. The Lord takes account of it; God takes account of it. Who can shepherd? There would be firmness,
“shepherd them with an iron rod”. How does a person learn to do that?—You learn it from Christ, you learn it in your own experience. You know what a Shepherd He is; you learn the
shepherd care of the Lord Jesus Christ; yet there is firmness attaching to it. How thankful we can be that there is firmness in it. How many of us would be here today if He had not been firm? It has cut across certain things we might have done, but it is in His love: He has kept us and preserved us, and it is for our good.
So it is what we learn from Him in the time of His rejection, but it will come out in that day.
These persons will be qualified to rule; the Lord will give them authority, and they will shepherd the nations with an iron rod. Then He says, “as I also have received from my Father; and I will give to him the morning star”. That is for the present, that is not for the future; you get that portion, you get the Lord Himself, the Morning Star, One who lightens everything up for us. One who keeps us in hope, One who keeps us bright in Him, the Morning Star. He is the One who is coming, beloved brethren. He is the One who sustains us and keeps us. Well, may we be exercised to be overcomers at the present time. There is not a phase in church history when overcoming is not needed; it is needed today. The Lord is quickly coming. May we be strengthened to be overcomers.
Now I finally want to refer to this appeal at the end. It is Jesus speaking; “I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things to you in the assemblies”. It is the personal name of Jesus.
When we first came to know Him how sweet that name was! We sometimes sing—
‘How sweet the Name of Jesus sounds
In a believer’s ear!
It soothes his sorrows, heals his wounds,
And drives away his fear’.
It is the same blessed Person, and He says, “I am the root and offspring of David”. He is the root of David. Think of what is coming out in the
world to come; the promises to David all have their source in the Lord Jesus Christ; everything will have its source in Him, the root of David. It speaks of His Deity too, who He is. Then He is the offspring of David; He is the One who is going to inherit everything; He is the rightful Heir, the rightful King. He is going to inherit it all. Then He says, “the bright and morning star”. That word “bright” is added at the end—“the bright and morning star”. He is appealing, speaking to His own, and He says I am “the bright and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come”. There is immediate response to the Lord as He presents Himself in this way as “the bright and morning star”. Those who know Him in this way will respond to Him, and say, Come, to Him. It is a great thing, a great exercise, that we might be ready for Him. “The Spirit and the bride say, Come”. Despite all that has come into the church publicly, there is this cry; there is a vessel in complete unison with the Spirit, “the Spirit and the bride say, Come”, a vessel in full accord with the Spirit. How faithfully the Spirit has served that it might be so. The cry has gone out, “Behold, the bridegroom; go forth to meet him”, Matthew 25: 6. We know what this relationship means, the bride, the assembly viewed in this way, where there is pure affection for Christ. How Paul laboured at it to present the saints a chaste virgin to Christ. I was struck on Lord’s day in considering Rebecca. When she came on to view it was said she was a virgin, suggesting pure affections for Christ. Those who know His company; those who know Him in this way, they are the ones who say, Come. I am challenged in my own heart as to whether I can join in that, “the Spirit and the bride say, Come”.
Well, beloved brethren, may we respond to Him in this way, and may we be ready. The close of
the dispensation requires that there should be a vessel with this feminine response. The dispensation is not going out in defeat. It is not going to end in public glory; the public side will remain; the public ruin of the church will remain to the end; but it is not going to end in defeat—“the Spirit and the bride say, Come”, there is going to be something for Christ. In however few it may be, it will be there. I would like to be among them. It is those who know the Lord in this way as “the bright and morning star” who will respond—“the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that hears say, Come”. Is there anyone hearing who has not yet said. Come? The word is, “let him that hears say, Come”. Join in; come into this. It can be known as we commit ourselves to the Lord Jesus Christ. Then it says, “And let him that is athirst come”—the evangelical call goes out to the end. There is a lot said about being evangelical; there are those who are evangelical; those who know Christ’s love in this relationship, know what it is to respond to Him, who have bridal affections, they are the best ones to be evangelical, to bring in persons. “And let him that is athirst come; he that will, let him take the water of life freely”. So it is available; the water of life is freely available. The Lord Jesus has suffered that it might be available.
Well, I just feel the need of this myself, beloved brethren, to know the Lord in this way as
“the bright and morning star”, that we may be ready for Him when He comes. May it be so, in His name.
Address at Buckhurst Hill
December 1989