THE ISRAEL OF GOD
[p. 554] THE ISRAEL OF GOD
None of the things mentioned here as the distinction and privilege of Israel have ceased to be; they all subsist in a spiritual way in the church, which is spoken of by Paul in Galatians 6: 16 as “the Israel of God”.
First we get “the adoption” — sonship. This pertained to Israel as we see in Exodus 4: 22, 23: “Thus saith Jehovah: Israel is my son, my firstborn. And I say to thee, Let my son go, that he may serve me”. But sonship at the present time pertains to the church. Adoption is man in liberty and the joy of known relationship with God. Wherever we find God delighting in His people, and His people delighting in Him, that is, in principle, adoption. It is a mutuality of affection and delight between God and His saints. “If Jehovah delight in us, he will bring us into this land, and give it us” (Numbers 14: 8), shows adoption known by Joshua and Caleb. God would have His delight in man to be known, and this comes out in adoption.
We are brought into sonship by the Son of God being preached to us as glad tidings. God revealed His Son in the apostle Paul; He made that blessed One known in the affections of a man here on earth that that man might preach Him as glad tidings. God’s thought for man in wondrous grace is to give him the place, relationship, and Spirit of the risen, glorified Man — His beloved Son. In this we see how God’s heart is set upon man. The shining of it forth in manifest glory will be the blessing of the universe in another day.
The full thought of God concerning us is sonship, and He has set it forth in His beloved Son. When we believe the glad tidings we get the Spirit of God’s Son — the Spirit of sonship — so that we may delight in God with responsive affections. The ministry of the new covenant sets forth what God is for man, but sonship is what man is for God. It is more than [p. 555] reconciliation; I should connect reconciliation with priesthood — it is moral suitability for service in connection with holy things — but sonship is relationship and responsive affections. Sonship is involved in “I ascend to my Father and your Father”, but reconciliation and priesthood would come in rather with “My God and your God” (John 20: 17).
Sonship pertained to Israel, but we have it now in a higher way; it was their place as an earthly people, but now sonship is in connection with a heavenly order of things. Israel will come into sonship by and by, but not in the same way as the church. I could not say that the revelation of God will ever be less than it is, but the capacity to receive and respond to it differs in various families. Sonship, as known by us, is the place of the risen glorified Son of God; it has a distinctively heavenly character; and we have the Spirit of the One who has ascended to His Father and ours. The apprehension of that gives a blessed sense of liberty. Sonship gives character to the whole structure of grace in the souls of the saints, and we need to be evangelised so as to know it better. We have not the full gospel without sonship. How blessed to see that Man is in the presence of the Father for His delight; God has satisfaction in a perfect Man who answers to Him in full responsive affection. That is His thought for us, and He makes it good in us by giving us the Spirit of that Man.
So far as we are concerned the cross has to come in; we have to go in judgment, and we have to learn experimentally the necessity for this. But in the gospel, God gives us the truth as divine light; the cross shows me what I am, and how God has removed me from His own eye, and in the Son of God I see the full blessedness of God’s thought for me. Romans shows how the gospel is perfectly adapted to meet all the need of man; Galatians shows how it is exclusive of man after the flesh; but in both epistles it is the Son of God who is the substance of the glad tidings. Romans 8 goes on to the consummation of God’s purpose — the saints “conformed to the image of his Son, so that he should be the firstborn among many brethren” (verse 29).
Then “the glory” pertained to Israel. The glory of Israel was God’s presence in their midst. “Thy God thy glory” (Isaiah 60: 19) will be true of them in the world to come. Simeon, when he took the child Jesus in his arms, spoke of Him as “the glory of thy people Israel” (Luke 2: 32). The presence of God is today the glory of His people. The church is “built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit”. Pentecost was like the glory filling the house. The apostle pressed the truth of the temple upon the Corinthians because if God’s glory is in the assembly, man’s glory can have no place there. God’s presence was to be so really in evidence that an unconverted man coming in to the meetings could take cognisance of it. We are “the living God’s temple; according as God has said, I will dwell among them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be to me a people” (2 Corinthians 6: 16). This is “the glory” which pertains to the Israel of God, and it demands separation from everything that is unsuited to the presence of God. He dwells in His assembly, and His activities are there — it is “the assembly of the living God” (1 Timothy 3: 15). In the assembly all must be suitable to Him; a vessel to dishonour is one who gives a wrong impression of God. It was when Christians lost the sense of the presence of God that human activities came in. That was the “Ichabod” of the church — if one may say so — the glory had departed. All the gifts are in the dispensation of the Spirit, under the administration of the Lord, but God is the One who “operates all things in all” (1 Corinthians 12: 6). It is a wonderful awakening when souls come to see that God’s presence and activities are the glory of His people. After that you do not desire, but dread man’s activities.
The next thing is “the covenants”. There are two thoughts in connection with covenant. One comes out in Hebrews 9 where covenant is used very much in the sense of a will which makes known the disposition of the testator. Then there is also in covenant the thought of a bond of agreement according to which two parties go on together. God has brought the [p. 557] disposition of His heart into evidence in the death of His Son; He has written that wonderful testament in the blood of His own Son . God has brought to light His perfect grace and love towards His poor fallen creature; His compassion and mercy and goodness are made known in the covenant.
But the very grace which the covenant declares as existing on God’s part becomes the bond of agreement between God and those with whom He consummates the covenant. If God engages and binds Himself to man by the covenant it is that man may be bound to Him according to the terms of that covenant. God works in man by His own quickening power, so that there may be an appreciation of the covenant in man’s heart. As to Israel, this quickening is seen in the valley of dry bones (Ezekiel 37). The people will be made to live in the knowledge of God — to live in that which He has made Himself known to be in grace — and what God is will be the bond of agreement between Him and His people. “All shall know me in themselves, from the little one among them unto the great among them” (Hebrews 8: 11), and the knowledge of God will form an unbreakable bond between Him and His people; they will be bound to Him in the knowledge of what He is. “My people shall be satisfied with my goodness” (Jeremiah 31: 14). What God is becomes the security of the whole universe of bliss.
Closely connected with the covenant is “the lawgiving”. God will put His laws into the mind, and write them in the heart of Israel. That is, He will so operate in quickening power in man’s intelligence and affections that man will be in accord with all that He is. The Lord is the Spirit of the covenant, but on the other hand Christ is the Spirit of the law. All the will of God in regard to man has come to light in Him; all that is pleasurable to God in man is seen in Christ. In having the Spirit of Christ, and being formed thereby, the “lawgiving” is made good in the saints. God will bring to pass in another day that the law will be set forth in Israel, and His will will find expression in a people here on earth. But this has place now in the “Israel of God”. In Balaam’s prophecy we see a people in the wilderness according to God’s mind.
The next thing is “the service”. This is in relation to holy things, and is priestly or Levitical. “The service” was all connected with the tabernacle, but we have to do with the spiritual realities which were typified in the tabernacle. It is very important that priestly and Levitical service should be maintained. A priest is marked by intelligence of God’s mind. “The priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and at his mouth they seek the law” (Malachi 2: 7). One part of the service is sacrificial; there is the offering up of spiritual sacrifices. Then there is the intercessory part — the offering of incense on the golden altar. It is a great and holy service to pray for the testimony. Another part of the priest’s service has to do with the maintenance of light and administration as set forth in the candlestick and the table of shewbread. Then the Levite is under the direction of the priest, and his service is more of an outward character. We are priests within, but Levites without. We have to carry all that is of God in testimony here. “The service” is maintained today in the Israel of God as saints are exercised and in spiritual power. If we better understood our place in sonship with the Father, we should better understand our position in relation to the testimony. All the treasures of wisdom and knowledge were set forth in figure in the tabernacle; it was a pattern of things in the heavens. The priests and Levites had charge of the tabernacle when it was set up and when it was in movement. We ought to be exercised about being in priestly fitness for “the service”. The apostle Paul was concerned as to the Corinthians because they were not in priestly garments. The thought of bearing God’s testimony is blessed, but at the same time serious, for it necessitates separation and moral suitability to God. In Nehemiah’s day the wall was built before the priests and Levites took up their service.
Now we come to “the promises”. The promises were all occasioned by the development of the power and fruits of evil in the world. And promises come in because in the wisdom of God it was not His way to meet the evil by bringing in good manifestly at once, but to leave it to work itself out in full result, and at the same time to be a test and discipline to faith. Evil was manifested here in every possible way, but good was known in the blessed promises of God, which faith laid hold of. The promises are wonderful if you look at them as setting forth what is good in the midst of a world of evil. God will not merely remove what is evil, but He will remove it by bringing in the corresponding good. He has a triumphant answer of good to every form of evil that sin and Satan’s power have brought in . Now the Israel of God is a people here on earth boasting in all the good that is of God. We embrace all that is still future so far as manifestation goes, and stand consciously in all the good of God. He has firmly attached His saints to the One in whom all the good is established; all the promises are Yea and Amen in the Son of God; and all are to the glory of God by us. The church’s true dignity and blessedness are to stand consciously in the knowledge and joy of all that is good, and outside the church good cannot be found, for it has not yet been brought in publicly.
Then we have “the fathers”. We have Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and all the rest, in a much more real way than Israel after the flesh had them. Every feature of God’s ways came out in connection with “the fathers”, and nothing is more important than that we should have knowledge of the ways of God. Hence the great value of the Old Testament, and saints lose much who neglect it.
Then the crown of all is “the Christ, who is over all, God blessed for ever”. We have Him not according to flesh, but according to Spirit. That wondrous Person of whom we were speaking this afternoon — the Head. Great glory and privilege attach to the saints as “the Israel of God”. Sonship [p. 560] is the basis of everything, and the crown and topstone is “the Christ”. Paul was in intense exercise because those to whom such blessed things pertained were missing all the good of them. Israel after the flesh missed everything. Now it is an exercise for us whether we are really in the good of what pertains to us as “the Israel of God”. May God give us eyes to see, and hearts to value these things, for in them eternal life subsists. These things constitute spiritually Mount Zion where God commands “the blessing, life for evermore” (Psalm 133: 3).