THE TIME OF THE SPIRIT

Summary of Readings

A.J.E.Welch

(i) John 14: 1-4, 15-24; 20: 17, 18.

The Lord would give us a better and more extensive appreciation of what attaches to this present time of the Spirit. This is the great climax of the dispensations, never prophetically defined as to length; Mark 13 reminding us that the extent of it is the Father's own matter. The Lord sets it out for us here by relating it to His own movements, "I go to prepare you a place ... I am coming again and shall receive you to myself". No suggestion of man's failures has any part at all in the extension or conclusion of this time. Running along with this, the passage in John 20, which the Lord seemed to put into our minds together this morning, shows that the great divine unfoldings began at their full height - “my Father and your Father, and my God and our God". The Lord is ensuring that His living relations with those who love Him are never to be interrupted. It is a great challenge and stimulus to be constantly in living relations with Himself. It is through the Spirit we have part in the life of Christ. The Spirit would exceedingly enrich what is spiritual, and the need to get into what is spiritual is great. The realisation of Christ in glory strengthens confidence. We have the fullest furnishings from God's side, and the power to be engaged with glory. He could say, “Go to my brethren ..."; the glorious side of accomplishment bursts on our view, with the intenseness of what is presented, against the intenseness of what is presented against the background of darkness. The whole position is clear, and the feelings of the Lord are disclosed to us as He comes to this.

(ii) Matthew 13: 16-52.

The point of enquiry in mind is this remarkable time in which God has called us - this distinctive period of His ways in which what is richest and best relating to the scope of love's purposes is being secured. It is a momentous time in which there is no room for part-time Christianity; it is to bring out the sweetness and power of the love of Christ for the assembly, and on our side the committed, refined and full answer of true hearts entering into what is in the Lord's mind. The intensive activity of the blessed Spirit should never find us slow or sluggish, but quick to enter upon these engagements in the realm of life, the great spiritual realm which more than ever is to be the occupation of the saints. This section of Matthew is of great import in what is before us, because we are shown how God in His infinite wisdom has established things in view of fruit for Himself appearing and being gathered, and indeed garnered, despite the intrusion of mixed conditions. God is working this out in proximity to what has altogether different origins, so that the word “suffer both to grow together unto the harvest is significant. The Lord indicates what will then take place - the darnel gathered into bundles, the wheat brought together into the granary. This helps us to understand how the good fruit is appearing in immediate proximity to that which results from what the enemy has done. The Kingdom - power and authority - is needed, so that God, in a way which to man is entirely mysterious, proceeds to the end He has in view. The Lord emphasises the importance of the parable, focusing His remarks upon the disciples ("Ye", v 18), distinguished from the crowds. The Kingdom involves power guarding the testimony, the saints and the truth. We have to be submissive to Christ, acknowledging His authority and the principles in which the Kingdom operates. We are to be genuinely unpretentious and humble in respect of much that is past and current at the present time. "Gathered together unto my name" (Matt 18: 20) provides a thoroughly legitimate position for Him to come to. There is intensity of feeling when the Lord speaks of the treasure and the pearl; "one pearl" is a concentration of what is most precious to Him, one single entity. Depth of conviction is needed of what the assembly is to the heart of Christ. Discipleship is seen in persons of subject wills and minds who assemble in the humility of those who would be taught by the Lord.

(iii) Acts 26: 15-19; 1 Corinthians 15: 3-10; Acts 20: 28-32.

The time of the Spirit has in mind the fullest and richest product of what is formed of God in manhood in the saints. Great potentiality lies in the Spirit for producing manhood like Christ. This priestly scribe, Luke, teaches this side of things, giving the episode of the Damascus road three times to show how a man was laid hold of by a glorified Christ. Luke links the idea of growth with the Person of Jesus, but what grew was just what it was in the perfection of His humanity, perfect at every step and point of growth. In every one of us, as in Saul of Tarsus, the power of sin had to be overcome. It could not be dealt with apart from the precious work of Christ, His suffering, death, burial and rising again. His work complete gives wonderful scope to the Spirit to form in the saints those features, so precious, of that manhood, having the assembly in mind. Paul is before us both as himself a leading subject of the living touch of a glorified Christ and then as a servant taking his place in the quality of needed service that would further this great work in persons, and especially in local assemblies. Paul delights to take his place in humility amongst his brethren. The Lord came out of heaven to secure him in refinement of formation. In present smallness young men are called to rise up and stand on their feet. The Spirit is needed for this. Formation of manhood in us we understand and practice continual self-judgment. The emphasis here is on the matter of appearings to Paul. “What I shall appear to thee in” is a reference to the assembly. We should be set for the carrying forward of formation, and strengthen, help and if need be, exhort one another. 1 Cor 15 is a chapter of spiritual matters, involving the distinctive character of Christ's work in the saints. We are here in charge! How shall we go away? What are we going to devote our energy to? Things in a locality will not prosper if there are not those prepared to commit themselves to the Pauline charge in energy. The Lord will sustain us in life by being kept in nearness to Him.

(iv) Revelation 21: 2-4, 9-12, 21 to end; 22: 1-5.

We need to keep this expansive time in our minds in the light of what was referred to in prayer, that we are those "upon whom the ends of the ages are come". The Spirit would give us to survey the great, and in certain respects, complex area of divine dealings and see everything in its due place. It makes us very restful. God would have have us basically restful. John is affected by what he sees and hears, but is never in a disturbed condition. He knows his God too well. To refer to this book at this point would enlarge our area of interest, seeing all, as John does, in reference to one supremely attractive creature vessel. Our minds can be directed by the Spirit to a single entity though it be a city and though it have the characteristics of a bride. So we have a culmination of what is Pauline and of what relates to John's view, with which we began. We might well think of John and his lifetime; what diversity of experience he had. Now he is caused to regard what Paul has wrought and to see it in relation to the enemy's vigorous attacks upon it. We may perhaps get our affections expanded in these things that have to do with the final conclusion of everything in view of God's eternity. Abraham waited for the city. Why did he single out in his mind the thought of a city? His faith acted in view of this conception which he appeared to cherish - the city. That was compensation for leaving Ur of the Chaldees. The idea of a city in scripture is seemingly introduced by man, but God would say, "I already have that concept prominently in My mind". The psalmist speaks of a city "compact together''. It involves inter-relationships of life. The city is tangible. The assembly is not just an abstract idea. Paul especially has that in mind. At Corinth, "I have espoused you unto one man, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ". There might be one brother and his wife in a place, but what is in view is the assembly, no less. In the Spirit's day there should be a great conception of what the city is. Mr Taylor used to say how Abraham rejoiced to see Christ's day (John 8: 56). here was something he saw that intimated to his soul the glorious character of what God had in view.

In the eternal view of the city very, very little detail is given. What can we say in our present conditions about that vessel in which the divine dwelling will be? We are just cast upon the Spirit of God to us a view, such as He alone can give us, of something which awaits a new condition of things for its full unfolding, and yet the character of which is intimated to use now. The tabernacle of God being with men is perhaps the most blessed feature given to us. We come in the assembly to the culmination of everything God had in His mind throughout all the ages and we touch the vessel in which God can dwell with men. If the Spirit is free in this company nothing is out of reach of what is unfolded on God's side. The Spirit can tell us anything within the area of revealed truth. There might be a brother and his wife and maybe another sister gathered in a place to read the precious scriptures; just as much as is open to them, basically. There may not be a great assertion of gift, that has its right place in divine arrangements; but as to what the Spirit can unfold, just as much is open to them. Much is in the mind of God, but He has brought out something, a single glorious vessel which, so to say, presents to the universe what is peculiarly precious to Himself. Think of God, speaking with reverence, producing His masterpiece and displaying it, opening out what His mind is, to worshipping sons! It is something which He brings into view in tangible character as speaking of Himself. Is not that most blessed? These scriptures are peculiarly satisfying. God is showing us that to which the word "completion" does attach, but is scarcely adequate, because what is here is in fulness. "The former things have passed away". Earlier in the book it says, "The cities of the nations fell". The features that fill the world around have passed away and are not governing us. This is anticipated, according to measure, in the assembly now. Peter reminds us in the second letter, "All these things then being to be dissolved" (chap 3: 11). Are we to have our minds filled with those things? The Spirit would fill our minds with things which relate to the true portion of the assembly and its present engagement with Christ and His interests.

The thought of "a bride adorned for her husband" would have a sanctifying effect upon us. Can we just get a view of what the Lord has for His own heart, and what God has for His own pleasure, and move into what is touched later when it says, "his servants shall serve him"? What is the crowning object of our pathways? Is there something we had in mind to do tomorrow which need not be done, or which would further God’s dispensation which is in faith? What can we engage the attention and affectionate interest of the dear young brothers and sisters with? Could there be anything more precious than to engage their minds with this city? "Her shining" is a divinely accorded distinction in this choice vessel. There is reflected glory, and there is something constitutionally in this vessel which is of God, which marks off her distinctiveness from everything else in the realm of creation. John the baptist was the burning and the shining light. What was inward was first. The shining is wherever the assembly characteristically is, including the very small companies. Where the simple-hearted devotion of such a vessel is, the shining will appear. Philippians is an attractive epistle, a love letter as Mr Taylor said, but containing that gentle but firm injunction to those two sisters to be of one mind in the Lord. Conditions may be small; Abraham dwelt in tents with Isaac and Jacob. Occasions like this, arranged in a simple, informal manner provide great opportunity for those relationships to be deepened. We go away in a few minutes to the homes of the brethren and an atmosphere of liberty there in which the continuance of the same things is assured to us. This means that God is providing ways for what is of Himself to be built into the constitution of the saints, and built into the constitution of localities, so that they are no longer systematised companies of people with no life, and no enjoyment, and no objective, but companies of persons in the fulness of links with a glorified Christ, the enjoyment of those links proving fruitful immediately to God in His service. What John is presented in the eternal setting would be the fulness of what Paul had begun to teach as to new creation. He begins by saying, “If anyone be in Christ there is new creation" and then "I know a man in Christ". A new creation order of things is to come in; it says here "Behold, I make all things new''. These things are in the Spirit's custody to open out to us. The Spirit of God has an attractive way of presenting things, to cause us to enquire in to these things and find in our experience what they mean.

As to the prominence of the Lamb, there is no change in the way Jesus is before us. The Spirit gives us to realise the extent of what that Person has accomplished for God and for us. All that we know of the blessed God we know through Him. It is an intimation of what, in its full character, constitutes the mediatorial system. God is known to us in that way - God and the Lamb, who in sacrificial love secured all this for Him.

BUCKHURST HILL

24-26 December 1972