THE GLAD TIDINGS AND THE MYSTERY
R. Taylor
Romans 16: 25–27; 1 Corinthians 2: 7–10;
I was impressed as reading these verses in Romans with Paul’s connection between the glad tidings and the mystery. He speaks of these two things as closing the epistle showing
how closely they are linked; they are part of our great heritage, dear brethren. God has not only come in to meet the question of our sins, He has given us a place in a wonderful company, the vessel that is spoken of as the assembly of God. As we look at these scriptures I trust we will get some fresh impression of it, according to His purpose before time began. Mr. Darby gives a very fine footnote as to the mystery, ‘It formed no part of what was unfolded in the ages of time, in which God developed his plans in creation; it was a purpose before, and eternally hidden; it was not in reckoned time’. If you look through the Old Testament scriptures you will not find anything that refers directly to our present position and circumstances, but we can see that there are types of it, because God could not hide what was so precious to His heart. This day that we are in was purposed before the ages of time. It gives a very elevated view of the present time.
You think of the days of Moses, and other Old Testament saints, they all belong to a different dispensation, and all awaited the incoming of Jesus. In the incoming of Christ God found the Man that He had looked for down the ages of time and He found it in His beloved Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, a Man upon whom the heavens could be opened. He found there One who came to do His will, no one before had been able to do that, but He found in Jesus One upon whom the whole purposes and counsels of love depended, and so a new dispensation began, which formed no part of His ways before. A new day dawned when Jesus entered into the world, and it was established in His death and resurrection which enabled God to come out righteously and reveal His thoughts and purposes regarding men.
So Paul says here, “according to my glad tidings”. The whole epistle is unfolding God’s glad tidings concerning His Son. He is pointing men to look no longer to themselves, or to measure themselves by the law, but he says it is the glad tidings of God concerning His Son.
You say, I thought it was
concerning me. No, the glad tidings is concerning His Son, and God would have all men to come to see how much Christ means to Him. So Paul is seeking to establish souls, “Now to him that is able to establish you, according to my glad tidings”. What does that mean? It means in the first place that your sins are met. As you go through Romans it begins with the awfulness of man. It says, “There is not a righteous man, not even one”, Romans 3: 10. It goes over the experiences that man finds in himself. I am sure all who would come to that part of the glad tidings, feel that, outside of Christ, they are lost, helpless, hopeless in the sight of God; a condition that He could hardly look on. Yet in Christ He has presented a Saviour, who has met, not only your sins and your guilt, but the whole condition of the race, in order that you may find peace.
It is a great point in Romans, “peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ”, Romans 5: 1. There is no peace without Him, we see that in this world, there is no peace in man’s arrangements; they have tried everything, they must be coming to an end of their resources as we look at things today. They have tried one thing after another, it all breaks down and fails but Paul’s glad tidings is “peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom we have also access into this favour”. Those chapters bring in one thing after another to establish us in the glad tidings. Not only are our sins forgiven but we are justified. What glad tidings they are, that you have been cleared of your debt, and God justifies you through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. You will find everything is centred in Christ in Romans. He is a propitiation for our sins, we are justified in the power of His blood, reconciled through His death, and saved in the power of His life (Romans 5: 1–10). What a great system of blessing God has introduced in this dispensation. In the old economy things were never settled; but in the glad tidings Paul says things are settled “through our Lord Jesus Christ”.
The entrance into the things of God depends on our link
with Jesus. He has cleared the ground and in the doing of that He has won my heart. He is the One who has met our needs to gain our confidence and our affections. So Paul is saying that we are established. That means that we are able to go on against the stream. We are still in a condition of great weakness, flesh and blood, yet established according to the glad tidings, as Paul has presented it. So we can stand our ground knowing that it depends on Christ, not on us. My enjoyment of these things depends on my link with Christ. Paul would leave these believers at Rome with that assurance.
How firm a foundation it is! And then it goes on, “according to the revelation of the mystery”; there is something else, our sins were not forgiven for us to be left here as individuals trying to do the best we can. In the type, God brought His people out of Egypt in the power of the blood that was shed, and they were able to move through the Red Sea to sing the song of Moses, “Thou by thy mercy hast led forth the people that thou hast redeemed”, Exodus 15: 13. God moved in mercy, there was nothing in us, when He found the resources in Himself to move in mercy to meet us in all our need, “Thou by thy mercy hast led forth the people that thou hast redeemed; Thou hast guided them by thy strength unto the abode of thy holiness”. Then it says, “Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thine inheritance”, Exodus 15: 17.
That is what I would like to speak about, dear friend, that you are not left here with your sins forgiven, you are brought into a circle that the Lord Jesus speaks of as My assembly. Persons who have been justified are brought in to enjoy something of why God forgave our sins. It was initially in my sight to give me peace, it was to settle my conscience, but it was in God’s mind that we may come into the great resources of His love, the great things “which God has prepared for them that love him”. Who would not love Jesus if their sins were forgiven? They would know the debt that
the Lord has paid. Who would not be attracted to the Man who has borne the load and satisfied God, and cleared the ground for Him to come out in the resources of His love, and tell us of the things that He has prepared for them that love Him? Well, to enter into the joy of it He has given us of His Holy Spirit.
That is one of the great blessings of our sins being forgiven, that we receive the Holy Spirit.
Paul brings that out in the earlier part of the epistle, that the Spirit is there as the power, where sin had been working, you may say without any interruption, having dominion over us, when we were trying to do what was right but could not find the strength for it. Paul shows us the way through these exercises is to find that the resources are outside of ourselves, and greater than anything we could ever imagine, the things, “which God has prepared for those that love him, but God has revealed to us by his Spirit”. Paul says in Romans, “for obedience of faith”. We do not only love the Person but find it easy to obey someone we love. We know that He only has our good at heart. That is what Paul is bringing to these Corinthians that he has things to tell them about that man can never understand, but he says, God has revealed them to us by His Spirit. That is how the light of the assembly has come, by revelation.
God has found in Christ One in whom His purposes can be unfolded. He has found His delight in Christ. So He has moved of Himself to attract us into something that heart nor eye could ever fathom, things that He has prepared before the world’s foundation, things that He will reveal to us by His Spirit. O, what a token of His love when Jesus said to those disciples, I am leaving you but I will not leave you orphans (John 14: 15–18). What a beautiful touch!
How they must have felt it, the One they relied on was going away but He says, I will not leave you orphans, I will send the Holy Spirit, and He will be with you and will be in you.
That is what Paul is developing here, the Holy Spirit in us to give us some
insight into the things that would be revealed to them that love God. These are the things that are in the purpose of God. They could not be unfolded before because there was no vessel to receive them, but now the Spirit having come, there are vessels who are able to receive something of these things by revelation. That is how the light of the assembly came in, it was a revelation to Peter.
He had been blessed in the preaching, yet had Jewish thoughts, as we may have other kinds of thoughts about ourselves, but Peter on that occasion in Acts 10 sees a great sheet coming down out of heaven, and it says it took place thrice, what wonderful grace. Peter could not understand it and neither might you or I. We hear the assembly being spoken about and we may not understand it, but let us just keep listening. God brought that sheet down three times to Peter, and he saw things that he could not understand, but the impression he got was that God was ready to unfold the purpose of His love and it was including those of the nations.
Peter says, “it came even to me”, Acts 11: 5. As you go on your path, trusting in Jesus, if you keep listening to the words of His grace, you will find that light coming even to you. You will come to see that God has something here on this earth in which He is depositing the purposes of His grace and love. He said, “it came even to me”. How that must have touched his heart.
As I say, it will come even to you that God has something here, it came even to Paul. He said to Paul, “why dost thou persecute me?”, Acts 9: 4. Jesus was in heaven at that time yet there He is speaking to Paul. It just means that there is something here on earth divinely owned by the Lord Jesus. That is the assembly as it is spoken of in Ephesians, Christ and the assembly.
Christ is in heaven, that is where He is, and we will see as we close how He is serving us in all His wondrous grace from that position; but first of all it is revealed to us by His Spirit, for
“the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God”. It would give us to see that there is something here on this earth, where revelations by the Spirit are cherished and
practised and enjoyed. But it needs an ear to hear.
To go back to the types, I speak of Rebecca for a moment. We often speak of her as a type of the assembly, but you know she was a young girl with an ear for the gospel, you may say.
She had an ear for what was being spoken in the meetings, she was ready to listen to what the Spirit was saying. If you look at the chapter that is the initial presentation of the chapter. We read much into the chapter, and rightly so, but initially she was like a young girl who listened to what the Spirit was saying and what did she get? She got some impression about Jesus that she never had before. The Spirit, typified in the servant, brought her silver articles, speaking about redemption, the work of Christ; He told her about His master, Isaac, a type of Christ in the glory. He told her something of the great place that He had in the Father’s affections. It says “the servant brought forth silver articles, and gold articles, and clothing”, Genesis 24: 53. The test comes, “Wilt thou go with this man?”, Genesis 24: 58. That was the whole issue.
There were other persons who saw these things, there was Laban, her brother and other people there. They saw these things and they said, Let us wait ten days; they would have hindered the enjoyment of what the Spirit was saying, but she says, “I will go”. Then there was a change in her life and that is what there will be, if you make way for these things, there will be a change in your life. You may hear the expression, assembly-minded persons. Who are they? Well, Rebecca was that, so when questioned, she says “I will go”. She trusted him.
The Spirit unfolded some of these things that she had never seen before, silver articles and gold articles and clothing. That clothing was to be for Isaac’s eyes. It would never have been any use in that country if she had stayed there. If you hear the gospel, if you hear the truth presented and just stay where you are, you may know the terms, but you will never know the enjoyment of it until you make room for the Spirit of God and say, “I will go with this man”.
She went on her way, a great test in her life, and it only brought out typically the reality of
her love for Christ, appreciation of the Spirit searching all things, even the depths of God.
In your tender years you may not understand the assembly. Listen to what is said about it and the Spirit will give you understanding. Do not say, It is too deep for me and just leave it. Paul says, “Think of what I say, for the Lord will give thee understanding in all things”, 2 Timothy 1: 7. That is what Rebecca did, she listened and you know what happened? She had to make a great choice; the pull of nature, how strong it must have been, saying that you do not need to do it today, just wait a little. She says “I will go”. What had she found? She found resources far beyond what she needed, it says that she rode on the camels. That is another expression of divine grace provided to see us through the wilderness journey. Then she finds herself in the company of Isaac, a type of the heavenly Man. What a joy it must have been to Isaac, and I can tell you what a joy it will be to Christ, to see some young persons committing themselves to what the Spirit may be saying today, to find their part and their enjoyment in what there is here under the guidance and service of the Holy Spirit of God, and under the eye of Christ. It is a very blessed thing that when you believed on Christ, God looked on you as, in Christ.
What a place of favour! And if you know something of that the net result will be that Christ will be in you. That is how it works.
You are able to come out here in heavenly grace, because you are enjoying where God has placed you in Christ, and that can never be changed. He would like to see something of Christ in you. You may say, I see breakdown, I see confusion; that may all be true but look at Matthew 16 and you will find Christ saying “on this rock I will build my assembly”. If you are with the Spirit and know something of His revelations, you will find that there is something here that Christ is building that is going on day by day, week by week. Amidst all the confusion there is something being built, persons finding their place in this wonderful vessel, the
assembly of God. Romans is like the early teaching in Exodus. It has been said it is like the boards of the tabernacle, persons are being set up. An interesting thing is that the wood that was in these boards was the same wood that was in the ark, Christ in them. That is what the exercise in Romans would bring to light, that there is something formed in you that is Christ, and it has to find a place, not an independent place, but a place as in the tabernacle, where the boards were set up, joined to one another. You will find someone who you can link on with, you will find another assembly-minded person to keep their company, and speak with them about the great things that the Spirit would reveal to you. These boards finally became the dwelling-place of God, and an expression of that is to be found in the local meeting, where there are persons who have been through those exercises and have some touch of the Spirit’s grace upon them. If you look for it, I am sure you will find something there that has the stamp of God about it, where God can reveal something of the secrets of His love.
That is what we read of in Ephesians, those great purposes of God, the great things that He has prepared. It says, “in whom we have redemption”. He has redeemed us to clear us of every encumbrance. Redemption involves purchase, it means there is a price paid for your soul, and that price was the blood of Jesus. God paid that price when we could never meet it.
Redemption means that we are not our own, we have been bought with a price, our sins and offences have all been cleared. God moved in that way that He may make known to us the mystery of His will. It is the same word as we had in Romans. It is a reference to what man cannot fathom, it is not mysterious, but it is a mystery that man’s mind can never penetrate, that God would move like that to unfold His purposes that He had before time began, to unfold them by His Spirit to persons who have come into the gain of redemption, the forgiveness of sins. And He says, I have a place for you in My house.
If you look in 1 Corinthians 12: 11–27 you will find you have a place in the body; it speaks there of the eye, the foot, the ear, having a place, using the human body to illustrate it. All are needed and every one has their place; as we enjoy these purposes of His love, we will find our place and we will fill it out in righteousness. We will fill it out humbly yet in the dignity of the grace and the calling that has been named upon us. So if there are Christians together, humbly owning their part in the present public breakdown, yet are meeting in the light of Christ in glory and the Spirit of God here, you find some expression there of the assembly, without claiming to be it. That is how Paul begins the epistle. He knew their state, he knew what they were saying about him even, but he says, “to the assembly of God which is in Corinth”, 1 Corinthians 1: 2. Paul addresses the saints in Corinth in the light of what God had told him earlier, “I have much people in this city”, Acts 18: 10. I have often thought he must have wondered, Where are they? but he went on holding what God had said, and eventually he found them. He found persons who had been redeemed, who had been purchased, and who were able to have some impression of the great place they had in divine affections.
What you find in Ephesians is the place the assembly has in the counsels and purposes of God. It says, “In whom we have also obtained an inheritance, being marked out beforehand according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his own will”. I can hardly say any more about it than that; just read the verse, the Spirit will give you some impression of the great love of God. You have been brought into a company divinely owned, and you have obtained an inheritance, you have a place there that is yours, as part of that wonderful company that will soon be translated to glory. In the meantime it is here and you are enjoying something of that inheritance “being marked out beforehand”. Nothing of man in it, it is all God’s thoughts “according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his own will, that we
should be to the praise of his glory”. That elevates our place here, dear brethren. We are not only here as sinners saved by grace, but we have a place to fill here that we should be to the praise of His glory. Now that tests us as to how much we are enjoying divine favour that He purposed before time began.
It caused the doxology that we read of in Romans 16 as Paul was speaking about the great mystery, his soul breaks out, “the only wise God, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever. Amen”. There are more doxologies in Romans than anywhere else in the Scriptures.
Paul is tracing the ways of God, and the wonderful way they come out in Christ, and his heart breaks out in response to God. It says, “For of him, and through him, and for him are all things”, Romans 11: 36. Everything began with God, and that is what you come to in your life, that it all began with God before the world, then in time coming out in the resources of redemption to bring us to His purpose, to have us in Christ, finding our place now in the very conditions we are in to the praise of the glory of His grace.
Then he goes on in Ephesians 5 speaking there of the distinctiveness of Christ and the assembly, He loved the assembly. How precious it was to Him, He delivered Himself up for it in order that He might sanctify it. It is His great occupation today that not only did He deliver Himself up in giving His life on the cross, He did that, but He has also made it His full occupation today, while it is here on the earth. It says that He loved the assembly, and He is sanctifying it, purifying it by the washing of water by the word. That is what is going on in the local meetings. It goes on as you read the Scriptures, it goes on as you read the ministry.
You will find there is some sanctifying effect in the word, the washing of water by the word brings refreshment. You get that in some of these beautiful hymns that have been indited by the Spirit. Mr. Darby says,
‘My soul is all transported
Whene’er I think of thee!’ (Hymn 51)
That is all part of the washing of water by the word; we get our thoughts and our outlook changed.
Then it goes on “that he might present the assembly to himself glorious, having no spot, or wrinkle, or any of such things”. Think of such things being possible! We know our own hearts, but think of Christ serving us in that gracious way, the washing of water by the word.
That is happening in the meetings, we have it in the singing of these hymns, we have it in conversations with one another about Christ, as the sanctifying and washing effect goes on, but it is that “he might present the assembly to himself glorious, having no spot”. That is Christ’s ideal for the saints, that is Christ’s ideal for the assembly. Men may say many things about it, but that is Christ’s ideal, and He is serving it that it may be without spot or wrinkle; marvellous thing! You can look at it as it began at Pentecost, when the assembly came into expression early in the Acts, about two thousand years ago and it is still here. It is a marvellous fact to me. Satan has been against it. You see that in the Acts; there were attempts to annul the testimony. What attacks there were, you may say almost succeeding in the Dark Ages, but it has gone through; Christ has been serving it in His grace and so it continues until today. That is because there is a direct link with Christ in glory and what is here, that He calls
“my assembly”.
I appeal to you, young as you may be, seek to find your place in it, and you will find that you are identified with something that is not going to finish in breakdown, though publicly it may seem like it, but it is going to finish in glory. It says, “that he might present the assembly to himself glorious, having no spot or wrinkle”. The length of the dispensation was not for God to deal with sin, but it is that He may soon display to a wondering universe that there has been a vessel here on earth, finding expression in local gatherings, proving by the washing of water coming in time
after time, removing any wrinkles, so that she is unwrinkled. One of the hymns speaks about that, she will shine unwrinkled in all her beauty and glory, and soon she will be presented to a universe, but first of all the assembly will spend its own time with Christ before it is ever displayed to the universe.
That is why you get from John in Revelation 21 the eternal day before you get the millennial day, because Christ wants this vessel for Himself, something that He has nourished, cherished day by day; He is going to have a time when it will be Christ and the assembly. She will be there in all her freshness as a bride adorned for her husband. There is the result of what has been formed in time, she has taken on the adornment, new Jerusalem, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband, and that adorning is going on now. Give yourself over, like Rebecca, and say “I will go”, follow the One who will lead you into an area where there are administrations of grace flowing in all their blessed fulness. Then, after Christ has had that time, Christ and the assembly, she will come out as the Lamb’s wife. She is in there first as the bride, and she comes out as the Lamb’s wife. God will display to the universe what has been wrought in this dispensation, hidden in the ages of time, but in our day it has been unfolded in the Spirit’s grace and power. Think of Christ seeing something fresh of assembly features growing in you, even now. I appeal again even to young hearts; you will see breakdown, you will see sorrow, but if you just look there is something else, there is the assembly of God and the Spirit is ready to reveal it to you.
May you find your place in it, and hear the Lord’s word, “this do in remembrance of me” (1
Corinthians 11: 24), and see the expression of the love of Christ in the loaf and in the cup.
Then you will find very quickly that the Spirit opens the heavenly door, and gives you a taste of that scene beyond what man can ever see or hear, and it is to be our present portion. May we cherish it, dear brethren, in these days of
darkening influences, and seek to find our place in this glorious vessel, purposed before time began, but come into expression and being revealed to those who love Christ. May each of us find more our happy part in it, for Christ’s name’s sake.
Address at Buckie
31 October 2009