THE KING AND THE MAN
THE KING AND THE MAN
Isaiah 32:1,2 “Behold, a King shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment. And [p. 498] a man shall be as an hiding place from the wind, and a covert from the tempest; as rivers of water in a dry place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land”. —
My thought is to present to you the King and the Man. I apprehend these two thoughts are bound up in the gospel. We have to take account of the King, and we have to take account of the Man. The King is to supersede all that is political in the world; that is, the King as seen in Christ; and the Man as seen in Christ is to supersede all that attaches to man as we know him down here in the world. So that a right apprehension in the soul of the two ideas effects deliverance, first from the political world, and, secondly, from all that attaches to man as he is, fallen man. It is well to bear that in mind. We have to be delivered from all that is fallen and a right apprehension of these two aspects of Christ effects such a deliverance as that.
Now the idea of the King opens up a very wide subject in the Scriptures and in the history of the world. There is nothing said about a king before the flood; and indeed the idea arose in connection [p. 493] with a rebellious man; an idea which God will meet, I may add, but it came to light in Nimrod. That is where the idea took form. Now you will find that following upon that the great idea of kingly power came to light in the posterity of Esau. He was Edom, and Edom represents man’s pride; he was a man descended from Isaac and Rebekah, but a man who despised what was of God; he had a wonderful ancestry, but he despised what is of God, and bartered it for a mess of pottage. That is Esau. When you come to the genealogy of Esau in Genesis 36, you find a chapter full of dukes. The point in Esau is not that he is violent, that is Nimrod; what attaches to kingly power in this world is violence and pride; violence as seen in Nimrod, and pride as seen in Edom.
I dwell for a moment on these early chapters. It is well to consider the book of Genesis; you get the initial ideas of things there. Kingly power arose in these two connections. There was violence in Nimrod, and the beginning of his kingdom was Babel, which means confusion. Nimrod disregarded the judgment of God. The judgment of God was seen in the word Babel, and Nimrod, disregarding it, began his kingdom there. He would centralise power in disregard of God’s judgment on centralisation. That is Nimrod, and that is what marks the present moment. The great effort of the moment is centralisation. God will break up every combination in the world. What is in the heart of man at the present moment is combination. If there is one feature of apostasy manifest at the present time more than another, it is the effort at combination. After the flood they were conscious of the absence of divine support. But what we should notice is that kingly authority began with the entire disregard of the judgment of God.
Now what followed upon that, was the royal line [p. 494] of Esau, and there the man after the flesh attained the zenith of human pride. Kings reigned in Edom before any king reigned in Israel. Man after the flesh is always first; he will always be first if he can, but what I want you to see is that God meets every possible condition that arises here in this world. He meets it in His own way, and so He brings in a king of His own.
Genesis 36 gives the history of Edom. It is a chapter full of dukes. Dukes after the flesh are of little account, but God is pleased to give us the whole line of Esau, and in the next chapter we have the genealogy of Jacob, and all we get there is a lone lad of seventeen years of age. There was nothing pompous about Joseph! Hated of his brethren, reproved by his father, a lone lad, but he had the light of God in his soul, beloved friends, and in that lone lad God indicates to us how royalty is reached according to Him. Think of that lad seventeen years of age! He was loved of his father, but misunderstood by his father.
Now Joseph says, “Hear, I pray you, this dream which I have dreamed: for, behold, we were binding sheaves in the field, and, lo, my sheaf arose, and also stood upright”. (Genesis 37:6,7) What light there was in that! That is the initial idea of royalty according to God. But that was not all. It was a great deal for him to dream that his brethren should submit, but he dreams again, and he says; “I have dreamed ... and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me”. (Genesis 37:9) What light that was! The sun, the symbol of universal dominion; the moon, subordinate authority; and the eleven stars, everything that points to dominion in the universe. That is royalty according to God. That royalty, beloved friends, is reached by another road than that taken by Nimrod, and than that taken by the dukes of Edom.
[p. 495] Think of Joseph! The Spirit of God refers to him later; he was sold as a servant. What a road to reach royalty! Psalm 105 says, “sold for a servant: whose feet they hurt with fetters”. (Psalm 105:17,18) Where was the evidence of power? His brethren were too strong for him; the Egyptians were too strong for him outwardly, but “his word came: the word of the Lord tried him. The king sent and loosed him ... and let him go free”. (Psalm 105:19,20) What a history had been his until the king sent and loosed him! A man with all the light of God that was then in the world in his soul, none his equal. “He made him ... ruler of all his substance”. How qualified he was! “To bind his princes at his pleasure; and teach his senators wisdom”. (Psalm 105:21,22) That is God’s king. I am not saying for a moment that Joseph was of the royal line, for he was not. Judah was the royal tribe, but we see in Joseph the contrary to the line of Edom. He comes out into publicity, and he binds the princes of Pharaoh at his pleasure. That is God’s king; that is God’s idea. Now a king of that type will “rule in righteousness”, and none other.
Now there is more than that. When we come to the prophecy of Balaam, we find everything given from the divine point of view. It is well for us to see these things from the divine point of view, in order to apprehend them in their fulness. Balaam says Israel’s king “shall be higher than Agag”. (Numbers 24:7) Amalek was the first of the nations. God’s King is higher. God sees to it that Christ is exalted. Agag is Antichrist really; not only a king as those of the line of Edom were, but Agag is king of a nation directly supported by the devil. That is what is coming into this world. We may say that the kings of this world are supported in a sense by God, so long as they exercise government. But there is a moment coming when Satan will directly support a king. What kind of king will he be? He will do [p. 496] his own will absolutely. He comes in his own name and does his own will, and Satan lends all his support to him. Such will be Antichrist. What a man he will be! We are living in a day in which men are admired. Agag is the type of man who will be highly approved of upon earth and supported by satanic power.
Now, the majesty of Christ comes to light when that man appears. He comes into evidence when man reaches the zenith of human power in opposition to God. We are told of the Antichrist, that “he sits in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God”, (2 Thessalonians 2:4). It is the acme of assumption and defiance of God. The Lord Jesus then appears, and “the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming”. (2 Thessalonians 2:8) Think of that! Think of the “spirit” that is in “the mouth” of Christ now! That leads me to the thought of what He is as Man. Luke presents Him as Man to us, and says, “they marvelled at the words of grace that proceeded out of his mouth”. (Luke 4:22) The spirit of His mouth affects our hearts. There is no destruction in it now. It will be destruction when Antichrist appears, the king who does his own will, but the Lord’s mouth at the present time speaks of all that the gospel involves; you remember Him in the synagogue at Nazareth.
I would now speak of the Man; and what I would say is this, that the Man is really in a sense a greater thought than the King. There are two thoughts of Him in Scripture: there is Christ Jesus, the anointed Man, and Jesus Christ, the Man anointed. I would speak now of the Man that is anointed. What you find here is that that Man becomes certain things to you. The King rules in righteousness. What I understand by a righteous rule is a rule of love. You cannot have righteousness without love; it is impossible. Nothing can be right without love.
[p. 497] A rule of righteousness is a rule of love, but it is also a rule of wisdom. Think of a Man on the throne who loves you! I need not remind you that the Lord is not ruling the world now. His rule has no reference to the world at the present time, but it has reference to your soul.
You remember Saul of Tarsus as we learn of him in Acts 9; what had the Lord’s rule reference to in Saul? It had reference to his soul. That is what the royalty of Christ has reference to now. Look at the words of grace that come out of His mouth. He speaks as Man and Saul owns Him as King. He says to him, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?” (Acts 9:4) That was a Man speaking. What words of grace in His mouth! What a Man He was, and Saul owns Him as Lord. That was right. In owning Him as Lord, Saul owned he needed His protection. So do you, so do I, and, thank God, we can have it. The righteous rule of the Lord has reference to your soul. Depend upon it, if you do not know Him as Lord, your soul will suffer loss. His protection at the present time is for souls. Think of all the power that will be used in the consumption and the destruction of the Antichrist; all that power is for the protection of your soul now. It involves our deliverance from all that is adverse to us, all that is adverse that is outside of you. It involves that, but, remember, it involves the disallowance of all that is adverse that is inside of you. If the Lord will not tolerate evil that is without you, He will not tolerate it in you.
Is there one here who does not own Christ as Lord? He can do more for you than the king and the parliament. If you could enlist them all on your side, they could not do for you what Jesus can do for you. He rules in righteousness, but He rules in love. If you own the Lord, you find the Man. That was the history of Saul. How he loved to speak of the Man Christ Jesus; and so does the prophet:
“A man shall be as an hiding place from the wind”; a remarkable expression. Adverse winds blow from various quarters. In Luke 7 an adverse wind blew upon a poor sinner from the Pharisee Simon, a hypocritical man. The Lord was a hiding-place for her. There was the Man. In Luke 10 you have a wind of a different type; it blows from a sister. Martha found fault, and Mary found a hiding-place in Jesus. Do you understand that a Man becomes that to you? Do you know Jesus? How much He can do for you! It is not the question here of the assertion of His power, but what that Man is. He appeals to the heart of Simon in Luke 7. He appeals to Martha in Luke 10. In each case He was a hiding-place. Have you found refuge in Jesus from all the storms? Many here know what it is to have found a hiding-place from the wind, a covert from the storm. How blessed for the heart to find it all in a Man! He answers your accusers; you have no need to answer them. Mary did not. The woman in Simon’s house did not. They let the Lord answer, and He did perfectly; and in doing it He was a hiding-place for them and a refuge, also.
He is also “as rivers of water in a dry place”. The woman of Sychar in John 4 found that. She was thirsty. It was not that the world was any less sensual than it had been; it did not afford any less pleasure to her than before, but her soul was thirsty. Are you thirsting after the world? Well, Jesus is as rivers of water in a thirsty land. Now note! When the work of God begins in your soul, the pleasures of the world lose their power. I know what that is, they lose their sweetness, they lose their attractiveness, and your heart is desolate. That woman went to Sychar with an empty water-pot, a type of herself, empty. She went out alone, she was desolate, and she met a Man, Jesus.
You remember how Philip spoke to the eunuch in. Acts 8; he “evangelised Jesus”, the Man to him. When he went to Samaria, he preached the Messiah, but when he went to the eunuch he evangelised the Man. The poor outcast woman of Samaria went out to Sychar and she met a Man, and He became to her “as rivers of water in a thirsty land”. There He was, and He proposes to her to produce in her a fountain. What a Man He was! He says to her, “If thou knewest ... thou wouldest have asked of him”. (John 4:10) Who is He? A few verses previously, in chapter 3:35, we are told, “The Father loveth the Son”. The Son was the Man. “The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand”. (John 3:35) If the woman had known that, she would have asked of Him. He assumes no position. He is a Man weary with His journey. How does He appear at the well? In royal dignity? No, as a weary Man. He “sat thus on the well”, “wearied with his journey”, (John 4:6) and yet He proposes the very greatest thing to that desolate heart. He was to her “as rivers of water in a thirsty land”. What a moment it was for her! That is what the Lord proposes to do for you.
Then He said, “Go, call thy husband”. (John 4:16) The point in that was to reach her conscience. The inner springs of her being had to be exposed to her. That is a wonderful service on the part of the Lord. He takes no pleasure in that work, but it is a necessity. He has to do it before your soul can enjoy the sweetness of the living water. The corrupt springs have to be exposed. The light shines in, and what does it discover? It discovers hidden corrupt springs; these have to be judged. “Go, call thy husband”. (John 4:16) What was that to her? It was the exposure of her whole life. That is the effect of the work of God - the exposure of your inner being. Your whole history is brought up before you, and you judge it. She goes to the men in the city. What a change in her!
[p. 500] What a changed woman she is! She is engaged now with the Man, not with the men; not with five husbands, but with one Man. “Come, see a man”. How completely He had gained her heart!
It is a remarkable moment that we are living in! We are drawing near to the end. God is waiting upon man patiently, presenting Christ. Have you found the Lord? Has your heart found an object? In the Lord you have protection, and in the Man you have an object. See how it affected the eunuch in Acts 8. Jesus had become the controlling object before his soul; he accepted death with Jesus and went on his way rejoicing.
“As the shadow of a great rock in a weary land”. It is one thing to be in a thirsty land, another thing to be in a weary land. The Lord becomes the shadow of a great rock to you. How completely He meets us in every circumstance!
I trust that what I have sought to present will be clear to you — all that circles round these two thoughts of Christ as King or Lord, and as Man. May each one here find Him as both!