THE GREATEST THINGS FOUND IN LIMITATION
L. A. Barlow
Luke 2: 10–14; Judges 6: 11, 12; John 12: 1–3
A wonderful thing about the Scriptures is that in them God has provided for our day, a day that is outwardly marked by small things. The question is raised, “Who hath despised the day of small things?”, Zechariah 4: 10. I think God would encourage us by showing us that what is vital is often outwardly small. We may well desire numbers, and surely God will have His numbers, as Revelation shows, but I believe that what God is looking for at present is persons of substance. When Ezra arranged for the bringing up of the vessels for the house of God, the great question was the weight, rather than the number (see Ezra 8). Once God has what He wants, He can always add to it, as He did at the beginning. In Jerusalem at the commencement of this dispensation reference is made in the Acts to the number of the names, showing that each person was of special value. I believe that God is looking for a similar answer now we are at the end. You will recall the two vessels of shining copper, precious as gold, that
were brought back from Babylon (Ezra 8: 27); that is what God is seeking in our day. May we therefore be encouraged and concerned to consider what is of substantial value, rather than just numbers.
It is this that made me refer to the scripture in Luke’s gospel. The greatest thing that had ever happened in this world had occurred, a wonderful thing!—the Saviour, who is Christ the Lord, had been born, the glorious Person who will fill a universe for God; and yet how limited was the number of persons who were aware of it. A lowly Babe in Bethlehem’s manger, was said to be the sign. I think it is a sign for our day, that the greatest things are to be found in conditions of outward smallness and weakness. There was nothing outwardly attractive by way of what is natural, but all was connected with the greatest things possible, and indicated wondrous expansion, “a babe wrapped in swaddling-clothes, and lying in a manger”. Think of it; a Babe, outwardly helpless, yet the glorious Person who is going to fill the universe. Oh may we be encouraged and not despise the day of small things, seeing that it is part of the ways of God that His things are, generally speaking, marked by outward smallness in this world, but connected with what heaven itself can take account of, “a multitude of the heavenly host”, as it says here. May we get heaven’s view of things. This lowly Babe involving “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men”.
I think this helps us, beloved, to accept what may appear to be outwardly small, but should nevertheless make us concerned that things are valuable and real. I believe there is a need to relate divine operations to the position in which we may find ourselves at the present time.
Men may talk of things dying out, but the very existence of things
in outward smallness is of immense encouragement, for it is so often connected with God’s direct movements. What a circle of things surrounded the birth of this glorious Person.
Another has referred to it as a sterile area of things where there was the exclusion of what was incompatible. May we find grace to secure and maintain the conditions that were found with these persons in Luke. It is very interesting what is mentioned in these chapters, the Lord Himself as a Babe, and then as a Boy. His father and mother, I suppose, relatively young. Then there is Simeon, an older man, and Anna, an older woman, varying generations but all connected with what God was doing. I think this would be an encouragement to us, no matter what age we are, and cause desire with us that we might be content with what may appear small and is despised but is nevertheless connected with the revelation of the greatest things. Luke was with Paul at the end, showing, I believe, that it is in such an area as is portrayed in the beginning of his gospel that the greatest thoughts of God are treasured, valued, and protected now. May we be amongst those who are characteristically engaged in doing such things at the present time.
The scripture in Judges also relates to a time of great restriction. The Midianites were attempting to cut off the food supply. It is interesting to trace the references to the Midianites.
It was they who took Joseph out of the pit and sold him. May we be preserved from using christianity for our own personal advantage! It is a sobering thing that many have used it in that way, turning christianity into a means of personal present gain. Such fleshly features tend to cut off believers from the true food supply. The same nation again appears (Numbers 22) as the people of God are about to enter the land. The Spirit having been given, in type, there
was a forward movement. We then have Balaam’s parable, viewing the saints in relation to the great thoughts of God, and the Midianites come forward with an attempt to corrupt the people of God, to hinder them from entering the land. They refer to what is of nature, beloved, which would tend to divert the saints from entering into their true heavenly portion.
In Numbers 25 those involved in corruption were persons of influence. Scripture actually mentions the name of a prince of Israel. How many have been diverted by having prominent persons before them! There is a great need to have before us what all the saints are according to the thoughts of God.
To revert to the scripture read, we find Gideon threshing wheat in a wine-press, in conditions, you might say, which are abnormal and restricted. But, typically, he values the saints according to what they are as related to Christ. It is interesting that when the Greeks come up in John 12, as if to make something of the Lord publicly. He immediately refers to the grain of wheat falling into the ground and dying in view of bringing forth much fruit. May we be in constant exercise to bring in the needed food which will help the saints to understand their blessed relationship with that glorious Man who is out of death. I suppose the wine press would refer to the pressures which may come in as we accept the limitations, but it would also, no doubt, have an allusion to something being produced for God. It is a great thing to help the saints increasingly to know what they are as related to the purposes of God and the glorious place that He has in His mind for them, because it is in the enjoyment of these heavenly things that the service of God is carried on in a vital way.
As we know, the actual experience later on of
the men who were with Gideon involved constant reduction, but as a result the whole issue in relation to Midian was met and conditions of peace established for all Israel. I believe, beloved, that God will add, but He will add where there is what can be added to. Any shining out always involves earthen vessels being broken. Paul refers to “Bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body”, 2 Corinthians 4: 10. May we be simply concerned, in spite of all the difficulties, to provide food in season. It is possible, beloved. Maybe the conditions do not appear ideal; they were certainly not ideal for Gideon, but nevertheless he is carrying on this service. No matter what the world might think of it, an angel of Jehovah appeared to him and said, “Jehovah is with thee, thou mighty man of valour”. It is a great thing to have some sense that God is with us in relation to what we are doing and can recognise us in this way. May we value heaven’s commendation rather than the approbation of men. How good if we qualify for those beautiful words of the Lord Jesus, “Well, good and faithful bondman … enter thou into the joy of thy lord”, Matthew 25: 23. It is open to any one of us to qualify, but be assured the Lord will only say that to us if it is really true of us. May this scripture encourage us, in spite of the outward conditions, to continue to be concerned to provide food.
In the scripture in John’s gospel it is again a question of a few persons. As others have noted, as you proceed in John’s gospel, during the Lord’s life here numbers tended to become reduced. In the end you have one woman at the tomb. What a woman! She had but one object, that glorious Person. She represents what is of the assembly vitally. May we be concerned that in our localities
there is something that answers to the assembly in this way. These two chapters—John 11
and 12 are peculiarly attractive for they speak of the love of that glorious Person for individuals, for you and for me, but His great objective is to set us together in relation to Himself. Sometimes gatherings are mainly composed of persons who have natural relationships with one another. No doubt this is of God, because He loves the idea of a family. When the question of nations will cease, God will have a universe that is composed of families, every family named of the Father, but the great thing is that our vital relations together should be connected with our links with Christ. The Lord had to come into the circumstances of those He loved in order that He might be the true centre, that they might understand that what was lasting and abiding was their link with Him and their links with one another through Him. It is a great thing when we too come to that, that He is the resurrection.
Delightful as natural relationships are, they are subject to death. But God has given us links that are beyond the range and power of death. They are links with this glorious Person who is the resurrection and the life.
So the chapter read shows persons who are set together with one objective—to provide for Him, each one serving in his or her own place. There are no complaints from Martha.
Sometimes we complain about one another as occupied with the natural sphere of things, but it is a wonderful thing when we understand our links with one another as associated with the Son of God. If He loves each one of us here, surely it should be simple for us to love one another. And the effect of that love, as known by us each one, would be to create a desire to provide collectively for Him and Him alone. As He becomes, where He is, the centre for each one of us personally, we are set together in a wondrous way
that nothing can possibly interfere with. The result of that is that something is available, not necessarily very large, but of tremendous value, capable, indeed—as it was here when released in relation to the One who was filling the affections of His own—of filling the house with the odour of the ointment. What that must have meant to the Lord Jesus!
All this occurred in the presence of Judas, the betrayer, and with the Lord’s actual death lying just ahead of Him. Of course, what lies ahead of Him now is the day of His glory, when everything will be subject to Him and ministering to His pleasure. What a privilege that in the day in which we find ourselves we can provide Him with something which gratifies His own heart. Mary did this in view of the day of His burial. We have the privilege of doing things in anticipation of the day of the manifestation of His glory. May God just help us and encourage us to see what is available to us in the day in which we find ourselves—a day of small things outwardly, but, as Malachi reminds us, a day in which God finds that which is pleasing to Him. Books are written and persons are spared, because of what He finds for His own pleasure in them. May God help us increasingly to see what He is doing so that we may not despise the day of small things, but may fill out our, part in providing for the saints and for the praise and service of God.
Address at Gothenburg, Sweden
5 September 1976