A PLACE FOR CHRIST HERE
[p. 41] A PLACE FOR CHRIST HERE
Matthew 16: 13 - 18; 1 Peter 2: 1 - 5
JBS We must bear in mind how far we have gone. We have seen in Romans that we are justified and, more than that, we have learnt to prefer Christ to Adam. Consequently in Hebrews we have seen how we have the Lord’s company from the lowest point with us to the highest point with Himself in the presence of God, the holiest of all. Anyone who has learnt those two steps is prepared to go on. He knows that he is not only clear of all that was against him in the sight of God but he is freed from sin and, not only that, but he has learnt to prefer Christ to Adam. Then, further, he has company with Christ and in His company he learns what resources are in Him. We are borne by Him above everything here so that we can enjoy Him in the presence of God. Thus He is for us a great Priest over the house of God, and practically the effect is the same as beholding the glory of the Lord; 2 Corinthians 3:18.
Now you find that your heart is drawn away from this earth by a Person who is not here and whose company is the solace and desire of your heart. The next thing you have to learn is that there is a spot on the earth where you can find Him. In Hebrews it does not say you have gone to heaven but that you are in company with the One who is in heaven and you have found out how indispensable He is to you because of the benefits you derive from His company. To one who has reached that point it would be a great thing to know that there is a spot on earth where you can be in company with the Lord of glory, not only in your house or circle, but in His house and His circle.
WAW Do you think that we must find Him up there before we discover that there is a spot on earth where [p. 42] He is?
JBS Well, I think if you do not know what His company is you can hardly appreciate what it is to find Him in the assembly. In Hebrews you have presented the congregation of God, not actually the assembly. He is a great Priest for us collectively over the house of God, and He is also a great Priest for us individually to lift us above our infirmities so that we can accompany Him into the presence of God.
WK What difference do you make between the congregation and the assembly?
JBS It is those who form the assembly who are the congregation.
WK But then you make a distinction between them?
JBS I meant that in Hebrews the saints are not viewed as gathered as the assembly of God. It does say once, “In the midst of the church (or congregation) will I sing praise unto thee”, and in chapter 10 we are warned not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together.
JG Do you mean that the truth is more individual in Hebrews?
JBS Well, they are looked at as taking the place of Israel - the people of God.
WK Do you say they were not in union?
JBS Well, they were not formed into it.
Ques Would you say that they were not beyond the congregation on earth?
JBS They are christians and therefore beyond the congregation. But I dwell on the simple fact for the soul that first in Romans you are freed from sin and thus fitted to have company with Christ; then in Hebrews you have His company and He not only supports you with His company down here but He bears you up above your infirmities as the great Priest who has passed through the heavens. You know what He is to you individually, and collectively He is for us a great Priest over the house of God. You are brought to God’s presence but Hebrews does not go beyond that; there is nothing about coming to the Father yet. I think it is when one has reached this point that he is ready for the further truth that there is a place here on earth where the Lord is to be found. Take the case of the youngest believer. He will say, ‘I desire to break bread.’ Why? Because the Lord has asked me to do so in remembrance of Him. And where is He? I ask. Oh, He is risen. You know He is risen and you are going to remember Him in His death. It would be a terrible thing to remember His death if you did not know that He is risen. The way christendom gets out of it is by making the Lord’s supper merely a setting forth of the blessing received from Christ’s death. They say, ‘Take and eat this bread in remembrance that Christ died for thee.’ There is not a word of that in Scripture. They make it merely the personal benefit to you, not a remembrance of the Lord Himself in death. Unless you know He is risen you cannot really remember His death, and christendom gets out of the difficulty by putting a human interpretation upon the Lord’s words which gives them a personal application to the believer. Nothing is more common. How often hymns are given out at the Lord’s supper as if my benefit was the chief thing in it. Sometimes I have to say, ‘I do not go to meet my Saviour.’ He is my Saviour, but I go to meet the Son of God. If you are not saved, if that is not settled, you have no business there.
We have the pattern of it in John 20. The Lord says, ‘Peace to you.’ There is not a disturbing element left, I have removed everything that-was between God and you. And then more, He breathed on them as if to say, I put you in the same character of life that I am in Myself. That is the pattern, not the institution, of the assembly.
I say to a person who has got the two first steps-brought to God without a cloud, knowing Christ’s [p. 44] love and preferring Him to Adam, and finding out the resources that there are in His company at the right hand of God - I say to such a person, however young in the faith, would you not like to meet that One in the spot where He is on earth? Certainly he would. I do not think it is a question of what his information is, but I believe that when he looks for the Lord in that place he must and he will look for Him as risen from the dead. For once you accept Him as risen from the dead you will find more and more every day what an inconceivable step it is to take, to go into His presence.
WAW An inconceivable step to find Him on earth?
JBS An inconceivable step to find where He is on earth.
WAW It is a great thing to see everything settled first.
JBS Yes, otherwise you will make it, as they do in christendom, a means of grace. If a man is going to die they give him the sacrament. The Lord’s supper is simply the remembrance of the Lord in death. If you are at the Lord’s supper you are identified with the responsibility of the table; but we are identified with Christ’s death all along the road.
WK You do not mean the benefits of His death?
JBS I mean the effect of His death. If you are a partaker you have communion with Him, and that is the next step. We have rather confused things by speaking of going to the Lord’s table. It is to the Supper we go, but it is to the table that responsibility attaches. “The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of the Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of the Christ?” (1 Corinthians 10: 16). I am not identified with my own death but with Christ’s death.
WK You speak of that as responsibility?
JBS And is it not? But I will tell you another [p. 45] thing: the more really you remember Him the more heartily you are glad that you are identified with His death here. “Where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried”, Ruth 1: 17. I am out of my own death and identified with His. The Corinthians forgot this and they were trying to reign as kings. I am sure that if we had a deeper sense of the fact that Christ died here instead of looking for something from this place, we should be refusing everything that would tend to make us forget that He died here or that would in any way make up to us for His death here. Supposing you saw ‘He died here’ written on every wall and every tree you came to, what would you think of it?
WK It certainly is not the happy side.
JBS But it is the true side. His death here has severed you from the place where He died and attached you to Him where He is.
WK It connects with what you said on the first evening about being separated from the man.
JBS The first great thing every one of us has to learn is affection. If we all had affection everything else would come easy enough.
TMG If we were all like Mary of Bethany.
WAW By taking the cup you say, I identify myself with Him in His death. Do you mean that I own there that I am severed from everything here, that everything is gone as far as this earth is concerned?
JBS It is His death I have before me, not my own. I am out of my own death, not to enjoy myself here, but to be identified with Christ’s death. I am a partaker of the altar.
JW You say you would hesitate to ask a person to partake of the Supper?
JBS Because of its responsibility.
JW But would it be right to put the responsibility before him?
JBS I would try to put the Lord before him. The question is, Does he know Christ risen? If he [p. 46] does not know Christ risen how can he remember Him in death?
JW A person might be justified and not up to partaking of the table?
J.B.S. Why not?
TMG Your point is that the person wants to get to the Lord where He is?
JBS Yes. It is not only that he knows the Lord as everything to him outside of this world, but that there is a spot on this earth where He can be found.
TMG Affection is really the great thing.
JBS But then you must have affection in connection with the fact that He has removed everything. Therefore I put the case of a young believer as an example and I ask him does he know Christ risen, because if he does not he is not justified and he has no business at the Supper, but if he is justified he can then remember Christ’s death. If it is Christ risen and in glory that he knows it is not simply his Saviour, though He is his Saviour, of course. He is declared to be the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead. Therefore in Hebrews all through it is the Son of God.
JFH I think there is a difficulty in people’s minds about being justified. They take it for granted in regard to others when justified themselves.
JBS A person is not justified until he knows Christ risen from the dead.
JFH But sometimes we take it for granted.
JBS Yes, sometimes we ask a man, Are your sins forgiven? But that is not the same thing. The question is, has everything been removed, and how does God whom I offended feel about me? Yes, everything is perfectly removed and God is perfectly relieved in regard to me. See how Paul preached the gospel. He said to the jailer in the agonies of conversion, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved”, Acts 16: 31. The question at once arises, Where is He?
[p. 47] He was in death and judgment, but He is out of it all. When I preach the gospel from the story of David and Goliath I only go so far as David having Goliath’s head in his hand. The work is done, not doing.
WK When you speak of a person being justified you do not mean that they understand justification?
JBS No, but that they are clear with God. It is very important to observe that the Person of Christ risen was the first thing presented by the apostle to the newly born soul. He did explain all to him afterwards, but that is the first thing he presented to him for faith.
WK The point is to be in it; explaining it is quite another matter.
JBS Quite so.
WAW That would give another character to the assembly.
JBS Yes, surely it would. But let us take the steps we have gone over. First you are justified and in connection with that you prefer Christ to Adam; next you have the company of the One whom you prefer and you find the resources that are in Him at the right hand of God - that He can bear us above the greatest infirmities down here and can carry us into the glory of God up there. Now comes the question, how can you find Him here on earth? If you read Matthew 14 you find how the Lord is refused here on earth and takes a new place. In the beginning of the chapter John the baptist is beheaded (verse 10); the Lord was virtually rejected and He goes into the wilderness as rejected and there He feeds the multitude. Then we find Him taking a new place altogether: He is no longer in the ship, He is on the water - walking on the water (verses 24 - 31). You may say He was in the ship. Yes, but He is there no longer.
TMG What do you call the ship?
JB S. He was in our circumstances down here.
[p. 48] WK Your point is that He has left our circumstances, and that if we would be with Him we must leave our circumstances and enter into His?
JBS Yes. Peter has affection for the Lord and therefore he will join Him where He is. So I do not put the step before the young believer but I would put the Lord before him. Would you like to meet the Lord? Yes, I would go anywhere to meet the Lord. I do not tell him where to go but I know that if he joined the Lord in the place where He is it would make a great change to him. What was said to me when I was young was, ‘Have you faith for it?’ I did not know whether I had faith for it or not but I knew that was the place for me. Affection leads the believer to take the step without knowing what is involved in it, though he knows enough to deter him as a man from it.
WAW But still the purpose and the affection surmounts everything?
JBS Yes, that is the thing all through. In Romans you have His love, in Hebrews you have His company and you learn what wonderful resources are in His company. You have found what He is as passed through the heavens. Would you like to go to heaven? Would you like to find Him on the earth? It is easy to explain earth and heaven, but it is not easy to explain an out-of-the-world condition. Walking on the water illustrates it. I would not ask a believer, Are you walking on the water, but, Are you going to Him, a risen Saviour? If you go to Him as the risen One you are outside of everything that is of man. In Matthew 14, of course, we have only a pattern. In Peter you have first grace in action “If so be ye have tasted that the Lord is gracious”. But that is not all: “To whom coming, as unto a living stone” - where? “Disallowed indeed of men”. You have to go outside of man to get to Him.
WAW Because the living [p. 49] stone is there.
JBS You are coming to that.
WK And the step must be taken.
JBS Yes, but I do not put that before the young believer; what I put before him is, Do you know Him risen and are you set for joining a risen Christ? It must appear to the youngest believer that to do that I must take altogether new ground, but still I do not mind it to get to Him. I have already learnt to know Him, I have tasted His love; I know something of what He is to me and that I have to do with Him in glory and how He can maintain me in the presence of God.
WAW Well, if that is not desired in some measure I would have very little confidence in the person.
JBS Yes, but I do not say merely desired, but you are set for it. And you must come to the place before you find out what it is.
Ques Was that why you read Matthew 16?
JBS I read it to show how you become a stone. As the author of the Synopsis has said, Peter was called a stone the very moment he was called by the Lord but he was not confirmed till Matthew 16. You must be built in before you are built up. No doubt Peter was morally learning what his place was in Christ, when he came to a place where there was nothing to support him but Christ. John 6 occurred at the same time as Matthew 14: the one is God’s side the other is man’s. John 6 is that I have to go through death to get life. I must feed upon Christ as dead. Therefore in the end of the chapter Peter says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God”. I think it is interesting to see how Peter reached this: it was by going outside of all that is of man. He had travelled through what was death to himself (to us Christ’s death) in order to reach Him. If we live in that sphere it would be - it must be - the life of [p. 50] Christ.
AG What is the difference between that and what people have in their thoughts now, that it is their own death?
JBS Well, it is not true. You will very soon find out where they make the mistake if you speak to a man who holds the doctrine of holiness by faith. He says, If I am dead with Christ one minute, I can be dead two. The first part of the statement is right, the second is wrong - he leaves out “with Christ”.
AG If you say baptism is the setting forth of the death and resurrection of Christ, does not that bring in ourselves?
JBS Well, nineteen out of every twenty people make baptism a profession of their faith. When you come to Scripture you find there is no other way you can appear before God but by baptism - you must pass through death.
AG I was thinking it was so little apprehended that it is Christ’s death.
JBS It is Christ’s death, but death as God’s judgment upon man. What came out at the flood was, “The end of all flesh” - not sins - “is come before me”. Everyone admits that the sins must be put away but besides that the thing that committed the sins must go. There is atonement for sins, but there is no atonement for sin. Christ has appeared in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. What people have thought to improve or get atonement for must go. If there is atonement for it you want to keep it, but I do not want to keep it. God has condemned sin in the flesh. It is ended in the death of Christ. He has died out of that condition. He gave up the life to which sin could be attached.
WK And being judicially ended it could not be revived.
JBS Never by God. If you revive it you will only bring in judgment, you will be [p. 51] scourged.
AG Is not that often a continual struggle - reviving the flesh?
JBS If you say there is a continual conflict between flesh and spirit, I agree with you.
TMG Would you explain what you mean by saying that if you revive it again you will be scourged?
JBS One who does so is delivered to Satan for the destruction of the flesh. I see it often, that a man indulges himself in what he calls a harmless thing and that very thing which he indulges comes down upon him. He has cut a rod to beat himself. I do not mean that a person is to be an ascetic. But the body is the Lord’s and you have no right to treat it badly, because it is His, and neither have you any right to indulge it, because it is His. It is entirely under a new government.
WK You must then get direction from the One to whom it belongs?
JBS Exactly, and there is where the exercise comes in.
WAW It is not hard to keep the body under when you are in the proper place.
JBS If you walk in the Spirit it is not. It is not, as under the law, a question of doing what you do not like, it is a question of affection and the more thoroughly you are attached to Christ in heart the more readily you can say, “God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world”, Galatians 6: 14. I part with the old thing and I am very glad to be rid of it for I am sick of it.
WK The difficulty is in walking in the Spirit.
JB S. Quite so, but you see again it is heart work. If you are walking in the Spirit you will keep Christ prominently before you. If you have lost it you have allowed yourself to come before you. Nothing tries me more, for instance, the whole day long than to avoid trying to say something pleasant or amusing.
[p. 52] That is a trial. Why? Because it is of no profit. You say, What harm is in it? I say there is no profit in it.
But let us go on with the subject. I do not think that I come into the house of God for my own blessing. I hope I will be understood, because I know very well I am touching upon ground that is not generally familiar. I do not say that I do not get blessing there, but that is not what I am looking for. People say, I can have the Lord’s company at home in my own room. True, but not in the same way as in the assembly. “We all, looking on the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face, are transformed according to the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit”. I believe you could have that in your own room; but there is this difference, that if the Lord is with you in your own room it is about your circumstances, but if you are in His company in the assembly it is with reference to His circumstances. If I want to know what the Lord’s mind is and what His pleasure is for me as His servant I must come into the assembly. If I want to know how I ought to order my own affairs, getting a house, for example, I have the Lord in my own house. And I believe if I were really looking to Him I would go to the right place. I have said to a person looking for a house, if you go into the presence of the Lord He will soon direct you to the right place, He would influence you to the right course. But then in the assembly it is another thing altogether, it is not with my own affairs I am occupied there but with His. It is like the queen of Sheba: she gets into Solomon’s own private home circle and there she is lost.
WK It was the things connected with him that entranced her.
JBS Exactly. In the assembly you are brought into correspondence with the Lord’s pleasure and therefore you come out to serve Him [p. 53] rightly.
WK And all this is effected by the work of the Spirit?
JBS Yes, you have come into the ground of the Spirit in Romans and you must keep to it. Not only your sins are gone but you yourself are gone.
WK We have not merely the objective side - Christ up there - but we require the subjective side, the Spirit in us?
JBS Yes, all is effected by the Spirit. I say that once you are conducted by the Spirit into the presence of Christ you will never lose it. I do not say you will never lose the joy of it. You may do that through failure but when you are restored you will come back to it. It is what the apostle looks for: “Until we all arrive at the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, at the full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fulness of the Christ”, Ephesians 4: 13. Some people try to get out of that by saying it is in the future, but it happens to be present. You may say we are very far from it. Well, I admit that.
WAW That dims the brightest thing on earth.
JBS If I want to get the Lord’s mind about His interests I cannot until I go into the assembly. If you want His mind about your own circumstances or your own individual path you can find Him in your own house, but it is in the assembly you learn what fits you for His service.
WAW I do not see how you get His interests in the assembly.
JBS Well, that is where all His interests are found. I believe there is a great lack of understanding that the place from which to go forth on the work of Christ is from the assembly. I heard a brother once say, ‘There are a great many preaching here but very few praying.’ The Lord shows in John 15: 12 - “This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you” - that you must begin at home, in the inner circle.
[p. 54] Ques Is Hebrews 2 accomplished in the assembly?
JBS That is the first note struck. He leads the praises to God where God is. He bears our names upon His breast.
WAW But it is privately in the closet I learn how to act for Him individually?
JBS It is not merely learning it but you are fitted for it. It is like Elijah getting two breakfasts before he started on the journey to Horeb; 1 Kings 19. He was prepared.
AG You were saying the assembly is like the parliament?
JBS Yes, if one may say so, the Lord is the Speaker. It is He who rules everything.
AG You must get His eye?
JBS Ah, now you come to what I find rather difficult. I believe a great deal is said and done in the assembly that is not by the Lord’s direction. Things are often done by influence. We are no better than other people; we have all the elements within us that they have. The principle among some is that you wait till you are moved. And so a person often says, ‘I had so-and-so on my heart.’ But having a thing on your heart is not authority for acting. A sister might have it on her heart as well as you.
WAW Well, if you think of all that we are the wonder is we get on so well!
JBS Ah, that is not the way to look at it. The way to look at it is how far behind we are.
The next subject will be the Head. Now we are supposing that we have got as far as the assembly in Acts 2, and that we are there in the power of the Holy Spirit, but I think there is a great difference between being led by the Spirit of God and being directed by the Head. I do not believe 1 could explain it but still I believe there is a great difference.
WAW But it is not direct revelation you get in [p. 55] the assembly?
JBS I do not say it is, but when we come to the Head I will tell you all I know about it, which is very little. You get direction. I do not say having a thing on your heart is direction; it might be of the Spirit and yet it might be only for yourself. Really it is so solemn and so great that I can say very little about it. But I believe that nine-tenths of our meetings do not go beyond Acts 2. We defer to the Holy Spirit and we look for the Holy Spirit to profit and He really does profit, but so far as I know the teaching does not go beyond the gospel as a rule.
WK I think that is very easily accepted.
JBS I do not see much going beyond the gospel when a brother gets up and speaks about the wonderful enjoyment the prodigal had in the father’s house. Everyone would say what a beautiful discourse; still he did not get beyond the gospel. I am only showing how low down we are, and I think it is a great thing for us to get the idea that instead of being the light of the world at the present moment we have only begun to light a farthing candle. So far behind are we as to what the church of God is.
TMG When you speak of the gospel do you mean that it is something connected with ourselves?
JBS Yes, I know what people like. In the periodicals people are always looking for something about what Christ is to them.
Ques But does not the Spirit of God take of the things of Jesus and show them unto us?
JBS Where do you get that? The things of Christ in John 16: 14 are really the Father’s things as the next verse shows: “All things that the Father hath are mine”. But that is not direction.
Rem It will take you where you will get direction.
JBS Well, that I will not deny. Direction is from the Head and in connection with the body because it is what suits the body. There is nothing more difficult [p. 56] to explain.
TMG I think if I am not mistaken I have heard you say - using that word in Revelation 3 - that there is a difference between His supping with us and our supping with Him?
JBS I do not say that passage means that, but it explains the two sides. If a person asks me how it is that brethren with all their light are not in a different state, I turn to Haggai. There I see that the people were stopped building the house of God and they built none for sixteen years. They were very busy about their own blessings, but they were not prospering.
Ques Do you mean worldliness?
JBS No, but they were occupied with their own blessings. I see it everywhere. No one can tell it like one who is suffering from it. People gladly hear of what concerns their blessings, but to turn to Christ’s side and to be occupied with what He is interested in - that they do not seem to enjoy.
WK Does not that prove the want of the satisfaction of John 4?
JBS Well, I find in Haggai that they sowed much and brought in little; they looked for much and it came to little.
WK The energy of the Spirit was wanting.
JBS Really nothing can satisfy the true heart but to know that I am united to Him, and if I am not united to Him I can never really understand what are His interests.