SPIRITUALITY (4)
[p. 54] SPIRITUALITY (4)
Numbers 14:26 - 38; Numbers 20:7 - 13; Numbers 21:16 - 20; Numbers 26:63 - 65; Joshua 14:6 - 15
JT What is in mind for this reading is to see how faith works in the believer from the point reached this morning until the believer is settled, as it were, in the inheritance; then to show how the Spirit works concurrently, indeed, supporting faith, keeping it fresh. Hence these scriptures should be considered one by one, only, being so many, we cannot remain long in considering any one of them. Christ is seen objectively in Numbers 13 in the change of Hoshea’s name to Jehoshua; the testimony was therefore enhanced; the testimony accruing from the search. The search was complete, and the testimony rendered was complete, but the element of unbelief prevailing in the ten, as over against the two, its result is to be seen. Our passage in chapter 14 shows that the judgment on the unbelievers and complainers continued for forty years in the presence of the little ones, as is said, “your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms, until your carcases be wasted in the wilderness. After the number of the days in which ye have searched out the land, forty days, each day for a year shall ye bear your iniquities forty years, and ye shall know my estrangement from you”, verses 33,34. That is one solemn fact entering into the period of their little ones as they were growing up; all this happening before their eyes. They represent the generation that should inherit, and in the antitype this has to be taken up by each of us. The search was for forty days, disclosing a perfect testimony as to the heavenly land. The flesh, with its incorrigibleness, has to be judged day by day for forty years in the experience of those who [p. 55] enter. In this period faith had its distinction. Then types of the Spirit follow, running along with this experience, with a view to building up spiritual constitutions. The first is in chapter 20, where the water flows and the people drink, in spite of ministerial failure. It comes through ministry, that is, through Moses and Aaron, but the ministers failing most seriously; the water, however, flowed in spite of their failure, and the people drank. It is not said in Exodus 17 that they drank, but they drink now; meaning that there is advance in the sense of appropriation. It is said that “much water came out, and the assembly drank, and their beasts”; but the responsible ministerial element is judged; all this enters into assembly history, and individual history at the same time. Hence, chapter 21 brings out the incorrigibleness of the flesh, and its judgment in the brazen serpent, that is, sin in the flesh condemned, and faith appropriating the well. It is not the rock, but the well — a digged well — alluding to scope being made for the Holy Spirit in the believer, so that the Spirit is recognised feelingly. Then we have the prophecies of Balaam, bringing out what the people are as under God’s eye, never to be cursed but blessed, and then the numbering in view of the inheritance in chapter 26. So that faith goes through, as we are told in verse 65 of that chapter, “there was not left a man of them, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun”; they go through; that is, the link between Egypt and Canaan is maintained in faith. Those whom God brings out He brings in, in identity; not in condition, but in identity; and not simply as raised from among the dead, but through faith and the Spirit developing a constitution suitable for Canaan. That is seen in the passage read in Joshua 14. Faith is still strong, still unimpaired, as appreciative as ever of the inheritance, and even more so. That is in general what one believes the Lord would have us to ponder [p. 56] over as part of our subject. Later we shall have opportunity, God willing, to consider the generation that goes in with Caleb and Joshua as in the daughters of Zelophehad and the daughter of Caleb. We ought to dwell particularly now on this point of faith going through in freshness and power accompanied and sustained by the Spirit.
AMH Would you say as to faith represented in these two men, and the constitution in Caleb, and the generation that is numbered as along with them, that these account for Balaam’s prophecy? What he prophesied is really there before God in substance.
JT Quite so. It is important to keep in mind that spiritual substance is there from the outset.
FJF Is that why the Lord prayed for Peter that his faith should not fail; that thus he could go through?
JT Yes. If God takes up a people, or a servant, He maintains His identity through faith. Faith is the operative element on the side of the believer; it is the gift of God, but it comes by a report, and it enables the believer to go through the wilderness into the land. The Spirit is received from God; it sustains faith, so the believer may be full of faith as a man like Stephen. Scripture says he was “full of faith and the Holy Spirit”, Acts 6:5.
PL Does Stephen in his address indicate that he had travelled those forty years?
JT That is an important suggestion. Of course he travelled much more, but evidently he had judged the flesh, as it came out in the forty years.
PL I wondered whether all the thoughts you have suggested this afternoon are not gathered up in Stephen. Did he not reach the land, full of faith and the Holy Spirit?
JT That is what I thought. He is strikingly mentioned. In the Acts 6:3 the twelve apostles say: “Look out, therefore, brethren, from among yourselves seven [p. 57] men, well reported of, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we will establish over this business”, then, in Acts 6:5, “And the saying pleased the whole multitude; and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit”; in Acts 6:8, “Stephen, full of grace and power”; in verse 10, “And they were not able to resist the wisdom and the Spirit with which he spoke”; in Acts 6:15, “all who sat in the council, looking fixedly on him, saw his face as the face of an angel”; then in Acts 7:55, “being full of the Holy Spirit ... said. Lo, I behold the heavens opened”, and in the last verse, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And kneeling down, he cried with a loud voice. Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And having said this, he fell asleep(Acts 7:59,60)”. Your remark is well supported in these passages. They show a man marked by faith and the Spirit going right through into the land.
HDT Would you say a word as to Paul’s charge to Timothy to maintain faith and a good conscience?
JT Another side surely. Someone having failed in this respect, having made shipwreck. A good conscience must go with faith, and it is therefore significant that it is said of Joshua and Caleb in Numbers 14:38, that they “lived still of the men that had gone to search out the land”. As others came under the judgment of God, they lived. That would be the idea of going through; as others fail, those who have faith live. The just live by faith.
EBMcC You spoke this morning of some having dropped out, but certain men whom God used to recover the truth in the last century went on to the end; Would they correspond with Joshua and Caleb?
JT Yes. It is a question of life. The expression, “lived still”, literally means that they did not come under judgment. It is very remarkable that very soon after the death of Mr. Darby, the great subject of life came up for consideration — the Lord reminding us [p. 58] that the testimony could not go on except through living persons. Christianity is not simply doctrine, or principles, by themselves; it is a question of living persons; those who stand as others fall.
HH These were exercises of 1884 as well as 1890.
JT Yes, all bearing in the same direction. Certain ones were setting up a system of doctrine and making the Old Testament saints have eternal life; they were whittling down the truth, denying it really; and the Lord came in, and showed through ministry that eternal life is in Christ, and it could not be divorced from the Spirit. It was not simply something obtained through faith in Christ, but maintained by the Spirit, as the Spirit is life.
Ques Would the thought of trading come into this, making use of what we have.
JT The type of the prophet’s widow, 2 Kings 4, is applicable, because it relates to the use we make of the Spirit. Faith develops by the Spirit. It is not simply that I get the Spirit at a given time and rest in that, but, speaking reverently, I use the Spirit. The passages read indicate how faith appropriates the Spirit. The use of the Spirit, which Romans 8 teaches us from this point of view, involves that we live. If we, by the Spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, we live. The forty years during which these men, one by one, died in the wilderness is the testimony of God’s judgment on those who fail in this. As we accept the truth of Romans 8, putting to death the deeds of the body, we live. Then it goes on to say, “If Christ be in you, the body is dead on account of sin”, Romans 8:10; that is, there should be no more sin. If Christ comes in. He sees to that; that the body is no more a vehicle of sin, or He cannot be there; and the Spirit is life so that there should be righteousness; that is, righteousness is the development of life. The statement, “But if the Spirit of him that has raised up Jesus from among the dead dwell in you”,(Romans 8:11) shows what a great [p. 59] thought is in mind, in Romans 8, regarding the Spirit. It is the Spirit of that Man that is so pleasing to God. Then it says, “he that has raised up Christ from among the dead shall quicken your mortal bodies also on account of his Spirit which dwells in you,(Romans 8:11)”. So that the position is secured right through in a practical way, not simply on the principle of faith, but in addition to that, through the Spirit. If we are alive and remain when the Lord comes, with the Spirit dwelling in us, we shall be quickened — our mortal bodies will be quickened — on account of that Spirit.
AED Would the thought of sowing to the Spirit and reaping eternal life fit in with what has been suggested, Galatians 6:8?
JT Yes. You reap eternal life by sowing to the Spirit.
FJF Would you say that those who have left on account of surrendering the light of the truth and the path of faith, have surrendered the Lord’s presence by doing so, and thus are in estrangement?
JT I think that is right. You are alluding to the word “estrangement” in Numbers 14:34: “After the number of the days in which ye have searched out the land, forty days, each day for a year shall ye bear your iniquities forty years, and ye shall know mine estrangement from you”. This is the attitude God takes up, estrangement. Their house is left desolate.
LDM Did Moses cause estrangement when he smote the rock instead of speaking to it?
JT Moses has to suffer having this incident recorded, so that we may see how God resents the failure of those representing the public ministry at the present time. Those who profess to minister the truth have failed, but nevertheless the water flows. That is, the dispensation is maintained in spite of their failure, but God does not pass over their failure; they were not to go into the land, that is the point. Moses did not fail in [p. 60] a characteristic sense, for he was faithful in all God’s house. This incident is regarded as representing ministry typically.
EESL Did they fail in misrepresenting God?
JT Moses used the wrong rod, and he was not told to smite the rock, but to speak to it. We all know how the clerisy loves authority; indeed, it has been so all down the history, since the introduction of the clerical principle. Scripture says, “Moses took the staff from before Jehovah, as he had commanded him. And Moses and Aaron gathered the congregation together before the rock, and he said to them. Hear now, ye rebels: shall we bring forth to you water out of this rock? And Moses lifted up his hand, and with his staff smote the rock twice, and much water came out, and the assembly drank, and their beasts”, Numbers 20:9 - 11. With his staff he smote the rock; the staff of authority; whereas the truth is, that inasmuch as priesthood had been fully vindicated in chapters 16 to 18, smiting has already taken place. Christ is Priest in heaven as having died, and speaking to Him is now all that is needed. Moses used the rod of authority, falsifying the position, and that, really, is the history of the clergy, but yet the water is flowing; the rock is there, thank God!
NBS What is the thought in God’s instruction to Moses to speak to the rock?
JT Christ being in heaven, this is the time of speaking, not of smiting. Christ is in heaven and the Holy Spirit is here. It is the period of the word of God and our freely addressing Him, 1 Timothy 4:5.
NKMcC Why are the beasts brought in in Numbers 20 and not in Exodus 17?
JT They are live stock and come under God’s care. They have a place right through from Egypt. I think it would be also to bring out the plentifulness of the water.
AMH Is this speaking to characterise the whole of [p. 61] the ministry in the present day? For instance, “in meekness setting right those who oppose”, 2 Timothy 2:25. Undue pressing, or forcing of a matter, would be a denial of the character of the moment.
JT Quite so. The servant of the Lord must not strive. We know how, from Rome and all patterned after it, much stress is laid on authority. No doubt that is what is meant; in the antitype we see what was in the mind of God. Moses has to suffer so that we might see this great thought as applicable to us now.
HJM Is it intended that true ministers should use the rod of priesthood, and so speak to Christ, as the Rock, that God is hallowed before the eyes of the people? The character of the moment is to hallow Him by addressing Christ as the Rock.
JT I think that is the thought. A feature of clericalism viewed by itself (not that some sharing in it are not godly men) is that authority is needed to sustain the thing. Rome is sustained by the constant assertion of mere human authority, which God hates. God would never record this of Moses and Aaron were it not for our education as to what it typifies. He loved them too well, but they have to suffer on our account. God brings this out in order to show how abhorrent is the attitude of the clerical system, which it represents; going so far as to speak to the people of God in this disrespectful way — calling them rebels.
HH Paul’s conduct at Corinth would be quite different to Moses using the rod. I suppose there is a relation between Numbers and Corinthians.
JT He refrains from using the rod, but he put it to them as to whether he should come with the rod. He preferred to come in love, and the way was made open for this.
In Numbers 21 we have the Spirit again, not coming in through ministerial work, but as the well itself. The idea of the rock is in Christ, but in an objective sense.
[p. 62] The Rock which followed them was Christ, 1 Corinthians 10:4. It was there, and in spite of the objectionable action of Moses, the water flowed, because typically it was still the period of grace, and the Lord is not going to be limited because of ministerial failure. The character of the present dispensation must be maintained. Christ is still on the Father’s throne, and the Spirit is still here, and that is the line He is on. Sin in the flesh is dealt with in chapter 21 in the brazen serpent, and now the Spirit is viewed, as we say, in a subjective sense. It is the well. “From thence to Beer(which means well), that is the well of which Jehovah spoke to Moses, Assemble the people, and I will give them water”, chapter 21:16. Without any reference to the rock or to ministry, “Then Israel sang this song, Rise up well, sing unto it” — “respond unto it”, is said in the note. There is a response to the Spirit in this sense. It is a question of the well, but the well in the believer, the well of water springing up into everlasting life, so that we read, “Well which princes digged, which the nobles of the princes hollowed out at the word of the law giver, with their staves”, verse 18. Now we have reached the supply, which is dependent on our state and not on ministerial action. It is within the scope of each believer. So that it is a question of digging, that is to say, of making room for the Spirit.
EBMcC Could we give this an application today, the princes digging the well being the ministry that is coming to us today? We have ministry meetings, is that the well of water springing up in our midst?
JT It is a question of moral authority - princes digging at the word of the law-giver. God had said of this well, “that is the well of which Jehovah spoke to Moses, Assemble the people, and I will give them water”, and then there is the song including the digging. It is a matter of authority, not merely the exercise of gift in ministry. We are on the way to finality, for the [p. 63] Spirit is within our own scope according to John’s point of view; it is a question of our state. The Spirit is given to the believer and it becomes in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. Digging is making room for the Spirit — removing what hinders with authority.
HH “Shall become in him ...” John 4:14.
JT Quite so; Romans 7 and 8 also correspond with this type.
EESL What kind of action is contemplated by this gathering of the people together, and the princes digging the well?
JT I suppose it is gathering in the sense that the saints are united. We are under divine ordering. Of course it implied a literal gathering together then, but as applied to us it is the general thought of gathering. We have two thoughts in Acts 2; first that they were together in one place when the Holy Spirit came, and then in the end of the chapter, all that believed were together, and hence the things that are stated of them. This principle of being together operates so that the Holy Spirit has scope. He is within our range, as it were. God gives Him, of course, but here it is the springing up through digging. It is a definite place here, “Beer”; a point to be reached, not a rock, but a well; hence the movements afterwards, as we have often noticed, “from the wilderness they went to Mattanah”, and so on; a steady movement towards the land; no longer a zigzag course, but a course out of the wilderness into the land, where the judgment of God does not apply.
WJH As you said, that is suggested in Romans 8, where so much is said about the Spirit; being led by the Spirit of God; being the sons of God, and being glorified.
JT Yes, especially where it is said, “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”, Romans 8:14.
[p. 64] It would answer to this type, as the Spirit is fully recognised in the believer. Then there is movement towards the land, because He leads now. The believer uses the Spirit, but then He leads the believer towards the land.
GM God was finding pleasure in His people!
JT There would be no estrangement now. We overcome the estrangement on these lines. God is complacent in us, “Gather the people together, and I will give them water”.
In chapter 14 you have those who live, while others die; those who live on the principle of faith, and then in chapter 15 God says, “When ye come into the land (Numbers 15:2)”. That further light in your soul is assuring as conveying the purpose of God. It gives you balance, as affording the certainty of believers being brought into the land. Then chapter 16 is the awful rebellion of Korah, which brings in the establishment of the priesthood in Aaron, on the principle of life. That is, Aaron’s staff bears fruit over night, and in appropriate order, budding, blossoming, and ripening almonds; thus priesthood is established in life. That is the lesson of this chapter. God would say to Moses and Aaron, Now act on that principle. It is a question of life now, not of smiting. It is a living order of things. It is Christ’s priesthood, as He is above. He is living to make intercession for us. He is available for us. “Such a high priest became us, holy, harmless, undefiled, separated from sinners, and become higher than the heavens”, Hebrews 7:26. That is our Priest; that is the position; God now directs Moses to Aaron’s rod, saying, “Take the rod”, that is, the priestly rod, which is laid up in the tabernacle, Numbers 20:7,9. Moses takes the rod, but he uses his own rod for smiting, using it twice, calling the people rebels. This is the great failure we have been speaking of. These chapters afford important lessons in relation to our subject, especially as to faith and the Spirit.
[p. 65] Ques Would the period that intervened between the smiting of the rock and the digging of the well suggest that they had not continuously availed themselves of that which God had given?
JT The facts stated at the beginning of chapter 20 show that they had not availed themselves of the Rock that followed them, but it is there amongst them, and God would have them to drink now. Hence He directs Moses to use the priestly rod, but chapter 21 is further on, “Assemble the people, and I will give them water”; the water takes the form of a well, not a rock, meaning it is now in the saints and is to spring up. The Rock is an objective thought, that is Christ, but the well is in ourselves. Then the prophecies of Balaam come in; God holding him in His own hands, so that there should not be a word from Balaam but what is in keeping with God’s own mind as to the people. They are not to be cursed at all, for they are blessed. God is pleased with them. The enemy would curse them, but God blesses them. It is irrevocable, so that through these prophecies we are established as to the mind of God. Then God counts His people again. We find they have not diminished, the numbers are about the same as they were forty years before; but the only ones remaining of those who came out of Egypt are Caleb and Joshua. They represent the element of faith sustained by the Spirit of God; and Caleb, in Joshua 14, says of himself in effect, that he is in faith and in the power of the Spirit. He reaches the inheritance on the line of faith and the Spirit, and he is as vigorous as he was forty-five years before, showing how faith is sustained, and how God looks for this in us.
Ques To maintain us in fruitful spirituality, do we need plenty of water?
JT Quite so; so that these allusions to the Spirit that we have been reviewing, account for the vigour of Caleb at eighty-five years of age. He was as vigorous as [p. 66] he was at forty. The secret is faith and the Spirit; he is a spiritual man from the beginning; it says of him, as he is introduced to us, that he was a man of another spirit. He says, “I brought him word again as it was in my heart”. That is the man; he was spiritual, thoroughly appreciating what God had purposed for His people.
Ques Does Caleb suggest that state in the Spirit which goes right through?
JT That is what I am seeking to show, and how important it is for us all to go through in this sense — in spiritual vigour. In this way we bear testimony to the power of Christianity, that we die in faith. “All these died in faith”, Hebrews 11:13. Well, if they did, why not we? They did not have the Spirit; we have; so that if the will of God requires that we die, then we die in faith and in spiritual power as well.
AMH Would it be right to say that whatever the people were basically as brought out of Egypt, they are now characteristically such as cannot be cursed, but they must be blessed?
JT Yes. The brazen serpent having come in, God has dealt with sin in the flesh, so that whoever looked lived. In the antitype that is eternal life, which is God’s blessing. Psalm 133. Joshua and Caleb lived. But now he that believeth has eternal life. So that we go through. The Spirit sustains us. Eternal life is not simply through faith, I do get it by faith at the outset, but it is sustained by the Spirit. To divorce it from the Spirit is fatal.
ESW Would it be right to say that at the outset faith takes precedence of the Spirit with us, but we come to see eventually that the Spirit takes precedence over faith? Both are needed to enter into the land.
JT Faith and hope shall cease, but the Spirit does not. In eternity He takes the form in us of the Spirit of adoption.
WJH Paul seems one like Caleb. At the beginning [p. 67] he brings the report to Ephesus of all the counsel of God, and goes on with that, and “being such a one as Paul the aged,(Philemon 9)” there is no diminution of spiritual power.
JT In the letter to Ephesus which we have had mentioned before, he enlarged on unity among the brethren. He turned aside in the parenthesis of chapter 3 to speak of himself and the knowledge he had of the mystery — he wanted them to know this. They did not have all that he had, but what he had was available to them. It is involved in the search, as was remarked; and in chapter 4 he stresses unity.
LDM Did Caleb have his eye on Hebron from the moment that he saw it in the land?
JT Evidently, and so we are told it was built before Zoan — that is, it represents what was before the world. He wanted something that was before this world. Of course his forefathers — Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — all had been there. Hebron was well known in the family of faith.
HDT You spoke of Ephesians going further than Colossians. What had you particularly in mind?
JT Ephesians fully develops the counsels of God. So that it is “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ ... having marked us out beforehand for adoption through Jesus Christ to himself, ... . taken us into favour in the Beloved”, Ephesians 1:3 - 6. The full thought of the search is in Ephesians.
AH They journeyed after this song. This is the second song, is it not? After this song they journeyed.
JT They journeyed also, we read, after the first song, which is an objective thing. It was Moses and the children of Israel, but Moses leading. We are told that Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea. It is a question of the leadership of Moses, but now it is typically the leadership of the Spirit. “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God”, Romans 8:14. That is what is implied in this type. They went from Mattanah to Nahaliel and so on, and reached Pisgah, which looks over the surface of the waste. So they moved forward and, I suppose, took a view of the past — “the surface of the waste”; but they are now moving out of the wilderness. The Spirit leads us out of the wilderness. He leads us in the wilderness, but leads us out of the wilderness, and that is the point here. It leads on to Canaan.
AMH Why is this digging at the word of the lawgiver instead of the priest? One would have thought it was more a priestly matter.
JT I think it is the authority of Christ as in Romans.
FJF What does Caleb mean when he says “to go out and to come in”, in Joshua 14?
JT It is liberty, I suppose. “I am the door; if any one enter in by me, he shall be saved, and shall go in and shall go out and shall find pasture”, John 10:9. I suppose there is liberty in a general way. We know how it applied to David. He brought Israel out and brought them in. It is one thing to lead the saints out, and another to bring them in, but then here, it is a person himself going out and coming in, and we are to learn to do that. A trustworthy person can do that.
EE Would you say a little more about the lawgiver?
JT I think it is Christ as presented in Romans; the authority of Christ is there in relation to digging. In fact how can you get on without it? It applies to oneself. You can see, for instance, in the woman of Samaria how she understood the teaching of the Lord. “The water which I shall give him shall become in him a fountain of water, springing up into eternal life”, John 4:14. How she would need the teaching of Romans to be subject, to teach her the feature of subjection, for the Holy Spirit only operates in those [p. 69] who are subject. The gospel is for the obedience of faith, among all nations, and the Spirit is given to those who obey. So that while we are down here we need the authority of Christ.
AMH The authority of Christ would help us to recognise and remove obstacles so that the Spirit would be free unhinderedly.
JT Yes. “I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord”, (Romans 7:25) is a recognition of the Lord’s authority; and the subject of the Spirit is afterwards opened up. Romans 7 really implies making room for the Spirit, in some sense, because you have reached the ability to name inward things, so as to disallow sin in the flesh, what would hinder the Spirit.
PL So that spiritual ministry always bears the stamp of divine authority — speaking as oracles of God.
JT Just so.