The Resurrection Of The Lord Jesus ................................ 213
I think it is necessary to say that. The clerical system is marked by that. Therefore, anyone, in whatever state of soul he or she may be, who is there, is actually connected with that system. Therefore, it is incumbent upon us that we must withdraw from such. I think that needs to be stated, because I think some are a little bit confused about it.
J.D.G. Yes. The weakness in persons comes out if they go out of fellowship to go back to that. It shows that they never really had a judgment of what the clergy is. ‘The Notion of a Clergyman Dispensationally the Sin Against The Holy Ghost’
was written by J N Darby, Collected Writings vol 1 p.36. The simplicity of it means the Spirit was not free in the system. A believer being personally there according to the light he has, the Lord might help him. But the Spirit of God is shut out of that system. Whereas, when you come to “those that call upon 198
the Lord out of a pure heart”, all are functioning. That is what we started with.
J.M.
Mr Darby illustrated that when he was going through the exercise, he said, if Paul had come along he would not have been allowed to preach because he had not been ordained. So the Spirit really is shut completely out of that system is it not?
Therefore, we must judge it from that point of view.
J.D.G. It is not to say that the Lord may not bless a soul individually through a word that may be given, we could not say that, but it is to bring forward that the system itself, its iniquity, lies in the denial of the liberty of the Spirit functioning in persons. Every person secured by the Lord who has the Holy Spirit should function in the assembly.
J.A.G. You cannot function in that system. Iniquity is not in the air—it is expressed through those who contribute to the system.
J.D.G. That is right. It is good to be clear about that. We should understand why we are where we are. Young people will come into the intelligence of it, if they set themselves to grasp something of what we are speaking about this afternoon.
J.A.G. If persons who have purported to call upon the Lord out of a pure heart have gone out of fellowship and formed links with that system—such a course is iniquitous.
J.D.G. But those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart, that would be displayed in their life and their style of life and their practice and their associations? So we take account of persons and their associations.
R.T.
“Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right to the tree of life”, Rev 22: 14.
J.D.G. Yes, go on and say more.
R.T.
Garments come up very often as showing our character and our circumstances, do they not? “Blessed are they that wash their robes”, they have a right to the tree of life.
You are getting clear so that you can be in the enjoyment of divine love.
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J.D.G. Yes, so it says, “that they should go in by the gates into the city”. That is Rev 22: 14 that we are speaking about,
“Blessed are they that wash their robes, that they may have right to the tree of life, and that they should go in by the gates into the city”. That is the holy city down here is it not? It is not the holy city in the millennial day.
R.T.
It says, “Without are the dogs”. That is people that just feed on themselves and feed on what is evil and that kind of thing, but washing your robes brings you into an area where divine love is enjoyed.
J.D.G. Yes. You do that by departing from iniquity. You actually have to move. It is a moral thought but it is practical.
D.B.R. Does this really open out the true ground of unity?
You have spoken about persons who may have stayed in places to preserve a kind of formal unity, but is this the true ground of unity?
J.D.G. Yes, that is right.
J.A.G. I was just going to say that the gate is to maintain the standard and that is in the local meetings.
J.D.G. That is right. It is the true ground of unity.
‘Separation From Evil God’s Principle of Unity’ is the true ground of unity, J N Darby Collected Writings, vol 1, p353.
J.S.
‘Grace, the Power of Unity and of Gathering’, J N
Darby, Collected Writings, vol 1, p366.
J.D.G. Grace, the power of unity and of gathering. Well, you can see that that is right. Grace operates in a holy environment does it not?
J.A.G. So we “pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart” and in verse 24 you are coming upon “bondman of the Lord” which is the background to what we had this morning.
J.D.G. Yes, I am sure it is the background to it—bondman of the Lord. Jeremiah, interestingly, just amplifies what we are speaking about. It brings out that God has not changed His standards at all. At this time Judah was going on with its idols and its ways but God says, Well there may be something 200
precious in there. He says, “If thou return, then will I bring thee again, thou shalt stand before me; and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth”. And then He says, “Let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them”. You cannot go back. Once you have separated from persons on account of the truth it is a sober matter, not a casual matter.
J.A.G. It is akin to apostasy to go back.
J.D.G. Well, how can you go back to these systems that you have left? How can you go back to what you have left? You cannot go back. You will help persons by saying “Let them return unto thee”, that is not because of us personally, it is because of the divine standard, and the dignity in which we hold the fellowship of God’s Son and walk in it.
G.C.McK. Jeremiah went through very, very deep exercise in this chapter did he not? You were speaking about the exercise of those who moved about 1827. He even began to challenge God. “Wilt thou be altogether unto me as a treacherous spring, as waters that fail?”, Jer 15: 18. He went through very deep exercise but this set him in a right track, on a right path. Is that what these men did, like Mr Darby about 1827? They were set in a right path that God would support them in.
J.D.G. Yes, and they were led step by step. They went step by step there. Their dependence on the Lord was there. So we have come into things, and we break bread together as a company of believers and we understand the truth, we understand something of what has come out in the ministries of the recovery as to the dignity of the assembly that we have, and what is comely to it in the way of departing from evil, washing our garments. That means we are free from associations, whatever nature they are, and we seek to maintain that. God takes delight in that.
R.G.
In practical terms does it mean that tomorrow morning when we come to the Supper and greet one another, as we do, we are greeting persons who have come this moral road, filled with the Spirit, and waiting for the Lord to make Himself known to us?
J.D.G. That is right.
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I am saying that because there are a lot of young people here, and we might go away thinking, Well this is for persons that are not here yet. But the practical side of this is, that this is for every one that will break bread tomorrow morning in our various places. Is that right?
J.D.G. You have to maintain the truth every day. If you do not maintain the truth of Scripture and what is in accord with the divine Name, in accord with one who suits the divine presence, you would just be nominal. You would just be there by name. We want to be there in exercise. So if we have moved out morally from amongst what is ecclesiastical error and clericalism, we have to maintain ourselves now in holiness.
“Pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart”. We have to maintain that in holiness. You cannot return to these matters. Even amongst brethren where there has been sorrowfully division, you cannot go back. It is not a nominal matter. There are not any issues that I have been involved in, and the brethren here, which were nominal. It was a real sober exercise and it was sorrow to depart from brethren.
J.M.
We have to be alert as to the way in which the enemy moves, you referred to what Mr Darby and others went through, and it was not very long after that when the enemy sought to do the same thing only do it in another way. The truth had to be maintained and it must be maintained today, tomorrow and each day that we are here, do you not think?
J.D.G. Yes.
J.A.G. We need to be careful about the principles of Bethesda. We need to think about that in every local meeting I think.
J.D.G. You will have to clarify what you mean by the principles of Bethesda.
J.A.G. Well, our brother was speaking about Plymouth and what went on there. They were quite prepared, in Bethesda Chapel, to take neutral ground. They would not pass a judgment on Plymouth, but if persons from Plymouth, where evil was allowed, came to Bethesda and said they agreed with what Bethesda agreed with, Bethesda brethren would break 202
bread with them. By and large I think that is what happened is it not? There was neutrality as to the person of Christ.
J.D.G. So what you are pointing out is that a person who is in fellowship with others who are going on with evil, and says personally they are clear as to the thing, they are still involved because they are practically breaking bread with them.
J.M.
Even though that person may claim to be personally clear of it, if they are actually connected with a company that is going on with it you cannot go on with that.
J.D.G. That is right. “Let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them”.
D.B.R. Two false principles involved at that time were neutrality and tolerance. Tolerance is a baneful thing. There is no holiness in tolerance. If you begin to operate that way you begin to tolerate more and more things all the time.
J.D.G. I am glad you use that word ‘tolerance’ because neutrality is one thing, but tolerance might be regarded as grace. But it is not grace if it is going on with unholiness.
G.C.McK. It says, “thou shalt be as my mouth”.
J.D.G. What do you make of that?
G.C.McK. Well, it says, “and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth”. Through the exercises of about 1827 there came out a ministry that was authoritative, it was from the Lord. That guides us, you might say, in a definite way. Mr Darby’s ministry is something of that character, is it not?
J.D.G. Yes, it is. It is what is accredited is it not? God has put His approval on it. That is most important, because young believers should be careful what they read. Even ecclesiastical books that may seem all right on the surface may contain wrong teaching of which the author was ignorant.
R.T.
What is the brazen wall that you were speaking about?
J.D.G. It says, “And I will make thee unto this people a strong brazen wall”. That is there is something worked out in the 203
believer that has come through the fire. It is in accord with divine judgment and will resist a return to evil. What do you say?
R.T.
So are we looking for that today, to be continuing through the dispensation? Something that has been set up as a strong wall, there is something there where divine life, divine love can be enjoyed.
J.D.G. That is right. It is good to see that. It is not just a brazen wall where you would resist evil but it is to protect what is within, is it not? All that we are speaking about right now is not just for the sake of position, but to protect an area where eternal life can be known, and where the service of God can be enjoyed.
J.A.B. So would you say that the scripture read in Ezra shows that the absolutely necessary exercises that you have been going over are a means to an end? They are not an end in themselves, but they have in view the service of God and what is precious to God, is that right?
J.D.G. That is absolutely right.
J.A.B. Some of the young people here might say, Well what we have been speaking about sounds a bit negative to me. But it is an absolutely vital means to the service of God being maintained in life and power and preciousness, is that right?
J.D.G. That is what I thought. In Ezra you come to God’s assessment of persons who are prepared to go back from Babylon to Jerusalem. These Israelites at that time had been captive for seventy years under divine judgment, but the word had gone out to return; God had given it, through the Persian king Cyrus. Not all went back but some went back and here is a group of persons going back. And you can see if you read the passage how dependent they were on God’s support on the way. But the vessels are really the persons. They represent persons who are exercised to return from the captivity of Babylon to Jerusalem, which is a figure of what we have been speaking about. It is in view of being weighed in the house of God.
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J.A.G. Your exercise then is of these persons that there is quality.
J.D.G. Quality. Yes, I am glad you bring that in, because it was in my mind that the Spirit of God is prepared to help in separating the precious from the vile, to bring the precious into an area where the quality can be assessed by divine Persons.
R.Gr. Do you have more to say about the matter of recovery?
You touched on it in your address last night, and here we have persons who are recovered and there is value added. What would you say about that?
J.D.G. Well, that was in my mind in reading this. I was attracted also to the two copper vessels, “shining copper, precious as gold”. I think that is vessels who have been through the exercise of what we have been speaking about; having judged what was in Babylon, and are in accordance with divine judgment as to holiness and righteousness. There is something that shines in the person that is as precious as gold. It is a moral feature and it underlies spirituality.
R.Gr. Do you think that the shining implies the ornamental work which is a sign of the work of the Spirit?
J.D.G. Yes, I am glad of that remark. The shining I think is the ornamental work of the Spirit, it is ornamental in the sense that it is bringing out the lustre of a glory that relates to the believer as subject to the Lord.
R.G.
What would you say about them waiting until they come to Jerusalem before they are weighed?
J.D.G. I just thought that they were brought back and were serviceable in the house of God. I think you get the weight in the service of God. I think spiritual weight comes out. You are really being weighed in the service of God for the pleasure of God. There is a very intimate matter there that you can assess and rejoice in, what has been wrought by the Spirit in the soul of a believer.
R.G.
Would it be according to the shekel of the sanctuary, which belongs to Jerusalem so that you have God’s valuation of them?
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J.D.G. Yes, God’s valuation. When they are weighed in the house of God that is a very fine touch. We rejoice to be together to celebrate the Lord’s supper and the service of God, because you really begin to appreciate the work of God shining out now, in an environment of holiness and righteousness and apart from what belongs to nature altogether.
J.A.G. That is really the assembly shining—her shining. It is like a precious stone.
J.D.G. Yes, her shining like a precious stone is brought out in the millennial glory, is it not? It is the environment in which she shines, but there is a shining in the realm of privilege too, is there not?
J.A.G. Yes indeed.
G.A.B. Paul says, “let a man prove himself, and thus eat of the bread, and drink of the cup”, 1 Cor 11: 28. When we come together that is when the Lord would assess what our condition or state is.
J.D.G. Yes, you mean when the brethren come in on Lord’s day morning, you are viewing them as vessels of shining copper, precious as gold. They have been through the wilderness week, they have kept themselves and proved themselves, and we accept one another on that basis.
G.A.B. The King James Version says, “let a man examine himself’, which would be a self-examination, but “prove himself’ means that I must be able to be weighed in the divine balance.
J.D.G. That is very good because it means that as you gather for the Lord’s supper, you do not come casually, but as a person who says, I have sought to be true to the Lord in the past week, I have sought to be true to the confession of His name in whatever environment I have been in, I have been before the Lord if I have had to be adjusted in regard to anything in my pathway, and now I am free. He can present himself before the Lord, like in the house of our God, and be acceptable.
D.J.W. Why is it copper?
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D.J.W. Does it relate to the brazen altar? Does it have some connection to the fellowship of His death do you think?
J.D.G. I thought that. I thought there was what we have been speaking about vessels in accord with divine judgment.
What God has judged in the death of Christ, in accord with that. What would you say?
D.J.W. Well it is quite an exercise, and it has been said to me, Well if you separate from persons you are really looking down on these people. But it is far from that, is it not? It is having the divine judgment. It seems to me that persons find it difficult to grasp that certain persons would be so connected with iniquity, even though they may be morally upright and pious in their own life, and yet there is what the Lord is about to spue out of His mouth. Can you help us please on that?
J.D.G. Well, the Lord does not spue any true believer out of His mouth, no matter where he is. If there is a true believer in this world that belongs to Christ He will take him at the rapture. The person will be saved, although all their works may be destroyed. Persons may think you are thinking high of yourself to separate from other believers. You are doing it, not because of them personally, but because of what they are associated with. Scripture affirms that if you are exercised to name the name of the Lord, and things where you may be are not in accord with it, you cannot abide there, righteously or with a good conscience.
J.T.B. It says, “precious as gold”. Is there a moral equivalence in the copper with the standard of divine righteousness in the gold, do you think?
J.D.G. That is what I thought.
J.T.B. These exercises to which you have been referring would produce the copper, the shining copper, but they are simply commensurate with the outshining of divine righteousness in the gold. Is that right?
J.D.G. Yes, the gold and the silver and the copper all relate to features of the work of the Spirit in the believer, do they not?
So divine righteousness and the appreciation of redemption, 207
and the exercises associated with the wilderness way, all come together to enhance the service of God as we participate in it.
J.T.B. In Nehemiah it was a seed of Israel that separated themselves from foreigners, as if there is a continuing line according to the divine generations, do you think?
J.D.G. That is very good.
H.P.
In 1 Thessalonians, it speaks of the Lord coming, it says, “caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air”, 1 Thess 4: 17. I wondered if there would be a close connection to the Supper?
J.D.G. Yes. You may have heard that Mr Stoney is reported to have said he was going to meet the Son of God when he was on his way to the Supper. So he was going to meet the Lord.
You want to be in the same state to meet the Lord, as coming together for the celebration of the Supper, as if He translated you, would you not?
H.P.
I wondered if our hearts are ready for the Lord at the Supper, as you said.
J.D.G. That is right. It is in regard to the Lord. We name the name of the Lord. It is that Person that is precious to you. So whatever others think, you do it. So it says in 2 Tim 3: 12,
“And all indeed who desire to live piously in Christ Jesus will be persecuted”. So you will suffer reproach, and you will suffer misunderstanding, but you have to bear all that on account of faithfulness to the Lord. Is that right?
D.B.R. I wondered if you could say a little more about the earlier part of chapter 3, and how that bears on what the enemy, what Satan is bringing in in our own day. Did you have something in mind about that?
J.D.G. I thought that things have deteriorated, and features of evil which marked paganism are now being allowed in some churches, to which Christ’s name is attached. You have to turn away from that, 2 Tim 3: 5. There is no believer, who is in the light of the scripture, who should ever continue with what is happening now. It is an increase in evil since the days when Mr Darby and others separated from the churches.
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D.B.R. You could really say it is profane for men to cohabit, the more so if they are functioning in ministry to which Christ’s name is attached.
J.D.G. Yes, so scripture says, “from these turn away”.
J.M.
If you view Christendom as it is at the present time, you might have to say that the enemy, Satan, has a hold there, a tremendous hold, and that should make it quite clear to any real believer, that he can have absolutely no part with that whatsoever.
J.D.G. Yes, that is what I think. That is why I think this section in chapter 3, the first five verses, makes it mandatory for a believer to leave immediately.
J.M.
What is going on derives from Satan. The Lord has no place there. I am not saying that there are not believers there, but if you take the system, you just have to judge that the Lord has absolutely no place there, and therefore we just have to leave it.
J.D.G. Yes, because these features (2 Tim 3: 1-5), are very similar to those described in the beginning of the epistle to the Romans, as characterising heathen life, but are now reproduced under Christianity, covering itself with that name, and now having a form of godliness.
B.W.L. In these last days, “The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former”, Hag 2: 9. It is wonderful to think of, and it is in the midst of this darkness that “The latter glory of this house shall be greater than the former”.
J.D.G. Yes, that is taking forth the precious from the vile.
There is a place, where the precious can be, that is pleasing to the Lord. We have to accept that we may be misunderstood, even amongst our families who have departed from the truth; persecution could arise from that area. They despise you because you are walking in a pathway that they do not regard.
But we regard it. So you are identified with the Lord’s name in the place of reproach.
J.A.G. Coming together in assembly to celebrate the Lord’s supper is a very dignified matter is it not?
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J.D.G. Yes, it is. Coming together in assembly, you are in full accord with what that vessel is, set out in its pristine glory in Paul’s ministry, as we spoke about it yesterday.
J.A.G. It links on with what was said about the rapture.
J.D.G. You cannot have Ephesus publicly now, but you can have the joy of calling on the name of the Lord out of a pure heart with others and enjoy the Lord’s presence.
C.K.R. In the light of what we have been focusing on in the reading, the Holy Spirit would be committed to it in a full way would you say?
J.D.G. Well, I think the Spirit’s operations at the present time are to secure vessels to honour according to this scripture (2
Tim 2: 19–22), in view of filling out the service of God according to Paul’s ministry. However, there are believers who do not have the light of the assembly as we understand it, who are true and precious believers suffering for the name of the Lord Jesus publicly, and in some parts of the world being persecuted too. That is another matter. But those who are in the light of the assembly are to be guided by the scriptures as set out in 2 Timothy.
R.T.
It says, “I will be to you for a Father, and ye shall be to me for sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty”, 2 Cor 6: 18. We may think that we are exposed through all these exercises but we are brought into a system of great protection are we not?
J.D.G. Yes, so practically where it involves our employment, we have known through the experiences of brethren, how the Lord has come in for them to maintain them, and yet be true to His name.
R.T.
Persons have lost families and everything, but they have come into an area where they enjoy the Father and all the resources of His love.
J.D.G. That is good.
P.A.G. It says in Leviticus, “Holy shall ye be, for I Jehovah your God am holy” (Lev 19: 1), and these matters of which we have spoken are gone over in some detail in Leviticus 19 and 210
20, but it says at the end of chapter 20, “And ye shall be holy unto me”, v 26. Do you think the fact that “ye shall be holy unto me” would be a great lever in our souls as to what we have been speaking of?
J.D.G. Yes, I think it is. It is a Person. It is not just a doctrine, although that is important, but it is a Person that you are coming out to. You name the name of the Lord, you are coming out to where He is, “there am I in the midst of them”.
A Person that is precious to you.
R.H.
Mr Stoney used to speak of Satan’s objective to get at the top shoot. If he were to gain his ends would it be true that God would be robbed? Is that his objective?
J.D.G. Yes, that would be right. Stop the growth and stop the life. Life is to continue.
J.McK. You have been promoting deep exercise as to what our activity is and our exercise is. Alongside of that goes divine working does it not? The idea of divine making runs along with what may result from exercise on our part. I will make you a brazen wall, and then the vessels that are divinely produced and divinely polished. God’s hand needs to be discerned alongside our exercise does it?
J.D.G. Yes, I think the Spirit of God has an objective at the present time, in the midst of all the conditions that we have been speaking about to have a people apart, rejoicing in the living character of what comes from God as attached to Christ.
Fourth reading at Aberdeen, Scotland,
15th August 2009
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G.A.Brown,
Grangemouth;
J.A.Brown,
Grangemouth;
J.T.Brown, Edinburgh; J.A.Gardiner, Aberdeen; R.Gardiner, Kirkcaldy; J.D.Gray, Edinburgh; P.A.Gray, Grangemouth; R.Gray, Grangemouth; N.J.Henry, Glasgow; R.Hodge; St Ives; G.C.McKay, Glasgow; J.McKay, Witney; B.W.Lovie, Aberdeen; E.J.Mair, Buckie; J.Mitchell, Edinburgh; H.Pfeiffer, Bad Endbach; D.B.Robertson, Cumnock; C.K.Robinson, Glasgow; J.Strachan, Dundee; R.Taylor, Kirkcaldy; D.J.Willetts, Birmingham
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THE RESURRECTION OF THE LORD JESUS
Ephesians 1: 16, 17, 19-23; 2: 1, 4-7
It will be evident that I have in mind these three references to the Lord’s resurrection. In John 2 the setting is that “the passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem” (v 13); and He found conditions of trading in the temple, which He calls “a house of merchandise”. He quotes from Psalm 69, “For the zeal of thy house hath devoured me, and the reproaches of them that reproach thee have fallen upon me”, v 9. That is what He brings forward. If you read Psalm 69, you will find it is a sorrow Psalm. The Lord is feeling things, but it leads to a disclosure. They question Him, “What sign shewest thou to us?”, but He had already declared Himself as the Son of God in saying, “make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise”. The Jews were opposed to Christ right from the outset of John’s gospel. In answer to their question He says, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up”, referring to the temple of His body. Herod’s temple was empty. There was a shrine but there was no divine dwelling there. I do not know what was within the shrine because the ark was lost and never came back after the captivity.
The divine presence was not in Herod’s temple, but it was present in Christ’s body, and the disciples took note of it.
What convinced them as to the verity of it was His resurrection.
This blessed Man, the Lord Jesus Christ, was God manifest in flesh and He had the power to raise Himself from among the dead. He says to Martha in chapter 11, “I am the resurrection and the life”, v 25. Life, as we have often been taught, was inherent in Christ. It is intended to have a result in us, to grasp hold of the fact that Jesus has lain in death. That body lay in death and He had the power to raise His own body, and He did. “When therefore he was raised from among the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and believed the scripture and the word which Jesus had spoken”. That is a good result. That is not just Psalm 69, but I believe it is the whole of Scripture, so that they grasped hold of the truth of Christ having raised His own body. It does not speak in this 213
scripture of any other results or what sprung from that death.
That is another side of things. Here He raised His own body from among the dead and they “believed the scripture”. The whole of Scripture was quickened to them; it became living.
“And the word which Jesus had spoken”, so that there is not only the Scripture, what is written, but there is present communication, “the word which Jesus had spoken”. So we, as believers having the Holy Spirit, have communication with that blessed Man who is now in glory, and we are helped to see the living character of the Scripture. It is borne testimony to by the fact that the One who said, “The zeal of thy house devours me”, and brought Himself forward as the Son of God, that blessed Man, was shown to be God Himself in the temple of His body. What a thing it is that the flesh of Christ veiled the Deity. Man cannot look on the Deity; it dwells in
“unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6: 16), but here was the Deity present amongst men and, as the thorn bush burned, they were not consumed, Exod 3: 2. But there were persons who remembered. It is good to be such persons who remember what the Lord Jesus says, and to grasp hold of the fact that Scripture is indicted by divine Persons. It is a living book to the believer; and then there is “the word which Jesus had spoken”, and that word is still available.
I would desire to be careful in what I say because it is a very precious subject and a very holy subject. Romans 6
brings out another side of the resurrection of Christ. Believers are being addressed. “By the disobedience of the one man the many have been constituted sinners, so also by the obedience of the one the many will be constituted righteous”, chap 5: 19.
That is the apostle speaking to persons who have righteousness, righteousness not of their own, but righteousness as given of God on account of the work of Christ,
“righteousness of God … towards all, and upon all those who believe”, Rom 3: 22. Paul begins this epistle as “God’s glad tidings ... concerning his Son ... marked out Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by resurrection of the dead”, chap 1: 1-4. His own resurrection was proof of that.
What I wanted to speak about was this precious matter:
“as Christ has been raised up from among the dead by the 214
glory of the Father”. That is a beautiful reference to Christ’s preciousness to the Father. “Thou art my beloved Son, in thee I have found my delight” (Mark 1: 11) at the Jordan, at His baptism. Then the preciousness of Christ at the mount of transfiguration: “This is my beloved son: hear him”, Mark 9: 7.
And then the Father was without Christ in manhood for three days and three nights. His spirit was with the Father, precious matter that is too. Here the Father is coming in relation to the resurrection of this blessed Man. Christ had glorified God on the earth. He glorified Him, filled out all that was desired of man, and He had gone into death; that precious work had been completed, and persons had been saved. But this scripture lets us into the secret. The Father’s desire was that that Man should live again, that He should have that blessed Man again, His Christ. It was not possible that He should see corruption, Ps 16: 10. The Father waited, in His patience, these three days and three nights to fill out the matter of scripture. “He was buried; and ... he was raised the third day, according to the scriptures, 1 Cor 15: 4. But He was “raised … by the glory of the Father”. All that the Father represented in affection, everything that was expressed in the Father, demanded that Christ should be raised. He raised Him from among the dead.
What delight He had in the selection of that blessed Man!
The previous scripture I read had the effect on persons after His resurrection. Here is another scripture: “raised up from among the dead by the glory of the Father”, the Father’s delight. Paul shows us that God is going to have pleasure in others also following on Christ’s resurrection. Christ does not remain on the earth. Here it does not tell us that, but it is assured to us. Paul tells us that in the next scripture. It is Christ in resurrection in this epistle, but for us as the believers it is Christ not only in resurrection, but also it is Christ in glory, Man in heaven.
O the sight in heaven is glorious!
Man in righteousness is there;
Once the victim, now victorious
(Hymn 212)
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That is the light that shines for us. There is a Man in heaven, but there are believers on the earth, and we come into that as believers on the earth. We are believers on the earth. We are not raised with Christ in this section, not viewed that way. He is raised; He is glorified as a blessed Man in heaven; and the Spirit is given so that we have a link with that Man in heaven; but we are to “walk in newness of life”. That is the Christian walk. That is the walk of victory, supported by the Spirit, a link with a Man in heaven that we can take account of there, and “walk in newness of life”. What a joy to the Father, not only to have Christ “raised up from among the dead” by His glory, but to have saints here walking “in newness of life”, responsible persons. You and I are responsible persons in the flesh and blood condition and yet walking “in newness of life”, a new tread, a new way of life. It is really a new creature, but it is presented in this way from the responsible side: “we also should walk in newness of life. For if we are become identified with him in the likeness of his death, so also we shall be of his resurrection”. We are walking here in the light of a Man in heaven and there is a tread, a firmness. We could say, with our knowledge, that our eyes are on the goal. We are walking here with an objective from the Red Sea to the Jordan and anticipating going over it too. Heaven is before the saints. In the wilderness in Exodus, the people turned towards the wilderness and saw the glory, chap 16: 10. That is an attraction. Here we are in the wilderness. Christ is in glory, but we turn towards the wilderness and see the glory. The glory for us is there in a blessed Man in heaven. I say these words to encourage us to see how the glory of the Father so appreciated Christ that He raised Him and then He commends Him to us. He has that Man in heaven, but He has men here below responsibly in the scene where Christ once was, walking as He walked.
In Ephesians 1 Paul’s prayer is that we should understand something of “the might of his strength”. “The surpassing greatness of his power” is God’s power. It is “the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory”. It is that blessed Person. What a Personage He is! Consider “the surpassing greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of the might of his strength, in which 216
he wrought in the Christ in raising him from among the dead”.
It is to have an effect on “us who believe” as we grasp hold of the fact that this power “which he wrought in the Christ” is towards us. It is a most expressive scripture to me that God worked according to “the might of his strength, in which he wrought in the Christ” bringing Christ out from among the dead. What a working there was! I cannot say much about it but I would like to leave the impression on our hearts that divine might was expressed there, “the might of his strength”, as if there was a power there that would have, if it could have, prevented the resurrection of Christ, but Christ could not be holden of death, and divine energy was expended in raising Him from the dead: “in which he wrought in the Christ in raising him from among the dead”.
And then He exalts Him. Here it tells us He is not to remain on the earth. He is to be exalted and He is exalted. “He set him down at his right hand in the heavenlies”, the Father’s delight is in having Christ at His right hand in the heavenlies.
But what is most attractive here is that He is not going to be there alone. We are raised with Him. That is what the second chapter brings out: “and you, being dead in your offences and sins … but God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love wherewith he loved us, (we too being dead in offences,)”—that is Jew and Greek he is speaking about —“has quickened us with the Christ”. When God exercised His power in bringing Christ out from among the dead, we are viewed as coming out with Him. We are quickened with Him. It does not exactly say Christ was quickened, but the suggestion is there; but Christ is made to live, and there He is in the divine presence, but He is not alone. God has in this setting brought us out from among the dead too, “dead in your offences and sins”, not an iota of response from us to God at all: “you, being dead in your offences and sins”. We are not viewed as being responsibly active; we are viewed as “being dead in … offences and sins”; but God’s mercy came in. What a thing, dear brethren: “but God, being rich in mercy, because of his great love wherewith he loved us”. That is a remarkable thing. It comes to mind that it relates to a company that is chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, Eph 1: 4, but viewed here, in this setting, as “dead in your offences and sins”, but made to live 217
and live in another manner: “has quickened us with the Christ”—made to live with Christ and—“raised us up together”.
That is not resurrection; that is elevation: “and has made us sit down together in the heavenlies in Christ Jesus, that he might display in the coming ages the surpassing riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus”. God is going to display that. We are not in heavenly places actually yet. We know something of it in spirit, but Christ is there, and we have been quickened with Him. We are made to live in the life of another Man by divine power, to take account of the fact that we are Christians, and have been made to live by God’s operations within us. It is the divine action, the divine power and divine will. It says there, “For ye are saved by grace, through faith; and this not of yourselves; it is God’s gift”. Faith is viewed here as God’s gift; grace has operated; love has taken the form of grace operating in us to bring us into association with Christ as alive from among the dead, but raised and seated in heavenly places. So here you get a view that our destiny is heaven, heavenly places. We touch something of it in the service of God. That is where we are going to be actually.
We belong to a heavenly family. What a power, what a working!
He raised Christ from among the dead “by the might of his strength”, but “the might of his strength” has operated in us as “dead in … offences and sins” to make us live and live to God.
I trust these few thoughts might enlarge our hearts and give us an appreciation of these aspects of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus.
EDINBURGH
12th January 2010
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It will be evident that what is on my spirit in relation to this meeting concerns the building of a house. God builds His own house and it is stable. I want to speak about wisdom building a house. It is a very fine house, wisdom’s house, and I would like to apply it to how we build our houses, not with the bricks and mortar, but the moral and spiritual features that should attach to a believer’s house. We all carry in our spirits the catastrophes that have come into households amongst us, and it is on my spirit to say some words that might give guidance in relation to principles as they are followed through that ought to result and, under the Lord’s good hand, will result in stable households in the testimony.
Wisdom has built this house; she has hewn out her seven pillars. Seven suggests completeness, in Scripture. It is a very fine house as all our houses should be morally and spiritually, and perhaps too in hospitality which is associated with the fellowship of God’s Son in its dignity. She has
“slaughtered her cattle, she hath mingled her wine”—this house would be a very fine house to go into—“she hath sent forth her maidens: she crieth upon the summits … Whoso is simple, let him turn in hither”. It is a fine thing to have a house like this; you can bring persons into it and they are going to be safe, they are going to rejoice. There is happiness in this house because Christ is there. Wisdom has been made available to us to do this. If you read these sections of scripture it says,
“Jehovah possessed me in the beginning of his way”, chap 8: 22. He used wisdom in building the planets and the earth, and the whole universe. In looking over some things I was attracted to a comment regarding the verses in chap 8: 25, 26:
“Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth; while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the beginning of the dust of the world”, that God made the particles, the dust, before He constituted and made 219
the worlds. He did it by Christ, “by whom also he made the worlds”, Heb 1: 2.
Wisdom is proceeding, but wisdom has a companion.
Most houses are constituted with a husband and wife, but some are sisters alone and some brothers alone; but we can all draw on a Companion in relation to the establishment of our house, who can give us counsel. That is Christ. In a marriage we can draw on that wisdom, the wisdom of Christ to establish a household. “I wisdom dwell with prudence”—it is very fine to dwell with prudence. If you want to see how that works out in the New Testament, read about Aquila and Priscilla in Acts 18. You will find them in the epistle to the Romans and Corinthians, and in 2 Timothy—three times Aquila is mentioned first, and three times Priscilla is mentioned first.
There is equality and equivalence in a husband and wife.
There is ability to draw on the resource from one another, “find the knowledge which cometh of reflection”. That is a mature thought. When you are a child you do not have that knowledge that comes from reflection, but you get it as you grow up. You get the “knowledge which cometh from reflection”, that is, well considered thoughts. Learn to discuss matters together.
Those who are married have to learn that. There is the ability in a companion to discuss matters and to make use of the results. Young people who are here and are contemplating marriage; think about that, forming something that will remain. As we will see later, the storms will come, but we would all desire that our building will remain standing. It is a very fine thing to dwell with prudence, to reflect on things, even if you are alone in the house, to reflect on things. Do not act precipitately but reflect on things. Even as a young person who may not be married, but growing up and beginning to reflect: reflect on things, reflect on your decisions, reflect on them, call on Christ, “who has been made to us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and holiness and redemption”, 1 Cor 1: 30. Christ is available to all and should be drawn upon.
Christianity is a living system and deals with living persons; draw on resources that are available to you in Christ. Draw also on the resources that may be available to you amongst the saints of God. The whole matter that is on my heart is the establishment of a house which remains like wisdom’s house 220
where persons can be invited in and find safety. There is a tract by Mr Cutting, ‘Safety, Certainty and Enjoyment’. It is a reality and it is found in Christ, and it is found in the saints and in the homes of the saints where there is food that abides.
The Lord has drawn our attention today to food that is obnoxious, but this food in this house would be profitable. Let us see when we invite one another into our homes, and even if when we are not inviting one another in, but living as families or by ourselves, that the food we imbibe will build a constitution which will stand the pressures of life and anxieties of life.
These are divine principles—I am speaking in view of preservation, and the setting out of principles which may be of guidance in relation to matters extant among the saints. It says in Ephesians, “even as the assembly is subjected to the Christ, so also wives to their own husbands in everything”—
that is a very delicate relationship, it is not lording it over them, we will see that in Peter, it is not dictating, it is a sharing thought. Husbands are to “love your own wives, even as the Christ also loved the assembly”. I do not think in scripture you ever find the woman being told to love the husband or the man, but you will find that the husband or the man is told to love his wife. It is a high standard of love to maintain in a house but it is a standard in view of preserving things. Then it says, “So ought men also to love their own wives as their own bodies: he that loves his own wife loves himself. For not one has ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, even as also the Christ the assembly”—it is the husband’s responsibility to love his wife. That is natural love; marriage involves natural love. There may be more than that in it, but it is natural love and the husband has to maintain that love.
This is a divine standard. Christ considers for His assembly, He purifies it by “washing of water by the word, that he might present the assembly to himself glorious, having no spot, or wrinkle, or any of such things”. The husband has to love his wife and maintain her affections for himself, inviolate in a world where attractions may come, so that the marriage may be held together. You may have to work it out for yourself in the detail of your life, but divine principles remain, love remains and the standard as set out in this scripture is Christ 221
and the assembly. How Christ has nourished and cherished His assembly in view of the day of presentation which will take place, indeed in principle it takes place each Lord’s day when we experience the joy of union with Christ. So, “no one has ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it, even as also the Christ the assembly”—I leave that word with you, the divine standard is to be seen in the husband here. He has to accept responsibility for loving his wife. Scripture does not allow any diversion from that; it is the husband’s responsibility.
When we come to 1 Peter it is an abnormal situation,
“wives, be subject to your own husbands, that, even if any are disobedient to the word, they may be gained without the word by the conversation of the wives”. I do not think that the woman would be looked at here as marrying a man who was unconverted. In the days when Peter lived there were persons who got converted, the wife in this situation was converted and the husband was not, but the point of scripture is for the woman to seek to develop what will morally attract a husband, counting on God to work in this situation. It is also a word to all sisters, that to remain attractive they should cultivate the
“conversation carried out in fear”. That is respectful behaviour, not fear of violence in the household. “Whose adorning let it not be that outward one of tressing of hair, and wearing gold, or putting on apparel; but the hidden man of the heart, in the incorruptible ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which in the sight of God is of great price”. Dear sister, the Lord would have us all, the sisters in particular—the young women too—to cultivate these moral ornaments. Take character from the Lord Jesus: “the hidden man of the heart”—
that is Christ—“in the incorruptible ornament of a meek and quiet spirit”. That does not mean to say that the woman submits to anything; it is the manner of her spirit. If she is related to the “hidden man of the heart”, she is related to the Lord Jesus and she will develop a meek and quiet spirit and will stand by principles. She does not depart from principles to gain a husband; she remains by divine principles in order to gain her husband, counting on God. It may be she will not succeed, but God would bring about within her a reward or the comfort of her own heart, namely, Christ as the “hidden man 222
of the heart”. The pressures of life develop features of Christ.
These dear sisters here have a very trying time in this situation, we would all be sympathetic with that and pray for any one like this that she may develop “in the incorruptible ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which in the sight of God is of great price”. That is something that will go through, something that will be seen in the eternal day. It will go through into eternity after time has lapsed and flesh and blood condition has ceased, but she is doing this for her husband whom she had and who was unconverted. I suggest they would both be unconverted when they were married, but she was converted, came to Christ, and she seeks to win her husband. But, at the same time it is a good exercise for every sister to develop these features which are most attractive. Not only will your husband see you in your natural beauty, but he will see you in your moral beauty, beauty that belongs to what is going through into eternity, what is moral and spiritual. I do not think the question of Sarah “calling him lord” meant that he subjugated her; I think it means the idea of honouring him. You should always honour your husband.
I want to come on to this, “Ye husbands likewise, dwell with them according to knowledge, as with a weaker, even the female, vessel, giving them honour”. That is the husband’s responsibility; he is to love his wife. Now he is to dwell with her knowing that in certain aspects it is “according to knowledge, as with a weaker, even the female, vessel”. It is a vessel that was taken out of the man, that is in subjection to him. No husband should ever abuse that position but in tenderness seek to nourish the feature of subjection in love, maintaining love. It is the husband’s responsibility to love his wife at all times. It says, “as also fellow-heirs of the grace of life”—that is very important. Adam and Eve are not the full example literally of marriage. “Fellow-heirs of the grace of life”—that is Christian marriage, persons who are in the light of the Lord Jesus as Saviour and Lord and are living their life in relation to Christ in glory and His interests here who find their life in the circle of the saints. They are not only enjoying natural life, but they are enjoying together spiritual life. You take up marriage in the Lord and you have a bond, not only in nature—that will finish one day, but a bond that is spiritual 223
and it enters into the position of husband and wife that they become fellow-heirs of the grace of life. They can share exercises together; they have the same interests, the same Lord. They find their life in the same sphere, not in the things that belong to this world, but in a sphere of eternal life—life amongst the saints—and their whole aspect is related to the Lord’s interest here. Natural love, natural joys are to be enjoyed, but there is more than nature, “fellow-heirs of the grace of life”. That is Aquila and Priscilla: read about them, they staked their neck for Paul at one point (Rom 16: 4), and they considered for the testimony; they had the assembly in their house. Their whole life, the whole sphere of the life of the household, centred in the Lord’s interest. It involves sacrifice to do that, to hold a household and build it in relation to the Lord’s interest. There are things you cannot go in for and do not want to go in for in the world, there are things that you would not have in the house because you do not want to have them there. Young people have to be nourished and cherished with care, admonishing them, not causing bitterness in the lives and hearts of young people because they are going through struggles.
I come to Exodus, and what I had in mind was the fact that you need the manna daily. We are in the wilderness journey, all of us, and we need the manna daily. That is Christ, it is not Christ in His ministry, it is Christ as a Man and how He moved amongst men. How did the Lord move? I have been more and more impressed with the reality of His humanity, when He was here as a Man. It says in the synopsis, if you walked down the streets of Galilee at that time when He was alive, you would meet Him in passing as a Man in His life here, J N Darby, Synopsis vol 3 p198. You might have had to do with Him in business as a carpenter; what kind of attitude did the Lord have in His life here? He was here for the pleasure of God and He was in favour with God and men. You need the Scriptures every day; this manna is not to be kept overnight.
Who is responsible in the house? It is the head of the house who is responsible to collect the manna and it is an absolute necessity, it is a divine principle, you need Christ every day, you need the Scriptures every day. The husband, or the head of the house, must gather it in the morning. You have to gather 224
it in the morning, but you have to share it with the household.
In our own homes, the father, they say, is the breadwinner, he brings home sufficient to buy the food, he sees that everybody gets a portion. If you want to run a house according to one that the Lord can bless, you need Christ every day, you need the word of God. You need to begin the day with the word of God in prayer; everyone here should do that. Young people, you must begin the day with the word of God and in prayer yourself. If you are in a household you have the added advantage of the father, the head of the house, bringing in the manna. He may not be able to share it in the morning, he may be away before you are up, but he will share it with you sometime during the day to help you be established and meet the world that you have to pass through. We have to go out and be for God in the world as it is. The Lord moved in the world as it was in His time, and He was here for God in that world. He said, “He wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the instructed”, Isa 50: 4. We need instruction, every household needs instruction. To establish a house you need to abide by what I am saying, it is in Scripture; it is not my thoughts, it is in Scripture. You cannot hold the manna over until the morning, you must gather every working day. It says that on the Sabbath they carried it over. On the first day of the week we are usually all free to gather in the house, and you read the Scriptures together before going to the morning meeting. You are not going into the world to work, you might read a different scripture where you would impart some impression of what you are about to do, “this do in remembrance of me”, Luke 22: 19. It is a wonderful thing to remember the Lord Jesus in the scene of His rejection. Some believers do not do that, but it is not right. Scripture says, “this do in remembrance of me”.
Every believer that loves the Lord would do that in remembrance of Him. When the Lord’s day morning comes around, you sit at table and you read the scriptures. We are going to meet the Lord Jesus. We are privileged to remember Him in the scene where He has been rejected, amongst a company who treasure Him. You see the brethren come into the meeting; they belong to Christ. He calls us, “my brethren”.
We regard the saints as coming in as Christ’s brethren; that is 225
the privilege, more than responsibility, on the first day of the week; but on the weekdays it is definitely responsibility. The head of the house, the husband, has to secure something for the wife, for the family, whoever is in the house, and the head of the house should do it. Whoever is responsible must gather that food. We need the food, we need Christ, we need the word of God. There has to be some explanation given, some transference of the impression of the scripture to the realities of life and what your family has to face as they go out into the world, to school or business. There needs to be some understanding passed on. God maintains this manna until they reach the land, “the children of Israel ate the manna forty years, until they came into an inhabited land: they ate the manna until they came to the borders of the land of Canaan”, Exod 16: 35. For us, that is what I have said, you eat the manna Monday to Saturday, and when you have come to the borders of the land on Lord’s day morning you have Christ,
“the old corn of the land”, Josh 5: 11. It is Christ as indigenous to heaven. You are not going out to meet responsibility on Lord’s day, you are going to remember the Lord Jesus and come into the blessedness of the privilege of His headship as He comes amongst us. He comes to us. Christ comes to us; He comes to hearts that are waiting for Him. He comes to hearts that He finds faithful, He comes to hearts who have been in households who are blessed, who have gathered the manna. There is a constitution formed in the believer that is pleasurable to the heart of Christ and in the service of God those impressions are released in an atmosphere of holy privilege where for the time being you can consider the work of God in your soul as being complete, at that moment, yielding to God the fragrance of what it will yield eternally.
Where we read in Luke’s gospel is a very sobering matter. I speak with feeling, dear brethren, and sensitivity of the preciousness and the tenderness of what we have been speaking about, and not in an arbitrary or any hard or legal way. I do not want to convey that impression, but to put us all in touch with the Lord Jesus as persons who have proved the blessedness of the Spirit indwelling us so that our link with the Lord is maintained every day in quickening power by the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is a real matter; it is what we 226
call organic—living. The Lord says to these persons, “why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things that I say?”—is what I have been speaking about too difficult? Is it not possible in our households to run them in the way that Scripture suggests? I think the Lord will give you strength and guidance to run your home that way, and it will be established, founded on the rock. These principles that I have spoken about are rocks, they are fundamental, the pillars of wisdom’s house. It does not tell us in Proverbs what it is founded on, but you can be assured that it is founded on the rock. What God establishes He established in Christ.
Storms will come, storms come in life to all of us; individually and household-wise, they come. The devil has in mind to break down the house, to break down the house of the believer: the relationship of husband and wife, family, and father and mother too. He is out to destroy the relationship.
But if you are founded on the rock, founded in Christ and He is your Counsellor, you will be able to withstand the stresses of life. These are real matters. We have all had experiences in life, the young people too have experiences in life, real experiences, real sorrows, real tragedies, real upsets, but Christ is the answer. The household is the answer too, if secured and kept for Christ. How challenging it is, but if we maintain a sense of love in the house, a sense of appreciation, a sense that everyone in that house is valuable, young or old, they are all valuable, they all belong to Christ; we want to hold them for Christ. You are building on the rock. Build your own house on the rock and you will find as the scripture says, “the stream broke upon that house and could not shake it”. It is possible; it is seen amongst the saints too in large measure. I am not saying that it is not, but continuance in the path maintains a house in suitability to contain the storm. Your own house, your own dwelling place, if you do not maintain it the storm comes and down it comes. This thing gets blown away and that thing gets blown away because you have not maintained it. Morally you have to maintain your house and then, when the storms come, you have an anchor and that is in Christ, an anchor for the soul. You run to Him for shelter, you run to Him for guidance, and you will find that He will give you guidance in relation to your house and the devil will be 227
thwarted. The Lord says that if you do not do as I say it is going to fall.
God allows things in the lives of men and women, and in nature and natural catastrophes in the wisdom of His ways, but it is to draw all to Himself. You will find that you can always say to somebody, ‘Cry to God, speak to Him, and you will find that He is a God who hears’, as Psalm 107: 28
suggests. How blessed it is to have One who hears and who never slumbers or sleeps; He is always there available. Christ is always available to you, not only as a friend of tax-gatherers and sinners. It begins that way, but, “there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother”, Prov 18: 24. He is a friend who will impart His thoughts, His intimacy about all things that are dearest and most precious to His heart. He is available to every believer.
May the Lord bless these few words, for His Name’s sake.
LONDON
2nd April 2010
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Genesis 1: 26-27; 3: 8-9; 4: 26 to 5: 2
Romans 3: 22 from “for there”-23; 6: 19 from “For even”-
22; 8: 29
I have a thought as to image and likeness which I would like to consider in the presence of the brethren. God brought in man. Much had gone before this in Genesis 1 verses 1 and 2, and thereafter the preparation of the earth for the present creation, for man. The animal creation came out of the earth by the power of the word of God, remarkable matter! The earth had been brought through to its vegetative state on day three, then it brought forth living souls on day five and day six. God does not bring man out of the ground as He had done with the animals. He considers this personage, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”, divine Persons taking counsel to bring in a being, a remarkable being, man. He came from God as having intelligence—he is able to name the animals, every one of them. He had a mind capable of receiving divine communications and God sets him over the creation. He gives him instructions and there he was in the image of God. He represented God, but he also had likeness which is a moral thought. God gave man that likeness when He created him, when He breathed into man the breath of life, so that man has a distinction from every other creature, man is “of God”, Luke 3: 38.
I read in Genesis 3; God came down in the cool of the day into the garden. He was walking there and He expected Adam and Eve to walk with Him. I believe God had in mind to commune with man.
Coming to chapter 5 we have, “In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him”. Thus, after the fall, the scripture stresses the fact that man was made in the likeness of God; image is not mentioned. What man was morally in the likeness of God had been destroyed by the fall, and man now had a fallen, an evil nature, derived from the fall, and the poison of Satan was in his bloodstream. God does not give man up. He has in mind to secure man in His likeness.
How did man come to it, that he no longer represented God’s 229
likeness? I think there is an indication in Seth naming his son Enosh, ‘Man as weak, mortal’, note. What was in the likeness of God had gone, and He recognises what fallen man is, and that therefore God has to work again. There were many thousands of human beings in the world who only caused God grief as shown in chapter 6. God, however, secures the faith line as described in chapter 5 where eventually there is a man, Enoch, who walks with God, and that man is a heavenly man.
He finds his place in heaven; so that God has secured in this short space of time an answer in moral likeness in working in these persons, this line of weak, mortal man. That is the line it was—“he died”, “he died”, “he died”, weak, mortal man, but there was something for God in faithfulness there. And then you get another man, Noah. He walked longer with God than Enoch. Enoch walked with God after his son was born. He walked for three hundred years. How pleasing it was to God, and God communed with him. That is what God desired even in the garden; God came down to commune with man and to have man walk with Him, and lead him into the secrets of His mind. Noah walked with God all his lifetime so that God had something to treasure.
Now, how do we come into it? That is what brings me to Romans 3. I thought there was an indication here in line with Seth naming his son Enosh, weak mortal man, with the fact that we are convicted, “for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”. I am a sinner, and come short of the glory of God. There is nothing in me that corresponds to the likeness of God and if there is to be true image there has to be likeness.
This is presented to men in responsibility, “for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”. That is the bottom line, you might say, but it is the beginning of hope and recovery because it leads to man being justified; God able to justify.
Thus, coming to the matter that “all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God” is an answer in a man or a woman to the fact that the fall has taken place and there is no longer what God desired in man in likeness. But God has in mind to secure that likeness and this is the beginning of it. So it says,
“for the shewing forth of his righteousness in the present time, so that he should be just, and justify him that is of the faith of Jesus”, v 26. That is the beginning. God justifies. It is what 230
proceeds in the soul. I cannot go into the details in these chapters in Romans—“the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit” (Rom 5: 5), but then how do we take account of the features of likeness? That is why I read in chapter 6 because, before we come to Christ, before we acknowledge that all men have sinned and come short of the glory of God, “ye have yielded your members in bondage to uncleanness and to lawlessness unto lawlessness”. After coming to Christ “so now yield your members in bondage to righteousness unto holiness”. That is likeness, yielding your members in bondage to righteousness unto holiness. That is likeness coming to light in us as believers, the work of God in the soul by the presence of the Holy Spirit. And then, “having got your freedom from sin, and having become bondmen to God, ye have your fruit unto holiness, and the end eternal life”.
That is the prospect: “your fruit unto holiness” is fruit that God can delight in that is to His taste, and is secured in man through the gospel. Chapter 8 says that He “has condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law should be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to flesh but according to Spirit. For they that are according to flesh mind the things of the flesh; and they that are according to Spirit, the things of the Spirit”, v 3-5. There is a differentiation.
There is power to differentiate in your soul, so we are now fulfilling righteousness, fulfilled responsibility. That is a completed matter in the power of the Holy Spirit. What a triumph for God, considering that man had so soon fallen, likeness was destroyed, and then God continues with man in flesh and blood condition and makes of him what is greater than what was in innocence, man that He can glorify. That is why I touched on chapter 8, “Because whom he has foreknown, he has also predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son”. The work of God in the believer is suited to a body of glory. “Conformed to the image of his Son” in its fullest thought involves being like Christ actually, Christ as a Man. There is a blessed Man in a body of glory, and
“conformed to the image of his Son” involves that you and I anticipate that in finality we will be like Him.
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There Christ, the centre of the throng,
Shall in His glory shine
(Hymn 178).
“So that he should be the firstborn among many brethren”. He is the Firstborn. He has His own distinctiveness, but He has many brethren that are like Him. What a triumph for God from a disaster, where likeness was destroyed, and image did not continue fully to represent God! Here image is secured again, representation of God in men. God has Man in righteousness in Christ, and man in righteousness in the saints; persons who know good and evil, and able to judge good and evil by the power of the Holy Spirit.
May the Lord just help us in these things. I trust we have the Holy Spirit. What a triumph for God! I trust we have had a little help as to God’s great triumph in regard to likeness and image. For His Name’s sake.
EDINBURGH
20th May 2011
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I have a thought as to companionship. It came into my mind in the service of God that we were suited companions for the Son of God. This scripture refers to the bringing in of Christ “into the habitable world”. It is strictly speaking of the Jewish remnant in the future that will be attracted to the Lord Jesus and become His companions. At this time the writer is addressing Jewish Christians from Judæa and Jerusalem, who had to flee because of the impending destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, around AD 70. The Lord is brought into the habitable world as the Firstborn. He is named as Son, but He is brought in and the remnant recognise Him, and they have a link with Him in companionship.
Companionship is not kindredship. Kindredship, in one sense, is something that exists; from one point of view you can do nothing about it. I just mean that, in a general sense, kindredship is that. As believers that which we derive from Christ, it belongs to us. But companionship is another thing.
Companionship springs out of attraction. The Lord is
“anointed ... with oil of gladness above” His “companions”.
This passage brings out the greatness of His Person. It says in verse 12 of Hebrews 1 “as a covering shalt thou roll them up”—
that is the creation—“and they shall be changed; but thou art the Same, and thy years shall not fail”. The title “the Same” is His eternal personality. But I understand that “thy years shall not fail” in this setting here is the endless character of His humanity. That is something to grasp hold of, the enduring character of the Lord’s humanity.
The passage brings out the greatness of the Person in His own distinctiveness, but it also brings out that He has companions. That must be in His humanity. It must be persons that are attracted to Him, that want to be in His company. Do you want to be in the company of Christ? You cannot enjoy eternal life apart from the company of Christ. It is bound up with Him: “and this life is in his Son”, 1 John 5: 11. It is bound up with Him. As we were remarking on Lord’s day, the beauties of Jesus, His lowliness, His purity, His 233
devotedness, His love, His kindness, His grace, attract you because you belong to Him. They attract you to that blessed Man. You have a desire to be His companion, be in His company. When He was here there were those who gathered around Him and became His companions. It says in Acts 4
they recognised Peter and John that they were companions of Jesus (v 13); that is, that they had been in His company. I wonder if we are recognised by others as the companions of the Lord Jesus, those who frequent His company. To be a Christian you have to be in Christ’s company. It says, “and the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch”, Acts 11: 26. That is because they were Christlike. It may have been a term of reproach, but it was reproach attached to the name of the Lord Jesus. Barnabas when he arrived there saw “the grace of God”, Acts 11: 23. He saw that in persons who were desirous of being companions of the Christ.
What a blessed privilege it is to think that you are a believer and I am a believer in the Lord Jesus, but “saved by grace, through faith; and this not of yourselves; it is God’s gift: not on the principle of works, that no one might boast”, Eph 2: 8, 9. And we are desirous of His company, to be in the company of that blessed Man. What attracts you here tonight, dear young brethren, if it is not to be a companion of the Christ? There is no obligation on you, in one sense. You come here freely. You come here because you desire to be in a company of persons that are like Christ. What an environment to be in! What a safe environment to be in, with persons who are self-judged, who, by the Spirit, express the features of the Lord Jesus! We have not seen Him yet. When we see Him “we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3: 2), but we have the privilege now of enjoying companionship, companionship of the Christ. Mr Darby says in the Synopsis in Ephesians chapter 2, ‘A Mary Magdalene, a crucified thief, companions in glory with the Son of God’, JND Synopsis vol 4
p398. What a thing, dear brethren. ‘A Mary Magdalene’, that kind of woman, what she was, and ‘a crucified thief, companions in glory with the Son of God’. We are going to be companions of the Son of God in glory. We touched something of the blessedness of it in the service of God in this place earlier in the week, on Lord’s day, suited companions of the Son of 234
God. That is why the Lord comes to us, because we are suited companions to Him, persons to whom He can make known His mind, His thoughts. A companion is one who shares in your thoughts. Kindredship is not necessarily that, but it should normally include it, but companionship involves that you share in the thoughts. There is a link there in affection where persons exchange thoughts. It is a shared life; you enjoy it in the presence of the Son of God, in the presence of the Son, in the presence of Jesus. You receive from Him and you impart something to Him that He finds delight in. Not only is it for us, the blessedness of His company, but something for Himself.
He desires companions. He has found companions in the saints and He desires their company because they are Christlike; they are like Him; they think like Him; they love like Him; they act like Him; they move like Him; their testimony is that of the Lord Jesus. These are wonderful things, dear brethren. What an attraction to us!
Well, the second scripture brings out how He made us His companions. Have you ever thought of it? It says, “he also, in like manner, took part in the same”. He came into a condition of flesh and blood from His side; it was His own matter. The body was prepared for Him, the body of flesh and blood. It is a wonderful statement, “Since therefore the children partake of blood and flesh, he also, in like manner, took part in the same”. He came into the condition we are in.
He had never been in that condition before. He had never been in a toilsome life before. He had never been in that kind of life.
He had observed it in men as being in the form of God, but He had never partaken of it, but He comes into a body, takes part in the flesh and blood condition, sin apart, but He takes part in it. He knows what it is to go through the temptations, dear brethren. As soon as He came into His public service, the devil was there, right away, but He is anointed by the Spirit going forward to “plunder the goods of the strong man”, Mark 3: 27.
He knew what reproach was. He knew what enmity was. He knew what it was to be hated. He knew what it was to be spit upon. He never knew that when He was in Deity, but He “took part in the same”, came into the condition of flesh and blood and all that attaches to it, everything that attaches to it, “sin apart”, Heb 4: 15. But everything else that attaches to it, He 235
came into that condition. He can feel for you in all you go through, the struggles in life; He understands that because He has been here as a Man in flesh and blood. He had struggles in the sense that He was up against the power of Satan. It comes out in Gethsemane, His feelings, the depth of His feelings, what He went through, the pressure on Him. He was a Man who would pray. The Lord Jesus was a praying Man.
He prayed all night several times in His life that we are told of.
That is the kind of Man He was in the flesh and blood condition. He knew what weariness was. He sat by the well at Sychar, a Man “wearied with the way He had come”, John 4: 6. He did not use His divine power to overcome the weakness of the flesh, physically. He knew what weakness was; He knew that. He came into flesh and blood conditions and bore that, went through with that, accepted the limitations of it. He needed sleep. When He was in the boat and free from His labours, He lay down and slept on a pillow, Mark 4: 38. The storm did not bother Him. He trusted in His God. That is the Lord Jesus, the One who “took part in the same”. It was not His by common lot; He came into it. Flesh and blood is ours by common lot. We did not come into it in that sense; we belong to it; but He came into it; and He came into conditions in which fallen man was. He came into the world in which fallen man was expressed, the same world that we are in. He came into that world and He went through that world. Even His own brethren despised Him. They did not believe in Him until after His crucifixion. The first time you find them amongst the brethren is in Acts 1. His mother was there and His own brethren. They were there. That is the environment the Lord Jesus came into. He knew all these things.
He “took part in the same”, but He set us free through dying. He set us free from the power of death: “that through death he might annul him who has the might of death, that is, the devil; and might set free all those who through fear of death through the whole of their life were subject to bondage”. He set us free. He brought us into an environment where we taste life. There is life outside the realm of death. Eternal life is the kind of life that lifts your spirit up because it is enjoyed on the other side of death. Our links together are beyond death. They will go through to eternity. But what a thing it is to be 236
attracted to be a companion of that Man! That is, you have a desire to be amongst His people. You have a desire to be there because you are attracted to the features of the Lord Jesus there, and so you are set free, set free from the whole world and all its system. You have to work here; you have to earn your living here; you have to endure the toilsome life; but your eye is on the goal. But when you are on the way to the goal, you have companionship, and that companionship is linked up with the Lord Jesus.
May your heart be attracted into it for His Name’s sake!
EDINBURGH
16th August 2011
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Ecclesiastes 7: 8 (to “beginning”); 12: 1 (to “youth”), 13, 14
It will be evident that I desire, with the Lord’s help, to speak a little about the end; not a gloomy end but a gladsome end.
Firstly I want to speak about Solomon. He says, “Better is the end of a thing than its beginning”. Now, Solomon was king in Jerusalem. He was blessed with wisdom from God and he ruled in that wisdom for a time. I would think he wrote this book at the end of his life. He was able to enjoy everything in nature to the full and, beyond the full, you might say, gratify every desire; then he writes this book. It is a book that delivers you from life under the sun. There is another life than the life under the sun, far more satisfying, but here he says, “Better is the end of a thing than its beginning”. I just want to caution everyone. Is that true, true of my pathway? It finally became untrue of Solomon’s pathway. Solomon is looked on as a type, but I am not speaking in type just now. He magnifies all that gratified his heart, and it resulted in him being influenced by those around him to introduce idol worship in Israel. That is what he did, and God, as a result, came in in judgment on him and divided the kingdom after his death, took it away and rent the kingdom so that his son had two tribes and the other ten tribes went to Jeroboam. It was not a very fine end, was it?
But I think in Ecclesiastes he comes to a judgment of his course.
In chapter 12 he states at the beginning, “And remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth”. It is a good word. An old brother I knew in Saltcoats used to say, ‘You cannot bend a tree when it is old; you have to bend it when it is young’.
Come into subjection to Christ, dear younger brethren, when you are young! Come into subjection to Him! That is, you delight in His will. Come to Christ as your Saviour. “And 238
remember thy Creator in the days of thy youth”. You are going to have to meet your Maker. Men speak about it lightly, but it is going to be true. They are all going to meet their Maker.
Then he comes to this matter: “Let us hear the end of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments”. I think Solomon came to that. I would like to think that Solomon personally came to that, came to a judgment of his whole course of departure from God, and came to this: “Let us hear the end of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments; for this is the whole of man”. Personally, from this point of view, he ended well, but he left a legacy that was disastrous. We do not want to do that.
I pass over to the other matter which I want to speak about, the divine end. I will begin with Luke 22. I am seeking to impart some impressions I have had. The Lord Jesus had a beginning in relation to this life. He is a divine Person, but He had a beginning in relation to this life. He came in as a babe: O strange yet fit beginning
Of all that life of woe
(Hymn 188).
He knew what the sorrows of humanity were, but the time came for Him to depart. Scripture says, “his hour had come that he should depart out of this world to the Father”. That is John’s gospel (chap 13: 1); but Luke does not present that; he presents another view of Christ. We went through Luke’s gospel in our own place, a Man available for men. Blessed Man, available in grace for men! He is still available yet, but here He says, most touchingly, “And he was reckoned with the lawless: for also the things concerning me have an end”. I suppose that end is the fulfilment. Another has said the cross is ‘the centre of the history of eternity’, JND Synopsis, vol 3
p361. That is a remarkable statement, the centre of the history of eternity. Everything hinges on Him. All that I am going to speak about after this hinges on Christ on the cross and His work on the cross: “the things concerning me have an end”.
How feeling it must have been, how touching, to hear the Lord Jesus say of Himself, “And he was reckoned with the lawless”.
Isaiah said it before that, many hundreds of years before that, 239
prophetically, but here is a blessed Man saying He, Himself
“was reckoned with the lawless”. Isaiah says a little further on He “made intercession for the transgressors”, chap 53: 12. On the cross He “made intercession for the transgressors”. “He was reckoned with the lawless”; He was crucified with lawless men, by lawless men, but He says, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23: 34): He “made intercession for the transgressors”. Another has said, on the cross the thief was suffering for his own sins, and Christ was suffering for the thief’s sins. That is the Lord Jesus.
“For also the things concerning me have an end”, but what was the end? That God might be glorified. The end was that the matter of sin and of sins would be finished and dealt with completely and the man that sinned would go out of sight; so, “Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures; and that he was buried; and that he was raised the third day, according to the scriptures”, 1 Cor 15: 3, 4. Scriptures are brought in in regard to His death and His resurrection, but it says “he was buried”, a salutary matter to grasp hold of. The line of humanity that had displeased God and had been lawless was ended in the burial of Christ. The atonement involved the burial of Christ, completed there, finished there, all the history of our sins finished in the grave of Christ. He “has been raised up from among the dead by the glory of the Father”, Rom 6: 4.
What an end! He glorified God in His death, and then was exalted above. It was not man’s end. Man thought they had finished with Him when they saw Him on the cross and when He died, but it was not God’s end. The things concerning Christ had an end: “he was reckoned with the lawless”. How affecting: let it sink into your soul that the Lord Jesus should say that! What it was for Him, a holy Person, “holy, harmless, undefiled, separated from sinners” (Heb 7: 26), to be “reckoned with the lawless” and have to declare on the cross that God had forsaken Him! That was included in the end. But then He was “raised up from among the dead by the glory of the Father”. A new hope opens up, a new vista. You know, young friend, the end that we are going to speak about finally is when time ceases to be. Time is a creation. “Even from eternity to eternity thou art God”, Ps 90: 2. God came into time. Mr Darby said that it presented itself to him in this way; that all 240
time was a kind of parenthesis in eternity, Letters vol 3 p213.
The Lord Jesus came into that parenthesis, into time, as a Person, a blessed Man, and a Man who is going to live for ever, a Man that we delight in as believers, a Man we are going to delight in, a Man we are going to be like: “we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is”, 1 John 3: 2. What a prospect!
What an end for the believer!
Well, on the way to that you get Corinthians and this remarkable statement by Paul, “so that ye come short in no gift, awaiting the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall also confirm you to the end, unimpeachable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ”. God is going to do that. God came into the life of these Corinthian saints, and they were converted, and they had the gift of the Spirit; but they departed from the dignity and the characteristics of one who had the gift of the Holy Spirit. They were not characteristically spiritual persons.
But Paul says, before he enters into the state of the Corinthian saints, and there was a bad state, ‘In the day of our Lord Jesus Christ you are going to be there “unimpeachable”’. What does that mean? You are going to be without reproach. What a thing to say! They were squabbling and fighting amongst themselves as the following verses state, but Paul says, first of all, ‘You are going to be presented before God in the day of our Lord Jesus—that is when He comes to reign—
“unimpeachable”. There will be no charge against you’. What a thing to say! I am not accusing anyone here of fighting or squabbling, but the scripture speaks about the state of this locality, Corinth, and that is what they were doing. Paul introduces this thought about being unimpeachable. When it would be read, what would they think? ‘Wait a minute’, they would say, ‘We are not in that state of unimpeachability now.
We are not without reproach now’. The Corinthians were certainly not without reproach, but Paul says to them ‘In the day of our Lord Jesus Christ you will be without reproach’.
Why? Because He “bore our sins in his body on the tree”, 1
Pet 2: 24. They are all gone. At the judgment seat of Christ, if a Corinthian saint came there and he had never adjusted these matters, he would “be saved, but so as through the fire”, 1 Cor 3: 15. The Lord may have to say to him, ‘I bore your sins in My body on the tree and you know it. Everything is gone. Your 241
behaviour in life after your conversion was not approved of God, it fell far short of that; but through God’s salvation “your sins are forgiven you for his name’s sake”’, 1 John 2: 12. “The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin”, 1 John 1: 7.
If you have a true link with Christ, young friend and older friend, your behaviour does not alter your final destination, but it will alter the Lord’s commendation to you.
But I say to you this much: if we do not adjust ourselves in relation to being “unimpeachable” now, and we wait until the judgment seat, we will miss out in formation spiritually after Christ. God has intended that the exercises on the way lead to spirituality, lead to the development of features of Christ in each one of us on the way, and we will get the gain of them.
Every Corinthian saint who had adjusted his ways in the light of the death of Christ and the work of Christ would come into the commendation, “Well done”, when he meets Christ at the judgment seat, Luke 19: 17. Paul opens this up to reach the conscience of these persons, to reach the conscience of the Corinthians, when he says, ‘In the day of the Lord Jesus Christ you will be there “unimpeachable”’. You are in the presence of God now. It is God’s grace. He says, “in respect of the grace of God given to you in Christ Jesus”, v 4. They had received the grace of God. How had they handled that? How had they lived in relation to the grace of God? At the time he wrote they were not “unimpeachable”; they were not without reproach.
But he says, ‘In the day of the Lord Jesus you will be without reproach’. Why? Because of the work of atonement of the Lord Jesus. The reading of this passage became a lever in the hearts of the Corinthian saints, before he went on to show that they were certainly not without reproach, and caused them to judge themselves. Let the matter of unimpeachability finally, if we are not in line with it now, cause us to judge ourselves.
Now Philippians is a happier matter. These saints were going on well. Happy conditions, brotherly conditions, sisterly conditions, in large measure existed at Philippi, “each esteeming the other as more excellent than themselves”, chap 2: 3. Happy matter! Happy fellowship! And he says, “having confidence of this very thing, that he who has begun in you a 242
good work will complete it unto Jesus Christ’s day”. They had fellowship with the gospel. That is, they had fellowship with the gospel and all that related to the going forth of the gospel, the reproach of the Christ and all that related to it in this world, despised persons. They were in fellowship with that.
Publicly they were Christians. They were known as that in their city and amongst themselves. He says, “he who has begun in you a good work will complete it unto Jesus Christ’s day”, and then he says again, “that ye may judge of and approve the things that are more excellent, in order that ye may be pure and without offence for Christ’s day, being complete as regards the fruit of righteousness”. Keep up the good work, dear brethren! Keep up the good relationships! In Philippians, salvation is at the end of the road. You are going to get salvation, from this point of view, when you reach heaven, when you reach Christ. That is how it is presented: it is all at the end of the road. You get help on the way. ‘I take the heav’nly road’, Hymn 228. They are on the heavenly road.
They are drawing their resources from heaven, but they have to keep up the good work until Christ comes; so He has nothing to rebuke them about. They were “unimpeachable”, I believe, at the time. They had completed the “good work”:
“unimpeachable”. What a joy to heaven to see believers set together and “unimpeachable” now, without reproach now. He says, ‘You keep that up!’. He says, “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling”, chap 2: 12. You are working it out along with others in your place, “your own salvation”, kept from the world, kept for Christ, and, in the end of the day, looking forward to that body of glory, “into conformity to his body of glory”, chap 3: 21. What a prospect!
I encourage us all here with all the pressures on the way, whatever they are, if relations are good in your locality, and I believe they are, keep it up! Keep it up! Patience is needed.
Endurance is needed. The way is still continuing in God’s hands. The testimony is still going on. He has not closed the day of grace yet. But you need help on the way. Paul says, ‘I am convinced that that good work He has begun in you He will complete unto Jesus Christ’s day’. What a completion! The Lord will say to you, “Well done, thou good bondman”. What a commendation at the judgment seat of the Christ!
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Well, then in Corinthians—I only touch on these things—the Lord Jesus Christ at the end “gives up the kingdom to him who is God and Father”. What a moment! I believe it is the last act in time. I think this matter of the Lord committing the kingdom to the Father is the last act in time.
It is right on the verge of eternity. What a moment! You will be there, friend, if you belong to Christ! You will see Him do it. You will be there when He hands over the kingdom to the Father. In the day to come when He reigns over the earth, it is the mediatorial kingdom. He is reigning on behalf of God and in that time, and in the gospel time too, He subdues persons.
You and I are among the persons who have been subjugated, brought into subjection, in time, for the praise of God, but He will do it finally in judgment. It says, “when he shall have annulled all rule and all authority and power”. He will have dealt with the last rebellion on earth; that is at the end of the millennium, Rev 20: 10. The Lord has dealt with that at this point. He has dealt with the wicked dead. It says, “The last enemy that is annulled is death”. He has dealt with that. The great white throne is past before this; He has dealt with that.
Persons who died in their sins, raised in their sins, have a place in the lake of fire. What an end! He has brought all things into subjection under His feet, then He is going to hand over the kingdom to the Father, and He Himself is going to be in subjection to the Father.
He was in subjection to the Father in His lifetime here, and He is going to take that same subjection in eternity; so you can understand the Lord saying in His prayer, “thy kingdom come”, Matt 6: 10. He is anticipating this moment when the Father would be supreme and take over rule: so it is the Father’s kingdom. Christ’s mediatorial kingdom ceases and ceases for ever. We will be there, dear brethren.
Everything will be in subjection to God. It says, “then the Son also himself shall be placed in subjection to him who put all things in subjection to him, that God may be all in all”.
He is placed in subjection to the Father as a Man. When Christ hands over the kingdom to the Father, He takes a place in subjection, Man in His true place. We are in our true place when we are in subjection to Christ, in subjection to God. And 244
then it says, “that God may be all in all”. What a moment, dear brethren. Christ has His place in that as a divine Person. It is beyond our understanding, but not beyond our appreciation of divine Persons, the Father, the Son and the Spirit, “that God may be all in all”. The new heavens and the new earth are there. There is a sphere in which God is going to rule and time is going to be ended. What a prospect! We shall have bodies of glory like to His own body of glory: what an end, the divine end!
May it cheer our hearts, may it encourage us on the way, to be like the Philippians and continue in patience and earnestness and desire and sincerity, to be on the path, pleasing to the Lord Jesus; and if, indeed, my heart is like the Corinthians, to adjust myself in accordance with that divine word. No matter what I do, if I belong to Christ I am going to be “unimpeachable”. What a work Christ undertook! Every redeemed creature there will be “unimpeachable”: not one will be able to be charged with anything because of the work of Christ. Let us be in accord with the work of the Lord Jesus and appreciation of what He has done for us and walk here as guided and helped by Him for His Name’s sake!
GLASGOW
3rd September 2011
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The thought came to me during the celebration of the Lord’s supper on Lord’s day -
For Thou our hearts hast won
(Hymn 454).
I did not feel it appropriate at the time to refer to the state that our hearts were once in, for on that occasion when we were spiritually in a privileged realm, the Father’s realm, our hearts had been won and past history, in one sense, did not come into it. The Lord was rejoicing in what He had in all our hearts because those hearts were linked up with Himself in a spiritual realm, the Father’s world. It was inappropriate to bring in past history then.
However, tonight we are back in the realm of responsibility and we can take account of the question, ‘How did He win our hearts? —
For Thou our hearts hast won.
My thoughts turned to this scripture: “For God so loved the world ...”. That is the world as it was at the time when Christ was here, the same world as today, but as another has said, it is not the love of complacency: it is the love of infinite compassion. God had compassion on that world, and He has compassion on this world, the world in which we are. He takes account of everyone. Job says, “thou Observer of men”, Job 7: 20. That includes you and me—God observes men. He observed them in the antediluvian world, where some awful conditions existed with angels entering into humanity; then in His consideration and mercy for mankind as a race He took them all away, except Noah and his family. That is what He did. Then He continued with man, watched him, set him up, saw failure, but also found pleasure in those whom He could call out of this world. God has called you, dear believer, called you into His world. But your heart must have been touched—
what touched your heart, what made you turn to Christ? What made me turn to Christ? Initially it was for my sins to be 246
forgiven; that is what made me turn to Christ. I suppose, if someone had quoted to me this scripture, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish, but have life eternal”, I would have thought it meant that I was going to go to heaven when I die, and I would have a bright future when the Lord raises the dead and changes the living, I would have a body of glory and I would be enjoying that eternal life. God had more in mind than that; “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son”. “Only-begotten” refers to time, it happened in time; Christ became the “only-begotten Son”, Ps 2: 7. Not too many believers understand that; those of us who have come under teaching which we are convicted is according to the truth as in the Scriptures understand that Christ was not eternally begotten before all ages by the Father Quite a number of believers think that, and others think that He was in a relationship of sonship in the Father’s bosom in the past eternity, but we have been instructed in teaching which, as I said, is according to Scripture that divine Persons existed in Trinity, three Persons in the Godhead, related to one another, co-equal and co-eternal. They are there beyond us; they are infinite Persons, and we worship in the sense of that. But, they came into another relationship, a relationship in which One of them came into manhood because God had thoughts in mind in regard to man, which were greater than what was in the hearts of men. One divine Person came into this world as a Man and He came in so that, from this scripture, God could give Him, “he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish”. The man Christ Jesus “gave himself a ransom for all”, 1 Tim 2: 6. Propitiation would be included; that is why the gospel goes forth. Propitiation is that God was satisfied with the work of the Lord Jesus on the cross, and God is able to come out and offer salvation to all. That touches your heart—that God has come out in the glad tidings to offer salvation for all. There is not one person in this world who cannot come to Christ if they accept Him as their Saviour.
That is the greatness of the glad tidings; propitiation involves that “he is the propitiation for our sins; but not for ours alone”, that is the sins of the Jews, “but also for the whole world”, 1
John 2: 2. God gave His Son so that He could preach the glad 247
tidings to this world that He so loved. What a thing to get that into your heart, dear younger friend, that God gave His Son,
“his only-begotten”. The scripture uses language that the human heart can understand; what a God He is! He says, “his only-begotten Son”; we understand what “only-begotten”
means because we have families. Persons sometimes have only one child, a son, then he is the only-begotten son. God had only one Son coming into Manhood and He gave that blessed Person, One in whom He found delight. He gave that Person, He gave Him up so that, “whosoever believes on him may not perish, but have life eternal”.
It touched my heart as I considered the scripture that God gave His Son, His only Son; if I believe on Him, I am not going to perish. That is not just future: it is now. It may include the future, but it refers to perishing now, loss of true life now. Life eternal is to be enjoyed now. God saw the condition of man under the pressure of death in this world, poor puny man, frail as he is; God knows what we are, and He says, ‘I will bring forward my thoughts of life eternal into the present time’. He says, “may not perish, but have life eternal”, that is now. What is life eternal? In an eternity to come believers will have life, but it would not be necessary to call it life eternal; it might be a similar character of life, but you would not call it that when time ceases to be. It says, “For God has not sent his Son into the world that he may judge the world, but that the world may be saved through him”—what is the world? The world is a sphere of life in which man lives at the present time, the habitable world, and God has in mind that that world will be saved through Him, that there will be a sphere of life for believers that is suitable. The finality of it is,
“who takes away the sin of the world”, John 1: 29. So the whole sphere is cleansed by judgment, but at the moment God is working through the glad tidings to draw your heart into this wonderful offer of His, that if you believe in Christ you will not perish but have life eternal
John 17 tells you what eternal life is, “as thou hast given him authority over all flesh”, that is the place the Son has,
“that as to all that thou hast given to him”, that is those who have come to Christ, those who believe in Him, “he should give 248
them life eternal”. If you have come to Christ, the Father has been active in your life; He has brought you to Christ. It says,
“as to all that thou hast given to him, he should give them life eternal”. He has in mind that that sphere of life should be yours now. It says, “And this is the eternal life, that they should know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou has sent”. When you come to Christ, when God touches your heart, when you give your heart to Jesus, it is the beginning of another highway for you; it is a highway of life, and you will come into the knowledge of the only true God.
What a blessing that is for a believer over against an unbeliever, who has no satisfaction, “having no hope, and without God in the world” (Eph 2: 12), as we were, once aliens from the promises. Now, “this is the eternal life, that they should know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent”—we come into the knowledge of God as the true God; He brings you into that. He brings you into it in a sphere of life. Eternal life is a sphere of life, it is a world of life, and that life is found amongst the circle of believers. What a privilege to be amongst believers and to be in the understanding and knowledge of “the only true God”. The whole of scripture contains the knowledge of God that we come into through the gift that God gives us in the Holy Spirit; we come into an understanding of the Scriptures, the Scriptures become a living page to the believer. I ask you, ‘Is the Bible a living page to you?’. Does it illuminate itself in your heart?
Now I know what God is to me: He is “the only true God”, I know Him as Father, “and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent”, I know that blessed Man. He is in heaven now, but I know that Man, and so you begin to understand the atmosphere of heaven which is found in the sphere of eternal life and it is to be found on the earth, but not in the world; it is found amongst Christian believers and you will find it there, as your heart is drawn after this blessed God who “gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believes on him may not perish, but have life eternal”. You are drawn into an atmosphere of appreciation of that God who has entered into your life and mine, an appreciation of the One whom He sent, “Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent”. He sent Him for the purpose of bringing you and me into the blessedness of a sphere of life where we can 249
enjoy what is eternal now, with the pressure of death lifted from the spirit in that sphere. What a satisfaction comes from that, your knowledge of God, the blessed One who has considered for humanity in a way no other can consider for them, to bring them into blessing—poor, sin-sick, downtrodden, violent, corrupt man with a corrupt heart. God has touched all our hearts that have come to Christ and cleansed them and sanctified them and filled them full of His love, “the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”, Rom 5: 5. The love of God is a wonderful thing, entering into the heart of the believer and giving him a sense of eternal life. Eternal life is a sphere of affection, affection for the Father, affection for Christ, and stimulated by the Holy Spirit. What a blessing is yours, dear young friend, and dear brethren, that hearts have been won, won over completely, so that He fills the heart that no other can fill. The world cannot satisfy your heart, no other relationship can satisfy the heart in the way God satisfies the heart, because He brings you into touch with relationships which are eternal and blessed.
I hope that these few words give an impression—work it out for yourself—how God has won your heart. You may have the pressure of business problems, the pressure of day to day life problems; they are lifted from your spirit in the Christian circle because you are in an atmosphere which is holy, undefiled; and there is the presence of a blessed God through the presence of the Holy Spirit, to fill and satisfy the heart.
May it be your portion.
For His Name’s sake.
EDINBURGH
3rd July 2012
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Isaiah 43: 1-3 (to “Saviour”)
What you find in these scriptures is what God can do.
That is a great matter for us at the present time, when there is tremendous pressure on us in the city. But it is for every one of us, not just the household concerned. God would bring out His interest in all of us. He says here, I have “created thee, O
Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel”. He is working in the souls of the saints, sometimes more distinctly than others, but much is done in secret. The results may be seen displayed in the assembly as gathered together. God says, “Fear not, for I have redeemed thee”; that is a great matter. Every moral stain has been removed, we have been brought back and are cleared from everything that is moral; the price has been paid. The scripture in Corinthians says “glorify now then God in your body” (1 Cor 6: 20); that is redemption’s glory. “I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine”.
I wonder if we all have had a sense of being called by Him by name, whoever we are.
Here we get two names, Jacob and Israel. It would bring out various features in the man, in what relates to the person;
“I have called thee by thy name”. What a strengthening effect being called has on the believer’s spirit, and then for God to say “thou art mine”. Bought with a price; what a price He has paid; “thou art mine”. We do not belong to ourselves; we belong to this blessed One, our God, who says He has “called thee by thy name”. That is special!
The believer is looked on in Pergamos as having a name (Rev 2: 17) that is peculiar and distinct to the believer. I wonder if we have all had a sense of that, the name that God has called us by. That is what is proved in the testimony, it is formed here. It is a secret, a secret name which the believer has with the Lord Jesus. It is very precious to have some sense of the distinctiveness of the personality of each saint. “Thou art mine”; what a thing to know that we belong to Him and He has called us each by our name, that secret name; what a 251
name it is for the believer. Oh, to have a sense of Christ’s approbation individually, our own peculiar joy in Christ which no one else can ever know. Christ revealing Himself to the soul in an intimate and personal manner. What will shine out eternally is the blessedness of the features of Christ. The name must relate to features of Christ because Christ is the pattern, God’s pattern.
It says “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee”.
There are experiences that enter into the life of the believer, passing through the waters: you find that Christ is with you.
What a comfort that is, what an assurance that is. And then
“through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee”. Whatever the obstacles are in life’s history; you prove Him. The believer passes through these things, but “they shall not overflow thee”.
You may wonder how you got through sometimes; you got through because of the fact that He was with you. And then
“when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned”. Daniel’s companions proved that when God quenched the power of fire and there was a man there with them in the furnace that looked like a son of God (Dan 3: 25); that was the witness of the king. “For I am Jehovah thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour”; what a Saviour we have!
I read in Hebrews because we have heard it said since we were young that ‘we have an all the way Saviour’. What a thing to know the blessed Saviour all the way. He is described as the Priest, and it says that He has the “priesthood unchangeable”. “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and for ever”, Heb 13: 8 (KJV). He is “able to save completely those who approach by him to God”. This is a remarkable matter; “able to save completely those who approach by him to God”. God is our object, and this blessed Man is there. The throne of grace is the place where you get your answers, there is a blessed Man functioning there; He is supporting you. You find, sometimes in a distinctive way, when you are going through these pressures, that this experience of the Lord Jesus supporting you is very remarkable. He is not only supporting you here in the testimony, but He is supporting you with a view to “approach by him to God”. He is considering for His God, 252
and He is considering for the believer. He is supporting where weakness might come in and would hinder. You find the support of Christ. It says “he is able to save completely those who approach by him to God”. This word “completely” is remarkable. There is no doubt about it, He has that power, and the believer experiences it. You are desirous of approaching God; it is by Him. I have been more affected later in my life than I was when I was younger about asking in the name of the Lord Jesus. It is a very precious name, and asking in the name of the Lord Jesus (John 14: 13) is not taken lightly on the lips of believers. God hears that name, recognises the name of that Person, the name of the Lord Jesus. How precious it is. You are asking, and trusting that God will answer in relation to the name of that blessed Man who is our High Priest. He is functioning there, functioning to support us. The instruction given in Romans 8 shows that the Spirit’s power would enter into it.
In Philippians, He is an all the way Saviour. Paul says
“Not that I have already obtained the prize”; he was not claiming to be anything above his brethren, he was in a race.
This chapter, as we have been taught, views the Christian’s race as running from the beginning of our Christian lives until they are complete in glory. The prize of the calling on high of God is to be found in heaven. What a matter to have before us; it lifts up our eyes. The children of Israel turned toward the wilderness and saw the glory, Exod 16: 10. When you turn towards the wilderness to see the glory, the eye is not on the wilderness, the eye is above the wilderness as looking to see the glory. Paul speaking as a Christian (Paul does not claim to be an apostle in this scripture) says, “I pursue, if also I may get possession” of the prize. What a thing it is to have our eyes upon the prize, dear brethren. There is a whole range of support on the way; he says “I have been taken possession of by Christ Jesus”. Paul’s life had been revolutionised by Christ Jesus, that Man in the glory. Paul did not know Christ after the flesh, but he knew Christ in glory and his whole life had been revolutionised. We have never seen Christ of course, in the sense of his flesh and blood condition, but we have seen Christ in glory, by faith. There is a Man in heaven and we are on the way to being with that Man. What a thing to lift us up 253
in our spirits, to take account of the Man in the glory, and He is coming! He would encourage us with His coming, “I am coming to you”, John 14: 18.
So Paul says “forgetting the things behind”. That is not exactly sins, that is advantages in life here, but “forgetting the things behind, and stretching out to the things before, I pursue”. So “stretching out to the things before” is the calling of God, “I pursue, looking towards the goal, for the prize of the calling on high of God in Christ Jesus”. What a completion!
What a moment when completion takes place, when the body is changed. The redemption of the body is the final matter.
Those of us who are alive at the coming of the Lord will be quickened by the Spirit who dwells in us. Believers will realise then the blessedness of salvation. The first song sung in heaven is the song of redemption; you get that in Revelation 5.
What a company will be there, not only the saints of the assembly, but all the saints since Abel. Every one will be there and singing the song of redemption, because redemption will be complete then; every one will be saved completely, all brought there perfectly complete. The work of God is housed now in vessels of flesh and blood conditions with all their weaknesses, but then it will be housed in a house from heaven, eternal in the heavens.
Let us keep stretching out to the things before. Paul’s life was changed. In the ways of God, dear brethren, things can come into our lives which change them and change them forever. That is what you prove in your life here; changed and changed forever. May the Lord encourage us. We can be encouraged, sympathetic with one another and encouraging one another to pursue. God uses circumstances to bring about change. I think He has something in mind that the glory of Christ might shine out amongst us, for His Name’s sake.
EDINBURGH
19th March 2013
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Hebrews 10: 24, 25 (to “some”), 37
Genesis 24: 10, 11 (to “well of water”), 54-58, 61
What I have in mind to speak about is the effect of the Lord’s tarrying, or apparent delay, on every believer and on every man and woman. He has gone to heaven. He has not come back yet. When He will come back, we do not know. That is not ours to know. Scripture says that times and seasons are in the Father’s hand, Acts 1: 7. But I tell you this, everyone here, His tarrying is going to have an effect on your life whether you are a believer or an unbeliever, whatever you are. There is not one of us in this room can escape the effects of the apparent delay of Christ in not coming back. Is that true? I am sure it is true.
These dear believers in Peter’s second letter were Jews.
They had a knowledge of Scripture. They were Jews that were scattered in the dispersion; that is, they had left Jerusalem and scattered. At this point in their history they were about to suffer the destruction of Jerusalem by the emperor Titus, around AD 70. Peter is warning them and encouraging them.
He says they are going to find that mockers would arise
“walking according to their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?”.
We are in the days of the mockers. They pass by this hall and other churches and pay little attention. Over a lifetime you can see what a change there is. It used to be in the villages where we came from that there were several churches, and people filling the churches every Lord’s day.
Many are empty now. That is the state of things. If you pass by Straiton Retail Park, it is full of cars every Lord’s day; there is plenty of social life, plenty of trade and commerce. Christ is outside. What a scene! “Where is the promise of his coming?”
The noticeboard is out there, announcing the preaching ‘if the Lord will’. “Where is the promise of his coming? for from the time the fathers fell asleep” so it is until now. Burials take 255
place in churches, in this hall and other places. People continue to die: “Where is the promise of his coming?”
Well, Peter reminds them here, first of all, of divine judgments. This may be a little obscure; “earth, having its subsistence out of water and in water”. “Out of water and in water” refers to the initial state of affairs in Genesis 1: 2. God began in the next verse to prepare the earth for man. He cleared the waters and made the dry land appear. Then the next matter is, “by the word of God, through which waters the then world, deluged with water, perished”. That is Noah’s flood. What is Peter saying? He is telling these dear disciples to remember God came in in judgment and cleared the scene before, and He is going to come in in judgment and clear the scene again. He says, “But the present heavens and the earth by his word are laid up in store, kept for fire unto a day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men”. Men may not realise that there is only a limited time. Finally, it will be judgment. You may say, ‘what a forecast! What kind of gospel are you preaching?’. There is one bright verse in this passage.
It says, “one day with the Lord is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”. Then scripture says, “The Lord does not delay his promise, as some account of delay, but is longsuffering towards you, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”.
What a God! He says, ‘I am waiting’. Who is He waiting on? On persons that do not know Christ, but, more than that, on persons who know Christ. Life is before you. What is it going to be? The time that remains, what is it going to be?
Thank God for this word, “longsuffering towards you, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance”. What a good thing it is to come to repentance! I trust we have all had some experience of it, and that the children will come into it, “repentance towards God, and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ”, Acts 20: 21. What is the apostle saying? Jesus is the Saviour of sinners; Jesus is the Saviour for me. That is what he is saying. Christ is still the Saviour. We can receive the remission of sins. Why? Because His blood has been shed on the cross. What a moment when He said, “It is finished”, John 19: 30! Then one of the soldiers 256
with a spear pierced His side. Malice pierced His side; love expressed itself in the blood of Christ coming forth: Thy blood love’s answer gave
(Hymn 230).
Dear friend, you can trust Christ as your Saviour, and your sins are forgiven.
What if I sin afterwards? It is still forgiven. You can never be lost once you come to Christ in reality. You can never be lost. What a blessed hope! So God has waited nearly two thousand years. Peter wrote this almost two thousand years ago, about AD 60, before AD 70, and it is still true today. I say, friend, when you come to Christ, you find blessing and salvation, comfort and consolation, but it is a test to men, mockers. Will they believe? God in His patience has waited.
God’s patience is waiting, and He is waiting on you to come to Christ.
And it is also a test for the believer. Christ’s apparent delay is a test for the believer. What is your life going to be?
Is it going to be for Christ or is it going to be for yourself and for the world? Every one of us here has a life to live, whether it be long or short. What is your life going to be?
Well, I come to Hebrews 10. Now this is written to believers too, like the believers that Peter wrote to. It is written to Jewish believers of the dispersion. As I said, they knew the Scriptures; so when Peter referred to the earth being “out of water and in water”, they knew about God’s writings in the Old Testament. It was not unintelligible to them. So here again the writer is writing to them advising them to flee Jerusalem.
This again was just before AD 70 when Jerusalem was destroyed by Titus, and they did flee. They left their homes and fled, set up homes elsewhere. There were no policemen in those days to protect their homes. In this passage in verse 34
you will find that their houses were plundered when they were at the meeting; so such happenings and other tests caused some of them to stay home, and miss the the Lord’s supper.
“Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together”, I understand, refers to the Supper, especially. Never overlook the Lord’s supper! Always bear it in mind! Some dear believers 257
were “forsaking the assembling of ourselves together”. Christ had not come yet. They were in suffering and persecution, and what was the worth of it? Do not forsake the Lord’s supper.
You will get something for your soul. Do you know, friend, when you take the loaf and break it and eat of it, and when you take the cup and drink of it, what are you saying? What are you saying to yourself? I “announce the death of the Lord, until he come”, 1 Cor 11: 26. Everyone here who took part in the Supper this morning was saying when they did that act, I
“announce the death of the Lord, until he come”. Who do you announce it to? I announce it to you and you announce it to me. I believe in faith that Christ will come. He has not come yet. But I “announce the death of the Lord, until he come”.
Take part in the Lord’s supper! It is a preservative for you through the week. Week after week, partake of the Lord’s supper! “And the first day of the week, we being assembled to break bread”, Acts 20: 7. Let that be a habit! What a precious habit to have the privilege to gather with the saints!
And then the scripture says, whatever your testings may be, “For yet a very little while he that comes will come, and will not delay”. He will come. Do you have faith in that? Do you have any faith that Christ is going to come? You have great testimony in Scripture that Christ is risen. That is the fundamental matter. Christ went into death, His blood was shed, but He came out of death and was seen, and not only was He seen, but Peter says in Acts 10 that they ate and drank with Him after He was risen from the dead (v 41), a blessed Man, a real Man. He did not have to eat for His subsistence, but He did it to show He was a real Man. They saw a real Man leave this earth when “a cloud received him out of their sight”, Acts 1: 9. Do you believe that? So the angel said that He shall come again in like manner, v 11. He will put His foot on the Mount of Olives, Zech 14: 4. He will do that. He will come again. Be encouraged, Christ will come again, but do not forsake “the assembling of ourselves together”. Let it be a habit to be present at the Lord’s supper! You may not be able every time, but let it be a habit as long as you have your health and strength and ability, and circumstances do not on some occasion prevent you. I know occasionally things may prevent us from being at the Supper. That is not what I am speaking 258
about. I am speaking about what is characteristic. It says here, “not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together”.
That is a test. Time is a test; life is a test; the Christian pathway is a test. What is my life going to be? Is it going to be for Christ or for myself, and my pleasures? What is it going to be? It applies to every man, every woman and every child: Christ or the world? “What then shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ?”, Matt 27: 22. “Let him be crucified”, they declared. You would not align yourself with the crucifixion of Christ? No, I do not believe anyone here would do it, but remember the test! One week after another week the Lord Jesus says, ‘Remember me’. I want you to grasp hold of the sense of divine affection, Christ’s affections to have you remember Him. If you do not remember Christ, be exercised to do it if you are a lover of the Lord Jesus: “this do in remembrance of me”, Luke 22: 19. Be among those who say when you partake of the bread and the cup, I “announce the death of the Lord, until he come”. I believe Christ will come.
What a hope! May it be your portion!
Then I come to Joel. Now, Joel deals with the Old Testament but he also prophesies in relation to the New because you will find this verse that I read in chapter 2: 28 in Peter’s preaching in Acts 2: 17. He quotes it to affirm the pouring “out my Spirit upon all flesh”. God said it in this passage here. Wonderful things that God said in Scripture!
He did not just say, ‘I am going to pour out my Spirit on the Jew’—I am speaking about the nation of the Jews. No, He said,
“I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh”, a divine secret. God had a secret at this point in time and Judaism or the Jew, whom He had taken up, did not understand, but God understood. Then He discloses His mind when the Spirit comes. Speaking to the Jews, Peter asks if they did not remember the Scriptures. Do you not know what the Scripture says? God said through Joel, all these years ago, five or six hundred years before, “I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh”.
Then He says, “And I will shew wonders in the heavens and on the earth …”; and then in verse 32, “And it shall be that whosoever shall call upon the name of Jehovah shall be saved”.
“Whosoever”: not just the Jew or the Greek, but all the nations of the earth if they call upon God’s name shall be saved.
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“Whosoever shall call upon the name of Jehovah shall be saved”. That is a wonderful thing: the Spirit came and the Spirit has continued here. He has been here for the two thousand years that the testimony has been here. He has been indwelling persons and He has been seeking persons, but judgment is about to come. We are tending to the close of the dispensation.
God’s house is filling fast.
The day will come when it will no more be said: Yet there is room!
(Hymn 70).
There is still room today, but, friend, there are
“Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision!” People are not prepared to make their mind up: Christ or the world; Christ or my pleasures; Christ or my ways; Christ or my will. They ponder and ponder and ponder. In one sense we all come through a “valley of decision”. Do not tarry there! Make Christ your choice! “What then shall I do with Jesus, who is called Christ?” “Believe on the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved”
(Acts 16: 31): that is what Paul says to a man. Do not tarry in the valley of decision!
I was at a preaching once and the brother preached from this scripture appealing to his audience not to tarry, to make a decision for Christ. There was an older man present. He came most Lord’s days to the preaching. A member of the audience told me that those who knew him were very concerned about him. When asked about his soul’s salvation he always says, ‘I am keeping my options open’. What a thing!
‘I am keeping my options open’. Do not tarry, friend! Do not put off decisions in life! You may reach a stage in the government of God where you are unable to make a decision.
What options do you have if you are lost? If you have not come to Christ, what options do you have? If you are in a state of unbelief, you are lost. You are a sinner. What are the options?
The option now is to take Christ as your Saviour, but you have no option other than that. If you do not take it up now, you may never be able to take it up. I leave that word with you. Be warned! Do not procrastinate! Do not put off decisions that 260
are vital in life! “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision!” You will find people like that all around you.
Unbelief is at the root of it, despisal of Christ, despisal of the gospel; so beware!
Now I come to Genesis 24. I have taken up this passage and want to explain it. The servant here is a type of the Holy Spirit, and Isaac speaks of Christ in glory. Paul says the Old Testament gives “types of us”, 1 Cor 10: 6. The passage illustrates how the Spirit has come down seeking what is for the divine heart, for Christ’s heart, seeking believers for the heart of Christ. That is what is announced. He finds a young woman. It could be a young man. Rebecca is her name. She is by a well of water. He seeks to captivate her life for Isaac, that is for Christ. Now, the servant comes to this city. The note (‘b’) says it is ‘Syria of the two rivers’, Aram-naharaim. It says, “and he arose and went to Aram-naharaim, to the city of Nahor”, but he does not abide in the city. This is a word to believers as I am applying it tonight, and to young believers with life before them. It is a city and he comes along, and the Holy Spirit (the servant in the type) is looking for someone prepared to follow Him to where Christ is. Where? In glory!
This young woman is like someone who never yet understood the fact that Christ was in glory. She was by the well of water.
She was not in the city; she was not by the rivers; she was not in the commerce or social life of the city of the two rivers; but she was by a well of water. She was in an area where she was protected in her father’s house. And she knew Isaac, as a soul may know Christ, but she had other exercises to learn. What exercises do you have to learn when you come to Christ as Saviour, when you receive the gift of the Holy Spirit? Typically she receives the gift of the Spirit. He speaks to her heart.
Has the Spirit of God spoken to your heart? Has He spoken to my heart? We need this all the way through, dear Christian friends, not just to start with. The Spirit of God has to speak to our hearts, to keep us on the narrow way, the way of Christ’s pleasure. It says, “for our commonwealth has its existence in the heavens” (Phil 3: 20), our associations of life.
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Christ. That is what I want to lay on all our hearts. There are a good number of young people here and there are those in middle-age too, a little older, but there it is: life, what is it going to be? Are you prepared to go where Christ is in glory? Your life will be different. It will not be by the rivers of the city of the two rivers where you will find your pleasure. You will find it amongst the people of God, find it amongst the fellowship of God’s people. There are many Christians on this earth. You will find this kind of life among them. So the Spirit speaks to her heart and says, ‘Will you come with me? I will take you to a Man in heaven. I will take you and make your life enriched.
I will speak to you about a Man in glory. I will speak to you about Christ in glory. I will bring you into a way of life where things are not finished by death. I will bring you into an area of life where you have a light and a hope’.
And you are in a race. Have you ever been in a race?
What do you do? Everything is given up to win that race; so this is what I am speaking about in Genesis 24. Read Philippians chapter 3; I cannot go into the fulness of it tonight.
You will find Paul says, ‘I am all out. I am leaving everything behind that does not matter to me. I want Christ in glory. I am going to find my associations of life amongst persons who are waiting until their bodies are changed’. That is what he says: ‘I have a body of humiliation but I am waiting for another body, a body of glory. I want to run that race and finally I will get it’. Every believer will get it in Christ, but he says, ‘I want you to come into the race and lay aside things that do not matter, “every weight, and sin which so easily entangles us”
(Heb 12: 1), things of this life that would entangle you’. This is for everyone here, not just for one or two, every one here.
What is your life going to be? Where are you going to find it?
What are you going to do? Are you going to commit yourself to the Lord and to the Holy Spirit and ask His guidance and help to put your foot in the pathway, the divine highway? You will never regret it. You will have problems, trials in life, too, but you will have One to support you, help you through, and you will have a joy that you can never experience otherwise.
So what I wanted to come to was that the Spirit captivates the heart for Christ. The Spirit of God does that.
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Then somebody says, ‘Just put it off for ten days! Do not start yet ! No, do not start yet! It is a good thing to have before you, but do not start just yet! Just put it off for a time and have your pleasures where you are!’. There was to be a journey before her, and it was her mother and brother that wished to delay her in this setting that I am speaking about. They said,
‘Just wait a few days, or ten days’; they had little appreciation, as it were, of Christ in glory, but she had. What do they say,
“Wilt thou go with this man? And she said, I will go”. It says,
“And Rebecca arose, and her maids” and then it says, “And the servant took Rebecca, and went away”. Where is he going? To another Man in another world! Isaac was coming from Beer-lahai-roi, ‘Well of the Living who was seen (or “who reveals himself”)’, note ‘c’, Gen 16: 14. She is going to meet Christ in glory. On the way the Spirit of God says, ‘I will help you. I will teach you about that blessed Man. I will bring you into companionship with persons who are on the same way as you.’
What a thing, what a challenge, what a reward, to be in the pathway that is leading to Christ in glory!
Well, I leave these thoughts with you for His Name’s sake.
LOANHEAD
23rd June 2013
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