“WHILE YE ARE WITH HIM”
I just thought, dear brethren, of this principle here set out in this first scripture. The prophet said, “Hear ye me, Asa, and all Judah and Benjamin! Jehovah is with you while ye are with him”. That seems to be a divine principle that is always true. It is easy to claim the Lord is with us but not so many claim that we are with the Lord, and that is the basis for the Lord being with us according to this scripture, “Jehovah is with you while ye are with him”, and that ought to be an exercise with us to be with Him, “And if ye seek him he will be found of you”; that is, He is always available to be with. I suppose it involves being in communion with Him, it involves knowing His mind, seeking His mind and having His mind. That is the basis of the Lord being with us, that we are with Him. That ought to be our constant exercise, I think, in our individual pathway to be with the Lord, to be near to Him, to have His view of things, to be with Him. Asa was successful in this combat with the Ethiopians. I think he had half a million men and they had a million men, and the prophet seems to drive this home. It is “while ye are with him”, that is, are we with Him today and not with Him tomorrow? I may have been with Him yesterday and not with Him today. It is, “Jehovah is with you while ye are with him”; therefore that ought to be a constant daily exercise with every one of us. If the Lord is going to be with us, we have to be with Him.
And so in the gospel of Mark we have this calling of the twelve. It says, “And he appointed twelve that they might be with him”, that is, if they are going to be of service, which they were of course, they had to be with Him to see how He did things, to learn from Him, to be in close contact with Him, “that they might be with him”. Matthew sets out more the Lord being with His people, God with us in Emmanuel, and in Matthew 18, the Lord with the two or three who are gathered together to His name; but Mark seems to set out this principle of which I am speaking that is, “that they might be with him”, and then that He might send them out. They were sent out as being with Him. The basis of power is being with Him in His company. We can be as much in His company as we desire. These disciples were with Him for, we understand, three and a half years. He went in and out among them. They were with Him. At the end of the gospel it says, “the Lord working with them” (Mark 16: 20), but the basis was that they were with Him. I just raise this exercise, my own exercise and lay it before the brethren here.
So in John 12 we have this often referred to, the grain of wheat which produces fruit after its own kind, like itself: “Except the grain of wheat falling into the ground die, it abides alone; but if it die, it bears much fruit”, it bears much fruit like itself, and that would be the idea of kindred with Christ, the idea of being of His brethren, of His order, and that is true of believers of His order, but then it says, “He that loves his life shall lose it, and he that hates his life in this world shall keep it to life eternal”. That is the principle of discipleship, of really being with Him and taking character from Him. We know how He, shall we say, lost His life in one sense, gave up His life on our account, and those who are of the same order, have the same outlook, with Him in practical life of discipleship here. And the Lord says, “If any one serve me, let him follow me”. Well, how important that is, “let him follow me” that is, being with Him., “and where I am, there also shall be my servant”. It is as if to say, 'Where my servant is, there will I be', it is “where I am, there also shall be my servant”.
I just raise this exercise that the Lord is with us as we are with Him. May the Lord help us to fulfil it.
EDINBURGH
9th June 1992
This article is first published here, lightly edited and not revised by
Mr Renton
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