DIVINE SUPPORT IN GOD'S HOUSE
DIVINE SUPPORT IN GOD’S HOUSE
These scriptures contain what I have in mind to present, that divine support is available to those who recognise the house of God. From the time of its introduction we find divine help associated with it. We should ever bear in mind the truth of the house, and as we look at facts we will find evidence of divine help. The apostle Paul is pre-eminently connected with the house of God; he was concerned that we should all know how to behave in it.
It is impossible to stand up against opposition here if there is not the support that is available from God. Paul had divine support; his testimony was in keeping with the truth; it comes out at Corinth. He had the help which is from God. In going to Corinth, he took an obscure place, he lodged with a man and his wife, who came from Rome, and who was a tentmaker by trade, and Paul abode with the tentmakers. He had all the light of God in his soul and he knew it. What a marvellous picture is presented to us by the Spirit of God — the great apostle in Corinth as an artisan; in that city of architecture he had the light of God, and the building of God was going on. God had much people there, and those people were to be enlightened. They were to be made acquainted with the ministry of the apostle, and be brought into the assembly. The Lord says to him: “No one shall set upon thee to injure thee” Acts 18:10. I desire we should take it in: He has graciously given us a part in it. Nehemiah in an earlier day said, “I am doing a great work” Nehemiah 6:3. Such work can only he carried on by the help of God. The Lord said to Paul, “I am with thee”, Acts 18:10 so he continued there teaching the word of God, the mind of God.
In God’s house we are privileged to have the mind of God. It requires patience, which is a sign [p. 310] of power and help from God. Paul speaks of it as one of the signs of an apostle, all patience. How could he go on? Because of the word that the Lord said, “I am with thee” Acts 18:10. We would drop down to the level of what is about us, unless we had divine support. Paul “came not in excellency of word, or wisdom ... but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power” 1 Corinthians 2:3,4. The word of God is brought in and taught among them, so that now they have the mind of God in that city.
Jacob was a household man, and what comes to light in his history raises solemn questions with us. Our houses should be schools where our young people should graduate to the house of God. Jacob was a plain man dwelling in tents. “The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked” Genesis 48:15, he says; that God had preserved him every day. Jacob was obedient, he went to find a wife of his own people; his brother’s wives were a grief of mind to Isaac and Rebecca. Jacob would marry into his mother’s family. On his journey he sleeps on the bare ground, and he sees the Lord at the top of the ladder. “The Almighty God appeared to me at Luz” Genesis 48:3, he said. For the moment he says, “How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven” Genesis 28:17. None other! God was there. That is how to find out which is the house of God. The presence of God is the point that decides things. “If therefore the whole assembly come together in one place” 1 Corinthians 14:24 and an unbeliever comes in, he falls down and says: God is among you; that is the test. Is God there? He says to Jacob: ‘I am going to be with you and I will bring you back, and all the families of the earth will he blessed in you’. Jacob speaks of “the God that shepherded me all my life long”, Genesis 48:15. It is the word of a man who has been disciplined in God’s school, and who would pass on [p. 311] the results to the coming generation; so he says, “God … bless the lads”. Genesis 48:15,16.
Moses is presented as the one who is faithful in all God’s house, and is a model. God was with him; he is the minister there (Exodus 3:12). God says, “For I will be with thee”. He was faithful in all God’s house. Moses was forty years in Egypt, he was forty years in the wilderness alone, and forty years in the wilderness with God and the people. What a history! God knew what His servant had to endure. God showed him a bush that burned and was not consumed. A bramble is not of much account, but God was in that bush. It no doubt speaks of the people being a worthless kind of people in man’s judgment. God speaks to Moses and he gets further disclosures. It is the same when God speaks to us. Moses says, “Who am I?” He might well ask, but God took him up and says: “I will be with thee” Exodus 3:11,12. Let us rest in that. If God is not with us there is something wrong, and we must learn what it is. When Israel made a calf, God left the camp. There is nothing more dreadful than abandonment. Christ was abandoned on the cross for us. Moses virtually says: ‘God is not here’. He pitched the tabernacle outside the camp “afar off”, and God spoke face to face with Moses. No intelligent christian will go a step if God is not with us. “For I will be with thee”. Moses says there is no other way that we shall be distinguished, if thou art not with us (Exodus 33:16).
In 1 Chronicles 17:1, David comes in as gathering up all that I have referred to and more. He was taken up as a boy tending his father’s sheep; next thing he is found in the fields or woods. Then later he says: “I will not give sleep to mine eyes, slumber to mine eyelids, until I find out a place for Jehovah” Psalm 132:4,5. Nevertheless he has to say “Behold. I dwell in a house of cedars, and the ark of the covenant of Jehovah under curtains” 2 Samuel 7:2. It comes home to us: Where is the house of God? David says: ‘I am dwelling in a better place than the Lord is’.
What kind of place is the testimony obtaining with us? “Thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thy heart” Deuteronomy 6:5. If I do that, my means are at His disposal; they are subservient to this great house. We must also have Solomon; he is a counterpart of David. The builder is the son and this leads me to Christ. Moses is a faithful servant in God’s house, Christ a Son over it. He who builds the house is greater than the house. The Son builds the house. God addresses Him as Son.
In Psalm 89:19 David is accounted of in this way, “I have exalted one chosen out of the people”. He gradually emerged from among the people. Christ is Son of David and is addressed by God as Son. The One who inherits a name more excellent than others has now come. In Hebrews 1 you will see how the inheritance descends to Him. He builds the house. The character of the house is determined by the Son and governed by the Son. Moses was a servant in God’s house, Christ is Son over it. Think of the influence we have thus in the house; built by the Son and influenced by the Son. That is the house God would have us continue in.
Have we arrived at divine support? the experience of it? You need it in business and in the family, but especially in the house of God. If you give out a hymn, it should be by divine support. “If thy presence do not go, bring us not up hence” Exodus 33:15, Moses said. So God resumes His place in the camp. He brought them out to bring them in, and there was divine support to the youngest as well as to the oldest.
[p. 313] Pages 313 - 340 — Addresses in U.S.A., Canada and Great Britain, (From Volume 187).