THE USE OF WATER

E.C.Burr

John 13: 3-5, 10-15; 2 Kings 3: 11, 12; 1 Corinthians 3: 6-8

I suppose that there are few things spoken of as extensively in the Scriptures as is water with so many different applications. It is referred to right at the beginning of the Scriptures in the sense of the Spirit of God hovering over the face of the deep; and then as Genesis 1 proceeds we have the waters specifically identified. And at the end of Revelation, I suppose we might say in the last column of the Bible, we have the water of life. Through the Scriptures the bearing of water can be very different; it can speak to us of the application of death when we think of water in relation to baptism for instance, it can speak to us too of the Holy Spirit as we think of other types of what water would suggest to us. It comes in in a variety of circumstances, it comes in in relation to the needs of individuals, it comes in with a bearing that is doctrinal, it comes in with bearings that are severe and bearings that are refreshing. I suppose as I say there are few things referred to more constantly in the Bible than water that have so many different applications.

I would like this evening in this opportunity of the saints being together to make a few remarks from the scriptures which we have read about the use of water. The thought perhaps came to me somewhat as we were here last night for the prayer meeting: a brother in the course of his prayer referring to the meeting proposed for tonight desired of the Lord that the saints might be refreshed by being together. We spend a fairly busy time, our minds get occupied; but not for the first time, and indeed I am not the first brother to have found the journey on the New York subway quite profitable for impressions. And these scriptures came to my mind as bearing on the use of water in relation to refreshment, refreshment for the saints, refreshment for their souls, refreshment in relation to the needs of the testimony, refreshment in relation to in some way lifting the sense of burden that might from time to time be on the spirit, refreshment in the sense of promoting what God is doing, refreshment in the sense of uplifting out of whatever distress or sorrow or care we might be in and giving us the experience of something having come in to change things for us, to make things different, to bring in some fresh approach, some fresh intimate touch, especially an intimate touch in our case from the Lord, but perhaps from one another that has this refreshing character for us.

The scripture in John 13 is very familiar to the saints. I suppose that others and myself would be exercised from time to time as to the degree to which the way in which scriptures are taken up and put into effect is sometimes in inverse ratio to their familiarity, and the most familiar scriptures are often the least practised. We are tested as we approach them and we are tested as we approach John 13. In one sense I suppose Jesus Himself meant to test the disciples by it. I think that is clear from what He says at the end of where we read, that He was not content in Himself just to have washed their feet and to have anticipated that they would see that this had been an example for them, and that they would have, if one may put it that way, taken the point that it was something they were themselves to do in relation to one another; but He explicitly points the lesson for them that "as I have done to you, ye should do also". And I think beloved that the Lord would bring home to us the necessity of serving one another in the character of washing one another's feet. I had wondered in thinking over these scriptures whether it would be possible to say that they all had a positive bearing, but I suppose one would have to admit in relation to the washing of feet that it necessarily has something of a negative bearing in that it has to do with the removal of the soil and the effects of contact as we go through the day with a different order of things from that in which Christ is. That we might from one point of view regard as a negative product, but the intention of the Lord's action in John 13 is "Unless I wash thee, thou hast not part with me". The purpose therefore of the activity of Jesus in washing the feet of the disciples is that they might themselves enter into "part with me". What could be more positive than that? Part with Him, as we often remind ourselves, not only in the sphere of privilege, in the sphere of life where He Himself is, where He is glorified having triumphed over death, having triumphed over the situation in which all God's waves and billows went over Him, having come out of death and left those waves and billows for ever, and now glorious and triumphant over death, alive to the ages of ages - not only part with Him in that sphere where He is alive for ever more but part with Him in the testimony where He still delights to go with His beloved saints in the testimonial sphere. As He says in Matthew's gospel: "I am with you all the days, until the completion of the age", chap 28: 20. That is to say He commits Himself to us in relation to the sphere of the testimony. But beloved, the purpose of His washing our feet, and therefore the purpose of our washing one another's feet, is that we might have part with Him in the testimony. It is not so much from the point of view that He would have part with us - how blessed that is that He graciously comes into our service and our weakness in the testimony, He comes into that just as He promises in the end of Matthew's gospel and in the end of Mark's gospel - but that we might have part with Him in the testimony, because He is Himself still characteristically in the testimonial situation, there is still His name here, He Himself not here as to His position corporeally but His name here, and He Himself therefore here testimonially. And the objective of His washing our feet and of our washing the feet of one another is that we might have part with Him in the testimony. This is a very elevated level of the testimony. Most of us approach what is testimonial on the basis of making the best effort that we can, being sure that somehow through the support of the Lord and of the Spirit we shall get through. But let us look at the testimony from the point of view that He is in it characteristically, and the point for us is to have part with Him in that testimony. I have often thought, and I commend the thought to the brethren again for their affection, that the Father is concerned that He should not have lost anything in the earth by having Jesus in heaven. He once had in Jesus here everything that delighted Him as Man and now He is in heaven. Mr Darby says so affectingly, There has but one object been seen upon the earth that might redeem the place but now it is gone, Jesus is with the Father. Although Jesus is with the Father the Father intends to have here in testimony something equivalent to what He had in His beloved Son. And the purpose of His washing our feet, and therefore the purpose of washing one another's feet is that we might be in the testimony with Him, consider that He is here and that we are to walk alongside Him in the testimony: not Him coming into our poor and feeble efforts testimonially but recognising that He is in the testimonial position here and that we are capacitated by the service of His washing our feet to walk alongside Him in His movements in the testimony.

These things, beloved, are very attractive. How elevating it is to think that although publicly the testimony may be reduced to very small dimensions collectively, and it is reduced we might say in a sense to the weakness of our own capacity individually, yet Christ is here testimonially still and the objective of the saints should be to be in such a condition all the time that they could walk with Christ testimonially all through the day. And He serves us to that end. If He sees anything on us that soils us He Himself would serve us by washing our feet. He would descend in the graciousness of His own humiliation and take the wash-hand basin and put water in it and take the towel with which He was girded and He would wash the disciples' feet in order that everything that was unsuitable to Him might be removed from them. And this, beloved, is the service that we are intended to render to one another, to keep one another suitable for the company of Jesus. Often we think of it as keeping one another suitable for instance for fellowship, keeping one another consistent with what belongs to the fellowship of God's Son here; but the great thing we should have in our minds is that this service of washing one another's feet is to keep us fit for the company of Jesus in testimony - fit for Him where He is, as we say in privilege or in glory: that as well - but the area where we need refreshment and comfort is the area of the testimony. And we are to serve one another by washing one another's feet in that regard. Therefore it becomes a matter of tender concern to us if any of our beloved brethren with whom we have contact should to our own discernment become soiled by anything that is unsuitable for the company of Christ. We could refer to things that would make us unsuitable. I suppose one thing that we tend to regard not very seriously as making us unsuitable for His company is the neglect of His interests. How can we say to the Lord, as one of the scribes did, "I will follow thee whithersoever thou mayest go" (Matt 8: 19) unless we commit ourselves to His interests? He will have to say, I see little evidence of your desire for My company, I am afraid I see the tendency to neglect My interests, to neglect what part with Me involves and requires. We are very negligent, beloved, about the interests of Christ. And we could serve one another in that regard, not in admonition, not in correction, not as it were with a rule or with severity, but encouraging one another with the refreshment that it would be to be delivered from neglect of His interests, to find part with Him in the sphere where His own interests lie. Beloved, there is nothing like the company of the Lord's people for refreshing the soul when one has been in the world.

Then there are other things that we might contract, there are sins which easily beset each one of us. We all know - Solomon says every one knows the plague of his own heart (see 1 Kings 8: 38) - we all know the sins which so easily beset us. Sometimes we can discern the sins which easily beset others, and while being careful as to what the Lord says about the beam that is in our own eye before we attend to the mote that is in the eye of our brother (see Matt 7: 3), what service could we better render than that protective service of refreshingly washing someone else's feet in order that they might be delivered from what is characterising them as sinful which makes them unsuitable for the company of Christ either here or where He is? How many failures might have been nipped in the bud if there had been the readiness and the ability to draw near, and in the gentle service of washing one another's feet to bring in some experience of deliverance from things which were beginning to get a hold, and the deliverance is much easier before things have really got a hold. You could think of the sin that came in at Corinth - the man who had his brother's wife. Suppose as soon as a brother or a sister noticed that that brother was taking too much interest in someone else's wife there had been the ability to put water in a wash-hand basin and take a linen towel (not a scourge of small cords) and by means of its application to rescue somebody from what was going to be disastrous in a local assembly. Suppose in Galatia, when somebody began to reintroduce the law and make out that you were saved according to the law, what would we have done beloved? O, you say, Paul was militant about that, he withstood Peter to the face, he would not stand for it. O yes, we can take up scriptures like that, they are often very useful in our hands and become something that we think we can be really skilful with. But, beloved, the way to have helped Galatia was to have taken the wash-hand basin and the water and to have taken off the linen towel with which one was girded and washed the feet of the brethren there in the same way that the Son of God had come in and washed the feet of His disciples. The solution to things in Galatia was the establishment of sonship according to the Son of God, and the Son of God had left an example that "as I have done to you, ye should do also".

Therefore, beloved, let us consider for the refreshment of one another in the delivering operations that we can bring in, so that one and another are helped to be free from things which otherwise will hinder our having part with Christ. Let us think of the brethren just as they are, think of them in their weakness, think of them among the ignorant and erring. How easy it is to get out the rule book for the ignorant and erring, how easy it is to make allowance for the strong and the able, but how little we actually reflect the attitude of Jesus in things that we do! Yet He has given us this example that we should wash one another's feet. Beloved, let not the familiarity of the scripture turn us aside from considering whether we could not the more aptly take up this service in relation to anything which is hindering the enjoyment of part with Christ among His people at the present day. One thing that should impress us continually, it should impress us every time we come together because there it must impress us, is how few saints there are available today for the testimony of God according to the truth. Would you like any of them to be lost? Would you like any of them to go away? Would you not, if it was the means of saving any one, take the water and wash their feet and dry them with a linen towel like that with which Christ was girded? It would be done in righteousness surely, but righteousness brought in in such a way that it is healing and comforting and supporting and refreshing, rather than righteousness as it has been used in the past as if it were some arbitrary dictum to use, as was once said, as a stick with which to beat the brethren. O, righteousness was never intended for that; the law uses righteousness as a means of comfort and support, a means of establishing things according to God. Beloved, when the Sun of righteousness arises does He have a stick to beat the brethren? He has healing in His wings (see Mal 4: 2). Therefore let us learn things from Christ in the way He has done things Himself and let us refresh one another by taking these things on.

Now I refer to Elisha because what comes in in his case is not related to failure, as far as I can see, it is not related to departure, or falling short. I know that when Elisha was first laid hold of Elijah was in a depressed state. Did not Mr Taylor say that he had just resigned his commission? He was about as low in his spirit as he could get, although I suppose if we trace his history after that we find times of revival. But what is Elisha remembered for? Is he remembered as the man that saw Elijah go to heaven? He had done that, he had seen Elijah go to heaven. Is he remembered for his own great exploits in support of the truth? Is he remembered for powerfully standing by the truth when other people were departing from it? No. They say, Is there a prophet? And they say, Yes, there is Elisha. And what is his qualification? He poured water on the hands of Elijah; that is the only thing that the king of Israel's servant said about him. I would think that would be quite a good thing to be remembered for beloved. One would just as soon be remembered for having poured water on the hands of the brethren as to have been remembered as some distinctive servant, or someone able in the truth, or someone good at administration, or something like that. I think it would be a fine thing to be remembered as one who had poured water, as it were, on the hands of Elijah. I suppose Elijah was fairly old. We are not, as far as I recall, told how old he was, but you get the impression that he was an old man, that he had served God faithfully and had come to the close of his period of service as far as divine disclosures to him were concerned. And another man is brought along. Is he brought along as one who will as it were elbow Elijah out of the way? O no, he poured water on his hands. You see he knew that here was someone serving God. We may relate Elijah to those having a distinctive part and activity in the testimony, and that would be right in its setting. But let us think of Elijah as representing any one else of the brethren. Now what Elisha did was to pour water on his hands; and you get the impression of Elisha, evidently a younger man, taking account of an older man, one about to depart as it were to be with Christ which is very much better, but there was a little while in which they lived together. And what did Elisha do? Characteristically he refreshed the other brother. Beloved, none of us has the status and position of Elijah, none of us is the single prophet of God in his day; even if God had to remind him that he had many, many others who had not bowed the knee to Baal. Whatever may be said about them they were known to God; but evidently in some measure they were secret disciples because you would have expected that Elijah would have known of them. But there is Elijah, as I say, none of us like him, none of us having that prominent place, but there is, you might say, one of the saints. Start with the elderly saints, start with those who have already passed what we speak of as the allotted span. And here is Elisha: he has his own service - what a blessed service he has, what grace and favour is to enter into Elisha's service! The service of Elisha has many parallels with the service of Jesus in Luke's gospel in the activity of grace. But what did he do? Did he say, O well, I am serving at so-and-so. O no, he poured water on the hands of Elijah. And beloved, this service of refreshing one another is open to every one of us. Every one of us can refresh another of the brethren. We can start with refreshing one other of the brethren, we can go on to refreshing one or two of the brethren, one or two of the sisters, one or two of those on whom God's hand in discipline or in sorrow may appear to have come unexpectedly. We in our country bear the actings of the Lord in the way He has left amongst us three young widows with two small children each. One thing that they need all the time is to have water poured on their hands, because things get oppressive and difficult for widows. They have no husbands, their husbands are with Christ, and they have in that sense no one to depend on here. But beloved, there must be someone, as long as there are two or three in a place, who could pour water on the hands of the rest of the brethren. If there were only two, one could do it to the other and the other to the one. In a large meeting it is a service that any one can take up. It is not a service taken up formally like responsibility for the preaching of the gospel or counting the money. It is a service that is informal, unofficial; it springs from spontaneity in the heart, it springs from discerning that there is a need for refreshment in the meeting, and being the person who brings it in. Sometimes you can change the whole character, especially of a weeknight meeting, by coming into the meeting as if you are happy to be there. You do not have to have actual water, you do not have to have actual hands, what you can do is to change the atmosphere by your own attitude to the things of God and to His people. It is a service that I commend to the brethren it is a refreshing service. Think of what Paul say about Onesiphorous: "he often refreshed me, and has not been ashamed of my chain" (2 Tim 1: 16). Think of what he says about Phoebe: "she also has been a helper of many, and of myself" (Rom 16: 2), and he would as it were be able to say of Phoebe that she had poured water on his hands. In these times of stress and anxiety, sorrow and care, there are things, as Paul says, that come upon us daily (see 2 Cor 11: 28). I suppose there are some of the brethren who every morning when they wake up are again burdened, freshly burdened with exercises, perhaps local exercises, whatever they may be, as soon as they wake up it seems as if all the sorrows and the exercises come back again. What they need early in the day, beloved, is not a tranquiliser or something like that but someone to pour water on their hands. Husbands can do it very easily as they pray with their wives in the morning, bringing in enough water in the prayer so that the house feels watered all day, and wives and children are restful in the sense that somehow the stream that flows from Lebanon has come in and has refreshed, quietly refreshed every one that is there. Beloved, like washing one another's feet, this service is open to us all. You do not have to be nominated by God to be the next distinctive prophet, you do not have to have been nominated by God to replace the man that has gone up to heaven, you just have to have a discerning eye for where refreshment in a meeting is needed and then be ready to bring it in. I was speaking in Plainfield on Saturday about healing and God saying that He would apply a healing ointment (see Jer 33: 6), encouraging the brethren that as they move around, wherever we may go, we may take with us a healing ointment. Beloved, let us take water for hands as well so that the brethren are refreshed, so that they feel better because we have been there. It is not that we can go around, any of us, and solve every problem - the Lord, as Corinthians shows us, is able to solve problems in the assembly by using the brother that is the least esteemed - but what any of us can do is to go around to refresh the brethren in the spirit of pouring water on their hands.

I commend this service to the brethren. It is a time even now when refreshment amongst the saints is still needed. Now I just add a word in regard to the water in Corinthians. The service of Apollos there is not exactly the same as in John 13, it is not exactly the same as Elisha's service to Elijah, it is not a question there of helping one another with refreshment in relation to the defilement or the burdens of the way, but it is the sense of an ability to work along with God in what He may be doing in a place. The brethren will recall beloved Mr Taylor's remark that the movements of the Lord are discerned by the character of the ministry He gives and by the grace that it produces in the brethren, (see Vol.20, p.251). What is needed in that connection, beloved, is that first of all there is the ministry. Just as we do not have Elijah we do not have Paul, we have not that distinctive apostolic character of ministry; we have ministry however, let there be no doubt about that, we have ministry and the truth in the ministry. And the Lord is giving ministry at the present time which is quite distinctively powerful. Looking at the ministry that the Lord is giving characteristically and widely we have ministry at the present day of a power that has rarely been experienced amongst us. I say that without any hesitation. I am fully aware of the way in which the great expanses of the truth were opened up by the distinctive men who have gone before us and are now with Christ, but there is an experience of the participation and sharing of the brethren in what the Lord is giving at the present day that makes it quite distinctive. Have you never noticed - you must have noticed in New York itself - how brothers that some years ago you would have been surprised to hear say anything, and then you might have said if they did say anything they might not say much, and now you listen to them because you know that if they speak they will have something from God. That is an aspect of the way in which the Lord is serving in sowing or in planting at the present time. There is ministry at the present day of which I venture to say that nobody need be ashamed. But what is needed, beloved, as that ministry comes is not only that it be planted but that it be watered. Just as there is not Paul, I suppose there is not Apollos. Apollos was a very distinctive man; he had a good knowledge of the Scriptures, a thing that not everybody has; he was shown the way of God more exactly; he developed his own spiritual personality so that he was never, if I may use the word, intimidated by the distinctive gift that Paul had. If Paul said, Apollos will you go to Corinth? Apollos would say, No, I do not think so, the Lord has not sent me there. He was not minded to go (see 1 Cor 16: 12) and Paul accepted that. You can see the way in which a spiritual personality was built up in Apollos. I trust that spiritual personality is being built up in us all, a personality with full respect for one another which is not in any sense dependent on what there is in another servant or another brother or sister. But Apollos watered; he would go to meetings with Paul, he would hear Paul planting things, he would hear Paul planting a bit more about the kingdom of God, a bit more about the things concerning our Lord Jesus Christ, a bit more about the assembly and about the world to come and about the glory of Christ. And what would Apollos do? Apollos watered it. He discerned what the Lord was giving through Paul; he discerned what the character of the ministry in which the Lord was moving was and he watered it; that is to say, everything that Apollos could do to make the truth flourish Apollos did. He just helped the truth to flourish in the place where he was. I suppose sometimes he did it more widely, but Apollos had a very distinct connection with Corinth and, as the truth came amongst the brethren, he set to work that the truth might flourish. Now again, beloved, that is a service that is open to us all. We can all water like that. We may think - and sometimes the brethren by their actions imply it - that the responsibility for developing the truth can well rest with one or two particular brothers; but there is scope for the service of Apollos, the promotion of the truth among the saints. That is what Apollos did. I suppose he would be waiting on the Lord and, because there is one Spirit, he would easily discern the character of the ministry that the Lord was giving. And Apollos watered it, he promoted what the Lord was giving among the saints. You might say that was an insignificant service. I suppose in Corinth they might say, Well, when Paul is away Apollos is quite a help to us. But the general service of Apollos was to promote the truth among the brethren, to see that the ministry prospered and flourished. This is not difficult in these days, beloved, when, as I have said and as is generally accepted among the brethren, we have not what is of the distinctive quality that we have in the Lord's goodness had in the past; but we still have the Spirit. I think if I could put it in a simple way, one text which governs us greatly in London where there are brothers with gift, brothers who the saints will readily go to hear and whose ability in the truth is well known (and how thankful we are to have them amongst us), what the saints in London cling to is the scripture that we turned to in the first reading in 1970 after the division, that "one is your instructor, and all ye are brethren", Matt 23: 8. That scripture often referred to remains amongst us in London, and it may have something to do with - if I may speak well of my own place - the general prosperity of the work of God there, that the spirit of the brethren is that one is your Master and all ye are brethren. So that someone might have the word one night and give a lead in the meeting (there has to be a lead given in meetings; readings which are described as mutual do not usually get very far) but it is open to anybody to water; nobody need think that the service is too small for them or that they are too great for it. Apollos readily took it on, recognising that God was the giver of the increase. Paul says "neither the planter is anything, nor the waterer" - neither is anything. Think of that! Paul, you are the planter: but neither the planter nor the waterer is anything, that is he is nothing at all, God gives the increase. But there would be no increase if the service was not taken up in responsibility of someone planting and someone watering. And Paul goes on in the closing verses that we read: "But the planter and the waterer are one; but each shall receive his own reward according to his own labour". It may be that in the day to come that reward will actually be known. Paul says himself "Henceforth the crown of righteousness is laid up for me, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will render to me in that day; but not only to me, but also to all who love his appearing", 2 Tim 4: 8. But there is a reward now for watering; that is, to see the prosperity of the brethren as a result of some small service that you have done amongst them in making the truth prosper. And the Lord, beloved, would lead us in these things. I think the Lord would lift from us something of the burden of current exercises. The brethren need delivering from occupation with the failure of the past: the time past suffices for that. There are lessons to be drawn from it, beloved; let us draw them inwardly but let us give the brethren the positive results of our examination of our own past history. Let us not as it were carry out inquests in public so that the brethren are turned aside from what they might have been enjoying in planting and watering. Let us go in for that kind of service. We hear often a desire and an appreciation of what is spoken of as positive ministry: let us be set for it, beloved. There is nothing to set the brethren forward like the truth on the highest level. I think anyone who serves is obliged to serve in relation to the highest truths that he knows. As the brethren are served on the level on which Christ Himself is, that is, Jesus is with the Father, let every planting of that kind be diligently watered in order that its fruit may be seen. The Lord will be pleased with it and the brethren will flourish on account of it. The exercises of John 13 will give discernment as to every issue that might arise, and we can refresh one another, and we can promote the truth, and we can thus secure things in our localities and among our beloved brethren in such a way that the Lord will be pleased with it. And the Lord Himself will be refreshed as He Himself comes amongst us: we all recall the occasion on which He was refreshed beyond measure when somebody washed His feet.

Well, beloved, may the Lord just use these impressions for the comfort and refreshment and setting forward of the brethren, for His Name's sake.

BROOKLYN NY

29 June 1976