CHRIST AS THE MAN AFTER GOD’S HEART

Psalm 132: 1–18; 2 Samuel 6: 1–15; Romans 12: 1–5

PM We are seeking to enquire together into the reference in Acts 13, where Paul says as to the history of Israel, that Jehovah said, “I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man after my heart, who shall do all my will” (Acts 13: 22). I wondered if in this reading we might look at David as a type of a believer. How delightful he is to God. This psalm brings something out in relation to that. No doubt it is David that wrote this psalm. He speaks to Jehovah of his committal in relation to the ark. David loved what God loved. He had heard something as to the ark and he had heard of its preciousness to God. He had never seen it. I suppose the ark was in the house of Abinadab long before David came on the scene. He had never seen it, but he had heard about it. I suppose he had heard about it at Bethlehem. Jesse, who himself may not have seen it, would have given some impression of what the ark had been to the children of Israel. The ark in itself was God’s link with His people; the witness that God was among them. It was not very large. Two and half cubits by one and a half by one and a half, and it spoke of Christ, and it brought out the distinctive glory of One who stood in all His uniqueness because of who He was, in His own Person, yet here in lowly humanity. And David says, ‘I heard of it’. Maybe he heard of it in relation to their journeyings in the wilderness and the crossing of the Jordan. How the ark had gone before, and how in the house of Dagon it had looked after itself in the midst of opposition. And its power had been known in the midst of a scene that was contrary. God awakened in David desire that that ark, that Christ, should have His own place.

We noticed yesterday in 2 Samuel 5, that David had just been anointed in Hebron. In chapter 6 it is as if David says, ‘I have been given the place that God intended for me, but I cannot fill it out unless the ark is in its place’. He says, “we heard of it at Ephratah, we found it in the fields of the wood”.

What he was considering for was that there might be an answer for God in His people. I wondered if we could see the exercises that David went through in the actual bringing up of the ark. And then, perhaps, we might get a touch in Romans as to the present bearing of committal to what is for God, in the present day. Do you think that might open up some enquiry for us?

RJC I am sure that is very helpful. Each one of us has some appreciation of the Lord Jesus as our Saviour, but He is also the One that leads us through the wilderness here, or is available to us, through the wilderness. We should appreciate Him in that way, do you think, as the One who is available to us to see us through every circumstance in view of what would be for the pleasure of God?

PM Yes, I think so. What comes out in David’s history from this point is really typical of the headship of Christ as the ark has its place. But I wondered if we might just concentrate our affections on the committals of David as a type of a believer that required that there should be the leadership of Christ in the scene of His absence.

RJC The ark went on before in Numbers, did it not, to seek out a resting-place for the children of Israel? So the ark can look after itself, can it, and yet it is so available to us?

PM Yes, it speaks to us, does it not, of what came into lowly conditions in the person of Jesus? and yet the half cubit in each direction, reminding us of the glory of who was here, and the mystery of His person, that One was here, that could not be encompassed by man— greater than anything that man could ever grasp. He is ever beyond us, and yet He came into finite conditions in order that He might provide for His people a way through the wilderness, and across the Jordan, and that God might be served.

CKR Clearly with David there was definiteness. He says three times, “I will not” in verses 3 and 4. It was like Romans 12, it was his intelligent service that certain things, “I will not come into”, “I will not go up”, “I will not give sleep” until these spiritual exercises had been settled and satisfied.

PM Each of those things were legitimate things, were they not? What made him make that committal?

CKR You could open it up more, but I have always thought that he heard of it, but when he “found it” that was something very very distinctive and a milestone for him.

PM He was conscious, was he not, of what the ark meant to God? In fact, when we come to 2 Samuel 6 it is the ark of God, bringing out I think God’s delight and appreciation typically of all that there is in that blessed Person, who even today is guiding His people through. David says, and what you draw attention to is important, “I will not come into the tent of my house, I will not go up to the couch of my bed; I will not give sleep to mine eyes, slumber to mine eyelids, Until I find out a place for Jehovah”. That is what was in his heart. It was not what was for him. Here he was anointed in Hebron but that was not what was in his heart at this moment. What was in his heart was what was for Jehovah.

RDP Is there a big difference between these two words, he heard of it’ and ‘he found it’? Because he heard of it and it would have been a matter of almost history. It was forty years at least since there had been any movement of the ark, but the difference between ‘hearing’ about the Lord Jesus and ‘finding’ it is significant is it not in our day?

PM Well, just help us as to it. We need help from one another.

RDP I was thinking you began with “I have found David”, Acts 13: 22. It seems to convey more than information, more than interest. It brings about in David a lifetime commitment, not only himself, but everything that he had. I just think it is so important for us that we do not stop at ‘hearing’ about divine things. We have another generation coming on, but when he ‘found’ it, his heart, his mind, his life was engaged with Christ, in type.

PM I am thankful for what you say because it is important to hear about it. The household teaching, the morning read, all helps towards the hearing about it, but the work of God in David, through the hearing of it, involved that he would not stop until he found it for himself. Have I found Christ for myself? Not only the answer to my sins, blessed and glorious fact that that is. Unchangeable. But have I found the Person for myself? David says, I will not stop until I find it.

JCG What do you understand by the “fields of the wood”? “Found it in the fields of the wood”.

PM I suppose it really is a reference to Kirjath-jearim where the ark was found, is it not? but you have some thought as to it, why it is worded that way.

JCG Well, there is a place where we name the name of the Lord, in a place where David was searching as applying it to ourselves. He was searching for where the Lord’s name is honoured. Naming the name of the Lord would be involved in that, would it, and we find a company who are true in relation to Christ as typified in the ark?

PM Yes. What you say is important and will help us, because the object in view in naming the name of the Lord and departing from iniquity (2 Timothy 2), is not just what it is for us, but that there might be a place for Christ. That is what is in view. We may get an impression perhaps when we are young that we are just holding ourselves aloof from everything here. That is not the object in naming the name of the Lord. Naming the name of the Lord and departing from iniquity is that there might be a place in which Christ can be at home. It is a little like Bethany as a type. Outside of Jerusalem with all its pretension, and there is much pretension around us and we have to guard that it does not come in, into our own heart, but outside of it all was that little company in which He found a home.

JCG So he comes to it later that it is “Jehovah ... and the ark of thy strength”. That in the midst of the fields of the wood and an area that might appear to be obscure, he finds something which is the ark of the strength of Jehovah; and that is important for us at the present time in the midst of the breakdown through which we go on.

PM I was hoping we would get a touch of that because at the juncture where we are in the history of the testimony, we need the confirmation that it is the ark of His strength. We may feel our weakness, and we should. As we feel our weakness, and are before God in relation to it, we come to prove what the ark of His strength is, that there is One who is great enough to uphold and carry everything through for the pleasure of God.

JS In Exodus 25 when God was thinking of a tabernacle for Himself, a dwellingplace. He begins with the ark, everything is centred on Christ. David seems to be governed by the same idea, “Until I find out a place for Jehovah, habitations for the Mighty One of Jacob ...”. Therefore, do you think, he felt that the ark was in unsuitable surroundings?

PM Yes, it was not valued was it? It had been in that house for forty years or more, and nothing is said as to it. It was there in a house on the hill. All the circumstances were favourable, but the ark was not valued in that house. Is the ark valued in our houses? Is Christ the centre of the house?

NJH The recovery of the truth, as we call it, actually began in the exercise of, and hearts of persons, for a place really for the ark, is that right? And that is only maintained by exercise in our hearts now. Otherwise we will revert to Abinadab’s house on the hill, is that right?

PM I think we could just look at that for a moment, because God worked sovereignly, as we were reminded yesterday, one hundred and eighty years ago. It does not make anything of us or where we are, but God worked sovereignly in the hearts of men; not only in Ireland and this country, but in Germany and other places across the world. At the same time God was beginning a work in the hearts of men. And the work was, that light was dawning that there was another Man in another world who did not have a place here, and the exercise was that there should be conditions in which He could have a home. Now in God’s ways we have been very favoured in that He has added and blessed and fed His people. But the danger at the present moment is that we might just rest in what He has done, rather than have a living link with what He is doing.

RG And a living appreciation of who He is, do you think? It is interesting it says, “Until I find out a place for Jehovah”. He does not say, for ‘it’ or for ‘the ark’. Do you think he is reaching something of the half cubit when he says that?

PM I am sure of that. You have more to say.

RG Well, I was thinking that we treasure the greatness of the work that Christ has accomplished, but when we realise there is a half cubit we come to some appreciation of the infinitude that is there. Not only the perfection but the blessedness of the One in whom God finds such pleasure. So he says, “Until I find out a place for Jehovah”. That is His Person, is it not?

PM It is. That is helpful. It was not just the ark but the greatness of Who was here. Who had been in the midst of them? Who had operated for them right through? The greatness of that blessed Person. He says, ‘He is worthy’. Because of who He is, He is worthy of His place. Christ is worthy of His place, dear brethren. Through grace we have ours, but He must have the first place in all things. David says, ‘I have been given mine’ in 2 Samuel 5, but Christ must have the first place.

RGr Do you think the fact that he begins by saying, “Jehovah, remember for David all his affliction”, would suggest that David was beginning to understand that God’s ways with him had a definite end in view in order to the securing of this place for the ark? Do you think that is a current voice to us? We may be oppressed in our spirits by circumstances that arise, but God has a definite end in them, and as we bring them up before God, then we would begin to understand how He is working with the saints with an end in view.

PM That is most helpful, especially where we are at the moment. God is passing His people through affliction. And there is also, along with that, would you say, the affliction that enters into the exercise of soul that Christ should have His place?

DBR Do you think that is why he brings in the “Mighty One of Jacob”? I was thinking of the working out of the ways of God. Would we not have respect of how each other are affected by the ways of God? What you are bringing in is a very practical matter. What would you say about the “Mighty One of Jacob”?

PM It is remarkable that David should bring it in in this setting. Hebron had just been in his view, but he says, ‘there needs to be a place for the Mighty One of Jacob’, the One who was operating with His people in difficult circumstances. How He had worked with Jacob, bringing him through exercises that to Jacob were painful, and yet Jacob was the first one in the Old Testament that had light as to the house of God. And the exercises that were brought out with Jacob brought out an appreciation of the house of God. And really that is what David is reaching out to here, that through the circumstances through which God is passing His people, there is going to be an answer which belongs for the divine pleasure, and relates to the house of God.

DBR While there is sorrow in this city, there is pressure in it, and there is pressure generally among the saints, but there is to be an end to it. And that really is that the ark might have its true place and that God might have a dwelling-place. Do you think that is the house of God?

PM I think it is, and the exercises and the discipline through which the Lord passes us, is never an end in itself. He has an object in view and He does it in His love. He does it to draw us nearer to Himself and to appreciate the world of which Christ is the centre. And we are to appreciate that His own dwelling here in the house of God, is that He should be known here in relation to the circumstances and sorrows and pressures and joys of man. God comes in and makes Himself known in relation to those very conditions.

JW David links his affliction with his committal here. Do you think in the times we are going through God will be looking for a committal on our part? A committal that there should be suited conditions for the Lord and for God, both personally, householdly and in our local companies.

PM And that committal costs something. I think that is what is in view in the affliction of David here; that there is a cost. Is Christ worthy of that? Yes, He is, unquestionably! But have I come to it that He is worthy of my unreserved committal? David says, “Jehovah, remember for David all his affliction”. I believe it would be right to say that if I have in my heart the truth of the assembly and the desire to prove the headship of Christ, it would involve sacrifice and committal. The enemy is set against the working out of what belongs to Christ in assembly conditions, and committal in this respect would involve affliction in the soul.

JWr In the pressures and exercises we go through the divine intent is that Christ might become more to us, do you think?

PM Yes. That we might come to appreciate something of what the Father sees in Him, and to give Him the first place, practically, as the Father has done. One thing this psalm brings out, and I say this to our dear young brethren, and I would say it to myself, we never drift into anything in Christianity, we only drift out of things. If I drift I shall drift away. Christ is worthy of full and unreserved committal and David says, ‘Jehovah it costs me something’.

RDP Is there another significant difference between what David says about bringing the ark up to me, but finally it is brought not to me but to its place? Do you think it is important to see that is a greater thought than what the ark is to me? And David came to that through affliction; I am thinking of what our brother said about the house of God, the greatness of the position that is His is greater than me alone.

PM Yes, and it has already been established by God. In one sense I do not add anything to that, I come into the gain of it. Not that it centres itself in me, I am to centre myself around it, and that really is the exercise that David came to in 2 Samuel 6. What David had to see, eventually, was that everything for him was to centre in the ark.

RHB In the psalm that you read there are two oaths, are there not? There is what David swore, but God had sworn unto him. Is that involved in finding the ark, do you think? Finding what God Himself has committed Himself to and the effect of that being that we devote ourselves to it?

PM Yes. You can open that up.

RHB Well, I do not know that I can but God swore, David says, in truth unto David. He had a sense of God’s own committal. It is a remarkable thing, is it not, that man should have a sense of that, that God had sworn unto him? and that the effect of that in his soul was that he was going to devote himself to the ark? But it would appear at this time, well it might be too strong to say it was despised, but it was of little account really, was it not?

PM Do you think the committal of David at the beginning of this psalm is really answered by Jehovah’s appreciation of him? That perhaps might encourage us. If I commit myself to God I can be sure that He will give abundant manifestation of His own affection for me. Paul says, things “which God has prepared for them that love him” (1 Corinthians 2: 9), but He has revealed them to us by His Spirit. If I love God and His house, His Spirit will unfold to me the things that God appreciates and I wondered if that came in here. David says, “Let thy priests be clothed with righteousness”. But God answers that. He says, ‘they will be clothed with salvation’. They will come into the gain of all that is in the heart of God for them. How God loves to answer the committal of a man. You can trace that through the Old Testament.

PJM The answer comes very quickly it seems in the psalm. He says, ‘I am not going home until I find a place’ and then it says, “For Jehovah hath chosen Zion”. That is the answer. Do you think God answers quickly those who are exercised as we were reminded about Daniel? There were those who commit themselves. He says, ‘I am not going home until I find a habitation for Jehovah’ and very quickly he gets the divine mind.

PM Yes, how quick that was with Daniel. We were reminded of it last night that “whilst I was yet speaking in prayer” (Daniel 9: 21), even before he had finished praying, an angel was sent forth, swiftly, to give him the assurance that he was a man greatly beloved. I would say that to the young people here, if you commit yourself to the Lord and His interests and His assembly He will quickly give you the assurance that you are one that is loved.

JDG I was wondering whether the assembly week and the celebration of the Lord’s supper concentrates this exercise for the believer now. As we gather together in assembly, that is a distinctive matter, a distinctive meeting, and makes way for the Lord taking His place, that belongs to Him and Him alone in the midst; that is a weekly exercise and the exercises through the week work towards that. I wondered if that simplifies the matter for us in our day.

PM And we really gather together in assembly, with the ark in its place in the affections of those that come. We come to really announce to the world that Christ is the One who has His place in the purpose of God, and in the affections of His own, and He will take up that place in the day to come. It is the reversal of the judgment of this world, as we come to the Supper. But then we prove what the ark is as a type of the One in whom everything is centred for God as we proceed.

PAG Did you have some impression about the ark of God “which is called by the name, the name of Jehovah of hosts who sitteth between the cherubim”?

PM Well I wondered if it was to give us some impression of the holiness and majesty of God. Much was proceeding here. David’s exercises were coming to light and coming to light in conditions in which the ark had not been appreciated. And the movements forward at this junction were not priestly movements. But God remained the same—The ark of God—He who sitteth between the cherubim. The standard was not changed, was not lowered, from the divine side, and really David is called back to that. He is brought back to appreciate the ark of God—God who sitteth between the cherubim.

PAG I think what you say is helpful. I wondered if one of the things that we ought to be exercised about is the name of God and the name of the Lord Jesus. To value it and to protect it. These names are greatly misused in the world. I do not want to speak about that, but we should value and protect the names that have been made known to us, and in what we say and what we do we should shun what is not in accord with that name.

PM That is most important because we are moving through a scene where the names of divine Persons are put alongside the names of others. But this is the ark of God, who is called by that Name, who sitteth between the cherubim. The divine standard is upheld, the rights of God maintained, and David has to come to the appreciation of that.

JCG Do you think that Urijah would be one who really had respect to the name of Christ in testimony in the time of conflict? He says, “The ark, and Israel, and Judah abide in booths”, 2 Samuel 11: 11. He had respect first to the ark, and we need to have respect in whatever difficult circumstances are faced, to bring Christ in first. That would be the way in which he triumphed although he had to pay for it with his life.

PM Everything for God centres in this glorious Person, and the service of the Holy Spirit is to bring us to see that everything for us must centre in Him too. If I am going on without a living link with the Person, I am going on in relation to something in which life is missing, in which the affections of God are missing. The Spirit would bring us back to see that we align ourselves with the greatness and the glory of the One who is represented in the ark. But David in his exercises sought to bring it up, but he did not bring it up rightly. The state was low here. The ark had been out of sight for so long, and it had sat in the house of Abinadab on the hill. What had it been doing there? Maybe covered up by other things. It did not affect the household. Christ should affect our households, dear brethren.

RDP I just think it is a very important point, because we would say actually as far as motive was concerned, this was a good effort by David. He put his whole energy into it. He brought all his army up to do it. He built a new cart. It had cost him something. His only motive, you might say, was Christ, but he did not do it in accordance with the due order. I just wonder whether one of the tests that we have to face in our day is that God will not be served in any way. And that was the lesson he had to learn was it not? We are in the midst of Christendom in which man’s mind and his novelties come in to his service, and that is a hard lesson to learn that God will only be served in His own way.

PM And involving that what is done is done in the power of the Spirit. The power of the Spirit here was set aside, typically, and the ark was brought in on something new. It was Philistine. The Philistines had done this earlier in the first book of Samuel, and David takes it up, but it was not right. There is a danger in the day in which we are where everything is changing in the world around us, technology is changing, everything is changing, and there is a danger of saying, ‘Well can we not look at this in another way?’ There is no other way. God has established His way in which Christ is brought in as Supreme, and only that way will do for God.

RT Is there a danger today of resting in position without vitality, and missing the communion that is necessary for movement?

PM I wondered if that was the position of Abinadab really? He was on a hill, favourable condition, and yet there was not that vital link with the ark. I suppose they spent too long on the computer and the social network, as we might say, and they did not look at the gold that was placed upon the ark. That gold did not shine in Abinadab’s house. It lit up the house of Obed-Edom. It lit that house up, but it did not shine in Abinadab’s house.

JRW I was going to ask if you could say a little more as to Christ having an effect in our households. Say some more practically to help us. It would make those households different to the households in the world, would it not?

PM In what way?

JRW That is what I am enquiring as to. I was thinking of what the Lord Jesus said in John. He said, “He that loves his life shall lose it, and he that hates his life in this world shall keep it to life eternal”, John 12: 25. He then goes on to say, “If any one serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there also shall be my servant. And if any one serve me, him shall the Father honour” (John 12: 26). I wondered whether there would be in such households what heaven can take account of even though despised in the world?

PM That is most important, because of what we are we tend to be influenced by what is around us. The house of Obed-Edom was influenced by the ark. It gave character to that house. It brought in a blessing.

NJH I was just going to say the attack in households was more direct and frontal. Now it is more subtle, is it not? All forms of the world are coming into the house of the believer.

PM And the head of the house has a responsibility to keep the ark before the affections of each one in the household. Some of us have to hang our heads because we have not excelled, but we have a responsibility to keep the ark in all its glory before each member of the household. How we begin the day with read and prayer, and how we hold our households in relation to Christ and His interests, and the saints. The way the saints are spoken of in the house bears on the question that has been asked. If Christ has His place, everything that He values will have its place also in the affections of those in the house.

AM In Chronicles it says there “the ark of God remained with the family of ObedEdom”, 1 Chronicles 13: 14. It is quite interesting that it is not just Obed-Edom, but it remained with the family. The whole family was affected by the presence of the ark.

PM Yes, that is helpful, because each member of the family held themselves in relation to the shining of the glory of the gold in the ark. Who was there? It was a type of none less than God Himself, come in in the person of Jesus. What effect that has in the household! We are not speaking of a theory here, dear young people. This is not theoretical. I trust it is not. If Christ has His place in the house, the whole house will be affected by it, each member regulating themselves in relation to it.

WWL Would there be something in Obed-Edom’s house being near to Nachon’s threshing floor? You spoke about valuation. In the threshing floor you would separate between what is good and what is worthless.

PM It is where the results of the death of Christ are coming to light, is it not? What bearing does the death of Christ have? We have baptised households. A baptised household, if we are held in the gain of it, is finished with what belongs to the world. We have a part in a life in relation to divine Persons. Not only is the world no longer our life, but there is another life; we are baptised to “the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”, Matthew 28: 19. What a vista opens onto our view. We come into it, I think, through the ark having its place.

RFW I was wondering if in result there is a divinely given joy, a character of joy that the world cannot give. It says the second time, does it not, that they brought up the ark from the house of Obed-Edom into the city with joy? Joy was missing the first time, but there is something divinely given that the world cannot give.

PM Yes, there is a lot of noise the first time. But when you come to the second time there is what is proceeding from the heart, priestly affections for Christ. When they had gone six paces he sacrificed an ox and a fatted beast. Everything must be in keeping with the death of Christ. If there is an answer for God it must be in keeping with the death of Christ, and this will result in joy.

CKR Is it instructive to see also, that Jehovah blessed Obed-Edom and all his household? If we then turn to the testimony going westward, and in Philippi the jailor’s house was baptised, “he and all his straightway”, Acts 16: 33. As though God would show His delight in that in view of the development of assembly truth in the Western world, would you say?

PM That is most important, because when the testimony came into Europe, households played a very prominent part in the movement of that testimony. You have Lydia and the jailor and then you have others, who Paul speaks of later. Households are needed in the present moment. They are needed in relation to the ark. Households in which Christ is supreme, and as such households emerge in our local companies there will be strength collectively as we assemble together.

CKR Would you bear the word also that the household situation is preceded by strong marriages in the Lord, and that having an influence on formation of households? PM Yes. What do you mean by strong marriages in the Lord?

CKR Well in the sense that a brother and sister, they themselves, are committed to the Lord Jesus, individually, in their lives, and then come together out of love and affection for one another, but also having the desire to commit themselves to the things that relate to the ark and for the pleasure of God. So the household from the beginning takes character from these glorious truths.

PM Yes. And it is necessary that there should be that committal individually in the brother and the sister before being joined in marriage.

NJH I was thinking that not only was the house blessed, but Obed-Edom influenced David and the whole of Israel. It is not only maintaining what God has done in the house, but the people of God are going to benefit through it, such as the houses in Corinth and Philippi and other places.

PM The whole kingdom becomes affected by it. It shows what one person can do. What God can do through one person. The committal of one person gives God room to act. I might say, ‘Well what difference would I make?’ That is not the motive, dear brethren. If I commit myself the motive is not to see what difference I can make. But if I commit myself to God He will do something. If I think I can do something for the Lord, He will never use me. But if I commit myself to Him and keep near to Him, He will do something and He may use me in the doing of it. But I cannot effect anything. We have to come to that. But God can effect something through committed persons.

RGr I was going to ask, do you think Psalm 48 bears on what we are speaking of? It says, “Walk about Zion”, and then it adds, “Mark ye well her bulwarks” (Psalm 48: 12, 13). Do you think we need to hold our households, not only as separate from the world, which is necessary, but as supporting the assembly. We look at it from an assembly standpoint. Would that be right?

PM I am sure that is important. And the bulwarks are part of Zion. “Mark ye well her bulwarks”. They are part of Zion. Are our households part of Zion?

PJM The end of the section you read, Jehovah has His house, a place for the ark. Then there is the dealing of the cakes and the measure of wine and a raisin-cake. And all the people departed everyone to his house. Do you think we are beginning to see the working out of this? The attractiveness of what God first demonstrated in the house of Obed-Edom now flows out No longer is the ark turned aside. It is entered into its own resting-place and every one can go home to their house with something substantial in their hand.

PM Yes, and God had blessed the house of Obed-Edom, every one goes home blessed. Committal to Christ secures blessing, blessing in the soul, strength in the soul. They go home nourished and blessed.

What is in view in Romans is us taking up our part in the body. The will of God in Romans 12 stands related to our part in the body. That raises exercise of itself, and Paul says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the compassions of God, to present your bodies”. I think we were affected yesterday by the body that the Lord Jesus had, the body that was prepared for Him. And He gave that Himself. But now we have bodies. How do we use them? What do we do with our bodies?

RJC Our bodies are to be presented a “living sacrifice”. Is that the end result of working out these Roman exercises, that we are totally committed to God in all our exercises? It is a “living sacrifice.”

PM Yes, “intelligent service”. Committed wholly for the pleasure of God. What joy He has. Persons in whom He finds His delight. He found it in its fulness in Christ, but He is finding it in the members of the body in the present time.

DCB You referred earlier to priestly affection. It affects me that priestliness runs through what you have been bringing before us in thinking for God. But that must be motivated by the depth of priestly affection.

PM And it is awakened here as Paul says, “I beseech you .... by the compassions of God”. Previously he had been speaking of the fact that God had shut up all together in unbelief that He might show mercy to all, and he breaks out in doxology. And then he says, “I beseech you therefore”. There is to be an answer to the way that God has moved from His own side, awakening affections in men, answering to God, because God has operated so fully from His own side.

JWr Do you think that the body is to be holy? I wondered if that linked with our brother’s enquiry. We cannot be priestly unless our bodies are holy, can we?

PM And we are to keep our bodies holy. In the old dispensation if a son of the priest was to take up his part in relation to what his father had exercised, it was necessary that he should be without defect. He was not to have one limb longer than the other, and other details are gone into (see Leviticus 21: 16–20). He had held his body in relation to the system in which the ark was the centre. Now how do I hold my body? Is it holy, acceptable to God? Or am I putting it to things that are unholy in their character?

RG Our bodies are not our own, are they?

PM They are not our own. And they are also the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6: 19).

RG We have been bought with a price. We should ever remember that, should we not? So that as having an appreciation of how we have been bought with a price, then our bodies would be for the One who paid the price.

PM Yes. Very affecting that. He came as a dependent Man, as One who relied entirely on the Father. Now He would say to us, ‘You are not your own’, ‘You belong to Me’. The price of redemption has been paid. What a price! If we are here on Monday, as we go out into the world, let us just remember, in the company that we keep, in what we do, let us remember that we are not our own. We belong to Christ. And he says here, “And be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind”. It seems to me, dear brethren, that involves that I make way for the operation of the Spirit. The believer begins to think differently. He is transformed by the renewing of his mind. The believer’s mind is not occupied with the things that the natural man is occupied with. The believer’s mind is occupied with the things of God. That would be normal. He thinks differently. He is transformed by the renewing of his mind. And that is in view, it says here, “that ye may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God”.

JAB I would like you to open up what Paul means when he says, “that ye may prove”. It is not a sort of logical proof as in a puzzle, but it is the result of experience, is it not? What you are talking about is experimental. We either find this to be so or we do not, and your exercise is that we all should find it to be so, is that right?

PM I think so and I find it testing for myself, but as the Spirit has His place in relation to our minds and affections, and we commit ourselves to what is for God, then we find that God is working out His own will and that is for our blessing, “good and acceptable and perfect”. We have often been reminded it must be in that order, and we prove it in that order, that it is good. And then in proving that it is good we find we regulate ourselves according to it. It is acceptable. And then we can see that it is perfect.

WMcK The first person who says, “I love” in Scripture, the Hebrew bondman, if he came in with his body, such is his love that he says, “I will not go free”, Exodus 21: 5. That should be our committal, would you think, as a result of what is before us?

PM Yes, he is taken to the doorpost, and his ear bored through. Just to speak simply, I have often thought every time he went through that doorway he would be reminded of his committal. There was the mark where his ear was bored through. And the Spirit would constantly remind us of the day of our committals to the things God.

WMcK And every time his wife and children looked at it they would see that bored through ear. And, therefore, the head of the household should be, without saying anything, an expression of absolute committal to Christ, do you think?

PM That is very affecting because the committal of the head of the house produces an influence in the household. I shall never be able to save or to influence my children rightly in relation to the path, if I am not committed to Christ wholeheartedly myself.

Reading No. 3 at Glasgow
14August 2010

KEY TO INITIALS

D. C. Brown	R. Gray	C. K. Robinson
J. A. Brown	N. J. Henry	D. B. Robertson
R. H. Brown	W. W. Lovie Jr.	J. Strachan
R. J. Campbell	W. McKillop	R. Taylor
R. Gardiner	A. Mair	J. R. Walkinshaw
J. D. Gray	P. Martin	R. F. White
J. C. Gray	J. Mutton	J. Wright
P. A. Gray	R. D. Plant