THE PRACTICAL WORKING OF THE ASSEMBLY, ON THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY.
[p. 355] THE PRACTICAL WORKING OF THE ASSEMBLY, ON THE PRINCIPLE OF UNITY.
CG We should like to read something on the assembly.
FER Then we had better look at 1 Corinthians 12 - 1 Corinthians 14. These chapters do not bring before us the idea of the saints as risen and quickened with Christ, as in Colossians and Ephesians, but the practical working of the assembly on the principle of unity. We have what may be called the first principles of the assembly. Chapter 11 virtually gives the Head, for it is the Lord who is prominent there, and He is the Head. Chapter 12 gives the body, for it brings in the truth of the Spirit, and one Spirit makes one body.
WB Is Christ the Head as the One to whom the body is subject?
FER Yes.
AH Does Head and Lord convey the same thought?
FER No, but we distinguish the Person who is Head by the title of Lord. As Lord, Christ holds Himself in a sense distant. He did so to the Corinthians because of their state. The moment you recognise Christ as Head, you understand that you take your character from the Head. The secret of the confusion in the world is from lack of a Head.
Rem Antichrist will be given that place by Satan.
FER He comes on the scene after Christ, the true Head, has been refused. Christ is Head of every man, but now this is true only to faith. In a system like popery they try to impose a head, but it is not the true thing. In Adam, God began with a head: he was the first man and the head. We have in the assembly the introduction of the Head before the body. The way in which God put things right is by the introduction of a head. (Ephesians 1: 22)
[p. 356] The idea of a head is one from whom character is taken. When things are in order according to God, every man, instead of asserting his own will, will take character from Christ. “Such as the heavenly one, such also the heavenly ones”. If every man took character from Christ, things would be right in the world. My body takes character from my head, for the intelligence is there. All the confusion in the world, the separation into nations, and confusion of tongues arose from the fact that man had lost a head; everything was marred, and man went his own way. In coming together in the assembly we own Christ as Head.
Rem If Christ were realised as Head, everything would go right in the assembly.
FER Yes; but I should like to see that every one took character from Christ; then we should have wonderful meetings.
Chapter 11 virtually presents Christ; chapter 12 the Spirit, by which Jew and gentile have been baptised into one body. The Spirit into which we have all been made to drink is, I judge, Christ, from whom we take character.
Ques “The Christ” (verse 12) — what is that?
FER The church as the anointed vessel. That is the true place of the church here.
WB In what way is the Lord brought before us in the Supper?
FER In His death, the Supper gives Him His proper place of pre-eminence; He claims pre-eminence, but in love. He has taken the place of “first-born” that we might accord Him this place of pre-eminence. He is Head of all principality and power. We own and recognise Him as Head of every man and of all principality and power. The church is His body and He is Head to it.
Ques In chapter 11, when the bread and cup are before us, what do they convey?
FER You find yourself in the presence of the Lord’s death, the greatest expression of His love. In the bread and cup He sets forth the conditions on which [p. 357] we can have part with Him.
JC And that holds good the whole week through.
FER Yes.
WB Some think the breaking of bread to be the stirring up of your pure mind by way of remembrance.
FER But you have not known His sufferings in order to remember or recall them in the way in which the apostles would, you have to take the institution up spiritually rather than literally.
Rem The Lord said, do this “in remembrance of me”.
FER I think He referred in that to what He had been here when with the disciples, and they were to recall Himself. To us, the bread and wine, as setting forth His death, give us the expression of His love, and Christ has given in them, too, the conditions under which we can be with Him.
Ques The bread and cup recall His death?
FER They recall Himself. You have to go behind the bread and cup, for the Supper calls Himself into presence; and that is more even than laying down the terms on which He can be with us. Many get the good of His presence though not much in the intelligence of it. The Jew had no more title to Christ in death than the gentile, whatever he might have had in His life. Thus Jew and gentile are on common ground in the presence of the death of Christ.
WB I think of Him in all He died to put away, all that I was after the flesh, in order that He might have us with Himself in all the love He expressed there.
FER That is the force of His body given, the removal side; the cup is the cup of blessing. It does not speak of the bread of blessing, because that refers to removal. The Supper is introductory to the sanctuary, to the priestly service of God, according to the appointed order.
TP As to the Supper being at the beginning of the meeting, it would not do to [p. 358] force things?
FER No. You must recognise when saints are ready for it spiritually; but you will not find much good will be done by putting off the breaking of bread.
JC But you would not make rules?
FHB No. Chapter 13 comes in to regulate all. Love regulates everything. In John 20 when the Lord came into the company of His disciples, He brought before them the record of His death. He shewed them His hands and His side. “Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord”. His hands and His side identified Him as the One who had died.
BB Chapter 13 comes in for us to have consideration for those who may not be up to the truth of things.
FER Yes; the Corinthians were not much up to the truth.
AH You would deprecate an unwritten church service?
FER Yes, but we ought to try and help saints to that which is true, namely, priestly worship. In regard to this, Hebrews and Colossians go together, that is, in Colossians you apprehend God’s work in us, namely, that He has quickened us together with Christ; and in Hebrews we have boldness to enter into the holiest. You must connect the holiest with the land of promise. The greater and more perfect tabernacle is in the land.
Rem The tabernacle was set up at Shiloh.
FER The greater and more perfect tabernacle is connected with mount Zion, but it is all, of course, a moral idea, and is realised in our apprehending the place which Christ has taken up before God on our behalf. If you understand what being quickened together with Christ and raised up is, you enter into association with Christ in the holiest.
Ques Is Christ’s presence the holiest, for it is not a place?
FER Yes; but the point in Colossians is the apprehension of what God has wrought — what is true in us; quickening is what God has effected in us. As quickened [p. 359] together with Christ, we are in the land, in association there with Him.
Ques Why is it “in Christ”?
FER Because we are not actually in heavenly places yet. We are there in Christ.
JC I am there before God in Christ, and as Christ is.
FER You are there before God as you are, according to what God has made you. Everything in the holiest is according to God’s glory. You are there according to that glory — holy, without blame before Him in love. In the holiest there is a power of exclusion of everything in us which is not according to God’s work in us. We are true worshippers because we are there according to what God has wrought in us. At the coming of the Lord we shall be actually quickened and raised up, but that is effected in us now in anticipation. There is the work of God, and you are in the holiest in virtue of that work.
AH Not only in Christ, but of Christ, as Eve was of Adam.
FER Yes.
JC Then it is really all that is of God in me that enters.
FER Yes. These things are said by many to be mystical, but they are only mystical to those who do not understand them.
Ques. What is quickening?
FER It is making alive out of death.
Ques. When is that true?
FER When the love of God is so effective in the soul that you are conscious of being associated with Christ in that love.
Ques. Is it progressive?
FER Quickening is really the sum total of God’s work in us.
Ques Does not the quickening process go on if the person is clear of the world?
FER Well, it enlarges. The secret of deliverance [p. 360] lies in the divine nature. 2 Peter 1: 4.
Rem Quickening is more than intelligence?
FER In scripture spiritual intelligence is connected with love. See Ephesians 1 and Colossians 2.
Ques As to the holiest — Is the idea of it that we realise heavenly association with Christ where love has found its rest and satisfaction?
FER Yes. The love we have learned in its activities down here in discipline, and in other ways, is there at rest. It is the same love which we experienced here that we find there at rest. There is a place where everything is according to God, and there is found perfect love in complacency and at rest. We read in John 17: 26, “that the love with which thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them?”
Rem In Corinthians we do not find much of this.
FER No, they were not up to it, the tendency with them was to party making.
Rem You said that Corinthians was a contrast to Hebrews and Colossians. How?
FER In Hebrews and Colossians we get the idea of the assembly in its true character according to God. In Corinth they were party making, going after leaders. In the assembly there is no such thing as leadership or pre-eminence. In your natural body there is no pre-eminence, your finger is as good as your eye. No member in the human body seeks prominence, though on the other hand it might be paralysed, and die out of use. You have to be particular in the assembly as to conduct, no person should express judgment on what is done there — it is a very unhappy position for any brother to place himself in, for he makes himself judge.
JC If on the one hand a person is not to make himself prominent, many, on the other hand, do not take any part at all.
FER Chapter 13 would correct that. Love is an active principle which would bring to the front many who do not now take part. It is a lack of love, rather than [p. 361] a question of modesty.
Ques Is there not a fear of criticism?
FER Well, love would lead a man to forget himself; to correct all these things our hearts must get into the scene and region of love; one cannot correct them for another.
P Do you not think prayer about it would effect it?
FER Yes, for that would bring out the love.
BB If love were manifested would it not bring it out in others?
FER Yes, love is the life of the assembly, and Christ claims to be pre-eminent in love. The Supper puts that before us.
Rem If we were formed in love there would not be such long pauses.
Ques Do you not think that the real defect in all of us is that we are not affected by the love of God, not that we do not know about it?
FER Do you think that if love were in activity there would be these horrible divisions coming in? Doctrine will not correct these things, but divine love would; but for its acting, people must keep themselves in the region of the Spirit, not in the influence of the world.
AH If a person is quickened with Christ he must be of Christ, nothing of the flesh could be quickened.
Rem It is new creation.
FER That stands in rather a different connection.