DEUTERONOMY 10
If God is to have a people for His pleasure, as redeemed and answering to His love, it must be brought about, as a result of His own work in them, and of their abiding in Christ. And this is set forth typically in the chapter now before us.
We have seen what Jehovah proposed in the covenant through the mediatorship of Moses. What answers to it for us is the revelation of the love of God in His beloved Son. That love could not be satisfied without an answer to it being produced in His people. It would not suffice that the covenant should be made known as in the heart of God concerning His people; it must, necessarily, for His pleasure, be made good in their hearts. But chapter 9 has proved that this has not been the case naturally either with Israel or ourselves. On the contrary, stiffneckedness and rebellion have marked us. Then how can God fulfil His promises, and the purposes of His love, and secure what His heart desires! We must admit that it has all failed on the [p. 105] line of what is natural, but God would have us to understand that it can be secured on the line of what is spiritual. This is true both as to Israel and ourselves. Four times in the first four verses of this chapter we have reference to the “first” tables, and the “first” writing. We know that “the first” in Scripture refers to the natural, “the second” to the spiritual (1 Corinthians 15: 45 - 40). Everything connected with the natural man breaks down; all on that line is perversity and rebellion. So that Moses was constrained to cast the first tables out of his two hands and break them before the eyes of the people (Deuteronomy 9: 17).
Moses himself was typical of Christ as the One who could carry the covenant unbroken; the two tables were in His two hands. But there was no answer to it in man after the order of Adam fallen. The death of Christ made manifest that all was hopeless on that line, for if men could answer to God’s pleasure what need that Christ should die for them? The hopelessness of the situation in that connection was demonstrated when the “two hands” of Christ were nailed to the cross. His being made a curse for the people was the most solemn evidence that the first tables were broken. It was the declaration that they were under the curse of a broken law, though He, in wondrous grace, was made a curse for them.
But when we come to the second “two tables” an entirely new thought is introduced. Moses was to hew for himself down here two tables for Jehovah to write upon. It suggests a divine work in man wrought under the hand of Christ as Mediator and Intercessor. The Gospel of Luke presents Him in that twofold character, and we see Him in that Gospel working so that God might have “good pleasure in men”. That is the theme of the praise of the heavenly host in Luke 2: 14. Proverbs 8: 30, 31 stands connected with this: “Then I was by him his artificer”, — as it may be translated: see note in New Translation — “and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him; rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth, and my delights were with the sons of men”.
Christ as the Wisdom of God had the joy of contemplating men, not as fallen and perverse, but as those with whom His delights could be, and He was God’s Artificer to bring it about. Those who came under the Hand of Christ were divinely fashioned so that the covenant might be written upon them. “His hands and his feet” (Luke 24:40) cover what is presented in Luke’s Gospel. “His feet” would refer to His blessed movements here, making God known in infinite grace, setting forth the covenant as it was in God’s heart towards men. But “his hands” suggest the thought of mighty touches of divine skill on the souls of men, so that they might come into correspondence with God, and be responsive to Him. If Christ touches a man morally that man becomes impressionable Godward; there is an undoing of the works of the devil; there is something to shew the skilfulness of the Hand that has touched him. We could not think of Christ touching anybody without some evidence being left of His handiwork.
Moses hewing the tables is a type of Christ as God’s Artificer, fashioning men for the good pleasure of God. At the end of Luke we see the result; men with their understanding opened to understand the Scriptures, men just ready to receive the promise of the Father, and to be clothed with power from on high, men “with great joy, and ... continually in the temple praising and blessing God”. These were not men after the flesh — fallen and perverse — but men such as Christ and the blessed God could delight in. They were not morally of the first man, but of the second Man out of heaven.
[p. 107] Each of them was expressive of the truth that “that which is born of the Spirit is spirit”. And we see them in the beginning of the Acts with the covenant written on them — knowing God’s love and loving Him, and loving one another. They were then suitable for “the land”? which is, indeed, “the habitable part of his earth”.
God has told us how He will cleanse Israel morally from all their uncleannesses and from all their idols. “And I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and keep mine ordinances, and ye shall do them. And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God” (Ezekiel 36: 24 - 27). God will by His own work prepare the heart of Israel to be divinely written upon, and when it is so prepared He will fulfil the word in Jeremiah 31: 33, 34. “I will put my law in their inward parts, and will write it in their heart; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people”. All that in which they failed naturally will be secured in them spiritually by the work of God. I believe that the second tables, hewn by Moses, have a typical reference to this.
Paul applies the figure of tables divinely written upon to saints of the present period when he speaks of the saints at Corinth “being manifested to be Christ’s epistle ministered by us, written, not with ink, but the Spirit of the living God; not on stone tables, but on fleshy tables of the heart” (2 Corinthians 3: 3). By divine working human hearts become “fleshy tables” on which Christ writes with the Spirit of the living God so that men carry in their affections the impress of what God is as revealed in grace. The new covenant is consummated,
[p. 108] as to the spirit of it, in those who know God through Christ the Mediator, and who love Him and love one another. But this is the fruit of divine working and teaching in a people quickened spiritually by the Lord. “The Spirit quickens ... Now the Lord is the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3: 6, 17).
Believers now have “the Spirit of the Lord” — the Spirit of that glorious Man who is the Mediator of the new covenant. There is thus “liberty” to take up in holy affections what pertains to the covenant. Only such a people could truly enter into the land, or take up their inheritance in it in a spiritual way for the pleasure of God. It was not — it could not be — made good in Israel at that time, for it awaited the coming of Christ, and the closing up in His death of all that was connected with man after the flesh, and the gift of the Spirit from Him as risen and glorified. But it was set forth typically in the second tables that God would write in such a way as to secure what was in His own mind and heart. The covenant was utterly broken in connection with what man is naturally, but it will be divinely and permanently written in the heart of Israel in another day by the gracious working of God. And the spirit of it is made good today in those on whose hearts Christ writes, and who “looking on the glory of the Lord with unveiled face, are transformed according to the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit” (2 Corinthians 3: 18).
The “ark of wood” suggests the preservation of the covenant — in contrast with its being broken — in a suitable vessel. It was so perfectly in Christ, and everything hangs upon that. It was written of Him “in the volume of the book”, “To do thy good pleasure, my God, is my delight, and thy law is within my heart” (Psalm 40: 7, 8). But He cherished and preserved it as the true “ark of wood” that He might make it the law of the “great congregation”. The divine intent was that what was true in Him should become true by divine teaching, and by the presence of His Spirit, in the whole of God’s Israel.
But when we think of God’s “good pleasure” or “law” as in the heart of Christ what an immense expansion is given to it! We are at once carried far beyond the letter of “the ten words”. The letter, applied to man in the flesh, only gave the knowledge of sin, and was a ministry of death and condemnation. But the spirit of the covenant was the knowledge of God as a Redeemer, Deliverer, and Saviour-God — as One so known by “thousands” as to be the Object, on their part, of love and obedience. The spirit of it was that all blessing should come in on the principle of God having His place with His creature, and that God should be known as the Source of all blessing. No right-minded creature could wish that blessing should come in on any other principle; indeed it is morally impossible that it should do so. For God must be God, and the creature must be in the place that becomes it. Otherwise all would be confusion. But see how wondrously God has wrought! A Divine Person — the Son — has come into the world saying, “Lo, I come (in the roll of the book it is written of me) to do, O God, thy will” (Hebrews 10: 7). All that God delights in for the blessing of His creature man has been brought in on the principle of love and obedience as in the heart of Christ. And the law as put in the inward parts of Israel and written in their heart, under the new covenant, will be the law as cherished and preserved in the heart of Christ. It will be the knowledge of God as forgiving and as bestowing upon them all the good that is in His heart.
It is of the utmost importance that we should think of the “good pleasure” or “law” of God as in the heart of Christ. Christ coming into the world as the obedient [p. 110] and righteous One brought in the good pleasure of God as to man in the full extent of it, and this in reference to all that man was as a sinner. We learn from Psalm 40 that it meant the bringing in of God’s righteousness, and faithfulness, and salvation, and loving-kindness, and truth. See Psalm 40: 9, 10. God’s thoughts toward us “cannot be reckoned up in order ... they are more than can be numbered” (Psalm 40: 5). The covenant, as we know it according to the spirit of it, is a ministry of righteousness and of the Spirit, and of God’s innumerable thoughts of blessing as set forth in Christ. Our sins are purged, never to be remembered any more; we are sanctified and perfected in perpetuity through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Hebrews 10 enlarges on this as the outcome of God’s will being taken up in Christ. God’s innumerable thoughts of blessing are established in a way that glorifies Him, and fills believing hearts with joy and praise. We know the will or pleasure of God by seeing it made good by Christ. He has gone into death so that all that was in the will of God for our blessing might be brought into effect.
The three great prophets, Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Isaiah, bring out what we have been considering. Ezekiel shews how tables are prepared for divine writing; Jeremiah tells us of the writing on them; but Isaiah develops most fully how everything depends on the coming in of Christ, and on the pleasure of God being secured in Him. All hangs upon the Virgin’s Son, Immanuel (Isaiah 7), who becomes the Servant upheld by Jehovah, and delighted in by Him (Isaiah 42: 1). “Jehovah had delight in him for his righteousness’ sake: he hath magnified the law, and made it honourable” (Isaiah 42: 21.). We read, “The pleasure of Jehovah shall prosper in his hand” (Isaiah 53: 10). The Ark of the covenant is spoken of as God’s strength and glory. See Psalm 78: 61; Psalm 132: 8. It typifies Christ as the One [p. 111] by whom God causes His counsel to stand, and does all His pleasure. The covenant is available for all the Israel of God as made good in Christ. It will never be understood, or rightly taken up, save in that way. So that everything depends now on our abiding in Christ; it is thus that the covenant will be preserved in its true power in our souls. The unction which we have received teaches us to “abide in him”; and John adds his personal exhortation; “And now, children, abide in him, that if he be manifested we may have boldness, and not be put to shame from before him at his coming ... Whoever abides in him does not sin ... He that says he abides in him ought, even as he walked, himself also so to walk” (1 John 2: 27, 28; 1 John 3: 6; 1 John 2: 6).
The ark as seen in Exodus 25 is typical of Christ personally as the One by whom all that is in the pleasure of God will be carried into effect in the moral universe. God and His will are to be supreme, and all has been secured by Christ coming into Manhood and taking up the will of God in obedience and carrying all through perfectly to the glory of God. But I think that the “ark of wood” as seen in Deuteronomy 10 would speak of Christ as the One in whom all that God would bring about for His pleasure in men has been patterned. The land can only be entered upon spiritually as what was true in Christ becomes true in the saints. Obedience and love as learned in Christ are to be characteristic of all those who are His. I believe this to be the point of view of the Spirit in Deuteronomy, where possession and enjoyment of “the land” is the subject. “The ark of the covenant, covered round in every part with gold” (Hebrews 9: 4) is Christ in His personal and unique glory, but it seems to me that the “ark of wood” is suggestive of Christ in that aspect in which what is true in Him can also be true in His saints. It suggested that God had [p. 112] His own thoughts in reserve, and that, He would, in due time, secure them, first of all in Christ, and then through Christ in those who should abide in Him as having His Spirit. One would cherish the thought of this even if we have a humbling consciousness of how little it is so practically.
When John speaks of the “old commandment, which ye have had from the beginning”, he is referring to what was true in Christ; but he goes on to speak of “a new commandment”, and says of it, “Which thing is true in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light already shines” (1 John 2: 7, 8). I think the “ark of wood” in Deuteronomy is typically expressive of the “new commandment” as that which being true in Christ can also be true in those who abide in Him. It is striking how John puts the saints, as it were, in Christ’s place, and says of them what he had said of Christ. We are more ready to believe that the thoughts of God are secured in Christ than we are to recognise that, by the work of God, what is true in Christ becomes true in those who are His. But the elect of God are sanctified to the obedience of Jesus Christ. The one born anew can say, “For I delight in the law of God according to the inward man” (Romans 7: 22). And it is through the “obedience of faith” that we receive the glad tidings. Where there is obedience, righteousness, and love, there is moral correspondence with Christ as the “ark of wood”. The covenant will be made good in the heart of Israel in a coming day, and surely the spirit of it is made good in the saints in this, the Spirit’s day. Or are we to accept that there will be a fuller result for the pleasure of God in saints who are of Israel than there is in saints who are of the assembly?
[p. 113] John would shew us where the commandments are made good; he would say, like Moses in Deuteronomy 10, “and they are there”. John does not speak in terms of the covenant, but he gives us the substance and vitality of it as made good in a company who know the love of God, and who respond to it, and who love one another. Such keep the commandments of God; what is true in Christ is also true in them; indeed John says, “that even as he is, we also are in this world”. The people of God thus take character from the “ark of wood”, and become the expression here of God, and of what is pleasing to God. A vessel is secured in which all that pertains to the covenant can be cherished and preserved. The typical teaching which follows in the book of Deuteronomy can only be taken up spiritually in the light of this. It can only be taken up in virtue of divine work and teaching, and of abiding in Christ.
A parenthesis is introduced in verses 6 and 7 mentioning circumstances which took place historically long after what Moses had been speaking of, but which are brought in here by the Spirit of God to call our attention to two things of great importance. First, the necessity for the priestly service of Christ in view of the land being entered and possessed. Aaron’s exercise of priesthood was limited to the wilderness, but Eleazar is a type of Christ as Priest in relation to entrance upon the inheritance. Aaron represents Christ as exercising priesthood in relation to wilderness needs and weaknesses, but Eleazar represents Him as Priest in relation to the inheritance. Joshua was to stand before him, and he would enquire for Joshua “by the judgment of the Urim before Jehovah” (Numbers 27: 21 ). Eleazar is a type of Christ as Priest in relation to all that which, from the Deuteronomic standpoint, can be described as “good things to come” (Hebrews 9: 11). As the true Aaron He can sympathise and succour in all wilderness needs, but as Eleazar He has complete knowledge, according to divine light, of “the eternal inheritance”, and of how we should go out and come in to acquire possession of it. He knows as “high priest of the good things to come” how to allot to all Israel, and to each tribe, their appointed place in the divine inheritance. It is an aspect of His precious and continuing service which we do well not to overlook. The military exploits of Joshua without the priestly direction of Eleazar would not have sufficed to secure to the heirs of promise the enjoyment of the inheritance. And we need Christ as “high priest of the good things to come” — things that have now come, and can be known as spiritual realities — if we are to have present enjoyment of them.
Then the “land of waterbrooks” speaks of a region where there is the flow and activity of the Holy Spirit. The people themselves do not often bring divine thoughts before us; it is generally far otherwise; but the incidents that occurred on their journey are often freighted with rich meaning. And this “land of waterbrooks” to which they came immediately after the transfer of the priesthood to Eleazar was a remarkable anticipation of “the land” as described in chapter 8: 7. It speaks of the copiousness and variety of the refreshings of the Spirit as known even on the wilderness side of Jordan. God is pleased to give to His people manifestations of the Spirit in the assembly viewed as in wilderness conditions, as in 1 Corinthians. He gives ministry in freshness and power there that His saints may be incited to move forward energetically into that which is peculiarly the domain of the Spirit. To experience the activities of the Spirit as described in 1 Corinthians would be a great inducement to go on to know what His activities are amongst the saints viewed as over Jordan. There are [p. 115] thus two great encouragements brought before us in this remarkable little parenthesis: the thought of Christ’s priestly service with reference to acquiring possession of the inheritance, and the thought of the Spirit as an abundant and perennial Source of refreshment and fertility.
Then we get in verses 8, 9 the separation of the tribe of Levi. “The tribe of Levi” represents the element that, is distinctly “for Jehovah” (Exodus 32: 26), and which preserves what is of God, and what is due to God, They consecrated themselves to Jehovah, and brought on themselves a blessing. The overcomers all through have been the true “tribe of Levi”; they have risen superior to what was natural; they have been able to gird on the sword, and to shew that God and His things were more to them than the influence of nature. What should have been true of all Israel was realised in Levi, and Jehovah took them in a peculiar way for Himself. They represented in Israel something which is greater than the inheritance, namely, the direct service of God. This was given to them as peculiar distinction and privilege, and they remained as a separated tribe, not participating in the inheritance like the other tribes, but representing in all Israel what was due to God; and to His holy service. The inheritance was held by the people largely that it might minister to them, and that the service of God in their hands might be fully maintained.
Their service was threefold — “To bear the ark of the covenant of Jehovah, to stand before Jehovah to do service unto him, and to bless in his name, unto this day”. [p. 117] These things are distinguished for us from the inheritance, and they represent what the inheritance is intended to support, as we shall see later in this book.
“To bear the ark of the covenant of Jehovah” would represent priestly ability to sustain the ministry of that infinite wealth of divine grace which is enshrined in [p. 116] Christ as the Ark of the covenant. The apostles were true Levites; they carried in their holy service the strength and glory of God as shining out in fulness of grace and truth in Christ. They were ministers of Christ, and, as carried on their shoulders, there was competent new covenant ministry. As sustained of God, they did not stumble, like David’s oxen, nor did they allow the Ark to fall into Philistine hands, and their service is a model for all the “tribe of Levi”. Nothing can be more precious and holy than the ministry of Christ in the glory that attaches to Him as the Ark of the covenant. This is indeed greater than the inheritance, for it is the shining forth of the glory of Him who gives the inheritance, and the Giver must be greater than the gift.
Then “to stand before Jehovah to do service unto him” refers to sanctuary service — ordering the lamps and the shewbread, burning incense, presenting offerings and sacrifices, and carrying on the service of song. We are apt to think that what serves man is more important than the service of God, but this is not so. The result of our being in the good of what God has given to us will be that we shall have tithes and offerings. We shall minister fully to the “tribe of Levi”, and the service of the sanctuary will be sustained. The inheritance is bestowed in order that there may be a result for God in levitical and priestly service.
Then, finally, “and to bless in his name” would indicate that God will have the last word, and that word is always a word of blessing for His people. If He is served according to what is due to Him in His house it will surely result in full blessing, according to the greatness of His Name, flowing out upon His people. It is no small part of the privilege of the “tribe of Levi” to be able to express towards His faithful people the blessed thoughts that fill the heart of God toward them. It is the glory of His Name to be known as blessing.
These things are distinguished for us from the inheritance by the separation of the tribe of Levi, to whom they pertained, from all the other tribes, and by the fact that “Levi has no portion nor inheritance with his brethren; Jehovah is his inheritance according as Jehovah thy God told him”. Our Instructor would remind us that, wonderful as the inheritance is, it is bestowed in view of God being served according to His pleasure, and that He would delight to be to us greater, and more to be gloried in, than all He gives. Jehovah was Levi’s inheritance, and he was separated to represent in Israel what was due to Jehovah in holy service. We must not think of the tribe of Levi merely as representing certain persons distinguished from others as God’s servants, but as representing a spiritual condition and service which the inheritance has to support. God would have us to be concerned, not only about the possession and enjoyment of the inheritance, but about His holy service, and the maintenance of all that is due to Him. He would have us to remember that the inheritance is not everything, but that it is given so that it may yield support for “the tribe of Levi”. He would have us see to it that what that tribe represents is maintained and ministered to in ourselves and in others. This is the first mention of the tribe of Levi in this book, but we shall find that it occupies an important place in the subsequent teaching.
We are again reminded in verse 10 of how much we owe to the intercession and advocacy of Christ. It is a persistent service of faithful love which He carries on through the whole period which is typified by the “forty days and forty nights” of Moses intercession. Many a secret unrighteousness that might have developed into open failure or public departure has been the occasion of His advocacy, and in result has been judged, and our soul has escaped like a bird from the snare of [p. 118] the fowler. In the remembrance of this we may well be constrained to take up, in our measure, a similar service. “If any one see his brother sinning a sin not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life, for those that do not sin unto death” (1 John 5: 16).
Probably many of us have owed our “life” not only to the advocacy of Christ, but to the asking of some brother! I wonder how many brothers owe their “life” to our asking? Sin is a serious matter for it is morally death; but in a brother it brings into exercise the advocacy of Christ, and the asking of any brother who sees it, and on this ground “he, shall give him life”. Instead of the brother who sins being cut off, or permanently lost to the brethren, he gets “life”; he is restored, and retained for the enjoyment of spiritual good, and for the companionship of the brethren.
At the moment to which Moses refers here the people, on their side, had lost all title to the land, but Jehovah listened to the intercession of Moses, and said to him, “Rise up, take thy journey before the people, that they may enter in and possess the land, which I swore unto their fathers to give unto them”. What a testimony to the grace and faithfulness of God, and to the fact that His people owe all to His mercy through the Mediator and Intercessor! Many of the people sinned unto death and fell in the wilderness, but those who went in and possessed the land did so on the ground of God’s faithfulness to His promise and oath, and on the ground of the intercession of Moses. To speak in John’s language, God gave them life.
Christ, as the true Moses, would remind us of how much we owe to His intercessory service. I believe it is due to His intercession if any of us have “life” to enter into the purpose of God, after all that has happened in the history of His people. Every bit of faithfulness has been the result of Christ’s intercession. “At that [p. 119] time Jehovah separated the tribe of Levi”. “That time” was when Moses prayed; and I have no doubt that whatever has been distinctively for God has been secured and maintained by the intercession of Christ. The overcomers “unto this day” have been thus maintained; He prayed that faith might not fail. But for the intercession of Christ everything would have broken down in the assembly, but through His prayer something has been maintained for God, and will be to the end. As we learn this it turns us more simply and wholly to Him; He gets a very great place with us; we do not trust in ourselves or our own faithfulness; we believe on Him.
Christ as Mediator has brought the light of God to us; as Intercessor He sustains His saints that they may enter into it, and answer to it. Such are the conditions of weakness on our side that we could not be self-supporting. Indeed the creature will never be self-supported; even in condition of glory in eternity all will be sustained in virtue of God being all in all, and Christ being Head, and the Spirit all-pervading.
One loves to regard every bit of faithfulness, and holy separation, and devotedness that has ever appeared in the assembly as the fruit of the intercession of Christ. Our Moses would bring home to us how dependent we have been, and are, on His intercession. It is good that we should linger on this. None of us would have ever got the victory over natural influences, or would have had the things of God preserved in their preciousness in our hearts, if Christ had not prayed for us. If “we more than conquer” it is “through him that has loved us”. When Paul asks, “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” he is thinking of the love in which He intercedes for us at the right hand of God. None of us could face the pressure: or resist the seductions, if we were not sustained by the intercession of Christ. The very fact that we have the Spirit is in answer to His prayer. “And I will beg the Father, and he will give you another Comforter, that he may be with you for ever, the Spirit of truth” (John 14: 16). Then the Spirit in us becomes an Intercessor (Romans 8: 26, 27), and we ourselves become marked by an intercessory spirit. It is not learned or self-sufficient people that get on spiritually, but persons who are marked by prayer and supplication.
It is deeply touching to know that such activities begin at the right hand of God. Every spiritual movement in our souls can be traced to the intercession of Christ, and then we become characterised by prayer. And even our prayers derive their efficacy from His service on high, for as the Angel-Priest of Revelation 8 He has “a golden censer; and much incense was given to him, that he might give efficacy to the prayers of all saints at the golden altar which was before the throne”. It is blessed to think of spiritual movement’s as beginning at the right hand of God, and being worked out through prayers which go back to be presented there as efficacious through the incense which Christ adds to them. All that pertains to the covenant is worked out in this way, and only thus will “the land” be entered upon and possessed.
Now God is to be feared, and loved, and served, and obeyed in the light of His sovereign love and choice, and the pleasure which He has in His people. “Jehovah took pleasure in thy fathers, to love them, and he chose their seed after them, even you, out of all the peoples, as it is this day” (verse 15). “He is thy praise, and he is thy God, who hath done for thee these great and terrible things, which thine eyes have seen” (verse 21). Now the heart must be circumcised, the will and lusts of the flesh cut off, so that the blessed character of God may be reproduced in His people.
Much is said of the greatness of God, but the tenderness of His grace is magnified. “Who executeth the judgment [p. 121] of the fatherless and the widow, and loveth the stranger, to give him food and clothing. And ye shall love the stranger; for ye have been strangers in the land of Egypt”. I think at least ten times in this book the widow, the fatherless, and the stranger are mentioned as subjects of care. It shows how God would have His people to enjoy all that His love and purpose have conferred on them in a spirit of grace and consideration that is like His own. There will always be among the people of God opportunities for the expression in a practical way of His own gracious character. And He delights, too, as the last verse of the chapter shows, to multiply His people. On the first day of the assembly’s history He added three thousand souls, and how many saints there are on the earth today it, would be hard indeed to tell!