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WALKING (1)

JT One has been thinking of the disposition the Lord would make of us all so that we may be mutually helpful, both brothers and sisters, in order that we may get the benefit of what there is available, and hence I thought of suggesting the idea of ‘walking’ in the Scriptures. It is said in Hosea that Jehovah taught Ephraim to walk and it is thought to link that on with the types, first seeing the bearing of the prophets on such a thought, and then the types in Exodus and Numbers. As I said, the passage in Hosea was suggested because it speaks of Jehovah teaching Ephraim to walk. That is how it should read in verse 3: “And I it was that taught Ephraim to walk, — He took them upon his arms”. The verses read suggest that this is a divine thought, that we should know how to walk. There are also other thoughts that enter into the passage which denote the divine and tender feelings shown to Israel as He took them up out of Egypt.

Then in Exodus, the passage, “And the children of Israel went arrayed out of the land of Egypt”, really means, according to the note, that they went out by fives. That would be a military formation. Later it is hoped that we shall look at Numbers where walking is taken up more definitely in relation to the tabernacle, but so far the scriptures read are to show what they were as coming out of Egypt, formed militarily, not simply to make war but in view of the tabernacle, and how they were to walk in relation to it in certain groups — four groups. It is thought that the allusion to Hosea would affect us as it is intended to, having been written by one who was a very sympathetic man, most tender in his feelings toward Israel, yet firm, saying the very strongest things which were needed. But what is especially in mind now, as we remarked, is as to our walking together, and whether we are to be divinely ^[p. 171] taught to walk as we are divinely taught in other things. It says in John 6:45, “And they shall be all taught of God” John 6:45, which alludes to ordinary instruction, but what is in mind now is walking.

LES It is very touching that following on in that chapter in Hosea it says, “My heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled together. I will not execute the fierceness of mine anger, I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God, and not man, — the Holy One in the midst of thee: and I will not come in anger. They shall walk after Jehovah” Hosea 11:8 - 10. Do you think there should be a correspondence in these days with that?

JT That is just what is in mind. The first such walking is spoken of as alone: “Enoch walked with God” Genesis 5:24 — not after Him but with Him. It is an individual matter. So did Noah walk with God; and God said to Abraham, “Walk before my face, and be perfect”, Genesis 17:1. So that it was early in the mind of God, and the question now is as to walking together. It is applicable to a local position, as it is to the general one, for Ephesians speaks of walking. God had ordained certain works that we should walk in them (Ephesians 2:10), which would be more general and universal, for there is a great deal of individual or independent action, I might say, in localities taking on certain ways and procedures. We should have in mind that assembly customs are to be universal. “But if any one think to be contentious, we have no such custom, nor the assemblies of God”, 1 Corinthians 11:16. So that in these procedures whatever they may cover we ought to bear in mind that there is universality and catholicity in all that is done in the assembly. The allusion to going out arrayed, meaning they went out five in a rank, is certainly very suggestive, indicating that we are not making any great show of strength or numbers, but yet in rank and order — ^[p. 172] military order.

RRT You have said that this matter was early in the mind of God. Is it significant then that the first mention of it in the Scriptures is in regard to God Himself? They heard the voice of God walking in the garden, showing that it is a very early thought in the mind of God, set forth in Himself.

JT Very good. They heard the voice of the Lord God walking. Very suggestive! So John in Revelation heard behind him a voice; what he saw was seven assemblies, seven golden lamps. The suggestion of the assembly is what he saw first, and then Christ in it, the Son of man in the midst of them; so that it is a good thought to bring forward. Adam and Eve heard the voice walking, speaking; the voice meant that Jehovah was there. And then we have what was alluded to before, that Enoch took it on and walked with God.

FT Would you say that experience with God underlies walking? Ephraim was taught. I was thinking of Mary sitting at the Lord’s feet and hearing His words. There seem to be underlying conditions there whereby she would be able to walk.

JT Well, no doubt what is really involved in her position is that she was moving in the principles already inaugurated. It comes after the mount of transfiguration in which the voice says, “This is my beloved Son: hear him”, Luke 9:35. She was moving on that line and was hearing Him. She had an ear, not on the mount but in her own house (or at least in her sister’s house) and she was sitting at His feet hearing what He was saying. The point would be, therefore, to take in whatever the principal word is for the moment, and this particular thing is what she observed, for she sat at His feet and heard what He was saying.

CJ The man in Acts 3 would be in line with this thought. He learned to walk with the brethren, entering with them into the temple.

JT He did indeed — “walking, and leaping”, Acts 3:8 Are there certain features which should mark us in relation to our walk? I was wondering whether Ephesians 4 would fit in with your idea. Paul writing says, “I, the prisoner in the Lord, exhort you therefore to walk worthy of the calling wherewith ye have been called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in love; using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace” Ephesians 4:1 - 3.

JT That is a very appropriate scripture, and very general, for it is an Ephesian scripture. It bears on what we were saying in the sense that we are to walk together. We have already touched on one walking, such as Enoch, and God Himself walking, but what is in mind as Numbers teaches is walking together; and that is what I believe Hosea would lead up to.

CCT Do we see this walking together in Elijah and Elisha? It says, “They two went over”, 2 Kings 2:8.

JT Just so; that helps.

FA Is the figure a physical one, making use of the physical fact of walking which depends on the power inside, as spiritual walking would depend on our experience with God?

JT Quite so.

EGMcA Does the first part of Hosea set forth the children of Israel taking on the licentious character of the nations around, and then this prophetic word comes in to bring them back to Exodus 13? They were not walking in ranks excepting according to the nations.

JT Just so. The nations influenced them very much, which is, of course, the case now; we are influenced by surrounding circumstances.

Ques Why does God especially refer to Ephraim ^[p. 174] here?

JT Because he had the leading place in Israel; therefore the anointed kingdom even after its division is very often referred to as Ephraim; but it is a solemn matter that Ephraim was the younger son of Joseph and God moved him up beyond Manasseh. It shows that while we are moved up sometimes, or move ourselves up in local positions, God may have to take us in hand to point out where we have broken down as He did with Ephraim. Despite this the birthright came down to him, and he had the first place. The birthright was Joseph’s. It had belonged to Reuben but he lost it because of his conduct and God gave it to Joseph, and so it came down to Ephraim.

EGMcA Does God use the word ‘Israel’ in verse 1 to indicate His sovereign choice and then the name Ephraim as guiding him in his walk to come up to this idea?

JT I think so. The second part of the verse would show that actual de facto circumstances are in mind. It is what was set up in the land, and Ephraim had the first place. God goes back to the beginning with Ephraim, when he was a child. It says, “And I it was that taught Ephraim to walk”, which would mean in his childhood. It really covers the whole position in childhood days showing how God is interested in us, which would apply to every local company and to the whole assembly too; as in childhood days.

FRA It is a question of teaching. Some of us have been under the teaching of men but it was God that taught Ephraim to walk.

JT Just so. I am sure we begin aright by calling attention to the childhood days, whether it be those of an individual christian or of a local assembly or of all the assemblies. That is, what pleasure God has in us in our childhood days when we are teachable, or should be teachable! Ephraim was greatly ^[p. 175] favoured because he was one who was pushed forward or elevated in the family, in Joseph’s family. But in Ephraim’s old days 1 Chronicles tells us that there was calamity in his house, which is a common thing now. The brethren have calamities in their houses and it is well to take note of that. Ephraim’s children went down to the inhabitants of the land — whatever land it may have been — to steal cattle and were slain. He felt the loss of his children, though it was their own conduct largely, and therefore it says there was calamity in his house. But God gave him other children. It is a question of how you look after your children if you want to save yourself from calamity. He had other children and some of the greatest in the testimony, for instance, Joshua; he was one of the posterity of Ephraim when calamity was in his house, showing how God may exceed our expectations even in the sorrow. There is a daughter born too that is mentioned; she built certain cities, showing what the sons and daughters may do after a calamity, when it is really accepted. Ephraim was comforted, his brethren comforted him, showing how after the thing is accepted God may turn it into greater blessing than we may expect. It says, “And his daughter ... built Beth-horon the nether, and the upper, and Uzzen-sheerah”, 1 Chronicles 7:24.

RRT Is this looking at the matter first in an elementary way?

JT That is what I thought, because Hosea is a very affectionate prophet and worked with other prophets. According to the history you can see he was working with other prophets, but he was affected by marital relations — Jehovah’s own marital relations and how they had been interfered with. These relations have a great place with God and the sorrows that have come about through them too in this country especially. Hosea deals with all this. He is tender about things and yet he is severe, as has ^[p. 176] been noted. But he speaks about our childhood days. There are some brethren here that are, perhaps, coming into the truth; their eyes have just been opened a little and God is looking at their walk. It is not a question of the truth but how the truth is affecting us, whether there is any walk that is suitable to it, and God is saying to us that He is ready to teach us how to walk; and we shall see that that teaching involves that we have to learn how to walk with others. “But youthful lusts flee, and pursue righteousness, faith, love, peace, with those that call upon the Lord out of a pure heart”, 2 Timothy 2:22. God is going to put us into good company in our childhood days and teach us how to walk, and that implies walking with others.

LES The difficulty with Ephraim was that he never learned to walk with Judah; but at the end “Ephraim will not envy Judah, and Judah will not trouble Ephraim”, Isaiah 11:13. And at the end of Hosea it says, “Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? intelligent, and he shall know them? For the ways of Jehovah are right, and the just shall walk in them” (Hosea 14:9).

JT Very good. One might cite further facts about Ephraim both in regard to Gideon and Jephthah. They were encountered by Ephraim in their services and the Ephraimites demanded why Gideon did not ask them before he did anything. That is to say, Ephraim represents an element in persons who are assertive and make demands, arising from rights and ability and the like, that we may have. Gideon very humbly said, What was I in comparison with you? and appeased them, but Jephthah quarrelled and they lost more than forty thousand men. They said, “We will burn thy house” Judges 12:1; they were violent. We do not want that.

RRT All this is elementary in a way, but would you say that there is a majesty and a greatness about ^[p. 177] it? That is, we learn that it is not in God’s mind that we should be impotent but that He would Himself take on the matter, and is prepared to teach us to walk. “And I it was that taught Ephraim to walk”. We get a thought as to the greatness of the matter, God Himself being prepared to take us on and teach us.

JT Quite so. The tenderness that we have alluded to enters into the matter here. “When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son”, Hosea 11:1. It leads us on to the Lord Jesus. And then the prophet, as is usually the way, turns to something else promptly, almost without notice. “As they called them, so they went from them” (verse 2). That would be an allusion to subsequent history. “They sacrificed unto the Baals, and burned incense to graven images”, showing how this prophet runs on to other things abruptly, and God deals with us abruptly too at times. And then it goes back again to what we are saying, the tenderness and the child condition: “And I it was that taught Ephraim to walk”. That comes in here as if the Spirit of God would put it in where there is severity, as it says further, “He took them upon his arms, — but they knew not that I healed them”. There was healing needed. “I drew them with bands of a man, with cords of love; and I was to them as they that take off the yoke on their jaws, and I gently caused them to eat” (verse 4). So that it is like a child taught to walk and taught to eat, and relieved and healed and set up in his infantile days in view of manhood.

HB Is there somewhat of an answer in the first epistle to the Thessalonians where Paul’s tenderness is seen in working with Silvanus and Timotheus in this great matter?

JT That is good. And then, too, he sent Timotheus to the Corinthians that they might learn in Timotheus his ways as they were in Christ during ^[p. 178] his absence. The Corinthians really had not learned properly how to walk and eat. They did not even know how to eat the Lord’s supper, and he sends Timotheus that they might know how to walk, might learn Paul’s ways as they were in Christ — not the ways of the world around, but as they were in Christ; and then how to eat, because if we do not learn to eat the Lord’s supper we shall never learn to eat at all.

EGMcA Does verse 3 indicate the affection of Hosea where it says, “He took them upon his arms”? Is that a statement of Hosea’s, all his own? And “I it was that taught Ephraim to walk”, and “but they knew not that I healed them” — do these statements indicate the tenderness of God?

JT It is like some passages we get in the Psalms. You sometimes wonder who it is who is speaking; there are other voices. Christianity involves that there are other voices; the voice that was heard in the garden was Jehovah’s, but it was Jehovah Elohim. That would work out into the Trinity. There are different voices: holy, heavenly, divine voices, and maybe the prophet’s voice. We love to hear them. You just wonder at times, in the Psalms especially, who is speaking, but when you really do learn you are enlarged and feel how rich we are that there are three Persons dealing with us who love us. The Lord says, “The Father himself has affection for you”, John 16:27 as if the Lord is saying, It is another love. The Son loves and the Spirit loves, because the Spirit is said to love us, but the Father loves us, and the more we get into these things the richer we feel ourselves. That is intended, because the prophets are intended to enrich us. What voices there are! So that you get, for instance, the seraphim in Isaiah 6: “In the year of the death of king Uzziah, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and his train filled the temple” Isaiah 6:1. There were seraphim ^[p. 179] and then Isaiah speaks and the Spirit tells him to do something, so that we are enriched in all these things.

LES It is remarkable how in Deuteronomy Moses recalls the voice of Jehovah moving among them and with them. In chapter 5:24 it says, “Behold, Jehovah our God has shewn us his glory and his greatness, and we have heard his voice from the midst of the fire: we have seen this day that God talks with man, and he lives”, Deuteronomy 5:24.

JT In another reference (Revelation 10) the Lord Jesus is seen coming down. He roars like a lion, with his right foot on the sea and his left on the land. Then there is an angel that speaks, and John tells us who the speakers are, but the Lord Jesus is directing. John is to eat the little book the angel has in his hand, and he says, When you eat it, the way it affects you will tell whether you are fit to prophesy again. It did affect him just as the angel said to him, and he says, “Thou must prophesy again”, Revelation 10:11.

LES Do you think that the matter of the little book has an important bearing on our walking together? You had something in your mind about the little book.

JT Well, I would not like to go into that now, but there is a little book, and the one who was writing about it says, speaking of the Lord Jesus, “And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which if they were written one by one, I suppose that not even the world itself would contain the books written”, John 21:25. So that this little book is important as having a bearing on something that we should know. Possibly we shall come into the teaching as we proceed, but now I am thinking of this childhood condition and how we all need to be taught how to walk and how to eat. What tenderness there is in God so that we ^[p. 180] should learn!

CCT I was wondering about the tenderness of God that has been mentioned. Would the intelligence of what you have in mind here enable me to walk with my brethren?

JT Just so. “Be ... tender hearted”, it says. The Bible is full of these things, especially Peter’s writings, because he treats of the governmental dealings of God. He deals with saints at a distance. They are at that distance because they are under the government of God, but christianity comes to them at a distance. Christianity sets them up where they are, teaching them how to walk, so that we are to “follow in his steps”, 1 Peter 2:21.

Ques Do you not have the teaching of this where John in his first epistle speaks of the old commandment and the new? The new commandment would be what was shining out in them and the old commandment the words they had received.

JT The old commandment was what the Lord was here, the word they had heard. The new commandment was the same thing, “which thing is true in him and in you”, 1 John 2:8. The new commandment implies what we are, how the walk of Jesus is seen in us now. Christianity really is in mind as compared or contrasted with our Lord and His walk here below. I believe what tests us is our local companionship, whether we can really walk with the brethren, get down in order to walk with the lowliest.

GMacP Sometimes we may get the idea of independency in our souls. In Acts 9 evidently Saul of Tarsus was taught how to walk with the brethren in Damascus; he was taken by the hand and led to Damascus.

JT Very good. Galatians enlarges on that, as to how they took account of what happened to him, especially a brother who was before him in the service — a great servant — Peter. Paul says, “I went up to Jerusalem to make acquaintance with Peter”, Galatians 1:18.

^[p. 181] as if he would learn from Peter. The time had come for that. Some one had led him into the city and he had learned from Ananias. The Lord had prepared Ananias so that he should teach Paul, telling him what he should say to Paul. These things show the system into which we are brought, and how God has prepared everything and foreseen everything so that we should be taught how to walk and eat and do all things.

Rem As the apostle Paul says to the Thessalonians: “We used to exhort each one of you, and comfort and testify, that ye should walk worthy of God, who calls you to his own kingdom and glory”, 1 Thessalonians 2:11,12.

JT Just so. And then another thing: the Thessalonians themselves were models. He tells them they became imitators of the assemblies of God which were in Judaea, meaning that we have to look far afield to get all the divine principles and not to build up anything in a merely local sense, or have any local customs at all. Christendom is built up on national customs, and local customs, whereas true christianity is a universal idea; so that the Thessalonians were imitators of the churches in Judaea, which were a long way off and in a different country too. The idea of nationalism is to be deprecated among the brethren.

TS Do you think we should get the gain of Hosea’s name? It means ‘deliverance’. This walking involves that.

JT Just so. Think of the tenderness with which he speaks of Jehovah’s marital relations with Israel in chapter 1. “The word of Jehovah that came unto Hosea, the son of Beeri, in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah, kings of Judah, and in the days of Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel. The beginning of the word of Jehovah through Hosea. And Jehovah said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms, and children of whoredoms; for the land is entirely given up to whoredom, away from Jehovah”, Hosea 1:1,2.

^[p. 182] He is speaking about the treatment that He has received from Israel in this sense, because He was really a Husband to her. Then He says in chapter 2:14, “Therefore behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak to her heart. And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of Achor for a door of hope; and she shall sing there, as in the days of her youth and as in the day when she came up out of the land of Egypt. And it shall be in that day, saith Jehovah, that thou shalt call me, My husband”, Hosea 2:14 - 16. That is, she would learn to call God her Husband; she would know God and learn to know Him as Head and to be subject; “and shalt call me no more, Baali; for I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their name. And I will make a covenant for them in that day with the beasts of the field, and with the fowl of the heavens, and the creeping things of the ground; and I will break bow and sword and battle out of the land; and I will make them to lie down safely. And I will betroth thee unto me for ever; and I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in mercies; and I will betroth thee unto me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know Jehovah. And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith Jehovah, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth; and the earth shall hear the corn, and the new wine, and the oil; and they shall hear Jizreel”, Hosea 2:16 - 22. Pardon me for referring to all this, but it is only to bring out this matter of teaching. Jizreel means ‘God soweth’. Sowing is a primary thought. He sows her to Him, as it says, “For if we are become identified with him in the likeness of his death, so also we shall be of his resurrection”, Romans 6:5 ^[p. 183] We are planted and sown in that sense. “And I will sow her unto me in the land; and I will have mercy upon Lo-ruhamah; and I will say to Lo-ammi, Thou art my people; and they shall say, My God”, Hosea 2:23. So that God teaches us in this as He takes Israel up afresh in the future; and as He takes us up now He would teach us according to primary principles, and especially that we should be linked up in a marital way with the Lord, as Paul says, “I have espoused you unto one man”, 2 Corinthians 11:2.

LES I was wondering if we do not get an example of this in John 4, in the woman’s having had five husbands and living with one who was not her husband, and then coming into touch with Christ? Was He not her Husband, and had she not to come to a moral judgment about her history? The valley of Achor became a door of hope to her and she was morally adjusted and able to walk.

JT She left her waterpot. She “went away into the city, and says to the men ...”, John 4:28 showing that she was delivered, because the principle in this book is deliverance, as was remarked. She had had five husbands and the one she had then was not her husband. She needed deliverance from them and she got it because she got the Lord. “Come, see a man”, she says. I think that helps too, because she says to the Lord, “Sir, I see that thou art a prophet”, John 4:19. It is when you begin to see and perceive things that you show you are growing; you are not writing to others all the time as to what to do. “The Lord will give thee understanding in all things”, 2 Timothy 2:7. We learn from the Lord. So the Lord says to her, “Woman”. It is the first time He calls her “Woman”, as if she had attained womanhood in being delivered. That is the teaching of Hosea. She was brought into the wilderness and taught to sing there as in the days of ^[p. 184] her youth.

LES She is brought to recognise Him as her Husband and no longer only as Lord. “Come, see a man”.

JT “I have espoused you unto one man”, 2 Corinthians 11:2.

RRT She had never taken one step properly in a walk with God until she left her waterpot after her conversation with the Lord and went into the city. These were the first steps she had ever taken rightly; she had learned how to walk.

JT She learned something too about the value of the body. It had been devoted wrongly, not used rightly. She left her waterpot, which implies her own vessel, meaning she would carry the water herself; but that could only be as she was delivered from impurity. How could she be espoused to one man, a chaste virgin to Christ, on those lines?

LES So Ephraim says in the last chapter of Hosea, “What have I to do any more with idols?”, Hosea 14:8.

JT One thought to connect it with this condition in the last chapter, but the woman of Samaria certainly helps us because it is a question of womanhood in this book. She is delivered from all uncleanness. She, so to speak, calls Him, ‘My husband’.

TS Do you include the marital thought in the Lord’s calling her, “Woman”?

JT I think so. The Lord is leading her up to the level that was in His mind about her. She has come to that level really because she says, “I see that thou art a prophet”. And He says, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when ye shall neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem worship the Father ... . But the hour is coming and now is, when the true worshippers ...”, John 4:21,23 because she had talked about worship and He answered her too. Then He speaks about the true worshippers.

TS In connection with Adam’s saying, ‘Woman’, it immediately follows: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife”, Genesis 2:^[p. 185] 24.

Is that the full thought?

JT That is the idea exactly. Adam named her: “This shall be called Woman, because this was taken out of a man”, Genesis 2:23. That name is to go on down. That is the word the Lord uses to the woman of Samaria to deliver her from five or six husbands. Such a travesty of marriage, to say the least about it! But now she is to have one Husband! “Come, see a man who told me all things I had ever done: is not he the Christ?”, John 4:29. So that she sets something before the men and they come to hear too.

CCT In that statement she really commences in service.

JT Just so. She is set up in service.

GMacP Does it suggest a subjective state in us capable of taking on divine teaching and being maintained in it?

JT I would say that; we begin to proceed. When the truth is set out people talk about this and that and the other thing; they talk about their clergyman, saying what a fine man he is, forgetting that he does not know the Lord, perhaps. They forget that, and many other things that God abhors.

EGMcA She really began to do what the apostle says in 1 Corinthians 6:20, “Glorify now then God in your body” 1 Corinthians 6:20. That is part of the walk.

JT just so. When she left the waterpot she left herself in that sense. She was a new woman, a new person.

FRA Do we get a touch in Nicodemus? He came to Jesus by night in John 3, but in chapter 19 it says, “Who at first came to Jesus by night”, John 19:39. Now he was not coming by night; he came with Joseph of Arimathaea.

JT He came with one hundred pounds of spices ^[p. 186] too.

TS Is the reason for so much confusion in christendom the lack of what is marital being understood?

JT Christendom is a travesty as regards God. The marriage relation must be there, and to admit any other is wrong. She says, “Come, see a man” John 4:29, and the apostle says, “I have espoused you unto one man” 2 Corinthians 11:2, and John the baptist says, “He that has the bride is the bridegroom”, John 3:29.

LES So that it says, “Neither is woman without man, nor man without woman, in the Lord”, 1 Corinthians 11:11. If you have ‘Ish’ you must have ‘Ishshah’.

RRT In speaking about the proper use of the body as illustrated in this woman, walking really would be a fundamental thought, just in line with that; for after all in a physical way walking is a co-ordinated action of the powers that are resident in the child; and so in a spiritual way could we think of it similarly? God would teach us to bring into proper co-ordinated use all the spiritual powers which we have and then we should go on to greater things in the use of the body.

JT Quite so. We know how parents love to look at little ones as they begin to toddle, and presently they begin to use their members better and learn how to keep balance. It must be pleasurable to God to see us use our members as we get light, and Romans teaches us how to use them.

GMacP To “walk in newness of life”, Romans 6:4.

JT Just so.

EGMcA You remarked in the beginning of the meeting that we should not localise these truths. Would not the scripture that says, “Shall two walk together except they be agreed?” Amos 3:3 be looked at in a universal way?

JT That is a word that one had specially in mind in view of these meetings. How can we walk together unless we are agreed? A wise man says ^[p. 187] that.

JMcK In view of what you have been saying, would it not be a concern with us that in our local assemblies we should be walking in the order in which the assemblies in other parts of the world are walking?

JT “Thus I ordain in all the assemblies”, 1 Corinthians 7:17. I think what has been said as to 1 and 2 Corinthians is helpful and far-reaching too. Paul would teach the Corinthian assembly to walk, and then he says, for that reason I sent Timotheus. He also taught them to eat. He says, as it were, You are eating, but it is not the Lord’s supper. You are eating like partisans.

JMcK Would the letter the apostle wrote to the Colossians, in which he said that after it had been read in Colosse it should be read in Laodicea and that the letter to Laodicea should be read at Colosse, have that principle in mind?

JT That is right. That would mean that both assemblies were taught the same thing and yet Paul did not make them do with one letter, he wrote two letters.

FRA It says in Revelation, “He that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the assemblies” — all seven of them.

JT Quite so.

GMacP What God may be working out amongst us, He will work out universally in the world to come. What He wrought in Ephraim will be wrought out in Israel.

JT The last chapter shows how they come to it. “O Israel, return unto Jehovah thy God; for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words, and turn to Jehovah; say unto him, Forgive all iniquity, and receive us graciously; so will we render the calves of our lips”, Hosea 14:1,2 meaning there would be sacrifice in it. “Assyria shall not save us”, Hosea 14:3. That is a great matter for guidance negatively; do not turn ^[p. 188] to Assyria. The king of Assyria was a pretentious king. “We will not ride upon horses”, we will not be pretentious, using horse-strength; “Neither will we say any more to the work of our hands, Thou art our God; because in thee the fatherless findeth mercy”, Hosea 14:3. It shows what God is; His grace and favour and kindness to the fatherless. “I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely; for mine anger is turned away from him”, Hosea 14:4. Notice the singular there. That would be Israel, I suppose, as a whole nation. “I will be as the dew unto Israel: he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His shoots shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive-tree, and his smell as Lebanon. They shall return and sit under his shadow; they shall revive as corn, and blossom as the vine: the renown thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon. Ephraim shall say, What have I to do any more with idols? (I answer him, and I will observe him.) I am like a green fir-tree. — From me is thy fruit found. Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? intelligent, and he shall know them? For the ways of Jehovah are right, and the just shall walk in them; but the transgressors shall fall therein”, Hosea 14:1 - 9.

Rem It is good to see that God ever has recovery in view.

JT How full these thoughts are, and how tender! What one had in mind was the tenderness with which God deals with young persons.

CCT Would you say it brings in the thought of a restful position? It says, “They shall return and sit under his shadow”.

JT Just so. Canticles would fit into Hosea, where the bride learns to sing in the wilderness. “In his shadow have I rapture and sit down; and his fruit is sweet to my taste”, Song of Songs 2:3.

EGMcA You get the eager tenderness of God in verse 8: “Ephraim shall say” Hosea 14:8, and then it says,

“I answer him”. That is, God is in it. Then Ephraim says, “I am like a green fir-tree”, and God says, “From me is thy fruit found”. Those are the other voices of which you were speaking.

JT It has to be read carefully there to see who the speakers are.

EGMcA What should impress every one of us is that no matter how obstinate or rebellious we may be, God’s love does not turn, and even if the brethren have to take up our case, it is the love of God that is behind it to bring us back into the knowledge of Himself as children.

JT Just so.

LES Is the urgency of the matter seen in the prophet Jeremiah where the word as to the early walk of Israel is, “Cry in the ears of Jerusalem” Jeremiah 2:2, and do we see the result of God’s teaching when she went out after Him into the wilderness? Do you think God delights to record this?

JT I think Matthew guides us in that because of the idea of the place children and youth have; children in the temple were saying, “Hosanna to the Son of David” Matthew 21:15, and the Pharisees reproved them, but the Lord says, “Have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?”, Matthew 21:16. That is the idea, and Matthew has it particularly in mind. The Lord is seen in the second chapter of Matthew as a little Child. He is called a little Child nine times and there is the phrase, “the little child and his mother”, Matthew 2:13. Also we have, “Out of Egypt have I called my son”, Matthew 2:15. And when the disciples are together they say, “Who then is greatest in the kingdom ... ?”, Matthew 18:1. Think of that in the light of the truth of Matthew and how the babe condition is stressed! The Lord took a little child and set it in the midst of them and said to them: “Unless ye are converted and become as little children, ye will not at all enter into the kingdom of the heavens”, Matthew 18:3.

^[p. 190] So that we are shut out if we are depending on our own greatness; the Lord says the little child is the idea. It is “this little child” Matthew 18:4 — the one He makes the selection of.

RRT It is beautiful to see what you are speaking about in the latter part of the book because earlier God had to say that Ephraim was oppressed and corrupted in judgment because in self-will he walked after the commandment of men. In God’s dealings with us, although there may be that self-will and walking after the commandment of men, it is all, as we meet it in exercise before God, to eventuate in what we have in the end of the book.

JT That is the way the truth stands, and one would love to know the book better; and the brethren, too, should look into it especially from a marital point of view and the feelings of God about His rights over us.

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