THE LEADERSHIP OF THE SPIRIT
J.A.Gardiner
Numbers 21: 14-22; 27: 1-5, 18-21; 36: 10-12; Deuteronomy 34: 1-6;
I am conscious, beloved brethren, of the need of help in reading these scriptures and in seeking to say something about the leadership of the Spirit. It is a very blessed matter when we come to the fact that the Spirit of God is to lead us in the way in which we go. The epistle to the Romans tells us that persons who are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God (Rom 8: 14), and then the Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God (v 16). He leads us and He maintains us in the conscious knowledge of our relationship with God. Well through the book of Numbers, in chapter 21, they come to the well, in type to the Spirit. A lot of wilderness experience has gone past and they have arrived at this point. Deliverance has been experienced and the brazen serpent, and now they are journeying, they are moving. The book of the wars of the Lord comes to light here in verse 14, certain things are said in it. All that is said relates in a way to the trend and movement of the Spirit towards the inheritance. His main mission, the main object of the Spirit's mission here is to glorify Christ - blessed and wonderful service. He is not here mainly to help us to judge ourselves or to help us to overcome the flesh in ourselves: that is all part of His service, but His main object is to glorify Christ and to take of the things that are His and show them to us. So we need to follow His leadership through to this moral position where the state is settled and His place in our hearts is settled and we are settled and contented in ourselves to follow His wonderful leading as He leads us on towards the heavenly inheritance.
So we come in this chapter in type to the recognition of the Spirit of God, "Rise up, well! sing unto it". We would do well to inquire of ourselves if it is the case that we have moved this far to the well, the well that springs up. Are we conscious of the springing up, beloved, in ourselves of the Spirit of God? "Rise up, well! sing unto it", or 'respond unto it', a blessed state of soul to be arrived at morally. Through the teaching of the glad tidings the Spirit of God has His way with us, we are conscious that there is no condemnation. We are going on to the position which is referred to by Paul as 'in Christ Jesus'. That is something further perhaps than eternal life; it is the life of Christ where He is now in the heavenly situation, where our blessings are in the heavenlies. This well has been dug, the princes have digged the well. This book is a book of princes, marvellous personalities, men of God, personality that is of God, personality that was formed by the Spirit of God, men who have gone before us in the marvel of the provision of the love of Christ and have seen to it that the well has been digged and the nobles of the people have hollowed it out at the word of the lawgiver. The Lord's authority has been recognised and these princes, these wonderful men who have moved in such a way as having been affected by the precious sufferings of Christ, and the Spirit of God given on the basis of the sufferings of Christ, these men have actively dug the well. They have made way for the Spirit of God, they have removed all the earth and all the obstacles.
If you want to see these princes and their movement you go to chapter 7 of this book. There is a marvellous expression of the function of the body of Christ in maturity in the twelve princes of Israel; persons who move responsibly in appreciation of what is set out in the altar. The dedication gift of the altar is a marvellous conception in fulness in answering to the love that was made known there. These twelve princes were coming from the various points of the camps in the twelve days and the whole situation is held up so that love can give expression in this wonderful way. They are coming with the same thing, each one coming on a different day and no divergence with them, there is perfect unity. You can say of these princes that they were joined in soul, thinking one thing, thin king the same thing. Their thought was to answer in fulness to the love of Christ. If you want to see full-grown men according to the measure of the stature of the Christ, they are before us in Numbers 7. God delights in that, He loves that. These men arrived at that substance, they arrived at the marvellous acquisition in their souls of appreciation of the humanity of Christ because they dug the well, because the Spirit of God brought that substance into their souls. That is very blessed. The standard of things there is all set out before us in the book before we start any wilderness journeys. Numbers 7 is a marvellous chapter. Numbers 5 is the trial of jealousy, as the brethren well know, and the Lord has the right to set that trial on. In one sense that trial continues all the way through, as to whether the wife is faithful or not. We well know from the teaching that the faithful wife conceives the Nazarite, she brings forth that quality amongst the brethren that makes a special vow of committal to the holy things of God. So the Nazarite is the basis for the sustenance of the blessing of the priest upon the nation; "Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee", Num 6: 24. Jehovah commits His blessing safely, His word safely, He commits His thoughts safely to that kind of situation where persons are committed to Him, who are moving on the principle of a vow of the Nazarite. They are not relating themselves exactly to what is natural, whether from the skin to the seed-stone of the grape, if it is to interfere with what is spiritual and what is for the heart of God in the continuance and maintenance of His service here. That does not mean to say that they are unnatural, it does not mean to say that they are hyper-spiritual; there is nothing like that in Christianity. Christianity is simple and straightforward; Christianity, then, is Christ. And these men in Numbers 7 are Christ, two cups of fine flour, dishes of gold - you read it - and Moses goes in at the close of that chapter, as the brethren well know, and he goes in to speak to God and God is so delighted with it that He speaks to Moses. He anticipates Moses. Oh, beloved, how blessed it is if that is the situation in our local meetings, we find that God comes in and He gives expression to His delight in what is proceeding. In one sense that is the ultimate, the aim and object of the assembly that the local meeting is here to sustain what ministers to the heart of God Himself.
Well, these princes digged the well, the nobles of the people hollowed it out at the word of the lawgiver, with their staves. I would like to encourage every one of us to continue on that line to see that the well is maintained in a free flow, that you use your staff to maintain the flow of the Spirit. Do you know where you get your staff? You begin in Egypt, you get your staff in Egypt; you begin in your experience with God in the glad tidings in deliverance out of Egypt. You come out with your loins girded, your staff in your hand and your sandals on your feet, you come out in haste. If there is anybody here not out of Egypt, not out of the world, beloved, heed the word of God and make haste to get clear of it. It is not a place for a Christian, it is a place that is under the judgment of God. There is not a house, not one house in Egypt, not one but the firstborn was slain in it. He made sure that the Egyptians knew about the judgment of God, made sure that the Israelites knew about it. That realm then is characterised by death. The leadership of Pharaoh is the leadership of my own mind in independency of God. There is great provision in the gift of the Spirit of God: "Well which princes digged, which the nobles of the people hollowed out at the word of the lawgiver". That has been made available to us, beloved. You think of princely men who digged the well. The well was all clogged up, the early fathers clogged up the well, shutting out the Spirit. So what grew out of that was a whole clerical system of things. Somebody would come between you and your relations with God; your link with God in Christianity, beloved, is the Spirit. What labours then went into the clearing of the well. It is not sufficient that these books should be on our bookshelves, not sufficient. If we have desire after Christ, if we have love for Christ, we will start looking into these things and see how the well has been cleared, how in the line of church history the recovery has gone right back to what is apostolic, based on what is written in the holy word of God. Marvellous grace, wonderful mercy, that it has been so and that we have been preserved in relation to it. So I would say to everybody here, especially young persons, you should get J.N.D's Synopsis if you have not got it; you should get it and read it and see how the scriptures are set out, find out the context of the settings in the books, what they mean and how one book stands related to another. This is your inheritance, beloved. God wants you to be wealthy. Heaven is not going to be full of paupers; it is going to be full of persons of wealth who are quickened together with Him; they are able to live with Christ in heaven equal to the fulness of spiritual exchange that belongs to the inheritance. You and I need to see if our inheritance, if our field is in any sense as productive as Boaz' field was. You can go away, persons go away and they can blame the brethren and they can do all sorts of things. The root of poverty of soul is always in ourselves. There was a field that prospered; God visited it and prospered it and that inheritance prospered whilst they that went away to Moab lost everything. I think we should be greatly encouraged to make way in ourselves for the Spirit of God and find out for ourselves what is meant when persons speak of the great ministries of the revival. Find out if these ministries are based on Scripture. You do not have to take anybody's word for it, you know; there is no brainwashing or anything like that going on. You get the books and read them. Read your Bible and find out if that confirms your conviction. Does that word carry weight with you? Be like the Bereans, search the scriptures daily and find out if it is so. You are not looking for error, you are not on that line; you want to say, I wonder if I can be confirmed in this, does this give confirmation as to what is working in me, what is being produced in me through the sovereign activities of the Spirit in new birth. Does this feed me? Is this how I see it? Am I carried in my convictions by it? You have all these wonderful ministries of persons who have been in the inheritance and have searched it out, who have made way for the Spirit of God and have known what the leadership of the Spirit is. They have been under the command of the Lawgiver, they have moved at the word of the Lawgiver. So I would say, beloved, you are perfectly safe to follow the teaching of the truth as it has come down to us through the great ministries of the revival. And you find, as that is so, you begin to make progress in your soul. The main thing is the Scriptures; the standard of the truth is in the holy writings, and the standard of the truth here is in the Spirit and is equal to the standard of the truth of Christ in glory. These are marvellous things, beloved.
So we are in a position of safety and salvation as we move on that line. They begin to make progress and go on here to the top of Pisgah, which looks over the surface of the waste. Really we are in the area of that eighth chapter of Romans, looking back at things from the Spirit's point of view. You can look back at the rebellion, you can look at a time in your own soul maybe when you said, Yes, it is a good land, it is a fine land but we are not able to go up and possess it. You may look back at a time in your soul when you may have despised the pleasant land, look back at a time when you tried to manipulate the manna and make it better, grind it in hand mills and all that sort of thing, when you were not too appreciative of the blessed, lowly Saviour who was here and graced the wilderness. Beloved, when you come to the Spirit of God it all changes. You get God's point of view, you see the beauty of Christ as every morning that manna fell around the camp, every day the dew fell and then the manna fell. That was your food for the day, the lowly, humble Jesus who graced every situation, who gave effect to every situation for the glory of God.
That is the only food you have in the wilderness. There is nothing here for your soul, nothing else to feed what new birth began, nothing at all. You will find if you are appropriating anything on that line it is going to result in moral death. The Spirit of God is leading the sons of God towards the inheritance; so you are independent of the world, you are finding other features coming up now but you are not in any sense having any affinity with them. Here was Sihon the king of the Amorites, but you are an overcomer. It is a marvellous thing to be an overcomer. I marvel at some persons in business or in life, at work they are on top of the job all the time. No matter what problem comes up, whatever it is, they have this relaxed attitude that they can just go through it, nothing seems to bother them and they go right through and solve the problems and they get the answer. The Spirit of God would make us like that make us overcomers. A marvellous position is being established at the close of the book of Numbers. You are going on the king's road, the highway is clear. There are no side roads, there are no crooked paths. You do not need Sihon's wells, you do not need his vineyards, your supplies come from the Spirit of God from heaven. Oh, beloved, how wonderful that is, to be superior to what is in the world and prove the power and the virtue of the name of Christ. You know what salvation is. To know that you have confessed with your mouth, and believed in your heart and you are saved. You are in the power and gain of the kingdom, you know the King's road, the royal road that leads through to glory, and the Spirit of God is leading on that road.
So you are concerned about your inheritance. That is what marks these daughters of Zelophehad. They do not want to be done out of anything. These wonderful ministries, beloved, have opened up the inheritance to us, they have broken things down and made it so we can feed upon it, and understand it. Always prove them by the Scriptures. Here are these women, five of them, "And they stood before Moses, and before Eleazar the priest, and before the princes and the whole assembly, at the entrance of the tent of meeting". It is a very public matter for these five sisters. In type they have a judgment of church history. You might say of them they know where they are and why they are there. They are convicted and convinced in their soul that they are standing on true assembly ground, they are among the persons who are numbered for heaven - that is the second numbering in the book. The first numbering, as the brethren know, is numbering for war in the wilderness for conflict, the second numbering here in Numbers is that you are numbered for heaven. Are you going over? The Jordan is deliverance in that sense; it is liberation. You die with Christ morally and you are liberated and you can go into the fulness of the inheritance of God and that is before these women. They have a judgment of the whole natural line; their father died in his own sin, he was not in the band of Korah, and they say, "Give unto us a possession among the brethren of our father". That is very beautiful, a marvellous desire. Have you that desire in your heart, beloved? Are you after the inheritance? Your inheritance is in the love of God and you want to dwell in His love and to enjoy the blessedness and the wonder of the divine dwelling. God says, I really appreciate that.
Now somebody else appears here. It is not the well now, but it is Joshua. God provides spiritual leadership militarily in the Spirit. That links on with this feature in our own souls. Moses is going, that line is going; Joshua replaces Moses. It is the subjective line of things in the brethren. You are of Him, the Spirit of Christ is of Him. So it says here that Moses is to commit himself to Joshua and set him before Eleazar the priest. The whole situation here now, beloved, as the Spirit of God has His way with us is that the mind of the Lord can come into our souls immediately. There is a marvellous reference here to Eleazar the priest, who shall inquire for him by the judgment of the Urim before Jehovah, touching what is spiritual and what is capable of infinite expansion. Joshua then is provided as the divine answer to the work of God that is set out in these five sisters, a very wonderful provision. God says, That is the kind of person that I am going to dwell with. So leadership now is in Joshua; it is spiritual and it is in power. In another scripture He says to strengthen Joshua and encourage him (Deut 3: 28). We need to do that, beloved, in ourselves, strengthen that kind of leadership and encourage it and make way for it with one another.
Now do not feel that this is repulsive, do not feel that this is going to put you in bondage, do not feel that you are going to be afflicted by some other man or something like that; this is leadership, beloved, that brings in liberty, the liberty of the sons of God. It brings us into the enjoyment of our inheritance, brings us into the conscious enjoyment of our links with Christ risen and glorified. That is Joshua; in the type he is capable of overthrowing every adverse element that would seek to hinder you from the enjoyment of God's love and the enjoyment of your portion with the brethren. So he needs to be made way for. As long as he keeps within the limits, you might say, of Moses' commission he is going to have good success in all his ways. It is fine then to be successful, it is fine to know that you are moving in an expansive way into the greatness of divine love, you are conscious that you are one of the sons of God. There is no greater privilege, beloved, afforded to any person, any human being you might say, than to be conscious that he is one of the sons of God whom God knew before the foundation of the world. This is the practical working out of the truth, so that we come into the blessedness of sonship. The Spirit's leadership is greatly to be recognised. That he is set before Eleazar the priest is very fine. "At his word" that is at the priest's word, "shall they go out, and at his word they shall come in, he, and all the children of Israel with him, even the whole assembly". The position here is such that the headship of Christ is known. Oh, how blessed that is! We are in that area. We have been in the area in Numbers 21 of eternal life where the poets are, where there is buoyancy of soul and buoyancy of spirit, where you say, Come, see a Man who has told me all things I have ever done. There is an evidence in principle of the leadership of the Spirit of God. How marvellous that is in testimony, Come, see a Man, she says. And here it is at the word of the priest, Eleazar, "they shall go out and at his word they shall come in". The whole situation now is spiritual, it is increasing in spirituality. A great proof now that that which is born of the Spirit is spirit and that which is born of the flesh has receded and if it is brought back there will be a hindrance of the Spirit. But here the priest's word is to be recognised! That is the word of Christ, in a position where you are receptive to the word of the Lord. Oh how blessed that is! He that keeps My word abides in Me - that is a very beautiful word of Christ's in John 15 - He that keeps My word abides in Me and I in him. I remember one saying, Keep the Lord's word to abide in Him, for to keep the Lord's word preserves us from lawlessness and His word abiding in us causes us to be intelligent. And intelligence, beloved, in Christianity relates to the eyes of our hearts. It is not a mental thing. God is not producing Philistines, He is producing men like Christ, the Lord can say they are His brethren, they are of His order, they are His like. That is what the Spirit of God is labouring at. It is the assembly - it is not just any meeting, nothing like that exactly, it is the assembly of God. A divine conception that has its beginning on the other side of death. When the Lord came out of death the assembly came out with Him. When Christ came out of death, beloved, you came out of death with Him. Therefore the need to be maintained in the consciousness of the Spirit's work and of the Spirit's service. If it is not true of us it is possible that things may degenerate to the level of whatever is current in Christendom. Laodicea came out of Philadelphia because of apathy as to the truth. I am not saying that is the current situation at all - the great position in the revival is to keep His word; "thou ...hast kept my word" and "thou hast kept the word of my patience", Rev 3: 8,10. And that is kept in our affections. The truth is carried forward and carried through in the hearts and the affections of the brethren. It is not carried through exactly in your head because you are then likely to lose it, but if you carry it through in intelligent affection things are maintained. And when that is so, and it will be so, the bride is in evidence. We are waiting for that call, the Spirit and the bride saying, Come, (Rev 22: 17).
So at the close of the book there are these five women and they are there in the mutuality of love. Their names are not in the same order, as you well know, as in Numbers 27, but there is the evidence there of the love of the Spirit and their inheritance is vouchsafed to them. They were exercised and concerned and they followed their exercise and the Lord honoured their exercise. Beloved brethren, He will honour that kind of exercise in any and every soul. If you are concerned about your inheritance and you carry the matter before the Lord He will provide all that is needed in order that you might come into the gain of it, and that it may remain. It says, "their inheritance remained in the tribe of the family of their father". That is very wonderful. There is division, half a tribe is living in the natural things, half the tribe of Manasseh are on the wilderness side of the Jordan. They are finding their life there in business and nature, and there is nothing wrong with that as long as it is controlled. We thank God that He provided three cities of refuge on that side because it is there they are mostly needed but the cities of refuge in the land are a fine thing, Joshua hallows them. When you come to that I think you really come to the divine estimation of the wonder of the provision of the glad tidings. The gospel and the working of the truth, as he says in Ephesians "the word of the truth, the glad tidings of your salvation" is maintained in sanctity in the heart of the believer, and so you are safe. Well, that is very blessed here, their inheritance remained in the tribe of the family of their father. So things continue on that line.
I just want to touch on Moses because he had some wonderful insight into the fulness of the land. This is the other side of mount Pisgah. There is the side that looks over the surface of the waste, where you can look back from the Spirit's viewpoint and see that waste, that howling wilderness, and marvel at the grace of God and the mercy of God that took you through it. You say, If it had not been for God I would have been lost in that wilderness - it speaks of all those that perished in the wilderness. Why then was I not one of them? Because of the mercy of God and because of the grace of God, because on the responsible side in some measure I must have been subject to the leading of the Spirit. So you come now to this other view and you see into the whole of the inheritance. Would you like God to show you the land? None of us know much we know nothing perhaps as we ought to know it, but if we are concerned to have a view of what the brethren speak of as the inheritance, let us ask God to show it to us. He delights to show the inheritance, to show you the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. May be you have never seen it in the local brethren in New York, may be you have been looking at other things, but there it is in all its beauty and glory shining out. Oh, beloved, do not miss it! Ask God to show you it, the riches of the glory of His inheritance in this room at this moment. Think of the wealth that there is here present of the knowledge of God, of the knowledge of God in grace, of the knowledge of God in love. God wants our hearts to be committed to that. He has no love or desire for persons who are apathetic. The Lord says to Laodicea, Thou art neither cold nor hot, I wish you were one of them. He wants us to be committed to what He has set up and established in the blessedness and glory of His love in a local place and to seek for the furtherance and the extension and the addition of His work in that place.
Beloved, let us then ask God to give us a view of His inheritance. Think of what Moses saw. He sees the land in all its fulness and glory. And we might say, to carry the type over into Ephesians, he sees the Christ dwelling in their hearts through faith, he sees the breadth and length and depth and height, and the glory and grandeur of divine purpose accomplished through the wonderful working of the Son of God. Think of the Christ of Ephesians, Solomon setting that out in type, Solomon setting out the Son of God. Think of the grandeur of things under Solomon in the house, paling in a sense into insignificance as you see the wonder and grandeur of what God has secured in the assembly. There is to be glory to God in the assembly unto all generations of the age of ages. How marvellous that is. So the scripture in Ephesians, in this exalted part of the book, is to be filled with the Spirit; "speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and chanting with your heart to the Lord". That is the service of God going on, relationships with the Spirit wonderfully known and enjoyed, spiritual things being communicated by spiritual means - experience, "psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and chanting with your heart to the Lord; giving thanks at all times for all things to him who is God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ". That is a marvellous exhortation at the close, "submitting yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ". I think that is in the holy recognition of the work of God amongst the brethren. There is no trouble, there is no diversity, you know how to submit yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ, in the appreciation of what He has wrought amongst the brethren. It is the only reference that Paul makes to being filled with the Spirit. Luke has many in the Acts. There is something very distinctive about this exhortation to be filled with the Spirit, speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. What diversity, what wealth, what spiritual communication and interchange exists amongst the brethren as the service of God is carried on throughout the whole of the dispensation at this level and in this way. I believe in that sense we begin to be equal to what is set out in the princes in Numbers 7. The dedication gift of the altar then continues right through the dispensation. The sufferings of Christ, the work of Christ and the marvellous knowledge of God made known in the death of Christ is maintained in our hearts in freshness and in power and in vitality and the truth is maintained and carried through in the power of the Spirit.
I think that is the idea of what is bridal, freshness and vitality and youthfulness all the way. Oftentimes, you know, you feel a bit bored, you may feel a bit fed up, you think the meetings are getting heavy and you cannot be bothered. Then you should start looking to yourself. See if you can find your way along that line that has been suggested. The Spirit of God is so anxious, so concerned, to glorify Christ and to lead us to Him; if we can only come into the current and flow of His movements He will readily and happily take us on. So we need then to learn how to sow to the Spirit and from the Spirit reap life eternal. These are great possibilities, beloved, available to us. May the Lord encourage our hearts and give us to understand the more, and further than that give us to experience the more and find that the well springs up unrestrictedly in our souls and thus we will grow and increase in our appreciation of the wonderful manhood of our Lord Jesus Christ. May it be so for His Name's sake.
BROOKLYN NY
25 October 1986