Books by T. Austin-Sparks

[Shammu]

Chapter 2 - The New Cruse

Reading: 2 Kings 2:19-22; Acts 1, 2; Mark 9:50.

When the above passages are read together it will be seen that they are bound by a common tie; namely, salt, and what it signifies. Throughout the Scriptures salt stands for recovery, preservation, and permanence.

In the first passage mentioned, we have the waters of Jericho lacking in some constituent, which resulted in the miscarriage of the trees; the fruit falling ere it ripened. Nothing reached its intended end; nothing fulfilled its promise. All fell short of its design. Thus the labour proved in vain, and all the toil ended in heart-breaking disappointment. There was the field, there were the trees, there was water, there were labourers, there was much energy, there were good motives. Withal nothing got fully and finally through; it all stopped short somewhere. There was no maturity, satisfaction, and full justification of all the expenditure and effort. Some essential property was absent, and this absence made all else futile as to the ultimate issue. How different from the tree planted by the streams of water, that bringeth forth its fruit in its season, mentioned in Psalm 1:3!

Now, while it is the “salt” that is the vital and most important thing, it is rather of the cruse that we shall speak for the moment. Acts 2 undoubtedly brings the salt into view, but Acts 1 precedes that. Our attention is first drawn to Elisha’s request for a new cruse. (In this passage, the “cruse” probably meant a small pan or dish; the word is related to the “pans” of 2 Chron. 35:13. In other O.T. passages, a flask is probably intended.) Why use a vessel at all? Why not take a handful? And then, why a NEW cruse? Why will not any cruse do? Well, that is just the point. For work like this a vessel must be specially prepared and set apart. What is the nature of the work to be done? What is the condition needing to be dealt with? At rock bottom it is the loss and absence of a distinctive SOMETHING. It is deficiency in respect of a certain distinctiveness. Everything is there but THAT.

The modern spiritual counterpart of this is that things have degenerated into indefiniteness, vagueness, uncertainty, ambiguity, as to real meaning, life, and purpose spiritually. The original meaning of things is no longer there. Things said and done do not mean what they did at first. Terms have come to be applied to, and be used of, that which is not permissible in the realm of their original Divine employment. There is a difference of meaning, and the tragedy is that so many have gone on with the form and fail to see that the power is not there.

If we take the book of Acts as the model, and the epistles as revealing the truth intended by the Lord to be the abiding basis of that which sprang into being in Acts, we cannot fail to be impressed with the presence of a certain something which made everything at that time very much alive and superlative. Whether in respect of what was individual and personal, in salvation, service, and suffering, or of what was corporate, in fellowship and practice, there is only one phrase that expresses the effect of that great something: it is Resurrection Life. There is hardly a chapter in this book but - when you have read it - provokes the spontaneous ejaculation: ‘That is life!’

Now, without further delay, what was it that produced this atmosphere and spirit of life? What was it that made everything so wonderful to those concerned? There is only one answer. It was – 

THE LORD JESUS HIMSELF.

The Lord Jesus had been glorified, and the Holy Spirit had come as the Spirit of the glorified Lord to glorify Him on the earth (John 16).

Was it the matter of salvation? Well, it was not salvation as such. It was not just BEING SAVED, either from something or unto something, but it was the SAVIOUR. The message of salvation was all focused in who the Lord Jesus was. Look at the preaching. “They ceased not... to preach Jesus as the Christ” (Acts 5:42). Find a discourse anywhere in the Acts which ‘got through’ and you will see that it is - not a treatise on Evangelical Theology - but a presentation of the glorified Lord Jesus. If it was Christ crucified, it was Christ not dead but risen and glorified. Look at the address at Pentecost (Acts 2:32,33,36). See the words to the lame man and the subsequent address in the Temple (ch. 3). Listen to the words addressed to the Council in chapter 4. Whether it be to individuals or to companies, it is always the Lord Jesus who is in full view.

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It is the same in the matter of service. In the Acts service is never something appended to salvation as a further consideration. One of the striking omissions in this record is that of exhortations and urgings to propagate the Gospel. Service here is never the result of organization or special pleading and appeals. It is free, spontaneous, eager, ‘natural’. It is not of constraint from without. It is not by an appeal to a sense of duty or obligation. It was not something which was special in its connection and time. It was at all times, in every place, under all circumstances: irrepressible testimony, proclamation, in direct, public manner and in ordinary conversation. “There arose... a great persecution... and they were all scattered abroad... They therefore that were scattered abroad went about preaching...” (Acts 8:1); “travelled... speaking the word... preaching the Lord Jesus” (11:19,20). What was it that created and produced this? It was the Holy Spirit’s glorifying of the Lord Jesus in their hearts! He - the glorified One - was so real to them, and the wonder of who He – “Jesus of Nazareth”, the Crucified One - really was, as now revealed and manifested to them and in them, was so great, that even these “new bottles” were finding that unless they let it out this new wine would burst them.

And what was true in the matters of salvation and service, was also the secret of their ability to suffer. There is no doubt that it cost dearly in those days to take sides with ‘The Nazarene’ – this as amongst men; but to take sides with “The Son of God” was something which provoked Hell. Put together, there is not a little in the record which indicates this suffering; but it was accepted in a spirit of “rejoicing” (Acts 5:41). It all seemed in the spirit of Hebrews 10:34: “Took joyfully the spoiling of your possessions”, or: “Received the word in much affliction, with joy” (1 Thess. 1:6). This cannot be attributed to optimism, sanguineness, or merely human good temper. It was not a ‘make-the-best-of-it’ resolve. It was the reality of the Lord Jesus as Sovereign and reigning.

As it was in these matters which came so directly home to the individual, and which were always individual tests, so it was in the matters which were more of a corporate nature. A ‘BAPTISMAL SERVICE’ in the Acts was a wonderful time, always accompanied by great rejoicing and a living witness of the Holy Spirit. There was nothing formal about it. It was not just a bit of ‘Church’ order or teaching. It was not just a command obeyed, or something just for personal blessing. It certainly was not a matter of compulsion, persuasion, or argument. It took place as in full view of the Lord Jesus, as the One who died in the stead of all; whose death was the death of all; and in whose resurrection “they which live should no longer live unto themselves, but UNTO HIM who for their sakes died and rose again” (2 Cor 2:15).

It was UNTO HIM. It was a testimony to a living reality, and a mighty spiritual fact, namely, that the one supreme object of life and all living was the Lord Jesus. All other objects, interests, concerns and visions had gone in their union with Him in His death, and all and only that which was of Him had come for them in union with His resurrection. This matter was lifted out of the realm of ordinances (such as the Jewish) and into the realm of testimonies. Jewish ordinances were looking on to something to come, and they never made anything complete (Heb. 7:19; 9:9; 10:1). These TESTIMONIES looked back to something consummated, into which there was experimental entry.

Just the same atmosphere of glory surrounded the ‘LORD’S TABLE’ - the “breaking of bread” (Acts 2:42,46). There was nothing of ‘Church’ duty or rule or regulation in this. This was not something apart and separate from the other life of the Church. This was not a ‘service’, as something by itself. At the beginning it suffered nothing by frequency - though, alas, it all too soon dropped from this plane. It was the centre and spring of all else. Worship, praise, prayer, the ministry of the Word spontaneously sprang out of this. It was living, and fraught with “great joy” (Acts 8:8; 15:3). It was to those who thus gathered and worshipped that “the Lord added... day by day those that were being saved” (Acts 2:47).

What, again, was the secret? It was the appreciation of the Lord Jesus. That table gathered all other testimonies into itself and became an all-inclusive testimony. There was the Offering wholly given to God without a reservation, and the will of God utterly done. There was union with that offered One in His death, burial, and resurrection. There was the one life shared by all, as represented in the Blood. There was the one loaf, which is the one Body, the corporate oneness of all believers. There was the “one hope” (Eph. 4:4), “that blessed hope” (Tit. 2:13), His coming again – ‘till He come’. So, then, ought not there to be a wonderful attestation of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of all? Yes, it was a time of great glorying in the Lord - the Lord was there!

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THE LORD’S PRESENT NEED

Each of the matters mentioned really needs a book to itself, but we merely touch them to lead on to our further point and object. Referring back to what we said in connection with the waters of Jericho, is it not true that in all these matters at the present day, in a very widespread way, the constituent of wonder and glory and life – that spontaneity and overflow in all matters which relate to the Lord Jesus - is lacking? What is needed? Our conviction is that, whatever may or may not be recognised as needed by that which ostensibly stands to represent God in the world today, His own need in the earth is that which will lift all the phases and aspects of the Church’s life and work into the realm where this glorying in and glorifying of the Lord Jesus is the dominant characteristic; where formalism yields to life; where all is aglow with His wonderfulness; where His train FILLS the temple; where 'ordinances' are living testimonies; and where all is vital, dynamic and effectual.

No one will disagree with this, but they may with the next. What is necessary to the Lord to bring this about? It is a new cruse, a new vessel. There is so much mixture in the constitution of the vessels today. The world has got in, on the one hand, and the natural man has so much taken hold, on the other. Tradition, formalism, ecclesiasticism and ‘mechanicalism’ are like chains and fetters upon the Lord. Moreover, as we have already said, things are given different meanings today from what they had at first under the sanction of the Holy Spirit.

A new cruse is needed, and it must be that which has been made like unto the Lord’s vessel at the first. It must be:
(1)  That which stands upon an absolutely New Testament basis.
(2)  That which marks the point where God has a clear way because the Cross has brought to zero all the personal interests and resources and confidence of such as form that vessel.
(3)  That which recognises, yields fully to, and glories in, the absolute government of the Holy Spirit in every detail of life and service.
(4)  That which recognises the utter Lordship of the Lord Jesus.
(5)  That which sees in Him all the fullness of wisdom, power, knowledge, grace and everything needed, and draws only upon Him.
(6)  That which is completely selfless and has only one object in view, and that passionately the glory of the Lord Jesus.

We leave till later the matter of securing the vessel, but here emphasize the necessity for it. When the Lord gets it - and He is getting it - He will make it the instrument for the restoration and preservation of His testimony in the earth. This newness may be costly, but then, special usefulness to the Lord is always costly.

No, this is not an appeal for a new sect! It is an appeal for a people embodying the principle and power of “newness of life”.

[Shammu]

Chapter 3 - The New Cruse (continued)

We expressed the feeling that, while many would agree with the statement that a general renewal of spiritual life is very much needed at this time, there might not be such agreement that what is needed specifically is “a new cruse”, an instrument conformed to the mind of God, solely upon the basis of sympathy with the Holy Spirit’s order and requirements. If there were pictured some new exclusive body; some select company; some iconoclastic movement; some spiritually superior class - such reservations would be justified, and might lead to suspicion, fear, apprehension. Such an attitude, though quite unjustified, and betokening the “flesh” and the activity of the Spoiler - the Adversary - might lead to much unnecessary loss, and make things more difficult for the Lord than they need have been.

Now, we need to recognise the fact that in the history of the Divine reactions the instrument has always been a definitely related or relative one, not exclusive and isolated. Although it may have been comparatively small in itself, it was representative and linked with the whole company of the elect.

RELATIVE AND REPRESENTATIVE MINISTRY

Did Esther represent an instrument brought to the throne “for such a time as this” - the occasion of a Satanic plot for the death of God’s people and the wiping out of His testimony from the earth? Then her life and the life of the whole company - although they were in captivity and ‘out of the way’ - were one, however privileged and exalted may have been her calling. She was involved in the testimony, and this brought her into a travail concerning the whole chosen race. We shall have more to say about Esther.

This same relative and representative function characterized Daniel and his brethren. They took the condition of the whole captive nation upon their hearts, and entered into what we might call a vicarious repentance for the sins of all their brethren. They themselves were the ‘overcomers’ of that time, but all their experience, revelation, and victory was in a deep relationship to the people of God, though apostate.

When Hezekiah was instrumental in turning back the awful idolatry and wickedness made so complete by Ahaz, he first of all instituted a sin-offering “for ALL Israel” (2 Chron. 29:24), and then sent letters throughout all Israel to call them to the Passover at Jerusalem (30:1-10). This is striking when we remember that Hezekiah was king over Judah, not Israel; the kingdom being rent, and entirely schismatic, with Israel much more idolatrous even than Judah, Hezekiah’s heart went out to all, and did not allow the grossest idolatry to create a spiritual abandonment of his so greatly erring and sinning brethren.

This principle of relationship and representation can be traced throughout the Word, and it is a most important one. There is no such thing as a ‘section’ of the Body of Christ. “The body is one”, but there are “bands” and “joints of supply”, fulfilling special related and representative functions or ministries. All the “members” may not be in equally good health, development, life, fellowship, but they are not thereby cut off. Christ will never have a mutilated Body.

We are not unaware of the greatness of the difficulty and problem with which we are here confronted. At the same time we make bold to tackle it for the Lord’s glory. If only certain principles are recognised and established, there is hope of improvement, at least to some extent. We must, therefore, in the first place keep clearly before us that it is only the really born-anew children of God, in whom there is something of the Spirit, who are in view - not the vast accretions to ‘Christendom’, or ‘organized’ and traditional Christianity, of ‘mixed multitudes’. However bad may be the spiritual condition of the former, they are not to be excluded from the SPIRIT of fellowship. That does not mean fellowship in work or that which is wrong, but it does mean earnest and loving solicitude for recovery therefrom. How patiently and diligently and ingeniously has many a surgeon or doctor worked to find some point of contact with life in a patient whose hold and interest was practically imperceptible! Should it be less so with us in this so much greater battle with spiritual death?

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But the main point is this. The Lord must have an instrument which He has formed in the fire and to which He has given peculiar knowledge of Himself. This instrument will have to stand upon a peculiarly pure basis of life in God. Whatever the rest may do, it dare not take its lead from them. Its methods, means, and standards must be those which have shed the less mature elements. Of some it would stand as God’s plummet to reveal that which is out of the straight; that which is short of God’s best - or God’s better; for who would claim to have reached God’s best? A much greater cost will have to be met by such an instrument; and there will be little place left, if it is spiritually constituted as against mentally apprehended, for spiritual pride.

Now the chief difficulty, as history has shown, is how to realise such a ministry, constituted by knowledge of the Lord through suffering, and how to hold it in relation to ALL the Lord’s people, avoiding separation in spirit, schism in the Body, exclusiveness and ‘watertightness’. It is the easiest thing to withdraw to some given point and look down on all others, as though to say: ‘We are THE people - you must come to us.’ The Lord will lose much this way. No; while in PRACTICAL matters, for consistency’s sake, there may HAVE to be withdrawal, as also where error predominates, yet the preservation of what there is of God must be diligently sought in spirit. While there can be no official link with what is wrong, there can and must be a reaching out in spirit to keep the door open for the “more excellent way”.

The next thing is to apprehend the Divine meaning behind the creating of this instrument. Surely it is twofold.

Firstly, to have for Himself in the earth that which is as close an approximation to His own mind as possible; that it should not be true that there is nothing which is in any real way an expression of the Lord’s mind. Thus, further, He would have that which cleaves a way through for others. So it ever was in battles of old. The specially trained and disciplined troops broke through for others.

Secondly, that there may be that which gives the Lord His point toward which to work. As He creates a sense of need in His people, and leads them on thereby, He would have that which can be His means of meeting that need in spiritual knowledge. That the Lord directs hungry ones to those who know Him through special dealings is a principle not far to seek in the Divine record.   We remember how Cornelius was brought into touch with Peter (Acts 10), Apollos with Aquila and Priscilla (Acts 18), and so on. There is such a thing as election to special service, and there ought to be mutual recognition of this. When the Lord Jesus took Peter, James and John into the more inward activities and revelations of His life, especially up to the Mount of Transfiguration, He was not guilty, in principle, of an act of schism in the Body. What the others thought or felt we do not know, but in the long run we know that ministry was in view, not personal preference, He was not making of them a specially privileged and separate company. A great need was coming, and this was His method of providing for the need which would one day be created.

The appreciation of what He did and what they knew had to tarry until that need arose. There will never be an appreciation of special resource without conscious need, but such need will justify God’s methods, and prove His wisdom sound. God has from the beginning of the world always had His escape ready before the fire broke out - His lifeboat before the wreck - His store before the famine - His Cross before the curse. His peculiar ways with some are in view of a coming need which will give them a peculiar ministry. There are those who are out on a general basis of activity with the Lord, going all the time in a continuous stream of good works. There are also those who are cut off from anything great as to measure, and are reserved for what the others cannot do; less in bulk, but perhaps of indispensable worth and service in emergency, and beyond a certain general point of attainment. The latter have to bide their time in patience, but when their time does come it is THEIR time in the Lord, and no one else can do the work.

Let us return to our main principle, namely that REMNANTS ARE RELATIVE. The remnants of which we spoke in our first chapter were not something conclusive in themselves. Sometimes a remnant of only a couple of tribes is referred to as “all Israel”, showing their representative character. While in the first instance the movement was on the part of a few, comparatively, there was from time to time a trickling after them, as there was that to which such tricklings could come. The remnant was not conclusive.

We must keep clearly and strongly before us the fact that, while the Lord must have His testimony maintained in the earth, and while He desires all His people to enter into the fullness of light and truth, and while there are clearly seen to be different companies of His people in Heaven, both as to time and as to position, the main characteristic of any company which may be termed ‘a remnant’ or ‘overcomers’ is that of vocation: that is, they stand in a vocational relationship to all other really born-anew children of God. It is something which they are called to be and to do which is preparatory for the rest. They have, amongst other things, to ‘pass over armed before their brethren’ (Deut. 3:18), to cleave a way and take the first shock of spiritual antagonism.

Now, before defining the nature of this instrument, we will say just a little more on this matter of fellowship. We have recognised two things, namely, that fellowship is limited to the measure of life and of the Spirit, and that for fuller fellowship there must be progress in the life of the Spirit; and then that, inasmuch as every true child of God has SOMETHING of Himself in them, there should be care and diligence in discovering, unearthing, and fostering that. We have now to see that, no matter how we may seek to go on with the Lord, there can only be TRUE BUILDING UP of the Body on the ground of fellowship and love.

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A SATANIC MASTER-STROKE

Perhaps one of the most SIGNIFICANT things to any who are “not ignorant of his (Satan’s) devices” is that there never has been a specially spiritual movement of God in the earth, calculated to serve Him in a particularly useful way, but what Satan’s animosity thereto has been manifested along the line of division, schism, discord, separation, and a breaking down of fellowship. And how often has the real sting and stigma been modified by a feigning love unbroken and preserved, when the divided parties should have no association with each other in the things of God. Love, let us again say emphatically, is incumbent upon the Lord’s people toward “all men”, whether of the “household” or otherwise (Gal. 6:10), but fellowship is something more. It is the most spiritual things which suffer the greatest shocks in this matter, and again we say this carries its own Satanic significance.

The methods of the enemy are numberless, the “wiles” unfathomable by human wit. A suggestion of suspicion, if it finds lodgment, is enough to completely paralyse the work of God and spiritual progress. Have a doubt and you are done. There never was a time when positive spiritual work was more jeopardised by suspicion than now. It would seem that hell is largely employed in issuing forth smoke, clouds, vapours, mists of suspicion, question, reservation, in order to infect with uncertainty, mystification, prejudice, fear, discrediting, distrust, aloofness. It is in the “heavenlies” that this is most registered; that is, the higher ranges of spiritual things. It is an ATMOSPHERE, and it is everywhere. You sense it wherever you go. In some places it is stifling - there is no clear breath of the Spirit, and a word of life is almost choked back.

Of course, this is no new thing, although now so intensified. The New Testament is full of it. The Lord Jesus met it - not in spiritual people, only in religious people. John met it. Paul met it in every direction. It was made to circle round his person, his methods, his character, and his message. Even some members of the mother assembly at Jerusalem showed suspicion and lack of cordiality toward him. Paul’s setting aside of the Law, for instance, seemed to them to go beyond even the Lord Himself, who had not openly abrogated it. Then Paul appealed to “visions and revelations” (2 Cor. 12:1), but they asserted that these were dubious, or at best they could only serve to ratify his own personal convictions. Again, both Paul and his opponents appealed to the Old Testament, but the letter of the Old Testament seemed undoubtedly to favour the literalists, and his ‘attempt to read new meanings’ into the old revelation seemed to them mere cleverness. They looked on it as barefaced denial of the Divine Word. To them it looked as though he did not believe the Bible. They regarded his innovations as morally dangerous.

Of course, this in SUBSTANCE ought to have no parallel today, but it has in spirit. There is nothing added by revelation to the Scriptures since the New Testament was closed, but there is much to be RECOGNISED in them by the enlightenment of the Spirit. There is no new meaning, but there is much new RECOGNITION of the meaning.

CAUSES AND PRECAUTIONS

The point is, not that there never was or never will be an absence of this Satanic enterprise of smoke to prevent or destroy fellowship, but - what is to be our attitude in such circumstances?

It would be vain to try to deal with all the secondary causes. Sometimes the ground of the adversary’s success, either in ourselves or in “them that oppose themselves”, is that we may be living in certain respects in some proximity to the “flesh” and the “natural man”. Some secret pride may make possible jealousy, criticism, envy, ‘hurt-ness’, fear of loss, self-pity, comparison, or a wish to be out of the place of difficulty. Sometimes it may be immaturity; sometimes imperfect knowledge or understanding – ‘seeing through a glass darkly’. There are worse things than these, too; but there are also such things as are either utterly imaginary, or real only because they seem real to those who register them. That is, the enemy can set up situations which are utterly false in themselves - they have no foundation in FACT. They are phantoms - but how terribly real phantoms can be!

How shall we meet all this? It seems so hopeless, and would almost drive us to ultra-individualism. Let us not abandon hope until we have been faithful to the exhortations, ‘Give diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit’ (Eph. 4:3), and "Prove all things" (1 Thess. 5:21). The final test will, of course, be - Is the Lord present in blessing? If so - and we ought to have spiritual discernment - then up to that point we ought neither to oppose nor to refuse all fellowship.

But before we are so general, perhaps we have a duty which costs a little more.

Seeing how great was the matter involved - no less than the Holy Spirit’s presence and ministry - Aquila and Priscilla might easily have labelled Apollos as in error, altogether wrong and wanting, and left him and the assembly of which he was ‘pastor’. But they saw the lack and lovingly took him and in a humble spirit helped him to see it (Acts 18:24-28). There is a fine record of the man after this. It could so easily have been a breach and a loss.

We must always be sure that those who seem to us to be wrong are not capable of being helped on those matters which are absolutely vital to fellowship. What have we done and what do we do in the matter? To come to a conclusion and forthwith to abandon those from whom we differ is a positive violation of scriptural method and instruction. This is often great loss to the Lord when there might have been gain. It would seem from the Word that the grounds of separation, WHEN ESTABLISHED, are brought within a small range as to number, though of course outweighing all others in importance. They are: the denial of the person of Christ, that He is truly God come in the flesh (2 John 7, 10); the denial of the necessity for and sufficiency of His death for reconciling men to God (Gal. 1:6-9); the practice of moral evil (1 Cor. 5:9); the defying of the united judgment of the whole assembly in a matter of wrong doing (Matt. 18:17); and, finally, the refusal to accept the authority in the house of God, of the Apostles and their writings (2 Thess. 3:14-15). All else is gathered up in these.

It would seem necessary to say again here what we have said earlier, that we are not dealing with the matter of co-operation in doubtful methods and on an unspiritual basis, or of a compromise on truth. There will ever have to be separation in these matters. Our point is the SPIRIT of fellowship - that we should not close ourselves up, as though we were apart from and superior to all others.   Many of us have to confess to a time when our lives were by no means conspicuous for their spirituality, and we owe much to the spirit of fellowship on the part of others. If so be we feel that, in the mercy of God, we have been given something more than some, we must be out to help, to win, to cherish. Above all, we must keep our hearts open and our spirit pure. It is terribly possible to get to a set place where no one can teach us, but we can teach others - they are the ones who are not going on with the Lord. This is entirely fatal to fellowship.

Now we must close this chapter, but with one important reminder. A great safeguard and security to that fellowship without which there is no building and progress in the House of God is to RECOGNISE, and bear continually in mind, that the master tactic of the enemy is somehow, by hook or by crook, to get in between the Lord’s people and cause strain and break. Our ‘diligence’ must be along the lines of ‘proving all things’; refusing the opinions and judgments of others - even the most spiritual; not listening to gossip or criticism; not going by appearances; and always keeping a very close walk with the Spirit and listening to Him on all matters.

When the Scripture says that we are to ‘prove all things’, we should apply that especially to the things which could serve the evil powers in their propaganda of suspicions, leading to divisions.

We should prove whether our judgment of persons and things is absolutely right. We should prove whether the things said by a person, by word or writing, are what we have taken them to mean, or whether they might not mean something that we have not recognised.

We should prove whether a person about whom we have a question is not open to being helped from the Word of God to see differently or better than he now sees.

We should prove whether love has no influence with such, and whether he is 'PROVED' to be bigoted, proud, and unapproachable.

Have we adopted such lines, or hurried to destroy by open attack or by the spread of suspicion?

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Chapter 4 - The Overcomer

Before we proceed to consider more definitely the nature of that ‘new cruse’ of which we have been speaking, a few further words on the relative aspect of this vessel are needed. In the Scriptures, as we have pointed out, it is clearly seen that all the reactionary instruments of God are of a relative character; that is, that they are related to and on behalf of a body larger than themselves. This is an underlying principle in the progressive activities of God. The point which needs to have extra emphasis is that, in SECURING all the elect territory, habitation and inheritance, whether as His first choice or as of necessity by reason of so general an apathy and worldliness on the part of His people, the Lord uses what might be termed ‘advance parties’. It is not necessary in this connection to present or argue for any theory or teaching concerning ‘selectiveness’, or ‘partial’ or ‘first-fruits’ in the matter of ‘rapture’. The historical, literal and time aspect is of secondary importance. What is of primary account is the SPIRITUAL fact, and this, we believe, is incontrovertible. It is a principle in every realm of creation and Divine method. There are –

HARBINGERS IN EVERY SPHERE.

Originally a harbinger was one who went before to provide lodgings, but the term has now come to be applied to any forerunner. An adequate recognition of the SPIRITUAL element in this universal fact, and especially in relation to “the eternal purpose”, would correct and adjust much on both sides - acceptance and rejection - of a set teaching of ‘partial rapture’. That is, if the vocational factor were kept in view it would supply the motive and stimulus so commonly lacking amongst many who reject that teaching; which lack has very largely become the strength of the teaching and its propagation. And, on the other hand, it would both obviate the difficulty concerning ‘all being of Grace’ and not of works, and remove any ‘selectiveness’ of spirit and temper - as ‘the elect of the elect’.   Let us repeat with strength: There is undoubtedly an advance party in every movement of God. This is spiritual before anything else, and it is vocational rather than meritorious. That there will be special rewards for such seems quite clear and beyond doubt, but rewards do not contradict grace.

When we contemplate the churches in Asia as presented in the Revelation, and admit the respective age application, it is difficult, if not impossible, in respect of at least five, to conclude that we are dealing with the unsaved and ungodly - with assemblies of religious people without any true spiritual history. It is undoubtedly a case of declension, of failure to go on with the Lord. Are all these to be eternally lost? And yet they represent the majority in every age.

We know that one answer to this is that all will be adjusted at the Judgment Seat of Christ; but what concerns us is - what about the others, the ‘overcomers’? Surely more is involved than being different from the rest and getting a better reward. Yes: the point is that the Lord must and will have His testimony in the earth according to His mind, and those who provide Him with the instrument for this fulfil a special mission, not only in the earth, but in the heavenlies - both now, and then.

Really, the focal point of this whole matter is not the two or more raptures. The fact is that the Lord has shown unmistakably that He has made no provision for a ‘second-best’ in the life of a believer or of the Church, but has called all His people to the fullest degree of faithfulness and devotion. There IS a second-best, as see 1 Corinthians 3:15, etc. Let us not fasten upon unscriptural labels, such as ‘partial rapture’ or ‘selective rapture’, but upon the facts - that there ARE such people as ‘overcomers’ and also, evidently, those who are NOT, and that there is a difference of no mean importance between the two.

It is all just an appeal to take no chances - “make no provision for the flesh” - but to be utter for God, whatever it costs.

We are now able to come to the more definite consideration of the nature and function of this peculiar vessel for God.

There is a great difference between a people moved by mere disaffection, discontent, ‘disgruntledness’, difference of opinion, personal dislike or preference, and one moved by the constraint of a great Divine vision - by the inwrought reaction of God, registered with pain in the heart.

This inward heart-longing found expression long ago in classic words:

“By the rivers of Babylon
There we sat down, yea, we wept,
When we remembered Zion.
Upon the willows in the midst thereof
We hanged up our harps...
How can we sing Jehovah’s song,
In a strange land?
If I forget thee, O Jerusalem,
Let my right hand forget her skill.
Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,
If I remember not thee;
If I prefer not Jerusalem above my chiefest joy.”
(Psalm 137:1, 2, 4-6)

[Shammu]

The implications of these great heart-yearnings represent the crystallizing of the Divine purpose from before times eternal. The ultimate thing in the heart of God, and that into which all the interests of those in real oneness of spirit with Him will be gathered, is presented in what is known as –

THE HOUSE OF GOD AND THE CITY OF GOD

When we speak of the ‘ULTIMATE’ thing, we mean that which is to be the eternal consummation of all the Divine method and means. The thing which is primary and final is the place, worship and glory of God in the universe. This factor will be implicit in all that we have to say. Were we asked what are the major lines and subjects of Divine revelation throughout the whole Scriptures, we should say with considerable conviction that they are: -
1. The Person of the Lord Jesus Christ.
2. His Cross - death, burial and resurrection.
3. The Church or House of God.
4. The Coming again of Christ.
5. The City of God.

There are other phases, but these TAKEN RELATIVELY are the primary themes, or aspects of one theme.

While the Person of the Lord Jesus as God manifest in the flesh is the sum of all revelations, it requires the Cross to give the full MEANING and reveal the full VALUE of that manifestation; it demands the Church to display the full CONTENT of that manifestation ultimately; and it calls for the City to define the NATURE of that manifestation. In leading men on to the appreciation of the Person, God begins with the Cross. If the House is the House of the Divine Son, and if the City is the City of the great King, then the House and the City are based upon the Cross. Moreover, if the House and the City are for the glory of God in Christ and His universal worship, then the Cross represents the nature of worship and the way of glory.

To put this more precisely: If the Lord has in view a people for His glory, by whom the content of the Son of Man is ultimately displayed to the universe, then this people will be fundamentally A PEOPLE OF THE ALTAR. This we believe to be the all-inclusive theme of Scripture. The Cross is the central recognition of the eternal rights of God. At the Cross and in the Cross all the rights of God from eternity to eternity are recognised and acknowledged.   That is central to Calvary. God has rights. God’s rights are that the whole universe should render Him undivided, unrivalled, unreserved worship, acknowledging that all things are His by right, and that no one else in the universe has a right before Him. That great fact is here gathered up in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He brings to God in His own Person His rights, offering Himself in the greatness of who He is and what He is - the rights of God.

God, by His Son, created the world for His Glory. The Holy Spirit was agent in the creation of the world for the Glory of God, in order that the whole earth should be full of His Glory. The Holy Spirit is likewise agent in the redemption of the world for the Glory of God. It is of perhaps deeper significance than we have recognised that the great song of the redeemed at the end, when the work of Calvary is consummated, is gathered up into one sentence: “Hast redeemed... to God” (Rev. 5:9). Redemption is unto God: it is bringing back to God His rights, and the Holy Spirit is the agent in this redemptive work which has the Glory of God as its objective, just as the Holy Spirit was the agent in creation for the same end.

Worship, then, with all its depth and fullness, is the key word. In the great consummation when God is to be worshipped in the whole universe, and the different songs of worship break forth - the song of one company, “a hundred and forty and four thousand”, worshipping God and the Lamb (Rev. 7:4), and then the song of the ‘great multitude which no man can number’ worshipping God and the Lamb (7:9) - there is the unveiling of the worship of the beast, and that is another consummation. The consummations of worship are there unveiled.

The worship of the beast is one which has been going on ever since Lucifer secured a following, a reverence from angels in high estate in heaven. When he found it in his own heart to make a bid for the place of the Almighty – to exalt his throne above the clouds, to ascend into the heavens, to be equal with the Most High (Is. 14:13-14) – he managed to gather to himself a company, all with the intent of drawing heaven’s worship away from God to himself; and ever since that lifting up of his heart in that infamous ambition another worship has been going on. He drew that company with him, the company of angels “who kept not their own principality”, and are “kept in everlasting bonds under darkness” (Jude 6). Then he appeared on the earth, and sought again to usurp the place of God in the worship of His Creation here; and in this he succeeded, and became, by reason of a conquest and the consent of man, “the god of this age”, “the prince of this world”.

[Shammu]

THE TWO WORSHIPS

From that moment he set up a spiritual system of worship which is perceivable behind the whole record of history. We have the breaking in of this evil element all along the line of worship, wherever and whenever the rights of God are recognised by sacrifice. Immediately Abel recognised the rights of God and erected his altar, slaying his sacrifice and shedding sacrificial blood, in the simplicity of the testimony of faith that here on the earth God has sole rights, there broke in this very thing against that testimony. The murderer came in to withstand and destroy the testimony, with Cain as his instrument, who also set up an altar and made a pretence in his darkened understanding to worship God. But he never got through to God, and that was the very ground upon which the Satanic element of jealousy and pride was churned up within him, and he became, because the Devil had got a purchase upon him, the instrument against the worship of God. The enemy’s scheme is deep laid; he knows what he is doing. Through the other worship he breaks in against the recognition of the Divine Rights, the worship of God; and from Abel onward it is always so.

Noah set up his altar upon the renewed earth, and in so doing declared that “the earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof”. But very quickly there broke in the other thing again. Even in that representative one the element of evil rises up to contradict the testimony, and before long the worship of God becomes associated with shame, and the glory is hidden again. We see the testimony on the one hand and the breaking in to contradict on the other.

Abram’s life-story heads up to the incident in Genesis 15, where that altar is finally set and the sacrifice is offered - and then the battle begins. While Abram holds on to God and waits and stands, the vultures descend, and a mighty conflict ensues for the preservation of that testimony to the rights of God, the worship of God; and then comes the horror of great darkness. When Israel, in the fulfilment of the vision which was then given to Abram in that very hour of conflict, came out into the wilderness and the worship of God was set up, there broke in this very same element, and you find the golden calf.

And so the story goes on. You come to Balaam seeking to curse Israel, but not permitted, and then setting up by insinuation the evil thing, fornication - a form of idolatry - and the Lord’s glory obscured once more. It was a beautiful picture that Balaam gave in his prophecy, perhaps one of the most beautiful things in the Old Testament. As Balaam stands, desiring for gain to curse, but constrained by the Spirit of God to bless, and as he speaks concerning this people dwelling alone, wonderful things are said and the glory of the Lord is presented concerning Israel; and then, as round by a back door, for that gain he teaches Israel to commit fornication. The glorious picture fades, and the glory of God is again obscured in Israel, because of this other worship. The rights of God are all the time disputed.

Then we have the wonderful story of Solomon. On the one hand, his building of the House, his setting up of the altar, and the glory of God descending. Here you have the Cross and the Church and the Spirit. On the other hand, the after-story of Solomon. What a tragedy - what a ghastly tragedy! The glory of God contradicted again by the very man who had so beautifully set up the testimony in Israel. The Devil is breaking in all the time to take God’s rights from Him, to rob Him of His glory.

It is the story of Elijah, fighting for the testimony in Israel in a day when the glory of God was hidden. On Carmel the great issue is the altar - the Cross, and the fire - the Spirit. The testimony is once more established in Israel; but the reaction of the powers of darkness is then through Jezebel to destroy the man who has restored the testimony. The issue in the word of Elijah is: “How long halt ye between two opinions? if the Lord be God, follow Him: but if Baal, then follow him” (1 Kings 18:21). You cannot divide the issue - it is one thing or the other. That is the testimony of God having His rights utterly and no one else getting a look in. And let the critics say what they like about Elijah destroying the prophets of Baal, four hundred on the spot - there is a very deep principle involved, a deep principle. The destroying of the prophets of Baal is the outward demonstration of the spiritual principle that there can be no quarter given to that which is set against the Throne of God. Whether it be Agag (1 Sam. 15) or the prophets of Baal, the point at issue is God’s rights. Is HE having the worship and the honour and the glory in this universe?

That is a very brief survey, through the Old Testament, of the constant breaking in of this evil element along the line of worship.

THE DEPTH OF CALVARY

Now, the Cross of the Lord Jesus gathered all this up, and “through the eternal Spirit” Christ secured the rights of God in His own Risen Person: so that “through the eternal Spirit” Christ met the whole of this thing in the universe at Calvary - He met it all.

Let us get behind Calvary, ever more and more behind, until we get to the ultimate. The Lord has led us by degrees deeper and deeper into the meaning of the Cross. There was a time when we thought that we had fathomed the Cross, when we saw the “old man” being dealt with, but we find that there are still ranges that we have not before seen. It was the Throne of God that Christ was standing for at Calvary; it was the ultimate and universal glory of God that He was fighting for in Calvary; and He met all this that was set against the Throne, and met it victoriously, and secured those eternal universal rights of God in His own risen Person: which means that Christ risen and ascended has secured in His own Person all the rights of God for the glory of God for evermore. In the Lord Jesus God has His rights secured.

I hope the Lord enables you to enter into that. Jesus Christ, “who through the eternal Spirit offered himself” (Heb. 9:4), now standing in the Presence of God, has secured in His own Person all God’s rights for ever, and the ultimate filling of the universe with the glory of God is secured in the Risen Person of Christ. There is no longer any doubt about the issue. God is going, without any question, to be universally worshipped, and the glory of God is going to fill the whole universe without any rival, because THE LORD JESUS is in the presence of God, victorious over every other thing that was against the Throne of God. This is something immense. He said: “Lo, I am come... to do thy will” (Heb. 10:7), and the will of God done utterly is the recognition of the utter rights of God, and God becoming possessed of them.

[Shammu]

When we talk about doing the will of God and wanting to know the will of God, oh, let us get the immense range of such words. The will of God means nothing else than that God shall be universally glorified and that He shall be the central object of worship in the universe. Read the Revelation again with that thought, and the book will become new. You will find then that the book of the Revelation is the book of worship, and you will see that that worship, which is there in ever widening circles to the ultimate bounds of the universe - that worship is brought about by the Lamb, “through the eternal Spirit”: the Lamb in the midst of the Throne.

The Holy Spirit is thus the minister of the glorified Christ, as He was the agent and the dynamic for the accomplishment of this great end in the Cross, and the securing of it in the Person of Christ in the glory. He is now the minister of the glorified Christ to work this out in the earth, and in doing so He will bring us to certain very important issues.

He will bring us first of all to this: that those who enter most fully into the meaning of the Cross - which is the will of God wholly done - will encounter the supreme assault of Satan.

Do you wonder that Satan hates the Cross? Do you wonder that he by any means will get the Cross set on one side? Do you wonder that those who go into the meaning of the Cross spiritually find that they have immediately come up against the whole system of antagonism from the Devil? It is so inevitably. We have seen Abel in the very earliest and simplest form of the presentation of the meaning of the Cross. When he enters into relationship with that blood, that sacrifice, that altar, he immediately and automatically comes up against the adversary. The Holy Spirit, through John, says of Cain that he “was of the evil one” (1 John 3:12).

So with Abraham, so with Joseph, so with Moses; so even in what might be thought to be the simple case of Esther. Let us pause with Esther for a moment. The book of Esther has been thought to be a commentary upon, an exposition of, the providence and sovereignty of God. Well, it is that, but there is a bigger background to the book. Here is one who is “come to the kingdom for such a time...” (Esth. 4:14). What time? A time when the testimony of God in His people was so set against by the enemy that he wanted the last Jew exterminated. You know the story of Haman - “Haman the Agagite” - a remnant of that Amalakite seed which had always been against God. Haman the Agagite had become inspired with the further purpose, utterly and finally to exterminate the Jews. Esther came to the kingdom for such a time as that, and put her life in the balances – “if I perish, I perish” - and met that awful deep-laid scheme of Satan. It is ever an illustration of the ultimate controversy of the Cross. You meet with that when you stand for the testimony of God in the earth. We will come back to Esther presently.

The story of Daniel is the same thing. Two gods: the god set up by Nebuchadnezzar, and THE God. Who is going to be worshipped? Daniel does not need to deliberate over his decision that Jehovah alone, and no other god, is to be worshipped in the universe; His rights alone are to be recognised. He meets the power behind that world-system and is called upon to pay the price. It is the same issue with Daniel’s three friends, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego.

THE SUPREME EFFORT OF SATAN

From the very birth of the Lord Jesus, it is known to Satan who He is and the scheme is put into operation to engulf Him in the massacre of a whole multitude of infants. The cruelty of the evil one to murder a mass to get ONE! He is after One, he is not after the crowd.

We have no record of any efforts of the enemy from that time until the Lord steps across the line which runs between His private life and His public life - and then He meets the enemy immediately. And what is the question? “If Thou wilt... worship me” (Matt. 4:9). That is what he is after. It is right out - he is betrayed at once; and it is that issue right up to the Cross. “If Thou wilt worship me.” It comes in a multitude of different ways. Satan only wants an acknowledgment, the ascribing to him of some rights in the universe.

But, ah, the Lord never recognised those rights - just as Mordecai refused to recognise the right of Haman. This is one of the most beautiful things in the book of Esther. Here is Haman claiming to be somebody: he has gained eminence, and everybody is bowing to him. But Mordecai refuses to recognise any of his glory, and ignores it all. And you remember Haman’s story to his family. ‘I am a great man; I have much goods, many children: but what is the good of it all if this one man will not recognise me?’ (Esther 5:9-13). It is a foreshadowing. There is One who counts more than all the rest, and until He can be captured or got out of the war the enemy’s fullness is divided. That One will not recognise Satan’s and that One is destined to bring about his doom.

The Lord Jesus met that all the way through, refusing to attribute to Satan one atom of right in this universe. He was out to challenge that, to secure all the rights for God in His own Person, and to come to the Throne Himself with those rights. And when He has done it we see the same thing going on with the Church. It is still the Church’s great issue: the worshippers and the worshipped, and the place or the no-place of the enemy. We shall deal with that when we come to speak of the Church.

[Shammu]

Now, only the Holy Spirit, in the power of the victorious Christ and by virtue of His shed Blood, can meet that challenge. We do not talk glibly, lightly, frivolously, about this thing. We view the ultimate issue with joy and exultation, but we recognise that it is “not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts” (Zechariah 4:6). And if the Lord Jesus Himself needed that it should be through the Eternal Spirit that this thing was wrought out, oh, how much more we! How much more we today! We should not rush into this battle; we recognise that nothing but the mighty energizing of the Holy Spirit could meet this great issue and challenge. But we recognise also with confidence that the Holy Spirit is the minister of the victorious Christ, and that His very advent is on the ground of that victory, to work that victory out in the universe; and we thank God for it. Why has the Holy Spirit come? Oh! not that we might have blessings and what we call power and influence and opportunity and service. No, He has come as Representative and Agent of the Christ, who has secured the rights of God in His own Person. To bring about the recognition and realisation of the rights in this earth - that is the work of the Holy Spirit.

The second thing that comes out of this is that the Holy Spirit always demands the ground of the Cross for His activity, if the glory of God is in view. But then, the Cross registers the removal of all that serves Satan. Now, it would take a long time to cover that ground again to see the things that served Satan. What was it that served Satan in Cain? Covetousness, personal ambition, jealousy, pride! That worked itself out in the murder of Abel - but the murder of Abel as an expression of hatred for God (although Cain may have been blind to the deeper nature of the thing). What was it that served Satan in Balaam? Greed, covetousness, world-gain. The Cross registers the removal by destruction of all that served Satan, and for us it is gathered up in one word: SELF.

What a wide word that is - what a comprehensive word! The stronger term is “the flesh”. Some people do not know what you mean when you talk about the “flesh”. They begin to think of positive vices and iniquities of deep dye. But the “flesh” is only another term for ”self”. Self is a very subtle thing, a many-sided thing. It includes self-interest, self-glory, self-preservation, self-realisation, self-advancement - all those considerations of influence and good-standing and prestige and following, and being understood and spoken well of. The phases of “self” are legion, and they, every one of them, serve Satan.

Moreover, they serve him in this other sense, that they divide the rights of God and usurp the place of God: and therefore, wherever there is the slightest suggestion or insinuation of self, the Glory of God is obscured and the Cross has got to be applied there. The Cross is not applied in the work of God just because God wants us out of it for the sake of having us out of it, to humble, to crush, to break us; no, it has this great end in view - HIS GLORY. And our glory depends upon His glory. We cannot come to glory until He receives His rights in the universe; and the Cross is the way there. The Holy Spirit demands the ground of the Cross in us, because the glory of God is in view. The Cross, dear friend, means utter devotion to God’s glory. The Holy Spirit only works on that ground - He has only ever worked on that ground. A pure work of the Holy Spirit, completely immune from Satan’s touch requires the Cross, which means complete separation from all of the old ground.

Perhaps you have read the wonderful record of what God did in China through His servant, Dr. Jonathan Goforth - a work of the Spirit in mighty revival. I think I have read few things which are more literal fulfilments of words which are often mentioned amongst us: “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and will shew thee great things, and difficult, which thou knowest not” (Jeremiah 33:3). When this true man of God arrived at a certain place, he was told immediately that he must not expect anything there such as he had had elsewhere, for there were difficulties. But there the Holy Spirit came in, and under His constraint different people got up and confessed such things as were never suspected - confessed them in public - in a mighty movement of God. But the Spirit of the Lord kept very short accounts with His servant, and every suggestion and insinuation of the Devil through his “flesh” had to be met. 

[Shammu]

Now, only the Holy Spirit, in the power of the victorious Christ and by virtue of His shed Blood, can meet that challenge. We do not talk glibly, lightly, frivolously, about this thing. We view the ultimate issue with joy and exultation, but we recognise that it is “not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of Hosts” (Zechariah 4:6). And if the Lord Jesus Himself needed that it should be through the Eternal Spirit that this thing was wrought out, oh, how much more we! How much more we today! We should not rush into this battle; we recognise that nothing but the mighty energizing of the Holy Spirit could meet this great issue and challenge. But we recognise also with confidence that the Holy Spirit is the minister of the victorious Christ, and that His very advent is on the ground of that victory, to work that victory out in the universe; and we thank God for it. Why has the Holy Spirit come? Oh! not that we might have blessings and what we call power and influence and opportunity and service. No, He has come as Representative and Agent of the Christ, who has secured the rights of God in His own Person. To bring about the recognition and realisation of the rights in this earth - that is the work of the Holy Spirit.

The second thing that comes out of this is that the Holy Spirit always demands the ground of the Cross for His activity, if the glory of God is in view. But then, the Cross registers the removal of all that serves Satan. Now, it would take a long time to cover that ground again to see the things that served Satan. What was it that served Satan in Cain? Covetousness, personal ambition, jealousy, pride! That worked itself out in the murder of Abel - but the murder of Abel as an expression of hatred for God (although Cain may have been blind to the deeper nature of the thing). What was it that served Satan in Balaam? Greed, covetousness, world-gain. The Cross registers the removal by destruction of all that served Satan, and for us it is gathered up in one word: SELF.

What a wide word that is - what a comprehensive word! The stronger term is “the flesh”. Some people do not know what you mean when you talk about the “flesh”. They begin to think of positive vices and iniquities of deep dye. But the “flesh” is only another term for ”self”. Self is a very subtle thing, a many-sided thing. It includes self-interest, self-glory, self-preservation, self-realisation, self-advancement - all those considerations of influence and good-standing and prestige and following, and being understood and spoken well of. The phases of “self” are legion, and they, every one of them, serve Satan.

Moreover, they serve him in this other sense, that they divide the rights of God and usurp the place of God: and therefore, wherever there is the slightest suggestion or insinuation of self, the Glory of God is obscured and the Cross has got to be applied there. The Cross is not applied in the work of God just because God wants us out of it for the sake of having us out of it, to humble, to crush, to break us; no, it has this great end in view - HIS GLORY. And our glory depends upon His glory. We cannot come to glory until He receives His rights in the universe; and the Cross is the way there. The Holy Spirit demands the ground of the Cross in us, because the glory of God is in view. The Cross, dear friend, means utter devotion to God’s glory. The Holy Spirit only works on that ground - He has only ever worked on that ground. A pure work of the Holy Spirit, completely immune from Satan’s touch requires the Cross, which means complete separation from all of the old ground.

Perhaps you have read the wonderful record of what God did in China through His servant, Dr. Jonathan Goforth - a work of the Spirit in mighty revival. I think I have read few things which are more literal fulfilments of words which are often mentioned amongst us: “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and will shew thee great things, and difficult, which thou knowest not” (Jeremiah 33:3). When this true man of God arrived at a certain place, he was told immediately that he must not expect anything there such as he had had elsewhere, for there were difficulties. But there the Holy Spirit came in, and under His constraint different people got up and confessed such things as were never suspected - confessed them in public - in a mighty movement of God. But the Spirit of the Lord kept very short accounts with His servant, and every suggestion and insinuation of the Devil through his “flesh” had to be met. 

[Shammu]

Chapter 5 - The Altar, The House, The Name

Let us now gather up in a positive presentation - even at the risk of some repetition - what we believe to be the essence and substance of that testimony for which the Lord has ever reacted, and would now react, in a day of declension. There are three words which represent this testimony, and these three words may be clearly seen to govern and interpret the whole of the Scriptures. There is no part of the Scriptures which does not relate in some way to one or more of the objects which these words denote. They are, in the Old Testament: THE ALTAR, THE HOUSE, THE NAME; or, in the New Testament: THE BLOOD, THE CHURCH, THE SOVEREIGNTY. 

THE ALTAR AND THE BLOOD

Every reaction and new beginning that has come from God has been by an altar. The first of these was that of Abel, although there must have been an earlier shedding of blood, when the consciousness of being uncovered led to God’s clothing or covering the expelled two with skins of animals. Then, when that world was wiped out in judgment by the flood, a new beginning was made with Noah’s altar. When there was nothing of a distinctive character speaking for God in the days of Abram, the Lord laid His hand upon him, called him out as an elect instrument, and brought him to an elect land; and there, with the man and the place of His new beginning brought together, an altar was erected. There was a brief lapse when Abram went down to Egypt, but on his return the original ground was re-taken with a reconstructed altar.

Thus a distinctive seed was marked out; and some four hundred years later, that seed being constituted a corporate testimony against world-wide misrepresentation of God, an altar was the conspicuous factor, initially and continuously. It is significant that, although many thousands of lambs were slain on the night of the separation of that people from Egypt, the record always speaks in the singular, never in the plural. It was always “the lamb” or “a lamb”. In God’s sight there was only One Lamb, and although every threshold was an altar, there was only one Altar in Heaven’s view. (The word in Exodus 12:22, translated “bason”, is in the Hebrew “threshold”.)

This truth of new beginnings with the altar can be clearly seen afterward in the case of the receiving of the Law and the pattern of the heavenly things by Moses. The great altar of the Tabernacle and Temple governed the life of Israel for many years, until the times of declension set in, and then each movement back toward God was marked by the altar coming again into its place. It was so in Elijah’s stand, in 1 Kings 18; and it was so with the revival under Hezekiah, in 2 Chronicles 30. It was so again with Josiah - 2 Chronicles 35. But hardly had Josiah passed off the scene than his work fell in ruins. Judgment fell, Jerusalem was destroyed, the Temple burnt, and the people went into captivity. After seventy years a remnant returned, and we read in Ezra 3:3 that the first thing that the remnant did was to “set the altar in its place”.

This is God’s new work in reaction. We have not gathered in every instance, but only enough to indicate, and perhaps establish a recognition of the principle. We leave the matter of the altar there for the time being, while we consider the essential element in the altar, which is the BLOOD.

The testimony of the altar is the testimony of the Blood. As we approach this sacred thing, may we urge our readers to give it the most careful heed? Here we touch the heart of everything. There has been nothing so assailed as the testimony of the Blood: by ridicule, by a sneer, by intellectual superiority, from one direction; by an ignorant and false refinement which pretends to be shocked, from another; by a merely rationalistic and philosophical interpretation, which sees no more than a crude system of ritual and rite by which a universal religious instinct expresses itself - a form and idea which belongs to times of immaturity and unenlightenment - from yet a third; these and many other modes of assault from its opponents. Then from its would-be friends it suffers in numerous ways, ranging from the ritualistic and sacerdotal debasement, which has names and forms without life and power, to the other swing of the pendulum, marked by a superficial, cheap, frivolous, noisy, jazz-chorus singing about this most holy and sacred thing – “the precious Blood”.

There is nothing in the universe more bitterly hated and more terribly feared by the adversary than the Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. But if it is to be a mighty operative factor in life and service, faith must have as intelligent a basis concerning it as possible; and we are especially concerned with the vocation of the people of God here! Let us then see what the Blood stands for.

[Shammu]

THE MEANING OF THE BLOOD

There are two aspects of this whole matter of the Blood. One (concerning which we have already said something) is that a death has taken place, and in that death one whole kind of humanity has, in the mind of God, been set aside. This relates to “Him who knew no sin... made... sin on our behalf” (“in our stead”) (2 Cor. 5:21).

The other, about which we shall now speak more particularly, is that which sets forth the inherently incorruptible life of God’s Son made flesh. If all that is said about the Blood relates only to death, then its sacredness cannot be understood, but becomes a supreme problem. We have dealt with this aspect in the book entitled “The Centrality and Universality of the Cross”, but we will point out the essential elements here:

Firstly, let us note the sacredness of life as in the blood. We are now familiar with the scriptural teaching that “the life... is in the blood” (Lev. 17:1), and “the blood is the life” (Deut. 12:23). There is a tremendous emphasis in Scripture upon the sacredness of blood. Indeed the word ‘soul’ is often used interchangeably with both ‘blood’ and ‘life’ and all the characteristics and values of the soul are associated in the same way with the ‘blood’ and the ‘life’. But the blood as the life is related in a peculiar way to God, as representing His specific prerogatives. Thus the whole matter is gathered up in a reservation and a provision as laid down in Leviticus and in John’s Gospel.

In Leviticus the Lord repeatedly stresses that blood is not to be drunk. This role would be broken under a penalty of death (Lev. 7:26,27, 17:10-12). The law concerning blood and its sacredness was carried so far that if a man went hunting and killed a quarry, he was to pour out the blood on the ground and cover it over with dust (Lev. 17:13). He was not to leave the blood exposed, but honour it, show it the same reverence, as he would the body of a fallen man.

Now does it not strike you with a great force of significance that, when we have repeatedly read: “Ye shall eat no manner of blood... Whosoever eateth any blood... shall be cut off”, then we turn and read in John 6:5: ‘Except ye drink the blood of the Son of Man, ye have no life’? Surely the very first thing which this implies is that the whole question of life has been shut up by God to the Person and Cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is the life of the Person, and gives to the Person a uniqueness and distinctiveness which no other in history has ever had. Then it gives to the Cross of the Lord Jesus a unique and supreme meaning and value, in that it was there that He shed His Blood and poured forth His life; releasing that life to be received by all who believed on the Person and accepted the meaning of His Cross.

The spiritually blind Jewish religious leaders of John 6 would naturally be very scandalized at His words about drinking blood, and would revert to the tradition of the letter of Leviticus. This would be because on the one hand they did not realise the meaning of that reservation, and on the other hand they did not recognise who Jesus was. To recognise the Lord Jesus is to be lifted above law into life.

The thought of the sacredness of the Blood as the life is that of the Divine relationship of it: that is, that it is bound up with the Lord and no man can touch it. All of a piece with this is bound up with the Lord and no man can touch it. All of a piece with this is –

THE HOLINESS OF THE BLOOD

We are familiar with the injunctions concerning the spotlessness of the offerings of old – “without spot, or blemish”. There was a sense in which the priests were expert fault-finders! Their business was to find fault if they could. The discovery of a blemish in a proffered sacrifice meant its immediate rejection. Their eyes were as the eyes of God in this matter. A beast was passed only after the most scrupulous investigation, when the formula ‘It is perfect’ was pronounced over it.

Such, likewise, then, was the blood, and this is the testimony of the holiness of the life of the Lord Jesus, and consequently of the nature of that Divine deposit within the born-anew child of God. We are not perfect or spotless, but the life from Him in us is, and by its vital activity through faith and obedience we are to be conformed to His image, and are assured that one day we shall be like Him. Blessed be God, we have the earnest of perfection. This precious Blood does cleanse.

This leads us at this point to say a brief word on

[Shammu]

THE SHEDDING AND SPRINKLING OF THE BLOOD.

If we are not mistaken, the shedding relates to the whole question of sin, guilt, death, judgment; and by the shedding there is remission, and the whole ground of salvation is secured.

The sprinkling is that by which we are brought into living vocational fellowship with God. The Tabernacle and Priesthood of old represented, not only Israel’s salvation, but Israel’s priestly ministry in the nations. They were meant to be “a kingdom of priests”, and God’s ministering instrument among and to all nations.

Hence there was a special significance given to the sprinkling of the blood. Although the Tabernacle was perfect as a structure; although the “pattern” was carried out to the last detail; although the priesthood was complete in number and adornment: nothing and no one could function until every part - altar, laver, table, curtains, candlestick, golden altar, mercy-seat, vessels, instruments, ear, thumb, toe, etc. - had been sprinkled with the blood. It was regarded as a higher function to catch the blood for sprinkling even than to slay the sacrifice and thus shed the blood.

Nothing lives in the service and ministry of God, save in virtue of sprinkled blood. Oh, that men would see this today! The most perfect structure, the most complete outfit, the most ornate edifice, the most extensive organization, the most fastidious order, and the most devout purpose will all fail to function in the eternal interests of God, apart from the virtue of the precious Blood of the Lord Jesus. The Holy Spirit - the Fire of God - is indispensable to spiritual life and energy, and He only comes where that Blood has been sprinkled. The Blood and the Spirit are one, and always go together - one as the preparation, the other as the attestation. Calvary precedes Pentecost. The Cross is the way to the glorifying. To be crucified with Christ is to have put away that “flesh” upon which the Holy Oil may not come. God is never going to quicken and vitalise what He has for ever put away; neither will He glorify and use in His service that which is of man.

Whatever the means and methods or necessities which come in their course, the one all-inclusive object of the Divine reactions is to have that in the earth which is wholly and undividedly of God. To this end it is essential that the Cross be wrought so deeply into the experience of the Lord’s servants that they shall come to utter despair as to themselves and all else, and send up a full heart-cry for the fullness of the Holy Spirit. To such a crisis the Lord will work by all manner of means, slowly breaking down all other ground of confidence, and writing ‘failure’ on all other resource.

The testimony of the Blood, the Cross, then, is the testimony of that which is uniquely, wholly, sacredly of God in absolute holiness.

THE INCORRUPTIBILITY OF THE BLOOD

The next related factor in the Blood as the Life is its incorruptibility and indestructibility. These elements go together and are one. What is incorruptible is indestructible.

This is a life over which death has no power. Death has been met in the power of this life. Hades has been entered and plundered in the power of this life. Satan and his entire kingdom have had their might exhausted by the power of this life. He who was and is this Life, now lives for evermore, as the Testimony to the universal triumph of His own Blood over every force that has stood in the way of God’s end.

By this imperishable life He has perfected salvation. Nothing of old was ever perfect, because the mediators constantly changed by death; death breaking in all the time meant no completeness. But this High Priest perfects for ever, because He lives after the power of an endless, “indissoluble” life. Therefore He is able to save to the uttermost, i.e., the ultimate and final end (Heb. 7:16, 23-25).

By this imperishable life He has bound His own to Himself. They share this life by new birth, and they will never die. Death is not cessation of being; it is something spiritual. Life triumphant over death is spiritual, and means ascendancy over sin, self, Satan, death. In other words, it is power and victory.

By this indestructible life the Lord Jesus has inaugurated a ministry and a work which will persist to its ultimate consummation, in spite of every force of earth and hell which may be hurled against it. Mighty empires and powerful hierarchies have been brought to ruins in setting themselves against that which He said He would build. “The gates [i.e., counsels] of Hades” have NOT prevailed, intensely as they have striven.

It is a blessed thing to be in and a part of that work which shall abide for ever. For a man’s work to go to pieces when he is withdrawn is no compliment to him. It only means that it was MAN'S work, not God’s. Like kingdoms, men rise and wane. Are we seeking to make a name for OURSELVES? This is very short-sighted, at best. The testimony to which God is reacting relates to a work which stands and persists when every destructive force has spent itself. This testimony, and such a work, is in virtue of the Blood of the Lord Jesus.

There are all kinds of alarms today because of rapid and drastic changes. Historic creeds are being treated as mere scraps of paper, and that by leading ecclesiastical representatives. Hoary institutions and traditions are rapidly losing their hold and influence. Organized Christianity is markedly on the wane. The maintenance of the religious system is demanding all the resource, acumen, wit, ingenuity and even cunning of men. There never were so many 'attractions', schemes, popularising methods, etc., to keep up the ‘church’ (?). Even in fairly evangelical quarters the appeals for help are so numerous that it is becoming - as someone has said - a matter of not being able to afford to go to church.

All this and much more speaks of failure and defeat, but the Lord will have that in the earth which is His triumph. To “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3) is something more than to contend for orthodoxy of doctrine; to champion an evangelical creed; to be a ‘fundamentalist’. It is to recognise and fervently seek to secure for God that upon which His own heart is set: namely, a people of the Altar, the Cross, the Blood. A people who have been crucified with Christ in spiritual reality and apprehension, and whose life is an abiding testimony to Calvary’s victory over all Christ’s foes, within and without, and from whom there flows to the ends of the earth the stream of Divine, holy, mighty, energizing and indestructible life.