We
come now to consider the assembly itself in its living operation,- as filling
(in the power of the Spirit, as alone it can) the place for which God designed
it. This place it must, of course, fill, in order to satisfy and to be
practically owned of Him; and the ruin of the Church, which all that have the
mind of God must acknowledge, has not lowered His standard for it, nor set
aside one word that has gone out of His lips. Gracious too, He is, and will be,
or who could stand before Him? but this does not imply the toleration of even
the least departure from His word, which would mean the giving up of His
holiness and truth, and of His love itself.
That the Church has failed,
miserably failed, is a solemn truth indeed; and this failure has altered
largely the circumstances in which we are placed today, and encompassed our
path with difficulties, while it has deprived us largely of the help that we
should have gained from one another. But it compels no one of us to
disobedience to the least word that God has spoken, nor deprives us of either
the wisdom or power necessary to "stand perfect and complete in all the will of
God." Difficulties are only means for us of realizing the more what He is for
us : as the spies said of the gigantic enemies that Israel would be called to
encounter in taking possession of the land that had been promised them, "they
shall be bread to us": for faith is strengthened by those demands upon it which
only expose the weakness and bankruptcy of unbelief.
We are to look at the
assembly, then, according to the character which the word of God has given it,
quite unhindered by any reasonings derived from changed conditions of the time
in which we live. And the assembly of which we are now to speak is not the
Church of God at large, but the local assembly: which in God's thought,
however, is that which represents it in the locality, being those who alone can
actually assemble, the practical gathering together of the members of Christ as
such.
These members, were they gathered all together, would show us the
whole assembly as the body of Christ, and thus each assembly is the body of
Christ in the place in which it is: a divinely-constructed organization, that
is - the only organization God ever owns as of Him, and all-sufficient to give
us as Christians all that can be rightly expected or desired in organization.
Of this, more presently: the first thing we have to notice now is the
individual members, who are spoken of individually in such terms as the whole
body is. That is to say, as the whole body is joined together ond united to the
Head by the one Spirit which pervades it all, and brings every member into
living and practical relation with every other and with Christ,- so each
individual also is in his own person a picture of the whole. Indwelt of the
Holy Ghost, "he that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit," with this effect,
that "your bodies are the members of Christ" (i Cor. Vi. 15, 17): each and the
whole of every individual belongs to Christ, and there is no one, and no part
of any one, permitted to be secular or self-controlled. Thus not only is the
white garment of practical righteousness to cover us completely, but the
"ribband of blue," the heavenly colour, is to be seen upon the borders of it,
just where it comes in contact with the earth.(Num. xv. 38).
If we are not
thus, in the sincere intent and purpose of our hearts, recognizing our whole
lives as to be lived for Him,- our every faculty of mind and body to be His -
ourselves taken out of the world by sanctification to Himself, to be sent into
it again as His representatives (John xvii. i6-i5),- then the moral basis of
all right fellowship is lacking with us,- of fellowship with Himself, and
necessarily with one another. In this case we do not and cannot fill our places
in the assembly, however much we take part with the rest in the meetings of His
people : for the place is essentially a spiritual one, and can only be
spiritually filled. Let us remind ourselves that there is nothing that is
merely negative in our lives and ways, but that our Lord's words are true in
particular as in general, that "he that is not with Me is against Me." If in
any one habit or practice of our lives we are not with Him, we are in that
respect against Him. We are in the miserable condition thus of being divided
against ourselves, and as a consequence shall find a loss of vigour and
competency, a lack of ability to make progress in the things of God, and even
to stand in the presence of the enemy. It is as to things that (abstractly
considered) were lawful enough, that the apostle marks off things that were
"not expedient"; and immediately he adds, as applying to these: "all things are
lawful for me; but I will not be brought under the power of any" (i Cor. vi.
i2). Lawful things might thus develop a power to which even such an one as he
might have cause to fear becoming captive.
Now here begins the question of
fellowship with one another. Are we in true and whole-hearted fellowship with
Christ ourselves? Have we no fence fencing Him off from certain portions of our
lives? Has obedience with us no secret limitations? Have we no division between
mine and Thine with Him, but do we know the blessedness of realizing that to
have all ours His, is the only way ourselves to enjoy it and find satisfying
sweetness in it?
Thus indeed will our bodies be the members of Christ. Our
hands will be for His work, our feet for His errands, our lips for His
communications and His praise. Our entire lives will be the expression of
communion.
Now, whatever shortcoming we may have to confess in actual
attainment, this, and nothing less than this, must be our honest desire and
aim, or how can there be a walk with God? for how can He consent to other terms
than these? would it be for His glory or our good, that He should do so?
Think, then, of what is implied in the "body of Christ," where the Spirit of
Christ links all together in harmonious subjection to the will of the Head, and
so in a living unity of the members with one another. And this is plainly the
practical "unity of the Spirit" which the apostle bids us to "endeavour to
keep." It is certainly not the unity of the body simply that he means; but it
is assuredly the unity of that which makes it in any proper sense the body -
the body fitted to Christ the Head. And this is what is to be seen in the
assembly of God, if this is to fulfill its proper character,- a living,
speaking, working unity of obedience, inspired by devoted love. What a
testimony to Him of "two or three" gathered together in this spirit! and it was
thus at the beginning, when it could be said that "the multitude of them that
believed were of one heart and of one soul; neither said any of them that aught
of the things that he possessed was his own": the true spirit at all times,
whatever may be the difference as to the manner of its expression. Where
something like this is not, already men have "their own things" to seek, and
"not the things of Jesus Christ"; the various interests lead in various ways,
the wisdom of the world comes in to secure them, and the door is opened for
every kind of departure. It is only the sense of what is ours in Christ, where
all have all in common, and the joy is but increased by sharing it with
others,- ours, where all abides and no room is left for the cares which make
man a weary worker for himself, the hardest of masters: it is only here that
the heart is fenced from the close-surrounding evil, and fenced in for flower
and fruit for Him who looks to find in us "the travail of His soul."
Thus
we may again see why Philadelphians are emphasized as those that keep Christ's
word. Communion can only exist where the heart is held by the revelations of
God's grace; and the soul that is kept in communion is that which is sustained
by the fresh manna, gathered every day.
The reading-meetings are thus a
great test of the state of an assembly; for it is there, if things be right,
that the knowledge gathered in whatever way is tested and made sure by that
personal conference and comparison which help so largely in making it the
realized possession of the soul. Here we may learn, too, if there be the
freedom and candour of brotherly love, the needs to which the truth ministers,
and the ability to use it for real edification. It is of immense value to test
in this way how far we have got the truth, while by this means what has been
learned by each is thrown into the common fund, to enrich the whole. Those who
know least would be surprised to realize how much the questions suggested by
their own need may help in various ways the very people who answer them. And
this is only one of the many modes in which the waterer is watered - the
minister is ministered to.
The reading-meeting is never, therefore, made
needless or of little value by whatever multiplicity there may be of more
detailed and connected teaching. Nay, all this creates a special need for the
reading-meeting, in order that the food laid before the whole may be
individually digested and assimilated. Here, however, any lack of nearness to
and confidence in one another will be surely felt as a hindrance, and need of
another sort manifested to those who have eyes to see.
"The children of
this world are" indeed "wiser in their generation than the children of light."
Persons brought into the inheritance together of large worldly possessions
would soon realize the necessity of becoming acquainted with what they had so
much personal interest in. How few are there who, in the case of spiritual
wealth which God has made their own, have boldness and earnestness to lay hold
of what is theirs by any means available to them! When, over sixty years ago,
the Spirit of God began to move freshly in the hearts of His people to recover
them to one another and revive the almost lost idea of the assembly of God, the
reading-meetings were a marked and prominent sign of the awakened interest in
His word, and that the people of God as such were awaking to claim for
themselves their portion in it. No class of men could be allowed, however
gifted, however educated and sanctioned by the mass, to stand between their
souls and the possession of what was needed alike by all and designed of God
for all. Now, alas, the decay of the reading-meeting means nothing else but the
subsiding of that eager enthusiasm for the truth that then was, the lessened
consciousness of the Spirit of God, in each and all His own, to give each for
himself the power to acquire possession. The flood-tide is gone, and the
diminished stream begins to confine itself to the old channels.
We need to
proclaim again that God never designed "theology" to be for a class of
theologians, but all the treasures of His word to be for all His people,- not a
thing in it to be hidden, save from the eyes of the careless and indifferent,
those who are willing to exchange their heavenly birthright for a mess of the
world's pottage. We need once more to assert that teachers are only a pledge,
on God's part, of His eagerness to have all to know,- not that He has
restricted to these the possession of any kind of spiritual knowledge. Teaehers
are only to show that there, in the living fount from which they drew, is the
living water for all, as free for others as for themselves. They are only the
truth of God's word made to stand out in blazon before the eyes of those who
have not yet found it there where He has put it for them, and with this for a
motto of encouragement to those who have faith in a God that cannot lie "Every
one that seeketh, findeth."
The success of teachers is shown by their
ability to make others independent of them; when men say to them as the
Samaritans to the woman of Sychar, "Now we believe, not because of thy saying";
and in proportion as the Church of God by their means is made to realize its
ability for self-edification. As the apostle says that Christ has given gifts
unto men,- "some, apostles; and some prophets; and some evangelists; and some
pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints unto the work of
ministry, unto the edification of the body of Christ, until we all come into
the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect
man., unto the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ" (Eph. iv. i
i-13). That is, the "work of ministry "-and this is left open to the largest
construction - is what the saints as a whole are to be perfected unto. Every
saint is free to "covet earnestly the best gifts" (i Cor. xii. 3!), and
responsible to use all the ability that he has, of whatever kind, to enrich
others with it. "The manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to
profit withal" (verse 7); and if there are special evangelists, all are free
and called upon, each in his measure, to evangelize; if there are special
teachers, all are free and responsible to com-municate to others what God has
given them of His truth. Love to each other, love to souls, is to have liberty
and be encouraged everywhere.
How blessed would be an assembly of saints in
this condition ! Every one realizing that the fullness of all spiritual
knowledge was open to him to enjoy, - the best gifts were his to covet,- that
he was, by the simple wondrous fact of his endowment with the Spirit, the
ordained minister of Christ to the world, the ordained servant and helper of
his brethren How intolerable is the thought of class restrictions to limit and
hinder the grace of God in His people! Yet, alas, into which, sensibly or
insensibly, they so readily sink down! The development of all gift is
necessarily hindered by it; and this is largely the reason why so few among us
are going forth to labour in the ample fields on every side, and why the
gatherings develop so little strength and stability. We need not talk about a
"laity," to have one. Let God's people sink down into indolent acquiescence in
their inability for their spiritual privileges, and little gift of any kind is
likely to develop among them. Those that can be fed only with the spoon are
infants or invalids. On the other hand, where spiritual life is strongest we
shall be most fully conscious of our need of one another. For spiritual
feebleness means always a strong world-element, and occupations, aims,
pleasures, in which as children of God, we can have no fellowship - can be no
help to one another. Our spiritual links become proportionately theoretical,
formal, sentimental. But where life is practical and earnest, its needs will be
felt and the grace realized which has united us together. Life is, wherever we
find it in nature, in conflict with death; and organization, which is its
constant accompaniment, is the embattlement of its forces against this. Nor is
organization a sacrifice of individuality: every part of the body is distinct
from the rest, has its own work and responsibility; and only by maintaining
this individuality can the welfare of the whole be maintained. Every one has a
place to fill that no other can fill: every one is necessary. Good it is to
remember this, as to ourselves and as to every other. If we forget it, we
cannot by this escape from the consequences.
The Church of God is therefore
an organization, the body of Christ,- the body on earth of an unseen Head in
heaven. The body is always looked at as upon earth, just as the Head is in
heaven; and thus, as governed by that Head, one with Him as joined by the
uniting Spirit, it is His representative in the world, to be the expression of
His mind, His will, His nature. This every individual is, of course; but that
is not enough: it has pleased Him to link these individuals together: and thus
even individual duty is not performed, if one's place is not filled in the
body, of which we are part. There is to be an "epistle of Christ," (not
"epistles," as it is practically often, sometimes actually, read) which, the
apostle says to the Corinthians, "ye are." (2 Cor. iii. 3)
If then we are
livingly linked together in such a manner, and for such a purpose, how
necessary it must be that, as gathered together, we should habitually seek His
mind, learn what He would have us do as yoke-fellows together, how we are to
sustain and supplement each other in His service. The value of organization in
this way seems, strangely enough perhaps, least appreciated by those who should
know it best - by those who have had recovered to them by the grace of God the
knowledge of His own perfect organization for such work as His, which demands
the very utmost of our united energies!
"Organization "is every where
appreciated among Christian workers in the various bodies of Christendom today:
nothing can be done without organization. So abundant is the manufacture of
them now, that they are in danger of becoming parasitical growths upon the
bodies themselves from which they sprang, and of over - burdening at last what
they were designed to buttress and support. There are in fact some very serious
reasons for the distrust we have (some of us) learned to entertain of them.
They are too loose and large in some ways - undisciplined and destroyers of
discipline : all distinctive faith is in danger of being swamped, by many of
them, through their loose association of the most contradictory elements, -
converted and unconverted, Christians with the deniers of Christ, in an
"unequal yoke" forbidden by God Himself under the severest penalties. (2 Cor.
vi. 14-18.)
And then on the other hand, by their mere human artificial
rules, they oppress the conscience almost equally, and substitute the will of
the majority, or officialism, for the guidance of the Spirit of God. With all
this we have learned so to link the very thought of organization, as to look
upon every suggestion of it with more than suspicion as necessarily unspirithal
and evil,-at least, outside of and so against Scripture.
But what then
shall we do with the thought of the "body of Christ," which is most surely that
of an organization, as it is also scriptural and divine? That common
relationship which we have to one another binds us to "consider one another to
provoke to love and to good works" (Heb. x. 24); with which the apostle
conjoins the "not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner
of some is, but exhorting one another." Do not such words imply the opportunity
given for more "consideration" of individual needs, and more occupation with
the Lord's work among us, and that in our "assem-bling together," than is
almost any where found among us? more than "open meetings" or reading meetings
or prayer-meetings, as these exist among us, can unitedly supply?
Must not
fellowship with one another be sadly limited in its range, if there is not
fellowship in the Lord's work among us and around us? if there be no gatherings
to consider this? and such not exceptional, casual, something supererogatory,
as it were, but earnestly and heartily entered into as essential to our
corporate duties, and thus to our right spiritual health itself?
Right and
left of us, in all the denominations round, Christians come together to
consider the Lord's work, and express their interest in and identify themselves
with it. Is it a necessity laid upon us any where as two or three gathered to
the Lord's name, that we should be cut off so largely as we are from all
gathering together for such purposes? I cannot but believe that wherever such
lack exists, it is a most serious one. It tends to make our interest in one
another partial and exceptional; to deprive us of much of the good that should
come of the differences that are among us which make mutual help so necessary,
and in its ministry so serviceable in binding us together; it tends to make our
Christian activities more desultory and feebler; to deprive us of many doors
that would be found open to us; and to expose us to the reproach of being (as a
whole) out of the way of usefulness. Why is it that those who have the gospel,
it must be allowed, in a simplicity at least as great as anywhere, should be
even capable of being assailed with just such reproaches? Why, in fact, have we
been left so much behind in the evangelization of the world by others with much
less light, but zealous in their cooperation with one another for such a
purpose? Have we been too heavily freighted by the truth we carried? If it were
dead truth, probably, but not if it were living Truth, that is known in the
power of it, is "such a weight as wings are to a bird, and had we gone in the
same zeal after the same class that these have sought, no ecclesiastical
prejudice could have robbed us of the blessing. The hindrance, of whatever
nature, has been something else than this. But again, has there not developed
among us a dangerous tendency, on slight occasion, to break up?
Is it out
of place to remind ourselves, that Philadelphia must be that - a "brotherhood"?
Have we not failed in cultivating that spirit of brotherly fellowship of which
the hand to hand occupation in the Lord's work is certainly a very important
part? We have, no doubt, left room for the development of gift, and been
unfeignedly thankful to see evangelists, teachers, and others raised up among
us; but have we not lacked in seeking, in the way stated, to make the work of
the Lord a matter of common responsibility and widest fellowship?
"Business
meetings," even "brothers' meetings," will not fill this gap. We need something
wide enough to take in all the Lord's interests on earth, free enough to give
every one place in it, practical enough to concern itself mainly with home
duties and responsibilities that lie upon us in connection with the places in
which we live and the spheres in which we move day by day. We want something
which will bring us continually into remembrance of our individual duties as
the Lord's workers, be suggestive, encouraging, and helpful as to our
fulfillment of them, fit us more together as really co-members of the body of
Christ, make us realize His mind for us as a whole, and form it in us, give us
practical wisdom for the days in which we live, that we may be like the men of
Issachar who came to Hebron, to make David king, "who had understanding of the
times, to know what Israel ought to do" (i Chron. xii. 32), - something that
may develop all the truth we have into practical expression. I am persuaded
that if the Church of God be, as it plainly is, an organizatior, we have yet to
use it for all the purposes of an organization, and that charged with the
responsibility of representing Christ, and being the practical expression of
His mind on earth. And if we be but "two or three" in each place, instead of
thousands, while acknowledging sadly, as we must, the broken condition of
things, we are just as much responsible to show forth in our measure what the
Church of God should be:- a living, united, working, cooperating membership; a
body, moving in unison with the mind of the unseen Head, in the energy of the
Spirit, which has formed and which inspires it. No one suggests that we can all
read our Bibles at home, and that there is no need of our coming together for
this purpose. Nor that we can pray in our houses and our families and have no
need of prayer-meetings in the assembly. Why should the work-meeting, the means
of communion in practice, be the only thing thought unnecessary.
Yet for
lack of this, the prayer-meetings become vague, general, with little definite
application to needs that are not known, and to service which is merely
personal, private, or shared by few, with which communion is not sought, and
little possible. Our reading meetings lack similarly the point of personal
application, the freshness of interest which is supplied by the incidents of
service unknown save to individuals. We are in fact, largely, individuals,
touching each other at a few points, hidden from each other in most; save as
personal friendships join us here and there, and which, without the larger
interests to steady them, tend to form us into parties, and in times of
pressure break us up into them.
How little do we "consider one another, to
provoke unto love and to good works"! how pointless, from lack of knowledge, do
exhortations of this kind fall! How little in general are we near enough to
each in our inner lives to encourage or give opportunity to make them! Yet as
children of God and members of Christ, we are in a relationship to one another
nearer and more abiding than any other can be!
We need to draw nearer
together as Christians practically, not merely theoretically. In the stress of
the world upon us we need to take each other by the hand, and strengthen each
other's hands in God. In the presence of evil we need to show, not a broken,
but an embattled front. In a world away from God but over which His mercies
linger, we need a more practical fellowship with the gospel, and encouragement
to every one to take earnest part in ministering it. In all that concerns the
Church of God we must have that which will give us better opportunity to know
that we are "members one of another." And we need, as partakers of the mind of
Christ, to give this more united practical expression.
Membership in the
body of Christ means service: every part of a "body" is in necessary
relationship with the whole, and there is no independency any where; each needs
and serves and is served by the whole. God has acted upon this principle
throughout nature; and nowhere more fully than among men. If "it is not good
that man should be alone," God makes for him as a helper, not the repetition,
but the complement of himself. He unites the weaker to the stronger, that even
by this weakness his strength may be better served. She is given him to be
ministered to, that by this she may minister to him also, drawing him out of
himself, developing his heart,- a blessing which all he gives cannot repay. The
needs and inequalities of men similarly have built up society by division of
labour; and even the regions of the earth are thus helpful by the difference of
their productions in binding together the nations of the earth. The city is the
highest development of this principle; and if man departed from God built the
first, yet God has prepared for His people the final one: a "city which hath
foundations," and will abide.
Thus ministry is God's law of nature, as it
is the expression of the nature of God Himself, which is love. "Love seeketh
not her own;" "by love" we "serve one another." Love is freedom, happiness, the
opposite of all legality, the spirit of heaven, conferring and reflecting
blessing. And that fullest description of love which we find in Corinthians is
enshrined in that of the "body of Christ" as its proper home and the means of
its expression. Here the necessity of all parts to one another is just what
provides for and makes necessary the constant out-going of love to one another.
There are some small animal half-organisms that grow by division; but the
higher the organism the more its unity is enforced by the abhorance of this. A
part lost is not supplied again: the creature is maimed, and goes mourning for
its loss, refusing substitution.
Such is the body of Christ then - the
highest pattern of such fitting together that can be: and if but two or three
can practically be together, this does not free them from the obligation to all
the members. Love would abhor the thought of this as freedom. and it is only at
peril to ourselves that we can act upon it. Love would indeed hold fast
therefore the local expression of the greater thing, not set it aside for the
unpractical and impossible; yet would it see that this did not in fact
degenerate into merely partial, and thus sectarian, display. It would still
look out and beyond, as partaking of the divine love towards all, and
unforgetfulness of the tie existing. It would look out over the whole field of
Christ's interests and identify itself in heart with all; seeking ever to widen
the outlook and extend the sphere of practical sympathy. Prayers,
intercessions, thanksgivings, would become ever with it more definite, while
yet larger in scope, and more according to the apostolic, sadly forgotten rule,
"for all men."
But more: did such a spirit animate us, we should come to
see, perhaps, that there were other "divine movements" among Christians
elsewhere; not less to be recognized as such because, mixed up with what was of
the Spirit of God, there were elements too purely human, and that the enemy was
striving to adulterate them with various evil. We should learn too that God had
lessons for us, most practical and profitable, from all around, if we were only
humble enough to learn from all sorts of teach-ers, and wise enough to be able
to "take forth the precious from the vile," the imperative condition for our
being "as God's mouth" (Jer. xv. 19). Doubtless we should find very frequently
our own rebuke in it, and this would test us much: it would show whether we
desired to believe that all wisdom was with us, and outside was only darkness;
whether, like Gideon's fleece, the dew of the Spirit was with us wholly, and
all the ground around were dry.
Not that it is meant by this to encourage a
tendency to run hither and thither, which is in general but the expression of
restlessness and want of proper occupation with our own things. Our feet are to
be kept in a known path, and not allowed in doubtful ones. It is the heart that
is to be enlarged, and not the path, which must ever be a narrow one. The
spirit of the wanderer is one too little heedful of the way with God to be able
to guide another into it. "Let him that nameth the name of the Lord depart from
iniquity" is a word which, followed in the spirit of it, will keep one from
every doubtful thing (which may, therefore, be evil) as well as from what is
known as such; and from that also in which I may see the working of the Spirit
of God, so long as it is yet mixed with that which I have to judge as contrary
to His mind.
I would press upon my own soul what I press upon others,
speaking from convictions which have been now a good while with me, and only
increase with the lapse of time, that while we rightly gather together as
worshipers, and hearers of God's word, we have nowhere perhaps, except fitfully
and exceptionally, gatherings of the whole as workers under the Lord our Head,
and to possess ourselves as such of His mind, wherever, however expressed, in
all the largeness which we must recognize His mind to have. I believe such
meetings to be necessary for the maintenance of true Christian fellowship in
its full reality, with each other and the Lord alike; and to help to make the
assemblies a living, intelligent representation, however feeble, of the "body
of Christ."
I had purposed saying more, but have perhaps reached the limit
of what the Lord would have at this time. Merely fragmentary and suggestive,
these papers must not be supposed to ignore what else in the address to
Philadelphia has been unnoticed. If He should be pleased to use them to bring
the consciences of His people more into exercise as to what is surely a special
word from Himself for the present day, the object will be attained.