"And when the
vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hand of
the potter, he made it again another vessel, as seemed
good to the potter to make it" (Jeremiah 18:4).
(So we are occupied at
this time with the second vessel being made by the
Potter. The first vessel, Israel, was marred and broken
and, for the time being at least, has been set aside, and
God has taken up the business of forming a second vessel,
which is the heavenly and spiritual Israel.
Now we have been
speaking latterly about the pattern of the new vessel,
and this pattern is the Person of God's Son - we are
"foreordained to be conformed to the image of his
Son" (Romans 8:29); so that the Lord Jesus Christ is
the pattern to which God is seeking to conform us. We
have seen the first movement in this new formation, that
is, we have been with the Lord Jesus at the Jordan for
His baptism, and we have seen that in His baptism He
stepped right out in an utter committal to God.)
We turn now to the
third chapter in the Gospel by Luke and read from verse
21: "Jesus... having been baptized, and praying,
the heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended in a
bodily form, as a dove, upon him, and a voice came out of
heaven, Thou art my beloved Son; in thee I am well
pleased."
You will notice that
the anointing of the Holy Spirit went with the baptism in
water, and there is an essential connection between these
two. In His baptism Jesus had stepped completely off the
ground of the self-life and had taken the ground of the
heavenly life with God. This position was witnessed to
immediately by heaven - "the heaven was
opened" - and was attested by His Father. Jesus
was attested by the declaration which the Father made and
by the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and it was
impossible for that to happen until He was on the other
side of baptism. The Holy Spirit is never given
to the life of the flesh. In the Old Testament it said
that the holy anointing oil should not be poured upon
man's flesh (Exodus 30:31,32), and the whole life of the
people of Israel carried a symbolism of this fact. If you
had gone amongst those people then you would never have
found anyone wearing a short skirt, for both men and
women wore long skirts, and their heads were covered.
Their very dress was a symbol of the fact that their
flesh should not appear before God.
Now I am not saying
that this has to be literally the case in our time, but
there is a good deal that symbolizes the refusal today to
accept the laws of God. Both men and women seem to think
that the more flesh they show the happier they are.
Well, of course, this
is symbolism, but it points to a spiritual principle.
Right through Israel, from the high priest to the
smallest child, the garments were long. They were
regarded as God's anointed nation and the anointing oil
could not come upon their flesh.
In the baptism of Jesus
Christ the life of the flesh was entirely repudiated. To
use the words of the Apostle Paul, He had symbolically "put
away... the old man" and, in rising out of the
water. He had "put on the new man"
(Ephesians 4:22,24). That is, He left earthly ground and
took heavenly ground with God. There was a link between
His spirit here and God in heaven.
You may think that is
an unnecessary remark, but the Holy Spirit has put a very
small fragment in here. It says: "Jesus, having been
baptized, and praying"; so that, on this
side of the grave, He was united with heaven, and, that
being so, He received the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
These are very important things for us to recognize. They
are vital to our union with Christ, and they set forth
the essential connection between baptism and the
anointing of the Holy Spirit. The normal sequence would
be that both happen at the same time; that is, there
ought to be no lapse between the meaning of baptism and
the receiving of the anointing. That was normal in the
New Testament. There were one or two exceptions, but they
were not the normal thing.
The point is that you
and I ought to follow up as quickly as possible with this
matter. I think I would be right in saying that what has
become the normal is a division between these two things.
My own experience is the experience of many of the Lord's
servants: there was a gap of years between my baptism and
my coming to know the anointing of the Holy Spirit, and
that gap meant a great deal of limitation which was only
removed when I came into the knowledge of the anointing.
What I am trying to say
is this: We should never regard the beginning of our
Christian life with baptism as just something in itself,
and that later on we are to receive the anointing of the
Holy Spirit. From God's standpoint there is no such thing
as a second blessing. I have been asked if I have
received the 'second blessing', and my reply is: 'No. I
have come into the first blessing.' It should be like
that.
Well, if we take the
Lord Jesus as our example, these two things really are
inseparable.
But, even if it takes
time, I must try to make this helpful to you. You will
understand that I am not here to try to give a full
explanation of the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. However,
because baptisms are going to take place today; there are
those who have said: 'Oh, I wish I could be baptized
again! I did not understand when I was baptized all that
I see now. Should I not be baptized again? Should I not
bring my baptism right up in line with my present
knowledge?' Well, if we were to adopt that procedure,
every bit of fresh knowledge that you received would
require a new baptism! If when you were baptized you
really meant to give your life to the Lord, and your
heart was right with Him, then God knew all that it
meant, even if you did not. I do not think anyone could
have known much less about the meaning of baptism than I
did when I was baptized. I wanted to belong to the Lord
and to go on with Him, so I was told that I ought to be
baptized. There were other people who wanted me to be
baptized more than I did myself so, in my simple way, I
just yielded to their wishes. The only thing was that I
wanted to love the Lord. Years afterwards I came to
understand a great deal more about the meaning of
baptism, so I went to the Lord about whether I ought to
be baptized again, and He just showed me that it was not
what I understood but what He understood, and that
into the first simple step that I took He put all the
meaning of that step and said 'I will lead you through
your whole life into the meaning of that simple step.'
I hope that is helpful.
Of course, it would be another matter if you were not
definitely saved when you were baptized.
I think we must leave
that there and return to our Pattern: These are the first
things that have been shown in the Pattern: the meaning
of baptism as changing our ground, leaving the whole
ground of the flesh and taking the ground of the Spirit,
and, by so doing, coming under the direct and complete
government of the Holy Spirit. By doing this we become
marked out by God - "This is My beloved son".
Thus we are distinguished by heaven and amongst men as
being in a new relationship with God. It is a very
important thing that every Christian should be a
distinguished Christian.
When we went out to the
Far East this year and arrived at the airport in Manila,
we were given a little card by the airport authorities
and on it were three letters: V.I.P. 'Very Important
Person'. Of course, that was not true, and was just a
courtesy on their part, but it may serve as an
illustration.
When Jesus stepped on
to that new ground after His baptism God gave Him that
ticket: 'Very Important Person', and that was what He was
in the eyes of heaven, though not in the eyes of men and
of this world.
Now, do you notice the
first thing that distinguished Jesus as heaven's Very
Important Person? "Then was Jesus led up of the
Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the
devil" (Matthew 4:1). If men did not recognize
who He was, hell did. Satan said: 'This is a Very
Important Person', and he paid Him very great attention
all His life. At the end of these temptations in the
wilderness it says: "He (Satan) departed from him for
a season" (Luke 4:13). It was as though
Satan said: 'You have defeated me now, but I will be back
again' and how true that was!
Heaven's Important
Persons are known by the enemy, and he will do everything
he can against that anointing. He will do it by
persecution, or he will try it by deception. There is no
numbering of the ways in which the enemy tries to counter
that anointing. But it is the anointing of the Holy
Spirit which gives us our importance - we are not
important in ourselves.
Now I think we can
leave Jordan and go on. That is the Man presented, the
first view of the Pattern that has been shown. From that
point the Pattern is described, and that description is
all gathered up in a very simple phrase, spoken by the
lips of Jesus: "I AM". That means that He is
the all-inclusive representation of the Mind of God.
Jesus Christ as a single personal reality encompasses all
the original intention of God. He is personally
universal. We have often said that when God reaches His
end, in everything that we shall see and touch, we shall
see and touch the Lord Jesus. What a glorious state that
will be! You will meet me and I will meet you, and yet we
shall not meet one another - we shall meet the Lord
Jesus. All the difficulties that we find in other people
will be gone and we shall just meet the Lord Jesus. He
will be everywhere and in all things. "A great
multitude, which no man could number" (Revelation
7:9), and yet one all-comprehensive Person, the Lord
Jesus. He is universal, timeless, without beginning and
without end. He speaks of the glory which He had with His
Father before the world was (John 17:5), and the Word is
that that glory is to be in Him "unto all
generations for ever and ever" (Ephesians 3:21).
He is universal and eternal, and yet He comes down into
history. This One of whom we are speaking as God's
Pattern, or Vessel is all that.
Just before we finish
let us look at a three-fold declaration that Jesus made
about Himself. The words are so familiar to us:
"I am the way, and the truth, and the life"
(John 14:6). He did not say: 'I have come to show you
the way, to tell you the truth.'
"I am the
way." That is not the Pattern's idea, doctrine
or theory: the way is a living Person. You can have all
the doctrine and all the theory, but not be in the way.
Difficult as it is to explain, this is what it means:
It is not by coming into the teaching of Jesus, but by
coming into Him Himself that you come into the Mind of
God. Being 'in Christ' means that you have been
introduced into the very Mind of God. When we come into
Christ we are introduced into the Mind of God. But that
is only an introduction. We are being introduced to one
another here at this time 'This is so-and-so' ... 'Oh, I
am glad to meet you' - but no one imagines that that is
all there is to know about that person. There are some
people you can know all about in five minutes, and after
that they have no more to give you, but there are others
whom it takes a whole lifetime to know. It is one thing
to be introduced to Christ, but it is going to take all
eternity to know Him. He as a personal reality is
the full embodiment of all that God has to give us. The
Apostle Paul did not say at the end of his life: 'Oh, I
do want to know more about Christ!', but he did say:
"That I may know him" (Philippians
3:10).
So Jesus says: I am the
Way. If you want to come into the full knowledge of God's
Mind, you will find it in Me. It will be a matter of
knowing Me more and more' ... "I am the
way... no one cometh unto the Father, but by me"
(John 14:6).
"I am the
truth." Again, it is not what Christ says, not
the teaching of Jesus. That may be important, but what He
is saying is: 'I am personally the truth.' All the
truth of God and heaven has become a personality, has
become embodied in a Man. When He says "I am the truth",
He is saying 'I am unique. There is not another like Me.
In the matter of the truth I am the first and the last. I
am the beginning and the end.' He is the unique presentation
of the Mind of God, the exact expression of the
Father. If we want to know the truth, it can only be in a
personal relationship with the Lord Jesus.
"I am the
life." What a vast amount that comprehends! This
takes us right back over the ages to the very beginning,
and on to the consummation. God has comprehended
everything in one thing. Is it the way, with all that
that means? Is it the truth, with all that that means?
All this is gathered into divine life. It was the
original intention of God that man should have eternal
life, and should share with Him His own life, but not one
man of all the vast multitudes that ever lived on this
earth had that life until this Man came and gave it. "I
came that they may have life" (John
10:10) ...John says: "The life was
manifested" (1 John 1:2). He is the life
and "he that hath the Son hath the life" (1
John 5:12) - not the teaching about eternal life, but the
Person Himself. You see, He is God's Pattern.
So we repeat: the
Pattern is a Person who is shown to us by the Holy
Spirit. There is one test as to whether we have seen this
Pattern. We may think we have seen because we have a lot
of Christian truth, but there is one, and only one, proof
that we have seen the Pattern. I use the words of the
Apostle Paul: "We... beholding... the Lord are
changed into the same image" (2 Corinthians
3:18-AV). The proof is that as the years go by we are
becoming more like Christ. It seems all too slow, but it
just must be like this - that more of Christ is being
manifested in us as time goes on. That would be the only
justification for our being here in this way - not that
you have a lot of notebooks full of notes (whatever you
are intending to do with them - it might be that you are
going to preach all this to someone else, but that will
not justify your having come here). The only
justification will be that, having seen the Lord, we will
be more like Him.
May the Lord make it
like that!