Reading: 1 Peter 2:1-12; Matthew 16:16-18.
We turn to the Word of the Lord in Matthew 16:16-18; the fragment of that
passage which is basic to our meditations is that in the eighteenth verse: "I
will build my church," and we will immediately seek to explain what we have in
view. And it is, that which issues from the death and resurrection of Christ,
and its real nature. It is here called by Him: "My church," and that embraces
matters no fewer and of no lesser importance than the Person of Christ, the
death and resurrection of Christ, the heavenly position and activity of Christ,
the advent and vocation of the Holy Spirit, the coming again of the Lord Jesus,
the new birth, the warfare with Satan, and the vocation of believers in the ages
to come. There you have a catalogue of the magnitudes of the Word of God, and
these are all included in that phrase: "My church." So that it will be seen at
once that to be occupied with what the Lord Jesus calls "My church" is to be
occupied with no small thing - not that it is my intention to deal with all
these matters, but I simply want to have you impressed at the outset with the
great importance of this matter.
Our specific object at this time is the nature of what Christ effects and
brings into being in His resurrection; and we shall consider this in two ways.
Firstly, what we may call contemplatively or objectively, and secondly,
introspectively or subjectively. That is, on the one hand we shall look at
its nature as it is presented to us, and then on the other hand we shall look
into it and see its deeper nature and content.
Peter's Explanation of What Christ Said to Him
To begin, then, with the contemplation of "My church." We have read a passage
which defines for us what Peter - the one to whom the statement was specifically
made - understood it to mean: "...upon this rock I will build my church"; he did
not understand it at the time. That is quite apparent from what he said a few
minutes afterward, but he did come to understand what the Lord had said to him,
and he gives us what he understood to be the meaning of that phrase: "I will
build my church," or: "...upon this rock I will build my church." Listen again
to his own definition and explanation of those words: "Unto whom coming" (that
is, of course, the Lord Jesus) "a living stone..." What was the rock? "Unto whom
coming a living stone, rejected indeed of men..." Look again at Matthew 16 and
you will find immediately after the Lord Jesus had said those words to Peter:
"From that time began Jesus to show unto his disciples, how that he must go unto
Jerusalem, and suffer many things... and be killed..." "Unto whom coming, a
living stone, rejected indeed of men, but with God elect, precious, ye
also, as living stones are built up a spiritual house..." "I will build my
church." "...built up a spiritual house..." That is Peter's explanation
and definition: "...built up a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to
offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Because
it is contained in scripture, "Behold I lay in Zion a chief corner stone, elect,
precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be put to shame." There you
have what Peter understood to be the meaning of the Lord's words in Matthew
16:16-18.
When we turn to the letter to the Ephesians we have what the Apostle Paul
came by the Holy Spirit to understand to be the meaning of such words. We shall
leave that for a little while, returning to it later, bearing in mind as we go
on, that what is before us is the nature, not just the object, but the nature of
that which Christ brings into being in His resurrection.
Christ is the Builder
Let us study this passage in Matthew a little more closely, and
see what is implicit in the statement. We begin with the personal statement of
the Lord Jesus: "I will build my church." "I"; that carries with it two things
quite clearly. One is that Christ builds the Church. That is discriminating and
important. Christ builds the Church. No man can build the Church. Christ
is the Builder. "And the Lord added to them day by day those that were being
saved." No man can add to the Church. No man can constitute the
Church, no company of men, no committee of men. This is something which is the
Lord's doing, and if the Church is eternal, only the Lord can build it. What man
may do will be but for a time. The second thing in connection with that "I" is
this; that in view of the imminent cross, the statement - "I will build my
Church" - means that the risen Christ will build His Church. He looks right
across the grace, He looks right through death, He looks to the other side of
Jerusalem, His crucifixion and all that was about to take place there, He looks
through it, beyond it, and says: "I will build my Church." It is the absolute
confidence and certainty that He will go through, that He will come out on the
other side; and He will be as truly on the other side of Calvary and of death
and all that that means as He is here and now on this side of it; and now as One
Who has already in faith and assurance and certainty passed through it, He says:
"I will build." That is the faith with which the Lord Jesus faces the cross. It
is a challenge. It is as though He were saying: "Let Elders, Scribes, Pharisees,
Rulers, men and demons, and all the power of spiritual death do their work, and
their utmost. I will build My church; I face the Scribes, Pharisees, Elders,
Rulers, people, devil and death, and I will build My Church in spite of them
all!" That "I" is a tremendous "I" as it comes there with the cross clearly in
view, imminent.
The Cross Essential for the Church
Now that leads us to three other things. The cross and the
resurrection mean, firstly, that the cross accomplishes something. You look at
it this way and you will see what I mean. Here is the Lord Jesus standing with
all that in view, and yet with an object which is the object for which He came,
the object which has been in the Father's heart, the Father's thought and
intention from eternity; the object which is the dominating object of His very
Being: "My Church"; "I will build," and yet before He can build that Church
there must be this thing, this death, this cross, and this resurrection. It is
not just some incident in His life, it is not just something which comes in the
order and progress and programme of things; it is something which is basic to
that object, without which that object cannot be, because this cross and this
resurrection is to be the scene and the occasion of accomplishing something,
apart from which accomplishment that Church cannot be. So that the cross and
resurrection of the Lord Jesus accomplished something. They are a part of a
scheme; a definitely arranged order of things in which they take a very vital
and important place.
I have to remind you that we are working towards seeing the
nature of the thing that results from His resurrection, and therefore it is
important to see that that character, that nature is resultant from His death
and resurrection: that the death and resurrection, the cross of the Lord Jesus,
gives character to the Church. And that is why they fulfil a purpose and are a
part of the whole design, because that Church cannot be without them, inasmuch
as it derives its very quality from them. You see the Lord Jesus, although He
was set upon that object, could never have realised it by leaping over from
Caesarea Philippi to the resurrection; that is, leaving the cross out. It was
essential to His end because it had got to yield certain features which would
constitute the Church. Those things we shall see later.
Secondly, the resurrection of the Lord Jesus means a new ground
by reason of a new state. Something has been left behind in the death. Some
whole realm and order of things has been dismissed, put away, and entirely new
ground is taken in the resurrection, and that new ground represents a new state,
an entirely new state; and it is on that ground that the Church is built.
Then, thirdly, the world is put aside. In the cross, the death
and resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the world is put aside, is left behind. Oh,
the stress that the Lord Himself laid upon that truth as we have it brought
before us by John in his Gospel 16:16-18,20-23. "In that day" - now go on to
chapter 17:6 and He strikes that note continually in the 17th chapter: "I am no
more in the world... I come to thee." "They are not of the world, even as I am
not of the world." The world is left behind. The world is ruled out, new ground
is taken, and on that ground the Church is built. The Apostle Paul, writing to
the Galatians explains the meaning of that so far as spiritual experience is
concerned: "Far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the
world." And when you and I testify to our union with the Lord Jesus in His death
and burial and resurrection in the waters of baptism, we spiritually accept the
position where the world is ruled out and left behind, and we take new ground;
and that is the ground upon which the Church is built. In a word, the Church is
built upon the ground where the world has no place. It is outside of the world.
In saying that, we are, of course, saying something that is very familiar to
most, but something which is growingly important in our time. The nature of that
which comes out in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus is that it has left the
world behind, and that it is outside of the world, in that sense in which the
Lord Jesus used the words in His prayer: "They are not of the world, even as I
am not of the world." "...even as I..." You cannot now associate the Lord Jesus
with this world; you cannot! And in exactly the same way you cannot associate
His Church with it, and the church which is associated with it, is not His
Church.
Eternal Purpose
Secondly, "...will build." We have seen a little of the
implications of that personal pronoun "I." Now secondly, "...will build," and
for our present purpose we note two things. This means that the Risen Christ
will be marked by purpose. "I will build..."; marked by purpose. I do not
merely mean determination to do something; but characterised by a spirit, a
power of purpose. I wonder if you have recognised that feature which comes
spontaneously into the life of everyone who becomes vitally joined with the
Risen Lord, that that life immediately assumes a spirit of purpose. If it never
had a sense of purpose before, it has now. If it was a wandering, indefinite
thing before, without object or aim or direction, the one thing that marks that
life now is a sense of purpose, a sense of object, a definiteness of direction,
a poise; and although as yet all that that means may not have broken upon the
understanding, there is a sense that has come, and that sense has come out fo
eternity, that life has come into the eternal, and by its union with Him has
reached right back into the before times eternal, into the counsels of the
Godhead, and has received now its character from those eternal counsels of the
eternal purpose of God. As that life goes on with God it will move more and more
to the place and state represented by the words of the Apostle Paul: "This one
thing I do..." It is a sense of purpose. It is the purpose of the Risen Lord.
This statement of His says to me, as I meditate upon it: "I am set upon My
Church and I give Myself utterly toward its realisation; the building of it and
the consummating of it dominate and govern all My thoughts, and draw out all My
resources. I am occupied with this thing; this is My purpose." And you know that
when you come into the Ephesian letter that that is what you come into at once,
"...quickened us together with Christ... and hath raised us up together, and
made us sit together..." You are in the realm of the purposing of God concerning
Christ, from eternity. "I will build My Church." An atmosphere, a spirit, a
sense of purpose.
And, beloved friends, there is, I think, much room in many of
the children of God, for that spirit, that sense, that dominating consciousness
of purpose, so that they shall become absorbed, engrossed, dominated by one
thing, the end which Christ has in view, and be burnt up with His objective,
which leaves room for so much of the scattering, destructive weakening,
paralysing work of the Devil. There is no greater defence against the Devil than
for your whole being to be dominated by one object. We leave far too much room
for him to come in by being like David, on his bed when the time came round that
kings went out to battle. The Devil played havoc with David that night and David
was weakened to the end of his days, and never recovered, because at that moment
he was not taken up with the real business of life. The Lord would have us in
union with Him in this sense, that we have this feature of His marking our lives
clearly: "This one thing I do"; a sense of Divine purpose eating us up; the zeal
of His House. "I will build My Church" is a statement which carries with it the
spirit of One Who has one all-inclusive and governing object in view, and when
you come to your later New Testament you find that that is the thing which
marked apostles and believers.
Read the Thessalonian letters again and you will see that that
is the spirit of believers in general there. And read the letters of the
Apostles themselves from the standpoint of the Apostles, and you find that their
hearts are eaten up with this one object. Hear Paul: "...that we may present
every man perfect in Christ Jesus." That is something which has drawn out his
whole being. Oh, that we should be one hundred percent on the Divine purpose,
pouring ourselves into it without any reserve. That is union with the Risen
Lord. That is to be the nature of the thing which comes up in His
resurrection. It is something governed by one object - purpose and action, "I
will build My Church." We must remember that the Lord Jesus, from the day of His
resurrection until now is in action. There is a sense in which He has sat
down. That sense is that He has accomplished all the work necessary to secure
the consummation of His Church. He is now at work by the Holy Spirit in the
outworking of the accomplished work. He is still working. "He ever liveth to
make intercession..." is one picture of Him in action. "I will build..." He is
building, He is in action, and He would have all who are in union with Him, not
only characterised by a sense of purpose, but definitely in action under that
sense. It is just possible to have a sense of purpose, and it lies in tomorrow
that never comes. When we are a little more qualified, when certain things have
taken a certain shape, or transpired - there is always that will-o'-the-wisp
future which we never reach, but when we will do what we purpose doing; but we
are not doing it.
The Lord Jesus not only has an object, but He is actively
engaged upon His object, and we are the proof of that. Union with Him means that
we are in action, definitely stretched out in action under a mastering purpose
out from eternity; for the eternal element arises with the Risen Lord. Temporary
elements have passed in His death. "I will build My Church..." Then we must be
governed by a sense of purpose in this regime of the active Holy Spirit. Of
course, the nature of the Church which He will build has been seen in Peter's
words: "A spiritual house." It is a spiritual thing.
The Church is Christ's
"My Church." There you have the implication of
relationship and proprietorship. The Lord Jesus builds His Church, that which is
peculiarly His in the sense that He has purchased it, He has made it His own by
right of eternal choice, creation and redemption. It is His. It belongs to Him.
And there again we have the importance of taking account of the fact that the
sovereign rights in and over the Church belong to the Lord Jesus and are vested
in no one else. It is not given to man or men to lord it over God's heritage; to
have the supreme government of the Church. It is His Church, and He is
Lord of the Church, and the Church which He builds is that which represents the
absolute Sovereign Headship of the Lord Jesus, to order, to govern, to direct,
control, to have the first and the last word, and every word between. It is
where Christ is Lord. That is simple; perhaps too simple and too familiar, but
we are working on toward our object.
The Church's Victory over Death
"...and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it." That
phrase is explained in the Old Testament to mean "the house of death." "The
house of death shall not prevail against it." In Acts 2 you have an explanation
of that: "thou wilt not leave my soul in Hades, neither wilt thou give thy Holy
One to see corruption," the first statement. The second, "...whom God raised up,
having loosed the pangs of death; because it was not possible that he should be
holden of it." "Holden," in the grip, the mastery, the dominion of death;
the house of death. The words: "shall not prevail" more literally are: "Shall
have no power of mastery." "The house of death shall have no power of mastery."
That related to the Lord Jesus, and that relates to everyone in that union with
Him as a part of His Church. He went into the house of death; the house of death
closed upon Him. We must remember that death is always a thing of positive
antagonism. There is a lot of romancing and sentimentalism about the
friendliness of death. Death is always an Enemy in the Word of God and always
stands in positive opposition to God's intention, to God's purpose. It is the
opposite, and that actively so, of what God eternally intended, and at last
death as the ultimate Enemy will be destroyed.
It was necessary for the Lord Jesus to go into the house of
death, representing all those who, because of the fall, have been enclosed in
the house of death. But He went in in the power of something which no other who
ever entered there possessed, and while the house of death closed upon Him as
representing man in sin, it found that it had closed upon something else as
well, which was more than its master, and: "He tore the bars away," and "Up from
the grave He arose," and death, the house of death, could hold Him no longer. "I
am the first and the last and the Living One; and I became dead, and behold, I
am alive unto the ages of the ages, and I have the keys of death and of Hades."
In virtue of that, though the house of death may close upon you and me, if the
Lord tarry, those gates of the house of death may close upon you and me, if the
Lord tarry, those gates of the house of death shall not have power to prevent
our being there in the perfected Church, in the consummated building of Christ.
The house of death will have no power to retain you and me when that trump shall
sound. He has the keys, that is, the authority, over the house of death, and
death will not be able to frustrate the realisation of His intention, His
purpose. The gates of Hades, the house of death, shall not prevail, shall not
have power to prevent. That applied to the Lord Jesus, and that applies to the
saints.
And now to close, for the moment; the implication of this
statement of the Lord Jesus reveals the oneness of Christ and His Church. "I
will build My Church; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it"
means, if it means anything, that the resurrection of the Lord Jesus is
essential to the very life and being of the Church. To prevent Him from rising
would be to prevent Her from having an existence. If Christ rises then it is
unto the realisation of His Church, so that He and She are one by reason of one
mighty victory over death. And that, I believe, is why, above all other things,
there has been such a dead set through the ages against the testimony of the
resurrection of the Lord Jesus. Why, immediately you come to the testimony of
the Risen life of Christ you become the object and target of all hell's
assaults; and the one thing of which you become more acutely conscious than
anything else is of the spirit and power of death, death working as a force
against spirit, soul, mind, body. Why? Because the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus is the greatest thing in the Bible, and upon the resurrection of the Lord
Jesus everything in the Bible hangs.
The purposes of God from eternity, before ever a page of the
Bible was written, hung upon the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. It is the
central and supreme thing in the history of the ages since man has fallen. And
that testimony to have an expression in individual lives, and more, in a
company, the Church, is therefore, the one supreme thing which rouses hell to
its depths. Hell cares not about our systems of teaching, whether they are true
or whether they are false; but hell does care about our living in the power of
His resurrection. It does not matter to the Enemy how wonderfully accurate we
may be in our Biblical interpretation, but the Enemy does, with all his might,
withstand our Biblical expression in a life triumphant over death. It is for
that that the Church has been brought into being. It is that which is the
Church's object here on the earth, to show forth Christ in Risen life and in
Risen power. Very often the teaching can become the very thing which covers over
and blankets and damps and numbs that life.
You and I, beloved, have got to be very careful that we never
become so interested in Christian doctrine and truth that it becomes the thing
which occupies us pre-eminently. What you and I have to be occupied with more
than anything else is the living of a life which is triumphant over death. That
is a far more difficult thing than studying Christian doctrine; it is the battle
of the ages. The nature of that which comes up with the Risen Lord is that it is
a living expression of the fact that in Him to the full, and in Him initially
and progressively, the gates of Hades, the house of death has not prevailed and
cannot prevail. We are called for that. The Lord lead us into the nature of what
He calls "My Church."
First published in "A Witness and A Testimony"
magazine, Jan-Feb 1934 Vol. 12-1