We have
seen that, at the end of the apostolic age, and with the
close of the first Christian century, Christianity had
completely changed. It had lost its primal, original
character and nature. And it was in the consciousness of
the onset of this change that the Apostle wrote these
letters to Timothy, and sought to indicate the way - the
only way, God's way - of keeping the things of God pure,
maintaining them according to their original nature. In
God's thought for 'Christianity' - I use that wide term
for the moment - everything had been, and was intended to
be, wholly spiritual; whereas that which was developing
was a system - formal, ecclesiastical, outward and so on,
ordered, governed, arranged and carried on by man. These
letters are a strong appeal for the recovery and
maintenance of that wholly spiritual character in every
department and every aspect of the life of the Christian
community.
Now I
have used the large word 'Christianity' and the term 'the
Christian community', and I am coming immediately to what
they really mean - the proper term for them - for neither
of those expressions is used in the New Testament. There
is a term for what they are intended to mean, and that
term is "the Church". I ask you to look at one
or two fragments from these letters which intimate the
matter.
"If
a man knoweth not how to rule his own house, how shall he
take care of the church of God?" (1 Timothy
3:5). We leave the context and immediate application, and
just note that this that is called the Church of God is
introduced, is referred to, as something that must have
been known and recognized, as something taken for
granted. There is such a thing as the Church of God.
Again: "These things write I unto thee, that thou
mayest know how men ought to behave themselves in the
house of God, which is the church of the living God, the
pillar and ground of the truth" (1 Timothy
3:14,15). Finally: "Therefore I endure all things
for the elect's sake, that they also may obtain the
salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal
glory" (2 Timothy 2:10).
Here
then we have, in both letters, attention drawn to the CHURCH.
What we have been saying about this turning-point in
Christian history, this change which was coming about,
this departure from the original character and nature,
was a CHURCH matter. It was not just
'Christianity', in that very general term; it was not
only that certain Christians were losing out, that a
state of spiritual decline had set in with some
believers. It was a Church matter. The departure was the
departure of the Church. And so these two letters are
essentially Church letters: that will become even more
clear to you if you just read them through.
Now it
is quite clear, from the verses we have just read, that
the Apostle was speaking of the Church in more than one
conception. He was not saying to Timothy, who was in the
church in Ephesus, and had a great responsibility given
him by the Apostle in relation to that church, 'Now
Ephesus is the church of the living God.' He was not
saying that any local church is THE Church. But,
to turn it round the other way, he was saying that THE
Church as a whole should find its representation in
every local church, that what is true of the whole
Church, in the mind of God, ought to be true wherever it
is found in a local expression. Any local church should
be a representation of THE Church as a whole. And
then the Apostle brings it down to the individuals, the
persons, and, in effect, clearly says, 'Now, any one of
you individuals can show what the Church is meant to be,
as a whole, or else you can let it down. You are not just
individual Christians - yours is a Church
responsibility!'
What Is The Church?
This
matter is of very great importance in the connection with
which we are occupied - God's first supreme thought
concerning the Church. What is the Church? That is
the first question. I think Paul very definitely gives us
the answer in a particular term that he uses.
"Therefore I endure all things for the elect's
sake..." (2 Timothy 2:10). If you look at the
context, you will see that the Apostle takes that back to
what he here calls "before times eternal". So
the Church is something which is 'elect before times
eternal', something quite clearly defined as an elect
people, an elect body, which has its roots in eternity
past, and therefore is not historical. It is eternal, and
therefore it must be spiritual. We may just note one
other relevant verse in this connection: "Who saved
us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to
our works, but according to His own purpose and grace,
which was given us in Christ Jesus before times
eternal..." (2 Tim. 1:9). "Purpose... grace...
given us in Christ Jesus before times eternal". So
the very first thing is that the Church, according to
God's mind, is altogether different from, and above,
anything that is historical - anything, that is, that has
its beginnings and course and development in time. This
is something which has its beginnings in eternity past,
and its course is ordered according to the purpose
conceived in eternity past. This is something not
constituted by man, not brought into being by any human
effort whatsoever: this is something which is constituted
by the Holy Spirit, the eternal Spirit. And, as we were
seeing earlier, that which is constituted by the Holy
Spirit is essentially a spiritual thing. "That which
is born of the Spirit is spirit."
Now
that, as we saw, relates to the new birth of the
individual: the individual Christian is essentially
constituted a spiritual being by the work of the Holy
Spirit. And what is true of the individual is true of the
aggregate of the born-anew: the Church is something born
of the Holy Spirit and therefore is a spiritual thing.
That does not mean that it is abstract. I have heard
someone, praying in a meeting, make the petition that the
message should not be 'so spiritual that it was hidden
and not manifest'. Well, we know exactly what he meant
and are in full agreement, and I am not putting him right
when I say that it is impossible for anything to be
spiritual and not manifest. Can the Holy Spirit be
present, active, living, and no one know it? What is
spiritual is not just abstract, indefinite; something
intangible, in the air, like a vapour or a cloud. What is
spiritual is terrific, it is mighty; and so, when the
Church was really a spiritual body, it was - and the word
can be well applied - it was terrific.
I
referred earlier to what the Church encountered, which
was developing just at the time that Paul wrote these
very letters. It caused his own imprisonment and his own
execution, and it was the cause of much that Paul wrote
to Timothy about being strong. For Timothy himself had
been arrested with Paul and imprisoned, and later
released. Paul (or the author of the letter to the
Hebrews) wrote: "Know ye that our brother Timothy
hath been set at liberty" (Heb. 13:23). But Timothy
knew something of what was pending. He needed to be
encouraged to be strong. I am referring to what the
Church had to encounter in those unspeakable
persecutions, horrors diabolical, indescribable, going on
for many, many years, with the whole Roman world, the
greatest Empire that had been, determined to blot out the
name of Jesus of Nazareth by liquidating the last
Christian on this earth; and it stood at nothing, human
or inhuman, to do it. And when it had done its worst, the
Roman Empire went to ashes and the Church rose out of
them, triumphant, growing. Yes, anything that is of the
Holy Spirit is a tremendous thing; nothing can stand
before it. Spirituality, true Divine spirituality - that
which is born of the Spirit and filled with the Spirit
and governed by the Spirit - is not something abstract:
it is a potent force in this universe.
The Church A Spiritual People
So the
Church, according to the Divine conception, consists
essentially of - indeed is - a spiritual people, and we
must somehow get to the place where we see it as God and
as Heaven sees it. And that means a tremendous adjustment
for us to make. Our practical difficulty is this. In
apostolic times, it was quite easy to see the Church as a
single entity. Although it was represented in numerous
local companies all over the Roman world, yet it was
still a single entity: it was not then divided up into
the '-ists' and the '-ans' and the '-ians' and the '-ics'
and the 'isms' and all the other terminations that we
know today. When you speak to Christian people today,
they very soon ask you if you are an '-ist', or an '-ic',
or an '-an', or an '-ian', and they say I am an... 'ist'.
Ah, but there was nothing of that in the Church in the
days of the Apostles. Whatever little differences there
were amongst the Lord's people locally, the Church as a
whole was one entity, everywhere, held together by
spiritual ties and by spiritual ministries, but with no
central government or sectional government of affiliated
bodies. It was just one, everywhere. If you had gone from
one province to another, from one country to another,
visiting the Christians in every place, they would never
have asked you whether you were an '-ist', or an '-ian',
or an '-ic' - whether you belonged to some particular
group, distinguished by a special name. No, you were a
Christian - that was enough. You belonged to the Lord -
that was enough.
But,
with the closing of the apostolic age, things were
changing - changing into what we have today. An
altogether wrong and false mentality has grown up around
the word 'church'. Most people today, when that word is
used, think of one of these things with a special
termination, or of some place or building - a 'church' -
and that is the mentality that is common. Let us be quite
clear: recovery of the original demands an escape from
that mentality. Do not misunderstand me: I am
not saying you have got to come out of this and that and
the other thing - I am saying that you have got to get
out of a MENTALITY. We need absolute emancipation
from this earth mentality about the Church, into the
heavenly standpoint; to see what the Church really is, as
God sees it and as Heaven sees it. We must get free of
the confusion which has been brought about by the
historical institution called 'The Church'.
What is
the Church, from Heaven's standpoint? Heaven does not
look upon the matter in the light of these titles, and
these sections, and these departments, and these bodies,
and these divisions; it does not look at it like that at
all. Heaven ignores all that, and looks for members of
Christ, born-again children of God, spiritual people, in
their constitution by new birth and the indwelling of the
Holy Spirit. And wherever Heaven sees those - whether it
be in an 'ism', or an '-ic', or an '-an', or anything
else - that is the Church, and you and I have got to
adjust to that. A CONGREGATION is not the
Church, but WITHIN a congregation the Church may
be represented by only two people. Out of 100 people
gathered in what is called a church, 98 may be unsaved
people, though adherents and communicants and all the
rest, and two may be born-again ones. Those two are the
Church, and the others are not! That is what the Church
is. It is constituted by the Holy Spirit bringing through
to new birth spiritually-made people.
I said
Heaven ignores the other. In a sense that is true, but
maybe in another sense it is not true, because Heaven
will judge the other as a false thing. In a sense,
however, Heaven ignores, and I say this because it is a
thing that you and I have got to do: meet people - no
matter in what they are; you may not agree with it, you
may think it is false; you have got to ignore that - meet
people on the ground of Christ, have to do with them, as
far as you can, solely on the ground that they belong to
the Lord. Our only enquiry has got to be: 'Do you belong
to the Lord? are you born again?' That is all. And then,
if they say, 'I am a so-and-soist: what are you?', we
must reply, 'That does not matter; leave that out. We
belong to the Lord: let us be content with this.' Until
you and I can do that, we are held in the lifeless grip
of a thing that has lost its spiritual power - because it
has lost its true identity, its true nature, which was SPIRITUAL.
Yes, we must adjust to Heaven's point of view. I am
really only giving you the Letter to the Ephesians! That
is how it is seen in Heaven.
For What Does The Church Exist?
Well,
that is the answer, very inadequately, very briefly, to
the question, What is the Church? The second question is:
For what does the Church exist? We have it stated
for us by Paul here, have we not, in the very words that
we have read: "...how men ought to behave themselves
in the house of God, which is the church of the living
God, the pillar and stay of the truth" - and there
ought to be no full period there, only a pause to take a
breath - "And without controversy great is the
mystery of godliness; He Who was manifested in the flesh,
justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached among
the nations, believed on in the world, received up in
glory" (1 Tim. 3:15-16). That is the deposit in the
Church; that is the testimony of Jesus. For that the
Church exists. It is to that the Apostle refers, you
notice, more than once, when he says: "O Timothy,
guard that which is committed unto thee..." (1 Tim.
6:20; 2 Tim. 1:14). 'O Timothy, guard the deposit, the
trust...' The Church is the repository of the testimony
of Jesus.
What is
the testimony of Jesus? There are, of course, certain
statements about it here, in the passage we have just
read. But I am not going to take up these different
clauses, because I am not at the moment concerned with
Christian doctrine, or with the doctrine of the Church. I
am occupied with the Church itself. But I turn you now to
the Book of the Revelation, for, as we have said in our
last chapter, the writings of John, written after Paul
had finished his work and gone to glory, related to the
full development of this very thing whose beginnings Paul
had witnessed. The Book of the Revelation is peculiarly
appropriate to this state of spiritual departure and
declension, and you find that the all-governing thing of
the whole book is this one phrase: "the testimony of
Jesus".
John
said that he was "in the isle... called Patmos, for
the word of God and the testimony of Jesus" (Rev.
1:9). But there is a Divine sovereignty over the Roman
Empire, over the persecutors and over the one who has
sent him to Patmos - a Divine sovereignty which says:
'Right, this is what I have brought you here for! They
sent you, but I have brought you! This is not their
sovereignty that has put you here; this is Mine. I have
something to say to the Church, and I have given you a
quiet time to say it for Me.' 'I was in the isle that is
called Patmos - because the Roman Empire sent me there?
because the Roman Emperor sent me there? because the
persecutors caught me and sent me there?' Not a bit of
it! "I was in the isle... called Patmos... for...
the testimony of Jesus". Now that may have been
because he had stood for the testimony of Jesus: but it
is very impressive, is it not, that that phrase runs
through this whole book, and is seen, as we go on, to be
the thing by which the Lord is judging, first of all the
churches, and then, representatively, the Church as a
whole. And, having dealt with the Church on the basis of
the testimony of Jesus, He moves on to deal with the
nations, and eventually with the Devil himself and his
kingdom. It is all related to the testimony of Jesus.
The Living Presence Of Jesus
What is
it? Well, the testimony of Jesus is presented to us
symbolically right at the beginning of the book, in the
declaration - we will leave the symbolism for the moment
- made by the Lord Himself. "I am... the Living
One... I became dead, and behold, I am alive unto the
ages of the ages, and I have the keys of death and of
Hades. Write therefore..." What is the testimony of
Jesus? The present, living Person of Jesus in the
power of the Holy Spirit. That is where it begins:
the living Person of Jesus. Not the historic Jesus of
Palestine of centuries ago - no, the right up-to-date,
here-and-now living Jesus, manifested, demonstrated,
proved to be alive in the power of the Holy Spirit. Is
that carrying it too far? Well, then, why, when the seven
churches in Asia are challenged, is there the seven times
repeated "He that hath an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit saith to the churches"? The Holy Spirit has
got this matter in hand. The Holy Spirit is challenging -
not concerning a creed, or a doctrine as such, but
concerning the manifestation of the living Christ, there,
and there, and there. The testimony of Jesus, whether it
be in Ephesus, or Smyrna, or Pergamum, or in any other
place, is just this: that the place where that church is
- the town, the city, the province - is to know, in the
power of the Holy Spirit, that Jesus is alive! That is
where it begins. By its very presence, by its very
existence, by its very life there in that place, the one
thing that people are to know is that they have not got
rid of Jesus. They have not been able to put Him out of
this world - He is here, alive!
It is
very simple; but that is what the Church is here for,
after all. The very basic purpose of the Church is in the
first place to make this world know that Jesus is alive,
not merely declaring the doctrinal fact, but by living in
the power of His resurrection. There are times in some
countries when the Church is not able to preach and
proclaim the truth of Christ, but that is not the end of
its power. Even though silenced in words, it can still
make known that Jesus is alive. Yes, the testimony of
Jesus is: "I am He that LIVETH..."; "the
church of the LIVING God, the pillar and
stay of the truth..."; but it is more - it is the
living victory of Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit.
"I became dead, and behold, I am alive..."
never to become dead again. "I have the keys of
death...", the mastery, the authority, the power
over death. 'I have absolutely triumphed over death and
all that occasioned death - sin - in the power of the
Holy Spirit.' That is the testimony of Jesus: His living
victory, present where Christians are.
Are you
thinking that this is all very wonderful and very
beautiful, but is this practical? Listen! It is so
practical that, if you are a living member of Christ, and
if you are in a company of believers, born-again
believers, constituted by the Holy Spirit, on this true
spiritual basis, you will, without doubt, be taken into
situations, conditions, where only the resurrection power
of Jesus Christ will get you through! Your very survival
will necessitate your knowing the power of His
resurrection. For individual believers, from time to
time, and for local companies of the Lord's people, just
as truly as for the Church universal (as in those days to
which I have referred), survival is a testimony to the
fact that death has no place here. Death cannot swallow
this up - death itself has been swallowed up in victory!
What a glorious assurance that is! What a ground of
confidence! What an encouragement! We come to times when
it looks as though the end has come, we are not going to
survive and get through. But never believe it! The life
of Jesus was not taken from Him by men: He deliberately
laid it down, by His own free will. "This
authority", He said, "I received from My
Father." The life of Paul was not taken from him by
the executioner's axe just outside Rome. "I am
already being offered, and the time of my departure is
come." Here is a man who knows when it is the Lord's
time for him to go to glory: he is just being offered up,
and he is handing himself over. Paul never said, 'I am
going to be executed, they are going to kill me'; he
said, 'I am being offered up'.
If you
and I are living on the basis of this One, Who says:
"I became dead, and behold, I am alive for
evermore" - if we are living in the power of His
resurrection, our end will be God-governed, not
man-governed. It will be when the Lord says, 'It is
enough', not when circumstances dictate. God is in charge
of this where His Church is concerned. And so, whatever
the world does, whatever men do, and whatever the Devil
does with the Church, local or universal, if it is really
on this basis, it just cannot be brought to nought.
Gamaliel is our standby here, is he not? 'If it is of
God, you had better leave it alone; you had better not be
found to be fighting against God. Be careful! If it is
not of God, well, it will peter out sooner or later; but
if it is of God, you can do nothing..." (Acts
5:34-39). And that from a non-Christian! You see the
point. This is the Church which is to embody the
testimony of Jesus in terms of a life that has conquered
death, to be the embodiment of a living victory in the
power of the Holy Spirit.
Expressing The Nature Of Christ
And then
it is to be the expression of the living nature and
character of Jesus in the Holy Spirit. That is far too
large a matter for us to consider fully here; it can only
be stated. But it must be stated, because, both in these
letters to Timothy and in the Revelation, much is made of
this matter of the expression of the Lord Jesus in His
character. The decline was from a level of character, the
departure was from an expression of what Christ is in His
nature. We can never, never overcome the world, nor the
Devil and all his powers, if that same Devil has got a
foothold right in our being, if there is something there
that is of himself in moral failure or delinquency. In
the power of the same Holy Spirit, you and I have got to
exemplify Christ - the Church must exemplify Christ,
express what Christ is; not merely give out facts about
Christ, but be the embodiment of Christ's nature.
That is
why John, coming back at the end of the apostolic age,
has so much to say about this matter of love. 'You don't
know the Lord', he says, 'if you don't love your brother.
It is no use your saying you love the Lord, if you don't
love your brother - that is all nonsense'. In other
words, it is hypocrisy. 'How can a man love God, Whom he
has not seen, if he does not love his brother whom he has
seen?' (1 John 4:20). That is John's argument. It is a
matter of 'walking in the light as He is in the light'
(chapter 1:7). So much of John's writings touches upon
this thing. Look at those letters to the seven churches.
What they are concerned with is state, condition, with
lost spiritual life, in the sense of expressing what
Christ is like in His nature. That is the testimony of
Jesus. The testimony is lost if you and I are
unChrist-like. It is no use using phrases, and making
claims: these have to be substantiated by what we are
like, and what we are like must be what Christ is like.
The Church is for that purpose. It does not merely
consist of a set of doctrines to be upheld - although the
doctrines must be upheld; not of a number of ordinances
to be maintained and repeated, not of congregations of
Christians having meetings and conferences. It is to be
the embodiment of Christ by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit Governing From Heaven
Now,
coming back to the matter of the point of change that we
mentioned earlier, the Church in which we find ourselves
today, with all its break-up and division, its
sectionalism and so on, is so different from what we have
just described. How are we going to get over this? Well,
it just depends where the seat of government is, does it
not? As things are today, there is no one government of
the whole Church on this earth, is there? We do not admit
the claims of Rome. But it is not true for any section
that the headquarters of the Church is any PLACE.
The headquarters of THE CHURCH is in
Heaven. THE seat of government of THE Church
is in Heaven; it is nowhere else. And the Lord will not
allow it to be anywhere else. When Jerusalem was
beginning to assume the character of a governmental
headquarters for the expanding Church, the Lord scattered
them to the ends of the earth. No headquarters on earth!
Headquarters is in Heaven.
At this
point I would like to take you into the Book of the
Revelation again, and indicate certain passages, though
without staying for much comment on each.
"John
to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you and
peace, from Him Which is and Which was and Which is to
come; and from the seven Spirits which are before His
throne..." (Rev. 1:4).
"These
things saith He That hath the seven Spirits of God, and
the seven stars; I know thy works..." (3:1).
"Out
of the throne proceed lightnings and voices and thunders.
And there were seven lamps of fire burning before the
throne, which are the seven Spirits of God" (4: 5).
"I
saw in the midst of the throne and of the four living
creatures, and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb
standing, as though it had been slain, having seven
horns, and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of
God..." (5:6).
This
book is, as you know, just full of symbols. Here you have
these four references to the seven Spirits. It does not,
of course, mean that there were seven separate Spirits.
Seven is the number of spiritual entirety, completeness,
fullness. When you come to the number seven, you have
completed something: for instance, the seventh day marked
the completion of creation. I need not go further. Seven
is spiritual completeness: so that the symbolism here is
of the fullness, the completeness, the absoluteness of
the Holy Spirit. "These things saith He That hath
the seven Spirits..." This that is going to be said
is in the authority and the power of the Holy Spirit. HE
is in charge of this matter, He it is that is
inditing these things that are to be said, He it is that
is before the throne. The Holy Spirit, in touch with the
seat of government, is dealing with things down here.
Have you grasped that? There are all these things down
here on the earth, but the throne, the seat of the
government of everything, is up there.
Note
that the first connection of the seven Spirits is with
the throne and with the "seven stars" which are
"the angels of the seven churches" (1:16,20;
3:1). The throne of government of things down here is in
the hands of the Holy Spirit, in the fullness of His
power and intelligence. The "seven eyes" speak
of His knowing all about it, seeing perfectly the truth
through all the deception, through all the masks, through
all the pretence and profession, through the 'name to
live'; perfect perception, perfect knowledge, perfect
comprehension. The Holy Spirit is governing in the
fullness of His knowledge. And in the fullness of His
power - "seven lamps of fire burning". This is
not cold light, this is not just theoretical knowledge;
this is not something abstract. It is a burning lamp, it
is something that is alive with fire, with power: He has
come to deal with this situation in the burning power of
His judgment and of His knowledge. Things are alive with
the Holy Spirit.
In order
to pass with Him, then, the Holy Spirit requires that
everything must be purely spiritual. It has got to be
according to the judgment of the HOLY Spirit, the
Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit operates in relation to
"The Lamb in the Throne". That is the testimony
in relation to all our sin, and all our failure: it is
the Lamb in the throne. But what we are saying is that
the Lord's idea of a Church, in any dispensation, in any
age, at any time, in any place, is that it is essentially
a spiritual thing, essentially a heavenly thing; it is
essentially governed by the Holy Spirit. The headquarters
are in the throne, and the Holy Spirit administers the
Church from Heaven. If He does not, then man will have to
administer it himself, and he will make an awful mess of
it, as he has done. Oh, for a people, wherever they
are - whether local companies or the Lord's people at
large - really to be under this government of the Holy
Spirit!
I will
close by saying this. Every one of us, and young
Christians perhaps especially, need to realize this:
that, in coming to the Lord, having received Christ as
our Saviour, having become a Christian, having been
converted - however you may put it - if you have been
truly born again, you are not just a Christian
individual. You are a part of an eternally foreseen,
chosen Body, you belong to a great spiritual, corporate
entity, you belong to every other truly born-again child
of God. Yours is a related life and not just an
individual life. So much depends upon your realizing
that! You have not JUST 'become a Christian' - you
have become something infinitely more than that. You have
become a member of this timeless, heavenly thing,
conceived "before times eternal", fulfilling
its real vocation when time shall be no more. That is
what you have come into! And you have come into a
tremendous vocation, to be part of that which is to keep
alive the testimony of Jesus in this world.
You see,
the Devil and his vast kingdom of countless hosts of evil
spirits, as Paul puts it, is out against one thing, and
one thing only. From the beginning, when Jesus Christ was
"appointed heir of all things" (Heb. 1: 2),
Satan has relentlessly and unceasingly set himself to
frustrate and spoil and destroy one thing - the testimony
of Jesus. And if he divides us up and gets in between us,
he has touched the testimony of Jesus, because the
testimony of Jesus is so bound up with our united and
related life.