Thy servant
heareth... be not silent, Lord. "Wait my soul
upon Thee for the quickening word. Fill me with the
knowledge of Thy glorious will. All Thine own good pleasure
in Thy child fulfill..." Lord this we make our
individual prayer. No words could better express our
desire at this time so we say again: Speak, Thy servant
heareth. And when Thou dost speak give us the enlarged
heart and the quickened faith to run in the way of Thy
commandment for Thy Name’s sake, amen.
We are well launched into
this matter of the place and meaning of the Cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ as it is in these various letters of the New
Testament. There’s a wonderful thing about these
letters and their message - it is that although
they were just the immediate outgoing of the heart of an
apostle to companies of the Lord’s people here and there
in relation to some existing situation and need, under the
Holy Spirit’s sovereign government and all unbeknown to
the writer, the apostle, they were documents for the whole
dispensation; as much for us as for those to whom they were
written. The apostle did not know that he was writing
the Bible. He did not realize that people down through
thousands of years would be studying every word that he put down and every syllable that he put down and
would be having their lives affected one way or another
throughout all the centuries and the effects and fruit to
appear in the coming eternity. He had no idea of that,
but the Holy Spirit did. And we are found here, a
little company, in that sovereign ordering in relation to
these writings, these personal letters of a shepherd apostle
concerned for the sheep.
Another thing which we have
already indicated which is quite wonderful, is how that same
sovereign Spirit of God governed and controlled the
arrangement of these letters. Altogether out of chronological
order the Holy Spirit saw to it that this one came first,
and that one came second, and that one came third, and that
one came fourth - in a precise spiritual order - a sequence
of wonderful progressiveness in the spiritual life. We
have noted that.
We have considered the place
of the Cross in the letter to the Romans, how foundational it
all is there and all-inclusive of what follows throughout the
New Testament. And then in such wonderful wisdom and
understanding, the Holy Spirit saw to it the first letter to
the Corinthians came next, beginning the break up of the
inclusive foundation of the Cross in Romans, to apply
it. And every body of us here surely has seen that this
is the next thing. The Cross and the two
humanities is something that has got to be settled before you
can get any further. Everything waits upon the
recognition and the response and reaction to this very
wonderful thing as the Corinthians (in their condition,
perhaps at least six years after the apostle went to them)
drew out this letter and in it revealed for all time that
there can be and often are as there was in Corinth, two kinds
of Christians.
Two Kinds
of Christians
Christians in two
categories: the soulical Christians called the natural,
and the spiritual Christians. And they are in two very
definitely different categories as this letter shows.
If you want me to read again to see what the one class is and
what the other class is, they are so clearly and definitely
defined. And the one is shown through necessity the
application of the Cross right into the very heart of Christians.
Yes, right into the history of those who are the
Lord’s.
The Cross is called for in a
very serious and solemn way in many, many Christians who,
like these Corinthians, were Christians. And God only
knows how they needed the work of the Cross to change them
from the one kind of Christian to another, from the one
category to the other, from the natural or the merely
soulical (which is, in another word, the wholly Self kind of
Christian) into the spiritual men and women of the
Spirit.
Now, I’m not staying
again to emphasize that distinction. It’s here and
that is the first practical application of the Cross after it’s
inclusive meaning has been set forth. It’s
being broken down now, and this within the whole circle of
the meaning of the Cross, this is the first thing that has
got to be settled. We can’t go on until that is
settled.
We’re coming this evening to the great transition from the first letter to the second. And what a
transition it is. It’s really a progression as
well as a transition.
That is, it’s not only
a change over on the same level, it is the development of the
new level or kind of Christian. A wonderful
transition or passing over, a wonderful progression in the
spiritual situation and what is now possible.
Now let
me say again, and I trust that you are seeking to take very
careful heart notice of what we are saying, because I want to
say once more to you dear friends: I am not here just to give
you more doctrine, and teaching, and information. If
God does not carry these things into our being and create a
real issue in us, we’ve failed - this conference or
convocation has failed and we would never want to have
another one. It’s very vital that this thing
should be plowed right deep down into us and to have
its effect. So I repeat that this difference, this
distinction, which is brought out so clearly and fully in the
first letter (and I would ask that you go back to your room
and read that letter again in the light of what we have
pointed out and read it carefully, not only verse by
verse, but sentence by sentence, and you will see how true it
is) that we have, before we can move on, we have to have a
settlement about this matter of the distinction that is
brought to light in letter number one to the
Corinthians. There’s got to be a settlement with
us about this: a recognition of the fact that there are two
kinds of Christians possible. One kind a purely soulical type
of Christian; they are a fact. And another type a
truly Holy Spirit kind of Christian. Very distinct are
these kinds. And the fact of that difference has got
first of all to be faced, settled, accepted, before we can
go any further.
The Lord won’t get us
any further until we’ve recognized it as a fact revealed
in the Word of God that you can be what Paul calls carnal or
spiritual; natural, soulical, or people of the Spirit.
Of course we could spend a lot of time on that, but we have
tried just to touch on it, to indicate what is meant by
it.
No, let me pause, may I pause to just add this
word: A truly spiritual person (that is, a person who is
governed and led by the Holy Spirit, who lives in the Spirit)
is one who brings everything to the Lord to ask His
mind about it. Even your dress and anything else about
your personal presence - your manner, your behavior, your
talk, or your silence... a great deal of soulishness is
in just chatter, frittering away the values of eternal
meanings by just standing around those that talk. You
know the Cross needs very really to be planted right into the
tongue of many Christians. And not mischievous tongues
essentially, not evil tongues essentially, but just tongues
that are not controlled by the Holy Spirit. The power
of the Spirit to be quiet and silent when it’s right to
do so. That’s what I mean.
The difference between a soulical (and that
is not necessarily an insane person but a soulical Christian)
and a really spiritual person... and until that
difference is recognized - seen and accepted -
and we have had a transaction with the Lord about it and
said, "Now Lord, if that’s the truth - it's
in the Word and I believe it must be true, I commit myself to
You to be made a truly spiritual child of God in all that
that means." You've got to do that and then
you can pass into the second letter to the Corinthians. You
see, the Cross comes in there doesn‘t it? The
Cross comes in. My, yes it’s the Cross indeed when it
touches us in these matters, very practical matters. It’s
the Cross. That is the transition as a fact. Now we
have to go on to consider the nature of the transition and
its necessity. And the second letter to the Corinthians
is occupied with what? It is the ministry of the Lord’s
people.
The
Ministry of the Lord’s People
The whole letter is occupied
with this matter of the Lord’s people in ministry.
I’m going to stop to define that, but I want you to
notice this to begin with, that while the apostle has more to
say about himself personally in this letter than in any other
letter that he wrote, (you know more of Paul after you’ve
read this letter than you would ever know by reading all his
other letters put together; it’s the most
autobiographical of his writings) it is as though he has so
much to say about himself he is saying it in the first place
about himself as the Lord’s servant. As the Lord’s
servant. And in the second place he is transmitting all
this to the church at Corinth and in effect he is
saying, "What is true of me as the Lord’s servant
has got to become true of you. Not special people
amongst you, but you as a church." That is, each
individual making up the church in Corinth. For this
ministry is corporate ministry, it is not just
individual. It’s corporate ministry. And so he is
speaking here about the ministry of the Church in its
localities which, of course, you can at once mentally
make objective and say well, a group of people. No; you, me.
This applies as much to us as the whole Church. It
comes down to the individual. There cannot be a church
without the individual. It demands all the individuals
to make up the Body - the members to make up the Body.
So, I must underline this, that you get very clear that what
is here about ministry is shown by this letter to apply not
only to Paul, though to him in the first place, but to every
member of the church at Corinth and that means to every
member of the Church down through the ages into this very
hall tonight.
It’s the ministry that
is before us. Well, first of all, what is the
ministry? What is the ministry? Could you answer
that question? Well, it’s getting a Bible,
studying it, getting to know something about it, putting it
under your arm and off you go to preach. Is that the
ministry? Is it putting on a certain kind of collar and
a tie, attire, and now you’re a minister; that’s
the ministry? One of the most pathetically tragic
comedies that I have ever met (tragedy, yes, to me comical it
was also) some years ago I knew a man who for thirty years
had been ministering the word of God, here, there, all over
the place. And he had been the leader of what was
called the "spiritual clinic" in conferences.
Oh, he was fully occupied with this. All his time was
given to this. And then one day I went to a convention
and I saw this dear man coming toward me down the road.
And he made his way to me, put out his hand and said,
"You see, brother? I’m now in the
ministry." He was wearing a clerical collar.
"I’m now in the ministry." See what I
mean? I said, "tragedy of tragedies" -
and in a certain sense, comedy of comedies. That’s
not the ministry. That’s a false conception of the
ministry.
Forgive me. I don’t
mean to draw laughs or make things humorous. It’s
too sad to have these false conceptions and notions
of what the ministry is. If you were asked now to put
down on a slip of paper your definition of the ministry, what
would you say? Now here you have the great New
Testament document as it has turned out to be, on the
ministry of the Church and its members, which comprises us
all. What does it reveal to be the ministry? What
is it? It is just and only this, but this
definitely: the ministration of Christ to other
people. The ministration of Christ! Bringing
Christ into view, not mentally, but livingly and giving
Christ - so that where you are and where you have been,
something of Christ is left behind. Something of Christ
is left behind. They do not know mentally something
more about Christ but they have felt the presence of
Christ. They have realized Christ by your
presence. Now I’m going to show that in a minute
in this letter. But that’s the ministry, if there
is anything at all in this letter that speaks of ministry,
it is just that people who come into contact with us and with whom
we come into contact, come into contact with Christ.
And that as we go on through life - what poor creatures
we are and Paul takes account of that concerning himself
- yet, somehow or other, we are leaving a trail behind
us of the influence - the "sweet savor" as
Paul called it - of Christ. The sweet savor of
Christ. The people will at last, who have known us thus
will just have to say "Well, yes, plenty of human faults
if you like, but there’s something of Christ I’ve
come into because of that woman - that man."
That’s very testing,
isn’t it? Very challenging. It wants spiritual
people to be like that, but that is the ministry. Get
clear out of your mind all these other ideas: professionalism
in ministry, ministerialism and all the rest of churchianity
and ecclesiasticism. The whole lot! Get rid of it and
come right down to this: my presence has to be a
ministry of Christ in this world, and if people are in real
spiritual need I have something to minister to their need; something
of Christ. Christ by the Spirit is ministered through
me.
That sounds very simple,
doesn’t it? It upsets a lot of our high-flown
ideas about the ministry. But it’s very
practical, very real. That is the ministry in this
letter. You see, the apostle gives us some illustrations
of this in the letter. I wish you’d all read it
before you came here this evening so that it was all fresh in
your mind, because we have only an hour. (By the way
then, read the letter to the Galatians before tomorrow
night.) But here the apostle gives us some
illustrations of the meaning of the ministry in the terms
which I have used.
First of all, he takes up this
wonderful matter of Moses coming down from the mountain with
the table of stone of the law, and the glory of God being on
his face. He came down with glory on his face - his
face was shining with the glory of God. He came down and as he
moved toward the camp that glory on his face was so strong
that the people could not bear to look. When he went in
to read the law, the people could not dare to look because of
the glory and it was necessary for Moses to put a veil over
his face when he read the law of the testimony.
A face full of glory, but
the people unable... unable to live in the good of it and
live by the power of it... and to appreciate it, and to
enjoy it, and for it to abide with them by reason of the lack
of spiritual capacity. It says, "They could not look on
his face." They could not... they could not.
They hadn’t the capacity required for looking at the
glory of God.
Now, you know the rest of the
story. Paul outlines it and brings it over into this
dispensation and he says, "When you shall turn to the
Lord, the Lord Jesus, the veil is taken away." And
then he says this wonderful thing, this marvelous thing upon
which, dear friends, you can dwell for the rest of your life
without any exaggeration, "God, Who said: Let Light
shine..." Let light shine! The great fiat at the
beginning, "Let there be Light..." "God Who
said: Let light be, hath shined into our hearts to give the
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the
face of Jesus Christ." And there’s no
veil! We have now spiritual capacity! We’re
spiritual people! We have the Holy Spirit! The face of
Jesus Christ holds the revelation of the glory of God.
My, what revelation of the glory of God the face of Jesus is!
That word "face" of course, is only
symbolism.
You know, you know by a
person’s face. You know a good deal about the person, don’t
you? A great deal about the person... The face is
supposed to be the index of the person, the character and the
content of their life. That’s how it’s used
here. There is in Jesus Christ an unveiled revelation of the
Father and that is shined into our hearts. Shined into
our hearts! It is not an objective thing - a sun,
or aura, or halo outside. It’s come into our
hearts! In other words, by the blessed Holy Spirit we
have come to see the Lord Jesus in the spirit, to
appreciate the wonder of God in Jesus Christ! It’s
shined into our hearts! And the apostle is saying by
implication, "If that Light of God’s glory came
upon the face of Moses and was seen by all the people, in the
same way, what has shined into our hearts ought to be seen by
people." You cannot have the Light of the knowledge of
the glory of God shining in your hearts without people
knowing something about it. That’s the
ministry!
And we could dwell a great
deal upon that part of the letter about the veil and so
on. There’s a lot more to do with it but
Paul is saying, "That’s the ministry!"
It's the ministry of the glory of Christ revealed in our
hearts. And then he uses another illustration. It’s
already been mentioned in this conference: the Living
Epistles. He’s moved into another realm. He’s
perhaps moved into the realm of what is called the Ostraca
- the broken pieces of earthenware which were cast out
of every home in what you call, the... what is it, the place
where you put your rubbish? We call it the dustbin, you
call it the, well, yes - rubbish tin. They were
thrown out there. On these pieces of earthenware messages
were written and sent like letters. That’s how
they communicated their messages and their information.
They were taken many, many miles.
A boy was in the army, the
Roman army far, far away. His letter wasn’t
a nice thing like your air letters, you know. His was a
bit of pottery with a message written on it for father or
mother. And when these were received and the message
was taken, the pottery was broken, and it was thrown
outside. It was called the Ostraca, that’s where
we get our word "ostracism" from - something thrown
out.
Now Paul’s taken that
up and he is translating it into the life of the believer in
the matter of ministry. Not referring as a sideline,
he’s getting his metaphors a bit mixed up, he usually
does, Paul, he’s too much in a hurry to sort
things out and put them all in proper order. He refers again
to Moses, tables of stone, pen of iron.... No, not on
tables of stone, or the pen of iron, but on tables which are
hearts of flesh, written upon by the Spirit of the Living
God, the finger of God, from the heart. And you become
a living letter! You will personally say, "We have
this Treasure in earthen vessels." Here you have
your earthen vessel with a message written on it. We
are earthen vessels and in us has been written by the finger
of God the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus
Christ, with the effect: we are living epistles read and
known of all men! And what do these documents
say? What do these human vessels say? These
vessels of fragile clay, what are they saying? They’re
making known the glory of God in Jesus Christ! We are
that. That’s the ministry!
I say again, it’s
challenging... it’s testing. But that is the ministry
according to this letter. He illustrates, you see, the
ministry - the living letters. And there’s a
transition having taken place, first of all a transition
from the outward - tables of stone, written with a pen,
outward - to the inward: the heart, hearts of
flesh. This ministry is something inside now first, not
objective. It’s not your library. Not your
collection of commentaries. Pull them down and make a
stone. It’s what the Holy Spirit is saying to you
in your heart about the Lord Jesus. These things may be
useful afterward, but first of all, what is the Lord saying
inside of me? What is the burden, to use the
prophetic language? What is the burden of the word
of the Lord in my heart? In my heart... "Thy
word is like a fire in my bones", said the
prophet.
A transition from the
outward to the inward - that’s the ministry. What
you’ve got inside - that makes the ministry. From
the outward to the inward; from the letter to the Spirit, and
the apostle draws that contrast, "The letter killeth,
the Spirit maketh alive". From the letter (that is
the mere verbiage of truth, even though it be Christian
truth) to the spiritual meaning and interpretation and power
of that truth; the livingness of that
thing. Not the dead letter but the livingness of it in
us. That is the ministry. Transition from death then (the
letter killeth) unto Life!
It all amounts to this, to
use Paul’s own words here and elsewhere, the inward
revelation by the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ as the
manifestation of God the Father. I’m not
saying apart from the Scriptures, or independently of the
Scriptures, or as a substitute for the Scriptures. I have
had in my life of ministry very sad instances of people who come to me and say "The
Lord has shown me so and so..." And I have said but that
"so and so" is not according to the Scripture; that’s
contrary. "No, it doesn’t matter. That
doesn’t matter. The Lord has shown it to
me." And you’re not surprised that there’s
confusion in a life. No, through the Scriptures... oh,
keep living the Word. Live in the Word. Let the Word of
God dwell in you richly, that in all wisdom and spiritual
understanding it is, dear friends, through the
Word the Holy Spirit reveals.
Some of us know quite well
what it is to have a fairly large, comprehensive knowledge of
the contents of the Bible so that we could take a blackboard
and outline any book of the Bible at any given moment and
never to have seen in the way that has completely
revolutionized our lives what that means. What that means...
that’s a very different thing, isn’t it?
What it means from just what it says; understand
that? But it is the Holy Spirit through the
Word revealing Christ within. That is the
ministry of the Church and that is the ministry.
Well now, the transition,
the nature of the transition, the cost of the
transition. It is here, of course that the Cross comes
in because such a life, such a life of testimony, such a life
of influence, such a life of ministering Christ, such a
ministry! This kind of ministry is a very
costly thing. Don’t make any mistake about it, and
we should dwell long and earnestly upon this fact: the cost
of such a ministry. Ministry, as it is called, is not
always a costly thing to those who carry it out; it’s
mechanical. Mechanical! No, but this kind of
ministry is very costly and as I say, that is where the Cross
comes in.
Now, isn’t it rather
impressive, it takes nothing away, but is rather impressive
that in this second letter to the Corinthians the Cross is
not mentioned once by name. And yet there is no letter
in the New Testament where the Cross is more implicit or as
implicit. Everywhere the Cross is implied, or
powerfully implied. And so you find that the
outstanding words in this letter are: the sufferings of
Christ. "The afflictions of Christ, which abound
to us." You can look that up. I believe
you’ll find that some nine times the sufferings and the
afflictions of Christ are referred to in this letter.
It’s only another way, isn’t it, of speaking of the
Cross... the Cross in the life of the servant, and the
service of the Lord. And if the apostle Paul is keeping
himself in a right and proper sense in view in relation to
service, what a lot he says in this letter about his
sufferings. My, you haven’t perhaps studied it,
what this dear man had to go through. He gives us later
a catalog of the outward adversities: shipwrecks and
the privations and the nakedness and the perils on sea and on
land - robbers and all that kind of thing. Well,
that’s pretty hard.
But there’s another
list that you collect from this letter to which he refers but
not completely, you have to arrive at it by deduction.
And the strange thing is that it came to him from
Corinth. The things that these dear believers, who owed
everything spiritually to him, the things that they said
about him! First of all, there was a clique, or two or
three cliques in Corinth which wouldn’t have Paul.
They said, "We are of Apollos" or "I am of
Apollos" and "I am of Cephas", and another
superior clique "I am of Christ", meaning "We
are not of Paul." Two or three sections who were
not having Paul. Not having Paul. And then the things
they said about him, they said his personal presence is
despicable. I suppose referring to his body, his
physical appearance, the scars and marks of his sufferings
and of his physical affliction. They said, "His
personal presence is despicable. His letters are very
bold, but his personal presence is despicable.
He’s an autocrat. He is turning everything to his
own interest, trying to get a following for himself.
He’s even using the funds for his personal ends.
And..." Well, shall we go on? All of these things
are in this letter, you know, they're all there. The
man discredited by those who owed him so much, despised,
rejected, humiliated but he says, "The more I love you
the less I be loved by you."
This letter is the cry, you
might say the sob of a broken heart, because of what he met -
not from the world alone, he could get on with that, go
through with that - but from inside... false brethren, false
friends, treacherous and disloyal, and many other unkind
things. And these are all called the sufferings of
Christ... the afflictions of Christ, which came upon
him. And then that one outstanding incident and he
said, "I would have you know, being that they fail
me, I was pressed beyond my measure of endurance. I had
the sentence of death... the sentence, that it was
death." Pressed out of measure, and the sentence
of death.
And one more thing: the thorn in his
flesh which did not come either from the world or from
Christians; something that the Lord allowed.
"There was given me a stake." Thorn is not
the word - it’s not big enough! "A stake
in my flesh! A messenger of satan to buffet me, for
which thing I sought the Lord thrice that He would remove
it." Can you visualize it? A man going,
"Oh, Lord, can You not be pleased to relieve me of this
thing?" Begging the Lord - no answer. Back
again, "Lord, Lord, do, do something about this
thing! Take it away." It does make the going
so hard, so difficult... "Take it away,
Lord!" And no answer. Third time, and we see
our Lord in Gethsemane three times, "If it be
possible..." The sufferings of Christ, "If it
be possible, let this cup pass from Me." And the
third time... and then the Lord answered. And how did
He answer? "No. No, My grace is sufficient
for thee. My strength is made perfect in
weakness." And the apostle’s response:
"Most gladly, therefore, will I suffer."
Afflictions, the afflictions of Christ.
Now, have I said
enough? I haven’t said all, mark you, to show that
a ministry like this that is being set forth here, is
a costly ministry. And suffering is inevitable.
But why? Why? God is more concerned with
quality than with quantity. God is supremely
concerned with the essential, the intrinsic value; not
the broad sweep and straight over of the superficial, but the
deep. The real. The thing that is going to reproduce
because of its intrinsic value; that when this man has gone,
what God is doing in him will last for two thousand years at
least, and grow and grow and grow till it fills the whole
world. Through the sufferings of this man!
It’s a costly ministry
this kind of ministry about which you ask for
ministry. Well, it depends upon entirely what our
hearts are set upon, dear friends, whether we just want
to be ships that pass in the night and speak to each other in
passing and then disappear forever out of sight. If we
want to be just some butterfly flitting across the world
without any vital impact, effect, influence. If you
want to be like that, is that what you want to be? Come
and gone and nothing very much to show for it when you're
gone? Or do we really in our hearts want it to be like
this - something that will live on and grow and grow when we
are gone. When we’re gone... that’s the most
testing thing, you know, for anybody; to live for a time to
come when you’ll not be here to know about it. I
wonder... Maybe he does know - I don’t know those
secrets of what’s known when you’re gone in the
presence of the Lord, but I sometimes wonder if they
don’t know, if Paul were to come back here in this world
today and see all the world full of books written about his
letters and all the churches and Christians, whether they be
spiritual or otherwise, who are just reading him and studying
him and talking Paul - I wonder what he would say?
Well, you know, it’s
the afterward very largely that’s going to tell what the
value of our ministry, what our life here has been. So,
the apostle has something to say about that, "We have
this treasure in vessels of fragile clay. Our outward
man is perishing", and so on. The test is the
eternal values. Perhaps in a short lifetime or a full
lifetime, at most an altogether inadequate thing, as far as
we are concerned... poor vessels of fragile clay. And
if you’ve ever said to the Lord as I have many times,
"Lord, you’ve got a poor piece of clay here.
A very poor piece of clay, I don’t know why ever you
chose it." Yes, and yet, and yet, the great
apostle Paul would call himself a poor piece of clay, a
vessel of fragile clay, "That the exceeding greatness of
the power might be of God and not of ourselves". And he
goes on with his catalog of troubles... We are persecuted, we
are... we are... we are, but! The intrinsic value - the fruit
of suffering. The fruit of suffering! Well, I’m
not mincing matters, as we say. I’m not hiding
from you. It depends on what kind of ministry, and
surely you know friends, if you have any experience at all,
you know that it’s the people who have helped you most,
most deeply in your spiritual life, have been people
who’ve gone through the fires, who have come to know the
Lord in suffering. Isn’t that true? And you
know quite well the people who haven’t suffered
can’t do any good for you, can’t help you!
You know that. You have to say, "My, they
haven’t been through suffering yet, and they can’t
help us." Isn’t it true?
Well here it is, here’s
the kind - what ministry is. What it is... its nature,
its meaning, its value, its eternal work, its spiritual
character of life to these, and the cost of it. The
cost of it. I would not for anything depress you.
I would not leave a cloud over your heart, God
forbid. But I know this is true, and I believe that
there are enough people here, if not all, enough people here
who would really, really respond and say, "Lord, do make
my life of some account, some eternal account. Lord, do,
do... whatever you don’t do, do this one thing: that
when I’ve lived my life, leave spiritual and eternal
values behind. That they may show themselves again in
other lives. I’ll not be here to see it, or know
anything about it, but nevertheless, Lord, that is not the
point. My pleasure, my gratification, my satisfaction
is not the point; it’s Yours, what You get."
Are you, are you really committed to the Lord in that way?
And would you, therefore, take up your cross?
That’s of course the Gospel way of putting it: it’s
a figurative way. You don’t get it like that
after, the actual cross, but what it means you do get, taking
up your cross, denying yourself (your soul) and following
Him.
I won’t add more.
I think you have enough to see this is the ministry: the
seeing of the Lord by the Holy Spirit’s illumination in
our hearts - and the spontaneous, the spontaneous effect of
it. It’s spontaneous! Oh, thank God for the
spontaneity of this! You see, you don’t have
struggle and strain for the ministry, I did that for
years - having to get up the sermons and find the straw for
the bricks and keep the thing going because I was paid a
salary to be a "minister"! Oh, the agony of
it all, until that great crisis of Romans 6 and the
Cross! Since when, that strain, that kind of strain
has gone out, it’s spontaneous, it’s an opened
heaven! It's an open heaven. It’s
spontaneous, living.
Well, is that enough?
The Lord give us silent and serious exercise about this, or
committal, so that when we’ve gone from this scene
everything is not gone with us that we were here for.
Shall we pray?
Lord, there may be that
which has to be corrected or straightened out, or more
clearly apprehended, but we have sought to convey to Thy
people something of what Thou has laid upon our hearts, and
we can only commit the issues to Thee. Blessed Lord,
take this night and really count it profitable... that there
shall be intrinsic value from these lives. Oh, make us
these living epistles, read and known of all men...
make our hearts these tables upon which the Spirit of God
writes the revelation of the glory of God in the face of
Jesus Christ. All that this figurative speech really means,
make real in us we pray. And give us grace that we may
triumph... triumph in the afflictions, triumph in the
sufferings, triumph in the adversities, and know that they
are the sufferings of Christ, the fellowship of His
sufferings. And they must, therefore, be very
profitable, very fruitful, if they are His. So be
it. And now, let Thy hand be upon us as we leave this
place, not wanting to quench anything that is really living
and spiritual; nevertheless, do save us from in any way
dissipating, dissipating what Thou, Lord, has tried to
say. So be it, for Thy glory and praise and honor,
forever and ever. Amen.