In these three services taken up in different localities, the Lord was undoubtedly, through Peter, preparing the way for Paul.

• The early part of chapter 9 is engaged with the conversion of Saul of Tarsus right up to the verse we read.

• The Lord Jesus communicated to Saul the truth of the body, for He said,
  • “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou Me?”,

• and Paul was the servant who was to bring in the present administration of the assembly in local companies.

• Up to that time, things had been somewhat centralised at Jerusalem, and there had been twelve apostles to do things for the brethren under the Lord’s hand.

• That phase of things had drawn to a close, and the vessel through whom the Lord was to organise – if one might use the word – the feature of the dispensation which was going to continue right through, was already converted;

• it was to be his service to set up local assemblies; the assembly on earth taking the form of local companies, and those local companies would have to learn to do things for themselves.

• There was not even one apostle attached to each local company. There were twelve at Jerusalem.

I think you will find in these three incidents the Lord is making way for Paul’s teaching; Peter laying moral foundations.

• Paul, in his ministry, confirms and develops these foundations but also brings in the heavenly side, the full truth of the assembly, and the doctrine of the body. Paul could say to the Thessalonians,
  • “Ye, brethren, have become imitators of the assemblies of God which are in Judaea in Christ Jesus”, 1 Thessalonians 2: 14.

• Lydda and Joppa were two of these assemblies in Judaea, and Paul was not slow to admit that the assembly of the Thessalonians, which he set up, became imitators of them; they were founded on right lines.

Paul, in his teaching, develops the lines which Peter indicates in these incidents.

• Romans and 1 Corinthians develop the principle of doing things for ourselves. Peter says to Aeneas, “Rise up, and make thy couch for thyself”, Acts 9: 34;

• while Colossians deals with the truth illustrated in the raising of Dorcas – the necessity for living conditions in our local settings; “Your life is hid with the Christ in God”, Colossians 3: 3.
  • We must be concerned to maintain living conditions and not simply activity in service.

• Then, in Caesarea Jew and Gentile are brought together, Peter and those with him enjoying full fellowship with Cornelius and his house, upon whom the Holy Spirit had come even as upon believers at Pentecost.

• This links with the gospel of peace in Ephesians, peace between man and man. Peter says to Cornelius, “Preaching peace by Jesus Christ”. The hatred between Jew and Gentile was annulled as it says:
  • “For he is our peace, who has made both one … having annulled the enmity in his flesh, the law of commandments in ordinances, that he might form the two in himself into one new man, making peace”, Ephesians 2: 14.

• If the greatest enmity – that between Jew and Gentile – had been slain, then every other enmity has been slain, and there should be nothing to mar the peace of our relations together in our local companies. We are formed in Christ into one new man making peace.

What I had in mind was to dwell particularly upon the first incident which is basic, that is, the question of rising up and making our couch for ourselves.

• The name Aeneas means praise, and unless we are able to do this in some measure, the praises of God will suffer.

• People who, in faith have acted on the injunction Peter gives here, are the people who are free and available in the praise of God, and we all agree that every local company should be marked by the praise of God.

I wish to take up the thought of ‘making our couch for ourselves’ in three ways: –

1. First, with reference to our own bodies, our own persons. In that connection I read Romans 7: 25, “So then I myself with the mind serve God’s law”.

2. Secondly, in connection with our houses; because if we have learned in some measure at any rate, to control our bodies, the next thing is to control our houses,

   and to take a stand like Joshua and say, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord”.

3. Then finally, which is the main point, we should learn as local companies to make our couch for ourselves, ordering our local conditions for the pleasure of God and the comfort and prosperity of His people.

   This is indicated in the verses I read in Philippians, where we are exhorted to work out our own salvation. That is said to a local company.

   It is a question of the local company working out its own salvation with fear and trembling, because

   • “it is God who works in you both the willing and the working according to his good pleasure”.

1. Our Bodies

As to the first point it is remarkably illustrated in Paul himself, because in giving an account of his conversion before Agrippa he says, “The Lord said, ‘I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: but rise up and stand on thy feet’ ”.

• One feels that is the call to each of us. How can we do it? Where is the power coming from? Peter gives the answer, he says to Aeneas, “Jesus, the Christ, heals thee: rise up, and make thy couch for thyself”.

• He presents to him Jesus, the Christ, and, dear brethren, in Jesus, the Christ, there is every resource that our souls need.

• Jesus, the Christ, is the One who has endured the cross for us; God “made him to be sin for us, who knew not sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him”, 2 Corinthians 5.

• He has endured the cross for us in order that as the Christ, the living Head, the new Head, He might have the wherewithal to meet every need of our souls. He can make us thoroughly whole spiritually.

• We are ruined and undone, but Jesus the Christ is available. What is there in Him for us? To begin with we have righteousness in Him,
  • “But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who has been made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and holiness, and redemption”, 1 Corinthians 1: 30.

• We have no righteousness of our own. We could not establish our own righteousness; our righteousnesses are as filthy rags.
  • But “from all things from which ye could not be justified in the law of Moses, in him everyone that believes is justified”, Acts 13: 39. What a great thing that is!

Then we have life in Him, for “He is our life”. Colossians 3: 4. Further, we have grace and strength in Him, for whatever the trial, He understands.

• He has been right through the path of obedience here. He is the Leader and Completer of faith, and there is an inexhaustible supply of grace and support available in Him to support us in every trial and test.

• We need to fix our gaze upon Him, in whom there is every resource for us, Jesus, the Christ. Beautiful title! One who is Head, One who gives the Holy Spirit.

“Jesus, the Christ, heals thee”. That healing is not only a question of what is available in Him objectively,

• but it takes effect because He is the giver of the Holy Spirit; that is implied in the title, the Christ.

• The apostle says, “The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death”, Romans 8: 2.

• It is because every resource is available in Christ, including the gift of the Holy Spirit, that it is incumbent upon us, in faith, to answer to the command, “Rise up”.

• Aeneas had been paralysed for eight years. He was like Paul in Romans 7. Perhaps all here have known something of paralysis, of feeling perfectly helpless.

• In Romans 7, what the paralysed man wanted to do he could not do, when it was a question of doing good. He had to say,
  • “I see another law in my members, warring in opposition to the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which exists in my members”.

• There he was, a poor helpless paralytic. What is the good of telling a paralytic to stand up? If Aeneas had looked at himself he would have said he could not do it, for he had not moved for eight years.

• Dear brethren, if our eyes are upon ourselves, that is where we shall be. But Peter directed his gaze to Another, to Jesus, the Christ. Do you believe there is all this resource in Christ for you?

• It is a matter of faith. He is presented to us in testimony, God bears witness to Him, and thousands have borne witness to Him in their lives.

• It is for me to appropriate in faith what is available in Christ, and to rise up as believing that all is available in Him; laying hold of Jesus, the Christ, the Healer.

• As long as I look at myself I shall never rise up, I am paralysed. God has brought in One to meet the whole situation, One who died upon the cross that sin in the flesh might be dealt with; the One who is the giver of the Holy Spirit.

• Aeneas rose up immediately: he moved in faith. As we rise up in faith in Him, we shall prove the reality of the Holy Spirit in us. The two things go together, “full of faith and the Holy Spirit”, Acts 6: 5.

The one who is full of faith will be filled with the Holy Spirit.

• The more Christ is my object, the more I shall experience in myself the operation of the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.

• “The law” implies a self-acting principle; as for instance, the law of gravity in nature.

• It corresponds with the Lord’s word in John 4, “a fountain of water springing up into eternal life”.

• We could not make it spring up: as long as we do not hinder it, it will spring up. What are the conditions under which it springs up?

• My vision to be filled with Christ; as I am drawing upon Him for grace for every need, there is a pure holy fountain springing up in me, a fountain of living water, purifying, satisfying and giving power, so that I can stand on my feet.

The Lord said to Paul, “Rise up and stand on thy feet”. The first thing we have to do is to stand upon our feet in connection with our own personal habits and ways –

• to make our couch in that sense, I take charge of my own person in the power of the Spirit. “I myself with the mind serve God’s law”; he had taken a stand.

• He was resolved that the law of God should govern him, and chapter 8 shews that on the principle of faith in Christ, and the consequent operation of the Spirit in the believer,
  • it becomes a practical proposition to serve the law of God not only with the mind but with the body.

• The flesh will always serve sin. The law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus sets me free from the law of sin and death – the self-acting foul, corrupt spring.

• It is always there, but it is met by another spring, “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus”, so that the believer has power, by the Spirit, to take possession of his body and use it for God.
  • “If, by the Spirit, ye put to death the deeds of the body, ye shall live”, Romans 8: 13.

• The Spirit becomes the power whereby the believer, according to chapter 12 can present his body “a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your intelligent service”. A great victory!

Our Houses

I pass on to the household thought. From the standpoint of our own happiness and of the testimony, it becomes of all importance that we should regulate our households according to God’s will.

• In that respect also we should rise up and make our couch for ourselves.

• Households are places where idols easily come in. Joshua refers to the gods of your fathers that were on the other side of the river, and the gods of the Amorite in whose land ye dwell, but he says, as it were,
  • whatever other people do, I am going to regulate my house according to God, “as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah”.

• I believe the Lord Jesus had this kind of thing in mind when he attended the marriage in John 2.

• It is a remarkable thing that in the gospel so essentially spiritual, the opening incident recorded of the Lord’s public ministry should have been his attendance at a marriage.

• I think it shews, since John is writing for the last days, how important christian households are, and how much the Lord is concerned in securing households purified from idolatry, like Joshua’s.

• He is so much concerned about it that He would attend the marriage to give the young couple a good start in relation to the testimony, and to indicate the way of true joy.

• He says, “Fill the waterpots with water”, that is for purification – they did the thing thoroughly, “They filled them up to the brim”. That is what is needful in our houses.

• There were those there to help in the matter, the servants did it. The household began with the idea of purification as the way to true joy.

• A common thought is that purification leads to legality and unhappiness; but purification is the way to true and full joy, joy which no man takes from you; there is nothing legal about it.

• The Lord turning the water into wine adds to the joy of the occasion, but it is by way of purification. The Lord is concerned about this in the last days.

Do not set up a home with the motives that govern the unregenerate man, self-importance and self-indulgence – Sihon and Og.

• They have to be met in a military sense amongst the saints generally; they are only met thoroughly as the inward motives are purified, so that the idols of self-importance and self-indulgence, with all the details they bring in, are dealt with.

• Then there is a basis for households to be established on the line of true joy.

• There is nothing in this to militate against natural affection and there is nothing legal about it. It is a question of the motives that govern the position.

• The link itself is of God and it is due to God that it should be enjoyed and taken up rightly for His pleasure. “For thy pleasure they are and were created”, Revelation 4: 11. Where does God find pleasure in it except amongst His people?

• So He wants it taken up in simplicity as from Himself, not in legality but in freedom; but, at the same time, with purified motives, having the Lord and His interests in mind.

• John’s gospel begins with a marriage and ends with a home, a home available for the Lord’s mother, a purified home where she could go.

• Further, this section of John’s gospel ends with the nobleman, who came to the Lord at Cana of Galilee, with the result that he believed himself, and his whole house.

• The whole house was now on the principle of faith and in the liberty of sonship, “Thy son liveth”, John 4: 50. There were no idols there, nor “the weak and beggarly elements” of legality.

In relation to our households the Lord would say to each one of us, “Rise up, and make thy couch for thyself”.

• You have the power to do it – the grace of Christ and the gift of the Spirit; now do it, undertake it. So Joshua says, “As for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah”.

• The word is to be full of faith and the Holy Spirit, to rise up, not looking at the weakness of the flesh, for there is nothing to be hoped for from the flesh, but looking to the Christ and going forward, putting things in order so that our households stand definitely in relation to the testimony.

In Philippi itself there were remarkable illustrations of what I have been saying. The work began at Philippi, with individuals who knew how to regulate themselves for God’s pleasure.

• Paul and Silas in prison were individuals who stood upon their feet and so knew how to regulate their spirits and bodies in prison.

• With backs scourged and feet in the stocks, they were in accord with the name of Aeneas, which means praise. They were praising God with singing.

• In Philippi you have Lydia’s household; she was baptised and her house. She took up baptism as a real thing, according to the meaning of the water, and she says, “If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house, and abide there”.

• It was a house where Paul could stay as long as he liked. She was not afraid of what he would see there; she asked him to abide in her house.

• Then the jailor’s house. How that man rose up and regulated his house at midnight. In the early hours of the morning there was a man putting his house in order for God. He “was baptised, and all his straightway”.

• How he carried things before him, being full of faith and the Holy Spirit. Think of getting the children up in the early hours of the morning and having them baptised. There was no delaying with him.

• Then he lays the table. He did it himself; he washed their stripes.

Those two households shew the beautiful mutuality of a christian home.

• In the first you have a woman – sisters are normally engaged in household work – free to attend to the things spoken by Paul;

• and in the second you have a man laying the table; a husband who did not shut himself away from household duties. It suggests the liberty and joy of a christian home. It says the jailor rejoiced householdly having believed in God. Acts 16: 34. The water was turned to wine.

Our Local Companies

All this leads on to the local company. The local company is to rise up and make its couch for itself. It depends upon ourselves how well we get on. There is a saying in the world that as a man makes his bed so he must lie on it.

• Whom have we to blame for having poor times? Why have we not made the bed better? How are we to make our bed as a local company according to God?

• By being governed by the truth of the body in a practical way, which involves working out our own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in us both the willing and the working according to His good pleasure.

• Corinthians gives the doctrine of the body, “For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit”,
  • and the apostle says, “Ye are (the) body of Christ, and members in particular”.

• Why do we not enjoy the truth of this more? Because in a practical way it involves that we work out our own salvation, with fear and trembling.

• We need to be determined to have nothing in our meetings that is inconsistent with Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The big man must be shut outside; no kings must be there.

• In Corinth they were reigning as kings; the line of Edom is full of kings and dukes. I may bring the big man into the meeting, the big man that wants power,
  • but we need to ‘work out’ because God is ‘working in’.

• In the body there are diversities of operations, but one God. The assembly is a sphere where Divine Persons are active, and there is no room for man as such at all.

• The Spirit distributes, the Lord administers and God operates.
  • “There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all”, 1 Corinthians 12: 4-6.

If we are to get the gain of the activities of divine Persons when we come together in our localities, it means that man after the flesh is to be shut out; “Jesus Christ and Him crucified” must be the basis.

• It involves our being together in the spirit of fear and trembling because God is doing things: that involves our being very sensitive.

• If we are to have prosperity locally I believe it depends upon our being governed by the light and truth of the body in a practical way, particularly in our gatherings, but also when we are not together.

• It is part of the Lord’s commandment in 1 Corinthians, that we should recognise the truth of the body and shut out all the greatness of man. That does not shut out God’s rights in sovereignty, for it says,
  • “God has set the members, each one of them in the body, according as it has pleased him”, 1 Corinthians 12: 18.

• Some may appear to be more conspicuous than others; some of the hidden members are the most vital, but God is operating in all.

• The truth of the body will help us to accept sovereignty and yet mutuality, enabling us to see what God has given each member, and
  • enabling us also to move together and seek grace to support each member in functioning in the most efficient manner, unselfishly making way for each other.

• By so doing we make way for Divine Persons and Their operations in sovereign grace.

May the Lord help us in these matters. We need to take home to ourselves that if things are not what they might be we have only ourselves to blame, and who amongst us can say they are all that they might be?

• If things are not what they might be in our lives or in our homes, or in our local companies, we have only ourselves to blame.

• God has supplied all that is necessary and so the word to each one of us at this time is, “Jesus, the Christ, heals thee: rise up, and make thy couch for thyself”. There is power to do it. May the Lord help us!

God has spiritual ends in view and one object before Him in the present trial is that we may gain a spiritual outlook and so be in sympathy with Him in what He is doing.

• The natural heart sets its hopes on greater ease and comfort here – the end of the war, retirement from business, etc. Its hopes do not go beyond such things.

• But the word “the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the coming glory to be revealed to us” indicates that the whole of “this present time” – i.e. the whole christian era – will be a time of suffering, and that the sufferings will not end until the dawn of the glory.

• We are to accept suffering as normal and not set our hopes on ease and comfort here, otherwise we shall have many disappointments and our wills may become rebellious.

• Our hope is to be fixed on the day of glory, “the revelation of the sons of God”. God has “begotten us again to a living hope”, 1 Peter 1: 3 –
  • a hope which does not fall short of the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ and our appearing in glory with Him.

• Hope is a most important feature – often lacking amongst us – and essential to our present salvation. “We are saved in hope”, “as helmet the hope of salvation”. “Now the God of hope fill you … that ye may abound in hope in the power of the Holy Spirit”, Romans 15: 13.

Scripture does not say that our circumstances bear witness that we are children of God – they may appear to belie it.

• The natural heart always regards material comfort and prosperity as the evidence of divine favour.

• But we do not need circumstantial evidence, for “the Spirit Itself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God” – and this in a scene of suffering.
  • The Spirit’s witness is far more important than anything material.

• We are to inherit even material things – all things with Christ. We are Christ’s joint-heirs. The whole world, in this sense, is ours, but in that day, with Him. Now we are privileged to suffer with Him.

Three kinds of suffering might be referred to:

1. the normal sufferings of the godly man as found in the groaning creation, not only having part in the woe that is the result of sin, but feeling with God as to the whole condition, and so, in his measure, groaning as Christ groaned, Mark 7: 34, John 11: 33, 38.

   Men groan and grumble, but the christian groans according to God, and with intelligent hope “awaiting sonship, the redemption of the body”. And in this the Spirit joins Its help to our weakness, and “the Spirit Itself makes intercession with groanings which cannot be uttered”.

   How we would desire to feel things more instead of being so shallow, so that we might experience the help of the Spirit in this way!

2. Persecution and reproach. There is not only reproach for the name of Christ, but the reproach that comes from being part of a failing vessel of testimony – a dual reproach.

   As we confess the name of Christ, how ready men are to throw in our teeth the broken state of the church.

3. The calamities and apparent misfortunes that befall the people of God, in common with other men, or even in excess of others.

These three forms of suffering link with the first, second and third books of Psalms respectively.

• The third form especially tests us, and has been a special feature of the trials of the past few years, which have shewn the need for adjustment in our outlook.

• All three forms of suffering came upon Paul in surpassing measure. When we think of the persecutions he endured we might well think the suffering was sufficient for any man, and would be spared all others.

But he suffered in health – had a thorn for the flesh to buffet him, and in addition calamities came upon him.

• He was shipwrecked three times – four times including the one recorded in Acts – and a day and night he spent in the deep.

• Further, he speaks of perils of robbers, perils of rivers, perils of the desert, hunger, thirst, cold, nakedness.

• The natural mind finds such things inexplicable. It would expect a chosen vessel to be shielded from all such things.
  • Have we not in our time thought of ships as unsinkable because brothers were on board?

• Would we be prepared to accept the ministry of one who was shipwrecked three times? Would we not be inclined to think that the Lord was not with him?

• Such happenings are a test of spiritual judgment and outlook. Many turned away from Paul as a prisoner, but he says the Lord’s prisoner. 2 Timothy 1: 8.

We need to allow our minds to be governed by scripture in these matters. God loves us too well to consider merely for our ease and comfort, though the very hairs of our head are all numbered.

• These happenings we do not expect and cannot understand, at any rate at the time, are really the result of love’s calculation.

• It was when the Psalmist went into the sanctuaries of God that he understood. He no longer envied the wicked for he realised that the man most to be pitied is the man who lacks discipline.
  • “Moab is at ease from his youth … and hath not been emptied from vessel to vessel …”, Jeremiah 48: 11.

• The great result reached is in verse 26, “My flesh and my heart faileth: God is the rock of my heart and my portion forever”. No adverse circumstance could now affect his assurance and joy for they were in God Himself.

A similar end was reached in God’s dealings with Job. Calamities came upon him, blows which seemed pitiless.

• But, referring to him, James says: “Ye have seen the end of the Lord, that He is very pitiful and of tender mercy”.

• At the outset, though outwardly serene, he knew no peace and rest of heart, Job 3: 25-26, and the blows that fell on him were necessary according to the calculations of divine love, to teach him true joy and rest in God alone.

One has often thought of the circumstances of the incoming of our Lord. What a calamity the enforced journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem would appear to be at such a time!

• What hopes and fears Joseph and Mary must have had as to the possibility of finding accommodation! And then to learn that there was no room in the inn, only a manger in the public courtyard available at the birth of the Son of God.

• No ease and comfort there. Judging by outward circumstances there was no indication of God’s favour and interest in that supreme event:
  “O strange yet fit beginning
  To all that life of woe”.

The whole trend of scripture shews that God has greater ends in view than to grant the objects of His favour mere material comfort and prosperity.

• In us the end is to be conformed to the image of His Son; and every form of suffering, “all things” indeed, work together for good with that great end in view.

In the light of this the christian is not doleful. He boasts in tribulation. James says

• “Count it all joy when ye fall into various temptations, knowing that the proving of your faith works endurance. But let endurance have its perfect work, that ye may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing”, James 1: 2-4.

• It is better to lose all here and lack nothing spiritually, as Paul when writing to the Philippians, rather than to possess the whole world without God.

The evidence that God is with a man is not seen in his circumstances, but in the fact that his spirit is maintained in joy and victory. This was supremely true of Paul.

• As subject to the Father of spirits we live. The very discipline is the proof of His love, for “who is the son that the Father chasteneth not?”
  • And in the suffering the “Spirit Itself bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God”.

• And further, the Lord Jesus Christ will be with our spirits, 2 Timothy 4: 22 – a most precious thing.

• He has trodden the whole path and is the Leader and Completer of faith. He was “made perfect through suffering”. No thought of ease and comfort prevailed with Him, but the acceptance of increasing suffering to the end.

• And it is ours to know not only the grace supporting us, but He Himself being with our spirits. How evidently true this was of Stephen!

• May God grant to us a spiritual outlook and a subject heart in accepting the “sufferings of this present time” so that we may prove in our spirits the love and support of Divine Persons and be maintained in joy and victory until He come!

Perhaps the point mentioned, the distinction between the Passover and the Supper is one we might look at first, and to get clear on that if possible.

• They are closely linked together, yet they are not one and the same thing. Nor is the Passover exactly a type of the Supper.

• The Supper would link on more with the sacrifices connected with the altar than with the Passover Lamb.

• The Passover is really the ground on which the people are secured in redemption. It is more a type of redemption, and on that basis God secures a people He can express Himself to.

• It is interesting that it is called The Lord’s Passover, conveying the way that He established His right to His people.

The boards of the tabernacle were set in sockets of silver; that is redemption;

• but the pillars of the court were set in sockets of copper, which links with the Altar.

• Keeping the Feast seven days and feeding on the Passover would affect the inward state of the saints and thus prepare us inwardly for the Supper,
  • whereas the fellowship in 1 Corinthians 10 refers more to our outward links and having God’s own judgment on what is around us.

• The Passover touches the inward working of sin in our hearts. Leaven is something hidden. It is not enough to have a right judgment of what is around, we need also to have leaven judged in our hearts. The Lamb is roast with fire.

• The feast of unleavened bread is connected with the seven days, it goes on during the week.

In Egypt the Passover was a household matter, but in the land it was to be eaten in the place where God put His Name.

• In that sense we bring the appreciation of the Passover with us to the Assembly.

• While the Supper is not the place to be occupied with the direct judgment of God upon sin, yet we bring that in our hearts to give depth.

• It seems necessary to have such an appreciation in order to get a proper sense in our souls of the love that dealt with what was against us; that is expressed in “My body … for you”. The appeal comes home to us in that way – what could He keep back?

Ques. How would you distinguish between the Passover Lamb and My body for you?

G.R.C. The Passover Lamb is really the question of what meets the claims of God, the perfections of the One who accomplished redemption – a sacrifice for sin – Christ our Passover has been sacrificed for us.

• The perfection of the Lord here, as apart from sin, would form us in relation to our own state and bring us to self judgment in a most definite way and lead us to appreciate a new order of Man – perfection as seen in Christ.

“My body … for you” links on more with the body prepared. “Lo, I come to do Thy will O God, a body hast Thou prepared me”, Psalm 40: 6-8.

• You have the complete thought – not exactly the head with the legs and inwards as in Exodus 12: 9, but the complete thought of what was contained in that vessel in which the whole will of God has been expressed.

• It makes way for the headship of Christ so that the saints recognise that there is nothing outside of Christ at all.

• It is said that in Him all the Fulness was pleased to dwell, Colossians 1: 19, and also that in Him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.

• It also involves our sanctification by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all, and our removal as after the flesh in our condition here, not only the judgment of sin but our being set aside and taken up in a new way.

The word memorial seems to involve that we already know Christ. No one can remember Him or call Him to mind unless He is already known.

• No unconverted person can partake of the Supper, because they do not know Him.

• We cannot remember the Lord beyond what we already know of Him. The idea of memorial is that it brings awakenings in our souls as to what we already know.

• In coming together we remember His death, but it is a living Person already known. The memorial is our real bond together; we assemble to break bread as knowing the Lord.

• The volume of spiritual power in the meeting is what is known of the Lord, so that as spiritual growth proceeds there should be greater power.

• There is a helpful note in Mr. Darby’s translation as to the word translated “remembrance”. It has the signification of calling to mind as a memorial.

• If in each heart the Lord is evidently present by the act of calling to mind, how wonderful that is! That would, as it has been said, prepare for Headship – He would be everything to us.

The Supper is peculiarly an Assembly privilege – it is connected with our history here as of the assembly, and it is in relation to the Supper that the assembly exercises go on week by week.

• In remembering Him we get a fresh impression of this Person, which would govern us during the week.

• We break bread to call the Lord to mind, but He comes in from His own side. We cannot exactly bring Him in. The Supper is the Lord’s appointment, and He is faithful to His own appointment.

• He was made known to them “in the breaking of bread”, Luke 24: 35. It is suggestive of manifestation.

Ques. Would it be a divergence to say a little on what it means to come together in assembly?

G.R.C. The expression “in assembly” does not seem to involve state, but rather gathering in the outward recognition of the Lord’s authority.

• The Corinthians are spoken of as coming together “in assembly”, although their state was not in accord with it.

• What existed at Corinth seemed to be contrary to the idea of the assembly – in that sense a denial of love’s authority. “The Lord” suggests love’s authority.

• It is the Lord’s Supper. As there were sects, they were not eating the Lord’s Supper; His authority was not owned.

“The Lord Jesus” brings in the affection side very strongly – that title has a great appeal.

• The loaf is an appeal for unity – “We, being many, are one bread”. It sets us practically together as one body.

• We need to recognise the Lord’s authority in the assembly and the way He exercises it. Until the Lord’s authority is fully owned we cannot understand Headship.

Ques. Referring to the scripture, “Each one taking his own supper before the others”, do you think that has a meaning at the present moment?

G.R.C. The Corinthians were of course, actually making a meal, but the principle may come in in being on individual lines.

• The point we specially want help on in these readings is the way the Lord would have us move together. He loves to see us move together as one.

• He would give that touch which we should be on the look out for. The Lord would give some definite touch on each occasion.

• Subjection would own love’s authority and we should be prepared for the touch which might come through anyone – we should not look to any particular brother.

Ques. Would you expect one thought throughout the meeting?

G.R.C. You cannot limit the Lord. It is a question of learning to move together with Him, but in moving and following the Lord there is usually a certain line.

• There is a suggestion in Ezekiel 46: 9, “He that cometh in by the way of the north gate shall go out by the way of the south and he that cometh by way of the south gate shall go out by the way of the north gate”.

• There would be order if we were with the Lord. Sometimes a hymn is given out and you feel instinctively it has touched every heart present, and at other times there is not that power.

• If we recognise the truth of the body we shall wait upon one another so that we can move together.

Rem. I suppose we may also wait too long and miss the opportunity?

G.R.C. If the Lord lays something on your heart you would seek grace to move.

• If we are in the spirit of waiting, we discern a time when the spirits of the saints seem to be vibrating in tune. Then we can go forward.

• The Lord intends, when we eat of the loaf, that the one body should become a practical reality to us. He would have one instrument that He can play upon, so unified that it is one instrument.

The drinking of the cup, too, brings about unity in the enjoyment of the love of God.

• There is nothing to set aside divisions practically like the enjoyment of the love of God. You cannot have divisions then.

• When we are unified in the love of Christ and of God, self-assertion and the assertion of the flesh is entirely put out; then the Lord can proceed with what He has before Him.

• In partaking of the Supper, it brings us to Christ as being supreme, which is the great basis of the assembly. It is the power to meet the disintegrating efforts of the enemy.

• The assembly is the fulness of Him that fills all in all. It has the complete apprehension of the Person of Christ and of the mind of God. With others it is partial.

• The Lord’s supreme delight is the assembly at one with Him in regard to the service of God. No vessel understands the Lord like the assembly.

• When the Lord was here everything for God was there in Him – now it is extended – Christ and the church are one.

The greatness of gathering together should increase with us.

• Simply to have a thought on one’s mind and give it out is not spiritually taking account of the thing at all. The occasion demands silence – we wait for the Lord to move.

• Someone used to say, “I looked for His eye” – he came like a blank sheet of paper but he looked for His eye.

• The commencement of the meeting is different. We come together to break bread. The Lord is not going to break the bread, and we cannot expect the Lord to come in until it is done.

• I have sometimes thought that we are more on our own resources as it were at the beginning of the morning meeting than at any other – though, of course, the Spirit is present to enable us to do what the Lord has asked us to do.

You have a different touch from each of the gospels – Matthew and Mark are constitutional; Luke is memorial and John gives you the great manifestations.

• If we do not start with Matthew and Mark, we cannot have Luke and John.

• As someone has said, the Supper is the kernel of Christianity and the Lord knew fully in giving it that everything in connection with the assembly centres in the Supper.

In Matthew and Mark the blood is made prominent, “This is my blood, that of the [new] covenant”. Whereas in Corinthians it is “This cup is the new covenant in My blood”.

Throughout Scripture, when God speaks from His own side, He expresses Himself, and this is specially so in the new covenant; for in Christ the expression is complete and that is the portion of the assembly.

• The covenant governs the thought of approach. Through the death of Christ the way into the holiest has been made manifest.

• The added thought of the “cup” indicates our satisfaction in the love of God, and the intimacy of our links with one another as in covenant relations.

With regard to the “cup” the Lord is bringing before us what was His own portion as Man down here. He says, “Jehovah is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup”, Psalm 16: 5.

• So that in that way the new covenant for the church is entering into what Christ enjoyed as Man here with God.

God being fully declared in connection with the blood of the covenant means that all that is of the flesh is removed judicially from before God and that

• the declaration is in connection with the Person of Christ – Who He is and what He is in His own Person, His unique humanity.

• His cup was perfect communion with God. You have God and man in perfect accord in the Lord down here,
  • but if we were to draw near to God a way had to be dedicated for us through the veil, that is to say, His flesh.

• The life to which – in us – sin attached, has been laid down, so that the declaration might be available for us.

• So that the blood would give us the complete assurance that the covenant is on an infallible basis – perfect love expressed and righteousness established.

In the loaf it is Christ’s love brought before us – “My body – for you” – but in the cup it is the love of God.

• “Perfect love casts out fear”. Perfect love implies that nothing has been overlooked. God has met every question in accord with His own attributes and secured us in love for His own pleasure.

According to Hebrews the new covenant is to be made with the house of Israel and Judah, but before that was promised

• God said to Abraham, “In thee shall all the nations of the earth be blessed”.

• We do not therefore limit ourselves in the cup, but take in, in our thoughts, the whole range of divine blessing.

• The assembly really understands and enjoys the new covenant in a way that Israel cannot. We have a greater apprehension of the love of God and the love of Christ.

• There is that which is common to Israel and the church; the remission of sins, for instance, and the covenant;

• but things in a way which Israel will not touch. The covenant involves for us the gift of the Holy Spirit.

By beholding the glory of the Lord the saints are formed in the new covenant – changed into the same image from glory to glory – it is a progressive thought.

• “All changed into the same image” –

• unity of character is brought about by beholding the glory, and

• unity of satisfaction is brought about by drinking into one Spirit – which is signified in the cup.

The first mention of the cup is in Genesis – Joseph’s cup – and it is said of that “in which my lord drinks”, in which indeed he divines, suggesting intelligence.

• The Lord has acquired glory in effecting the covenant – He is the great anti-type of Moses. Moses goes up saying “Peradventure”, Exodus 32: 30; but there is no “peradventure” with Christ.

• So the glory of the Lord would bring in intelligence – He has brought about all to the glory of God.
  • “Let him that glorieth glory in this that he understandeth and knoweth Me”, Jeremiah 9: 24.

• The covenant gives us understanding and knowledge of God in His nature and in all His attributes.

Ques. “Having sung a hymn they went out to the mount of Olives” – would that be response to the covenant? It does not say the Lord went and they followed – there seemed to be a mutual movement, with the Lord among them.

G.R.C. Does not that suggest the way the knowledge of Christ as Head works; you move with Him as they did? They could not help it – the attraction of the Lord’s presence was such to them.

Ques. Would you say that what follows practically in the movement is largely dependent upon whether the covenant has been apprehended in our hearts?

G.R.C. If the covenant is known, it really brings in the atmosphere of what belongs to the presence of God.

• The divine character has shone out; we are fitted to be there – we are there in love – in response. This gives boldness; we often lack holy boldness.

• The blood of the everlasting covenant ever stands before God in all its efficacy; so if there is not that boldness it is due to our lack of apprehension.

• An individual has entrance into the Holiest – but all that we touch individually, even as to the Holiest we touch in a far deeper way as together.

In appreciating the covenant, we understand one another – we love one another.

• The movement together is dependent upon our common enjoyment, whether we are one heart and one soul.
  • “It came to pass when the trumpeters and the singers were as one to make one voice heard in praising and blessing Jehovah … the glory of Jehovah had filled the House of God”, 2 Chronicles 5: 13-14.

• That comes out in singing a hymn together. We are in conscious unity in response to God.

• This moving together is where we are really tested. Sometimes a hymn is given out which shows that we have not moved together.

• This move to the mount of Olives is in the atmosphere of which we have been speaking – “they went”. Mr. Darby touches that in his hymn, “There Christ the centre of the throng”.

A spiritual person would not move contrary to the Spirit. It is possible for even a babe in Christ to be spiritual.

• In that way it is a serious exercise if things are not in harmony, because all have the Spirit. Spirituality is not limited to those who have gone on a long time.

• John’s babes know all things. A babe may give a touch – an impression of God and a response of love.

It is a most difficult thing for us to get away from the individual idea; whereas, if in the good of drinking into one Spirit, one is not thinking of one’s own part, but of moving with the company.

• Once the saints have moved on to Mount of Olive’s ground with the Lord among them, it is unsuitable that a hymn should be given out taking us back to the Lord on the throne.

• We need to be educated. Apart from these instructions we are going to carry on the meeting ourselves.

• In that case the meeting would consist in so many brothers taking part, and that is not the meeting at all.

• The saints should be conscious that there is something far greater than what is ministered in words – what is going out from the hearts of the saints.

To return for a moment to Leviticus 8; I believe that is a matter all the people of God need grounding in – sanctification.

• Before I speak of it in detail it will be well to say a few words on the service of God generally, and you will understand that what I mean now is the service of God as in Leviticus, that is, priestly service.

• In Numbers it is levitical service; in Leviticus it is serving God in His presence. The service of God has two parts to it; there is the service of God at the altar and the service inside the tabernacle.

Priestly service at the altar was a public matter; that is anyone could have come along and could have seen the priests serving at the altar;

• but inside the tabernacle no one saw what went on, only the priests themselves knew. Typically, they entered into a scene where all was of God.

• And you will find in Exodus 29 and 30 that those two sides of the service went on every morning and every evening;
  • every morning the priests went to the brazen altar and offered the morning lamb, and every evening the evening lamb, with its meat offering and drink offering.

• But then the priest also went inside the tabernacle every morning and evening, and he trimmed the lamp and put incense on the golden altar.

• You can understand that when a priest went inside and looked around as entering in spirit a scene where everything was of God, what kind of prayers and praise would go up from him at the golden altar!

• Our prayers and praise must be affected by our environment, and the prayers and outgoings of the hearts of the saints at the golden altar – that is in spirit in a scene where everything is of Himself – are sweet incense to God.

• That is the kind of prayer the Lord prayed in John 17. He is there as Priest at the golden altar, serving in spirit in a scene where everything is of God; He views the saints from that angle –
  • “The glory which thou hast given me I have given them, that they may Be one as we are one”.

• That is like the priest looking round and seeing the boards in the tabernacle, covered with gold, set in sockets of silver – the saints as they are before God.

• And that was going on every morning and evening. What a blessed thing it would be to take that up!

To take up priestly service at all we need to know something of sanctification, but what I have in mind to occupy us tonight is

• the service of God in connection with the morning meeting, the Lord's supper.

• I believe that this matter of sanctification according to Leviticus 8 has an important bearing in connection with the cup.

• We have been occupied this afternoon with the truth of reconciliation. Now reconciliation refers to the way Christ has laid the basis in divine righteousness for this scene where everything is of God.

• Reconciliation does not only bear on the church, but on all things in heaven and in earth. You now has He reconciled, Colossians 1: 21, 22. But reconciliation touches the whole scene of glory.

• We should be in liberty at all times in our spirits to enter into the immediate presence of God, without embarrassment, as a matter of enjoyment and contemplation.
  • Luke 15 is a matter of enjoyment, Hebrews 9 and 10 a matter of contemplation.

• If we understand the work of Christ we shall be free at all times to go into the holiest as a matter of enjoyment and contemplation.

• Think of going into a scene where everything is of God, and that comes into the morning meeting. It is a question of going into the scene as a matter of enjoyment in the first instance,
  • but then there is also the question of serving God actively, in a priestly way.

• It is one thing to be in the enjoyment of God's presence, and it is another thing to be free actively to serve Him in it.
  • If we are to serve Him actively we must have something acceptable to offer.

• When it comes to a question of actively serving God in His own immediate presence, we need something more than reconciliation, which is the bearing of the work of Christ in its wide and extensive character.

Sanctification refers especially to the bearing of the work of Christ on the church.

• It is not so much what the work of Christ has done for God in its vast and extensive character, but what the work of Christ has done for us in making us all of one with Him.

• If we are actively to serve God in His own immediate presence, we need to have a sense that we have part with Christ as entirely suitable, as all of one with Him.

• Many companies will come into the meaning of reconciliation, heavenly and earthly companies, but no company will come into sanctification like the church.

• They will have part in the universe of bliss, but no company will have part with Christ in the holy service of God like the assembly.

• What the Lord had before Him in a special way in going into death was that He should sanctify us by the offering of His body once for all to bring us in as a priestly company with Himself in the service of God. That is what is set out in Leviticus 8.

• I should connect reconciliation with the cup, and I should connect this also with the cup at the supper because it is the Mediator who does it.

• I suppose there was really no greater service that the Mediator did than this; it was probably the greatest act of Moses' service – to sanctify a priestly company to draw near to God, to serve Him.

• That was the great end in view in the covenant. God had come out to man and made known the terms on which He would be with man.

• God is with us on the line of supply, and it is all in view of our being with God in His realm of things and in such liberty that we are free to serve Him as consciously having part with Christ and as all of one with Him.

• What a wonderful thought it is. What could be a greater act on the part of the Mediator than to secure for God this great return from the covenant, this great response, that there is a company brought to God, all of one with Christ in God's holy service?

You will notice that the whole assembly is brought into it. What this means in Christianity is that all the saints take it up, we are all priests;

• we do not set apart a certain priestly class, but it is the saints moving together, all intent on God having an answer to His great thought,

• just as in Numbers the whole assembly move together to offer up the Levites.

• We are all in it on a priestly line. I would encourage even the youngest here tonight that what we are speaking of is your portion.

• There was no age limit to the priests. We have been sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

• The Levite had to become 30 years of age before he was entrusted to carry these holy things. It needs maturity.
  • But how are we to get maturity except by taking up priestly service?

• And when we grow to maturity how delighted we shall be to be entrusted with the carrying of holy things!

Let us look for a moment at this chapter to see some of the important things in it.

It says in Hebrews 2: 11 that He that sanctifies and those that are sanctified are all of one. That is

• the saints are entirely identified with Christ as a Man in the immediate presence of God.

• How has that been brought about? By Christ's wonderful service to us as the Mediator by the offering of His body once for all, typified in the sin offering, the burnt offering and the ram of sanctification.

• And so what has happened is that, through the work of God to begin with, everyone of us has a link with Christ through the service of Christ towards us as Mediator.

• We have all been washed all over. You say, why did Aaron need washing all over? – Aaron is a type of Christ.

• The Lord said “I sanctify myself for their sakes”. The Lord Himself has left flesh and blood conditions for our sakes. He need not have done, but He Himself has gone through the waters of death;
  • His position as Man before God is based on the fact that He died and has risen again; He did it for our sakes.

• Aaron and his sons were washed all over – we are brought before God on the grounds of death,
  • and that is the very same ground on which Jesus is before Him for our sakes, that we might be brought with Him before God;

  • and the precious ministry of the Mediator as to His death has this practical effect of washing us all over.

• The Lord says in John 13, “He that is washed all over …” The word of God, through the Mediator, through Christ, has come home in power to the soul, giving me a sense of a link with Him beyond death.

And then to go forward – Aaron and his sons were all clothed; Aaron in his special garments – Christ is unique in that – but the sons also were clothed.

• The part I want to dwell on most is that Aaron and his sons put their hands on the head of the sin offering; they put their hands on the head of the burnt offering, and on the head of the ram of consecration .

• Following that, Aaron and his sons had the blood put on the right thumb, the right ear and the right toe, and Aaron and his sons had their hands filled with what was delightful to God. Aaron and his sons were anointed and were sprinkled with blood.

• Thus the sanctifier and those that were sanctified were all of one, brought before God on sacrificial ground as all of one. I believe that to have that in our souls is going to set us free in the presence of God.

• It is involved in the cup and the covenant because it is the work of the Mediator. We come into the presence of God conscious that the sanctifier has made us all of one with Himself.

• It is man going in to God – not God coming out to man – on the same ground before God as Christ is as Man. How marvellous the grace of Christ, that He is now before God on the ground of a sin offering having been offered!

• Aaron and his sons put their hands on it – we are identified with Christ before God on the basis of that offering. He is there on the basis of that offering, not because He needed it, but in grace, that we might be one with Him on that ground; the burnt offering similarly, and the ram of consecration.

• It is especially calculated to set us free. The sin offering has dealt with all that is offensive and put it away; the burnt offering is the sweet odour of Christ to God in which we are accepted, but the ram of consecration is a touching reference to the death of Christ – consecration means the filling of the hands.

• He went into death to fill the hands of a priestly company with that which is pleasing to God. We have part with Christ, as all of one with Him, in the presence of God, and we come before God with our hands filled with that which is pleasing to Him.

• Moses put these things in the hands of Aaron and his sons – Christ and the assembly presenting to God all that Christ was in His death and in His perfect Manhood.

The details of what was put into their hands speak wonderfully of the perfection of Christ in that precious sacrifice and of His precious Manhood; He would fill our hands with these things.

• How could brethren be silent if their hands were filled with these things?

• And they were all anointed; so that in every way “He that sanctifies and those sanctified are all of one; for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren”.

• I believe that has a very important bearing on what we may speak of as the transition at the supper from what God and Christ are to us to what we are to God as having part with Christ in the service of God.

When it comes to the practical working out of it, John 13 helps. Once the priests were sanctified, when they were washed all over, they were never washed all over again,

• but every time they approached to serve God they had to wash their hands and feet at the laver.

• We cannot wash one another's hands – that is a matter which we have to see to ourselves: “Let a man examine himself and so let him eat”. We have to see that we have holy hands.

• But when it comes to a question of feet washing, in John 13 the Lord leaves that as a service of love which we can perform for one another. The truth of the body enters into that, it is a mutual service.

• John does not name things as Paul does, but the truth of the body is very prominent in the supper. The loaf reminds us that we being many are one loaf, one body, and we drink into one cup.

• We come together and sit down bodywise, in love for one another and recognising the fact that we are dependent upon one another.

• I have often come to the supper feeling as though everything depended upon me. The Lord does not expect us to bear that burden.

• You may come to the supper tomorrow morning feeling under some pressure in your spirit and you may not feel equal to the occasion, but what meets that is that we sit together bodywise.

• Instead of being disturbed because I am not feeling up to it, I come and sit down with the brethren.

• What I need is to have my feet washed. We cannot help getting our feet soiled, as it were, as we go through this world – “The Lord having loved His own who were in the world”, it says; that is why feet washing is necessary.

• The Lord Himself sets the thing moving even now. We come together and some brother somehow is free – some sister; no doubt they have proved the personal service of Christ.

• The thing is for that brother to give expression to what has set him free. So we sit down together and wait upon one another,
  • and someone who is free gives expression, either in a hymn or thanksgiving, to what has set him free, and that sets another brother or two free, and sisters as well.

• If you have come feeling unequal to things in your spirit and you sit down quietly, you thank God for the brethren; you are sitting bodywise; things do not depend upon you but on the body.

• Soon someone is free; it doesn't touch you much. Well, wait a bit longer; it has set someone else free and he expresses it, and now you have the touch for your own soul, your feet have been washed. What are you going to do?

• You look around the room and think there are a lot of others better qualified than you are. You think, should I take part now? Five minutes ago I could not have thought of it. You are just the one to do it; your feet have been washed.

• Take that hymn, or phrase, or thanksgiving that washed your feet, and go forward with your bit. And so the service goes on, until the whole company are free, brothers and sisters all free in spirit.

You thus reach the service of the sanctuary in its true character; all enjoying part with Christ, all ready to take up this great truth of sanctification as consciously with Christ, one with Him.

• We thus come into the presence of God with our hands filled with what is delightful to Him. No question then of waiting upon one another, but of wisdom as to when to bring your part in, what will be best for the occasion.

• That is the great end in view in the service of John 13. “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them”. We have to remember that is said at the supper table.

• Feet washing in another setting takes place in our homes, but I am speaking of the supper. How often meetings have been spoilt because we have not done it.

• The part others have taken has washed my feet and yet I have held back and the service has broken down at that point with me, because I have had my feet washed and have not gone on to wash someone else's.

• We should all take up the obligation of being sent into this world by Christ as the Father sent Him; and the first specific thing he says about being sent is that we should wash one another's feet.
  • “The servant is not greater than his lord; neither he that is sent greater than he that sent him. If ye know these things happy are ye if ye do them”.

• The first obligation of being sent is to learn to act bodywise with the brethren. I can only fill a little niche in any morning meeting. If I try to do anything else than that it would only mar the service of God, but the thing is to do my little bit.

• When it is acting normally, feet washing has taken place; everyone set free and everything going forward in liberty in the holy service of God.

• What it says in verse 11 is that all the priests present were sanctified without observing the courses.

• I have heard brothers say the priests should serve by course. So they should in certain aspects, but not at the supper. All the priests present were sanctified; that is the normal thing, every priest is free.

• That is how we should hold ourselves at the supper, all sanctified, all holding in faith the ground of Leviticus 8 and ready for the service.

• All the priests were sanctified without observing the courses – they were all ready to take up the service of God.
  • “The Levites which were the singers … being arrayed in white linen, having cymbals and psalteries and harps, stood at the east side of the altar, and with them an hundred and twenty priests sounding with trumpets”.

As I said earlier, the service of God is divided into two parts – the service of the altar and the service in the tent.

• The beginning of the morning meeting, and right through the supper corresponds with the altar, as 1 Corinthians 10 shews us.

• As the meeting goes on we experience the other side of the service.

• The altar is the public side – anyone 'sitting behind', as we speak, can see a company of saints serving God by the Spirit, boasting in Christ Jesus and having no confidence in the flesh. What a sight for anyone who comes in with eyes to see what is going on!

• During the early part of the meeting the public side is the only part there is, but as the meeting goes on the priestly company in their spirits pass into the immediate presence of God;

• the public side still goes on, the person sitting behind still hears the thanksgiving and praise but does not realise that that company he has been looking at have passed into a scene where everything is of God. That is the secret side.

• But on the public side it says here that the priests and the Levites were standing on the east side of the altar, arrayed in white linen. This is the third thing that I have spoken of as necessary for liberty in the service of God.

• It means that we accept the obligation of being prepared to take our part in priestly service. We are not only concerned as to washing one another's feet, but both brothers and sisters should be present as taking an active part – not only what is audible – we should all be present as actively engaged in priestly service.

• We should not come and sit down, but we should be standing, as it were. How God values those who come on this line in the way of response, standing at the east side of the altar and arrayed in white linen – that is, there is no fleshly emotion or sentiment; white linen suggests purity and sobriety.

One has heard of brothers who take the ground, as to audible part, that they will only act on impulse. That is not white linen.

• It may be right to act on impulse, but not to limit one's actions to impulse.

• The idea of a priest is intelligence and sobriety; he knows what is suitable at the moment, he takes his part as wisdom dictates. That is what I understand by standing, clothed in white linen, at the east side of the altar.

• That is, as you function in that way and go forward in sobriety and intelligence, you believe that the glory will come in.
  • “As the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the Lord” –

  • that is when everyone is free, when the note of praise has become unified.

• The priests were the trumpeters – the trumpet suggests a clear intelligent note – indicating the way the Lord is moving as singing praise in the assembly. There is the clear note of the trumpeters going on –
  • whereas the Levites, the singers, with their instruments, are the subjective side – what is going on in the hearts of the saints – hearts vibrating in unison with that clear priestly note.

• Then “Even the house of the Lord was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud; for the glory of the Lord had filled the House of God”. What a moment that is, beloved brethren!

• If we are prepared to take up the service of God in happy liberty,
  • holding in faith the ground of sanctification – what Christ the Mediator has done –

  • also holding ourselves in love one towards another as prepared to take our part in washing one another's feet,

  • and finally as standing at the east side of the altar – all having definitely before us that God should have His portion;

• then, once the thing is in unison and every heart is vibrating and this moment reached when the trumpeters and singers are as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking Jehovah, then the house is filled with the glory of God.

• What a climax! Formal priestly service comes to an end. You have reached the goal, the sense of the Divine Presence is filling the hearts of the saints;
  • you can be free in every way, the glory filling the house, and the saints consciously part of that new creation scene where everything is of God.

• The saints who have been serving in a priestly way are now conscious of being part of the scene where everything is of God, in the immediate presence of the glory. What a blessed thing it is!

That is what is in view in Hebrews – “For it became Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory …”

• I think that links up with what we have in Chronicles – “bringing many sons to glory”.

• I do not regard that as the coming display, the glory of the Kingdom, but as being brought into the immediate presence of all that God is and being there perfectly at home where the glory fills –
  • consciously part of a scene where everything is entirely according to God for His pleasure.

• God is bringing us to that wonderful eternal scene where all things are of Himself; and that is the climax to have in view, beloved brethren, every time we come together at the supper.

• If we reached that scene, how different our expressions would be,
  • not now so much occupied with the sacrificial side, what Christ was here and what He did here – that is what filled the hands of the priests earlier

• – but to be consciously part of a scene where everything is of God, where Christ as the Beloved, the Centre of all affection, has a peculiar glory, loved before the foundation of the world,
  • and now in the place given Him in divine purpose, as Man, before the world was.

May God help us on these lines, that we may really know complete liberty in His holy service and thus touch increasingly what it is to be brought to glory now, for His Name's sake!