The Supremacy of God
Early Ministry by G. R. Cowell
– Part Seven

Now the kingship of Christ has the supremacy of God in view.

• The Lord Jesus, Himself a divine Person, having come into manhood, must ever be supreme as Man. He is God's King, God's Anointed. All things in heaven and earth are to be headed up in Him.

• But He uses His supremacy to this great end – to bring about God's supremacy in the universe. Finally He will deliver up the kingdom to Him who is God and Father, that God may be all in all, 1 Corinthians 15: 20-28.

• This is the great end in view in the service of the Son, and it is the end in view in all service that is truly kingly among the saints.

The kingship of the Lord Jesus Christ is beautifully set out typically in David and Solomon.

• David brings Christ before us in the beauty of His manhood. No one sets out the grace of the anointing in the Old Testament like David, and in him typically we have some idea of the fragrance that ascended to God from Christ.

• David, whose name means "beloved", is beloved because of what he is, whereas Solomon, whose name Jedidiah also means "beloved of Jehovah", is beloved because of the relationship in which he is set, typically, as the Son of the Father's love.

• Of course both David and Solomon typify Christ as Son in measure, but what is emphasised in the case of David is that he is beloved because of his personal charm, and in the case of Solomon that he is beloved because of his relationship as Son.

• We see in David that, though he accepted kingly glory and dignity from God, he did not use it for his own aggrandisement. In the Psalms he repeatedly refers to God as King; to him God was ever King.
  • David's service and kingship were all to the end that God might have His place amongst the people.

• One of the greatest things that he did was to sing God's praise in the midst of the congregation. He is the writer of Psalm 22, and is typical of Christ as the One who would secure the assembly, where God's praises should be sung.

• We know too how David vowed to the mighty God of Jacob, how he swore to Jehovah,
  • "I will not give sleep to mine eyes, or slumber to mine eyelids, until I find out a place for the Lord, an habitation for the mighty God of Jacob", Psalm 132.

• True kingship in man ever has in mind that God should be supreme. The moral power expressed in a true king is used for that purpose, not for personal aggrandisement; so David comes forward and prepares abundantly for the house of God.

• His preparations are marvellous; for, while he prepared the material, he also set out the whole order of the service, securing the priests, the Levites, the singers, and the doorkeepers, securing much in his affliction and giving in his affection for the house of his God.

• What a spirit he showed in it all! It is David who utters the words, "the zeal of thine house bath eaten me up", Psalm 69: 9, fulfilled in perfection in the Lord Jesus!

The type merges into Solomon, who is not viewed in affliction and suffering, preparing for God, but as king in a scene of rest.

• David was a sufferer and a warrior; Solomon a man of rest, and he secures for God the fixed place of His dwelling, from which the ark never has to move.

• The Lord would have us take character from Himself as the true David – to move in a kingly way here as seeking what is for God,
  • and then He would have us come under His rule as the true Solomon and know in spirit the joy and rest of that scene where the ark is in its place and the glory fills the house.

• The great end of kingship is that God should have a fixed place for His dwelling, and that glory should fill the house. Paul prays in the third chapter of Ephesians,
  • "unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom every family in the heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; that the Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith".

• The Christ is the Anointed – the King – the One who has brought all to pass for God, and it is a question of apprehending Him in that character, in order that God might have His supreme place in the assembly. The chapter ends
  • that "ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God", and the result is glory to God "in the assembly in Christ Jesus unto all generations of the age of ages. Amen", Ephesians 3:14-21.

To bring the truth to bear on our own times, I refer to the prophet Zechariah, whom God sent to stimulate the people with the sense of His own supremacy, so that the work might go on to completion.

• A remnant had come back from Babylon and the foundations of the house had been laid, and then difficulties arose and the work stopped. But the work did not cease permanently, thank God, for we read:
  • "And the elders of the Jews builded, and they prospered through the prophesying of Haggai the prophet and Zechariah the son of Iddo. And they builded, and finished it, according to the commandment of the God of Israel", Ezra 6: 14.

• The completion of the work is attributed to prophecy, showing how important the prophetic word is.

• We continually need prophetic ministry to bring before us from God what would stimulate us so that the work might go on to completion.

This bears on our own times, for a remnant escaped from Babylon at the Reformation, but what soon marked the position was, as the Lord said,

• "I have not found thy works complete before my God", Revelation 3: 2.

• The foundations were laid, but the kingly element, represented by Zerubbabel in Zechariah, flagged, and what was begun was not finished.

• The supremacy of God is in mind. The Lord Jesus is not merely thinking of Himself, but of what is complete before His God.

• In Philadelphia there is the idea of completion, because there the Lord can speak to the overcomer of the temple of His God, the name of His God, and the name of the city of His God.

• Christ's God is supreme in the heart of the overcomer, and, therefore, the overcomer in Philadelphia has reached completion in his own apprehension of things, and that is what God would bring to us.

Zechariah's prophecy comes in to stimulate the kingly element to go forward and finish the work, but to bring this about the priesthood must be restored first; and so we have the vision relating to Joshua the high priest.

I would connect what is priestly and kingly with the two verses in 1 Timothy 1, linking the priestly side with the glad tidings of the glory of the blessed God, and the kingly side with the King of the ages.

• It is only as we are stimulated by the light of the declaration of God in Christ, only as He is supreme in our hearts as declared, that we are capable of considering for what is due to His honour and glory as the great King.

• The remnant had allowed wrong motives to govern them, as exposed by Haggai's prophecy, Haggai 1: 2-4, and, in result, the enemy brought in despondency.

• So we find Joshua clothed with filthy garments. They had got low down and were conscious of their own failure, and the enemy had taken advantage of it.

• The adversaries had written a letter to the king of Persia, stating that Jerusalem was a bad and rebellious city, Ezra 5,
  • and the enemy today would say, Look at church history, look at the terrible state of Christendom, look at your own discrepancies,

• and, if our hearts are not right with God, Satan gets the advantage; we are crushed and priestly service ceases.

• It would never have happened if they had not said, "The time is not come".
  • But God in grace reminds us that no conditions here can affect what the saints are before Him in Christ Jesus.

• Jehovah says to those standing by, "Take away the filthy garments from him".

• God has in mind that the dispensation should close with priestly service carried on in a buoyancy that has never been known before.

• Joshua is clothed, not simply in robes of righteousness, but in "festival-robes" for priestly service is the most joyous occupation in the universe.

• Could we come into the presence of the blessed God in the light of the outshining of His glory, and be other than happy?

• If we go into God's presence, we find that God is happy to have us there, and we are happy to be there. The glad tidings of the glory of the blessed God means that He is glad and we are made glad.

• So in Joshua, as representing the people, the priestly element is restored. He has a sense that he never had before of the joy of approach to God.

• The prophet says, "Let them set a fair mitre" [or diadem] "upon his head". The diadem means that we can come into the very presence of God and lift up our heads with joy and gladness.

The next chapter is to encourage the kingly element and presents another side of the position, which the prophet finds is far more difficult to understand. He has to be aroused as a man out of his sleep.

• Many of us need rousing, for it is a question of seeing what God has down here, and what we see is that at the end of the dispensation nothing vital is missing. The candlestick is there with all the seven lamps on it.

• It is true that the assembly has broken down, as the addresses to the seven assemblies in Revelation prove. Yet to Sardis Christ reveals Himself as One who has the seven Spirits of God,
  • suggesting the Spirit as distributed among the seven assemblies – the seven golden lamps – and the Lord still has that, even if the assembly has broken down, for the Spirit is still here.

• If we are prepared to stand for things, the full light of God is still available.

• The exercise for us is to become vessels of the Spirit, to make room for Him. We need to be brought into accord with these two olive trees, the "sons of oil, that stand before the Lord of all the earth".

• If the gain of the Spirit is to be known here on earth, there must be those who make room for the Spirit, through whom spiritual ministry can flow.

• Zerubbabel is encouraged to go forward relying on the power of the Spirit.

• The Spirit is here to give us the full light of God; He is here as the power whereby we can build;

• and He is here as the seven eyes of Jehovah which rejoice to see the plummet in the hand of Zerubbabel, Zechariah 4: 10, to give us ability to discern what is according to God. Thus the word to Zerubbabel is,
  • "Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith Jehovah of hosts".

  • He says, "The hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation of this house; his hands shall also finish it", and

  • "Who art thou, O great mountain? before Zerubbabel thou shalt become a plain".

• The kingly element is to go forward, and thus the mountain becomes a plain.
  • That is what actually happened in the history; as they went forward and built, the opposition vanished and the house was completed.

• God would raise the question with us as to whether we are going on to completion. The book of Zechariah ends with God as King in Jerusalem.

Chapters 5 and 6 are comforting as showing that God will see to things if we are prepared to go forward.

• Chapter 5 shows that He will deal with evil. We can leave it to Him, for He will see that evil is met, and He will finally remove the whole corrupt profession to make way for the coming down of the heavenly city.

• Then chapter 6 shows that we can trust God to deal with the powers that be, for these horses refer to the four great Gentile empires. They are viewed as
  • the "four spirits of the heavens, which go forth from standing before the Lord of all the earth".

• That is, if we are prepared to go forward in regard of His interests, we can count on God to overrule the actions of the powers that be.

• From this standpoint they are His agents. They may not understand that, for they are here viewed as horses who need bit and bridle. The point is that God is controlling them.

In keeping with all this, Paul, in his final exhortation to Timothy, commits the whole charge to him –

• "that thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ".

• Surely we all desire that; we desire to go on to completion, so that right up to the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ there might be
  • the concrete expression down here of what is proper to the assembly, that the commandment might be kept without spot right through.

• Then the apostle, to encourage Timothy, brings before him the supremacy of God as King, for he goes on to say,
  • "which in its own time" referring to the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ "the blessed and only Ruler shall shew".

• God is King of the ages, has ever held every age in His own hands, and alone determines the completion of any age.

• Even as to the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, it is the blessed and only Ruler, God Himself, who will show it in its own time, and He has not revealed the time to anyone.
  • "But of that day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father", Mark 13: 32.

• The One we know as Father is the King of the ages, holding times and seasons in His own authority.

• In the due time the Gentile powers will pass away like the chaff of the summer threshing floor and He will show the power and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

• In the meantime the four Spirits of the heavens go out from standing before Him; they can do nothing without Him.

• As we maintain faithfulness to God's house, He will maintain us – He who is
  • "the King of those that reign, and Lord of those that exercise lordship; who only has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light; whom no man has seen, nor is able to see; to whom be honour and eternal might. Amen".

• The apostle begins and ends this epistle to Timothy in worship to God as King.

May God help us to understand His supremacy both in His grace and in His majesty.

• May we, on the one hand, know increasingly the liberty and gladness of His presence, as made known in the glad tidings of His glory;

• and, on the other hand, in the light of His eternal supremacy as King, go forward boldly, learning through our Lord Jesus Christ how to be here in measure in a kingly way!

• May we go forward in the spirit of worship before our God!

I call attention to the greatness of God as depicted in this Psalm. It is a great thing to have an apprehension of the greatness of God. Who is like God?

• The name of relationship is only used once in this Psalm – Jehovah. In all the Psalms from 60 to 68 you will find little mention of the name of relationship.

• We need to have an increasing apprehension of the greatness of God as God. This Psalm speaks much of God. "Let God arise, let his enemies be scattered …" What else could happen if God arises?

• Then it also says in verse 4, "His name is Jah". Mr. Darby's notes indicate that Jah is the most absolute name of God in the Old Testament.

• God, that is, Elohim, refers to Him as the supreme Being, but then it says, "His name is Jah", the One to whom absolute existence belongs.

• Another title used in this Psalm is Adonai, translated "Lord". Who can dispute the rights of the Adonai? He chooses to exercise those rights in mercy and grace, and who can dispute them?

• That is the God who goes before His people. It would give us a sense of great assurance if we were in the faith of this.
  • We belong to a faith system, but if we do not see that God is going before His people we are not vitally in the faith system.

• He can raise up whom He will, and use whom He will, but it is God who is going before His people, and we need to believe that.

"O God, when thou wentest forth before thy people, when thou didst march through the wilderness", verse 7. What could Moses have done without God?

• The point was, God going before His people. He led His people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.

• Moses and Aaron were the instruments, but God was leading His people like a flock, and doing it in a most considerate way.

• His presence was borne witness to in the pillar of fire by night and the cloud by day. Think of a God like that, going before His people.
  • "When thou didst march through the wilderness … the earth trembled, the heavens also dropped at the presence of God". Think of God marching through the wilderness.

• God led them out, God went before them, and God brought them in. He used Joshua, but God brought them in to that good land. Later it is said,
  • "He chose David his servant and took him from the sheepfolds from following the suckling-ewes, he brought him to feed Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance. And he fed them according to the integrity of his heart and led them by the skilfulness of his hands", Psalm 78: 70-72.

• It was what God did. One prays that we may all be encouraged in this matter, encouraged in God, and that we may get a greater sense of the greatness of God.

The names God (Elohim) and Jah and Adonai are very great names, conveying the greatness of God, and yet that is the God who goes before us.

• We know that God. He is made known to us in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

• Think of all the operations of the Father, the tenderness of them, the care of them! He led His people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron. It is like a father to take his children by the hand.

• Think of the greatness of the Son, because what is known of God finds expression in the Son. He is the image of the invisible God. And leadership also finds expression in the Son.

• He is the great antitype of Moses and Aaron – He is the Apostle and High Priest of our confession; and He is the true David, the Son of David, the Root and the Offspring of David. He is also the true Joshua.

• He is the One in whom all the features of leadership shine in their magnificence, and they shine in Him as Man.

• But we never forget who He is in His Person. It is God who is going before us. Whether we think of the Father, the Son, or the Spirit, it is God.

• These titles, Elohim and Jah and Adonai, are equally applicable to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It is God, and God is going before His people; and so we think of the Spirit too.
  • "He will guide you into all the truth". What a lead the Spirit graciously affords!

God is going before us, but it is important that there should be leaders under God, and He will see to that.

• And so it says, "Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive: thou hast received gifts in Man, and even for the rebellious, for the dwelling there of Jah Elohim", verse 18.

• That links with our first passage in the New Testament. That passage has to do with what we may speak of as ministerial leadership.

• The second passage has to do with the leadership of elders, those whom the Holy Spirit sets as overseers.

• If we are moving in faith we shall discern what God is doing and shall know how to give a right place to those He is using. A true leader under God will never disturb the place of God among the saints.

• False leaders hold their position by displacing God, and a dreadful thing that is. In other words they seek to rule over the faith of the saints.

• If a man rules over people's faith he comes between them and God – a most serious thing. Even Paul did not seek to rule over the faith of the saints, for he says,
  • "not that we rule over your faith, but are fellow workmen of your joy", 2 Corinthians 1: 24.

• On the contrary, he put the saints in living relations with the God who was going before them.

• Paul's ministry was not that of a dictator. Dictatorship is easy. It does not require any moral qualifications. But it means that God is displaced. We see that full blown in the great religious dictatorship.

• Leadership according to God requires moral qualifications and moral power so that the authority of God is brought into the soul: not simply the authority of a man but the authority of God.

• The truth is brought home with all the authority of God, and the saints take it up as having been brought into touch with God. Paul at Corinth put the truth to them in such a manner that it put their souls in touch with God.

God will maintain leadership under Himself and leadership in the ministry of the word is connected with "thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive".

• It is a touching thing that, even in this connection, according to Ephesians 4, deity is emphasised.
  • "He that descended is the same who has also ascended up above all the heavens, that he might fill all things", Ephesians 4:10.

• What is stressed there is that this blessed Man who descended into the lower parts of the earth has now ascended above the heavens, which implies His deity,
  • and it is remarkable that the gifts are shown as coming from that altitude, which stresses that it is God who goes before us.

• It is from the ascended Man the gifts come. He ever retains His manhood. But we have to remember that the condition which the Lord took when here no longer remains. He said,
  • "Now glorify me, thou father, along with thyself, with the glory which I had along with thee before the world was", John 17: 5.

• Why should He say that in the presence of the disciples? To bring home to us that, as a glorified Man, He is also glorified with the glory which He had along with the Father before the world was. We have to distinguish between these two glories.

• He has thus ascended above all heavens and He is the One from whom all the gifts come. So that He is; still, in that sense, the great Leader on ministerial lines.
  • "He has given some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists, and some shepherds, and teachers, with a view to the work of the ministry".

• We may say that there are no apostles today, and that is true; although we have their writings.

• But Mr. Darby says clearly that in a lower sense apostolic gift can be said to remain, because right down the ages the Lord has reserved the right to give to certain persons specific authority. He quotes Luther as an example, and there are others since his day.

• While what such a person said and wrote could not be put on the level of inspiration, it was not infallible, and they were not called upon to lay the foundation like the apostles, yet there is a kind of apostolic authority about their gift.

• Who can resist the authority if the Lord has given it? It is really God going before His people still.

• If He chooses to give a person special authority, and we are really in the faith system and believe that God is going before His people, we shall not fail to discern what He is doing.

Then there are not only apostles but also prophets and evangelists and shepherds and teachers.

• In all these gifts the One who has ascended above the heavens, the glorious Man, expresses Himself. They involve that He is leading. He is going before His people.

• He is really the Apostle, so that apostolic gift is but the expression of Himself. It comes from Himself and expresses Himself in some little measure. He is the Apostle, the Prophet and the Evangelist. He says
  • "the Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach glad tidings to the poor".

• Christ was the Preacher; and He is still the Apostle and the Prophet and the Preacher, and He is still the Shepherd and Teacher. Only He delegates the work to persons He equips down here.
  • "He has given some apostles, and some prophets, and some evangelists".

• He has given them. He is in charge; we cannot tell Him what to do, nor question His sovereign rights. The One who has gone above all the heavens is acting in sovereign grace. He is the Adonai – Psalm 68: 17-18.
  • "He has given some apostles, some prophets …"

• Let us never forget where the gifts come from. If we do, we leave the faith system in a practical sense and see men as trees walking instead of seeing the Man above the heavens.

• The gifts are given for the work of the ministry,
  • "with a view to the edifying of the body of Christ, until we all arrive at the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, at the full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fulness of the Christ".

• The end in view is that we should be fully in the liberty of the family and also set together in the wonderful vessel, the assembly, for the service and praise of God.

If ministry is to be effective, the person must be in accord with what he ministers.

• Personal influence enters into all leadership and thus there must be moral qualifications.

• But while moral qualities must characterise those who do the work of the ministry, I would just add that all of us can have some part in ministry because it is said,
  • "but to each one of us has been given grace according to the measure of the gift of the Christ", Ephesians 4: 7.

• Ministry in its widest meaning is not limited to the ministry of the word. The ministry of the word is in mind in the gifts – the apostles and prophets and evangelists and shepherds and teachers – but then there is a range of ministry in practical ways.

• The Lord says, "the Son of man came not to be ministered unto but to minister". He washed their feet; He fed the five thousand. Phoebe was a minister of the assembly in Cenchrea.

• We can all come into this, for to each one of us has been given grace. We can all minister to the saints in some way. We can wash their feet. We can do a thousand things to express Christ and thus edify them.

• There is thus "the working in its measure of each one part". There is no part left out in the operations of the body.

• Some of the things we call the simplest things are the hardest things – visiting the sick, going after those who are getting cold.

• There are thousands of brethren who can do these things better than I can. It is skilled work. One is deeply thankful to find some sister who is skilled enough to do effectively things like that.

I wish now to refer to Acts 20: 28. It is not there a matter of gift but of leadership which flows from experience with God

• – the influence and power that a man acquires through experience with God; that is, the influence of a true elder.

• And so Paul says, "take heed therefore to yourselves, and to all the flock, wherein the Holy Spirit has set you as overseers", Acts 20: 28.

• Think of the Holy Spirit. God is going before His people, and the Holy Spirit is included in that.

• The Holy Spirit is taking account of men who have had experience with God and He sets them in the flock as overseers.

• We have spoken of the Lord Jesus, the Man who has ascended above the heavens. The gifts come from Him; and now there is the Holy Spirit.

• He takes account of men who acquire power and influence through going forward with God day by day, and He sets them as overseers,
  • and if He sets them there they will be supported by Him, for the Holy Spirit is here to care for the assembly of God.

• He chooses those He can rely on and He sets them in the flock as overseers.

• The Holy Spirit, we may be sure, loves such persons because their work is for love's sake. He would support such persons and He sets them in the flock. What dignified service!

• They are those who have gone on patiently with God, and the Holy Spirit takes them on to shepherd the assembly of God, which He has purchased with the blood of His own.

• Think of being entrusted with a service like that! Paul says to Timothy,
  • "let the elders who take the lead among the saints well be esteemed worthy of double honour, specially those labouring in the word and teaching", 1 Timothy 5: 17.

  • This is not ministerial leadership but a most necessary form of leadership without which all the ministry would fall to the ground.

The Lord would encourage us all to be available to Him and to the Holy Spirit in the service of God and of the saints, but we shall not be available unless we are vitally in the faith system.

• If we try to enforce things in a human way we become dictatorial, but if we recognise that God is going before His people we become available to Him and the power of God becomes evident in what is done.

Now just one word as to verse 24 of this Psalm.

• "They have seen thy goings, O God, the goings of my God, my king, in the sanctuary".

• This is the great end in view, the service of the sanctuary. Can we join with David in such language as this? Have we seen His goings?

• Have we ever reached the point in the service where God in His supremacy fills the vision of our souls? "My God, my king".

• David was the king, but not in the presence of God. He does not take the place of the king there.

• Unless we are maintained in the faith system, in apprehending God as leading His people in the pathway of testimony here, we shall certainly fail to apprehend the goings of God in the sanctuary;
  • but if we keep in faith as to the testimonial position we shall more and more understand His goings in the sanctuary.

• It is one thing to know God in His greatness going before His people in the testimonial position, but it is a greater thing still to know God in the greatness of His own realm.
  • "They have seen thy goings, O God, the goings of my God, my king, in the sanctuary".

• Would that we knew more of that, dear brethren! What return there would be in response and worship to God – God in His supremacy in His own realm in the sanctuary!
  • It is lovely to think of God in that respect, and to say "my God, my king".

• May God grant that we may all be helped to know God in His greatness, as maintained vitally in the faith system, so that He may more and more fill the vision of our souls.

1. When Moses asked what he should say when they said, What is His Name? the answer was "I AM THAT I AM". That was the Name.

2. But, in being sent to the children of Israel, he was to say to them that Jehovah, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, had sent him.

3. Later in the scripture we are told His name is Jah; Psalm 68: 4.

Now those three words are cognate words in Hebrew, I AM, Jah, and Jehovah. Together they bring out the great truth of the Name in the Old Testament.

• It was intended to bring home to the children of Israel that the great self-existent God, the only One, had put Himself in relationship with them.

• Other names of God are names in the sense of titles, and they can, of course, wrongly, be applied to false gods.

• The greatest name in the sense of title is the name "El". It refers to God as the One who alone has strength. He stands alone in His own strength; all other strength is derived.

• Not only is He the Source of all physical or material strength, but He stands in His own strength of character and nature; nothing ever moves Him or changes Him.

• The fancied gods of man's imagination are fickle, but the true God – El – stands in His own strength of character and nature, nothing ever moving Him to act contrary to what He is in Himself.

• He is the Mighty One and it is He who gives strength and might unto His people; Psalm 68: 35.

• But then the I AM made known to Israel, Jah Jehovah – see Isaiah 26: 4 – is the only true El. So that when the Name is proclaimed before Moses, the word is "Jehovah, Jehovah El", Exodus 34: 6.

• "I AM" is God's own assertion of His self-existence. He says I AM. The creature in answer to that assertion would say "Jah", the One who is, the great and only self-existent One.

• All other existences are derived; all other things began to be, but He ever was. Jehovah is the One who is, and who was, and who is to come; that is, Jah come into time. He not only is, but He was, and He is to come.

I bring these things out because that is God's Name. That name belongs to no other. And He says,

• "I will put my name upon the children of Israel".

• The God that we have to do with is that same God, He is the only God. But He has now been fully declared. I wish therefore to speak of the way "the Name" is referred to in the New Testament.

First of all I desire to speak of the name of Jesus. Jesus is no less than I AM. He is Jah Jehovah.

• Were it not so, His name could not have the place that it has in the testimony at the present time; it would be idolatry to give such a place to a mere man.

• The name that gives character to the present public testimony is the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is the name to which we gather and upon which we call.

• But the truth is that Jesus is I AM. In the beginning He was, and all things began to be through Him. And yet He has come into manhood.

• But His coming into manhood does not alter the truth of His Person; and, therefore, in this wonderful day,
  • the name of a Man is the Centre of things testimonially. But it is so because of who He is.

  • He is I AM; He is Jah Jehovah. Yet He is Jesus. He is the One we know.

• He says in resurrection, "thus it behoved the Christ to suffer, and to rise from among the dead the third day; and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name to all the nations".

• In His name repentance and remission of sins are preached. It is upon His name that men may call for salvation.
  • "Whosoever", Peter says, "shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved".

• The scripture he is quoting from in the Old Testament says,
  • "Whosoever shall call upon the name of Jehovah shall be saved", Joel 2: 32.

  • The Person he was presenting is Jehovah. And so he says,

  • "Repent, and be baptised, each one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for remission of sins, and ye will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit".

• His is the great testimonial name, the name under which we go forward in the preaching.
  • True, in Acts 2, because of the circumcision in Jerusalem, Peter asserts that He was Jesus of Nazareth whom God had made Lord, which is true.

  • As Man He is made Lord. But He receives from God what is His by right as a Person of the Godhead.

The way His name is stressed in Acts is remarkable.

• In chapter 3: 16 Peter says, "By faith in his name, his name has made this man strong".

• When they charged Peter and John not to speak at all nor to teach in the name of Jesus, they said, "If it be right to listen to you rather than God, judge ye".

• Later when again forbidden to teach in the name of Jesus, he said, "God must be obeyed rather than men".

• And when they were beaten, they rejoiced to be counted worthy to be dishonoured for the Name.

• This is the Name in the testimonial sense.

• In Acts 10, Peter said, "He is Lord of all things". He did not tell Cornelius He is made Lord. That was needful for the Jews in Jerusalem, because the issue was between them and God;
  • but when speaking to the Gentiles he said, "He is Lord of all things"; and he said "everyone that believes on him will receive through his name remission of sins".

• And so they were baptised in the name of the Lord.

• Later, when Paul came to Ephesus, the disciples "were baptised to the name of the Lord Jesus". That is an Ephesian title and corresponds with Adonai in Psalm 68: 17-18,
  • "The chariots of God are twenty thousand, thousands upon thousands; the Lord (Adonai) is among them; it is a Sinai in holiness. Thou hast ascended on high, thou hast led captivity captive; thou hast received gifts in Man". And that is quoted in Ephesians 4: 8.

• Who is this One who has ascended up on high in the right of His own Person? He is Adonai Jehovah.

• Adonai is a divine title of lordship, lordship in the right of Deity. That is the thought in Ephesians 4: 10; He has ascended up above all the heavens.

Then it is not only that the testimony goes forward in His name, but His is the name upon which we continually call, in all our localities.

• It is our public profession, that we call on the name of the Lord. And so Paul says,
  • "to the assembly of God which is in Corinth … with all that in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both theirs and ours".

I am seeking to prove to you that this is the testimonial name and that the name of a mere man could not be that.

• We are known in every locality as callers on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not only so, but the Lord says,
  • "Where two or three are gathered together unto my name".

• It would be dreadful idolatry to gather together to the name of a mere man.

• He says "There am I in the midst of them". His name is the very point of gathering.

• Not only so, but, when we have gathered, and at other times too, our requests are made known in His name.
  • "If ye shall ask anything in my name", He says, "I will do it", and later, "that whatever ye shall ask the Father in my name he may give you".

• Think of the power of that name! Our praise and thanksgiving, is in that name.
  • "Giving thanks at all times for all things to him who is God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ", Ephesians 5: 20.

  • And again, "Whatever ye may do in word or deed do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus", Colossians 3: 17.

Peter said, "Neither is there another name under heaven which is given among men by which we must be saved", Acts 4: 12.

• Even as to the Holy Spirit the Lord Jesus says, "Whom the Father will send in my name".

• Unless we are in accord with that name, and all that it implies, we shall never get the gain of the Holy Spirit. We may receive Him, but we shall not get the gain of Him.
  • "The Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things".

• Christians are not divinely taught unless they are in accord with the name of the Lord, subject to Him, acknowledging the rights and glory of His Person, for only then is the Holy Spirit free.

Now I speak about the Name of Father. The Lord Jesus said in the passage read,

• "I have made known to them thy name, and will make it known".

• It was a great feature of His mission here to make known the Father's name. The Father's name could not be made known until the Son was here.

• The Father's affections could not come into manifestation until there was an Object adequate for them. It is in the presence of the only-begotten Son that the Father comes into view.

• Those affections, of course, ever existed in God, for He created a father's affections, but they could not come into manifestation until the Son was here, and then it says, "the Father loves the Son". The Father's affections came into display.

• While the Lord was here, much of His service was to manifest the Father's name. He says,
  • "I have manifested thy name to the men whom thou gavest me out of the world".

I think you will find that the Father is mentioned over forty times in Matthew, and over one hundred times in John, showing how much of the Lord's conversation and teaching centred round the Father.

• He tells us in Matthew what the Father would be to us in our circumstances here; not only in our personal circumstances, but in the circumstances of the testimony.

• The Father is our ultimate resource, both as to our individual needs and as to our testimonial needs.
  • "If two of you shall agree on the earth concerning any matter, whatsoever it may be that they shall ask, it shall come to them from my Father who is in the heavens", Matthew 18: 19. He is the great resource.

But in John the Lord unfolds what the Father is in relation to the realm of purpose. He says,

• "My Father worketh hitherto and I work", and again,

• "All that the Father gives me shall come to me" and again,

• "No one can come to me except the Father who has sent me draw him".

• The Father is operating in view of eternal purpose. The Lord speaks many times of the name in connection with His Father. He says in John 17,
  • "Holy Father, keep them in thy name which thou hast given me".

• I have no doubt that is the Father's name.

There is nothing like family affection to keep us.

• The enemy has always attacked the family; he did so from the outset because the human family is the most important unit God has made amongst men.

• But the truth of the family of God is of transcending importance. If we are not kept in the Father's name, and thus in warm family affections for one another, the truth of the body will never prosper.

Family affections are fundamental in Christianity. Paul's most elementary assembly epistle is addressed to

• "the assembly of Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ".

• We would not be Christians at all if we were not in the Lord Jesus Christ. That is the testimonial name. We come into blessing through Him.

• But they were also in God the Father, and the whole tone of the epistle shows how strongly divine family affections were developing among them.
  • He desires that they should abound in love more and more towards one another and towards all.

• He does not bring the truth of the body into that epistle. He is concerned first to secure this strong foundation of family affections involved in being consciously in God the Father and thus kept in the Father's name in all the warmth and tenderness of that name.

• If such a condition exists amongst the saints, they will be prepared to accept the truth of the body, which is a testing truth.

• In the family we are all firstborn ones, all children of God, and all loved with the same love; but in the body we each have a different function.

• And I may not be satisfied with my function. I may want to do something that someone else is doing – something that God has not equipped me to do.

• We shall not be prepared for the test of divine sovereignty in the body if we are not in the gain of the family.

• Thus John recovers us to Paul by bringing us into the warmth of the family in the knowledge of the Father, the tenderness of His love for the Son, and the way He has embraced us in those affections which He has for the Son.

• What could be more tender than the Father's love? And it would make us very tender with one another, like Paul amongst the Thessalonians exhorting them as a father his own children and cherishing them as a nurse her own children.

Furthermore, apart from the knowledge of the Father and His Name, we shall never arrive at the great divine end. The Lord says

• "I have made known to them thy name, and will make it known; that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them".

• This corresponds with Paul's prayer in Ephesians 3: 14-19. He knows to whom to turn in this greatest of all matters. He bows his knees to the Father,
  • "that the Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith", that He might be enshrined there, that we might take character from the Father in His love for the Son.

• The Father loves the Son and He will bring about a universe where all will love the Son. I believe it is right to say that
  • the Father has devised, and is bringing to pass, a universe that shall be an adequate setting for the Son as the Centre. Such is His love for the Son.

• And He would give us according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power by His Spirit in the inner man, so that, in so far as creature capacity permits,
  • the Christ might have the same place in our hearts as He has in His; and that thus we might be able to apprehend that vast universe which centres in the Son.

• How important the Father's name is! "I have made known to them thy name, and will make it known; that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them and I in them". It involves the climax of Paul's ministry.

• Indeed the Lord's prayer in John 17 covers the whole of Paul's ministry, but in words which only the Son Himself could have expressed.
  • No one but a Person of the Godhead could have put the whole matter in such compression.

• How blessed the Father is! How blessed His affections are! How tender His affections for the Son and how much He is doing for the Son!

• He has embraced us in His affections and given us to the Son, and the Lord Jesus says, "I am glorified in them". He will be so glorified through all eternity.

I have referred to the testimonial Name – the name of Jesus, and to the Father's name. Now I proceed to Matthew 28, where we have

• "the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit".

• Whenever we consciously reach the Father's presence we are not far away from the glory of this Name.

• In the presence of the Father and the riches of His glory, with the Christ dwelling in our hearts by faith, we are not far from the fulness of God.

• As we are worshipping the Father and giving Him His supreme place in the economy of God, He would soon give us a sense
  • that He desires us to honour the Son even as we honour Him; and that He would also have us honour the Holy Spirit. There is no selfishness with divine Persons.

• So it soon becomes a matter of this great name coming before us in worship and praise,
  • "the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit",

• a name which speaks to us, on the one hand, of the economy in all its greatness, the Father supreme in it, His name coming first, therefore;
  • and yet on the other hand a name which brings out the equality in Deity of the Three Persons.

• There is the economy in its order, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit and yet the great truth that God is one and His name one.

• The economy remains for ever, thank God, and in that great economy of love the Father ever has His place of supremacy. Yet the economy had a beginning.

• But God Himself had no beginning. So the ultimate in our worship is God. From everlasting to everlasting He is God.

Now I go back to Numbers 6: 27, because God says, "they shall put my name upon the children of Israel". I believe, as applied to us, that would cover all I have been speaking about.

• The testimonial Name is ever upon us, the name of the Lord Jesus.

• The name of the Father is also upon us; we take character from Him in family affections and also in upright works; Matthew 5: 16.

• But over and above all that there is the Name to which we have been baptised.

• Every professing Christian on earth has, I suppose, been baptised to that Name – millions of them. To many it means nothing, alas!

• Think of all the children who are christened in this country to the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

• Who knows when God will work with any one of them and they will become alive to the Fulness to which they were baptised? But then this Name is upon us all.

"They shall put my name". I trust I have made myself clear that, in Christianity, it involves the name of the Lord Jesus, the name of the Father, and the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

• And it is for us to comport ourselves in accord with the Name. That is what is in mind at the beginning of Numbers.

• God had set up His tabernacle; He was dwelling in it. He called out of it according to Leviticus 1, and He spoke in it according to Numbers 1.
  • "Jehovah spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai in the tent of meeting".

• When it is a question of approach, God calls out of the tent of meeting; He wants us to draw near.
  • But in the tent of meeting He would tell us what He looks for as to our conduct outside.

• When we have been inside we are ready for the outside. Numbers is the ordering of the camp around the tabernacle.

• "Our God the centre is", we sing, and we think of a scene that is yet to come. But that is the truth now. That is Numbers.

• God is dwelling here in His habitation, the tabernacle of witness. He must be the centre; all the tribes were to encamp around the tabernacle and all their interests were to be in relation to the tabernacle.

• "Our God the centre is". How could He be anything else? Is He the centre of your life? If not, you are out of the matter as to anything vital. It is a question of God being your centre all the time, every day.

• That is what He would tell you if you go into the tent of meeting. He would say, When you go out, I want you to order all your circumstances in relation to Me.

• He says, I call upon you for military service. You are all soldiers. Pitch your tents, as soldiers, around My dwelling. That is what He expects us to do. If we have not done it before, let us do so now.

• Let each householder, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ, see that he himself and his house are set for the defence of the testimony.

• The next thing is He calls upon the Levites, who were nearer to the tabernacle than the soldiers.

• He would say to us, You are not only soldiers, you are also Levites. You have levitical obligations. You have to be prepared to carry, to take down, to put up, and to care for the tabernacle.

• Yet that is not all. He would also say, You are priests. The priests were nearer still, on the east side, close to the tent of meeting.

So God calls upon every one of us to orient ourselves and our households, in relation to Himself and His dwelling-place, in these three ways;

1. first in military formation,

2. secondly in the acceptance of levitical obligations,

3. and thirdly as priests.

• It is not a static affair, and there are no days off duty. There is no thought of a holiday in the Acts. In the divine scheme the only holidays were the holy days – the feast days.

• According to Acts, the apostles taught daily in the temple and Paul taught daily in the school of Tyrannus. If you took a day off at Ephesus you would miss something of Paul's ministry.

• The enemy is attacking all the time, the military are needed; there is service to be rendered at all times to the saints, the Levites are needed;
  • and there is the service of God, which is the most important, the priests are needed.

Following the ordering of the camp in chapters 1-6, every leper was to be put out of the camp; that is, discipline was to be rightly exercised.

• Then, in the trial of jealousy, pure affections were to be preserved, and then the Nazarite brings in the devotion in which all these obligations are to be carried out.

• It is at that point that Jehovah says, "they shall put my name upon the children of Israel".

• His name was not to be put upon a disordered crowd, but upon a holy nation in proper order around the tabernacle. He says,
  • "they shall put my name upon the children of Israel; and I will bless them".

• You cannot expect blessing if you contract out of the scheme. I call upon the brethren to be wholly in it; not half-heartedly, not with reserves, but wholly in it.

• What right have we to do our own will and go our own way? Look at the price that has been paid!

• This glorious Person, whom we contemplate in the holiest, has been to the altar of burnt-offering for us and has suffered outside the camp as the sin-offering.

• Are we to claim any rights for ourselves? Shame on us if we do! I look round upon my brethren, "redeemed from Adam's race and ransomed from the fall". What are we going to do with the rest of our time?

• Let us wake up to righteousness and sin not. To be dilatory about these things is sin.

• Let us wake up to the claims of God upon us, as redeemed and ransomed people, and let us be set in our right position, relative to God as the Centre, at the present time.

He says, "They shall put my name upon the children of Israel; and I will bless them".

• You will not lose by it; you will be blessed. It is the blessing of the priests. We are to be in the spirit of blessing as we look at the saints in divine order. Jehovah says,
  • "Speak unto Aaron and unto his sons, saying, On this wise ye shall bless the children of Israel: saying unto them, Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee; Jehovah make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee; Jehovah lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace".

I have no doubt, as others have suggested, there is a veiled allusion here to the Holy Trinity, which bears on what we have been saying tonight as to the Name.

• "Jehovah bless thee, and keep thee", no doubt a veiled allusion to the Holy Spirit here amongst us in blessing, the One who keeps us, the Paraclete;

• "Jehovah make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee", the Lord Jesus, whose glory we behold with unveiled face;

• "Jehovah lift up his countenance upon thee" the sense of the Father's countenance, His favour resting upon us as it rests upon Christ. "Jehovah lift up his countenance upon thee, and give thee peace".