Amid a chastened and subdued sense of God's presence, W. T. P. W. gave out-"Rest of the saints above," which was sung with much feeling.
H. H. S. then prayed, and afterward read 1 Sam. 17:49-58; 18:1-4. He said:- " I have read these verses because they strikingly illustrate the different effects the truth of the Gospel has upon souls. They suggest the question, Are we taken up with the blessings that Christ has made ours, or are we rather taken up with the Person of Christ-Christ Himself? The heart must have an object, it will and must be engaged with some object or another.”
"Generally the state of souls is to be more engaged with their blessing than the One who, in the depths of His love, has procured it for them. Observe in this scripture how positively we have pictured what I am stating: the mass of the people are taken up with the great blessing David had made theirs. He had wrought a wonderful victory, and achieved a mighty deliverance for them. There are three things mentioned that they did; they arose and shouted (ver. 52), i.e., they were filled with delight; next they pursued the Philistines; and then they spoiled their tents. Thus we have set forth: first, the conscious joy and delight of souls who know deliverance; secondly, their taking sides with Christ against His enemies; and thirdly, spoiling their tents-i.e., settling down and counting the blessings-dwelling upon what has become theirs.”
"Now, there is something far beyond all this, which 1 Sam. 18 brings before us. David returns with the head of the mighty giant in his hand: type of our blessed Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who delivered us from him that had the power of death, and puts us in possession of eternal victory. Here we find one whose eye is not on the blessing, but on the blesser. The Victor commands his attention and wonder; he gazes upon Him, and his soul is drawn out to Him. ‘And it came to pass when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David: and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.’ (Ver. 1.) And surely thus it is that our gaze should be filled with our Victor; thus should our hearts be engaged in adoring wonder. As the object of our affections and delight, how well we might be ever absorbed with Him, who contains in Himself all the excellences that suit the heart of God. That One, who was ever the delight of the Father, in His whole life down here; in His death; and is still His delight in the glory. Jonathan loved David as his own soul. There is our pattern, or, as Peter puts it: ‘Whom having not seen ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.’”
“Another thing that we have in this history, is in the fourth verse of this chapter: ‘And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle.’ Have there not been times when Christians have stripped themselves for Christ's sake? But ere we can do this, He must be to us what David was to Jonathan; His worth and beauty must have won our hearts; only then, as He becomes the engrossing satisfying object for our souls, shall we be ready to strip ourselves, and yield our all in willing devotedness and consecration to Himself.”
C. S. then read Neh. 13:1-13.
He said: “That word in the thirteenth verse: ‘And I made treasurers over the treasuries, Shelemiah the priest, and Zadok the scribe; and of the Levites, Pedaiah: and next to them was Hanan the son of Zaccur, the son of Mattaniah; for they were counted faithful, and their office was to distribute unto their brethren,’ is the word especially before me; though the context is very marvelous, too, teaching, as it does, the important lesson, and on which I will say a word or two, that the Moabite and the Ammonite were to be shut out of the Assembly of God forever. It contains a solemn voice for us in our day. They were the children of Lot, the righteous man, who had linked himself with the world. In the seventh verse we read, ‘And I came to Jerusalem, and understood of the evil that Eliashib did for Tobiah, in preparing him a chamber in the courts of the house of God. And it grieved me sore: therefore I cast forth all the household stuff of Tobiah out of the chamber. Then I commanded, and they cleaned the chamber: and thither brought I again the vessels of the house of God, with the meat offering and the frankincense.’
"A great chamber had been prepared for the house of the Ammonite; and has not a great chamber been prepared for the children of the world in the house of God in our day? We would lay hold on the fact that this great chamber was prepared for Tobiah, where, aforetime they laid the meat offering, the frankincense, and the vessels, &c., and it was the sight of this that so sorely grieved Nehemiah, that he says, ‘I cast forth all the household stuff of Tobiah out of the chamber. Then I commanded, and they cleansed the chamber, and thither brought I again the vessels of the house of God, with the meat offering and the frankincense.’”'
“Has not the truth of the presence of Christ in the assembly been restored in these last days? It is indeed a poor thing to be occupied with the stuff of Tobiah: rather, as Jonathan beheld David, would we behold Christ as set forth in the meat offering and the frankincense. How little, is Christ ministered in the house of God! How very little is a living and glorified Christ preached through the wide range of Christendom!”
“And then note the twelfth verse, ‘Then brought all Judah the tithe of the corn and the new wine and the oil unto the treasuries.' Have we not through grace arrived at about this point? Have we not been graciously permitted to come together to feed upon the Person of Christ?”
“Indeed, how often has the Lord, in His goodness, permitted us to do so! We may never meet again, and certainly not with the same circumstances before us as we have to-day; nor shall we ever here see fully how much God gave us through our beloved and departed brother. I remember, some years ago, when in the north of England, the truths of the coming of Christ for His church, and the presence of the Holy Ghost in the assembly, were not to be heard of. Oh, how much we owe to the beloved one God has been pleased to take away!”
“I would now notice verse 13- ‘And I made treasurers over the treasuries,' &c. Have we realized what God has made many of His servants in this day? Has He not communicated much to us through His treasurers-the precious truths as to the Person of Christ, the presence of the Holy Ghost on the earth, and the coming of the Lord?
"I would turn you, who are the Lord's servants, for a moment, to Acts 20:28 ‘Take heed, therefore, unto yourselves, and to all the flock of God, over the which the Holy Ghost,’ &c. Take heed! Are not the Lord's servants, the treasurers, here reminded of their solemn responsibilities? ‘Take heed unto yourselves, and to all the flock’—not a little part of the flock. The heart of God takes in nothing short of His entire flock. Oh, may our interests and service be with God's thought of the whole church of God before us!”
“And in this chapter in the Acts how we are reminded of the circumstances of the church to-day- ‘I know that after my departure,’ &c. But what is the apostle's resource? ‘I commend you to God and the word of his grace,’ &c. We have not accompanied our dear brother to the ship to-day, but to the grave, and we turn our thoughts to the blessed fact that God has still His treasurers to distribute His treasures to His people. Let us not be taken up with Tobiah (that is, the evil around and abroad), but rather let our hearts be occupied with the ‘meat-offering and the sweet frankincense,’ that we may know how to minister portions to the precious saints of God.”
“ In Rev. 21 we have a wonderful description of the church seen in her future glory as the Lamb's wife. ‘Her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper-stone, clear as crystal.’ But is not the church now, in His eye, adorned with this glory and beauty? Does He not see it already ‘clear as crystal’? It is, as we apprehend, His thoughts of His church, His present estimate of it-what it is to Him-that our interest will be awakened, and our hearts will fervently desire to be amongst His treasurers, and to minister the unsearchable riches of Christ to the objects of His love. Oh, how truly this was the delight and aim of that beloved servant who is now 'forever with the Lord'! "
C. McA. now gave out, “Join all the glorious names.”
T. R., after this, recalled attention to Acts 20, reading Acts 20:24-28.
He remarked, "We have indeed lost a great deal in the one whom God has been pleased to take from us. He was, undoubtedly, His instrument to recover much truth to the church of God. We have his writings left, and the memory of his devoted life, but he is gone. The circumstances of the apostle Paul, as given us in the portion we have read, in many ways resemble those in which we find ourselves to-day; and there was much in our brother's course and ways down here which answered to what we find in Paul's.”
"Paul, about to depart, commends his brethren ‘to God, and the word of his grace,’ foreseeing the evil that was coming upon the church. Here would be the all-sufficient resource of the saints.” (Heb. 11:5.)
“Our dear departed brother much insisted upon the inspiration of the scriptural and sought to unfold the whole word of God; and it is surely important that we should be careful to read all God has given us, as the reading of parts only leads to imperfect views of truth.”
"In Deut. 6:5-9 it is very interesting to notice how the Lord encouraged and exhorted His people in that day to a diligent attention to all His words, which were to be in their hearts, taught to their children, and continually spoken of by them.”
"How often we all fail, when coming together at each other's houses, or in meeting one another, to speak of Him and His word; how our intercourse often drops down to that which is unprofitable.”
"It is blessed to remember the faithfulness of our God, and to know that whatever our failures, our dangers, or our difficulties, we can always count upon Him. 1 Cor. 10:12,13 is a word we may well ponder. ‘God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able, but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.' If we were more occupied with the good, we should not be so liable to yield to that which is evil."
C. E. S. then prayed, and in prayer hung much upon Heb. 13:7: "Remember your leaders, who have spoken unto you the word of God, and considering the issue of their conversation, imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever."
W. T. P. W. then referred to a remark made by J. N. D. to W. Trotter, which he (W. Trotter) said left a lasting effect upon him. It was this: "The secret of peace within and power without is to be occupied with good-ever and always to be occupied with good."
How good is the God we adore,
Our faithful unchangeable Friend;
Whose love is as great as His power,
And knows neither measure nor end.
'Tis Jesus, the First and the Last,
Whose Spirit shall guide us safe home;
We'll praise Him for all that is past,
And trust Him for all that's to come.