Beloved brother,—Your packet was forwarded to me at M—, in Wiltshire, to which place I was invited for a Good-Friday meeting, which we have had, through the Lord’s unfailing love to us.
It is always a grave problem to me, after these select meetings (such as at Notting Hill, or our more frequent gatherings, as this at M—and other places) are over, and broken up—what is their real value to the many who were present, either at the session, or afterward? I have never solved this query to my satisfaction, but I have thoughts of this kind, about our provincial or our metropolitan meetings, which I will tell you. Perhaps it is not possible to estimate at the time what we gain from them, by any precise standard, or gauge—but we are all more than usually conscious of being in the presence of God, and of waiting upon Him, for a closer and richer communion with Himself, in all the counsels and intentions, which He is carrying out for His own eternal glory, and the glory of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the glory of the church.
At such a time, one is fully alive to the fact, that a great deal out of His precious Word has occupied us, and has passed through our minds and hearts; yea, and has spoken to us inwardly, so that all the capabilities of our spiritual and moral being, have been reached and engaged. But the effect, or if we may so say, the result must be waited for, and watched diligently.
The process at such meetings is too sudden to be calculated by any of our ordinary rules; and the transition too rapid from one subject to another, and these again in their various combinations, to be tested by weight and measure.
The palpable good at the time, may be this—that like a view from the top of one of the Swiss mountains at sunrise, we are conscious of looking out upon an expanse, so various and so immense, as to bring up a conviction in us, that we are surrounded, and lost in the midst of what is so overwhelming.
This may fall to our lot, once, twice, or thrice in a life-time, but it neither admits of definition nor description—only we are sure of the great fact—that we have been enveloped and borne away, by a length and a breadth, a depth and a height, that are more heavenly than earthly, in their nature—more eternal than temporal, in their character—and altogether outside of us, and our merely ordinary life, in the midst of men and things, where Christ is rejected.
Four or five days’ occupation and study of the word of God—or a Good-Friday meeting (especially when it quietly robs its right and left hand neighbors of many hours) having for their object a ministry by the Holy Ghost to souls, and which makes the Father, and His glory known to us, in connection with His beloved Son, must not be ranked with common causes, and their effects. They stand apart and alone in their known greatness, and bide their time.
Such a feeling as this is does one good, and because it is so new and strange to us. It carries its own conviction with it, that we have had to do with Him, who is without beginning of days, or end of years—who is the eternal God, and from everlasting to everlasting—and yet that He has come, so close to us, so very close, as to have cleansed us from every stain and spot, and seal us by His Spirit for the day of our full redemption, and His own glory. One, who has laid His hand upon us in infinite love, so that we can no longer feel as creatures merely, in the presence of a Creator—but as those who are in another relation to Him, as redeemed by the blood of His own Son, and He our Father, by this very work, which has made us known to one another, as united by His grace to Christ, the Son of His own love. It is this union by the Holy Ghost, that carries our best and choicest affections after Him, and settles them above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God.
To think, yea, and more than this, to know that our life is hid with Christ in God; and that we now stand before the Father as new creatures, in a new order of manhood, and one with His Son, who is the beginning of the new creation of God it is this immense love which overpowers us—so that whether in the body or out of the body, we cannot tell. It is indeed a translation out of darkness into light now, and into glory when the Lord comes; and makes one wonder where one is, by the greater wonder of what one is.
Brought in truth so very nigh to God, as to be loved by Him as He loves His own Son; and so one with that Son, as for Him to say, “as Christ is, so are you in this world,” puts one almost beside oneself—so that a vast and mighty feeling takes possession of us all, which defies either our minds or understandings fully to comprehend, or our tongues to declare.
Indeed, I think effects like these should follow a ministry when in the power of the Spirit—a ministration of life and righteousness and glory, from the risen Head, to His members on the earth, out of His fullness.
On this account I could not check a brother (and he, not a young one,) who said, “I could not tell what to do, to hold myself in”—at the M— meeting – and on being advised, “to let himself out before the Lord”—he replied, “why then I don’t know what I should do,” but “The spirit of the prophets is subject to the prophets.”
As to the ministry of the word, the subject with which we started was the blessed one, “That God takes care of His own glory in the midst of all that Satan has done and is still doing.” The charm of this is found for us that God does this now in the person of man, the Son of man. Jesus could enter into the strong man’s house, saying, “Lo I come to do thy will, O my God”—and on leaving it, lift up His eyes to heaven and say, “I have glorified thee upon the earth, I have finished the work thou gavest me to do.” The four gospels tell us how, and in what way Jesus did this on earth—and the Acts how He was raised up to do it in heaven, till He comes back from the opened heavens to fill the whole world with the glory of God.
The church is the new creation, and called out between these two periods “the little while” in which Christians are invited to the ascended Son of man in glory, by the descent of the Holy Ghost. This is how God is now taking care of His own glory and the glory of Christ as the Son of His love and the glory of the church as His Body and the Bride. He has made known to us the mystery, which was hidden in God from before the foundation of the world.
We then considered the manner in which God was preparing new vessels to receive the heavenly treasure for Christ’s glory—and how fitted for the Master’s use in testimony to others. The 120 were named to us, as the pattern for this period—a new company—men in Christ, and waiting for “the promise of the Father.” These prepared vessels were to be endued with power from on high—and as a receiver, we selected Stephen for our study, and were greatly encouraged at the outset of his history in Ch. 6 to witness the power of God in grace, over all the outbreak of evil and sin, on the neglect of the widows. These very murmurings were so over-ruled by the Holy Ghost, as to become the birth-place and cradle of the first martyr. The one man upon the earth after Pentecost, filled with the Holy Ghost, who looked up steadfastly into heaven, and was knit to the One Man in the glory of God. The model Son of man on high, at the right hand of the Father, and in the glory of God, and the model man below filled with the Holy Ghost, laying down his life in testimony for God during the times of Israel’s history—for the Messiah during His ministry upon the earth—and for the Holy Ghost whom they were then resisting.
Some profitable remarks were made as to the way Stephen was fashioned in the sixth chapter, in order to make him what he was in the seventh. In other words, he Was receptive to a degree in the former, that he might be without a fault in the latter. In truth Stephen’s receptivity was so continuous that its effects on the beholders was, as if his face was as the face of an angel—but this was preparative. The main object was to form and fill Stephen as a vessel of testimony for chapter seven—so that all this receptive power with which his vessel was charged, should only be the measure of its outlet, and of its conductivity (like a telegram) as he flashes his testimony round the wide sphere of all God’s actings from the day He appeared to Abraham, to the hour of their resistance of the Holy Ghost. The power of this conductivity in Stephen was so perfect that he could by the Spirit write the sentence of death upon the betrayers and murderers of Christ, that they even gnashed upon him with their teeth. Its conductivity was equally perfect upward to the Son of man, so that it wrote the assurance of glory on Stephen who called out, and said, “Lord Jesus receive my spirit.”
Its conductivity rose yet higher in its quality, when “he kneeled down and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.” It completes itself and is perfected in the comment of the Holy Ghost, “When he had said this, he fell asleep”—for me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
The opposite of this was then brought forward from Samson and Delilah, as a proof of Satan’s crafty power against the Nazarite. It is wonderful to see that as long as he held the secret of his great power between himself and God untold, he could do anything, and propound his riddle gained out of “the lion’s carcass,” to the Philistines. Delilah’s lap, and the Nazarite’s head on her knees, oh what a contrast to the head of the beloved disciple on the bosom of his Lord and asking who is it that betrayeth thee? Conscious love reclining on the breast makes John as bold as a lion—whilst conversely Samson got his meat out of the eater. The receptivity and conductivity of the Nazarite and the beloved disciple were in their nature alike at that moment—but their relation is snapped when the secret is divulged. The prison-house, and the eyes put out, and Samson making sport for the Philistines follow weep your secret of Nazariteship in the unshaven locks upon the head and of receptivity out of the fullness of Christ, maintained in the power of the Holy Ghost—and you may propound the riddle, or the mystery of God and of Christ to the wisdom of the world, and they will never unravel it. The conductive power and completeness of work in the Lord’s service, will agree with the receptivity of the vessel. The face of a man will shine like an angel to others, whilst we look steadfastly up into heaven and see the Son of man in the glory of God.
We can then bear testimony, that He gives “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, to shine into the hearts” of all that receive Him.
These were our morning and afternoon meditations in the main. The meetings or ministry in the evening was likewise very profitable and interesting—from Psa. 84, and by another from an extract of Exodus and Numbers.
We were occupied with Col. 3 as “dead and risen with Christ,” and then we walked on the sea with Peter naked; and after the great take of fish had been brought to shore, and numbered, we sat down to dinner with him, and the Lord. After they had dined we were much moved by the ways of the Bishop and Shepherd with His strayed sheep, and Peter’s restoration. We were very much struck with the way the Great and Good. Shepherd makes, and appoints Peter as an under-shepherd after his recovery. “Feed my lambs, feed my sheep” was very assuring to Peter and how diligently he went about this work is evident from his first epistle, and particularly the beginning of the last chapter, where “he holds out the crown of glory to the elders,” when the Chief Shepherd appears.
But I must leave this for the present – only adding that our God “who takes care of His own glory” took care also that His apostle Peter should not be without a crown of glory at the appearing of Christ. The Lord likewise took care to set Peter in His own path, of laying down his life in this world, as He did to the martyr Stephen, telling the secret to Peter, by what death he should glorify God!
So that we concluded “everything works together for good now – and whatever goes beyond good, will only work out for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.”
May the Lord grant that our receptiveness when sitting together at M—in His presence to learn of Him, may prove to have been like Stephen’s – both to live or die for Him. And further, that the power of conductivity in us by the Holy Ghost may flash the sentence of death upon the hearts of men all around us, who are as yet in the flesh and in their sins; in order the more effectually to prepare their vessels for the reception of light and grace from the crucified Christ below, and from the glorified Son above, that they may be saved with an everlasting salvation, and be like men who wait for the Lord! Yours affectionately, J.E.B.