Scriptural Principles Relating to the Church [Booklet]

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Very helpful; highly recommended.

Excerpt- With Some Remarks About Going on Accordingly—Part One I would like to look into the Scriptures this afternoon concerning the Lord's people here in this scene and His desire to be with them and to dwell among them as they journey on here. I believe it is very evident from His Word that it has been His desire from the very beginning to dwell among His people —not only for time, but also for eternity.

The first scripture I wish to turn to is Gen. 49, where Jacob is blessing the tribes of Israel. I particularly want to notice what he says to Judah in the 10th verse: "The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto Him shall the gathering of the people be." That should be in the plural, "gathering of the peoples be." Now, verses 22-24, "Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall: the archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob; (from thence is the shepherd, the stone of Israel)."

Here we have, I believe, the earliest expression of the desire of Jehovah to dwell among His people. The Lord is mentioned under the name of Shiloh. (Shiloh is both a place and a person.) And it says He is coming, "and unto Him shall the gathering of the peoples be." It is plural. It was not only the children of Abraham that these prophecies concerned, but they also took in the Gentiles "the peoples." We see that, too, in the reference to Joseph. This was how our blessed Lord and Savior had to come into this scene, as the lowly and rejected One. It speaks here of Joseph, that he was, "a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall." So his branches did run over the wall. They were not confined to Israel, but ran over the wall to include the people that James speaks of in Acts 15:14, "God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for His name." Here it tells us, in Gen. 49:23, 24 that, "the archers have sorely grieved him, and shot at him, and hated him: but his bow abode in strength." So we know that our blessed Lord and Savior had to come into this scene, in order to accomplish our redemption, as a lowly, humble man. On account of that, He was rejected by His people and the archers certainly did shoot at Him. But, "His bow abode in strength."