Address—E.F. Smith
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
This is June 24, 1972.
The following.
It's an address.
My brother Eric Smith.
We sing together #46 in the appendix.
#46 In the Appendix Have I an object, Lord below, which would divide my heart with thee, which would divert it, even flow in answer to Thy constancy?
Teach me quickly to return and cause my heart afresh to burn #46.
I would like to read just a few verses from the 8th of Numbers, but before we read I.
00:05:03
As the Lord enables, wish to continue on with this theme that we've been occupied by with these two days.
But applying this truth from the Old Testament.
As you know, the this is one whole, that this is the word of the living God.
That holy men of God wrote as they were born along by the Spirit of God.
That this book is not of private interpretation.
It is one book and I have suggested during the reading years a method of reading the word.
For instance, reading the old the Genesis with the four Gospels and Exodus with Acts and Romans.
And of course Leviticus with Hebrew and Numbers.
With Philippians.
And I was glad a brother quoted the 7th of numbers.
The yesterday.
The Numbers is the wilderness of the Book of the Old Testament.
Philippians is the wilderness book of the New, so we shall consider some portions relative to the Christian experience from the book of Numbers. We'll read a few verses from the Age and notice.
How God's truth is so wonderfully progressive. We'll read a few verses from the 8th of Numbers.
And then go back and quietly and as hurriedly as possible.
Speak of the different chapters. Just a very brief comment on each chapter leading up to the aids.
Verse one of chapter 8.
And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying.
Speak unto Aaron, and say unto him.
When thou lightest the lamps, the seven lamps shall give light over against the Candlestick.
We might mention that the seven lamps expressed the light of the spirit of testimony.
And they were connected, of course, as you know, with the beaten, beaten sharp of the Candlestick. Beautiful type A beautiful type 2 of the.
The spirits illumination.
And Aaron did so. He lighted the lamps thereof over against the Candlestick, as the Lord commanded Moses.
Now in verse.
Six, take the Levites from among the children of Israel and cleanse them.
Thou shalt thou do unto them to cleanse them, spring to water purifying upon them, let them shave all their flesh, and let them wash their clothes, and so make themselves clean.
Verse 14 Plus shalt thou separate the Levites from among the children of Israel, and the Levites shall be mine.
Well, we'll just comment that a little verse two would give us the true spiritual work as it exalts Christ. And I suppose this golden star shark would sustain the lamps and so on. There would be the.
Priestly Hand concerning the oil and applying also the snuffer well, we shall dwell on that too much, but we return now to chapter one.
We read in chapter one. I just want to make this a practical application of what we've been taking up these two days.
Take either some of all the congregation of the children of Israel after their families by the House of their fathers, with the number of their names, every male by their poles from 20 years old and upward. All that are able to go forth to war in Israel, thou and Aaron shall number them by their armies. Verse 18. And they assembled all the congregation together on the first day of the second month, and they declared their pedigree.
00:10:17
Notice that they declared their pedigrees after their families by the House of their fathers, according to the number of the names from 20 years old and upward by their poles, and so on. We notice here that they these, before they could be brought into the light of the sanctuary as we have it in chapter 8, they had to declare their genealogy.
Now you dear young people, can you do this?
You declare your genealogy.
I remember speaking with a rather skeptical MD and he was he was telling me about his geniality, how he was descended from so and so, and it was a wonderful genealogy he had.
And he'd evidently been well trained. He was a well trained man. He was an MD and from a very good family.
And he was friendly with us, with our family and he's turned to me and he said, Eric, you've had a good bringing up to, haven't you? Oh yes, indeed I have, doctor. I've had a wonderful bringing up. And I quoted the following. He brought me up out also out of an horrible bit.
Out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he have put a new song in my mouth. Even praise unto God.
I said that's a good bringing up doctor and he said.
Who?
Can we declare our genealogy? You dear young people? It's not sufficient.
To take your seat at the side of your parents.
And pose that you are there, gathered to the name, the precious name of Christ. I wouldn't say that you are not, but to pose that you were gathered there and never had experienced the new book.
I remember I think it was old Mr. Walter Scott making this statement in London years ago.
How sad it would be.
For parents to be home in the glory and some of their children who were apparently gathered with them.
In hell forever.
And he stressed the need.
Of that new birth.
There is no need for you to declare the hour or the moment that you really.
Turn from death unto life. But I do remember 67 and odd years ago when it was a definite transaction with my own soul.
Under deep conviction.
It was brought home to my own heart that I was a Sinner.
And not only a Sinner, but a lost Sinner, and for two nights couldn't sleep.
Until at 2:00 and 2:30 in the morning, I got out of my bed and cried to God to save me. That's a long time ago. It was a definite transaction.
Oh yes, it was a definite transaction, thank God.
For that moment when?
It was brought home to my own soul that I was not only a Sinner, but a last Sinner without God and without hope in this world.
So we trust that everyone of you dear young people here this afternoon can declare your genealogy.
The first Indian to come to Christ was brought to the Savior through the reading of John 1027. I taught him to read and to write the Spanish.
00:15:04
The first Indian to say to me, Sir, I'm saved.
And I looked at him and I said, how do you know it?
You know what he's saying. He opened his testament, which we had translated out of the Spanish, into the Inca tongue that he put his brown finger on that verse 27 and he read it to me in his own language.
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me, and I gave them to them eternal life, and they shall never perish.
And he said, so I'm saved because God says so.
There's been no trouble with him. He's a man of 66 years of age with a grown family. There's been no trouble with him. He was truly brought to the Savior's fate.
Can we then?
Say of a truth that we can declare our genealogy.
We trust that everyone present can do this.
Can do this.
This in in this first chapter. Then they had to declare their genealogy.
Now we'll hurry on. The time goes so quickly.
In chapter 2.
We'll just read a verse because there's not time to dwell on these wonderful truths of numbers.
And verse one and the Lord spake unto Moses and unto Aaron, saying, Every man of the children of Israel pitch by his own standard with the inside of their father's house.
Fire off about the Tabernacle of the congregation. Shall they pitch?
And so on. We noticed that these rallied to the banner.
They declared the genealogy and they rallied to the banner.
Dear young people.
Whose we are and whom we serve.
Sometimes we hear.
Conversations among young people, not always, but sometimes we do that, are very distressing.
With the usage of words and language which would almost convince us that they had never.
Known what it means to be saved by the grace of God.
We find.
Then hear that these have to rally to the banner. In the First World War I was conscripted.
As a soldier to go to the Gallipoli to fight against the Turks had no object. I could not escape. It was taken with 3000 more soldiers. The Lord in His mercy heard the prayers of my dear mother and all of us, and I was delivered from that dreadful fighting over there in Gallipoli.
And sent back.
But I do remember this.
3000 of us were gathered in under marquees tents.
And I was in charge of a group.
Of young men between the ages of 20 and 25.
And I said, man, I'm a Christian. I belong to Christ.
Please don't be throwing your boots around at me or anyone else in this top this tent who is also a Christian. Please remember that this is a dangerous business to go to war.
And it could be within a few weeks that you could all be in eternity.
Well, they listen.
And I believe the Lord.
00:20:02
Be first. Some of those men went, had the knowledge of sins forgiven, and they came to me and they put their arms around and they said thank you, Smith, for declaring you.
You are rallying to the banner for declaring your genealogy, telling us that you were a Christian. You belong to Christ.
Of the 3000 boys that went there, you could count those that came back on your two hands. How many may be in the depths of hell? How many of those may be?
In glory? I don't know.
Well, we rally to the banner.
If you belong to Christ the young person, tell them of Jesus and his love.
Tell them that Christ lives.
That is your savior.
When Dear Bob, Tony and I were in the.
Central America. Together we got out a similar track.
Giving the scripture, the scriptures dealing with the fact that Jesus lived, that Christ lived.
And it was distributed around the city of that fanatical city called San Salvador, over half a million souls.
We tell them that Jesus love.
But he was dead, and he's allowed again.
Christ not only has dealt with the question of sin as regards its root and its principle.
But our sin is born in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead and for sins, might live unto righteousness. By who strikes we've been healed.
For we will indeed a sheep going astray. But I now returned unto the shepherd and Bishop of our souls.
Tell them.
These rallied to the banner in the third chapter.
There were charges given to these. We won't have time to dwell on that, save to mention the names of three specific trials. I'd like to drill on that a little bit because it has to do with our readings.
In this sense, we have the Gershonites and we have the mirror rights and we have the Coalites. Now I do believe that Gershon means a stranger here. So we have Peter Ryan ministry there.
Morale means bitterness, and we have John's ministry.
Why do you say that no one knew the bosom of that precious Savior like John and the sorrows and the trials through which that blessed Son of God went?
But when we come to coercive means and assembly.
And assembly, and thus we have Pauline ministry. Well, why do you make that out? If you look on a little farther after the charges were given, you'll find that service was rendered was given rather to these three particular tribes.
And cots were a lot of them, we might notice that.
In chapter 4.
We have the service there in verse 24 of the families of the Gershonites to serve and for burdens. Then we have the Coarthites and the mirror rights to the Goshenites where allotted a certain number of of wagons, cats and oxen to the mayor rights. A certain number larger number of option and carts were allotted for the removal.
From place to place of the heavy things of the Tabernacle. But.
To the core fights. It was theirs to bear the holy things upon their own shoulders. Now I want to apply that a little bit to you, dear young people.
00:25:13
It's a personal matter.
Concerning the holy things of God.
And when we speak of holiness or perfecting holiness in the fear of God.
It just means this, that we exclude by the grace of God, everything from our life and testimony country to God's mind and to God's nature.
We repeat that.
Holiness is that the exclusion from of everything by the grace of God, from your life and mind. That would be contrary to the mind and to the nature of God.
So that there are no cards.
And there are no wagons for you in this sense.
That if you would.
War in holiness of life.
In separation, in a separated testimony, you have to learn the truth of what we've just been saying to carry upon your own souls, dear young men and women.
The things that speak of the glory of God, the holy things, yes, the core things carried was theirs to bear upon their shoulders.
The testimony of your mother and father will not suffice. Thank God if it's a godly 1.
And we do thank God for our godly mothers and fathers. But before God, it's a personal matter with you. You have to do with a holy God. You have to carry this blessed truth that you have been here. You have to carry it personally. It has to be applied personally to your own life and to your own testimony to have any weight at all.
Well, this was a service that was a lot of these.
But in chapter 5.
We come to the case of leprosy.
When I was in the islands of Hawaii.
In coming across from New Zealand in 1920 on the way to Bolivia, who should get on board? My father's dearest friend, the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Mr. Massive.
A humble Christian man, and with him another gentleman. The direct product of Mr. J ***** testimony in New Zealand. A brother who preached for 40 years.
Long since with the Lord.
He was on board.
We were invited. Of course, I was nobody. I was just a poor old misery. But Mr. Massey said, Eric, you come along with me, we're going to see the governor of the islands and we're going to have a run around the islands. The Prince of Wales has just left that beautiful car behind and I'm going to take you over. I said, Sir, that's a wonderful privilege. So we went all around the island.
But Mr. Massey, he said, we're going to stop at one place and have a look at a distance at the lepers.
Oh, I just turned up the word of God and read as the car was going along. On the way back from that I read about the leopard and the story of the leper and the law of the leper.
And you know, it haunted me.
Having seen hundreds of these poor souls in those years, they were trying to kill them with an oil called the Chalmagua oil, which they brought from into China. And some were getting cured. But the doctor accompanied the Prime Minister and the governor of the island said, now you stand at this distance, have a look at them and I'm going to ask a question. There's a man that's eaten up.
00:30:03
With leprosy.
He said tell me who's that the most the nicest looking man among the group.
Tell me who's the nicest looking man among the group?
And he pointed to a man whose face was eaten away with that wrong disease he had no his nose was gone, part of his tin was gone, his ears were gone, his hands were gone. He was a living corpse.
And he said that man is the nicest looking man among.
What was wrong with that? The Prime Minister said. Godly man he was. He said he's looking through leprous eyes, Eric, and this is same.
God hates sin.
And you, dear young people, are surrounded by it and played with it.
It was sin that mail my Savior to the cross of Calvary.
God loves the Sinner, but he hates, hates sin.
One day a man said to me.
A man can fornicate 1.
Is here for dictator. If he just sins once, he fornicates once.
Is that really fornication? He said. I said, brother, that's fornication if it's once practiced or 1000 times practiced. And we are sometimes lacks concerning the disciplining of those who engage in that promiscuous wretchedness.
Sin. Leprosy speaks of sin, and here we have the word.
Command the children of Israel that they put out of the camp.
Every leper and everyone that has an issue and whosoever is defiled by the dead.
That blessed Son of God knew no sin.
Did no sin, but was made sin for you and for me.
I've often thought of those 3 pictures.
In one of the psalms in Psalm 102, we read I am like a Pelican of the wilderness. I am like an owl of the desert. I watch and am as a Sparrow alone upon the house ton.
And on that same boat, I said to this brother, Mr. Hinman, I said, brother him, and you've been all over Palestine. Is that this little Gregorious Sparrow that hops around the doors? He said no, Eric.
That is the Palestinian Sparrow, and it's an unclean bird.
But he says the Pelican is an unclean bird, the owl is an unclean bird, the Palestinian parse powers and unclean bird. And then he quoted.
From John.
2nd Corinthians 521 For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. What a commentary on that.
Those 3 unclean birds send.
Has to go. We cannot tolerate, we cannot play with it. When I was in the armies of chaplain, and please don't believe me to be a military man at all, but I was sent into the war being a Bolivian citizen as a sanitary captain.
And a chaplain with 20,000 men to preach to. And I preached my heart away.
Turin and I noticed one day behind the lines 2 Colonels playing with these poisonous snakes that are so.
Fill that section, those jungles of South America.
And he had a pet Python.
Had a hole in the side of the hill and he used to feed this Python once a week with a pig, one of these heavily, they call them these wild pigs. He got so tame that big snake that he took that snake back to the city and he had performances that caused a sensation. The snake was 20 feet long and it would rise up on its tail and it would rise itself round this kernel.
00:35:29
And then slacken off. So tame.
Well, he thought this was something to make money with. So he had a special place, a theater, and he had a great big curtain that he stretched, stretched out, and he would go through this performance and as the curtain would drop, would be a shriek.
A stream. Some of the women would faint, others would scream. This great monster would wind himself around the curve.
One night there was a real shriek. He'd played too long with the serpent. The serpent wound surrounded and crushed him. These bones cracked. And there was a real sleep shriek. He played too long with a serpent. You young men, be careful.
I want to talk to you so definitely as an old man on the way out home.
Your mammals can be the safeguard of your mouth.
Or they might not be the safeguard of your morals.
Let me repeat that your manners could be the safeguard of your morals.
But your manners could not be the safeguard of your morals. And I want to tell you, dear young people, do.
Play with sin.
Look to that blessed Savior, You belong to Christ, You're a new creation. If any man be in Christ, he's a new creation.
All things are passed away. Behold, all things have become new.
Beware of the serpent.
I remember in studying a little Hebrew, my old Hebrew teacher, I said, what is the meaning of serpent? What is the meaning of that word in the Hebrew? He said Natasha NACASH. And I said, what does it mean? He says the shining one, the shining one. That's what Satan is, the shining one. In your colleges, everywhere you go, the shining ones.
Is at work to break and to burst your mind, and to ruin your testimony by this terrible thing called sin.
So leprosy was cleaned out. There was number no room for it. And when we come to the 6th chapter, just remember, I'm just making these observations that you might take an interest in reading this wonderful book, this wonderful book number in chapter six, we have the Nazarite.
What's it mean? Separation. Oh, you dear young people, I want to tell you that separation is to Christ.
That's the meaning of it. Separation is to Christ.
And consequently, from this rule it's sin, its iniquities, its pleasures and its systems, and its systems, its systems.
And we have yet to learn that there is not only moral iniquity, but there is ecclesiastical iniquity too.
And I speak to us, having been one time an ordained clergyman. Thank God he delivered me from the grave clothes of a worn out ecclesiasticism, and he filled my poor heart with joy and peace in being where God's Holy Spirit is free and open to wield and to apply all His truth that would separate me in half and in feet due to Christ, and consequently from this wicked world.
This poor world that's condemned already.
I was talking to a lovely young woman.
Sister and she said Mr. Smith, I'm going to get married.
00:40:00
Who? I said are you? I said. That's nice. I presume he's a believer.
Oh, no, no, Mr. Smith. He's not a believer, but he's almost persuaded.
I said, have you never read from 2nd Corinthians 6? Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers. What fellowship has light with darkness? What communion Christ with Satan, with Daniel?
What?
Fellowship.
The believer with an unbeliever, can you get married under those conditions? And she looked down and said nothing. She got married. She's repenting at later. She certainly is.
A ruined life.
A ruined testimony and that beautiful face is no longer beautiful.
Its pocket and sad looking and mean looking.
She's ruined her life.
Marriage should be in the Lord and not only in the Lord.
You may find you, dear young folk. You may find a person who's a Christian.
But still alive with some ecclesiastical system. Don't you think that you can get long flying with such an one? You may fight like Kevin Dog.
But marriage is a happy.
Happiness when you marry in the Lord, and it's of the Lord that if you're in fellowship.
Happy fellowship. Then look to the Lord for him to bring you a partner who is also in happy fellowship. This is what it means to be married in the Lord and to be of the Lord.
The Nazarite had to separate himself. Well, we Chandra Lamette, but remember, separation is to Christ.
And consequently, from this world, its sin and its system.
And there's another part that came up with no other question today was asked me about this. Are these other different denominations gathered? Do they gather in the name of the Lord? Mr. Smith and I said yes, except those false, but they're not gathered to the Lord's name.
We have to understand that because it's not then on gathered to the North Lord's name. And then the question was asked how?
If you are gathered to the Lord's name, you dear young people.
You're separated from every other name.
Contrary to that blessed name.
By being gathered to the Lords name unto the Lords name you are.
Consequently separated from every other name.
You may not think so, but it's true. It's true.
Yes, they gather in the name, but they're not gathered to the name.
To be gathered again, we say, to the name of the Lord Jesus, means that you are separated from every other name, every other name.
So this question of separation is very important. Now there was a mention made of offerings in Chapter 7, but our brother explained that very nicely and I'm not going to dwell on that.
But when we come over to Chapter 8 to Chapter 8, I'd like to dwell a little there.
For particular service, remember that the the teaching of the of Philippians is Christian experience.
And I don't know of any of Paul's epistles so wonderfully.
So wonderfully outlining this truth Christian experience that.
It's it's God's picture, shall we say, of the true poodle.
00:45:00
It's God's truth to enlighten the soul. That's the second thought.
And it's the word of God, shall we say, to enlighten the soul.
These are points that I just want to dwell on for a few minutes.
Truth is to be understood as it is couched in the language of God.
One I forget where it was somewhere along the way.
I asked a young person.
Where they were meeting and they said they were in the assembly, that's all they said they were in the assembly.
And the comment was that.
That was the only true place to be.
Well, that was a nice thought too, but then I had to tell that young person all that persons.
That the assembly as the House of God.
Is the pillar and ground of the truth.
It is the pillar and support of the truth that is true, but it's not the truth.
God's Word is the truth.
I do hope you young people will get that God's Word is the truth, but the assembly is if it's walking faithfully, is where the truth is. Hell is guarded, is kept, is kept.
And the apostle Paul says that we might know how to behave ourselves in the House of God, the pillar and ground of the truth.
Now the assembly then, in this sense, was a happy place to be.
But you're not gathered to any particular name, but you are gathered to the Lord Jesus Christ, and your where he has been pleased to put his name there we're two or three are gathered together unto my name.
There am I in the midst of them.
And I'd like to read just in conclusion, something about that.
That was given me many years ago.
Just to end this talk because it's going getting on late. It's getting late.
I want to read what was given me some years ago.
I presume that some of you have this in your possession, but when I got this, this was many years ago and I put it into Spanish.
Where it's to do with Matthew 1820, where two or three are gathered together unto my name, there am I in the midst of them.
Where the divine place? I'm putting this into the English from the Spanish.
Where the divine place?
203.
The divine testimony, the lowest plurality.
Are gathered.
Separates the divine separation to Christ.
Together.
The divine Oneness, the unity of the Spirit, we will mention, you know that a brother said he was trying to keep the yunti of the body, but he couldn't do that. Of course, that's already kept. What he meant was to give diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit.
There's a great deal of talk among young people today with whom I talk that they they say we must be diligent in keeping the unity of our spirits. That is ecumenism.
Ecumenism. And do you know that the dear Saints in Bolivia have been harassed for months?
By the ecumenical movements, just because they will not have anything to do with it.
150 of those dear brother got together to study the question of recommendation.
00:50:04
And for four days they bashed out the scriptures. I sent them some scriptures from Isaiah, which I'd like to read, but the time has gone. But they wrote over the whole thing, Separation. Separation they would have nothing to do with. I want to tell you to ask you to pray for them. Some pressure is being brought upon them already so that there's difficult to get a position.
And it could come to pass in this favoured land.
With the same ecumenical business, there could be pressure brought upon the Lord's dear people in this land, and our liberties could be curtailed. Here the Lord comes, here the Lord comes together, the divine oneness unto my name, the divine sufficiency. There I am, there am I, the Divine presence in the midst.
The Divine.
Couple.
These truths are put into Spanish. Many years ago you may have read this, of course, I don't know, but it impressed me. This verse, the divine place where the divine testimony two or three.
Are gathered divine separation together.
The Divine Oneness unto my name, the Divine sufficiency. There am I, the Divine Presence in the midst, the Divine company.
The divine center of May the Lord bless these remarks to us. Shall we just sing a brief hymn?
Number 174.
If some brother would stop that 174.