Genesis 1:1 - 25
J.T. One has thought of the idea of beginning. It may sound somewhat cumbersome as a subject, but it will show itself in time. It is in mind that we might have right terminology in our conversations; that the terminology may be intelligible and that the brethren may be on the alert to understand; for much is going abroad that is, to say the least, not clear in the sense of ministry, and the hope is that these meetings will help in the sense of clarity and in the sense of intelligibility as to Scripture; so that there may be freedom from mere novelties, and that we may be able to speak as the Bereans, who would search the Scriptures to see if these things were so. The thought is to carry the idea of the beginning; first as to Genesis 1 -- the beginning of things, the creative side, leaving man out; for the idea of 'things' carries down through the ages and enters into doctrine, constantly added to, but still the basic things are carried through. Then it is thought the second reading should have man in mind, especially seen in Genesis 2; and in later meetings the idea of the beginning in John's gospel and John's epistle. "That which was from the beginning" 1 John 1:1. Other features may open up as we proceed. Man is left out of this our first consideration, and, of course, we would all feel that the subject must be incomplete and it will be incomplete, for we have to learn in part. And so it is thought that we should confine ourselves to the things of creation in this first reading and then in the second reading to bring in the great thought of man, especially in chapter 2. There may be necessary enquiries in order to indicate the completion of the subject, but it is hoped we shall be able
to limit ourselves to the passage read. As already said, we learn in part and there can be no doubt that God has this in mind in these readings; the remarkable interest there is among the brethren as to the Scriptures and scriptural subjects, and how we are able to go on with these readings and increase our learning, for the great intent is to learn. Learn something, whatever it may be, for our gain on each occasion. Learn in part, but learn. And so we have to consider the chaotic condition that is indicated in verses 1 and 2 of this chapter and see how light came in. "But all things having their true character exposed by the light are made manifest", Ephesians 5:13. The first day, therefore, has to be considered as clarifying the whole position.
S.McC. Is it necessary to go back to the beginnings in order to get clear in our minds as to things? The Lord said in the gospels regarding a particular matter that came up with the Pharisees: "but from the beginning it was not thus", Matthew 19:8.
J.T. Well, I think that is good; and what has to be added is that the beginning is not an inscrutable matter. A beginning in itself is not an inscrutable matter. Certainly the beginning of things is not inscrutable, and so we have to consider what is in mind in verses 1 and 2. These first verses are inscrutable. They contemplate, of course, what God made. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth was waste and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters". So that before we reach our brother's suggestion we have to touch a little on the inscrutable. The beginning in itself is not inscrutable, but God is. But when we come to the New Testament it will become more apparent that the beginning here is left. We cannot enter much on it, because it is left in chaos. Therefore, we have to seek to bring God
into it, and see how in coming in He sheds light, and how the idea of beginnings is there and it must enter into all the created things; they became enlarged obviously as time went on, but we have to begin with the roots of things and see how they work out in the doctrine and ultimately in the doctrine of christianity.
A.R. Why does John start his gospel as Genesis 1 "In the beginning"?
J.T. There is a very great difference in the phraseology. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth", whereas in John it is, "In the beginning was the Word". It is inscrutable and infinite, and of course, better left until we come to it properly. But we can see the great difference between the two passages in that in John 1 it is a Person of the Deity. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God". But now we are dealing with things; that is to say, God's creation of the heavens and the earth, and that chaos had come in; therefore the need for the introduction of the positive side. Verses 1 and 2 leave us in a chaotic condition.
S.McC. In relation to what has been said as to inscrutability entering into these earlier verses, do you have that in mind in relation to God in His personal existence or in relation to things? In what way are you referring to inscrutability in these opening verses?
J.T. Just in the sense that God is alluded to. The footnote to the word "God" reads '(Elohim, the plural of Eloah, the Supreme. It is Deity, God in the absolute. When other divine names, except Jehovah and Jah, are used, they will be indicated)'. And then we have indications of the terms. But we are just left here with the simple thought of God, but we are not to rest upon that. It immediately carries on in the rest of the chapter to the thought of what He
does, what He created. And thus we come to material things, and they are not inscrutable; they are knowable.
S.W.P. Would the word in the book of Job help us in connection with this question? "Hearken unto this, Job; stand still and discern the wondrous works of God". And then later on in the chapter: "The Almighty, we cannot find him out", Job 37:14,23.
J.T. Well, it helps as to what happened in the years that followed what is here.
S.W.P. "The Almighty" not being found out would be inscrutability, but the works of God are what is seen?
J.T. That would involve a further period of time. That is to say, the knowledge of God came into being, and people had been learning. I believe that Enoch is the first one to indicate to us that the learning time had come; and of course, Job lived many years after. The flood intervenes and much else, and what we get as to Job has to be fitted in there, but not with the first verses, all indicating a period much further on than this first section.
S.J.H. Does Isaiah give the divine intent: "Thus saith God, Jehovah, he that created the heavens and stretched them out, he that spread forth the earth and its productions" Isaiah 42:5, and also, "For thus saith Jehovah who created the heavens, God himself who formed the earth and made it, he who established it, -- not as waste did he create it: he formed it to be inhabited" Isaiah 45:18. Is that the intent of God?
J.T. Quite. Much had intervened and the prophets come into that. Moses comes into it and others. The time of learning had come. Men were not slow; there were some who learned, but many did not. Enoch did. No doubt he represents persons able to learn.
A.N.W. Is the use of the word 'supreme' in a way relative and should we realise that the absolute Person is behind that appellation?
J.T. Quite; the Supreme must be supreme to something. It is a relative term, but even 'God' is to be regarded as relative in a certain sense. At the same time, the idea of relativeness and abstract must be understood if we are to get anything out of our enquiry. God Himself is not relative to anyone or anything. He is abstract; He is entitled to be that; whereas as soon as He creates or has things to be in relation to, then He is relative.
S.McC. In the note Mr. Darby points out: '(It is Deity, God in the absolute)'. Is the use of the word 'absolute' there the same as you have used in recent times in referring to absoluteness in relation to God?
J.T. I do not think so. The word 'absolute' is abstract really. He is absolute to something. I mean, the reference is that; it is the Absolute to something. I do not remember that I ever used the word as we now use it in recent times. We have to get the idea into our souls of God "... dwelling in unapproachable light; whom no man has seen, nor is able to see", 1 Timothy 6:16. We have to learn to use these words and in some sense understand their application, and thus the idea of relativity in each as in touch with everything.
A.B.P. The introduction into Scripture of the great thought of inscrutability in the Deity is to rouse our hearts in worship in view of all that has been done.
J.T. Quite so; in the sense in which we are able to take it on. God begins with us in great patience. We have just seen that He leaves out the idea of naming certain things, especially Satan. The time will come when it is brought in in fulness.
A.B. Is there something in the fact that the word
'created' is only in verse 1? It comes in again in relation to the sea monsters; after that we get the word 'made'. Is there something in that for us?
J.T. There is; the word as to what God blesses comes under that heading. He blesses the fishes and the fowls which would indicate that He is in relation to life, even in the creation. That is, sea monsters, fishes and fowls and the like -- He is in relation to that. They are something He is pleased with and something that He blesses. In verse 22 we get it for the first time: "God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply on the earth". Now the thought arises there as to what became of the fish, and yet they have a great place in the instructive part of Scripture. They are not especially mentioned in regard of the flood, and yet they went through. There must have been something in the mind of God in regard of them in view of the flood. They would be carried through because they have a great place in the Scripture later.
C.H.H. What is the difference between God known in the absolute and in the abstract?
J.T. Well, the word 'absolute' has a meaning, of course, which involves relativity, but 'abstract' does not. The word 'abstract' is simply that He is not in relation to anything but Himself. 'Absolute' and 'abstract' have not just the same significance. The idea of absoluteness comes into relativity. If absolute, it is absolute in relation to something.
Now coming back to these six days, which are our subject, leaving the chaotic conditions which we are entitled to do -- God would not detain us, although He touches it in the prophets, but what He leads us to immediately is light. "And God said, Let there be light. And there was light. And God saw the light that it was good; and God divided between the light and the darkness. And God called the light Day,
and the darkness he called Night". So now we are in a position to speak of the darkness around us and the need to keep clear of it and live in positive things in the realm of light; not spreading out too much but confining ourselves as Scripture does, to the beginning, the idea of light.
S.W.P. Is there a difference between this light and the lights as in verse 14 and the great lights in verse 16?
J.T. The idea of light is what we have just read. "And God said, Let there be light". In later references, we come down to things called lights, but the truth is the word as light appears. We do well to stop with the first day and see how far we can go; see how far we can accustom ourselves in dealing with things that refer to it in a limited way; learn to be limited when necessary. We are not to spread out when it is not necessary.
J.H. In your prayer you spoke of the lack of clarity in what is ministered, giving the clue to what you had in mind in this scripture. Have you in mind that each of these days has a feature that might well characterise the ministry?
J.T. Well, quite so. We are to learn to limit ourselves to any given time or thing; just limit ourselves and not be extravagant in speaking of it. We often become extravagant and lose the full sense of it. It becomes too big, bigger than it was intended to be. We are to learn to limit ourselves.
R.H. Is that why the beginning and introduction of evil is not dealt with here?
J.T. God does not plunge us into evil. He does not even name Satan. If we were teaching children we would be simple about it and begin with good things, positive things, lovely things: "whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are noble, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are amiable, whatsoever things are
of good report; ... think on these things", Philippians 4:8. Certain things we can think of restfully.
C.A.M. The darkness and waste is mentioned because we have to approach the great question of light in a relative way.
C.A.M. The question in my mind is the reason this matter of waste and empty and darkness is brought in before we have this great matter of light, and I was asking whether this is because of the way our minds will apprehend light in contrast to darkness.
J.T. We are not able to. It is the infinite side of things, and we are not required to dip into things beyond us. The time will come for dealing with them profitably, and we then will not be damaged by them. These things are just left and immediately we proceed to what is positive. "And God said, Let there be light. And there was light". We have already alluded to it: "And the earth was waste and empty, and darkness was on the face of the deep". Well, we cannot say much; the best way is to leave that. The Spirit of God says, "And God said, Let there be light. And there was light". We are in a wonderful realm in the word 'light'. He is not using lights but light. The word in the plural is used later, but not yet. We have to learn to rest in light; so the word in John's epistle is: "But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another", 1 John 1:7.
C.H.H. I was thinking of the term in Timothy: "unapproachable light" -- that would not connect with Genesis 1.
C.H.H. Do we distinguish between created light and uncreated light?
J.T. We are coming to a difficult point, because the origin of light is God. Therefore, it is difficult to use the word 'uncreated' in that sense; although it
is used. God is light; that is a cardinal truth. We cannot limit that to any creation; it is God.
J.W.W. Would you link faith with light? "By faith we apprehend that the worlds were framed by the word of God", Hebrews 11:3.
J.T. Yes, I would. That leads into more than we are seeking at the moment. I allude to Romans 10 to clarify that point. We are now dealing with faith, the relation between light and faith. "So faith then is by a report, but the report by God's word", Romans 10:17. We ought to come back to what was said as to the relation between light and faith.
J.W.W. I wondered if the principle of faith would be the light of God coming into the soul, so we could lay hold in a simple way, receiving what God has set out in His word. Is that right?
J.T. That is just what is said here. Faith comes by a report. Many of us may have in our minds that it is the act of God. Faith is the sovereign action of God; something is done by God sovereignly. So faith is there, it has to be there in the soul. But we are now linking on the word. That is one of the things instrumentally that God has in dealing with all these matters in creation. He has the instrumentality of dealing with them, and the instrumentality is the word, His word. And so in these verses we have read, "But they have not all obeyed the glad tidings. For Esaias says, Lord, who has believed our report?" Romans 10:16. That is, Israel -- what Isaiah says of them. And then the apostle goes on: "So faith then is by a report, but the report by God's word". So that we have to think about these scriptures, both by Paul and by Isaiah and then in the scripture before us, where God comes into it. God says here. We have that in verse 3: "And God said, Let there be light, And there was light". God says something and when He says something there is light; something has happened.
R.H. According to 2 Corinthians 4:6 there is the added thought of God shining. "Because it is the God who spoke that out of darkness light should shine who has shone in our hearts for the shining forth of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ".
J.T. Quite; that is an allusion to this very passage. But we are speaking now of the idea of faith, and what part light has in it. It would seem as if before we can have things from God, that His word must have an entry. And He says something here: "Let there be light". Let us confine ourselves to what is here. We are dealing with the first day, and it is a question of light and it comes in by the word of God.
S.McC. The idea of 'the word' introduces the moral side in connection with us in that way. While faith is the sovereign gift of God, the idea of 'the word' introduces the moral side in relation to us.
J.T. That is good. In the gospel service we have to bear that in mind, but we want to bring God in in our dealings with men. Men are in darkness; we are dealing with a dark situation. We must bring God in; and if God is coming in, it must be by His word.
A.N.W. The report is one thing, but God's word behind it is another.
E.G.McA. Does not this first chapter occupy us with God rather than what the different words mean? "God said, Let there be light". It is God we are occupied with.
J.T. That is the marvellous side of it; that in gospel service or any service we are in, we are to avoid novelties and bring God in; say something about God and bring Him into this. We have it here: "God said", so that we have God coming in.
N.B. Do we not have to distinguish between the
physical light, if it is correct to use such a term in connection with this scripture, and the moral light of God in our souls? In John it says, "God is light" and here, God saw the light.
J.T. The two things are combined as someone has said in 2 Corinthians 4:6. This chapter combines the two. This very passage is spoken of in that verse, and that is the moral side; "... who has shone in our hearts for the shining forth of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ". We come down to the moral side -- the most beautiful side of things -- in the face of Jesus Christ.
J.K.P. Does the apostle bring this before the saints at Corinth in the opening of the epistle -- the thoughts of God as to them? But they are just mentioned; they are not opened up yet. The state was not there for it.
J.T. The state of things at Corinth was not such as could be opened up to. The apostle is dealing with state as to overcoming it; but then the state is not absolutely dark at Corinth; it is simply poor light, poor shining, for there was some light there. And that is how things are now in Christendom; there is some light, but it is becoming increasingly dark and the question is, therefore, how to get God in. The question now is whether we can go on and not stay too long on one day, because we have six to deal with.
F.N.W. Is it significant that God Himself calls light Day and darkness Night?
J.T. He did it Himself. There is no one else there at the time. Later Adam does it and God delights in that. We have come to Adam saying things. God is Creator and loves to see His creatures, what they are and what may come out in them. And so we have to confine ourselves to one thought; that is, God. The second day refers to the expanse. We have to content ourselves with a little bit of one
thing, but it will give us some light as to the next thing, and the next thing is the expanse connected with the beginning, too; the opening up and widening out, and yet not much said as to that. God is not pleased with it; He is not saying much as to it. But it has an interesting side. The exclusion of Satan and anything of his doing is remarkable.
J.H. What is in mind as to this dividing on the first day?
J.T. It comes out on the first and second day. It is an element we need all the time. We need to divide things. So Timothy says, "... cutting in a straight line the word of truth", 2 Timothy 2:15, putting things where they belong, but especially dividing light from darkness. If we have to do with mixed marriages, then we have to deal with such matters and put things in their place.
E.A.L. Would this dividing between the waters be like the dividing between spiritual wickedness and what is of God in the spiritual sense? I was thinking of Ephesians 6"our struggle ... against spiritual power of wickedness in the heavenlies". There is a division between that and what is of God.
J.T. Just so. "God saw the light that it was good"; as if He rests in that for the moment. "And God divided between the light and the darkness". That is, God is saying it must be so. These two things must be; but we must make much of light and very little of darkness. "And God divided between the light and the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night". He gives a name to it. So that we will have to use it later in dealing with divine things, when dealing with darkness and light. We are just, so to say, getting a clear retrospect of the whole matter; so that when the Lord takes up the man twice it says that "he saw all things clearly". We are dealing with things now. And we want all to see, so that we
see matters with good sight, so that we can trust what we see. If we have not got good sight we cannot be trusted.
J.B. Does God use Abraham in regard to that in Genesis 15? He knows what to do in reference to the sacrifice -- certain things are divided and others are not.
J.T. It is really the understanding of the matter in Genesis 15, meaning that we have now arrived at the time of the subjective order of things. Abraham arrives at that time, the time when God can speak of things subjectively. So God leaves these things to him. It is a matter of taking certain things which he is told to take, but then he does things without being told, meaning that he is learning. Genesis 15 is the first time we get the idea of the word of God. It would take a whole meeting to go into that. We can just pause for a moment at that side and then go on to something more. We have to go back to the second day and see what it means, what the matter of the expanse means; what a wide idea it is.
J.McK. Does the idea of the expanse suggest a sphere in which God will operate for the bringing in of all these things He is speaking of in view of learning of Himself?
J.T. I would say so; you need everything if you are to get a true perspective. We get the description of everything in these six days, the divine thought, and we must hasten on to get them all.
A.R. Does the second day involve our eyes -- how far can we see?
R.R.T. This matter of divisions coming in so early with God too, would be a great matter in our lives, as to how we can divide between matters in our local settings; divide between this and that in administrative matters.
J.T. Almost every locality has these problems.
Almost every locality has some kind of problem that it cannot get over, and perhaps the difficulty is we do not see all things in relation to it. So here the man whose eyes the Lord opened saw all things clearly. It is a matter of clarifying things. It may be we are hindered because we do not take in everything entering into the thing.
L.E.S. "But when he is come, the Spirit of truth, he shall guide you into all the truth", John 16:13.
J.T. Just so -- all the truth. Very beautiful. The Spirit of God is here and we may be looking for a clarification of everything now as in view of the Lord's coming.
W.L. Each day is a new beginning, you may say. In that way, is it intended to have a moral effect upon us?
J.T. It is. You feel the need of the moral side all the time. So it is we begin with the first day of the week and how much comes up on the Monday and Tuesday. And so now we come to the second day. We have already made a point as to certain things being left out. "And God said, Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it be a division between waters and waters. And God made the expanse, and divided between the waters that are under the expanse and the waters that are above the expanse; and it was so. And God called the expanse Heavens". He did not wait for Adam to come and name it, but He Himself does this, and then it says, "And there was evening, and there was morning -- a second day". Let us see what is left out.
Rem. He does not say 'Good' of the second day. It is the only day of which it is not said.
J.T. God does not call it good. We have to search; there is not time to search now, but one of these days is not called 'Good'. Of others God remarks that they are good. Why is this one omitted?
C.A.M. I think you have said God waited until He put the sun there, referring to the greatness of Christ?
J.T. I would say that; the fourth day settles the matter. It is a question of Christ in the heavens. God has made Him both Lord and Christ. That clarifies so much; everything must come down from Him because He is in the position of administration.
R.W.S. There is no suggestion of the expanse in verse 1. Is this verse something added to that? "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth". Now there is a division between waters and waters. "God made the expanse, and divided between the waters that are under the expanse and the waters that are above the expanse". Is that not an additional thought as to what was in the beginning in verse 1?
J.T. There is a great deal in that fact because of the place water has in the second day. We know how essential water is to us. Presently there may be no such need, as we are conscious of love. What would we do without water? The quantity God has placed on the earth. He can take it up by a certain means He has in His own hand. You do not see how God does that. And it comes down again; and in coming down it expresses His goodness to man. What would we do without rain? So we have the incident as to Ahab -- how the heavens were shut up for three years and six months and then again opened too. God has a means in this second day of telling us of His goodness.
C.H.H. In the book of Job it says God reserves the rain for mercy and discipline. That would be the waters above the expanse.
J.T. Job gives us a lot of help on those points.
R.R.T. However good the waters may be, to get the gain of it we have God coming in and dividing
them. Is it in the division that we come into the gain of it?
J.T. It is in the blessing of the thing that we get the good, because rain does come down undoubtedly. We can see the Lord is helping, as He will help as to terminology in the ministry, that we know what to say and how to say right things.
A.B. Would these days be in the mind of Elihu when he rebukes Job and his friends? "Let days speak, and multitude of years teach wisdom", Job 32:7. He takes them back to the beginning in relation to God.
J.T. That is to say, it is connected with men of experience and what advantage they are to us. And that is what Elihu made much of. He recognises the old men, but they had to listen to a young man, too, and they did.
W.McK. In relation to terminology, would you say why God names all the creations of the first three days, and then after that leaves Adam to name? God sets an example, would you say, and the animals' and fowls' names are left to Adam?
J.T. That is very good. I am glad you mentioned that. There will be an enlargement of it in chapter 2, because we come to Adam in chapter 2, Adam active. Now we are dealing with God active in these three days. This matter of the expanse we can just leave. We see how necessary it is; and we have to ponder upon things in a creative sense, and see how important this day is in the government of God. It seems to be an additional thought to the first verse: this word 'expanse', the dividing of the waters, seems to be an additional thought. And we can see how useful it is in the use of the waters, and what God can do with it in the expanse. And then it goes on to the waters under the heavens. We have touched that already. "And God said, Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together to one place, and let the dry land appear. And it was so. And God called the dry land
Earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called Seas. And God saw that it was good. And God said, Let the earth cause grass to spring up, herb producing seed, fruit-trees yielding fruit after their kind, the seed of which is in them, on the earth. And it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, herb producing seed after its kind, and trees yielding fruit, the seed of which is in them, after their kind. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening, and there was morning -- a third day". Now we come to the operations of God in the sense of producing food and all else in the sense of vegetable life.
J.W.W. Is Paul's speaking at Athens to correct their terminology? They had an idol to the unknown God, and Paul in his witness brings home the first part of Genesis to their minds.
J.T. He does more than that. He brought the gospel into it, but in a limited way.
W.L. Does verse 12 suggest response to the word of God? "And the earth brought forth ...".
A.N.W. If the heavens in verse 8 are further than the heavens in verse 1, would the earth in verse 10 be an advance on the earth in the first verse? "And God called the dry land Earth".
J.T. Possibly. There is an increase in the new thing because it is a made-over thing. We have to bear in mind that verse 3 begins with something that had an existence before in some sense and is now being remade. The expanse is a new thought. God has certain operational things in His mind. "And God called the dry land Earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called Seas". We are in the presence of creation. The Spirit of God called it a creation. It is not the idea of made or remade; it was creation; although it was remade. We may as well view it as a creation and we have to see the
difference in it and see something that was not there in the beginning. So the thought of grass, the beautiful thought seen in the New Testament, too; "God said, Let the earth cause grass to spring up, herb producing seed, fruit-trees yielding fruit after their kind, the seed of which is in them, on the earth". And so now we are in the presence of life, life coming forth yielding what is needed among men; it is given to man for food.
H.B. What is the force of the use of the word 'cause'?
J.T. The earth is able to do something. We are touching the idea of life in a limited way; life in a vegetable sense, and there is power in it. You could split a rock with the power that is in it, showing the idea of power in creation comes into the earth in this sense and God can use it beneficially but He may use it harmfully, too.
C.H.H. Hebrews 6 speaks of the earth which receives the rain and brings forth food. That would be beneficial. I was wondering if that would not bring in creation in a harmful way when it says if it does not bring forth fruit it is nigh to a curse.
J.T. All that enters into what we are saying. We are to lay ourselves open for great things, to be opened up to us, but we have not time to go into it. We have three days and only three hours each day and much has to be done; so it is a question of what God can do.
J.H. We have the features of power and freshness and variety seen in life in its simplest sense.
J.T. We are dealing with much that is necessary to us every day of our lives; these things that are going on in the earth, and then we come to the lights. What wonderful things open up to us. In verse 14 it is a question of light. That is what God is. That is, the main thing is settled, you might say, in these three days. And then these lights are additional,
going over the ground again, so to say. And then the fishes in the fifth day and the cattle on the sixth day. We must just limit ourselves to the time we have. We have to go over all this in these three days and this is what we have to deal with, so we have to go on, and we have to see that lights are set in the heavens. Then there are the two great lights which God made. Is not God calling our attention to the beautification of things and how illumination comes into it? He is the Father of lights, James says; not of light, but lights, as if it is God coming into it and having pleasure in it. There were many lights in the upper chamber.
C.A.M. Does that bring in the family idea? It is not only the ordinances in the heavens.
J.T. Just so; the Father, the Son and the Spirit, all involved.
C.C.T. Is the earth in view in regard of these lights? "And God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens, to divide between the day and the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years; and let them be for lights in the expanse of the heavens, to give light on the earth". Is the earth in view in regard of this?
J.T. Well, indeed. God saw what was needed was this one thing -- light, and not only light, but a variation of lights. And so we have, of course, to think of the position, the heavenly position, and the position on earth and the position in the millennium, too. We have to think of all these things and what lights may be involved in them. Now we have the light of the assembly in relation to the economy and we have to learn to make the most of it.
G.MacPh. Is the idea of new creation set forth; God coming into creation in a new way, so that He may be known?
J.T. What lights we have in the beginning of Genesis! The truth opened up in the sense of light
or lights throughout the years. We have the dispensation involved after the flood and what light was unfolded in that. Then the patriarchal dispensation had much light, and the Mosaic dispensation, and the kingdoms. But nothing has been so clarified before. So that how rich the field is for us. How God is opening it up as we are restful and waiting upon Him. "The Lord will give thee understanding in all things", 2 Timothy 2:7. So in Luke 24, "He opened their understanding to understand the scriptures". That was in view of this dispensation. He can open our understandings.
J.A.P. Would the assembly come into the fourth day?
J.T. I would think that is so, for the assembly is seen in these lights -- the disposition of God in causing light to shine. The assembly, of course, is being reserved in the counsels of God for a long time, but now it has been disclosed according to Romans. When that is out, everything else is out. We have to get the truth of the assembly to get the whole truth. The whole truth as to the millennium and the eternal state is out when you get the truth of the assembly.
S.McC. So in 1 Corinthians 10 Paul is writing to the saints "upon whom the ends of the ages are come". I suppose every era or epoch really has a reflective bearing on the assembly in that way?
J.T. Quite so. What thoughts are there; how we have the key for the unfolding of the truth; the key of knowledge. You can go back and open the storehouses and David comes in in that way in his ministry with the number twenty-four to show how things are dispensed departmentally, and so God comes in so that we might learn how to come into it, and He opens our understanding to understand the things that are in that store.
C.H.H. Would the psalmist have that in mind when he says in Psalm 19, "The heavens declare the
glory of God". The assembly does more than declare it; she has it in Revelation 21. She comes down as having the glory of God.
J.T. "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the expanse sheweth the work of his hands", Psalm 19:1. What did you have in mind?
C.H.H. The glory attached to the assembly.
J.T. We come back to the assembly actually in the heavens now, because Ephesians contemplates that we are made to sit down in the heavenlies in Christ. We can go back and see what Psalm 19 discloses as to the heavens. The Lord Jesus is seen there as a Bridegroom going forth from His chamber and rejoicing as a strong man to run a race. We can see the beauty of all this because we have the key of knowledge and we can open the Scriptures.
A.H.P. How do you understand the stars here? We have three subdivisions, sun, moon and stars.
J.T. He makes the stars also. That brings ourselves in. "They that are wise shall shine as the brightness of the expanse; and they that turn the many to righteousness as the stars, for ever and ever", Daniel 12:3. "Star differs from star in glory", 1 Corinthians 15:41. The individual saints are in view, I believe, especially at the time before the Reformation and immediately after it. There may have been the darkest period and yet there were luminaries, stars to be seen.
S.J.H. In Philippians it says, "... among whom ye appear as lights in the world", Philippians 2:15.
J.T. The Philippians were up to it collectively.
J.W.W. The stars shine in the night. Would they be as the two witnesses in Revelation 11?
J.T. Just so. The whole of John's ministry opens this up, making way for individuals, for power in individuals, for light working in individuals. I believe the whole period right on from the Reformation is in mind, and light in the earth would seem
to be in mind. We are not left without some light.
C.H.H. "For star differs from star in glory", 1 Corinthians 15:41. That would refer to personalities, whereas the heavens declaring the glory of God would refer to what is collective?
J.T. That is good. "For star differs from star in glory". That is an individual thought.
R.R.T. Is the thought that rule is not so definitely connected with the stars. "And God made the two great lights, the great light to rule the day, and the small light to rule the night -- and the stars". That is, the matter of rule is emphasised with the great and the small light and then there are the stars.
J.T. And therefore with Paul in the shipwreck, the stars did not appear. And they had a terrible time; no light at all to navigate by.
S.J.H. Would this bring in the principle of authority in relation to Christ and the assembly and the gifts?
J.T. I would think so. The stars afford something in the way of guidance. They are a feature in the great system of truth; something to go by, to navigate by, because Paul comes in in that sense. I do not know much of the idea of navigation, but I can see the stars must be of great value, for even when there is no sun or moon displayed, when he sees the stars the navigator can tell where he is. He has some idea of regulation, of the depth of the water, and so on. All these things have to be in mind as they help us to understand what is here, and what is to come later on.
C.H.H. All forms part of His universal testimony to all men.
Ques. Are all these exercises in view of clarity in such matters as these? God, as reference has been made, did not create the world in one day; He took six days. We deal with each matter promptly as it comes up in our local gatherings. Is that right?
J.T. Well, yes; we learn in part as to how we use method. 1 Timothy helps us as to the younger men, how to learn, how to learn to divide up the Scripture; because there is an order in the writing of Scripture. We read, "Every scripture is divinely inspired, and profitable for teaching, for conviction, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be complete, fully fitted to every good work", 2 Timothy 3:16, 17. Well, that is the principle; to learn in part things as they come; not all things at once, but to try and take the days as they come and use them rightly.
H.B. Is that why the apostle uses the word, 'outline'?
J.T. "Have an outline of sound words", 2 Timothy 1:10. Not all I hear, but sound words.
F.N.W. Is 'sound words' in mind in the expression 'after its kind', and 'after their kind'?
J.T. Yes; you can tell what kind people are; what is their real origin, and judge relatively. That is to say, you can go back in their histories, tribal histories. God has granted that idea in the way of what comprises humanity divided up in tribes. Some tribes are not affected by the truth; and you can tell what they are by what is said of them.
D.Macd. Sound words would be plain speaking. Sometimes statements have a double meaning. Sound words would not.
J.T. Just so. They are wholesome. Whatever a man says you are not puzzled by it. If there is light in it you would not be puzzled.
E.T.P. Would the outline of sound words suggest the need of a pattern as David gave to Solomon?
J.T. Just so, as in any leading man God has raised up from the beginning. He has raised up certain in the sense of leading men of God, and that comes down to our day. "Remember your leaders who have spoken to you the word of God", Hebrews 13:7
Then we are exhorted to consider what they say. This is a very important matter, to consider men God has used. Even if they are gone. Thank God their writings remain and we consider them. So the sound words would come to light in these men; those marked by sound words that you can go by; you can trust them.
S.McC. In Acts 20 Paul reaches the climax of his ministry in relation to his service at Ephesus, and it says, "there were many lights in the upper room". The chapter would show the leading place Paul had in relation to the ministry in all that succeeds.
J.T. There were seven of them mentioned. They were in his company; that is, characteristically representing the work of Paul; and their names are given, and among them is a Berean. You might wonder why it says that; it is the word Scripture has for that kind; the kind of man needed at all times.
S.McC. Is it important in the matter of the dispersion of light there should not be division amongst us but co-ordination, as the stars in relation to the leading lights in the system of Genesis 1? These lights are in relation to Paul in Acts 20. There were many lights. Is that in regard of the dispersion of light in the ministry? I was thinking how the enemy would work on the line of divergence even in regard to the dispersion of light.
J.T. We should all think the same thing, the Spirit of God having His way with each. If you follow the facts, you can see He has a way with Him, taking up things and certain persons at certain times, and they have certain characteristics, and these characteristics are guides for us. So that if they have an established character we do well to bear that in mind, and not to ignore it altogether, and not to say so-and-so has too much prominence. Let us see what is there and what the history is. So that what we
have is deepened according to the Spirit of God in each. Let us see what each one is in His mind.
A.H.P. "Canst thou fasten the bands of the Pleiades, or loosen the cords of Orion"? Job 38:31. Could we view ministry that is from God in that light?
J.T. We cannot bind it, but we are glad it is there. These things cannot be limited. They are there. So you are thinking of the sweet influences among the brethren. They will not mislead you.
Genesis 2:4 - 25
J.T. As indicated already the thought is to look into chapter 2 in Genesis this afternoon. While we touched on the sixth day at our earlier reading, we did not complete the details. We ran on to the end of chapter 1. Indeed, the whole matter of the creation runs on from chapter 1 to the end of verse 3 of chapter 2, and then the second contemplates a new title taken on by God; a dual title really, the Lord God, Jehovah Elohim; meaning He had entered into special covenant relation with man. It is thought now that we should touch on the further part of the sixth day and then enter definitely on chapter 2 in which the covenant relation which God had taken on with man was contemplated. Chapter 1:26 reads, "And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heavens, and over the cattle, and over the whole earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth on the earth. And God created Man in his image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them". Another thing is to be noted: that word for 'man' in verse 26 is somewhat altered; in verse 27 it signifies the Adam, the man. That is to say, that great creature had taken on definiteness in title. Thus we can understand chapter 2 which properly begins with verse 4 in which we have the word called 'history'. "These are the histories of the heavens and the earth, when they were created, in the day that Jehovah Elohim made earth and heavens". That is to say, the earth is taken up definitely as a creation and having a history. The word 'history' signifies origin, so that we are now
introduced into more definiteness and more detail in the word 'origin' or 'history' of the heavens and the earth. It is hoped that we shall, with this in view, see more clearly what the creation of man signified and how it works out into knowledge, as we might expect; that God would introduce the idea of knowledge, especially in connection with man. The hope is now that we shall reach something as to knowledge. Men and women are to dwell with each other according to knowledge, according to what God has revealed as to the race.
C.H.H. In addition to the term 'create' we get the thought of being made and formed and built. Would the last three express skill?
J.T. I should think so; especially when you have the word 'built', pointing to the assembly itself.
S.McC. When you refer to God entering into covenant relation with man, just what is implied in that remark?
J.T. The word 'Jehovah' added to the word 'Elohim'. We noted already this morning that word for God. Chapter 1 commences with, "In the beginning God", the word is 'Elohim', meaning power, and the note says, 'Elohim, the plural of Eloah',the Supreme'. It is Deity in the absolute sense'. That is the primary thought, the creative thought really; the word denoting God in His relations with creation. But then the word 'Jehovah' is a covenant word and is drawn back, we might say, in the history from Exodus to introduce it in the beginning of Genesis so as to connect the thought of relation, of covenant relationship with man. It is dwelt on at length at the beginning of Exodus.
R.R.T. Would that illustrate what you were saying this morning, that God speaks of things in part to be taken up later -- the word 'Jehovah' being brought in here, but to be enlarged upon later?
A.N.W. Do you have any idea as to what was in Mr. Darby's mind in saying Jehovah Elohim and not Jehovah God?
J.T. It would be to bring us as near as possible to the origin, which is power. It is the plural of power, I understand. 'Eloah' would involve power. 'Jehovah' added to that would be to strengthen our minds in the whole matter, make men out of us. Of course, we see how it works out in later days when God takes on Abraham; that is, after the flood. He takes him on and reveals Himself to Abraham in that connection; the everlasting God. But then there was a further thought that He did not enlarge on until we come to Moses and that is Jehovah.
R.W.S. Has God still to say He waited a long time until man was brought on the scene? I understand from ministry, man is the most recent of the creations. Does that bear on God's affections entering into covenant relation with him as creating and forming him? All the years that geologists wish to bring in may be brought in between verses 1 and 2 of chapter 1, so that as you say, man is of a recent creation.
J.T. Quite; recent from the standpoint of verses 1 and 2. Indeed, we cannot say as to how long the time was. Geologists guess it. We cannot just be sure whether they know themselves but we do know that man is relatively a recent creation and it is in connection with him that the whole matter stands. And so as we remarked the article being placed before man is to call our attention to what he became in the mind of God, and the dignity attached to him; the man.
A.N.W. Verse 31 confirms what you say. While on almost every day the comment is made, it is good, on the sixth day when man was set there it says, "And God saw everything that he had made, and behold it was very good".
R.H. Does the expression used in Peter's epistle -- "a faithful Creator" bear on this appeal of God's covenant with man?
J.T. That fits in with Peter's line of truth; the government of God.
A.P.T. Paul seems to have the idea in his mind in speaking in Acts 17. He has the whole thought of God in his mind.
J.T. We touched on that this morning and I think it is quite in order now that we should introduce it into our inquiry.
A.P.T. I was thinking of verse 23, "To the unknown God", and then, "The God who has made the world and all things which are in it, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, nor is served by men's hands, as needing something, himself giving to all life and breath and all things; and has made of one blood every nation of men to dwell upon the whole face of the earth, having determined ordained times and the boundaries of their dwelling, that they may seek God".
J.T. That helps in what was meant. It is a remarkable address by Paul at Athens. It enters into what we are saying -- the place man has; the remarkable intelligence that presently shines out in him according to chapter 2. And so we have added certain thoughts in chapter 2 that we should not overlook, what was properly left out this morning, and that is the seventh day in chapter 2; and God blessed it. It is said, "And God had finished on the seventh day his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and hallowed it, because that on it he rested from all his work which God had created in making it". It is further enlarged on in Exodus 31. God was refreshed on the seventh
day; one of the most remarkable facts we get. According to the written page it is not said He was refreshed in Genesis; it is said in Exodus and it throws light on the whole position as to the advance that had been made and is, indeed, constantly being made -- the advance in the relations of God with His creature.
Rem. Would man as having been created on the sixth day be the crown of God's creation? He had rest on the seventh day. It would be complete in that man was created.
J.T. Quite so. He rested on the seventh day. He blessed it and rested on it so as to bring the thing itself out; not the person but the thing. The word, 'day' being blessed is remarkable and no doubt leads up to what we have now; the first day of the week. But the seventh day was blessed and God had been refreshed on it to bring out the progress which was being made in God's relations with His creature. Not so much with His creature man but with the whole position, the whole creation.
C.C.T. Would you say this seventh day stands out by itself more than the other six? God had something for His own pleasure.
J.T. It does. He rested on it and was refreshed on it. It brings down in a touching way what God can be to us; how simple He can be with us and how He would set us in liberty with Himself. When we come to Exodus we come to the time of naming things officially and there is a responsibility attaching to the things.
J.T.Jr. Enoch being the seventh from Adam would be suggestive of what God found in him -- refreshment, coming out also in Noah?
J.T. It might enter into it. Of course, Enoch was not there when the seventh day was blessed but still God was looking at things from His own standpoint and Enoch would come into His mind undoubtedly,
because it was a question of the acquirement of knowledge -- the knowledge of God and the relationship with Him. We, therefore, now must touch on the renewed or added thoughts as to creation in chapter 2. Verse 4 says, "These are the histories of the heavens and the earth, when they were created, in the day that Jehovah Elohim made earth and heavens, and every shrub of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew; for Jehovah Elohim had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground". So that we have certain negatives here in order to bring out positives and clarity. We have things mentioned here that have no existence at all except an abstract existence. That is to say, it is said, "and every shrub of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew". So that we have abstract thoughts here of a peculiar character and they are something we are to learn to use in dealing with the things of God. We have to learn to use them. We get a special allusion to them in Psalm 139; a special allusion to the assembly only in an abstract sense. That is to say, before it was really formed, it was there in the divine mind.
J.H. It says in Romans 4 that Abraham believed in the God "who quickens the dead, and calls the things which be not as being". Is that the same idea?
J.T. Just so; so as to clarify what has been said about Psalm 139.
C.H.H. Would not that correspond to verse 27 of chapter 1? "Male and female created he them".
J.T. Quite so, showing how God can speak of things. This passage in Psalm 139 is one of the most striking covering this point.
C.H.H. Would you think according to Psalm 139 that the substance yet unformed would be included in that verse 27 in the making of the man?
J.T. "I will praise thee, for I am fearfully,
wonderfully made. Marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My bones were not hidden from thee when I was made in secret, curiously wrought in the lower parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my unformed substance, and in thy book all my members were written; during many days were they fashioned, when as yet there was none of them. But how precious are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more in number than the sand. When I awake, I am still with thee", Psalm 139:14 - 18. It is remarkable as indicating how the Spirit of God anticipated the assembly in an abstract sense, although it could not be spoken of at all and was not spoken of at all until it was made manifest, as Paul says in the last chapter of the Romans. But at the same time, we are instructed as to how things come out and should be ready for them and should learn how to think abstractly at times because God does it; especially in the first epistle of John.
S.McC. That would be particularly important on Lord's day morning in assembly service, learning to take account of ourselves abstractly so that God might be served according to the desires of His heart.
J.T. I think that is good; especially if the epistles to the Corinthians are in mind, because they deal with the public service of God, the public worship of God, and were it not that we have the abstract thoughts found there it would be difficult to carry on the service of God, because there is so much contrary in fact among the saints at times. As, for instance, in the second letter Paul says he had in readiness to avenge all disobedience when their obedience was fulfilled. He was ready to let matters stand that had to be dealt with until certain other things had happened. And so in the constitution of the assembly he begins the first letter saying, "The assembly of God which is in Corinth". And it runs on for about nine
verses to speak of things that had taken place; that had been actually in Corinth only in an objective sense; not in a concrete sense but in an objective sense. There were certain things that were there and they are contemplated as there and their presence there enables us to carry on the service of God with a good conscience and at liberty. I will just read those verses to the brethren so that they may see how abstract things are there before they are actually in a sense present. In the first letter to Corinth, chapter 1, verse 4, it says, "I thank my God always about you, in respect of the grace of God given to you, in Christ Jesus; that in everything ye have been enriched in him, in all word of doctrine, and all knowledge (according as the testimony of the Christ has been confirmed in you), so that ye come short in no gift, awaiting the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall also confirm you to the end, unimpeachable in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful, by whom ye have been called into the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord". That illustrates what has been said and is to be understood if we are to rightly carry on the service of God freely and happily even although there may be certain things still undealt with.
H.B. Is that confirmed in chapter 5 where he says, "according as ye are unleavened"?
J.T. I was about to refer to that. "Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, according as ye are unleavened", (verse 7). That is abstract.
R.H. Would the apostle have written to Corinth, were not the houses of Chloe and Stephanas setting out the thing representatively?
J.T. You refer to the house of Chloe. Someone had judged the thing, you mean. The position of the assembly is maintained in the sense that someone had a judgment about it.
C.A.M. They would have to break bread week by week viewing the saints in a certain sense in an abstract way.
J.T. That is what we are saying. The epistles enable the saints to carry on the service of God by these abstract thoughts being there, being recognised.
S.P. Is it suggested in the matter of Balaam? God put His word in his mouth twice. It was an abstract word and then the Spirit of God came on him the third time as if God would force the abstract before him.
A.N.W. When it says every herb of the field before it grew, that would have in mind that it would grow.
J.T. God can call things that be not as though they were. The question is whether we have ability to speak in that way and follow the divine mind in what is said.
C.H.H. Would the abstract thought be supported by the Holy Spirit being with them in Galatians? There is no redeeming feature there among the personnel but the Holy Spirit Himself being with them.
J.T. Well, the question is whether we should attribute the abstract to the Spirit alone, or whether as in Galatia and as in Corinth there is some formation there. I doubt that God intends the abstract to go as far as no formation. There is some formation in mind.
C.H.H. "God has sent out the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father", Galatians 4:6. That is different from Romans 8.
J.T. Our hearts are in action. The Spirit is using their hearts. Is that not so?
J.T. It is so, because the Spirit is pleased to use our hearts and that is in measure a concrete fact both
in the statement in Galatians and in the epistle to the Romans.
A.P.T. In 1 Corinthians 6 the apostle says, "but ye have been washed, but ye have been sanctified, but ye have been justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God" (verse 11). Is that the same thing?
J.T. That is it; but the actual fact is stated there. They had been washed, they had been sanctified, but then we have to learn to trust God in His statements and limit the bearing of them.
G.MacPh. While you speak of the abstract thought, do you see the formation of substance in the assembly as being a vessel taken on by God?
J.T. In measure; it is a question of what there is; what God can say. He has His own way of saying things at times that we have to follow. But to come back to our scripture, the actual formation of man is contemplated in chapter 1 and confirmed in chapter 5, but we have to fill out the thoughts from chapter 2; just as in the book of Acts certain things have to be filled out that had not yet taken place in Acts 1 before the Spirit came. It would look as if God wished to have something there that could be called concrete before the Spirit came; something that would be needed to confirm the idea of the presence of the Holy Spirit. And so Peter's remarks or speech, as we may call it, in that chapter, mentions what was needed in view of the provision of another apostle; how it was needed and it came about before the Spirit actually came. And so here, before we have the actual formation of Adam we have the second chapter, as it were, the filling out of the position. The first and third might be carried on and the third might be added to the first. We should not have the concrete thoughts that we have in the second. They are mentioned to bring out the complete position; the position of man. He is formed
first and he is formed before he is breathed into. It is not one action. His formation is one thing and the breathing is another; and then the idea of a real man that God had to say to before there was any woman. So the scarcity was in the feminine at first, and hence chapter 2 brings out the truth, although the first chapter mentions accurately that God created the man and the woman on the sixth day.
A.B.P. It brings out the benign glory of what God is in Himself. The idea of things evolving out of themselves would be refuted by scriptures of this kind. All these things were there and existing in the divine mind and thought before they were placed in certain positions.
J.T. God has His own way and has every right to have His own way, and if He reserves in His mind that the thoughts of the second day should come in, these thoughts do come in and the actual facts take place. Adam was formed out of clay and then breathed into by God before woman is made at all. She is made from different material in a sense, from her husband. He was purely made out of clay. That is the word used. "But a mist went up from the earth, and moistened the whole surface of the ground. And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Man became a living soul". That is what we have before we have woman at all. Then we have the thought of the need of her. The need of her existed and it existed in Adam himself, showing how complete the second chapter makes the whole position.
F.N.W. In the end of verse 4 the order is reversed. It is not heavens and earth, but earth and heavens. Does that follow your line of thought now, as coming from this great range of chapter 1, focussing our attention on the earth and what God has in mind in connection with man in it?
J.T. It is the material used; the environment in
which man is set; what a being he was; what his capabilities were before woman came into view. That is the idea; to seek to be set up in the true knowledge of God so far in what He effected in man before woman came into being.
L.E.S. Would the words of the preacher in Ecclesiastes bear upon this: "one man among a thousand have I found, but a woman among all those have I not found", chapter 7:28?
J.T. I doubt very much that the preacher would allude to what we are dealing with in Genesis 2 in that. I would think he had a moral signification in what he said; what he had found in his experience. He had not found one woman; he had found one man, but he had not found one woman. It was in a moral sense.
L.E.S. I was wondering if the working out of this would be true -- how we really morally arrive at it.
J.T. If you deal with it morally you will have to come down the history, because for the moral side you will have to have the history, and the history that Solomon alludes to is not Genesis 2. It is not the fact of the non-creation of woman; it is that she was not there in that sense. There was none that answered to the mind of God in the feminine sense. That is what Solomon found. But I question whether that would allude in his mind to Genesis 2 because we are dealing now with actual creation; not exactly the moral side at all, but the actual fact of it.
R.W.S. It says in the end of verse 5, "there was no man", and in the end of verse 20, "no help-mate, his like".
J.T. That would be just the fact, the physical fact that there was not one. There was not even an Adam there as to physical fact. But in the passage we are reading now, that is to say verses 6 and 7, the formation has taken place and it could not be said there was no man when Adam was formed and
breathed into; so that I think what is before us now is a question of the marvellous intelligence that comes out immediately as to that man and even entering into his terms as to woman.
S.J.H. When Paul speaks of the offspring of God, would it allude to this breathing in of God? He calls them the offspring of God.
J.T. I think so. Adam is said to be of God in Luke; the son of God in a way. So that what is said later on elsewhere, "we are his offspring" would allude undoubtedly to Genesis 2.
S.J.H. I wondered if the thought of the offspring of God involved the breathing into his nostrils the breath of life, and then Paul speaks of them thinking.
J.T. The thing is whether we should not distinguish between creation and generation. I think we should. We have not come to the idea of generation, and offspring means generation. It is an offspring from a Being, from God; whereas what we are dealing with is not that; it is creation. Adam was created or formed by God, and then breathed into. If we read into it the idea of generation we must bring into it the breathing. The breath of God made him live. So that I think it would be right to bring in the idea of generation on those lines.
A.N.W. While Paul quoted the heathen poet in his preaching, he spoke of the creative side.
J.T. That is important. I think we should learn to have terms in our speaking so that we can all judge what we say to each other. That we are God's offspring is a question of generation, and a question of new birth; not that Adam was born anew, but new birth implies generation. We are born of God; we originate from God; not that a person newly born can be said to be a child of God yet he is very near to it. John goes further than that in his gospel saying, "but as many as received him, to them gave he the right to be children of God", John 1:12.
That is not simply because we are born anew but because we received Christ. That is to say, the full idea of the gospel, and that gives us the right to take the place of the children of God. We belong to that generation: "to those that believe on his name; who have been born, not of blood, nor of flesh's will, nor of man's will, but of God", John 1:13. That is the full thought.
R.R.T. That thought of being born of God in John 1:13 would come later than new birth that we get in chapter 3.
J.T. It would. It is the full thought in John's gospel: what is accredited to believers. That is only touched on now with the thought of having the thing clearly before us as we proceed, because we have very little time left relatively, and we want to get on to the full thought of chapter 2. We have brought in the thought of generation, because I think it is needed to see the full bearing of Adam's creation and his formation, and then the breathing. The breathing gives him the place of being of God.
L.E.S. Would you say a word as to chapter 5, the bearing of the generations? "Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created" (verse 2).
J.T. It is just to complete the history. Chapter 5 resumes the whole matter and links it all with Adam in order to bring out Enoch. Chapter 5 is the resume of what preceded it; so that we might see the place man has. It is just the brief reference to man's place in the day that he was created. "This is the book of Adam's generations. In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made he him. Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created", Genesis 5:1. That sets the whole matter where it should be in the full history in chapter 5.
C.H.H. Would the quotation in 2 Corinthians 5 fit in? "So if anyone be in Christ, there is a new creation" (verse 17).
J.T. It would in the sense of bringing us on to the full thought of new creation. In chapter 5 it is a very full chapter dealing with the subject, only it runs down in the chapter from our physical formation as in our bodies, as raised presently; our house which is from heaven -- our part in that.
A.N.W. In which chapter in Genesis would you place the "of God" in Luke 3? "Adam, of God" (verse 38).
J.T. "And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Man became a living soul" (verse 7). I would say that is where the setting is that Luke contemplates. He traces back the Lord Jesus to man, to Adam; and it is said that Adam was of God. You might say he was son of God in that sense.
A.R. Is that chapter higher than verse 27 of the previous chapter? Verse 27 says God created Man and in chapter 2 it says Jehovah Elohim formed Man. Is that greater than creation?
J.T. Maybe. The word 'creation' is a great word. It is sparingly used in our chapter because it is a very great word. It has an equivalent meaning to being born. They have equivalent meanings only I think the idea of birth is greater, morally greater. It brings us into line with the Lord Jesus, with man in Christ; not that He is born as we are, but "the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father", John 1:18 is the same idea. We are not begotten in that physical sense as He is, yet there is a remarkable link between Him and ourselves. New birth places us in line with Him on the line of generation.
S.McC. It is interesting in that way that we could never speak of Him as being created. It would be blasphemy to do so, but the scripture does speak of
Him as born. "The holy thing also which shall be born", Luke 1:35.
J.T. That helps us as to the need of care in using words. "The holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God", Luke 1:35. We can never be said to be born in that sense.
A.N.W. So that the Son was given, but the Child was born.
J.T. Just so. Now to proceed with our thought, we have to come down. We have spoken of the environment in which Adam was set including the garden, that is, Eden, and going over down to the end of verse 17. Then we have the divine thought, "It is not good that Man should be alone; I will make him a help-mate, his like". That is God's proposal. In verse 20 it is said, "but as for Adam, he found no help-mate, his like". But the narrative proceeds from what God said. So it says, "And out of the ground Jehovah Elohim had formed every animal of the field and all fowl of the heavens, and brought them to Man, to see what he would call them; and whatever Man called each living soul, that was its name. And Man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the heavens, and to every beast of the field; but as for Adam, he found no help-mate, his like". So the position is made very clear for us and I believe it is intended to be intelligible to us to have in our minds in dealing with doctrine later; what pleasure God had in man before the woman was created at all, and that gives force to what the apostle says as to the priority of man. He was not made for the woman but the woman for the man, and the man was made before the woman. All that is to enter into doctrine and our understanding of the truth. So before we have the formation of the woman we have all this said about Adam. What a wonderful creature he was and what pleasure God took in him to see what he would call the different creatures.
A.B.P. Does that help us to understand in a certain sense the idea of the greatness of man? In the world today human life is very cheap. Are we entitled to regard man in this light at this time?
J.T. I think it is right that it should be in our minds what man really is. The cheapness with which human life is held is surely obnoxious to God and it is a question of the saints being with God in these matters and holding the line of the truth against all comers.
G.MacPh. Would man in this connection suggest something of the greatness of Christ as set out in the gospels, and the woman come out in the apostle Paul saying, "I speak as to Christ and as to the assembly", Ephesians 5:32?
J.T. Just so. What man is capable of, because he is a great creature: man is the image of God, Paul says, and we are to be concerned that we do not discredit Him.
Ques. Would Psalm 8 suggest your thought as to man?
J.T. "What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him"? We get that and some other psalms like it, and what we are dealing with now is to get knowledge as to the actual formation that we have in manhood.
A.R. What do you mean as to doctrine?
J.T. Doctrine is doctrine. How often we deal with it and we have to be conversant with the truth; when things come up we know what to say. Young people are listening to us and we should see that they understand what we say. We are now dealing with the general position of doctrine.
C.C.T. Is that why Jehovah Elohim could trust Adam to use intelligence? God could expect him to be intelligent.
J.T. Quite so. You see how beautifully he is presented. The Spirit of God presents him according
to his relative value as a creature, and so you read, "And Jehovah Elohim formed Man, dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Man became a living soul". The word 'Man' being written with a capital refers to the dignified title he has. He became a living soul and that was before Eve was there at all.
Ques. God having to do so intimately with him in this breathing would involve His affections for the first time?
J.T. Very likely; although I would think that God knew well enough what He was making.
A.N.W. So far he is a living soul as the animals were in verse 24. He was a living soul. One was by the word of God and the other by the breath of God.
J.T. God is going back on the thing. We are not lumping all in the first chapter, lumping the sixth day and the animals with man; but the Spirit of God says in Job that God formed the animals with man, but this chapter would tell us God is going back on the facts so that we might have a clearer view. Hence we have intelligence. It is said, "And out of the ground Jehovah Elohim had formed every animal of the field and all fowl of the heavens, and brought them to Man, to see what he would call them". We have not anything like this exactly in chapter 1. We are now going back on the history. God is to impress us with this great creature, so that we might have a right thought of him. He is saying, I would like to hear what Adam would call this creature and that creature. So it says in verse 19, "to see what he would call them; and whatever Man called each living soul, that was its name. And Man gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the heavens, and to every beast of the field; but as for Adam, he found no help-mate, his like". That is the thing that God would now have us rest our minds on. Adam did not
find in all the creatures of the whole realm of cattle or the fowls or any others, anything to suit him. It was a question of Adam's own finding as well as God's. Then we see what happened. Verse 21 says, "And Jehovah Elohim caused a deep sleep to fall upon Man; and he slept. And he took one of his ribs and closed up flesh in its stead. And Jehovah Elohim built the rib that he had taken from Man into a woman; and brought her to Man. And Man said, This time it is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh: this shall be called Woman, because this was taken out of a man. Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And they were both naked, Man and his wife, and were not ashamed" (verses 21 - 25). This is the Spirit of God in verse 24: "Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and cleave to his wife; and they shall become one flesh. And they were both naked, Man and his wife, and were not ashamed". That is the history. Very brief but how full it is, and it is that God would impress us now with the creation of woman in view of the assembly.
A.E.W. Is the greatness of the man one reason why God turns to him in order to find a help-mate? It says, "but as for Adam, he found no help-mate, his like". Then it proceeds to His turning to Adam himself. Does that suggest the greatness of man?
J.T. "And Jehovah Elohim caused a deep sleep to fall upon Man". He is turning now to Man. That is God's resource and He is using it, and now we see what He does in the procedure and what comes out. It is to bring out the intelligence of the man.
C.H.H. Would the idea of finding enter into the thoughts of the Lord Jesus here? He was seeking according to Matthew 13 and He found the pearl and the treasure. Are the feelings and desires of the Lord indicated in Adam's feelings?
J.T. If we pursue it in that way; we go right through to Ephesians too. At the same time we should seek to keep to the point of what is in the chapter and then proceed from that point to another point and so get intelligence, bit by bit; learn in part on these lines.
J.H. In 1 Timothy Paul makes much of the fact that Adam was formed first, then Eve, laying the basis for headship.
J.T. Showing how Paul himself used the actual facts of Scripture in dealing with moral things among the brethren.
R.W.S. Paul says to Timothy, "Laying these things before the brethren, thou wilt be a good minister of Christ Jesus, nourished with the words of the faith and of the good teaching which thou hast fully followed up" 1 Timothy 4:6. I wondered whether what we are at now in this chapter is followed up; one thing leading on to another. Is that a key in the ministry? It should operate that way.
J.T. I should think Paul used these two young men, especially Timothy, to teach us how to learn.
Ques. Is that why the word for 'man' is changed in verse 23?
J.T. Yes; we have another formation. The vocabulary now is enlarged in what we are speaking of. We have two new words which we have not had before, showing how things grow. Even our vocabulary in dealing with the things of God grows as we are patient and learn bit by bit. So the word for 'man' is different here. It is Ish and Ishshah; Ish is man and Ishshah is woman. So that we are enlarged now; we have something. This reading gives us something we can stop at; an advance in our vocabulary in its use in divine things.
A.P.T. In verse 19 it says, "And ... Jehovah Elohim ... brought them to Man, to see what he would call them". And in the end of verse 22, "he ...
brought her to Man". Would Adam's learning be somewhat cumulative in that? He says something. Is there cumulative learning, step by step?
J.T. It is just as Paul would have Timothy in his mind as an ideal for us in the sense of learning, how we are to learn. He was Paul's pupil, as you might say. He would learn things as Paul had them, and so here. Adam is really learning from himself as if God would say, see what a creature I have. And of himself he finds words to express himself. So the passage says in verse 22, "And Jehovah Elohim built the rib that he had taken from Man into a woman; and brought her to Man. And Man said, This time it is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh: this shall be called Woman, because this was taken out of a man". He has coined a word. He has found a word to express himself. He has found a name for his spouse and he named her Ishshah. He says, "This time it is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this shall be called Woman" (which, as I said before, is Ishshah), "because this was taken out of a man". He gives the reason for it. So that he has finished the matter. God loves him to do it. He intended to bring out what a great creature He had made. Of course that is to be transferred in our minds to the Lord Jesus not as creature but as a divine Person. What a Man He is; that He should be before us in all these things.
R.R.T. This morning we looked at God differentiating between light and darkness and now this is coming out in man. He sees the animals and differentiates in what he sees now and calls it woman.
J.T. God would say -- not that we would put words into the blessed God's mouth -- but He would say, What a creature I have! He can converse with Me and I with him. He is conversing with Me about his wife. It is a question of holy conversation between God and man.
R.R.T. God would see what was exhibited in Himself and take pleasure in it.
J.T. Quite so. That is what we should stop with and see if we cannot grow in it as conversing with God. And so the idea of the conversational idea that is found in the New Testament as, for instance, in Acts 20 when Eutychus was restored and brought up and the brethren were comforted, the conversation went on. The holy conversation between God and His people went on, and of course that is what these meetings are: God speaking to us and we to God.
Genesis 15:5 - 21; Ezekiel 47:5 - 9; John 1:1 - 3
J.T. It is the first day of the week and the day continues to the evening, and it would seem as though we should fill it out. We know the Lord continued on the first day of the week till late in the evening, and it is in mind that we might look at something for expansion, enlargement, which the day would suggest.
The thought is that in the consideration of these passages, we may reach the thought of Deity which is to be linked up with our readings yesterday. It is fitting that as entering on such a subject as we had yesterday, we should come to expansion. So God comes in, according to what He is as God in a plural sense, and all that flows out of that in the sense of expansion. So it is thought that Genesis 15 affords an opportunity to touch on what is subjective in the sense of expansion, for it has to be connected with God, only in the Spirit, not as He is seen in the first verses or the early verses of the book as brooding over the face of the deep, or the waters, but in view of life, in view of expansion. That is in the sense of the Spirit, in the sense of expansion in the Spirit.
Ezekiel serves to bring that out, the river increasing to impassability, and then what flows out of that in view of the believer extending and doubling, for the river becomes double. Indeed, the suggestion is infinitely so because it cannot be passed over.
The verses in John afford the truth doctrinally of all this matter because it lies in the Word, the Logos, that is to say, God in that sense. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" John 1:1. It seems as if the Lord would help us as we are with Him in regard to the first day of
the week so that we are set free from all else to be engaged with these things and Him.
O.A.M. Would you say why you stress the Spirit in chapter 15?
J.T. That is where the subjective truth lies. If we connect it with God that is where it lies; it is a question of the Spirit.
S.McC. You were alluding yesterday to the thought of knowledge as entering into Genesis 2 in man. Now in this chapter that we are starting with, we again get that thought coming up with Abraham, do we not? He says, in verse 8, "Lord Jehovah, how shall I know that I shall possess it?" It is a question of knowledge again, is it not?
J.T. Just so, and I would say subjective knowledge, an expression that is intelligible as we understand the New Testament, not simply objective, but what is subjective, how enlargement lies there.
J.R.H. Would that be seen somewhat in the character of the animals mentioned here, the heifer and the she-goat and turtle-dove?
J.T. I think that is what is meant, that it enters into the chapter peculiarly, how Abraham was to know. He wants to know how he is to know and Jehovah gives him these creatures, as pointing to the means of knowing.
A.N.W. He believed Jehovah, it says. That would be objective, I suppose?
J.T. Well, it would. In the prophets it says, "We shall know, we shall follow on to know", Hosea 6:3. What is seen here-we all know, at least, I suppose some of us do in this chapter is the idea of the word of God as such.
It appears first in this chapter and in the sense of a vision, so that we evidently arrive at enlargement, for God anticipated Abraham; "After these things the word of Jehovah came to Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram; I am thy shield, thy exceeding great reward", Genesis 15:1. That was anticipative of
what was going on in the mind of Abraham, but it indicated what was going on in the mind of God, too. We have earlier the suggestion of what goes on, not simply what is in the mind of God, but what precedes it, and so in chapter 8 He says things in His heart. Jehovah says things in His heart. He does not say them out loud, so to speak. He says them in His heart, so there is a suggestion of things that are proceeding in the heart of God. They are to come out in detail, and this chapter seems to afford the opportunity of this, what God has in His heart, what Abraham, too, had in his heart, what he was thinking about.
We have what God had in His heart, and how He would expand His thoughts in view of Abraham. So it says, verse 2, we must remember that he is speaking in the presence of a vision, "And Abram said, Lord Jehovah, what wilt thou give me? seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus. And Abram said, Lo, to me thou hast given no seed, and behold, a son of my house will be mine heir. And behold, the word of Jehovah came to him, saying, This shall not be thine heir, but he that will come forth out of thy body shall be thine heir. And he led him out, and said, Look now toward the heavens, and number the stars if thou be able to number them. And he said to him, So shall thy seed be! And he believed Jehovah; and he reckoned it to him as righteousness. And he said to him, I am Jehovah who brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give thee this land to possess it. And he said, Lord Jehovah, how shall I know that I shall possess it?" That is to say, how is he to know it?
A.S.B. Is there some link with chapter 1 of this book as we had it in verse 14, "And God said, Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens", and now He is in vision speaking to Abraham in relation to the filling? You are using the word 'expansion'
as connected with that to fill it out with persons?
J.T. Yes. Well, that is what I think is so, and we shall see it further as we look into Ezekiel, because he pursues the line of the river issuing forth until he reaches an impassable point. That is to say, we have the suggestion of Deity, of God, and then what flows from that so that he is led back, whoever is leading him leads him back to the bank of the river, and then we have the idea of the double thought. It is a double river. That is to say, there is enlargement at once; the passage says, "Son of man, hast thou seen this? And he led me, and brought me back to the bank of the river. When I returned, behold, on the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other", very many. Then we have later the idea of the double river, "And it shall come to pass that every living thing which moveth, whithersoever the double river shall come, shall live", I think that we should rightly conclude that we are in a section bordering on God, on Deity, and what flows from it, "that ye may be filled even to all the fulness of God".
J.W.B. In the epistle to Colossians, full knowledge is mentioned three times. I was wondering if that would help us in regard to what we are speaking of now.
J.T. Very good. We find it, too, in Matthew 11, a similar thought, and then we find it in Ephesians 4, because God has nothing less than that in His mind for us, clear, full knowledge, what may be called real knowledge.
A.H.P. In the passage you quoted in Hosea, it speaks of knowing the Lord, of knowing God. "We shall follow on to know Jehovah: his going forth is assured as the morning dawn", Hosea 6:3. Would you regard this unfolding of God's activities as akin to the idea of His going forth, God coming out and making Himself known?
J.T. Just so. He is going forth. In that connection we read earlier of the people being destroyed for lack of knowledge, but in Hosea 6:3, "And we shall know,-we shall follow on to know Jehovah", and then His going forth is spoken of.
J.A.P. The way you were referring to it, can we lay it to purpose, know the purposes of God?
J.T. Well, quite so. Therefore it leads us into Ephesians. That is where God especially lays Himself out, so to speak, to instruct the assembly. We have general knowledge elsewhere, of course, but in Ephesians, as it were, God is laying Himself out to instruct the assembly. So that Paul says, "That ye can understand my intelligence in the mystery of the Christ", Ephesians 3:4. Someone had it and that was Paul, so that the idea is there.
G.McP. In the acquiring of knowledge, is there a certain process of soul history like with Abraham in this chapter?
J.T. That is a good inquiry, because that is the intent of the reading of the chapter, how we shall arrive at it, because that is what he wants to know himself, how he is to arrive at it. Peter raises the thought with the Lord in his final word with Him in John 21. He raises the question of knowledge, of what was there. Our chapter in Genesis 15 is just that. Abraham wants to know. The time has arrived that he should say to himself that he should come into the clear knowledge of things. He had not had a son born to him. He was to depart without a family, whereas in truth his name indicated, and eventually was rightly understood, that he was to be the father of a multitude. That has to be understood. How is it to be reached? So in verse 8 he further says to Jehovah, "How shall I know that I shall possess it?" and then we have these creatures, the thought suggested to him, or the command, really, to take a "heifer of three years old, and a she-goat of three
years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon". That is what he is told to do and what he is not told to do is what he further does, that is to say, what verse 10 says. "And he took all these, and divided them in the midst". Jehovah did not tell him to do this, but he did it, showing that he is learning already. It is the basis in him of clear knowledge. "And he took all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid the half of each opposite its fellow; but the birds he did not divide. And the birds of prey came down on the carcases; and Abram scared them away", showing what Jehovah does not tell him to do is especially to be noted, because we see in it the basis for clear knowledge, of getting on to full knowledge.
A.R. Verse 13 says, "And he said to Abram, Know assuredly". I suppose that is to be noted?
J.T. Quite so. That is to be stressed because there is adversity involved in it. He says, "Know assuredly that thy seed will be a sojourner in a land that is not theirs, and they shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years". He is to know the adverse side of things because we must know the adverse side. Whatever it may be, go through it; otherwise, we would be just living on objective knowledge. We have to go through things.
N.W. You have spoken of this as the learning time. Is your thought in connection with this chapter that God uses our present circumstances here to help us reach the truth subjectively in view of our eternal place which is not a learning time exactly?
J.T. Quite so. Some of us have thought that we go on learning eternally, but it is not so, otherwise we become monstrosities. This is the learning time. Hence in the great chapter, Ephesians 3, we are to know the breadth, length, depth and height, which is a suggestion of creature knowledge, creature limitation, but "the love of the Christ which surpasses
knowledge", Ephesians 3:19 is not creature limitation. We are reminded that while it is not creature limitation, it passes knowledge, which is our knowledge.
S.McC. In 1 Corinthians 13 it says, "now I know partially, but then I shall know according as I also have been known". How do you regard that -- "I shall know according as I also have been known"?
J.T. The question is to whom the knowledge is attributed. Who is it spoken of as having the knowledge? What has been known of him? What has been known of Paul? If it be infinite knowledge, then of course, it could not be with the creature, but if the knowledge is just what is in Paul, what he is capable of, what his history implies, well, then, it would be simply creature limitation.
J.R.H. That is, he reaches up to God's knowledge of him. He reaches up to that.
J.T. Well, I suppose so. The question is now, if we have time to look into it enough, as to the meaning of the expression, whether it is God's knowledge of him, or whether it is another knowledge of him which is to be the limit, or standard of the knowledge that is thereby attributable to him at all times. "I shall know according as I also have been known" 1 Corinthians 13:12. I hope the brethren are not mystified by such remarks, but I think we need to look into the thing.
A.S.B. How does chapter 8 of 1 Corinthians work in with that? "But if anyone love God, he is known of him" (verse 3). Would that enter into it?
J.T. That is very clear, but whether I have been known is a sort of hypothetical suggestion and who the person is who knows, is what is in mind. Clearly it is a standard of knowledge that Paul would have to come up to.
A.N.W. Obscure window would seem to suggest that the obscurity is on one side, and not on the other, "but then face to face". It is the same person,
and as much as is known is to be known then face to face.
J.T. I think in view of the things that are said in the passage, I mean in 1 and 2 Corinthians, that there is an uncertainty about it, so that in 2 Corinthians 3:17 we read, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, but where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. But we all, looking on the glory of the Lord, with unveiled face, are transformed according to the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit". There is something in the sense of what is seen there and what is linked up primarily with the new covenant that needs, perhaps, more consideration than we have time for now.
W.C. You referred to subjective expansion. The man of whom we are speaking, Abraham, was expanded in a previous chapter. He was told of a blessing in relation to the dust of the earth, but here there is a different expansion. I wondered if you had something more in your mind about the subjective side in the expansion here.
J.T. We have so far come on to verse 9. Abraham says in verse 8, "Lord Jehovah, how shall I know that I shall possess it? And he said to him, Take me a heifer of three years old, and a she-goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove and a young pigeon". Now we have come to this verse. Your inquiry is whether I have something else in mind. I have the question of knowledge, of the subjective feature of things in Christianity; that is, whether we have learned the initial idea of it, and clearly Abraham had something. Jehovah stops at a certain point and Abraham proceeds on his own account. Referring again to the Corinthian epistles, we have in chapter 7 a very remarkable set of instructions, items of instruction, where Paul differentiates between his own experience and the knowledge that flows from it, and revelation. It seems as if the
question is whether we have basically what assures us of the full thought of knowledge, full, clear knowledge, in being able to distinguish between revelation and what may flow from experience, and the Spirit working in us according to that experience.
L.E.S. Do you think that what the apostle refers to in Timothy-there were always those who were learning and never able to come to the full knowledge of the truth-would bear upon our passage?
J.T. It does bear on it, and what has been said about Abraham would meet it compared with 1 Corinthians 7. What is said of Abraham is the basis there of clear knowledge, because he is told by Jehovah what to do. "Take me a heifer", etc., but then he is left with that. Then it says, "And he took all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid the half of each opposite its fellow; but the birds he did not divide". Well, I think we have in this verse the suggestion that there is the basis in Abraham of clear knowledge, and that Jehovah is bringing that out as He did in Adam. He did not tell Adam what the names were to be. He left them with Adam and whatever Adam named them, those were their names. So I think God would lay down for us something in this sense as to clear knowledge. That is, if we have the basis of clear knowledge in any sense, then we can proceed, and God will be with us. "Consider what I say", it says. If we do not do that, we will not get on, but if we do, the Lord gives understanding in all things.
J.R.H. These are not sacrifices apparently, but rather the opening up of the inward parts.
J.T. There must be the idea of sacrifice in them, but they are to be divided, and another thing is they are three years old until we come to the birds. That is to say, Abraham has got to go out in the herds and find them and in finding them, he is learning. He is learning how nature itself works. We are told that
nature teaches us, and we are to be open for the teaching of nature.
T.U. Do you have any thought as to why the offerings are linked with three years?
J.T. I think the idea is maturity. That is to say, they indicate full-grown persons, full growth. Hebrews contemplates the need of full growth. We are not all the time learning, and yet never coming to a knowledge of the truth. If we look at the passage in Hebrews 5, perhaps it would help us a little, verse 11, "Concerning whom we have much to say, and hard to be interpreted in speaking of it, since ye are become dull in hearing. For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have again need that one should teach you what are the elements of the beginning of the oracles of God, and are become such as have need of milk, and not of solid food. For everyone that partakes of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe; but solid food belongs to full-grown men who, on account of habit, have their senses exercised for distinguishing both good and evil". I think the crux of the matter lies there, of what we are speaking of, that the age of these creatures denotes full growth; persons who have all their senses in exercise can proceed to further knowledge. You are not content with what you already know. You want more.
J.H.Jr. Is there a link with Philippians 1, Paul speaking of the love of the Philippians? He prays that their love might abound more and more in full knowledge and all intelligence, that they may judge of and approve the things that are more excellent. He goes on to speak of his circumstances. I wonder if that would link on with this.
J.T. That helps. The allusion to Philippians helps, indeed, because it is a great subjective epistle, having in mind what he had already attained to, and he had the accompaniments of real knowledge.
A.H.P. It is very remarkable in that epistle. The
apostle says that he desired to "know him and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings", Philippians 3:10. We might have thought that objective. Do you regard that expression as linked on with this idea of subjective knowledge?
J.T. That is right, "that I may know him". He has laid himself out for it. We want to proceed on those lines because it is urgent. It is the time of learning as we have been reminded and to know how is the thing. Abraham raises this question with Jehovah and this matter of maturity enters into it, the age of these creatures. Abraham in seeking them out of his flocks, as we may suppose he did, would be thinking all the time of when these creatures were born. He probably kept a record of the ages of his cattle. Some farmers do. I suppose good farmers ought to keep a record of the ages of their cattle, but especially when they symbolise persons, their ages, so that Abraham is the great family man. He was the great father. We may be sure that he would develop the fatherly thought, and especially as Isaac came into view, how the dates would come into his mind, how old persons were. It is important, too, because the testimony requires that we keep account of dates, the ages of persons, and especially persons that God is using because it may be that God might lengthen out the age of a brother if needed, as He did Moses and as He did Hezekiah, showing what an elastic situation we are in. What love is in God, and developed in us! What a realm we are in!
R.R.T. So that this matter of the age of the animals is something that God distinctly said to Abraham, "Take me a heifer of three years old", but then you were stressing that Abraham in his intelligence went beyond what God had told him, divided them in pieces. I was wondering if the smoking furnace coming in and moving between the pieces would indicate God's delight in what Abraham had
done and now going on to something further in view of that.
J.T. Well, that all enters into it. We have already alluded to what his posterity would have to go through in Egypt, but there are other things, too, in the sense of balance and discipline; so he is showing that he is worthy of trust, because he not only knows the ages of these creatures -- I mean to say he is to find out where they are and what the ages of his creatures or his cattle might be. He has to search the thing out, work the thing out, because the question of age must come up in each case, when the creature began to have being and how it is now. All that is a process through which Abraham has to go and he does, because he finds the creatures and then he drove away the birds of prey which came down, it says, on the carcases. That is to say, he is an alert man, a trustworthy man. He is not going to evade the devil's work. If the devil is going to do anything, he seeks to undo the works of the devil. That is what the Lord Jesus has done and that is in principle what we must learn to do, to undo the works of the devil as far as possible. Here he drove away the birds of prey. The birds of prey came down on the carcases and Abraham scared them away. "Resist the devil and he will flee from you", James 4:7. Therefore, the experience of the believer is worked out in these cases and flows from the fact that he believed in Jehovah. He was a believer. Abraham was a believer, and faith is worked out in all these things.
J.T.Jr. In the Lord's parable about the sower, the word of God was sown. The devil comes in in the first case of the seed sown by the wayside and takes away the seed. Here the birds come and Abraham scares them away.
J.T. Yes. I think the principle of scaring away ought to be with responsible persons, whoever they are, in either case, because it is when men sleep, the
Lord says in the other parable, the devil works. We are reminded that we are to be on the alert in the service of God, in the sphere of His testimony, that the devil does not get a footing at all; and if he does, there is some slackness because it is when men sleep that the devil works. I do not know whether that fits in with your remarks.
J.T.Jr. I think it does because the sleeping might allude to those active in service who are not looking after other things. Is that what you have in mind?
J.T. Just so. Take the history of the assembly and the testimony involved in it. The history of the seven assemblies in the book of Revelation shows that there was great remissness somewhere. There was a need for an Antipas. The devil got in somewhere. We have Christendom now on account of that, such as it is. It is the fruit of the enemy's work.
E.G.McA. I was wondering about the significance of the sun going down, the thought of having gone down and being dark.
J.T. That is a question of experience, so we should not move away from this matter of age and experience and learning based on it. This question of the cattle should be kept in mind first, and the scaring away of the birds. That should be kept in mind and we should go through with it and then see what the next thing is. Abraham so far is successful. Verse 12 says, "And as the sun was just going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, a horror, a great darkness, fell upon him". Well, I think we are reminded of Genesis 1. The point that we made yesterday was that what we have in Genesis 1 in the days will work out in doctrine and teaching and ministry eventually all down through the history of the testimony, and so we are reminded of that in this matter of darkness. The horror of a great darkness fell upon Abraham. It would appear that we are reminded of the way days are worked out, what the effect is on our lives, so that
the day begins with the evening, not with the morning, "And there was evening, and there was morning". If we look back to the first chapter it says there, "And there was evening, and there was morning" -- one day -- or "the first day". There is something in the history of the believer in the sense of the evening that we have to understand and learn that things are not all rosy with us, that we begin to sow really in the beginning of our lives, the evening and the morning. We have to learn that that is the way of reckoning days, and so Jacob says, "Few and evil have been the days of the years of my life", Genesis 47:9,or "sojourning". We have to take account of the way things are mentioned -- that is to say, evening first. I think this history of Abraham would imply that he had a very terrible time of it, but he had to learn it himself. All this experience, what we were speaking of as learning, as subjective knowledge, is worked out in our experience in this sense in going through darkness, going through the dark days. Whatever they may be, go through them.
A.S.B. Did you have in mind in relation to the age that it is really here, what is on earth being governed by the heavenly position, the solar system, but in the working out of it, it is brought down to the single days?
J.T. Just so, the solar system. It is good to touch on those things. The word 'solar' would not come in in the first three days properly. It comes into the fourth day. It is the question of the position of the sun. We have to be content at first with the idea of light. God called the light day. He said, "Let there be light. And there was light" Genesis 1:3, not saying whence it came. We have to learn from experience in that sense.
R.H.S. In 1 Corinthians 12 we seem to have knowledge by the Spirit, the word of knowledge. Would you suggest that we acquire knowledge through experience?
J.T. We do. The Spirit comes into it all. We have not time for that now. I certainly should like that we should all get the idea of this subjective learning or knowledge as contemplated in Genesis 15. Then we have to go on to Ezekiel, and we have to touch a little on John 1. So we will pass on to Ezekiel because we certainly have not finished our subject, and it is a good thing that we do not finish things, that we leave off things and come back to them. We have hardly time now to say any more about our chapter, interesting as it is, save that we have come to the point that Abraham has scared away the birds of prey, and he has gone through darkness. Then we may add that the creatures were set each against his fellow and the light passed through. It says in verse 17, "And it came to pass when the sun had gone down, and it was dark, that behold, there was a smoking furnace, and a flame of fire which passed between those pieces". Now the power of God has come in. We can hardly leave our subject without touching on this. The power of God has come in in the smoking furnace, and the flame of fire that passes through those pieces. Abraham has set them in a certain position, and God takes account of that position, and the power of God is allowed to come through because there is something substantial there, or we would not have such a scene as this-that is to say, a smoking furnace and a flame of fire. There is some substance to it because there is the smoke and the flame and then the result is that everything is secured. The covenant is made with Abraham. Now we are set up in relation with God and we know where we are and what we are doing. So that in touching it in this way, we may pass on to Ezekiel so as to see how the Deity comes in at the point of human experience. Then we have something that we cannot fathom, that we cannot pass through, and therefore we bow and we feel that we have to do with God
and it makes us reverential. We become illuminated and we find there is at least double what we thought there was-first as to the river, and then as to the trees on the banks of it which would allude to persons. I hope the brethren are following, that we are not being mystified. We have taken on a subject but one feels that we should and that we should see how enlargement enters into the first day of the week.
A.H.P. To pass through the waters might suggest to us how knowledge is increased with us. You were saying earlier in your prayer we know in part. Do you think this is progressive, from the ankles, knees, loins, then to impassable waters? Would it suggest something akin to the Spirit's way with us in forming us in divine knowledge?
J.T. That is what I was thinking. We must count on the Spirit in all our learning, in all that we know. We must have in mind that the Spirit is here, and the power by which everything is carried through.
A.R. Is the swimming experimental?
J.T. Just so. Waters to swim in.
C.A.M. Did I understand you to convey that in chapter 47:5, of Ezekiel, we come to infinitude, the river that could not be passed through. Is that right? In Mr. Darby's translation it is the end of a paragraph and then he is brought back. My thought was as to your allusion to the trees being persons. Is this to form some practical evidences of this life?
J.T. Quite. It is a question of having missed something, and now you are brought back to it. As was said already in verse 5, "waters to swim in", but we are now in infinitude, so that it is the realm of God in that sense. Then someone speaks, someone who leads (the idea of leadership must be in it) -- "And he said unto me, Son of man, hast thou seen
this?". He had not. So we are reminded of how much we miss. "And he led me, and brought me back to the bank of the river", and then not only that, "When I returned", the idea of returning to a point. Then he says, "behold, on the bank of the river were very many trees on the one side and on the other". Already some of us have been speaking of God "bringing many sons to glory". We cannot say how many. There are very many here.
S.W.P. Is there any link here with the river? You have spoken already of Genesis 15, God speaking of the covenant, and He speaks of the great river Euphrates, and then there seems to be further expansion of a river that is impassable in Ezekiel. Is it the extension of the thought of God in Genesis 15? He speaks of the great river Euphrates and leaves it there as if the thought of the river is to be a future development.
J.T. The river would be a full stop, you might say. We have come to something that implies a full stop and so David stopped there, but he did not stop there until he had established his boundaries. His empire was extended and finished, looked after properly, and I think that is implied in Abraham's position, because it is a question of the disposition of the earth in his case; but now when we come to Ezekiel, we are dealing with infinitude which is hardly the thought with David or in Solomon, or in Abraham, but Ezekiel is the power of God. It alludes to that, and we have this wonderful river and all that flows out of it and the idea of infinitude, and then what flows from plenty, from the latitude implied. These trees, very many trees and many other things are touched on in the sense of the power of healing in the river and the double river, that is, the idea is so increased that it is said to be double.
J.L.P. Is there any correspondence in what Job reaches at the end? When Jehovah turned the
captivity of Job, He gave him twice as much as he had before.
J.T. Very good. That would bring up the subject of the meaning of the teaching in the book of Job. It is not infinitude. It is double as much as he had before. There are certain limitations, however, to that, but anyway, it is a picture of Israel. That is, we do not rise to the level of heaven in Job. It is really Israel, only that we do arise to the idea of high priest because Job is constituted that. He is constituted a high priest because he is ordered to pray for his friends, and his prayer is effective so that the whole matter is finished really. The whole matter of the book of Job is finished with Job himself. It is a question of priesthood. When we come to Ezekiel, we are in the prophets, but a peculiar prophet because the idea is power, I think, in Ezekiel and so this river is a symbol of it, but it is such a thing as I can touch, as the creature can touch, and find his measure, too, in it, beginning with his ankles and going to his loins, and then swimming, the means of swimming, so that we might say it is the fulness of God, "filled even to all the fulness of God". I think that is what is in mind. It is a question of learning things by experience and then, too, the river in itself, in its double character, and the persons, trees denoting persons, a great many of them, and then the power of healing. So that there is much to be learned, as one was saying, on the Lord's day in all these things, how we are brought to God, how we are in the realm of God on the first day of the week.
R.W.S. Is it not remarkable that all this should come out in the book of Ezekiel where conditions publicly were so weak due to failure and is there not correspondence thus with our day?
J.T. We are reminded in Philadelphia that while there was weakness, there was strength, at least a
little. There is something you can go on and reckon on. It is a little strength.
A.S.B. Is there a parallel in what the apostle experiences in 2 Corinthians 12 in relation to the ecstasy? I was thinking of your reference to infinitude. He says, "I know a man in Christ, fourteen years ago (whether in the body I know not, or out of the body I know not, God knows)". There was infinitude connected with that. There was great gain as the result of it.
J.T. Quite so. We are not left in uncertainty at all. That is to say, God knows. That passage contemplates the love of Christ which passes knowledge, and then the next thing is the fulness of God, and that, too, passes knowledge, but we are sustained in it. We are not lost in it. We are there intelligently. That is what I want to understand.
J.R.H. Are you implying that by divine love we are brought into touch with infinitude from time to time, but with all that, we have much to learn?
J.T. You are always seeking to learn, because infinitude means that you can never end it, only it does not run on into eternity. The present is a learning time. It is a time of learning. It would be a misleading thing for any to put forward that we learn in eternity.
T.U. Would the expansion of verses 7, 8 and 9 be the result of a subject person?
J.T. Ezekiel was a subject person? Quite so. That is what runs through the prophetic word. It is a suggestion of leadership. Sometimes you cannot be sure of who the person is, but it is there. The idea of leadership is there.
Now, if we can end with John, because we come to the beginning, the greatest of all beginnings. The allusion is the greatest of all. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God". It is different from what we get later and which we hope to look at tomorrow, that which was from the beginning. Now we come down to narrow limits. John 1 is the greatest thought as to our subject, that is to say, the beginning. It is a question of the Person of Christ, a question of God. "In the beginning was the Word". He was there. He did not begin. He was there at the beginning, or in the beginning He was there. That is to say, it is eternity. He is eternal. He is the eternal God, and that applies to Christ as it does to the Father.
G.McP. Is that the link between this and Ezekiel? You spoke of being in the presence of the Infinite. In the gospel we are in the presence of the Infinite.
J.T. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God".
A.P.T. Is John 1 objective knowledge?
J.T. You mean the verses we have read? Well, they are statements made by the Spirit of God. It is not a question of the knowledge of the person whom God uses to write, because he is just an instrument, but it is the Holy Spirit we have to do with, the Person who is behind it all. So we are in the presence of God, dealing with God and God's statements, so that I do not think we should speak of the kind of knowledge there. It is a question of divine Persons.
A.P.T. In regard to one's self, how do I understand the truth known objectively?
J.T. It is a question now of the whole matter of knowledge, how it can be spoken of, and so it is with John himself. He comes down to use the word, "I suppose". It is just like Paul differentiating between the Lord's commandment and his own judgment, his own knowledge of things by experience. That is to say, it is limited, creature limitations. When you are dealing with apostleship, with such persons as apostles, you are bound to come to who they are, whether they are just creatures, or whether they are divine Persons,
and John is just a creature, although he is an apostle and the writer of the gospel. He is just a creature, and therefore he is ready to say, "I suppose that not even the world itself would contain the books written" John 21:25, but in that way he is just saying that the writings and work of Christ in themselves are infinite.
John 1:1 - 18; 1 John 1:1 - 10
J.T. The brethren will recall we began with the idea of the beginning so as to have the advantage of primary thoughts and how they run through; not simply in ordinary language but spiritual language; they run through. We just touched on John's gospel, chapter 1, at the end of our meeting yesterday and it is thought that we should resume the thought as to it. It is one of the most important passages, if not the most important, in the whole of the Bible bearing on what we are engaged with, for it is a question in John 1 of God; God in the three Persons who compose or form the Deity. So that the general proposal is to look at John's gospel again this morning, and in the afternoon John's epistle. In fact, the thought is that we should link on John's gospel with the first chapter of the epistle, leaving the balance of the epistle or any thoughts that may be in mind for the afternoon reading.
In looking into John's gospel and his writings generally, it may be remarked that they are included, although late, in the general thought of revelation which marks Christianity. There seems to have been a need for a restatement of facts (John's gospel evidently coming in the latest of all in the written page) from the purely spiritual standpoint and, of course, therefore, the standpoint of inspiration. Much had been written, too, in the way of description and history, but the gospel of John seems to fit in to give us authoritatively an account of things spiritually; so that the history of Christianity would be on a sure basis and run on to the end, John having been in mind when the Lord said, "If I will that he abide until I come, what is that to thee?" John 21:22.
It was a matter for the Lord to decide as to whether John should tarry until He returned, but evidently the Lord meant that His coming should be prolonged and not so immediate as might have been thought. Prolongation seemed to be a feature in that sense of this section of Scripture. And so the idea of the beginning marks the gospel of John as it does the book of Genesis, only the gospel of John, as has been remarked, deals with Christianity, the greatest of all dispensations; and, indeed, one might say, the last word as to everything for all the dispensations come upon us, Paul says. And now it behoves us, if we look into the thing rightly, to fix our minds on the Person of the Lord Jesus; not as in John's epistle because it is the neuter word there, "that which", whereas in the gospel it is, "In the beginning was the Word". That is, it is purely personal, and it is what is to be predicated of Him personally, extending back to His place in the Deity; not only in time but in the Deity, because it is not only that the Word was in the beginning, but the Word was with God-the idea of the association of the Word with God, and then that He was God. So that there will be no question in any mind save a reprobate one as to the Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and that He is the same Person in the Deity as He is in humanity, only His condition is outwardly changed in humanity. And so this section of the gospel, that is to the end of verse 18, includes the idea of the incarnation; not only the personal existence of the Lord in the Deity but His incarnate condition. Therefore, we have comprehensive facts which may be distributed right down the dispensation, and have been, too; the root facts distributed in the power of the Spirit, and, of course, that is greatly stressed in John's gospel-the presence of the Holy Spirit.
L.E.S. Was the first heresy that arose in order to weaken the truth as to the Lord's Person, as to His
incarnation and what lay behind His incarnation? It was the effort of the enemy to weaken the whole substantiality of the dispensation.
J.T. Yes; it was an attack, a direct attack on God but especially on the One who became incarnate; "The Word was God" it says. We are hardly capable of taking on negative features such as were involved in the attack, but John takes it up. It runs through his writings. The negative side of things, of course, was of the devil. Our wisdom now is to occupy ourselves with the positive side and become conversant with the roots of language and thought that enter into the doctrine of Christianity.
J.T.Jr. The introduction of the personal pronoun would help us, too, in verse 2: "He was in the beginning with God".
J.T. That is the Word being alluded to. The idea was that a word was available for use to designate the Person, and hence the emphatic pronoun in the beginning of verse 2, "He".
S.McC. Would you say something as to this appellation -- "the Word". Do you think it came out while the Lord was here among His disciples, or did it come out after the Spirit descended? It does not seem to be something revealed to them, but something that came out among them.
J.T. It was something they were conversant with. The disciples were conversant with the thought. The word evidently had become known, had become current, and what is said of it is in keeping with what has been remarked already; that is, it is a word that was intended to be known and useable and therefore the importance of knowing the meaning of it. It is one of the features that we are engaged with in the idea of the beginning, because it is said immediately, "In the beginning was the Word".
A.N.W. The identity of the Person both in Deity and manhood is established, but have you anything
to say as to the form of Deity in relation to the form of manhood?
J.T. Well, it is remarkable that Paul, although he is not the one that the Lord selected to write this gospel (it is John, the disciple whom He loved, not Paul) yet it is remarkable that he furnishes us with what is essential to John's ministry. What he furnishes us with is in Philippians 2:5, "For let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus; who, subsisting in the form of God, did not esteem it an object of rapine to be on an equality with God; but emptied himself, taking a bondman's form, taking his place in the likeness of men; and having been found in figure as a man, humbled himself, becoming obedient even unto death, and that the death of the cross". It is Paul that God selects to make this statement, and it is made in connection with the need for humility in dealing with the great subject; that it is in no way a matter to be dealt with academically but spiritually. It means we must be spiritual and if we are not spiritual then there is a test: "If anyone thinks himself to be a prophet or spiritual, let him recognise the things that I write to you, that it is the Lord's commandment", 1 Corinthians 14:37. So that Paul becomes the test in view of doctrine, and especially systematic doctrine, and system in every way, in the spiritual sense. He selects Paul who is the great builder or constructor of the assembly; so that the idea of structure must be before us and at the same time the spirit of humility is to be maintained -- grown in -- so as to handle such a holy subject.
S.J.H. Does the title "the Word" imply that there is more to be conveyed now, more than just a breathing into man? There is an expansion. There is more to be conveyed.
J.T. That is, I would say, right. We have to link on now with the book of Acts and the gospel of Luke, too, of course; but the gospel of Luke was very early.
The book of Acts is clearly later, but the gospel of John still later, and what has been said is, I am sure, right. There was evidently the need of something to be added in the sense of logos, that which denotes what is in the mind of God. It may not be yet declared, but it is in the mind of God, for "the Word" denotes or implies not only what is said or declared, but what may be said. So that as we noted yesterday in Genesis 8 God said certain things in His heart. They can hardly be called yet 'the word' because they are not spoken, but they are said in some sense in God's heart and that is the idea. What we are engaged with now may include what is in the heart of God as well as what is spoken, only we have to add to that, that Paul says he completed the word of God; so that there is nothing new now to be revealed. Everything is out. It is a question of our knowing how to deal with what is out; that is to say, what is put into language.
F.N.W. In 1 Corinthians 1 the note to the word logos reads, "Thus all that communicates the divine mind (the intelligible) is logos, and first of all Christ himself". Does that suggest there is more in a way to come out?
J.T. There was then, but there is not now, because the word is completed; Paul says, to complete the word of God. That is to say, the whole scope of the divine mind is out in that sense.
J.McK. Does verse 14 of this chapter help? "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us". Is that the whole thing brought out now?
J.T. Yes; it is a question of the Person. He dwelt among us. That is, He became incarnate.
The word is 'tabernacled'; He tabernacled among us, so that you could converse with Him and He with you. No doubt that could be said even before this gospel is written, but this gospel being written was Intended to cover Him in this word.
A.R. The two that followed the Lord in chapter 1 understood this word; they called Him 'Rabbi', which means 'Teacher'.
J.T. That is right. They felt the need of being taught which is what we need now. We all need to be taught and that is why they used that word; and, moreover, that is what Mary Magdalene meant in using it, too, that He was her Teacher, that she had no other. So that that restricts us in dipping into things that we have not seen. She would confine herself to what came out through Christ.
C.A.M. If I understand your expression Paul enunciated the doctrine in a systematic way so that we would rightly study the Person of Christ in John's gospel. Is that right? You were alluding to the teaching in the epistle and with that we can study his last writing as to the Person of Christ. It would guide our thoughts in our occupation with His Person in the John setting.
J.T. Paul and John and Peter are clearly linked up with deep affection. The facts relative to them would indicate that; and we have often mentioned as to the great servant that has been used of God to bring all these things to us, so that we should have them as we have them now, that he said to the brethren -- as he was about to die -- to cleave to Paul, but do not forget John, he said, meaning what we are dealing with now; we are not forgetting John. We are looking into John, at the same time we have inwardly deep down in our hearts that we must cleave to Paul. Therefore, the systematic side must be kept in mind.
J.T.Jr. Would the systematic side be suggested in the first few verses of Luke's gospel -- the method, the accuracy?
J.T. Undoubtedly Luke was taken up with that in mind. He was an elect vessel. He mentions in his second treatise that Paul was an elect vessel unto the
Lord. The Lord regarded him in that light. So the systematic side being involved in Paul's ministry has to be kept in view. John is dealing more with the personal side, what is in the Person of Christ; what is in the Deity, in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Of course, the system is in mind, too, but Paul stresses the system, systematic teaching.
A.R. Would that be seen in the school of Tyrannus?
J.T. Quite so; so long as you have the idea of a school, a teacher, a man that would demand that you should learn and be attentive. If we do not go too fast, we are coming now to the idea of the system side and Luke is taken up for that purpose. He tells us in his very first words in his gospel, "Forasmuch as many have undertaken to draw up a relation concerning the matters fully believed among us". This is just what we have been saying -- what was current among the brethren; things that were fully believed. There was real faith in them, "as those who from the beginning were eye -- witnesses of and attendants on the Word have delivered them to us, it has seemed good to me also, accurately acquainted from the origin with all things, to write to thee with method, most excellent Theophilus, that thou mightest know the certainty of those things in which thou hast been instructed". Luke 1:2 - 4. So that now we are led into Luke. We have already been thinking of Paul, the systematic side particularly in Paul, but Luke runs with Paul, if we may use that word, as understanding the systematic side of the truth. And so he would write to this beloved Theophilus who, no doubt, may be taken as a representative person at that time, a person capable of learning, so that he should learn with method; that he should have the true facts of the case and get them with method.
S.P. Is it suggested in the last chapter of 2 Timothy, Paul speaking of certain ones: "Demas
has forsaken me, having loved the present age, and is gone to Thessalonica; Crescens to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. Luke alone is with me", 2 Timothy 4:10. As if what was needed would be there regardless of any deflection.
J.T. Just so. Then we have to think of the person who is mentioned; who Luke is. So when Paul is at the height of his work, that is, in Acts 20, it is mentioned that certain ones were in the company; they accompanied him. They were not simply under his rule exactly as Timothy was, but they were companions; companions in the service, and the first one mentioned is a Berean. We may link that thought up with Luke, because the idea of a Berean is he is very concerned about having things right and proving the things that are said in ministry to see whether they are so, and proving them daily.
A.P.T. The facts of the incarnation being in Luke, would it be right to say it is not because Luke was a servant but because he was spiritually minded?
J.T. I would think so. There was a selection made. We were speaking of that the other day, selection being made of ministers according to the need and evidently there was great need according to the facts of Luke for a man like Luke.
J.H. He uses the word 'origin'. Does that refer to the incarnation, in verse 3?
J.T. "It has seemed good to me also, accurately acquainted from the origin with all things", Luke 1:3. That is to say, you now have in mind as to whether it is a question of the incarnation, but I would think it is what occurred before the incarnation that is in mind, but inclusive of the incarnation. So that Luke does not begin with the incarnation; he begins with Zacharias because it was a question of stating things as they were carried down from the Old Testament. Really that is what is in mind, the merging of things
from Old Testament times into New Testament times. It was the skill that was needed for that.
A.B.P. Do you think our ability to enjoy John's ministry lies largely in the place we have given to Paul's ministry?
J.T. Everything must eventually come under Paul. Although years elapsed from the record of Acts 2 until chapter 9, yet everything awaited Paul in that sense. It was necessary that he should come. The Lord had designed that he should come, and he was said to be taken up from his birth. So that the wholly right seed should be there; such as was needed at that time and it is needed at all times. There should be selections, persons suitable in crises, persons who can be relied upon to give the facts.
E.A.L. Do we see that in Paul's opening to Timothy? He embraces him as his own true child in faith, and then gives him instructions to keep clear of all those interminable genealogies, as if he had in his mind that he was a true child in faith, and the genealogy was going forward in teaching in that way.
J.T. Quite so. Therefore, we can see the full bearing of what is said in 1 and 2 Timothy, that there should be an avoidance of all fables or anything like fables, so that the truth should be with the brethren, and that is where Luke stands, I think, in the selection of ministers.
G.MacPh. John gives the kind of features that are substantially seen in the assembly in the face of public break-down, so that the assembly in principle from John's writings and from Paul's is going through.
J.T. The linking of those two men as they are in affection, because Paul sought out Peter and then John -- these three were especially linked, I would say, in the beginning, was in order that we should have the pure facts of the history of Christianity.
R.R.T. You have been suggesting emphasising
the thought of beginning, and I was wondering according to Mr. Darby's note in relation to verse 14 that we have been speaking of, that we have in particular a beginning here. That is, grace and truth began to subsist. The note says, '(The world'began to be'through him. He'became'flesh. So'grace and truth came into being'. I am not satisfied with'subsists', but'came'gives the idea of coming into the world. They began to exist de facto down here. The verb is singular, and'grace and truth'go together in the person of Christ. Nothing subsisted by the law, it was a rule given; but grace and truth actually commenced to be, not in God's mind, of course, but in revelation and actual existence down here)'. I was wondering if this beginning would fit in with your thought in general of beginning.
J.T. It does; only historically the word 'beginning', precedes what you are speaking of. That is to say, the beginning of things in Christ actually; so that it is not simply the incarnation here at first; the incarnation is a little later. The incarnation is in verse 14. The Word became flesh; but what we are now committing ourselves to is the beginning of everything. Whatever it could be or whatever it was the Word, the Person designated here as the Word, was there. He did not begin there. We should see how the idea of beginning comes in in that sense in John's epistle, but in this gospel the beginning is of everything; whatever could be called beginning; whatever you may think of or say, the Word was there. So that the soul is impregnated with the idea of the eternity of the Lord Jesus Christ, whom we call the second Person of the Deity; that He was there, and not only so, but He was with God there. He was associated with God there and not only that but He Himself was God. So that you can have nothing more plainly and firmly stated than the words we
have here. It is for us to get the idea in our souls as to the Person of the Lord Jesus.
J.H. The beginning precedes the "all things" in verse 3.
N.B. I wondered why Luke carries forward the title of the period of the Lord's humanity in verse 2 of his gospel: "those who ... were eye-witnesses of and attendants on the Word".
J.T. It is because he was in the current conversation of the moment; holy conversation it would be, of course, because they were all believers. The conversation included the Lord Jesus, and Luke is saying that there were those who were eye-witnesses of and attendants on Him, so that Luke is going to say things that can be counted as reliable, absolutely reliable, as inspired.
S.McC. In regard to our brother's remark, is it not important that the 'Word' is an appellation that is connected with the Lord in humanity? It does not belong to Him in the pre-incarnate conditions in Deity; it is not carried forward from the pre-incarnate condition of Deity into humanity.
J.T. That is good to make that clear. It acquired currency, it acquired use among the early believers and it had become known among them. Luke takes it up as John does only not in the same depth in which John does but it is the same Person.
R.R.T. And when it says, "And the Word became flesh" it does not mean that He was known as the Word before He became flesh.
J.T. It does not. That is the thing that ought to be kept clear in our minds, in our present inquiry. It has been the subject of controversy for many a day as to whether Sonship in Christ and the Word in Christ here are expressions that could be carried back into the circumstances or conditions of Deity. They refer to the Lord becoming Man in humanity --
the humanity of Christ. That is where they are to be understood.
J.W.W. Would Luke help us to understand the first line of that hymn, "Thou art the blest incarnate Word" (Hymn 11)?
J.T. Quite so. That had to be gone into very carefully. It took much time to go into all that, because the subject was very much on the minds of the brethren at the time. It was necessary for those engaged in the revision of the hymn book to go into all these attendant facts so that the truth should get into our hymns; that we should sing the truth. The best way of getting things is to sing them. "Thou art the blest incarnate Word" (Hymn 11) is accurate.
A.N.W. What has just been said about the Word would equally apply to the appellation 'Christ Jesus' in Philippians 2. "Christ Jesus; who, subsisting in the form of God", verse 6. We have no difficulty about that. Why should we have any difficulty about the Word?
J.T. Quite so. The term 'Christ Jesus' is already known and spoken of. It belongs to the earliest breathings of the Spirit in relation to Christianity and so the use of the word logos; only it required more place because of learning having to be dealt with. Much learning was brought into Christianity, by persons who would, perhaps, oppose it or nullify it or discredit it, and this learning had to be met and it was met in the writings of John. Hence the expression 'John's simple page' as over against what the human mind would evolve from the use of books; books that were spoken of at Ephesus; fifty thousand pieces of silver, it was said, was the price; showing how much there was in the sense of books to be met. And John's writings are intended in that sense to meet that, and it was the most simple of all language, and yet the most profound.
S.McC. You have pointed out yourself that even
the prepositions, small as they may seem, in this chapter are like a sword turning every way to guard the truth regarding the Person of our Lord.
J.T. Quite so. The Lord helped the brethren. He helped us, and hence, I believe, the truth remains with us. There may be some defects in some of these hymns yet, but in general the truth remains in the writings.
J.R.H. Would you say a little more about the value of hymns? You spoke of them as the best way to get the truth into us.
J.T. I do not know, but I would say the use of poetry is divine; it is of God. Exodus 15 may be cited as showing how the truth was interwoven in poetry and song; it is sung by Moses and the children of Israel, and then Miriam is brought into it to confirm it femininely; that is, to make the thing feminine in its character and attractive in that sense.
S.McC. Do you have any difficulty in singing hymn 1?
J.T. I would be afraid to bring that up because we have not time, but I would say in brief the hymn will need to be revised to make it fit in with the truth, if the Lord sees fit to have a revision, which is a question now. If there has to be one, of course, the matter will have to come up.
Ques. Those that have attacked the Scriptures have attacked our hymns as well.
J.T. Just so. What has been just said ought to be carried through in our minds, but there is not time now to discuss the question of hymns, as to whether some of them might not be deleted or revised. That is open to a question.
E.G.McA. Do the first eighteen verses of this chapter lay before us the essential principles opened up in Christianity regarding the deity of Christ, His coming into manhood, the existence of grace and truth and the revelation of God? Are they not the foundation
of the truth which the enemy would attack and which we are to be well formed in?
J.T. That is what I would say exactly. If we go through John's gospel we shall have to take up things that are somewhat looser than the wording in this chapter, but I would say that what you said is about the truth. These eighteen verses cover the whole matter. They are really prefatory in that sense covering the whole book. After we look briefly into them we can very well proceed in this reading and retain in our minds that these verses are prefatory and cover the whole of John's gospel, and such an expression as John himself uses when he uses the word 'also', which is remarkable, in keeping with Paul's way in 1 Corinthians. He used a similar form. John says, "I suppose that not even the world itself would contain the books written", John 21:25. So that we can see how the river widens out into infinitude. That is the very word also in John's mind. The work was so wonderful and enormous that he has to say, "I suppose that not even the world itself would contain the books written", John 21:25. I think we can leave it just in that sense; leave our minds open to these wonderful things and look into them and learn them. So far we have dealt with the Lord's humanity and now we have to come down to the incarnation. We have spoken of Him in the state of Deity. "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God". That is so far what we have. "He was in the beginning with God". Then we have the statement as to creation. "All things received being through him, and without him not one [thing] received being which has received being". That is a settled matter as to creation. Then in verse 4, "In him was life, and the life was the light of men". You might say that is covered in the incarnation. So it is; but it is not stressed here as to incarnation. It is simply a question that life was
in Christ and that it was light. The life was the light of men. Life began light. Life is substantial; light is hardly that, although we must depend on what is substantial for it. Light is the thing we are now to think of, and it was for men, not for angels. We cannot branch out into the angelic order of being or the realm of angels. We confine ourselves to men in our consideration of the matter. We are dealing with men. The light is for them and, therefore, angels can hardly enter into the thing fully. They cannot learn things as we do.
C.H.H. Would they be included in verse 3? They received their being through Him. That would be a greater thought than Genesis.
A.N.W. Is man included in the "all things"?
J.T. "All things received being through him, and without him not one thing received being which has received being". I suppose it covers the universe in the sense of creation -- "all things".
S.McC. Does the mediatorial side enter into that verse: "All things received being through him", or is it rather the Source side, He being God, that is in mind?
J.T. Well, it is more personal, I would think. God is dealing with them personally. The mediatorial side comes in more accurately in Hebrews: "by whom also he made the worlds", Hebrews 1:2. That is instrumental; but I would take this to be entirely Himself. "All things received being through him, and without him not one thing received being which has received being". The flesh "received being". You might say, well, God was the Author of the action, but I think it is better to leave it as it is. The Person who is acting is Himself, the divine Person, and He is God Himself. So that we can leave out stressing the mediatorial side here.
C.A.M. The expression is used to the church in
Laodicea: "the beginning of the creation of God", Revelation 3:14 in speaking of the Person of Christ.
J.T. Without saying He is the Creator; although it is inferred, but that is another setting of things. He is the beginning of the creation of God.
W.B. In Hebrews it says, "upholding all things by the word of his power", Hebrews 1:3. That is the Son's power. Does that fit in?
J.T. Well, that is mediatorial. I am very doubtful about stressing that side here because the point is to bring out the Deity of the Lord Jesus Himself. He is Himself God and He can do things; not in the mediatorial sense simply, but being God He can do things of Himself.
A.S.B. How do you understand "being", "all things received being"?
J.T. The word "being" there would be having come into existence. Things came into evidence and, of course, we could look into Hebrews if we had time, but we have not, but when we have time we can look into Hebrews from the mediatorial side and see how the 'being' has not come about of the things that are made. It is purely a matter of God. That matter flows out from what God is, if the brethren follow what I am saying in Hebrews 11. "For in the power of this the elders have obtained testimony. By faith we apprehend that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that that which is seen should not take its origin from things which appear", Hebrews 11:2,3. That is what I was alluding to. The scientific men as they are called, would unravel everything and give account of everything. This passage refutes it all. "By faith we apprehend that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that that which is seen should not take its origin from things which appear", Hebrews 11:3. That is to say, matter is not on the surface; it flows out from what God is. We cannot give an account of it either, save as from God.
A.N.W. He created visible and invisible things. Would you suggest some of the invisible things?
J.T. "The invisible things of him are perceived, being apprehended by the mind through the things that are made, both his eternal power and divinity", Romans 1:20. Is that what you mean?
A.N.W. I was thinking of Colossians: "because by him were created all things, the things in the heavens and the things upon the earth, the visible and the invisible", then what he goes on to say enlightens us, "whether thrones, or lordships, or principalities, or authorities: all things have been created by him and for him", Colossians 1:16.
J.T. Your question is as to what is visible and invisible. It is a question of whether we can go into it. Pardon me for restricting us, but we have so little time and I would prefer to look into that matter, if the Lord will, as to what is visible and invisible. We can easily talk of what is visible at the present time. "The invisible things of him", Romans 1:20. They are clearly seen; they are to be seen.
A.N.W. The "all things" in verse 3 would cover everything of our chapter.
C.H.H. In Colossians 1:16 you get both sides of the matter, the mediatorial side and what He did in His essential Being. The first 'by', would be similar to this verse in John; what He did in His essential Being, whereas the second 'by' is more what is mediatorial. I was referring to the two notes on the 'by'.
J.T. We begin with love, that is in verse 13, "and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love: in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins; who is image of the invisible God, firstborn of all creation; because by him were created all things, the things in the heavens and the things upon the earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones,
or lordships, or principalities, or authorities: all things have been created by him and for him. And he is before all, and all things subsist together by him", Colossians 1:13 - 17. What is your point, please?
C.H.H. The first 'by', in verse 16 according to the note is what He did in His own essential being, but the other 'by' is what He did as a Mediator. I thought the first 'by', would correspond to John 1:3.
J.T. "By him were created all things, the things in the heavens and the things upon the earth" That is to say, that is His own action as God. Quite so. Then it goes on, "the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or lordships, or principalities, or authorities: all things have been created by him". That is the second 'by', you have in mind.
J.T. The first 'by' refers to note k which reads, "Lit. 'in him', in the power of whose person. He was the one whose intrinsic power characterised the creation. It exists as his creature". Now let us get the next note, note b: "the instrumental power". The one is the power in the Person and the other is the instrumental power, and the 'eis' is under note c: "'for'. These three prepositions, en, dia, eis, show Christ to be the characteristic power, the active instrument, and the end in creation". I think there is a great deal of instruction in what you are calling attention to, quite in keeping with Colossians.
R.W.S. The great person, the great creature in mind in all these creative acts is man. "The life was the light of men". In all these created things you have been speaking of men are in mind as the greatest of all, corresponding with Genesis 2. "In him was life, and the life was the light of men".
J.T. Yes; you mean men are in view. Now if we can proceed to verse 4, "In him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light
appears in darkness, and the darkness apprehended it not". That was the position. The darkness continues; it is not dispersed. It does not apprehend things. That is the position up to verse 5. And then we have the question of how the Lord is light. "There was a man sent from God, his name John. He came for witness, that he might witness concerning the light, that all might believe through him. He was not the light, but that he might witness concerning the light. The true light was that which, coming into the world, lightens every man". So that Christ is light in the fourth day of Genesis 1. Christ is seen as light. He lightens every man. He sheds His light on every man and helps us to apprehend things as a man having his eyes opened; such as the Lord opening the eyes of the man at Bethsaida. He saw all things clearly. The whole realm of created things is in mind; not that man would see the whole thing at once, but the idea is what can be seen. Therefore, He sheds light on every man, so that they do not need to be pagans. They do not need to be Jews. The whole matter is in Christianity, and hence we have the account of Christianity in verse 11. "He came to his own, and his own received him not; but as many as received him, to them gave he the right to be children of God, to those that believe on his name; who have been born, not of blood, nor of flesh's will, nor of man's will, but of God". So that we have the whole position now taken account of here in these verses, which are an epitome of the whole matter. That is the Christian, whatever others may say of him, has a right that no other has, and that is the right to be one of the children of God. Their birth, their origin is understood. It is not simply that they are created but they are born. They have a place as born; so that we have a full account of our position; whatever people may say, this is our position. We have a right to take the place of being children of
God. "Not of blood, nor of flesh's will, nor of man's will, but of God"
G.W. Does Luke help us in relation to the words of Simeon? "A light for revelation of the Gentiles and the glory of thy people Israel", Luke 2:32.
J.T. Showing how things took form in the history of the truth; the Lord being in the arms of Simeon -- he took the Babe in his arms -- most touching, and said, "Lo, this child is set for the fall and rising up of many in Israel", Luke 2:34. But He is for the revelation of the Gentiles. That is how Luke meets the matter, and, of course, it fits with John. He is the unveiling of things; therefore, in Luke and John we are enabled to take account of things as they are. After that we have an account of the incarnation itself in verse 14. We have the incarnation; that is the point. You get in these verses an epitome of the whole matter, so that we might well finish with these verses, if we did not have to touch a little on John's epistle. We will have to devote nearly all the time this afternoon to John's epistle, because it is a question of 'that which' was seen in the Person incarnate, in flesh and blood.
A.R. Is sonship in mind in incarnation according to verse 14?
J.T. Quite so. "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father), full of grace and truth (John bears witness of him, and he has cried, saying, This was he of whom I said, He that comes after me is preferred before me, for he was before me); for of his fulness we all have received, and grace upon grace. For the law was given by Moses: grace and truth subsists through Jesus Christ. No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him". Therefore we have come to the end of the matter as an epitome, so that we will carry it in our minds.
R.H.S. Does Paul fit in here? "And confessedly the mystery of piety is great. God has been manifested in flesh, has been justified in the Spirit", 1 Timothy 3:16. "The Word became flesh". It seems to be more the mystery side. John does not give an account of His birth, but he says, "The Word became flesh". It is the mystery side.
J.T. It is. "And confessedly the mystery of piety is great". The practical side of things as to the need of piety in our ministry. "God has been manifested in flesh, has been justified in the Spirit, has appeared to angels, has been preached among the nations, has been believed on in the world, has been received up in glory", 1 Timothy 3:16. It might be regarded as a sort of poetic statement of the whole truth of Christianity, but very brief. Some think it is some piece of poetry that Paul would adduce to show what he was dealing with and setting out among the Gentiles.
Ques. Why is there no mention of His death in that verse?
J.T. Just so; it is not put there. I suppose brevity was in mind, as it is always in mind when we are dealing with literature, especially poetry.
A.P.T. In John 1:2 it is the emphatic 'He'. Does that refer to His deity? But then in the last clause of verse 18 it is the same 'he' That is the same Person in Manhood.
J.T. The emphatic 'He' is in both verse 2 and verse 18, "he hath declared him". The word 'him' is not in the original necessarily, but it may be. The idea is the declaration has come about and it has come about through this Person. It is a question of declaration, not revelation. "No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared [him]". As if the idea of declaration is left open, but it is the Son who has done it, and only the Son who has done it. If we leave out the word 'him' that is the position.
It is left open, and hence the great stress is on declaration.
S.McC. Do you regard the declaration as bearing back on, "No one has seen God at any time", or does it refer to the Father that John alludes to later: "And I have made known to them thy name", John 17:26?
J.T. I think this is wider and more like something that might happen in a court-house; a proclamation of some immense thing. The thing is declared officially without saying what it was. "He hath declared him". The declaration is made, great as it is and perhaps unspoken but the idea is there of declaration, and it is public, a manifest thing, a declared thing.
A.N.W. Therefore more God than the Father.
J.A.P. Is that why in John 8 the Lord brings in His own deity? "Before Abraham was, I am", (verse 58).
J.T. His deity is inferred in what is said here in the word 'declared'. The emphatic 'he' alludes to the fact that it is God Himself really. You understand that in your mind. No one has seen God but the declaration is made.
W.McK. Would you help us as to why it is the Son rather than the Word?
J.T. It is to bring out the greatness of the Son and the place He has in affection. We have already touched on it in Colossians. "The kingdom of the Son of his love", Colossians 1:13. We have already had that in Colossians, but now it is a question of declaration, and it is a question of a Person; the place He has in love, because the passage really deals with that. "No one has seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him". It is a beautiful expression that could apply to no one but the Son of God, that is to say, the second Person in the Deity-the Person who can
Himself say He is God. "The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father". That is to say, it brings out the personal place He has with the Father. What a place He has in the circle of the Deity, as we may say. He is predominant in activity. He is the doer of things and if it be a question of declaration He does it. Whatever the thing is, He does it. And "the only-begotten Son" is a question of affection. The preposition is 'in'. That is to say, He has come into the position. He has come into it, which means plainly it was not a question of eternal existence. He did not come into that, but He came into Sonship. That is the point in this verse, that He has come into it. The preposition means that. He has come into Sonship. He has come into that place and in that place He makes the declaration. So that love is bound up in it, and He is bound up in love.
G.MacPh. Does this link up with Genesis 1? God Himself in creation, and now in the creation He must make declaration?
J.T. I would go with that. If you bring Genesis 2 into it; only the position here is greater than that.
"The only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him". He has come into it, only it refers to Him as Man. The point is to show He is that. No one could bear this title but Himself. He is the only-begotten Son. It could not be applied to the Spirit or the Father. The application is to the Son, the second Person.
C.H.H. Would declaration apply to revelation?
J.T. I think revelation is more personal. I was alluding to the idea of a court-house; the president's proclamation-anything of that kind. It is official; but then here the point is to stress it is the Person who makes it.
1 John 1:1 - 10; 2 John 1 - 13
J.T. The second letter is read because it is felt the feminine side should be before us in closing, to see the responsibility attached to it, even to the extent of the exercise of discipline, that there should be balance. But what is mainly in mind, of course, is the first epistle, and, too, the fact that while it alludes to the Lord Jesus as Man, the neuter is used: 'that'; "that which was from the beginning", because of the need of substance in all our thoughts and all our enquiries. Luke has that in mind, too, because in alluding to the Lord He uses the words, "holy thing". He says, "wherefore the holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God", Luke 1:35. So that identification is in mind in the thought of substance.
S.McC. The beginning that is alluded to now in the epistle -- does that have in mind the incarnation, historically, I mean?
J.T. Well, not in as formal a way as we have it in the beginning of the gospel where it is said, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us", John 1:14. The allusion there is to condition; that is, the condition of incarnation.
C.H.H. Does this refer to what occurred after the anointing?
J.T. Well, it seems as if the Spirit of God would engage us with the Person in this sense; that is to say, the Person as incarnate, without stressing the anointing.
C.A.M. Do you connect this with the verse you alluded to in Luke's gospel, "the holy thing"? Is that to be viewed in connection with the fact "that our hands have handled"? That alludes to the
apostles' hands. There was something, I thought, concrete that could be handled.
J.T. Well, quite; and love, too. Simeon may be taken as representative of initial affection in that sense: "he received him into his arms, and blessed God, and said, Lord, now thou lettest thy bondman go, according to thy word, in peace; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation", Luke 2:29,30. And so as to our brother's suggestion as to this passage in John being possibly an allusion to the Lord as anointed, it seems to me that the whole Person is in mind in His history. Luke would stress that side, how He was taken into Simeon's arms, who immediately became a worshipper, for he blessed God; and how the Lord is viewed in Luke as born, and as a boy, which carries with it, because of age, some responsibility. So Mary connects responsibility immediately with her own position. She was really remiss in what had happened. In truth the ark was there, although not named. And so the Lord found His way Himself without having any reference to His parents. Mary said, "Behold thy father and I have sought thee distressed", Luke 2:48, but He immediately says, with a suggestion of reproach, "Why is it that ye have sought me? Did ye not know that I ought to be occupied in my Father's business?" Luke 2:49. So that He is in the presence of the universe already in responsibility, even if that responsibility or measure of it is to be limited in any way, as doubtless it was, because it seems so, by Himself, "And he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and he was in subjection to them", Luke 2:51. He is there, we might say, in infinitude. The Person is there. His worth and dignity are already alluded to in our brother's remarks as to the "holy thing also which shall be born shall be called Son of God", Luke 1:35. The immediate link between the birth as the 'holy thing' and the Son of God is to be noted; because the Son of God is the Person who is to be in full
exercise of responsibility, so to say, or at least full administrative charge in relation to God. And so it is said of Paul in view of this that he straightway began to preach that Jesus is Son of God. It is not the anointing but the Person, although Luke would stress the anointing; but the Person is in mind in these remarks.
A.N.W. You are extending the "we have seen" and "we have heard" beyond the apostles?
J.T. Yes, although we have no doubt to keep in mind that they are particularly in mind. "That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes; that which we contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the word of life", and then further, "that which we have seen and heard we report to you, that ye also may have fellowship with us". That is, the idea of the Son of God, the idea of the Person is there; although the anointing may not be there at the outset and was not, the Person is there; the Person in responsibility, seeing about His Father's business.
A.H.P. Is that all to add lustre to the greatness of the incarnation? In the end of Luke He invites them to "Handle me and see, for a spirit has not flesh and bones as ye see me having", Luke 24:39. Is there some thought of magnifying the greatness of the incarnation?
J.T. The passage alluded to is Luke 24 and what is in mind is His identification as in the midst, who He was; so that it is the full Person (I am using that word just for the sake of stress); He is there. He was invisible for a while for He did not emerge from Emmaus immediately into the assembly at Jerusalem. The mystery side is left open. Where had He been? He had vanished but where had He been? Late in the day He is seen standing in the midst of them; not anywhere but in the midst of them. The result
is perturbation, and the Lord quiets them; for it is not a time of rebuke. It is a time of reality in them, and what they were to Him, and how soon they can be used; how quickly He can render them useful to Him in the testimony. And so He is seen standing in their midst. It is not said that He came; where He was is left open, as if we are to be reminded of inscrutability even there.
A.P.T. This morning we were speaking of "as many as received him", John 1:12. Simeon received Him in his arms. Is that characteristic of the family entitled to be called children of God?
J.T. You are stressing the fact that they received Him and as having received Him they are recognised as children of God?
A.P.T. Yes; in connection with the Person; not His anointing, but Him.
J.T. Well, quite so. It is just a question now of the resurrection of the Person. Everything must hinge on that; the identification of the Person.
N.B. You just mentioned inscrutability. I would like to ask if these 'thats' involve inscrutability in the Lord's Person or whether they do not go that far.
J.T. Well, the neuter being used, I suppose, is to stress reality. The word 'thing' had already been used -- "the holy thing" which must mean reality and, too, substance. So here it says, "That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes; that which we contemplated, and our hands handled". I am not sure that inscrutability is necessarily stressed; I think it is rather that reality is there. There is no mistake about it; the real Person is there.
C.A.M. Is it right to say that what is stressed is a Person who is so infinitely great as He was, yet within our range, within the faculties we have to apprehend?
J.T. Yes; and He can be seen as the apostle says, "which we have seen with our eyes; that which
we contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the word of life". There He is reachable and touchable; and you might say, familiar in His relations with them. As the narrative goes on you see how much it was so; because Christianity must be founded on reality; a real Person in the relation testified to. The enemy was just ready to deny God; Matthew stresses that.
S.McC. If I gather rightly from what you say you carry this beginning right into Luke 1 and 2?
J.T. I should say that; and if it be a question of reality, well, it is important that there is a real Babe and a real Boy and a real young Man, speaking with the greatest reverence; a Man of thirty years of age. All that is most important as regards reality. Christianity is not like any of the Eastern or other religions; it is founded on fact, incontestable fact.
J.T.Jr. The Father's voice saying, "In whom I have found my delight" would mean it would point all the way back to His birth. His delight was in every movement of His.
J.T. Quite so. What a time it must have been, and it is a question for each of us as to the Father and His feelings; these feelings of the Father and the Son and the Spirit of God. Some of us during the past six or eight years have gone through experiences never gone through before by us or even by Christians, and we have found God in them. In the most remarkable instances, the most remarkable occurrences, we have found God in our circumstances. It is to strengthen our hearts and make us real, both in regard of one another and in regard of the service of God and the testimony in general.
S.McC. In these expressions in relation to what we are saying, "the eternal life, which was with the Father", would you carry that into the state of Babehood and Youth and Manhood that Luke brings out in such a way in the opening chapters?
J.T. What we have already said about it is that suitable conditions and provisions are made; suitable, seemly conditions; swaddling clothes are there and suitable clothes all along, suggesting right feelings. That is to say, in persons who are the subjects of God's work, in whom this should be seen. And so Luke 1 and Luke 2 is of the utmost importance as to what happened; first, as to the incarnation; as to the conception and the incarnation and the babehood and boyhood of the Lord, and how He is spoken of; how Elizabeth speaks of Him; how she speaks of John, the unborn child, moving in the presence of Mary, the mother of our Lord. These are all facts that are of utmost importance as to the reality of Christianity.
S.J.H. Is what you are saying so necessary in the way of substance with John that what he closes with is that we might have a conscious knowledge of it all? He closes the epistle with a conscious knowledge of it.
J.T. Yes; and ending with the wonderful fact in the first epistle: "He is the true God and eternal life", 1 John 5:20. He has that glorious Person in mind and yet inscrutability; for He is God. Yet as to what was said a moment ago as to what the Father might not, or might have found in the babe days of our Lord, in the early years of His life, what relations there might be -- it seems as if the Spirit of God would show us that things were seemly, not fantastic or extraordinary in any way. They were seemly. It was a real babe, needing all the attention of a babe. Seemliness is expressed in the testimony of God in Luke, that things should be so.
J.T.Jr. Great care is taken in Luke's gospel at the beginning in connection with the kind of persons who had to do with the Lord.
J.T. So it is the little Child and its mother, not its father. The Magi found Him with His mother,
which is seemly and what we might expect; with all the instruction and knowledge she received that she should be His caretaker. She was eventually made the mother of John the evangelist, showing that she was usable in the Lord's hand, and thoroughly subject, although there were exceptions, of course. At the same time she says, "Behold the bondmaid of the Lord, be it to me according to thy word", Luke 1:38 showing that everything was perfect in that sense and heaven looked on. We have touches in the prophetic word, of course, such as Samson's mother, Hannah and other mothers that we may transfer to Mary, for God would not stint what is mentioned in that way or in any way in the measure in which it might contribute to the glory of Christ. Any incident that might contribute in any way to the glory of Christ would be mentioned.
S.McC. It would be right to say that Mary was but the vessel connected with this unique matter of the incarnation. The Lord took not one single thing from her in regard of what we are now dwelling on, did He? He took nothing from Mary.
J.T. Yes, quite so; that is, in His humanity; although it might be said that she was His mother and His humanity came through her, but it will not do to say that, because God is His Father. He is the Son of God and His humanity in that sense must be attributed to God.
J.R.H. The incarnation would be like the unleavened cake of fine flour mingled with the oil seen in the oblation.
J.T. That we might devote ourselves to the priesthood so that we might take up things rightly. The Spirit of God just says enough in Luke on these points to illuminate and to enlighten us as to the Lord. There is much, of course, that could be said as to Mary's feelings, and Joseph's feelings and Simeon's feelings and Anna's feelings. This would be a priestly
matter; those who were touching and seeing and handling the precious Babe would all be priests. And it is necessary that we should so regard it; that in Christianity this should be enveloped in all that is needed to guard the Person involved.
R.W.S. We should take time to contemplate. It is not only seen with our eyes but that which we have contemplated.
J.T. I am glad you mention that because it suggests that affection and intelligence are called for, when you bring in the idea of contemplation into such a matter. What could not a person like Anna say, and Elizabeth, and John's father, Zacharias, as restored fully and able to speak? What would they not say? There would be a conversation suitable that you might expect from them. All that enters into Christianity.
J.A.P. Would you link up the contemplation with the beginning of Luke where Mary kept all these things in her mind and pondered them in her heart?
A.N.W. Is there any distinction between the contemplation in the first epistle and the contemplation of His glory in the gospel?
J.T. Well, I have no doubt there is a certain selection in the language in the epistle here and the gospel, in the idea of contemplation. It is said in the gospel: "And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father)", John 1:14. The word is 'tabernacled' meaning that there would be room for the display of what might be there in the way of adornment in the Person. "And we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father", John 1:14. The word 'with' there is intelligible to all of us. There is a note as to it: '(para, with a genitive as here, means'on the part of','from with'gives the sense. But this must not be understood in
the sense of'with'merely)'. The word 'with' -- the idea would be that we are on a common level, so to speak; that there is a platform on which divine Persons can be contemplated; not that the Father is seen displayed visibly in the sense in which the Son could be, but there is the thought of contemplation, and the 'with' would link the Father and Son together. "As of an only-begotten with a father, full of grace and truth". And then, "for of his fulness we all have received, and grace upon grace". I think that paragraph from verse 14 to 18 of John 1 is to add to the whole matter as to what Christ was in relation with God as His Father, and what movement there must have been; what holy movements drawing out the Father's affections there must have been.
G.MacPh. Would hearing and seeing go together? Hearing involves teaching. Contemplation and handling and seeing involve the substance.
J.T. Yes. "That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard". That alludes to speaking, "which we have seen with our eyes"; which would imply the means of contemplation and the scope of contemplation; "that which we contemplated, and our hands handled, concerning the word of life". And then the bracket which enlarges on the matter: "(and the life has been manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and report to you the eternal life, which was with the Father, and has been manifested to us:) that which we have seen and heard we report to you, that ye also may have fellowship with us". The idea of report is immediately added; that is, what could be reported in the sense of eternal life.
C.H.H. Would the expression, "that which we have heard" be an advance on Luke? That is, what the apostles had contemplated would go beyond what is contemplated in Luke.
J.T. I do not suppose there is anything more than what John says here; "which we have contemplated".
I do not suppose there is anything more in it than that fact; they were witnesses. They were full competent witnesses, and of course, that is necessary, because they were apostles, and the idea of fellowship is suggested here, that they had something of their own which is called fellowship.
A.N.W. That is the basis of this report. We cannot say we have seen what they have seen, but we have attended to their report.
N.B. Is there a relation between the eternal life which was with the Father, and the Word which was with God?
J.T. Well, there must be; only what John is putting down here is his own competency and the competency of the twelve -- the eleven and himself, to bear testimony; that there is ample, full, complete competency in the testimony rendered; and John is concerned about that.
A.N.W. Would not the latter be in time and the former in past eternity? "The Word was with God, and the Word was God", John 1:1. Would that be past eternity, before time?
J.T. Yes, quite so. What can we say except what is said, that He was with God? I mean to say, the Spirit of God does not give us anything more, any terms as to the Deity in its infinite attractiveness, save that They were there; that divine Persons were there, there intelligibly with each other.
A.N.W. Would "with the Father" involve time and incarnation?
J.T. Well, quite so; I should say that, too.
S.McC. In the conflict over eternal life, the attack of the enemy was to make eternal life a condition that existed before time; but the Scriptures do not present it that way.
J.T. No, they do not. What they do present is the Person who is the subject of the testimony, and
while that is carried back to eternity, yet there is nothing to indicate what the actual relations were; but when the testimony is rendered, then we have to consider the anointing, showing what was there and then the power of the apostles, too, because they were anointed, too. They were rendered capable of bearing testimony to what was there.
A.R. Is there anything in the holy Scriptures to tell us what was before time?
J.T. We have the statement, of course, that "the Word was with God", John 1:1. That is a fact. The mere word 'with' involves some association. It conveys the idea of association, because it is carried through to the Paraclete, to the Holy Spirit. But He is with the apostles in a real sense so as to be understood. The Father and the Son, or the divine Persons, to leave it just as it is, were with each other. This, of course, is something that can be positively stated. Why we should proceed further I do not know. I think there is much opened up to us to fill our souls, and perhaps we should not be too much desirous of having something spoken because it is so delicate a matter. It is always dangerous to say anything but exactly what Scripture says. And what Scripture says is, "and the Word was with God, and the Word was God", John 1:1.
J.R.H. The Lord spoke of the glory that He had along with the Father before the world was.
J.T. That is an allusion to this. I am glad you mentioned that. It comes where you expect it to come, in John 17, where we should expect a full revelation of what He would have us to see. The veil is lifted away for us to see in, but it is rendered very obscure; we cannot say much.
F.N.W. "For thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world", John 17:24.
G.MacPh. Reading John 1:2 may be instructive:
"and the life has been manifested", but in speaking of the report he says "the eternal life". Is that what they saw here on earth?
J.T. Quite so. Therefore it is "concerning the word of life", that is to say, what the eyes saw and the hands handled was concerning the word of life; not exactly concerning God and the Father and the Son, but concerning eternal life. That was the great issue in the controversy alluded to, but it is the point all the way down; what can be spoken of in the sense of eternal life.
R.H. Would the forty days the Lord was on earth after His resurrection have a bearing on this?
J.T. Well, there is something there to think of, because a good many of them were there. There were forty days. Luke tells us that in Acts 1, "having by the Holy Spirit charged the apostles whom he had chosen, he was taken up; to whom also he presented himself living, after he had suffered, with many proofs; being seen by them during forty days". So that there was a good period of time in which they could take account of the Lord. Doubtless He was not always visible to them, and the inscrutable side would be, no doubt, in evidence. But it goes on to say, "and speaking of the things which concern the kingdom of God; and, being assembled with them, commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to await the promise of the Father, which (said he) ye have heard of me. For John indeed baptised with water, but ye shall be baptised with the Holy Spirit after now not many days", Acts 1:3,4. So that I think we can, in a holy way, visualise something of what went on during those forty days. Luke does not mention it until this chapter, and surely he now mentions that to verify further what he intended by the Spirit to further disclose, and the treatise embraces the whole book of Acts. What things there must have been! And so Paul in his time in his
writing sees it is needed to mention that the Lord had been seen of Cephas, and of the twelve, and of five hundred brethren at once, and of James, then of all the apostles, and finally as Paul said, "last of all, as to an abortion, he appeared to me also", 1 Corinthians 15:8; showing that what Paul saw was just added on to the general position; what had been seen during the forty days before the Holy Spirit came down, and then what was seen as the Holy Spirit came down. Paul's experiences were just added to that, showing the full thought is there as to the Lord as He is now; what is to be apprehended now until He comes.
R.R.T. Would you say that would be included in verse 3, "He presented himself living after he had suffered, with many proofs", Acts 1:3? It does not enlarge on what the many proofs were, but it would contain a lot.
J.T. I suppose the King James Version translators felt the need of putting 'infallible' in there so as to enlarge on the thing; but it is just "many proofs" really. We are not told how many, but much must have preceded.
W.McK. Is this matter of reality to help us as to a clear knowledge? In 1 John 2:13 it says, "I write to you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning". That is a matter of reality to help us in regard of knowledge.
J.T. Well, what we are saying together now is to help us increase our knowledge and, of course, we are to increase our spiritual power and knowledge because the Lord is surely aiming to increase our knowledge, to make persons fit for the testimony out of us. And so this chapter in the Acts becomes of first-rate importance, because it seems to be almost a second thought of Luke's; not that he would speak of it in that sense except to make the idea clear. The first treatise was left unfinished. We do not get a complete
finish. Luke says, "And he led them out as far as Bethany, and having lifted up his hands, he blessed them. And it came to pass as he was blessing them, he was separated from them and was carried up into heaven", Luke 24:51 Well, that is how the matter is finished, and we can see that Christianity can hardly be left thus. Heaven would not leave it thus. The Lord would not leave it thus. The Spirit of God as come down from heaven would not leave it thus, and hence much time must have elapsed in order to bring the truth out, extending to Paul's times and to Paul himself. Hence, perhaps we have not thought of it as we are now mentioning it, that much time had to be expended from the divine standpoint to bring out the knowledge needed. That there should be real knowledge, too; not merely things written down, but real knowledge amongst the disciples. And so Christianity is a real thing, or has to do with real things, and the things mentioned just now are enough to prove it was real.
J.McK. It is a matter of what we have. Paul preached Jesus as the Son of God. In 1 John 5 we find, "that God has given to us eternal life; and this life is in his Son. He that has the Son has life; he that has not the Son of God has not life". What we have brings us to what you have in mind. God has committed to us certain things that we have received.
J.T. Just so; and that is completed in the sense that He is the true God and eternal life. You might say it is a separate statement at the end of this epistle to ascertain that the Lord Jesus is known here in testimony and in the assembly as coming in and going out among us; that He is the true God and eternal life and it should make us worshipful. It is intended to.
A.N.W. I presume the handling would include Luke 24 and possibly exclude Thomas' handling?
J.T. I would not mind letting all the handling come into it. There must have been much. The
appendix to John's gospel lets us into much; that is, the three manifestations.
C.H.H. Would Mr. Darby's note to 'handle' referring to Luke 24:39 help? "Handle me and see, for a spirit has not flesh and bones as ye see me having". That is the reference.
J.T. Showing how real the matter was; and now that He is actually in the assembly, we have the facts given. There is a difference between flesh and blood and flesh and bones. The condition of blood is not carried through; it is flesh and bones. That is to say, humanity in that sense, Christ as risen. And so John's epistle would say, "we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is" 1 John 3:2; as if the seeing Him and our own translation, our own change, would synchronise. It is a question of what we see. We shall see Him as He is, and also, we shall have bodies like His present one; like His own glorious body; that is the kind of body we shall have.
J.A.P. What would the Lord mean when He says to Thomas, "Blessed they who have not seen and have believed", John 20:29? Is that our position?
J.T. Well, that is to bring out the superiority of Christianity to the millennium when they will believe what they see; but the Lord is saying that Christianity is superior because we do not see, yet we believe. We believe-it is belief on the basis of our faith; not what we see but our faith.
J.A.P. Does this chapter then cover a greater matter than the report in Romans 10 -- faith comes by report?
J.T. Yes, I think so. This is the apostles personally making the report and so they are to be viewed as a class or group of persons morally fitted for these great things; that is, to make this report. The twelve had this service, to make this report; that is, the report of eternal life in the sense in which it is spoken of here. It is to greatly enhance the idea of
eternal life, and it gives us instruction as to the great conflicts already gone through about sixty years ago; terrible strife it was, but the Lord stood by the brethren and the truth of eternal life was asserted, and the truth continues. The brethren are able to speak of it now.
C.R.H. Was there any expression of eternal life before the economy?
J.T. You mean of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the present economy? It is on this basis the gospel is preached and it is preached for the obedience of faith. "In full assurance of faith", Hebrews 10:22. That is the basis of Christianity. We are not able to say much in the sense of what we see, but what we understand by faith.
R.H. Peter in his address to Cornelius' house says in Acts 10, "This man God raised up the third day and gave him to be openly seen, not of all the people, but of witnesses who were chosen before of God, us who have eaten and drunk with him after he arose from among the dead", Acts 10:40,41. Would that be like this?
J.T. Very good. How important it was; the twelve were not all there but there were six persons there with Peter, showing the keeping up of the thought of the importance of witnesses; that Christianity is attested to by accredited witnesses.
Ques. Is that why in chapter 2 in relation to chapter 1 which you are suggesting as a basis on which to work it says, "I write to you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning"?
J.T. Showing how important they were. There are three grades of persons: fathers, young men and little children. The fathers have first place because of their experience and that experience involves knowing Him that is from the beginning.
J.R.H. The Lord in speaking to the disciples says, "Ye too bear witness, because ye are with me from the beginning", John 15:27.
J.T. That is a good point to bring in here, because it fits in there in John 15 with the break in the gospel, in the whole book; that is, chapter 14. It is chapter 13 really that is the break. Chapter 14 introduces the Spirit. He is called there "the Comforter"; and the twelve "ye also". The Lord means by that that they had a peculiar place. Therefore it is said here, "that ye also may have fellowship with us; and our fellowship is indeed with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ". They are the only ones in that. We are admitted into it and others are admitted into it, but there is no such fellowship properly now they have gone. There are no such men as these twelve men up to that time.
J.McK. Do you get in Acts 1 the expression of the intelligence of the disciples in choosing one to take Judas's place?
J.T. Yes, and so they did what was needed, and it shows what comes out in John 15, following chapter 14; that is, the presence of the Comforter. The twelve apostles are seen as standing alongside of the Spirit. They have a place by themselves, and the Spirit has a place, of course, by Himself; and it is said that He proceeds from with the Father, stressing the word 'with'. That is, He is with the Father and has that position with the Father. He apprehended what the Father's thoughts were when the Lord Jesus went into heaven. That is where the Lord Jesus went, into heaven, and He comes from that point, too.
J.McK. I was thinking more on the line of witness among themselves. It says, "It is necessary therefore, that of the men who have assembled with us all the time in which the Lord Jesus came in and went out among us, beginning from the baptism of John until the day in which he was taken up from us, one of these should be a witness with us of his resurrection", Acts 1:21,22.
J.T. Just so. That is the period that had taken place when the gospel of John was written, so the twelve were there; the total number was there, and they stood alongside the Spirit. "Ye also" alludes to the place that they have and none will be by them. That is treated of in our chapter in 1 John. The twelve had a place none others had; a fellowship by themselves. They were competent to bear testimony to what they had seen of eternal life, and to the end that the saints may have joy. That it might be a real matter, that their joy might be full.
E.A.L. "And these things write we to you that your joy may be full. And this is the message which we have heard from him, and declare to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all". Then several verses following bring in the 'we'. In this way do we have to see that in this personal report the apostles are stressing that they personally have to be dependent on the Lord?
J.T. Verse 5 is the general position of Christianity; the earlier verses contemplate the twelve and what importance they had in establishing the truth of Christianity. "And this is the message which we have heard from him, and declare to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not practise the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin". So that the position now with the saints generally from John's viewpoint is established in this message, whereas they remain in their place and had a fellowship of their own. And the ground of the testimony, therefore, is incontestable because of these twelve men so accredited and so formed and set down beside the Spirit Himself, as witnesses. But then the Spirit would come down in addition to all this. He proceeded from the Father
to witness of the Father's affection shown thus as the Lord Jesus went into heaven. He would carry on and tell the saints generally what He could tell them. All that would be included in the gospel.
R.R.T. Would you say that the witness we are speaking of now of the twelve would be the same as what we referred to in chapter 5? "If we receive the witness of men",1 John 5:9. Is that the witness we are speaking of?
J.T. Quite so, showing what God had done. The epistle of John would bring out incontestably the pains God had gone to to bring in a testimony to men. "This is the witness", John says, and he tells the kind of thing that had been witnessed.
R.R.T. But then he goes on to say the witness of God is greater. "And this is the witness, that God has given to us eternal life", 1 John 5:11.
J.T. That is good and goes on to our own formation; how the witness should affect us as having received eternal life. How does it affect us? What a witness it is! Therefore, there is a little word to be said about the lady, the elect lady; having brought the twelve, the apostles, into evidence in what is stated in chapter 1, especially as to righteousness and the confession of sins -- a most important matter for us as Christians. But now we come to this elect lady. "The elder to the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth, and not I only but also all who have known the truth, for the truth's sake which abides in us and shall be with us to eternity"; a remarkable statement. I do not know if you get it just this way elsewhere. And then, "Grace shall be with you, mercy, peace from God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love". And then to follow up with what has been already said as to discipline, and how a sister can be used of God in the exercise of discipline, it says, "For many deceivers have gone out into the
world, they who do not confess Jesus Christ coming in flesh -- this is the deceiver and the antichrist. See to yourselves, that we may not lose what we have wrought, but may receive full wages. Whosoever goes forward and abides not in the doctrine of the Christ has not God. He that abides in the doctrine, he has both the Father and the Son. If anyone come to you and bring not this doctrine, do not receive him into the house, and greet him not; for he who greets him partakes in his wicked works". I thought it would be worthy at the close of our meetings that we might have this sister who is called a lady by the apostle John-that we might have her before us as illustrating what sisters can be in our day in faithfulness to the truth in regard of their children and their local meetings, and in regard of anyone that might come and prove to be unreal and might introduce bad doctrine. How we are to be protected from all this.
L.E.S. Why is the feminine side stressed here?
J.T. Well, we have it mentioned two or three times, and we have another one mentioned, whoever she is, who is worthy of note: "The children of thine elect sister greet thee". Therefore, we have two sisters, two women, women of note, in the ordinary sense, of worth. They are reliable persons who can be trusted in our localities and responsibility placed on them. It seems to me it would be a great asset to our position now if our sisters would awaken to what is possible in the sisterhood.
J.R.H. Is your thought that we should gather something of what we had in the beginning in Genesis, taking on basic ideas so that we might be sound and established and faithful in the doctrine?
J.W.W. Would Sarah's judgment of Ishmael be on the same line, the sisterhood in discipline?
J.T. You mean, "Cast out the maid servant and her son; for the son of the maid servant shall not
inherit with the son of the free woman", Galatians 4:30. And it is called Scripture, showing how the sayings, the words of a sister can be ennobled and have a place in the testimony, a unique place, because it is called Scripture. What she said to Abraham about Ishmael is called Scripture.
L.E.S. Would all this offset the power operating in system in regard of Jezebel?
C.H.H. Would John have in mind here what Paul is speaking about in saying Satan beguiled Eve?
J.T. That is the same line. Something has come to one's notice lately as to the place Jehu has in the testimony of God. Certain things have been said of him as if his position in the testimony is somewhat discredited; but in truth Jehu is seen to be a continuous testimony running through two dispensations, showing how a man can be used of God in two dispensations. So we have something like two chapters about Jehu in the second book of Kings and some small bit of testimony to him in the book of Chronicles and the question arose as to whether we do not need to be careful and give witnesses their full scope, whoever they may be. It is a matter of giving them the scope God gives them. And so, while Jehu was a fast driver, let God have His way and let God say what He will about Jehu and let us see how God is pleased to carry the testimony as to Jehu right down to the book of Revelation and give it a great place involving the destruction of Jezebel. That is the idea of his ministry, to destroy the house of Ahab and that runs right down to the great Romish system now.
A.N.W. "Come ... and see my zeal for Jehovah", 2 Kings 10:16.
A.B. Why is it the elect lady and her sister?
J.T. Well, he is speaking at the end of the epistle
about her sister. "The children of thine elect sister greet thee". That is, she is called an elect lady.
A.B. What is in mind in relation to 'elect'? Is it because of the rarity of this quality found amongst sisters?
J.T. It seems as if the word 'elect' is a first-rate word in the vocabulary of the testimony. I would think it fits in with the Colossian epistle. I think we shall find it operating in relation to the epistle to Colosse, in a vital way, and it is intended to encourage sisters. What is opened to sisters in the sense of importance in the testimony; not a matter of personal importance or distinction, but importance as to these matters because of its value, because heaven appraises it in that way. This sister, who is doubtless well known to the elect lady, is there, and both of them have children which would indicate that God is attaching value to the children of sisters who have a place in the testimony, and that they must not be neglectful of them. Their care of them is only to enhance their place in the testimony.
E.A.L. The footnote to verse 9 referring to the beginning is interesting. "Whosoever goes forward", the footnote reads, "What is called 'development': he does not abide in what was from the beginning".
J.T. And the note means what is called Darwinism. I believe God is aiming at that, and it is creeping into schools and is taught in the schools by women teachers especially, teaching it to young children. It is a great matter that the sisters be watchful over their children; and that is the point John makes to the elect lady and her children, to cling to the truth. If this bad teaching is brought up in the schools the children with their little voices come forward and say that it is not Scripture and God would honour them for it and support them in doing it.
A.P.T. The teaching of Jehovah's Witnesses is
very close to it. They attack the truth from house to house.
J.T. It is a terrible effort of the devil, this house - to - house matter. It is for us to withstand them. Some of us know the history of that thing and it is well to have it. Of course, the doctrine commenced with a man called Russell in Pittsburgh and later changed their name under a man called Judge Rutherford and now it is Jehovah's Witnesses, which is positively wicked, that they should dub themselves that. In the first place Jehovah is not the point now. It was the same with the woman with the spirit of Python at Philippi. She followed Paul and said, "These men are bondmen of the most high God", Acts 16:17. They have branded themselves in that way, in bringing forth a testimony that belongs to the millennium and making it the testimony for the present time.
B.H. I met such a man the other day and asked if he believed that the Lord Jesus was a divine Person and he said, No.
J.T. I know. Christian Science is in the same class.
S.McC. It is important in regard of what you are saying as to clarity in regard of doctrine; not only in relation to the meetings and the ministry but in relation to our houses. Let our sisters know the doctrine in view of these great errors.
J.T. Yes. We would not wish to whip the sisters because they cannot strike back, but at the same time there is a great sphere for sisters. We have alluded to the matter of the daughters of Philip several times, illustrious persons, who prophesied. That is to say, they did the work, and the question is whether sisters are working out the truth in their own experiences, so to speak, and answer people at the doors, or whatever it may be, and say the truth; or the schools -- young people rejecting certain things. They say, I cannot accept that; it is not the truth.
R.R.T. The elect lady here is suitable to greet the apostle.
E.T.P. Would you say the great preservative feature in us in this matter is holding the truth in love as we count on the Holy Spirit?
J.T. Quite so; holding it in love.
These books, John's gospel and the book of the Revelation, are written by John himself, and it is because of this that in measure they are read, because John affords us one who can be relied upon. The Lord made His selections in view of His services and made no mistakes, it need not be said; and hence if selection has to be made we can understand how John would be chosen to make them -- the selection of one to serve or for a group to serve. And so John has been selected at this time in order to point out persons who are without guile. He had a great knowledge of persons and no doubt the Lord had this in mind when He made him a favourite; when He made him the disciple whom He loved. Critical times had arrived in the history of the truth. John lived to be a considerable age; some lived to be a great age. Critical times had arrived. There were special missions needed; and so it was that the Lord said to Peter that if it were His thought to reserve John for such purposes that was within His rights. He had used Peter, too; He gave him work to do, greater indeed in import than the work He gave John. He assigned Peter to assembly service. "Thou shalt be called Cephas", John 1:42 He said to him when He saw him, according to John. He looked at him, which is something to be kept in mind, for a look from Jesus means something. It is not casual. He looked at Peter and told him what he was to be called. The account is different in Matthew because there the Lord says of him that he was material: "Thou art Peter". Paul had something to say about the apostles, which you can understand he would love to do in due course-after his conversion he had in
mind to become acquainted with the apostles, and I might say in passing it is a very important thing for young people as to what acquaintances, what companionships they are making. We get examples as to what to do in those matters: what kind of associations, companionships, we are to select for ourselves. And so in Paul's case he decided that he would go up to Jerusalem to make acquaintance with Peter. At that time I suppose he could scarcely make a better selection than Peter. He was a man of experience at that time, as experience went, although they were all comparatively young. As far as I can see the Lord did not select elder brethren to be apostles or to be overseers or deacons; He made His selection from the younger ones. And so Paul made his selection and the Lord would approve, there can be no doubt. He said he went up to make acquaintance with Peter and stayed with him fifteen days; so that we can see how the early apostles and Christians were governed, what influenced them, and we do well to take note of what influenced them and see to ourselves, as to what influences us in making selections as to companionships and the like.
In coming to John's gospel he clearly made a good selection to prepare his material for the book he was about to write. He also made a good selection in preparing the Apocalypse, and the Lord helped him in that. So that if there be any thought with any of us about serving in this way, whether in taking notes for the Lord's people or transcribing them or revising them, the Lord will help us to do it, and there is great need for it, too. Material for the saints in that sense, for their reading, is piling up and as far as I see there is no hope of overtaking the work that should be done, and done well. There are touches at the beginning of John's gospel and at the end of it that show that he took great care so that any selections that should be made by the brethren
in later years should be suitable; for the Holy Spirit was over it all. All that John did and all the others did was governed, controlled by the Holy Spirit. That is another point to keep before us, that the blessed Spirit is here in the office of another Comforter, another Paraclete; that is, another divine Person beside us, ready to stretch forth His hand to help us in time of need, whatever the need may be. It is not a time for idleness. The Lord is ready to send out labourers. The work needs to be done and He is ready to use us and give us to understand that we are worth using. I do not think the Lord would make selection of a person, who was not worth it, therefore we may as well challenge our hearts as to what we have been able to do heretofore, to see if we are worth anything, because heaven is making calculations on these lines. So John made his selection as to guileless persons. You might say, Why should he do that? Well, the word is there in this chapter 1 and the word may be there in the book of Revelation from which I have read. At any rate, the words 'lie' and 'falsehood' are very akin and very near to the idea of guile. John evidently in making his selections has the thought of selecting certain persons who are guileless, and the first one is Nathanael. There can be no question about the word applying to him; the Lord Himself is quoted by John here, and He points to Nathanael and says, "Behold one truly an Israelite, in whom there is no guile" (verse 47). So that it is time for us to look into this matter of guile if we have not done it already, for John has been selected to make selections of the kind of people that are known as guileful and then guileless people. So, as I said, you can see how he would think around and begin his great book on this point and begin it right. There is a man already converted immediately, you might say. He has been sitting under the fig-tree just recently and questioning what one is saying about the Lord
Jesus; and in questioning the servants of the Lord, those who are reputed to be that, we run great risks in speaking ill of them. In this particular case the person involved was speaking ill of Christ. He was questioning the Lord Jesus. "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" He is speaking of the Lord Jesus when he says that. You can see how easily we may make comments of that kind as to those who are seeking to serve the Lord's people. The Spirit of God will not forget what we say and will point a finger at us, too, as He can, if we are saying things that are not right, that are not true, about anything. So the Lord knew all about this and that is another matter that one can conveniently speak of, that the Lord knows everything about us. He says here to Nathanael, "Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw thee". One might multiply references of that kind -- where one was last night; where last evening was spent, and whether the Lord could say, I saw thee there; you did not know it, but I saw thee.
Well now, I am endeavouring to speak about Nathanael and the remarkable history that he has, which is left by the pen of John for us. He runs through the gospel, seen first in this way by the Lord, and the Lord saw him moving toward him. You say, Well, that is a small matter, but it is not a small matter; it is a big matter, that even he should move toward the Lord Jesus. Just a moment ago he had been speaking ill of the Lord; at least speaking disrespectfully of Him. Now the Lord looks at him; when He saw him coming to Him He looked at him. As I said at the beginning, a look from Christ at a person is no small matter. That is to say, it is a question of who the person may be and what the history may be behind it, and whether the Lord is looking at you inquiringly for something. Maybe you do what you can do and He may be questioning
that you are hardly fit to do it; that you require some adjustment before you can do it. There is great need, but there is great need of adjustment; and so when the Lord saw him coming to Him, He says, "Behold one truly an Israelite, in whom there is no guile". As if it were a rare matter and undoubtedly it was, and it is a rare matter now: an Israelite who is without guile is a rare matter today. Follow them up in their business affairs and household affairs and you shall soon discover whether there is guile or not. And if there is not then heaven knows it and is pleased with it. So it was that Nathanael was in mind to be an apostle, no less than that. How quickly the Lord would settle matters in that way. Indeed, when He appointed the apostles He spent the whole night in prayer. You can see how the Lord would go over the ground as regards Peter. He was always the first, and then James and then John. Nathanael is an apostle and the Lord has selected him, and in view of that He is saying things about him. Hence, as I said, I am now seeking to challenge the brethren as to what is to be done; how much is to be done, and whether there are any who can do it, and whether they are ready to come forward to do it and sacrifice to do it, because that is the way of heaven. The way of heaven is to sacrifice. The Lord Jesus made the greatest of all sacrifices. He has led the way for us in that sense, and so, therefore, I am inquiring now as to this person and what his capabilities are, what the Lord is thinking about him, what place he is to have in the list, in the cabinet; for there is such a thing as in David's time and Solomon's time and others': persons who have held offices, and so it is the thing is going on today and the places are not all filled. There is great need; not, indeed, for such work as I am doing now, in so much as there is a great number that can do it. Some think the number is increasing. Is it
because there is a certain advantage in it, more than in other offices that are unfilled? It is a question of whether we are making a right selection in choosing certain things to be done.
And so it is that the epistles to the Corinthians help us. We are to choose the best gifts, but rather that we may prophesy. That is a thing that is not very much done, especially by sisters. One often has spoken about that. In Philip's day there were sisters who did it. I do not know of any now. But I must return to what the Lord is thinking of. It is wonderful, indeed, that anyone of us should have the privilege of looking into what the Lord is thinking of doing, as it were. We think of it in the prayer meetings; we think of what the Lord is about to do with certain ones and pray for them accordingly. So the Lord was thinking about Nathanael. He was in His mind for an office and he is showing his capabilities; he is showing his reliability. I do not know of anything more important than reliability, that a brother can be trusted with a matter, whether it be doctrine or whether it be a visitation to a needy person who wishes to break bread and the like. It is a question of whether the persons are reliable and whether the persons who are seeking to serve them are priests indeed, priests unto God, priests unto the saints, so that they are reliable. I am venturing to enlarge on this matter of Nathanael that the Lord is making a selection of him. He is telling it abroad that he has a certain quality that is of the highest importance, and the highest order. He is a man without guile; he is an Israelite. I need not say that Israelites have certain characteristics and, of course, in the early days there were a great many in the fellowship who had those characteristics and there are very few now. At the same time, there are persons who follow in the steps of the early Israelites who were known as believers, who were selected when
any matter came up, such as deacon work. The time came when it was necessary to have them, and there is a great ado, so to say, made about it, that these brothers that ought to fill the offices are to be relied on. I am selecting this brother Nathanael because the Lord is taking him on. He is taking on others now, not of the same value as Nathanael but still the Lord is taking on workers and He is trying them out. He has His standards and these standards will soon appear. The Lord will work out these things so that they do appear and will appear, whether any are capable of taking on services which are so urgent and needed. I have already said I am not speaking of what I am doing now, for there are a great many in mind for this kind of service. It is sought after. Brethren come distances so as to have a part in it, and rightly. The thing has to be done, and so the question is reliability; whether a brother can be trusted to do such work and whether it will harm him in any sense. Because if it is liable to harm him, keep him away from it, and keep it away from him. If he has come a long way to get it, well, be careful. He may do well and he may not, because the Lord is looking for persons who are reliable in these matters so that the truth is being rightly presented to us by those who know it; those who believe and know the truth. These are the ones.
Well now, as I said, the Lord has already committed Himself to Nathanael. "Behold one truly an Israelite, in whom there is no guile". He is in the Lord's mind for apostleship, but it is now time for me to pass on to something else, and that is to think of Nathanael in his reliability as a guileless man. How important it is that there are such persons, even if there only be one in a thousand or a million who are really guileless; who are really trustworthy in the sense of doing things honestly, having no motive but uprightness in what they are doing. And so the Lord
went on to say to him, "Thou shalt see greater things than these". It is encouraging at this very moment, to me at least and no doubt to others, that there are such great things ahead of us; greater things than we realise ahead of us. "Things which eye has not seen, and ear not heard, and which have not come into man's heart, which God has prepared for them that love him, but God has revealed to us by [his] Spirit; for the Spirit searches all things, even the depths of God", 1 Corinthians 2:9,10. And that we can understand. We can have a clear outlook in that sense from the passage I have quoted from 1 Corinthians. So it was that Nathanael would be set on his way. Alas, he fell out of the way. John tells us that he went with Peter to fish when he should not have gone; but still he got his service. The Lord allotted to him the service He had in mind for him as He did with Peter. So the Lord has His thoughts about us and whatever they are He will carry them through. He may discipline us in order that He can carry them through but He will do it. "But desire earnestly the greater gifts, and yet shew I unto you a way of more surpassing excellence", 1 Corinthians 12:31. That is the way of love. So I would say to everyone, if indeed you may be diverted at all, look out for love. Take that on, because it will never fail.
Well now, I must go on to the Apocalypse, because we have a wonderful group there and they are selected by John. He makes a selection although in a prophetic sense; not in the clear way in which the gospels make their selection, but he makes his selection and we should just see the features of it to show how near the millennial blessing will be to ours, the one that we are in. John is dealing with both. He is dealing with the present dispensation too. Nathanael was really taken up primarily as an Israelite, but he becomes an apostle: therefore, he belongs to the assembly. Then the next group is the one at mount
Zion. We will just look at it: "and in their mouths was no lie found; [for] they are blameless" The word is really 'guile', or it may be 'lie', but there seems to be a question about that. 'Guile' would be quite safe to think of; "for they are blameless". So that we have some inkling here as to what millennial blessing will be and what the kind of people are to be in that day for the offices to be filled. But I am now dealing with the present time. I am dealing now with John, of course, who is not a millennial man. He is an apostle and so is Nathanael. And then these one hundred and forty-four thousand -- who are they? Are we safe to select them for our own dispensation? Is John not safe to do it? He has done it, and he has set them up in relation to the Messiah in the coming day in mount Zion. May we not say that there is great elasticity as to the things of God, and if it be apostleship and the like, if it be the appointments in the millennial day, may they not be brought forward to our own day? We are dealing with the same persons that we are dealing with in John. He has made the selection here. It is in the Apocalypse, of course, but at the same time it is a Christian matter, and John is a Christian apostle. He is the oldest one as far as we know, of them. He lived to be very old and all the time was loved by the Lord Jesus. He was always the disciple whom Jesus loved and is, I might say, yet, although he has passed on. But in the time while he was here he was the disciple whom Jesus loved, and if he made his selection he made it on those lines. "And I saw, and behold, the Lamb standing upon Mount Zion, and with him a hundred and forty-four thousand, having his name and the name of his Father written upon their foreheads" (verse 1). It is John and he is the disciple whom Jesus loved, and is the Lord not thinking of such persons now, such groups, persons who can be looked to and relied upon to carry through commissions,
things that have to be done? Surely it is so. We are in the apostolic time in that sense, although the book of Revelation is not written on that line. John does not write as an apostle; he writes as a prophet, but he writes. He is the writer and he is the one that loves, that knows love. He is the one that the Lord loves, too; he has not changed, and he will remain, too, in the Lord's love for ever and ever. We do well to love. If we want an office at all go in for love, because the Lord is making His selection and up to the last minute of this dispensation He will be making His selection and He will use whom He will, and persons whom He will use are reliable persons. He is looking at it now, and it is a question, therefore, of whether He is looking at us; whether we are looking for anything, whether He can take us on; whether He can rely on us for any work He has to do. One might think of certain nations, as to what is being done, what the Lord is doing. One might speak of those, but I would prefer to keep on, as I said before, the point is we are in the time when the Lord is doing things and they have to be done; even if it is only for a day or a week they have to be done, and He is looking for suitable workers. He will not take any others. He is not forced to the wall in that sense. He will make His own selection, so that it is a question, dear brethren, of whether we are ready for what there is to be done. The Lord is looking for us and casting His eye upon us even now as to what He has to do, and whom He may select to do it, and whether you have any predilections of your own and whether you want to keep on to them and gain your point or whether you are ready for what the Lord wants, for He is supreme. We have spoken of that today already -- the supreme One. The Lord is supreme in everything and He wants us, as I said before, for whatever is to be done, and He has His eye upon us. Are we to go in for it and do the thing, do the next
thing; not wait for someone to die to do it, but do the next thing; whatever the next thing is, do it? "What thou doest, do quickly", John 13:27. But there is the thought of having things done, and of one it is said, "What she could she has done", Mark 14:8. She did not wait at all. Whatever it was that came her way she did it. That is the idea. I am just seeking to lay it out in that sense, and put it before you and just leave it, in the Lord's name.
A.H. We have been thinking of this book in the light of the word that "I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify these things to you in the assemblies", (chapter 22:16), seeking to get moral and spiritual gain from looking into them, and would be glad if you would say a word in that relation as to this chapter.
J.T. This book was evidently given later than John's epistles, necessitated by the conditions of the assembly as to the truth in general, so that it is said, "Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave to him, to show to his bondmen what must shortly take place; and he signified it, sending by his angel, to his bondman John, who testified the word of God", Revelation 1:1,2 so that the word of God is involved, because the things are signified, not simply inspiration but signification.
This chapter may be regarded as one of the most distinctive as pointing to the signs. Here a great sign was seen in the heavens; therefore it is a question of signification, meaning that things are unfolded by signs, not simply in the sense in which the gospel speaks of signs, and not exactly wonders, but still they are wonderful things, they are really wonders; so here the sign is called great, and it is "a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars" -- rightly called a wonderful sign, but we have to find in the Scriptures identification. The sign involved is to be identified, and it calls attention to Israel, not the assembly but Israel, because she has the marks of Israel. "A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars". She is clothed with authority, the sun being the ruler of the day, and then the moon"BEGINNING" (2)
"BEGINNING" (3)
"BEGINNING" (4)
"BEGINNING" (5)
SELECTION FOR SERVICE
A PLACE OF PROTECTION