Address—B. Anstey
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I thought, they're clapping for me. Wow.
Let's take #169.
169.
No more to view thy chosen few.
In selfish strife divided, but drinking peace, the living grace that gave them hearts united Lord haste, that day of cloudless ray, that prospect bright, unfailing, where God shall shine in light, divine, in glory ever fading 169.
Lord, we can see.
Where?
You can understand.
And soul may be alive.
Love dreams.
Are always.
In grace.
I created my heart and giving heart.
Wherever God.
Says God's blessing on His word, our God and our Father. We look up to thee this afternoon and thank thee for the prospect that's bright and unfailing.
Blessed Lord Jesus, we long and wait for that moment our God, but until he does come, we just pray that that would preserve and keep us close to Him. We look to Thee now our God, as we would open the Scriptures this afternoon, and would desire to be fed from Thy precious word and exhorted. And we pray indeed, that thou would have a voice to each one of us as we read these things together. And we pray above all our God, that we would have the glory of our Lord Jesus before us.
And we pray that each one of us would be desiring to give him that rightful place. And now we just thank thee for the happy spirit that we have had thus far in these meetings. We thank thee for one another and for fellowship. We ask you that thou would preserve it to us, our God, though we do not deserve it. We look to thee now and ask thy help in leading and guidance, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen.
00:05:28
Let's look at an opening verse in Romans 14.
Romans 14.
Verse 19.
Let us therefore follow after the things that make for peace.
And things were with one may edify another.
And then turn on to Ephesians chapter 4 for a couple of verses.
Ephesians chapter 4 and verse one.
I therefore the prisoner of the Lord, or in the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith you ye are called.
With all lowliness and meekness, with long-suffering, forbearing one another, in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace, or in the uniting bond of peace, there is one body.
I like to speak this afternoon on the subject of, as we had there in Romans 14, the the things that would make for peace. And I've read this passage here in Ephesians chapter 4 because it brings before us our first and greatest responsibility as the Church, and that is to manifest what we are in this world. You see, I would assume that most of us here know that the Epistle to the Ephesians has a division and the first three chapters it brings out what we are in Christ as His body.
And in the last three chapters, beginning at Chapter 4, where I began reading, we had the practical exhortations that are based on the doctrine that has been laid down in the first part of the Epistle. And it's very interesting and significant that the very first exhortation that would come in is that which I have read. And it speaks to us of the first responsibility we have, being that we as the body of Christ should give expression to that fact in this world.
In a uniting bond of peace.
This is our first collective responsibility as being part of the Body of Christ.
We as the Church, unfortunately have miserably failed in this. The Church is in a divided state, as we all know, and we have contributed it to it ourselves. But nevertheless, this is the first great responsibility of the Church, that is, to endeavor to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. God is never committed to us.
The responsibility of keeping the unity of the body, that is something that he keeps intact by his power, and no force of evil or man can ever break that, for that bond is unbreakable. But the unity of the Spirit is something that he has given to us to keep.
And that we would, it really speaks to us of a practical unity that we are responsible to keep, as he says here. And we might ask the question at the beginning, what exactly is the unity of the Spirit? Well, someone gave this definition and I liked it. It is that which the Spirit is forming to give expression to the truth that we are one body.
Isn't that beautiful, that which the spirit is forming in this earth to give expression to the truth of the one body? Mr. Patterson wrote a booklet on this subject, and he had a definition that I liked too, And he said it is to keep in practice what is true in fact. And then he went on to say, well, what is true in fact? Well, as the passage goes on, as I read there in verse four, what is true in fact is that we are one body, and we are to express that visibly in the earth. Now, as I said.
The Church has miserably failed in this, and we have to lay our hand upon our own hearts. And when we think of how that we have contributed to it, those gathered to the Lord's name cannot be exempt from this failure. We have a history of divisions that lay behind us, that ought to humble us when we think of all that has been given to us in grace, and the privileges that have been granted to those who have been gathered to the Lord's name, and we think of how poorly we have.
00:10:14
Uh, handle ourselves in the last 150 years or so.
You know, I was talking to a man who was with the OR was with the Raven Fellowship. That is just one of the divisions that have broken off. And he came from Australia and he was in the gathering in that division in Australia in Sydney. And he told me that when he was there in the 1960s that he said that the Sydney gathering alone had 5200 people. He said the neighboring gathering which was Melbourne.
It had 2700 people.
And you think this is just one division that has broken off and have departed from the?
Path of all upholding all the truth of God, What have we if we had not divided? What a wonderful.
Fellowship there would have been had there not been the enemy working to divide the Saints, and I'm concerned about that because I don't think we have got the learned the lesson.
Even though we have been tested time and time again, I had put down on a paper years ago.
The various divisions, I know a number of brothers have done that. It's not a healthy thing to necessarily look into, but we do learn some humbling lessons. And anyway, I had put down the various divisions in the time frames and so on. And then I took my calculator and I divided how many divisions over a certain many years and I came up with an interesting fact.
And that is that there is a division amongst God's people approximately every 22 years, which is roughly a generation. And I take from that that every generation is going to be tested with regard to the truth that has been committed to it and how miserably we have failed ourselves. We know very well that we have not behaved in the way we ought to. Well, what should we do? Should we just give up and say, well, it's true, I know, and go moping about? I don't think the Lord would have us to do that.
No, I think that he would have us to be exercised about it. And so the question might come, what is it that we could do to promote unity and peace amongst God's people? One brother put it this way. He said that we should draw a circle around ourselves and then start inside that circle, asking ourselves what it is that we can do to promote the unity and the peace amongst God's people. I read at the very beginning that verse in Romans 14.
That we may follow after the things that make for peace. The apostle doesn't go into what those things are. He simply lays it for us to be exercised about it, Follow after the things that would make for peace. And so I might ask this question here for us this afternoon. What would those things be? What would those things might be that we should follow after? That we might promote peace and unity amongst God's people? Well, I like to look into various passages of the word of God.
For the answers to that, and the 1St place I'd like to turn is to an incident in the life and ministry of our blessed Lord Jesus Himself. There was a time, as you know, when His own disciples were threatened. That is, the unity of the disciples was threatened, and there was dissension among them, and the Lord knew that, and He gave special instruction for them to meet that. And I think we should begin there. So let's turn to Mark's Gospel, Chapter 9.
Mark's Gospel, Chapter 9. We're going to read a few verses together, verse 33 beginning.
And he that's Lord Jesus came to Capernaum, And being in the house, he asked them, What was it that ye disputed among yourselves by the way? But they held their peace, For by the way they had disputed among themselves who should be the greatest? And he sat down, and called the 12 and said unto them, If any man desired to be first, the same shall be last of all, and servant of all. And he took a child, and set him in the midst of them. And when he had taken him in his arms, he said unto them, Whosoever shall receive one of such children?
My name receiveth me, and whosoever shall receive me receiveth not me but him that sent me. And John answered them, saying, Master, We saw one casting out devils in thy name, and we fought, and he followed not us, and we forbade him, because he followed not us. But Jesus said, forbid him not, For there is no man which shall do a miracle in my name that can lightly speak evil of me, for he is not against me, against us.
00:15:11
Is on our part. For whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I say unto you, He shall not lose his reward. But whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea. And if thy hand offend thee, cut it off. For it is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two hands to go into hell.
Into the fire that is never shall be quenched. I understand verse 44 and verse 46 are not in the original text manuscripts, or at least there is doubtful.
Because it comes up again in verse 48, verse 45. And if thy foot offend thee, cut it off. It is better for thee to enter halt into life, than having 2 feet to be cast into hell into the fire that shall never be quenched. Verse 47 And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out. It is better for thee to enter into the Kingdom of God.
With one eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell. Fire, where their worm dieth not in the fire is not quenched. For everyone shall be salted with fire, and every sacrifice shall be salted with salt. Salt is good, but if salt is lost is saltiness, wherewith will ye season it. Have salt in yourselves, and have peace, one with another. Those closing words have peace, one with another. Show that this whole teaching of our Lord Jesus.
Is connected with the dispute that was going on among the disciples. And he gives some very interesting, very helpful and significant lessons for us with regard to the maintenance of peace and unity. And I'd like to look at him here this afternoon before we look at some other passages. The Lord Jesus, here, he lays down three things, three main reasons why there is these disruptions of unity amongst his people. First of all, as I read, we have the idea or the wanting to be great.
The second thing we have is having a critical spirit, and the third is giving offense in Word or in deed. These things very definitely are destructive to the health of any company of Christians, and we need to hear the Lord's words here and be helped by his his remarks.
Now prior to this, the Lord had taken the disciples up to the Mount of Transfiguration, and they saw him in His official Kingdom, glory. And this of course brought thoughts to their minds about the coming Kingdom that it was at hand. And this led to them having thoughts about who's going to have this place or that place in the Kingdom, and who should be greatest and what happened as a result of them starting to think about what place they might have. It produced a disruption in their happy unity. We find here that they disputed among themselves.
And the Lord knew all about it. And with the Lord immediately goes about to.
Correct this and address this problem, you know.
The wanting to be great can be traced to an awful lot of difficulties that there are amongst the Lord's people. Even to this very day it may not come out in such and such words that we want to play, so we want to be great.
But subsequent actions and words that come out of us and attitudes make it very clear that we've got a problem. We want to be heard, we want to be seen, we want to rule, we want to be great. And all these things do not promote unity amongst the Lord's people. Let me quote Mr. Kohler. I never met the man, but he came out of New York, I believe, and served the Lord for a number of years. And he said that before he was saved in the world, he wanted to be a great person, he wanted to be a great man, he wanted to make a mark for himself there.
But when he got saved he came amongst the Lords people and he said he wanted to make a mark for himself amongst the Lord people. And he said I had to find out that both were wrong, both were wrong. And surely that's true, isn't it? That to try to gain the ascendancy over our brethren, for whatever reason that we may have is only going to stir up trouble and difficulty? It's one of the proverbs. I think it's in chapter 28. It says he that is of a proud heart. Stirreth up Strife.
And so Pride is really at the root of a lot of this wanting to be great. And we have to be on guard about that, don't we?
00:20:01
My brother Cam Wilkins was in our home just a few weeks ago and he gave me some nice tidbits of thoughts that he'd picked up from his older brother. And I always like to get near to some of my older brother and listen to what they have to say from their older brother from another generation. It's always helpful. So I asked him some things about that and he said, well, he remembered one brother named Miller. I don't know who he is and he said that he gave him some very helpful things. I said like what brother?
Well, he said I can't know if I could just put my hand on it now. And he thought about it for a while and after a while he said, I'll tell you, he said to me one day, Cameron, stay small. Those who get big usually get taken away, he said that was good for me. And I've used, I've drawn upon that many times in my 50 years or so that he's been gathered. Isn't that a good word, Bruce? Stay small. Those that get big get taken away. Well, isn't that helpful, You know, I think of Jeremiah.
He told Barrick, Seekest thou great things for thyself, seek them not whether it's in the world or amongst the Lord's people. It's something that should have no place.
You know when business and our business that we're in, we're into the wholesale business of craft and art supplies. Anyway, my father had the business before we did and he used to tell us stories of a man that he used to meet in a in a competitor's company wholesale and his name was Morley Brown.
I never met the man, but I desired dearly to meet this man or to see him, because his reputation went before him. He was a man that was full of himself.
From what I've heard, and he was full of importance and wherever he went, he left awake behind him of people complaining and he was quite a person and although I never in all my years in sales with the business, I never did run into this man. But anyway.
What happened was his business after my father left the business and my brother and I and my other brother took over the business.
The, the business that the competitors business that morally worked for went bankrupt. And so we heard about that. We heard from the receiver. So we went over and bought up their inventory at 2530 cents on the dollar. So it was really great for us. And they left with the receiver, the head shipper of the business there. So I thought, here's my chance. I'm going to ask this man what he thought of Morty Brown. So he said Morty Brown, You know him well? No, but his reputation goes before him. Tell me about him morally Brown, he said we all hated him.
His name was Marty Brown. He said, you know, we had a name for him, a nickname for him. We never told it to him, to his face, though. But he said we used to call him Big Fat, Big Shot Brown. When he would go through the place, you know, we'd sit behind his back, there's Big Fat Big Shot Brown. And this man would go through thinking he could be a help of the shipping department. He come walking in and offer some advice that was completely outdated and a way off and they had to just look the other way. And he told me some interesting stories about this Big Shot Brown.
You know, I thought about that. Could we be that way among our brethren, walking amongst the Lord's people, thinking there were something? And we think we're laying a blessing on people and we don't know from behind us. They're going there. It goes big shots. So and so. Oh, brethren, could it be true? We can very often carry ourselves in such a way that it becomes evident that we're looking for some place? What does the Lord do? He sits down to teach them. Isn't that striking and significant? He takes a low place to start with. He takes the most diminutive of the human race. He takes a child in his hands.
And he sets out an object lesson of humility, and he puts this child here in his hands, in his arms, And he begins to instruct them and say, you know, if you would just receive a little child like this, you'd be receiving me. And this would be something that would mean a lot to God the Father. The lesson here, of course, is that.
Humility and the need for binding on humility the Apostle Peter, he says in his epistle.
Yeah, all of you bind on humility. Now you might wonder, why would he say bind on humility? Well, I guess it's because it's something that very easily can come off and we need to put a little energy into binding on humility. And so the Lord gives a lesson here, as I say, on humility, and he says here, receive one of these children.
What I would take from this is that the Lord is saying don't try to do something great that would bring you into the public eye so you get noticed and so on.
00:25:03
Wouldn't it be better to do some insignificant work? For him to be happy to do some small work like receiving a child is not going to bring you into the public eye. People who may not even notice it, but God the Father will notice it. And that is the way in which we will indeed bring pleasure to God our Father. And there will be reward in a place in the Kingdom for those who are happy to do that kind of a work. But very often we don't like to do that kind of work.
You know what I mean?
When the Saints get together for perhaps some work, maybe even to put on a conference, we know. I know what I'm talking about. We've had one. It's striking and very interesting to me to see the various individuals, what kind of work they like to volunteer for.
Very interesting.
Oh brethren, is it possible that we want a place?
A place that would make us notice. The Lord shows here that that's one of the roots.
Of causing dissension amongst his people while he goes on. And he says in verse 38 that there's another thing and that is having a critical spirit. Here is a man that John points out we don't have his name, but he was casting out devils in the Lord's name, and the disciples were exceedingly critical about that because he wasn't falling with them and they were jealous for the Lord and wanted to be.
To do things right. And so as a result, they they rebuked this man for doing that. And they wanted to tell the Lord because he thought that he was going to get a pat on the back. He thought the Lord was going to say very good, My son, that was well done. I'm glad you did that. But the Lord didn't do that. He rebukes there in a very subtle and very gentle way.
Their critical spirit of this man. And so we find here that the Lord teaches us the need for judging.
The critical spirit. You know, brethren, I believe this too is a cause of dissension and disunity amongst the Lorde people. You'll see here in that 38th verse that the disciples had completely lost sight of the center of their gathering, which was the Lord Jesus themselves, Lord Jesus himself, and they got to speaking about themselves. Notice how many times they say we saw one and he followed, not us. And we forgot him because he followed, not us.
They had lost sight of Christ being their center, and they saw themselves at the center and anybody who was not with them while they were ready to read the riot act on them because they didn't see that he was falling with them. What a dangerous spirit. And this was particularly embarrassing for them, you know, because they heard just back up in the chapter a little bit, There was a man that came to the disciples and his son had a dumb spirit, and they besought the disciples to cast out the dumb spirit, and they couldn't do it, it says.
Verse 18. And now they come across a man who could do it, and he wasn't falling with them.
They didn't like this idea, and we have to be careful ourselves of those who may be seeking to do a work for the Lord, who may not walk in the same path that we do. You'll notice that the Lord, though he gently rebukes them with regard to this, He does not tell them to go and join this man. They had further a greater light than this man, and the path for them was to follow the Lord, to take up the cross and follow him, as we had earlier elsewhere in the Gospels.
But nevertheless, he told them to leave this man alone in his work, and God would deal with him and work with him and lead him on. And this is a danger, you know, of us getting at the center of all the actions that we see that should take place here in the earth. We see ourselves at the center as dangerous. In fact, you'll see, and you'll find throughout Scripture that whenever God's people got occupied with themselves.
And themselves being the right ones and so on. God took away what privileges he had. Vote safe to them. Isn't that interesting?
If you turn back to Samuel first Samuel 4 and you'll see. Just hold your finger where we are. We're not going to we haven't finished in Mark's Gospel. But in First Samuel 4 you'll find that there was a battle against the Philistines and the children of Israel thought what we should do is bring the ark. And so it says in verse 3 the elders of Israel said, Wherefore hath the Lord Smith us this day before the Philistines? Let us fetch the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of Shiloh unto us.
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Notice that that it when it cometh among us, notice it shall save us out of the hand of the of our enemies. And then a little further on, when they they did get the ark, they brought it. There was a great show among them, and they were as much crying as yes, we have the ark, we're the people with the ark, we have it. And it was right at that time that God stepped in and took it away from them.
Because they were occupied with themselves and what they had, rather than what was, pertained to the glory.
Of the Lord. Then another one that comes to mind is in Micah.
Chapter 3.
Micah chapter 3, verse 11. We'll pick it up. Verse 10. They build up Zion with blood and Jerusalem with iniquity. The heads thereof judge root for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money. So it's a pretty poor condition of things going on at that time. Yet they will lean upon the Lord and say is not the Lord among us. Notice that.
None evil can come upon us.
Therefore shall Zion, for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps in the mountain of the House of the high places of the forest. See, the Lord was about to take his people away from Jerusalem, because they had got occupied with the fact that they were at the divine center. Now I'm not in any way speaking that we should despise or not regard the truth of the divine center of gathering. Those of you who know me personally know how I hold that dear.
A wonderful truth.
But what I'm saying is if we get occupied with ourselves rather than the Lord that is in the midst.
The Lord is not going to be happy as we find it. Another place comes to mind, the Laodicean Church they could occupy with what they had, and the Lord took the whole testimony away.
He spewed it out of his mouth. We know that the Laodicean Church is the last that depicts the last Christian testimony in the face of the earth, and So what we find is at the end of the Church's history, it would be occupied with itself rather than what pertains to the Lord's glory. Could this happen amongst us, brethren? Can we be so naive to think that it wouldn't?
Do we not have, perhaps at times, the center of the gathering as ourselves? Oh, brethren, I lay my hand upon my own heart when I say this. Those of you that know that we do need to be careful that we do not.
Displace the Lord in that place in the midst, and be critical of others who are serving the Lord up to the light that they have. Well, we find here that the Lord says.
Forbid him not he that is not against us.
Is on our part. But we have to be careful, as I say, even in our local assemblies and even in our private dealings, we draw that circle around ourselves, so to speak. And we need to be careful that we don't have a critical spirit of our brethren. It reminds me of the prophet Isaiah. You know prophet Isaiah. Before he was sent to be a help to the Lord's people, he had to go through some adjustment in chapter 5 of Isaiah we find.
That he has a number of complaints that he sees amongst the Lord's people, and I'm not for a minute suggesting that they were not there, that he was fabricating them. Isaiah in chapter 5 is like a man who was living in a chamber that had six windows in it, and he looks out one window and he sees things amongst the Lord's people. In verse eight he says woe to them that join house to house and lay field to field, till there be no place that they should.
Be placed alone in the midst of the earth. What he was seeing was the monopolist. He saw ones who were buying up all the land so that there was number place for the poor to live. He hooks up that window. He sees the monopolist. He says whoa. And then he looks out another window. Down in verse 11 he sees the drunkard and he says whoa. Then in verse 18 he looks out another window and he sees the profligate and he says woe again. Then in verse 20 he sees the hypocrite and he says woe again.
He looks out a fifth window and sees the philosopher are satisfied with his reasoning and his wisdom.
And again, he says, whoa.
He looks out a 6th window in verse 22 and he sees the unjust rulers amongst God's people. And again he says whoa whoa whoa whoa, He saw things that were wrong amongst God's people.
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But then those windows closed, and a window at the top of his chamber, so to speak, opens and light comes streaming down from heaven. In chapter six we find that the Lord's glorious scene, and it shines right into his very dwelling.
And for all at once he sees himself in the light of the Lord. And then he says, Whoa, is me No longer is he saying, woe is my brethren. He says, woe is me. He saw himself in the light of God, and he realized that he too had come short.
Verse five of chapter six, he says. Then I said, Woe is me, for I am undone. I'm a man of unclean lips. He had spoken unvisedly, unadvisedly with his lips, and he acknowledges it. It is only then what we find, that the Lord cleanses him and then makes him fit so that he can go.
To be a help to his people. And then verse eight it says, I heard a voice of the Lord saying whom shall I send, who will go for us. Then said I, here am I send me. We make an application there with the Lord Jesus very often in the Lord's day morning. But this is really referring to Isaiah being sent in his mission, a prophecy. But notice he's not sent until he's able to lay his hand on his own heart and say, woe is me. And sometimes when I hear brethren being critical of others and I'm not saying that what they're pointing out is necessarily wrong. It's right. What they see is things are inconsistent.
But I have said this before, and I said it this afternoon, But, brethren, have we come to the 7th? Woe have we got to the point where we've laid our hand on our own heart? Because we'll never be a help to anybody if we can just see what's wrong amongst the Lord's people. Are we able to see ourselves in the light of the Lord and then be able to bring something positive that could be a help? Well, we find here that Isaiah goes through this exercise and his focus is adjusted. He sees himself, and then the Lord says, no, I can use you.
And the Lord does want to use us to be a help amongst His people, but we cannot be helped be a help until we come to that point where we see.
Ourselves in his presence. You know the Apostle Paul is an example of one who lived like the Lord Jesus taught here.
He said about those who were preaching the gospel when he was in prison. I think it's in Philippians chapter one. He says whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is preached and I rejoice. And that's the spirit we need to have when we hear of others that are preaching and they are not necessarily walking with us in the path. I say again though, just to be on guard Here we find that the Lord does not encourage them to join this man in that path, but rather to leave him.
With the Lord. Well, let's go on. Then We have in the latter part of the chapter some principles with regard to another problem, and that is giving offense in Word or in deed. And he lays down the principle and it's broad enough to be applied with regard to lost people, and it's broad enough to be applied to the Lords own people.
To give offense in Word or in deed, and how careful we have to be above this. Very often we open our mouths and we let fly with things that can be offensive and can hurt people and we're not careful. But the Lord Jesus said that he was the meek and the lowly one and you know what it is to mean what it means to be meek and to be lowly. Well, I've enjoyed this thought that lowliness keeps self down meekness.
Gives place to others. Isn't that nice? Meekness gives place to others. Loneliness that I have been told is a character. Whereas meekness is more of a manner. It's a carefulness toward others. That's why we often say that a meek person is one who will not give offense. He's careful not to to just flash off anything that comes to mind or do anything.
Meekness does not give offense, but loneliness does not take offense.
If someone was to act in an Unmeak way, we have the spirit of loneliness. We can take it and we leave it with the Lord. And so that's the attitude that we need to have. We find here that the Lord speaks about those who would give offense, and he speaks about the hand and the foot and so on that could give offense. And what he's showing here is if there's anything that we may be doing or where we're walking that would give offense to others, hinder or stumble them in the path that we need to cut it off.
Not literally, of course, but to cut off that activity, to cut off what we may be doing, that we would not give offense to anyone causing them to stumble. And so it's not just with our mouths, but it's also with our deep. So it's in Word or in deed, I was saying not too long ago at a meeting I bear repeating, I believe that each one of us, as we get older, come into adulthood, we get, God gives us a, shall we say, a screen.
00:40:22
Or a filter in our minds whereby we can weigh our thoughts before we open our mouths and speak them, and God wants us to use that filter. Some of us, perhaps don't do that very often, and I have to lay my hand upon my own heart when I say that. And it does tell us some proverbs. 13 He that openeth his mouth wide shall have destruction, and so we can very often with our mouths, tear down our brethren.
And even destroy our own testimony as well. Let's be careful what we say by weighing our thoughts in the sanctuary of the Lords presence. Before we would open our mouths we could give offense. And the Lord concludes the whole issue here in verse 50 by saying salt is good. And if salt has lost its saltiness, wherewith will you be seizing it? Have salt in yourselves and have peace one with another. The solution?
The remedy for these conditions is very interesting, He says. Have salt in yourselves. The Lord is speaking symbolically here. He's speaking in a way that would teach us the remedy. Now the question is, what does salt represent in Scripture? Well, I believe that salt represents the energy of inward devotedness to the Lord. At least that's what older brethren have taught me. And I've compared it with other scriptures. And I like that the energy of inward devotedness to the Lord.
So he says, if you have salt in yourselves, you'll have peace among yourselves, peace among one another. Now isn't that good? If there is that energy of inward devotedness to the Lord in my personal life, I'm going to be at peace with my brother, and vice versa. If I am not walking at peace with the Lord and happy communion with Him, I'm going to be a problem to my brother. I'm going to be trouble to my brother crawling 1 woe after another like Isaiah or finding fault and criticizing or wanting to be great or something.
But if I'm going on with the Lord, there is that salt in my life of inward devotedness to the Lord.
I'm going to find that I'll be able to go on with my brethren as well, and that is 1 great way in which we can promote peace and unity amongst the Lord's people. Now how about it?
Do we take time to be in the presence of the Lord, to give them our heart? You know, it says in Proverbs 23, My son, give me thine heart. I remember a brother once said after he got saved, what does the Lord want? I'm saved, you know, I've come to him and I've got saved. And an older brother said he wants your heart, he's taken your sins away, but now he wants your heart. And if our hearts were taken up in devotion to him more, I believe that there would be a lot more peace amongst the Lord's people.
Having salt in ourselves will lead to peace among one another. Now let's turn on to another passage. First, Thessalonians Chapter 5. We'll just touch on a few more points.
First Thessalonians chapter 5.
Verse 12.
We beseech you, brethren.
To know them which labor among you and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you to esteem them very highly in love for their work sake, and be at peace among yourselves, and be at peace among yourselves. Now why would he put this?
Expression at the end of the exhortation to give respect and honor and esteem to those who are over us in the Lord. Well, I believe it's connected. It's very much connected. Now those that are over us in the Lord that He's Speaking of here could better be translated them that take the lead among you and it's talking about local administrative leadership. This is not talking about the exercise of gift necessarily amongst the Lord's people, but those that God would raise up.
To care for the flock in the localities from where we come.
God has given them a work to do, and we need to recognize that and to submit ourselves to all such.
Carry on that service for the Lord, and to give them that place, that of esteem and love, And when there is, there will be that acquiescing to them. There will be that desire to be to walk and step with them, and there will be peace among ourselves. There has been much difficulty amongst God's people by younger generations rising up and thinking they know better than their older brother.
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And I have to learn, may learn the hard way too, that we're not wiser than our older brethren 99% of the time. I'm not saying that the older brethren are exempt from failure, John the Apostle tells us there in first John chapter two he said brother. He says little children. But that word little shouldn't be there because it gives you the idea of just the younger ones in the family of God, he says children, if anyone among you sin, we have an advocate with the father showing that even the older brethren can sin and fail.
I'm not looking at that side of things here right now. I'm just talking about the normal order of things that God raises up, generally older ones, to carry on that oversight. And we need to give them that respect in our local gatherings. And there will be peace. Very often there will be younger ones, as one brother put an excuse me for saying this, but one brother put it this way, he said the ones that give the most difficulty in gatherings often are those who are what he called the adolescent elders. I thought, what do you mean by that?
Then I thought, I know what you mean. And then he explained anyway, he said, You know the ones about 40 years of age, They've raised a family somewhat. They seem to get a little bit happy with how they've done and now they're going to throw their weight around, they're going to tell their brethren they're 65, a few things.
Oh.
Rather than they're not following this expectation that we have here. You know, the older brethren, we may not think that they have wisdom for certain cases and so on, but I think it's our naivety that would bring us to think that the older brethren have been around. They know and they've seen a lot more than we have as far as human behavior and so on. And more than that, I believe that the Lord identifies himself with those.
Just as you have in Revelation, there is interesting that the stars are in the hand of the Lord. They're kind of an extension of His authority. It doesn't mean that they do everything right. I'm not saying that.
But this is 1 definite way in which we can help promote peace. And so if we could just go back over these things now what we have in the teachings of our Lord Jesus, we need to bind on humility. We need to judge our critical spirit. We need to be careful not to give offense in Word or deed. And now we have here we need to walk in submission to our older brother. You know what Mark those men of Issachar years ago and at First Chronicles chapter 12, it says that they were men that knew the sign of the times and they also.
It says they could keep rank with their brethren. What does that mean? It means they knew how to keep in step with their brethren.
Do we keep in step with our brethren? Are we ones that get out of step with our brother every time they see something this way, we see it a different way. Speaking of a certain particular individual, I remember an older brother saying every time we have a care meeting, the brother sees something different than we do. We want to paint the fence green, he wants to paint it orange. We want to paint the building this way, everything. Is that the way we are amongst the Lord's people? I hope it isn't. You know, it says about Asher that he dipped his foot in oil and he was acceptable to his brother.
What's the foot speak to us of our walk? What does oil speak to us of the Holy Spirit. If we're walking in the Spirit, that's the type of that.
We're going to be acceptable to our brethren. We'll know how to walk with them, keep in peace, keep in step with them. You know, some of us are like instead of one particular individual he always likes a good argument. Is that true of us? Oh brother.
Well, to challenge the older brethren with a spirit of defiance will never have the Lord's backing. But to walk with them and to give them to see that we do support them, There may be a time coming when they do make a mistake and we can draw alongside to them and say, well, brother, you know thus and thus, and they're going to hear us because they know that we are seeking.
The welfare of the Lord's people. But if we have a character, we have a history of always seeing everything different all the time.
What can you expect? They are going to not take our word for it. Well, let's look on at another passage because we're coming.
Along in the time that's allotted to us. First Corinthians chapter 14.
First Corinthians chapter 14. Here we have another way in which we can promote peace.
In the Assembly, 1St Corinthians, 1426. How is it then, brethren?
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When you come together, everyone of you hath A Psalm, hath a doctrine, hath a tongue, hath A revelation half an interpretation, that all things be done unto edifying. If any man speak in an unknown tongue, let him let it be by two, or at most by three, and that by course, or that separately in order in turn, and let 1 interpret. And if there be no interpreter, let him keep silence in the church.
And let him speak to himself and to God. Let the prophets speak two or three, and let the others judge. And if anything be revealed to another that sitteth by, let the first hold his peace for it. For ye may all prophecy one by one, that ye may all learn, and all may be comforted, and the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets. For God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, And all the churches or assemblies of the Saints notice those last words.
He's not the author of confusion, but the author of peace and all the assemblies of the Saints. And so he's showing here another way in which we can have peace in our assemblies and that is to exercise self-control in public ministry. And this is good for us. What the Corinthians were having a problem with was that their meetings were filled with disunity. And what he's saying in verse 26 is that everybody wanted to say something.
They all had something to contribute, even though it was not necessarily connected with the other thing.
One had a Psalm, one had a doctrine, one had a revelation. And what happened? It was confusion. And he sought to set this right by telling him that everything needs to be done decently and in order. I know some people have thought that verse 26, he was commending them saying, that's good, you should all come with something. Well, that's true. We should come with things in our heart. But what he's saying here is that this is confusion, brethren. Everybody's got something and it's not necessarily connected with one another.
As one brother put it, he's as much as saying if you want to paraphrase it, he's saying How is it then, brethren, that your meetings are like a free for all?
And we don't want to have our meetings like a free for all where everybody just has to speak, has to be heard from.
No. He goes about to set that right, that there might be peace, and if there isn't, it's going to create division amongst the Lord's people in a locality, as it was the case here in Corinth. You read back to the 1St and 3rd chapters. We know that there was division there, and you can just see why when they had this kind of a condition of things. Just like everybody's saying, well, me, me, me, I want to talk next, I want to say something.
And what he says has got nothing to do with what he said. And the next person, he's got nothing to do with what he said.
That confusion, brother, and it fosters.
A a condition of competition. And that's what there was at the problem in Corinth. Now to set this right, we find that the apostles speaks of three things. First of all, he says, let all things be done unto edifying, and you'll notice as you go down. Through the passages I read he uses the word left over and over and over again. This is a veiled reference to the leading of the Spirit of God, though the Spirit is not mentioned here.
I say it again. It is a veiled reference to letting the Spirit of God lead in the midst of the Lord's people.
And this is so very important that we would give place to the leading of the Spirit of God in ministry. In fact, wherever you get the word let in the New Testament is a Christian exhortation. What it's really referring to is that we are responsible to allow the Spirit of God and the new nature in us to do what is natural to them. And we're responsible to get out of the way, so to speak, to let the Spirit of God do what he would through us. Our problem is that we get in the way.
And we want to do what we want to do.
So he's saying here, well, I'll give you an example in Hebrews 13. One it says, let brotherly love continue. Well, we can hinder that, but the new nature is our brethren and the Spirit of God would certainly lead us to express our love to them. But we're responsible to get out of the way and let the Spirit of God flow through us and express that love in a genuine way.
And so here we have, let's mention twelve times in a few short verses. This is, as I said, is a reference to the giving place to the leading of the spirit of God. That is one way in which ministry and the assembly can be regulated. Now a second one, verse 32, the prophets were to exercise self-control. Verse 32 Says the spirits of the prophets are to be subject to the prophets.
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Now, when he's talking about the Spirit here, he's not talking about the Holy Spirit. He's talking about the Spirit that that is our God, conscious, intelligent, part of our being, our human spirit. We should be intelligent enough to see that maybe what we have today is not necessarily connected with what is being said, that maybe I should back off and let us another speak. And so the spirit of the Prophet should be subject to the Prophet. That is, we should learn to control ourselves and not just let anything that comes to mind come out.
In public ministry.
This will promote peace.
However, it's very difficult for some of us. Some of us don't know how to hold our peace. This was one of the primary lessons that the prophets had to learn. If you go to Ezekiel, you'll find that in his education to be a prophet that he had to learn to go and to keep quiet. He had to learn to be dumb for a certain period of time, and then he had to know how to open his mouth at a certain period of time. You find with the property of Elijah that he had to know how to be in quiet, in secret for a period before he would speak.
And it's very interesting that we must learn how to.
Hold our peace and we need to learn when to speak.
A third way in which ministry should be regulated in the assembly is in verse 29. Let the prophets speak two or three and let the others judge. This is a reference to the assembly having administrative authority.
To stop the mouth of a prophet if he fails to submit himself to the leading of the spirit of God and will not be subject to his own human spirit and exercising self-control if a person will not do that.
There is a recourse that the assembly has that we can ask that person to be silent.
We can, or rather tell that person to be solemn, and that is an administrative function that the assembly can lay if need be. But brethren, if there was divine love, there would never need to have that excitation. We would know what it is to.
Give way to the leading of the Spirit and to be happy to hear another minister the word rather than ourselves. That's nice. You know that we would listen to another. Well, I don't have time. I'll just because the time is over. But I'll just turn you in my mind to Romans chapter 12. And there it says as much as life within you live peaceably with all men. And then he goes on to say don't have vengeance on.
Those who do you wrong, but rather heap coals of fire on their head. And so doing that you'll overcome evil with good. So here you have another way in which peace can be.
Strived for, and that is by seeking to take those who are offensive and those who are one who may have something against us. Take their away from them, their hatred by acts of kindness given and done toward them, whereby they will be ashamed of their evil intentions and malice that they have towards you, and they will be LED to repentance.
And thereby peace will be had, and there will also be the.
Overcoming of good with evil. Mr. Darby put it this way, He said. If my bad temper gets you in a bad temper, then you have been overcome with evil. Another brother said. I am not going to let any man's hatred of me spoil my relationship and love for the Lord and his people. We are responsible to not let that happen. And so, by acts of kindness done towards those who may not appreciate us will diffuse the malice and the hatred that they might have in their heart and they'll be ashamed.
And there will be a change. You know Mr. Hayhoe Senior. Hey ho, I never met him. There are some here that did. And I'm talking about Gordon and Albert's father. He I heard on a tape one time that.
He had overheard some brethren speaking about him in the coat room where they were putting on their coat rack and it was very offensive. It hurt him. It went right to his heart. They were staying above.