Will not my influence be less? It is remarkable how often one hears this question put by those who see in the Word of God, that to act according to His mind there must be separation from existing ecclesiastical systems. To do so apparently denies access to the greater number of the children of God, and it seems, at first sight, plausible to decide that to get truth to the majority, you must be where they are.
Especially do such thoughts present themselves to those who have held prominent positions in such systems, and who have, up to the light they have had, been faithful. God has probably used much of their service, for. He will act in grace, in spite of man’s failure: but willfully to remain connected with that which is not according to the Word, in order to benefit others, is saying that man has power in himself, and leaves God out of the question.
Scripture would always settle such questions in a positive way if we only had submissive hearts to listen to what God has to say. “But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us” (2 Cor. 4:7). “I (Paul) have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase” (1 Cor. 3:6, 7). Jeremiah, who prophesied when Israel’s tribes were captives and scattered, gives the following important principal of action to those who would occupy a true remnant position: “Let them return unto thee, but return not thou unto them” (Jer. 15:19).
This is peculiarly applicable at the present time. The purposes and mind of God concerning the Church are seen in His Word. Its blessings and relationships rejoice the heart. In the manifest ruin of all corporate expression of what the Church is, the faithful child of God, while identifying himself with the ruin, and being humbled about it before God, weeping over it, leaves everything which practically denies that the Church is the body of Christ, and acts on 2 Corinthians 6:17, “Wherefore come out from among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord.”
The most positive testimony against anything wrong is to be separate from it. Identification advocates it. While in this separated position, those who occupy it do not ignore believers mixed up with the ruin of the Church, as to its practical expression of God’s mind, nor can they own such as being other than His children and members of the body of Christ (which latter they virtually deny by their connection with divisions.) However, the true position is outside, on God’s ground, expressing, though not manifesting, the oneness of the body of Christ; the Church not returning to them, but receiving with joy all who will come out to the Lord.
Let us look a little at the power of service. The fact that God’s Word speaks clearly as to what the Church is, and as to the path of one who desires to express this by individual testimony, should be sufficient; for surely to do the will of God should be paramount with all His own. He could not identify Himself with that which is contrary to the Word. God acts in grace, as we have said, but He uses whomsoever He will, and we can only count upon Him using an empty vessel. One who believed that he had any power, and that his influence without God’s power could effect anything would not be such.
But it is just here the enemy suggests, “But will not my influence be less?” It is a wile, and the more dangerous because there is an appearance of devotedness about it. Yet if the questioner were to examine himself honestly in the presence of God, it is most probable that he would find that the question arose from a lingering desire to stay where he is.
Granted that there are many associations hard to leave, yet the anticipation of such a step is more painful than the step itself, for the Lord does not give grace, strength and comfort for those thoughts which hinder action, but for and after the step itself. The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable James 3:17).
First, such a question is one of expediency. Secondly, it is not complete subjection to the Lordship of Christ.
Thirdly, it proceeds from either ignorance of the personal presence and power of the Holy Spirit in the assembly of God here upon the earth, or from not attaching the importance which this blessed, yet ignored truth, not only deserves, but demands.
As to the first, we might take the action of Moses as an illustration. Humanly speaking, it would appear that to stay at the court of Pharaoh and exert his influence for the benefit of the Israelites from that powerful standpoint, would have been wisest; but that was not the question with Moses, and Hebrews 11 records his step as one of faith; reasoning had not a place. So with all who serve the Lord. They should not reason, but act simply according to the mind and Word of God.
As to the second, the servants of men are not supposed to question their masters’ commands, but to go and to do as they are told. How much more the servants of the Lord!
As to the third, it seems to have been forgotten that the Spirit of God, who is personally dwelling here upon the earth in the house of God, is the immediate source of power. He is the agent, so to speak, by whom everything is carried into effect, but nothing less than God, and this 1 Corinthians 12:11 clearly proves; the same words referring to God in verse 6, refer to the Spirit of God in verse 11. He also “divides (distributes) to every man severally as He will,” for “to one is given, by the Spirit, the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge,” etc. (See 1 Cor. 8-10.)
The result in blessing, of the action of the gift, is clearly to be attributed only to God (see 1 Cor. 3:6-7); but if one endeavors with a bad conscience to serve in a place he knows to be wrong, even though his activity is blessed of God to souls, it could not receive the Master’s “well done.” God will work in sovereign grace, and a Scripture mockingly quoted, has been used for a man’s conversion, but such an instrument would not receive any one’s approval, much less the Lord’s.
It is plain that the gifts, of whatever character they are (for all believers have something to do; all members of the human body having their separate functions), come from the ascended Christ; they are distributed by the Holy Spirit, who is the energy and power in action and result, God being the source, but the Spirit is God; and the privilege of being the instrument used is man’s. Surely it is sad as well as foolish to allow such reasoning as that our influence, would be less by leaving a wrong place because the majority are there, to prevent us taking a right place according to God. God says, separation from evil, not mingling with it.
There are many instances of those occupying the position of testimony to God’s Word and will in the Old Testament; Enoch before the flood, Daniel and Elijah after, and in addition to Jeremiah, already referred to, we see in Isa. 1, where Israel is the subject of God’s dealings, that He, in view of their apostasy, says, “Cease to do evil, learn to do well.” (Read verses 10-20.) The evil here is not the mere depravity of human nature, but religious evil. There is also much teaching in the New Testament as to remnant testimony; and where Christendom, as a manifestation of what the Church is, is a ruin, there is a path for the faithful child of God distinctly marked out in the Word.
2 Timothy 2, already referred to, points out this path; and Hebrews 13:13 clearly teaches that we should be outside the camp, bearing His reproach. If the professing church is a camp (and it surely is, for an earthly religion characterizes it rather than a heavenly worship), the place of the believer is outside. Moses pitched the tabernacle of the congregation outside the camp, and all who sought the Lord went out to it (Ex. 33:7). May all who are in the camp answer as Levi did, when Moses, standing at the gate of the camp, cried, “Who is on the Lord’s side?” (Ex. 32:26). They gathered themselves together unto him. It is not, of course, supposed that the Lord’s people in the camp, or systems of man, would carelessly remain within if they saw their place outside, and it is because dear to Christ, that those who have the truth entreat them to come out and be separate. The place of power in testimony, however, is outside, testifying by a separate position as well as by word of mouth. May God grant that nothing may hinder any who are exercised from acting simply according to the Word alone, for “Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path” (Psa. 119:105); remembering that “to obey is better than sacrifice, to hearken than the fat of rams,” and “that to him that hath shall be given, but to him that hath not (or does not act upon the light he has) shall be taken away even that which he hath.”