WHAT is the meaning of the text we so often hear quoted― “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them”? (Matthew 18:2020For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. (Matthew 18:20).) ―M.
1st. It is clear that only true believers could be really gathered to the Lord’s name. 2nd In a previous chapter (the sixteenth) the Lord pronounced the nation to be “a wicked and adulterous generation,” “left them, and departed” (verse 4); and then said He would build something else—His church. “Upon this rock I will build my church.” (verse 18.) We are not surprised therefore to find afterward, when our Lord spoke of “the church,” that He should give the germ of all its great practical principles in a few words, which this verse seems to us to contain. 3rd. Being gathered to His name demands, in every respect, conduct worthy of that name, and forbids the tolerance or even introduction of anything that dishonors that precious name. 4th We know, from subsequent teaching of the Holy Ghost in the epistles, that He who is “in the midst” is now “head of the body the church”― “one body;” has sent down the Holy Ghost to form, indwell, and energize this body― “one spirit;” and is also “Son over His own house”― “one Lord.” It would then seem to us impossible to intelligently act upon this verse according to the Lord’s mind, without the practical acknowledgment of all these points of truth. It is distressing to see the use that is often made of this precious Scripture. Happy those who have a single eye to the Lord’s glory. We know who said, “If thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” (Matthew 6:2222The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. (Matthew 6:22).)
Because, though Satan be bound, and the Lord personally reigning, man’s evil nature, though greatly restrained, and in the most favorable circumstances, is still the same. The end of the millennium will be a most awful proof of man’s unmendable state as a sinner. “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”