For Zion’s Sake – Going through the Gates

[00:00:00] Shall we turn together to that chapter that we one of the chapters we considered in those special days we've had last weekend in Isaiah, chapter 62. [00:00:20] Isaiah and chapter 62. [00:00:35] We will just read these words from verse six. I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, and they shall never hold their peace day nor night. Ye that are the Lord's remembrances, take ye no rest, and give him no rest till he establish, and till he make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. The Lord hath sworn by his right hand and by the arm of his strength. Surely I will no more. Give thy grain to be food for thine enemies and foreigners shall not drink thy new wine for which thou hast labored. But they that have garnered it shall eat it and praise the Lord, and they that have gathered it shall drink it in the courts of my sanctuary. [00:01:22] Go through. Go through the gates. Prepare ye the way of the people. Cast up, cast up the highway. Gather out the stones. Lift up an ensign for the peoples. Behold, the Lord hath proclaimed unto the end of the earth. Say ye to the daughter of Zion. Behold, thy salvation cometh. Behold, his reward is with him, and his recompense before him. And they shall call them the holy people, the redeemed of the Lord, and thou shalt be called, sought out, a city not forsaken. [00:02:04] Now, we haven't very much time left to us this morning, but what I would like to do today is simply to say one final word upon the matter that we have been considering over the previous weekend. You will remember we thought very much about Zion. We talked about the battle for Zion. We talked about the building up of Zion. We talked about the travail for Zion. And we talked about the work of Zion or the ministry of Zionism. Now, for those who perhaps werent there, it may not mean so much, except to say this, that you see, when we look at this 62nd chapter, we hear the words of the Lord Jesus of the Messiah in the first verse. For Zions sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem sake I will not rest until her righteousness go forth as brightness and her salvation as a lamp that Burneth. Now this is not only the literal Zion and the literal Jerusalem, the literal Israel of this earth. It is perfectly true that that is a very real and deep burden upon the heart of the messiah at the present time. He will not rest until something happens with that nation and with that land and with that city in preparation for his return. [00:03:40] But of course, there is this other side that we have been considering. That is the Zion which is above that Zion, of which we read in Hebrews, chapter eleven and verse 22. But ye that is the redeemed of the Lord, ye are come unto Mount Zion, unto the city of the living God, unto the heavenly Jerusalem. [00:04:03] We have come. We are, we are seeking that city which has the foundations, whose builder and architect is God. We have here no abiding city, but we seek for that which is to come. And of course, the glorious thing, as it says in Galatians 426, is that every single one who's born of God is born in Zion. God doesn't disregard the fact that you were born in London or Tokyo or Hong Kong or Singapore or Orlando or I must remember some others, or the others will tear me to pieces. But you know what I mean. [00:04:48] All these cities and towns from which we come, God doesn't disregard that. He doesn't. In fact, I want to say something about it in just a moment. But what he does see as the supreme value is whether you've been born in Zion. [00:05:04] Now, if you've been born of that Jerusalem which is above, which is free, then the psalm 87 becomes a reality. When he counts up the nations, he will say, this one was born there and that one was born there. [00:05:21] They are not born in Ethiopia or Egypt, Rahab, or in the Sudan or in Tyre or, or in Philistia. They were born in Zion. And your birth is registered, registered in the Lamb's book of Life. And beside every single registration in that book is the birthplace, Zion. [00:05:49] So every real believer is a zionist. [00:05:55] There is not a real believer that isn't a zionist, because we belong to a movement for the liberation of the world. [00:06:05] We belong to that movement which is going to end and result in the earth coming back to its rightful owner, the nations becoming the inheritance of the Lord and the uttermost parts of the earth his possession. Now, isnt that glorious? That gives us a goal to work for. It gives us an aim, it gives us a horizon. We're not just saved and left to ourselves wandering round in a circle. I can't help feeling so often with some believers that they seem to be on the 40 years wilderness, wandering round and round and round and round. They go. They don't really know where they're going. They know they're out of Egypt, but they don't know where they're going to. They just go. They've got experiences. They've seen the pillar of cloud on fire by day and by night they've fed on the manor day by day. They've had water out of the rock. They even know something about the tabernacle, but they don't know too much about it. I mean, for them, the tabernacle is just something that's there, and the glory of the Lord is there. It's wonderful when the Lord speaks there and there we can offer our offerings and make our sacrifices. But they don't know that. The Lord's plan isn't for a tabernacle wandering around in the wilderness. His plan is for Jerusalem, which is solid and eternal. His whole plan was, you shall not offer, when you come into the promised land, you shall not offer your sacrifices and your offerings where you shall choose, on any high place like the nations which I will drive out before you, but you shall come to the place where I will cause my name to dwell. [00:07:43] And there you shall offer your offerings and make your sacrifices. Now, that place was Jerusalem. But you know, sometimes we believers, we've got out experiences of the Lord and we have blessed experiences of the Lord. We know what it is for him to provide. We know what it is for him to lead. We know what it is for him, as it were, to meet with us. And yet we're still going on an endless cycle, round and round and round and round the wilderness as if that's all that matters. To see the pillar of cloud and fire, to drink the water out of the rock and to eat the bread, the manner that God has provided. And sometimes for a change of diets and quails. [00:08:27] I mean, it seems as if that's all that matters, really, when the earth opens up and swallows up those who are troublemakers. Well, that's another experience. [00:08:37] But the Lord, that's not the purpose of the Lord. The purpose of the Lord is to get us through the wilderness, to give us experiences of the Lord, but to get us into the land and into that tremendous purpose of his. And it's all bound up with that Zion, all bound up with that jerusalem. Because until the Lord has his king in his holy hill of Zion, there is no possibility of the nations becoming his inheritance and the outermost parts of his, of the earth becoming again his possession. [00:09:13] The restitution of all things, the restoration of all things, is dependent a, upon the king being in his place in Zion. And secondly, Zion being built, and thirdly, Zion fulfilling its ministry. Now, when the king is in his place and Zion is being built, built up and the ministry and work of Zion is being fulfilled, then and only then do we become truly involved and instrumental in the ends of the earth coming back to their rightful owner and the nation being brought, as it were, under the government of our Lord. Now, the wonderful thing about this whole matter is God has got his king in Zion. There's no question about it. It says in psalm two, yet have I set my king upon Zion, upon the mount of my holiness. He's done it. [00:10:10] There's no question about. There's no question of the Lord Jesus being disenthroned unseated. There is no question of the purpose of God concerning the Lord Jesus being frustrated. God has set him in his Zion. He's there at the right hand of God the Father. And he has sat down until the father makes all his enemies the footstool of his feet. So the word goes out, the Lord will send forth the rod of thy strength. Out of Zion rule thou in the midst of thine enemies. It is said of the Lord Jesus. Now, how can he do that if all we have is a Zion which is in the never never? How can we do that if our Zion, of our Jerusalem is so above that we never see it? [00:11:01] The only relationship we have with it is a very tenuous relationship. It's something to do with our conversion, and that's the only relationship we have with Zion. No, dear friends, where is this Zion built? [00:11:14] I want to say this straight away. This Zion is built down here. [00:11:21] It's no good us being butterflies, flitting from company to company and tasting the ministry here and the ministry there, or going off on this or going off on that, unless God brings us into the discipline of a local company community of believers, on the right foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ. How is it possible for Zion to be built, may I ask? We're living in a fool's paradise, singing songs of Zion, singing our wonderful hymns about the glory of the Lord and the coming kingdom of the Lord when we are ourselves. Nothing to do with it. In practice, the only way you and I can really be part of the realization of the purpose of God. And the Lord has had, all through church history, successive stages which he has completed by the work of the Holy Spirit. And in the last part of this age, there is a final few stages to be completed, to be, as it were, taken, journeyed through. And I'm not saying that we're going to have novel things. May God preserve us from that. That's one of the dangers at the present time, because we know we're at the end of the age. People are looking around for novel things that are not even in the word of God, or cooking up things that aren't in the word of God, but which they say are in the word of God and thus deceiving the people of God. We don't want anything of that. What we want to know is the work of our Lord in such fullness and such power and such reality that we become, as it were, involved in this whole work of his in the restitution of all things. Praise God for that. [00:13:12] I say that that means speaking of us here in Richmond, that it's no good, us just simply saying, oh, well, I don't know. I don't find it very interesting. I think I'll go here or I'll go there or I'll flit off here or flit off there. What's the point of that? [00:13:31] There may well come a day when you won't have ministry anyway where we shall have to go into caves or into sheds or into our homes and meet in twos and threes. What are you going to do then when all you've spoken about is wonderful ministry? Wonderful ministry, wonderful ministry. And you've all despised anything that seems to be rather humdrum and routine of just getting to know one another and getting close to one another and praying for one another and really helping one another through what's going to happen when those days of persecution finally come and we will not be able to meet together unless the Lord starts to teach us now these lessons. Young people, listen to me. The older ones may have gone to be with the Lord. I don't know. I don't know how long we have. But you younger ones, unless God can do something in us now to really prepare us so that we are able. [00:14:28] The Holy Spirit has brought such a flexibility into us that he can, as it were, enable us to meet in the simplest manner to help one another, to pray for one another, to minister to one another, to glorify the Lord without all the great paraphernalia. Now, I'm not against big meetings. We can go too far the other way. We can sort of have a thing about getting together for a good Bible study or a good time of ministry or whatever else. [00:14:57] That's just as silly. [00:15:02] But you see, this Zion has got to be built here in Richmond. And I haven't got much to do with the Zion which is above and the Zion which is to come. If I have not allowed the Lord to do something in my own heart and life here, if I have not learnt something of the battle for Zion down here and known something of the victories and triumphs of the Lord in it through his finished work, what is the point of talking about the battle for Zion. The battle of Zion, huh? [00:15:33] If we talk about Zion. Built, being built upon. I think we're marching to Zion the beautiful, beautiful Zion and that fields that yield a thousand sacred sweets. I always imagine a sweet shop, sort of some sort of booth in the corner of a field. Sort of distributing sweets. [00:15:55] It's rather wrong, but I'm afraid I can't get this mental picture out of my head every time we sing that verse. But I mean, we sing these wonderful hymns. What do they mean? They don't mean anything. They don't mean anything. [00:16:10] The only thing we're ever used to is sitting in rows, listening. [00:16:16] Because we've never come to the place where we really know a building up of Zion inside of us and amongst us. So that we are brought together in the Lord. Now, this Zion has got to be built here. I can talk about the building up of Zion. I can talk about Zion and the glory of Zion. And his family foundation is in Zion. And glorious things are spoken of thee, o Zion, city of God. And really the whole thing is just in my head. [00:16:44] Where is this Zion built? It's built here. Where is it built? In the locality in which I live. How is it built? In the community of believers of the redeemed. Who meet very simply in the Lord Jesus Christ. With none of these restrictions and labels that divide, but simply as believers. So that we can really be built together and flow together with the Lord. Where the spirit of the Lord can lead us and do his job. [00:17:13] If our Lord. The burden of our Lord's heart is for Zion and for its building up and for its completion, am I to believe that all he does is pray? [00:17:25] Is it not true that the Holy Spirit actually realizes the travail and intercessory ministry of our Lord upon earth? That as the Lord Jesus prays, the Holy Spirit actually performs the things and does the things that he asks for, it must be so. And therefore, dear ones, we, you and I, we want to be in this work of the Lord, don't we? [00:17:54] I don't want to talk about Zion all day long and every day and sing these lovely hymns. And at the end of it find that I have precious little to do with Zion. [00:18:07] Then our Lord says to me, you know, you were born in Zion. [00:18:11] But that's all. [00:18:15] Nothing else ever happened because you didn't let it happen. [00:18:23] What does it mean then when our. When this word of command comes? Go through. Go through the gates. Oh, I've spoken on this once or twice and I almost hesitate now, every time I think, oh, dear, they'll all clam up, shut up and switch off, you know, they'll say, go through, go through again. [00:18:46] But the fact of the matter is, maybe the Lord is saying this for the third time. [00:18:53] Go through. [00:18:55] Go through the gates. What does it mean? Well, as I said last week, it means you've got to commit yourself, not to people firstly, but to the lord as the king in Zion. That's the first thing. And you've got to go through the gates into Zion and be part of what God is doing with Zion. Then you can go through the gates, as it were, out of the gates to build the highway for the people who are to come. [00:19:23] Now, one day, it will happen in this area. [00:19:26] I am convinced of it. Whether it is only in the last few years of the age, I don't know. But I know in my bones that in the end, the Thames Valley will see an awakening such as it has not seen before. [00:19:43] All those early battles that we fought over this Thames Valley and this area, which the Lord again and again said, I'm going to do this thing. I'm going to do this thing. In the end, he will do it. But are we ready for it? [00:19:57] If really the Lord began to work in such a way that thousands were really saved, swept into the kingdom of God, into the family of God, what would we do? We have enough problems now. [00:20:10] And as I've often said, there's a problem for every believer. [00:20:15] If we've got 250 problems now, when those thousands get saved, we're going to have a few more thousand problems. Now, you know as well as I do, thank the Lord, he's the one who's responsible for all these problems. But I'm a problem to him, and you are. [00:20:32] I don't know if you recognize that yet, but we're all problems to the law. But, my goodness, he knows how to deal with us. [00:20:38] Sometimes it takes him 30, 40 years, but he finally gets his way. [00:20:45] Now, all I want is, what does it mean to go through the gates? I want just to say these few things, as it were, a final summing up of all that we said about Zion in those times. First of all, it means a true personal knowledge of the king. [00:21:07] Now, I take it for granted, you know, I mean, of course, that you're saved, but I mean, much more than being saved. [00:21:15] I mean that we really, each one of us, we know the Lord for ourselves. We have got to know him. There can be no going through the gates if all we're talking about is human relationships, horizontal relationships, getting to know one another. Unless the first and foremost thing is that every one of us has got our own clear, intimate, original, original, personal knowledge and experience of the Lord. He is all the glory of Zion. [00:21:51] There is no other glory in Zion. He is all the glory of Zion. His is the grace and the truth that radiates from Zion. He, it is his glory which is the light, which, as it were, will lighten all the nations that will walk in the light. [00:22:13] In that light. [00:22:16] We need to get to know him. We need to have our own experience of his life, our own experience of his power. [00:22:25] Now hear me on this matter. [00:22:28] We need to have our own experience of his life and our own experience of his power. Don't hide in all the other inhabitants of Zion, in all the other daughters of Zions. That includes the brothers as well. [00:22:41] The scripture calls us all the daughters, and that lies for you, ladies. I mean, they say this book is all one sided, but it isn't really is. It always refers to all the men and they're great men of war, some of them as the daughter of Zion. [00:22:56] So, ladies, look up. [00:22:59] Not all one sided, but it's an interesting thing, isn't it, that we've got to really get to know the law before we get to know one another. Is it not interesting, Colossians? It says, holding fast head from whom? The whole body. So often we try to get the body and we lose the head. [00:23:18] We need a holding fast of the head. What does it mean to hold fast the head? It means you have your own intimate, personal knowledge of the Lord. You have your own experience of the Lord. You have your own understanding of the Lord. You have your own appreciation of the Lord. Now, we need to know his life. We need to know his power. There's no good hiding in one another. You can come into a meeting like this and there's plenty of life, and then you get. You sort of feel, oh, I came in a bit dull, but so you feel a bit better for it, you see, because you've coasted along with the life of everybody else. You see? Now, when those days of persecution and trouble come, you're going to be found out in that day, you will shrivel up and die because you have not your own experience of the life of the Lord. Now, don't say to, oh, what do I do? Do I run off into a monastery or a convent and sort of shut myself up in a cell for a couple of years and get my own experience? No, not at all. Just do what you're doing now, only do it with clear understanding of your problem. [00:24:25] Know that you have got to know the Lord yourself. And there is no good hiding in the company. Well, you don't. You don't. How do you stop hiding in the company? By stopping coming to the meeting? No, not at all. That's the way the enemy will get you. It is forsake not the assembling of yourselves together. And so much the more as you see that day approaching. So that's not the way as we see the Lord coming. Don't let the enemy get you on that one, or you'll be out. [00:24:50] What you need to do is to recognize the problem yourself. Now, I'm coasting along with these others. I've got to have my own experience. I've got to have my own knowledge of the king. [00:24:59] And it's not only his life, it's his power. There is an anointing for us, dear friends. Now, people sometimes talk about this anointing just as if somehow or other, we've all got it, haven't we? Of course we've all got it. Since we're all in the body and the head is one, our one head, and the anointing is on the head. Of course, we've all got this anointing. Furthermore, we have this anointing in a meeting. [00:25:23] You see, every time the church gathers the anointing is there the leaders, and if the responsible folks will sense what that anointing is and follow it. Now, insofar as we follow it, there's life in the whole meeting, and power in the whole, and the will of God is done. But there's a danger that we tend to think, because there is an anointing in the meeting. Now we've got it. You see, that we stand into. We all know. Do you know, I'm not being rude. Do you know that in a prayer meeting, the dimmest and most carnal christian can pray sometimes as if they're absolutely, absolutely spiritual? [00:26:04] I don't know if that's found some of you out. But you see, what happens is this. You can have a meeting and someone's absolutely all flesh, but because the meeting is following the anointing and they are caught up in it, they can absolutely come in with the right thing. With you. My, that was a good prayer of so and so. [00:26:22] Not the normal flesh, something of the Lord. But it's not really in them. They're still flesh. [00:26:31] Now, what I'm saying is this, there is an anointing in us all. Generally, there is an anointing for a meeting. But we need specific anointing. And unless we know the king who is the anointed one, you and I will never have specific and particular anointing. Now, people say to me, but surely you don't know it, do you? I mean, you take it by faith, and you. Oh, that's nonsense. Absolute nonsense. I defy anybody who's really anointed to tell me they don't know it. [00:27:05] It's the difference between chalk and cheese, between day and night. [00:27:11] When a person has received the anointing, they may be still very weak and lots of blame, but something's happened and they know it. [00:27:20] Whether it was watchman kneeling, whether it was DL Moody or Ruben Torrey or Billy Graham or anyone else, they will all tell you there came a point when something happened to me and God did something in my life, and I know it. [00:27:38] It's not that you become proud, because you're just as weak and stupid as ever. But something has come. The Lord has committed himself in a new way. Now we must seek. You see, some people are afraid to ask the Lord. They sort of hide in a general thing. Well, I am the Lord's the ten thing. Well, isn't that faith? Well, it can be, and it may not be, because sometimes faith is to say, dear Lord, I know it's all mine in you, but I at present am not experiencing it. [00:28:08] There's a lack in my life and I want to be specific. Ye have not because ye ask not. [00:28:13] I want to be specific. I want a specific anointing. [00:28:18] Now, when we begin to ask for a specific anointing, God answers us specifically. [00:28:26] So we need to have this only space. We're going to go through the gates. What's the point? This is a battle, believe me, we can't just all drift. We're going to need real personal knowledge of the Lord. [00:28:40] It's no good as all sorts of depending on somebody. If that one is wrong and says something, the whole work goes off the rails. Because there are not other people who have anointing who can say, just wait, just wait, we're going wrong. [00:28:58] And church history is full of this. [00:29:02] Movements that began with the Lord, which are now miles away from the Lord because of some big person in it who has said this and this and this, and everyone said, yes, yes, yes, instead of real anointing, so that we know the mind of the Lord and that kind of anointed fellowship where we can be prodded and restrained or sometimes pushed to really do the will of the Lord. A true personal knowledge of the king. Don't you think that's what's needed? I do. I think the beauty of the Lord our God needs to be upon us. When that happens, then the nations round about will take note. They will see, not religious people, not fanatical people, but they will see the beauty of the Lord that is Zion. And then I want to say another thing. [00:29:58] Just touching it, on it. Going through the gates means a life laid down for the king. I say that particularly a life laid down for the king. Going through the gates means you're not going to live in your nice little farm outside of the city, but you're going through the gates into the city, where it wasn't even a garden allowed in the old days. You had to have every garden outside of the city. You've got to go in. And in one sense, it's a life laid down. [00:30:28] Why? What does it mean, a life laid down? [00:30:31] Jesus said, if any man follow me, let him deny himself. Take up his cross and follow me. Why did he say his cross? Did he mean a kind of migraine, a sort of stomach trouble? That's your cross. You've got arthritic hips. Your cross. [00:30:50] You've got a sort of some allergy. That's your cross. No. Why then did the Lord say, take up his cross? He meant my cross made his. [00:31:04] My Calvary made yours. [00:31:07] Are you ready? What does it mean, let him deny himself? It means let him give up all rights to himself, as it says in the new English Bible, let him give up all rights to himself. Now, that's the problem. Haven't we all got rights? And isn't our problem the question of our rights? We like to have our rights and stand on our rights and fight for our rights. A life laid down is simply rights given up for the king. [00:31:39] What does it mean? It means our life is at his disposal. Is your life at his disposal? [00:31:49] Really? [00:31:51] If the Lord were to say to you this very moment in your heart so and so, I want you in Patagonia, are you ready? [00:32:13] If the Lord were to say to you now, you did this and this and this, which was wrong, and you harmed so and so, and I want you to go and say sorry. [00:32:27] Are you at his disposal? You see, we all talk about Lord, Lord. We sing he is lord. But when it comes to it, he can't say, go and say sorry. Go and do this. Go and make restitution. Humble yourself on this matter or go to this place or that place, or come here. No, when it comes to it, he is lord in name, but not in practice. [00:32:51] To go through the gates means that he is lord. And as his mother once said to those servants, whatsoever he saith, do it now. I'm not saying that at this moment. The Lord tells you something, you shouldn't share it in fellowship. If the Lord were to say to you, go to Timbuktu, I hope with all my heart that you would share it with your brothers and sisters. I mean, we don't just want people getting on trains. First thing tomorrow morning, I'm going to Timbuktu. [00:33:19] And then when they're there saying, well, I believe the Lord told me to come to Timbuktu. I mean, we have to be, you know, there's fellowship in this matter, and your brothers and sisters, you test this thing out, but I want to know whether you're really at the disposal of the Lord. That's my point. Can he really do with you what he wants to do? You see, this whole matter of worldliness, as some people call it, you know, it's all a matter of his lordship. There are times when the Lord allows a person to. Just because so and so is permitted to do so and so doesn't mean that you are. It's a question of whether he's lord in your life. You don't know how God dealt with so and so in earlier years. [00:34:01] You see, much of this kind of thing, of giving up things, of letting go things, is because God is really disciplining you. I think that we sowells, at times may have gone to some extremes, but my word, what the Lord did with him as an object lesson in this matter, let your hair grow long. He said to him, keep your hat on or don't have it on at all. I mean, weird things. But God was doing something with his servant to see whether he could produce an instrument of intercession that was absolutely at the disposal of the Lord. [00:34:37] Now, there are times when the Lord says to you, no more football. [00:34:41] It doesn't mean football's wrong. [00:34:43] It just means he said to you, no more football. [00:34:47] To others, he might say, no more of the box. [00:34:54] So the telly's got to go. [00:34:57] No, I don't belong to those who believe that telly is absolutely the devil personified and that he sort of grins out of the screen at every possible opportunity. [00:35:07] I thank God for the news commentary and other documentaries and many other things that are most instructive and helpful. But like a book, like a newspaper, like radio, there are things that are evil and things that are good. And in all these things, we can read newspapers and not read the word. We can read novels and never study the book of books, the word of God. And when that happens, the Lord has to be Lord of a life and say, this is destroying you. Finish out with it. [00:35:40] That's whether we're at his disposal or not. We can sort of say, now, Lord, this can't be the Lord. It must be the enemy. I mean, I'm getting extreme. [00:35:49] So and so has a television and a colour one, too. [00:35:54] So and so buys tickets and gives them to others for football matches. [00:36:01] Thats not the point. [00:36:03] The point is what the Lord is saying to you. [00:36:09] What he lets so and so do is another matter. [00:36:12] What hes doing in your life is something between him and you. And you? Are you at his disposal? Well, now, I just underline that once again. I want to go on to a third thing. What does it mean going through the gates? It means to be fitly framed together. Now, that is a most unusual phrase to speak of human beings, isnt it? Fitly framed together. When I see the size of some and the smallness of others, I wonder just what it means. Fitly framed together. But I suppose it's rather like a jigsaw puzzle. When a jigsaw puzzle is all in place, it's fitly framed together. The whole thing has found its relationship to all the other pieces. And you see the whole picture, a house is a whole matter of being fitly framed together. I remember, I was thinking this morning, I remember years ago when that building inspector who was such an ogre and a tiger and who became such a friend in the end and such a help when he first came in here and stomped around and saying, you'll have to do this, you'll have to do that, you'll have to do the other. And then finally, in a great moment of triumph, he stood over here and said, and the whole of this wall will have to come down. [00:37:25] And I said, the whole of this wall will have to come down? Yes. She said, the whole of this wall and part of that corner and right about there. And it will have to be rebuilt. First of all, a very strong foundation and then 13 inches thick. [00:37:38] And I said, 13 inches? But I said, we don't need a castle. [00:37:45] And he said to me, you don't know if Billy Graham will ever come and speak here. [00:37:56] And I said to him, I don't think Billy Graham will come here. He said, well, you don't know. [00:38:02] And he said, if Billy Graham came here, they would pack this place so that there wouldn't be room to stand. And he said, we're going to build it so they can stand from wall to wall. [00:38:13] Well, now, I'm very thankful for the old building inspector, really, because at that time we were quite a small company and it just seems so stupid. [00:38:20] But when I see the way we pack this room at times and see some of the riotous parties that are sometimes held here, I'm very glad for that 13 inch wall that went down. Now, it's fitly framed together. Wouldn't it be a terrible thing if it wasn't fitly framed together? I think some of you might well feel a bit nervous. [00:38:41] You look at all these people and work out their weight. Now, I don't want to get personal, but I mean, look at them all. I mean, let's say there's an average of about seven, eight, nine, shall we say nine stone a piece? [00:38:55] Should we bring it down? [00:38:59] I see some of the ladies are wincing under my ministry this morning. [00:39:03] Now, I mean, the point is this, when you work it out, all these people in here, there's a pretty. There's a large amount of weight, isn't there, up here. [00:39:11] It's a good thing this place is fitly framed together. It can take anything. [00:39:18] Praise the Lord. Now, God is building a house that can take anything. [00:39:24] It can bear all the glory. [00:39:28] All the glory. When the glory comes into it, it won't just disintegrate because it's been fitly framed together. It's going to be able to take all the glory and radiate all the glory. This zion that God is building is his eternal administration, his eternal headquarters, his eternal home, his eternal bride. It's not something just for an age. It's not something for just a little bit of time. It's something forever and ever and ever. And therefore he's really doing a thorough work. Now we can talk about being fitly framed together. What does it really mean? Well, frankly, it means a life shared. It means that once we've got our own knowledge of the Lord and we've laid down our life for the king, well, we've got to have a shared life. If we don't have a shared life, we don't know anything about being fitly framed together. What does it mean, a shared life? It means you just can't do anything off your own bat. You've got to think of others just like a family. Can't do everything off their own bat. They have to share. They have to take others into consideration. Do you understand? [00:40:29] And this means, very simply, that we have to open up to one another. That's what we don't always like, do we? I don't mean washing dirty linen in public, but what I do mean is this, that there are times when we have to open up to one. When we've got needs and problems, we've got to open up. Wasn't it wonderful last Tuesday? And some of the prayer times, how in different prayer groups, people opened up and said, I've got this need, will you all pray for me? I think more was done in some of those times than for a long time, just simply because we were able to pray for one another. When people don't tell us what the need is, won't open up, how can we be fitly framed together? [00:41:02] I look at somebody and think, oh, there's little so and so over there, so prim and proper. [00:41:08] Now, I better not look at anybody. [00:41:12] But you know what I mean. I think so. So correct. [00:41:16] Never a problem. [00:41:19] I wish I was like them. [00:41:21] No problems. [00:41:23] Bit lethargic, but no problem. And then they open up and we find out they've got real problems. [00:41:32] For instance, wasn't it lovely on Friday night to hear those testimonies? Now, I know that some of these dear ones won't mind me saying so, but I mean, if I just met them in a meeting, I wouldn't know that there were years and years and years of suffering behind those lives. [00:41:47] Great and deep problems that God touched and marvelously, as it were, solved and brought through into a new life. [00:41:56] But when I know it, doesn't it give me a new appreciation of them? [00:42:00] I feel I know them. I feel now I understand. And if there are problems or particular things, I begin to understand a little more their temperament. Because we've opened up now, you can't be fitly framed together unless we've opened up to one another. That's what it means. We've got to find relationship to one another and we've got to find our gift, our function. You see, we can't be fitly framed together unless the Holy Spirit can manifest himself as he will through one another in the building up of the body of the Lord Jesus. [00:42:34] We've all got something to give. Of course, we need had that love and care of one another. And oh dear, how often this lacks. It's as if the enemy comes in and sort of anesthetizes a whole company, as if he sort of puts a spiritual cocaine into the blood stream. And somehow or other, we. We all want to love each other. We want to care for each other, but we feel distant. We feel inhibited. We feel we just can't do it. That's the kind of bondage that needs to be dragged out into the open and broken in the name of the Lord. [00:43:06] Otherwise, the enemy's going to say, I will not allow this company to love each other. I will not allow them to care for one another. I'll just inhibit them all. He doesn't have to do it through foul insinuation and division and faction. All he has to do is inhibit us. So that somehow or another we just feel we can't do anything. We can't open up. We can't. It needs breaking. We need that love of God shed abroad in our hearts which cares for one another. Sensitive to one another. That somehow or other watches over one another. Not in a busy body manner, but in a really loving manner. [00:43:41] Such fit. Being fitly framed together is not going to come about. If you're flitting off here and flitting off there. I suppose some think, well, so what's he talking about? He flips off here and flips up there. [00:43:55] But I just remind you, I did have 25 years of it. [00:44:02] The thing is this, that we. We just won't get anywhere by. We don't take responsibility. We're not responsible. [00:44:10] But when God does this work, it's wise. Wonderful. [00:44:14] Well, now, those are a few thoughts I've had about going through the gates. [00:44:19] It really means every part functioning. Every one of us has a part to play. [00:44:25] And people say to me, well, I don't know. I feel terribly young and unable learn by experience. [00:44:34] Until you learn to open up and learn to contribute and learn to function. [00:44:39] You're never going to get anywhere. You have to start. [00:44:44] And when we start, God takes over our education. [00:44:51] Going through the gates. [00:44:54] Have you gone through the gates? I know many, many ones here who really have committed themselves to the Lord. [00:45:02] But I wonder whether what we've said this morning comes home with a new challenge. [00:45:08] You see, we can talk about going through the gates. And what we are committed to is a truth. [00:45:14] God preserve us. We need to see truth. But we are not committed to a truth. We are committed to the king. [00:45:23] And we are committed to that truth being made flesh and blood. [00:45:30] May God do this in us all. And may he preserve us from just littleness. Because thats what could happen. We could all get into our little groups. And love each other and care for each other. And minister to one another. And then in the end, somehow or other, lose the whole great objective of God, which is that we should know the rod of his strength going out of Zion, his ruling in the midst of his enemies, and so the outermost parts of the earth becoming his possession. May the Lord help us to occupy till he come and really go through those gates and commit ourselves to the Lord, that he may be able to do this work in us. Shall we pray now, Lord? We just pray together. O father, write this upon our hearts. Thou knowest us all, Lord, we are all given to apathy or lethargy one time or another. Lord, wilt thou bring this word about going through the gates into our hearts in such a vivid and dynamic way that we will not be able to escape it? We shall know it is the word of the Lord to us. [00:46:49] And o father, we know that thou more than anybody else wants to see this whole matter of Zion work out in practical circumstances, in practical relationships, in our life together. Lord, preserve us, we pray from somehow or other just being caught on different things that are secondary. Help us to see thy end and above all, Lord, to be committed to thyself and then to one another, and we ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.