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[00:00:01] We will read one corinthians, chapter one, verse nine, the 9th verse of the first chapter of one corinthians.
[00:00:17] And we will read in the revised version, God is faithful through whom ye were called into the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
[00:00:38] Then I want to read that to you in the new English Bible. This is the way it puts it. It is God himself who called you to share in the life of his son, Jesus Christ our Lord. And God keeps faith, called to share in the life of his son. This is the way Moffat puts it.
[00:01:16] Faithful is the God who called you to participate in his son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
[00:01:29] Then I want you to turn to one corinthians, chapter ten, verse 16.
[00:01:39] One corinthians, chapter ten, verse 16.
[00:01:45] The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not a communion of the blood of Christ?
[00:01:55] The bread which we break? Is it not a communion of the body of Christ, seeing that we who are many are one bread, one body? Now that word communion is exactly the same word as fellowship. Fellowship and communion are the same words. If you turn to two corinthians, chapter 13, verse 14, two corinthians, chapter 13, verse 14.
[00:02:28] The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. The communion or the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. And then I want you to turn to psalm 122. It's just a little interesting sidelight. Psalm 122, three. And in the hebrew text, it says, says, jerusalem, that art builded as a city that is compact, compact together.
[00:03:18] Jerusalem that is builded, that art builded as a city that is compact together. Now, in the Septuagint version, which is the oldest translation of the Old Testament, a Greek into Greek, this is what we have. Jerusalem is built as a city whose fellowship is complete.
[00:03:46] Jerusalem is built as a city whose fellowship. It's the word Koinonia again, whose fellowship is complete.
[00:03:58] Then again, I want you to go back to one corinthians, chapter one and verse nine. Read it. I'll just quote it. God is faithful through whom you were called into the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ our Lord. And then I want you to note that in my estimation, at any rate, that is the motto, if you like, the motto for the whole of this letter. So if you go back to one chapter one, verse two, one corinthians, chapter one, verse two.
[00:04:30] Paul unto the church of God, which is at current, even them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be saints, with all that call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, in every place their Lord and ours. Then again, verse ten. Now I beseech you, brethren, through the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, the fellowship of Christ.
[00:05:10] And then, if you will, turn from there to Romans, back to Romans, chapter twelve.
[00:05:21] Romans twelve, verse four and five.
[00:05:27] Romans twelve, four and five. For even as we have many members in one body, and all the members have not the same office, so we who are many are one body in Christ and several lessons members one of another, then, if you will.
[00:05:57] Of course, we should read right on there, I'm afraid, you know, doesn't take too long. It goes on, you see, to say, and having gifts differing according to the grace, according to the grace that was given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy, and so on. You need to read on there then.
[00:06:18] One Corinthians twelve, verse twelve. For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. For in one spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks were the bond or free, and were all made to drink are one spirit. For the body is not one member, but many. Now again, we want to read the whole of that chapter right through to the end of it. Then if we could turn to one Peter, one Peter, chapter two, verse five and verse nine.
[00:07:07] One Peter, chapter two, verse five and verse nine. Now this time it is the word priest or priesthood that we're looking at.
[00:07:17] Ye also as living stones, are built up a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Ye all are built up a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices. Verse nine. But ye are an elect race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's ability, own possession. Revelation, chapter one, verse six.
[00:08:10] And he made us to be a kingdom, to be priests unto his God and father. To him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Chapter five, verse ten.
[00:08:29] And madest them to be unto our God a kingdom and priests, and they reign upon the earth.
[00:08:41] Then one Peter. Back to the first letter of Peter, chapter four, from verse nine to eleven.
[00:08:56] One Peter, chapter four, nine.
[00:08:59] Using hospitality one to another without murmuring, according as each hath received a gift, ministering it among yourselves as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. If any man speaketh, speaking as it were oracles of God, if any man ministereth, ministering as of the strength which God supplieth, that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, whose is the glory and the dominion, forever and ever. Amen.
[00:09:36] And then one corinthians. Back to one corinthians, chapter 14, verse 26.
[00:09:46] One corinthians, 414 26. What is it then, brethren, when ye come together, each one hath a psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation, hath a tongue, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done unto edifying or building up. If any man speaketh in a tongue, let it be by two, or at the most three, and that in turn, and let one interpret. But if there be no interpreter, let him keep silence in the church, and let him speak to himself and to God, and let the prophets speak by two or three, and let the others discern or judge. But if a revelation be made to another sitting by, let the first keep silence. For ye all can prophesy one by one, that all may learn and all may be exhorted. And the spirits of the subject of the prophets are subject to the prophets. For God is not a God of confusion, but of peace.
[00:10:49] And lastly, Matthew and chapter 23.
[00:10:56] Matthew, chapter 23, and verse eight.
[00:11:03] But be not ye called, rabbi, for one is your teacher, and all ye are brethren, and call no man your father on the earth, for one is your father, even he who is in heaven. Neither be ye called masters, for one is your master, even the christ. But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whosoever shall exalt himself shall be humbled. And whosoever shall humble himself shall be exalted.
[00:11:43] Now, this evening I'm going to launch straightway in more or less into the middle of the point that we were dealing with last week, which was the church, his body, an organism, and not an organization.
[00:12:02] And if you weren't here last week, I can only suggest that you obtain the tape and listen to it. I trust that starting, as we will, in the middle of it will help at least make some sense to you.
[00:12:18] The fact is that there is a difference between an organism and an organization.
[00:12:26] An organism is something which has an organization.
[00:12:35] Sometimes its organization is extremely and exceedingly complex and intricate, but all of its organization had developed from the life within it. It never read a book. It was never taught how it should go or what way it should go.
[00:12:53] Its whole organization developed from within.
[00:13:00] Now, it's as simple as that. Where it must be living.
[00:13:04] An organism has got to be something living, whereas an organization is something which is by its very nature static. It is put together from without, by man, by some other agency, according to a blueprint or a set standard of rules or regulations or some plan.
[00:13:28] It can never change unless it is changed from without to within.
[00:13:33] In other words, as I said, my body is an organism.
[00:13:38] Quite a few years ago, it was just a little blob of flesh and blood, and now it's developed into what it is. Where did I get the whole organization? I have the built in thermostatic control, everything else that's in, inside my body, the means by which I expel foreign agencies and so on, continually that might come in and so on. How did I, how did I get it all? Where did the organization come from? I never read a book. It all developed from something within.
[00:14:09] But if I had a car from the 1930s, I had a car today, that car would be precisely a 1930s car. In the 1960s, it couldn't change. It still got the organization of the 1930s, because it was put together according to a blueprint, according to a plan by a man or by men.
[00:14:40] Now, that is the difference between an organism and an organization. Some people get the idea that because we say the church is organic, there should be no organization at all. That is not correct.
[00:14:54] There is an organization, but it is produced by the life, the risen life of Christ.
[00:15:02] And it is the Holy Spirit that makes that life of Christ real in us by the working of the cross. Now, that's just very simply, at least the point that we made. We made a lot of other points last week. If we would know the organic life and development of the church, we must first hold fast to the head and then know the life of the risen head by the spirit flowing through at least two of us.
[00:15:49] For the church to come into being, there must be at least two members.
[00:15:55] Now, it's as simple as that. You get two believers together, holding fast the one head and allowing the life to flow through them, and before long, that life will do everything.
[00:16:12] The pattern, everything else is within the life. Now, the organic nature of the church covers every single aspect of its life and functions. It covers, for instance, the order and the pattern. Why have we got so many confusion, conflicting church patterns, and why do they all claim to be New Testament patterns, or at least built on some system, some blueprint that has been discovered in the word of God?
[00:16:51] Because, as we said last week, in my estimation, there is no intended blueprint in the New Testament. It is an extraordinary fact that in the 27 books of the New Testament, not one is given solely to defining the organization which some people would have us believe is so vital and so important.
[00:17:14] God, who would have foreseen, who has foreseen all the mess and chaos and confusion that has resulted, I would have thought in all his wisdom, if the church was an organization, I would have thought in all his wisdom he would have at least devoted one of the little letters in the 27 books of the New Testament wholly to defining this organization, so that once and for all we can be absolutely clear as to the church's organization. But there is no such thing. Now I'm not going to go back over last week and so and explain Timothy and Titus and Corinthians and acts and so on that we must leave. But what I do want to say is the order and the pattern. And there is an order and there is a pattern in the church comes through the life within, as that life progresses and develops, increases under the headship of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[00:18:26] So the form, the order, the pattern developed, it cannot all be set up at once. Now, my dear friends, just think for a moment.
[00:18:39] God says, if you've got two people saved by the grace of, by his grace in Christ holding fast to the head on the ground of locality, you've got the church. Now, if you've got two people, supposing there was not another Christian in Richmond except just two of us, Michael and myself. These two of us can make a fine pair.
[00:19:04] Just the two of us. Just the two of us here in Richmond. How on earth could we have elders and deacons unless I was an elder and he was a deacon, as we could sort that then we wouldn't have a congregation.
[00:19:20] Yet God says we are the church in Richmond because the two of us are members of Christ. And where two or three are gathered together, there am I. And it's the same authority and the same power and the same life present. Where two are there as well as 500, precisely the same. Those two can act if they only are not ignorant in the name of the Lord Jesus, just as well as a large company.
[00:19:50] Now where are you going to have all your deacons and elders and all the rest of it if there's only two of you?
[00:19:59] And don't you see how stultifying it is if as soon as you grow to twelve, you decide to have elders and deacons and have all the older pattern? No, the pattern's got to develop from within. It can't all be set up at once. This is the mistake. We've got organizationalism in the blood.
[00:20:21] It's an extraordinary thing.
[00:20:24] We just can't help it get two or three people together. And before you know where they are, they've got to organize the whole thing according to their ideas of what the scripture says. And as soon as they do that, it stultifies and paralyzes the real flowing of the life of God. Now, the thing is, obviously, let us bother about holding fast the head. Let us keep our relationship with the head absolutely clear, and therefore our relationship with one another. Let us go on with the real job of really serving the Lord together and being built together and being used to bring others into a saving knowledge of God and all the order and all the pattern takes shape. You remember I showed you two things last week? Two things. Not two onions and not two daffodils. One daffodil and one onion. How is it that these two things, which look so alike, and there's a botanist here, and I'm sure in this matter, even the I, a layman. No, I'm right. No daffodil has ever become an onion. And no onion has ever become a daffodil. I hope I'm right.
[00:21:32] But it's never happened in the whole of history. No way is it the two things that look so alike and which I understand have at times been mistaken with dire results.
[00:21:49] How is it that these two things, which are so alike, have a different pattern? Why could it not be, as I said last week, if we took that little daffodil and put the onions all around it, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of onions, don't you think the proximity of hundreds of onions would turn this thing that looks so much like an onion into an onion? But no, all the hundreds of onions grow up as onions, and that grows up as one depot in the middle of all those onions, tiny little daffodil in an onion patch.
[00:22:23] Why put the onion in the center and hundreds and hundreds of daffodils all around it, and the influence of the proximity of all those hundreds and hundreds of daffodils will do nothing to the one onion. It still becomes an onion. The daffodils remain daffodils. Now, why is that?
[00:22:40] Why is that? Because inside that dry, ugly looking thing, there is onion life. And inside the life is an onion pattern and order. Inside that balm there is daffodil life, and inside that life there is daffodil order and pattern. So put the two things in together and the pattern develops. It doesn't bother its head about it. It bothers about living.
[00:23:09] This doesn't bother its head about becoming a daffodil it bothers about living, and it becomes a daffodil. When brothers and sisters bother about living, they become the church. The church has flows through the order and the patentation. Instead of getting all our heads sort of mixed up and confused about this and that way, you know, before you know where you are, there's division and argument and everything else, or the one at sixes and sevens on this simple thing of order and pattern. The thing develops.
[00:23:42] And that to me, is the book of acts. Wherever you look in the book of acts you've got here, there are differences. There are the difference between the Church of Jerusalem and the Church of Dante. There are differences, but it's the same thing. It's the same basic pattern, the same basic order that we find all spreading all over the world. But they didn't have a little book.
[00:24:07] It was inside.
[00:24:10] It's the same with government, the matter of elders or anything else that you might say. What happens? People say, oh, but you must have elders. You see? But isn't it not. Is it not an interesting fact that we know that the apostle Paul and the others, I hadn't time to go through it all, otherwise I would. Perhaps some of the extra times on the course will do it. Isn't it interesting the apostle Paul only appoint elders on his return journey nine months later when the believers who've come together have just been shoved together and left alone with the Holy Spirit? And then when he comes back, he appoints elders in every city. And then it says, he writes to Titus and says, I have left you in Crete to appoint elders in every city.
[00:24:59] Well, why didn't they do it at the same time? Start.
[00:25:02] The point was, they were allowing for the organic principle. There is no greater mistake than making men elders. Once you've made a man an elder, you can't de elderize him.
[00:25:13] It proves to be a mistake. And in many, many companies upon this one point, that they've been shipwrecked, they've rushed ahead and made this man and that man. And the other bit later, they find that's all a terrible mistake. And the whole thing is broken up on that. It's a mistake.
[00:25:33] The Book of Proverbs says, a man's gift shall make room for him.
[00:25:37] If a man is an elder, everyone knows it. In the end, it filters through the whole thing. It's not that everyone puts their heads against it. What do you think? It's just that they know there's something in the man. You can't help it.
[00:25:51] No, don't. For that think that every elder should be like an apostle, poor.
[00:25:59] They are just ordinary people such as yourselves. But we turn to them. There is something about them that we can't help but turn to. And when you put them together, as someone once said, take them apart and you would end them all on the scrap heap. But put them together and there's something there.
[00:26:17] Government, it comes from the light of God within. Isn't that so?
[00:26:23] And I tell you from our own experience we learned this, but I'll talk about that in a moment. What about ministries and gifts?
[00:26:34] They also come the same way.
[00:26:38] You see, the gifts and the ministries are within the life, the risen life of Christ, and they are manifested by the Holy Spirit. Sometimes there's got to be a breaking of the sound barrier, and then suddenly it's manifested the gift there. But did the gift just suddenly drop on them? It was there in the life of Christ.
[00:26:59] Now to use a natural illustration, you see, look here. I can give you years of piano lessons if I was a musician. But if you haven't got a gift inside, what have I done?
[00:27:13] I've just turned out a very wooden pianist.
[00:27:18] They can go through the notes, but the thing's not in them. No one would ever really bother to listen to them because it's wooden.
[00:27:25] But when there's a gift inside, does it suddenly drop on them when they're twelve years of age, or when they're eight years of age? Or was it there within their temperament, within their very personality and life? And it just came out, something just brought it out into the, isn't that sort of same with painting? Same with a gift of organizing ability, any other ability or gift. It's inside a person. And as they grow up, it's discovered, you just discover it sometimes. It's very strange, as it says, necessity is the mother of invention.
[00:28:02] How often that happens. You're forced to do something and you can't pay for it. Suddenly you find you have a gift.
[00:28:10] Now thats on the natural level.
[00:28:15] But gifts are not like apples tied on a tree, you know, as if you, God sort of ties this on you and then that on you and then the other on you. Its something that he draws out from the life of God within you and manifests. And that's why so often the manifestation of spiritual gifts comes with the Holy Spirit coming on a person, because the life has been cramped and limited. And suddenly when there's a release, out comes the gift.
[00:28:47] It's there. Now it's manifested.
[00:28:53] So for the church there are all kinds of ministries and gifts, they're all locked up in. The life of Christ is a release of the life. We need, need get the life released by the spirit of God.
[00:29:05] And all the ministries and gifts are manifested.
[00:29:12] And then again, I must say, progress, increase, multiplication, all come as the life of God grows and develops unhindered in his people. Isn't that the thing that brings men and women in? They sense the presence of God, they sense the life of God. They wouldn't put it like that, but that's what it is. There's something there that they say, well, I haven't met before, something in the people. It's not just preaching, it's in the people, it's the life of God.
[00:29:44] Now, I say we, when we first came together in 1953, I mean, as a fully, we were more or less out from everything.
[00:29:59] We of course, naturally believed in a New Testament pattern, but what else? So we had a week of prayer.
[00:30:09] It was, we looked in the scriptures and we saw that they had the Lord's table every Sunday, at least we thought they did. It seemed to be clear that some companies had it in the New Testament every first day of the week. So we said, well, we'll have that then we said, it's quite clear, they have elders and deacons, so we must have elders and deacons. We numbered, I suppose, about 30.
[00:30:31] So we had a week of prayer. And the result of that week of prayer was that we put aside three men as elders and four men as deacons.
[00:30:42] We did it in the most spiritual way it was possible. We did it with prayer, a whole week of prayer, and one or two of us even abstained from food.
[00:30:54] It was the most spiritual way we could do it. And we had a perfect church pattern. And I must say this, even people who are well up in church patterns told me that it was a perfect church pattern.
[00:31:10] Absolutely. And as far as we were concerned, and those of you who, who were there in those days will bear witness to this, we were absolutely one very, very happy, no trouble, no cloud on the horizon.
[00:31:24] About two years after this appointment of elders and deacons, a number of us became aware of what we could only describe as a kind of spiritual earth tremor.
[00:31:36] It was something deep down within the company that seemed to be shaking and we couldn't understand. We had such a sense that something was wrong and yet we couldn't put our finger on it. In the end, if I remember rightly, on a Friday, 13 of us brothers spent the day in prayer and fasting. Now, it so happened whilst we were there, it began to dawn on one or two of us as we sought the Lord, that it was something to do with this matter of the pattern, matter of government. I'm sorry.
[00:32:10] Yet the more I thought about it, the more I thought, what more could we do? We'd spend a week in prayer. Surely the Lord doesn't expect us to spend more than that.
[00:32:19] And I had gone without some food, too. I thought, well, I mean, after all. No. Can you go very much further?
[00:32:29] I thought it was the most spiritual thing, thinking the most spiritual technique. Impossible. I couldn't think. Was it? It was par excellence. Was there anything better in the study? There was, if you know what it is, a little acorn jar. If any of you know what, an acorn jar. If I thought about this, I would have got it out and shown it to you. And in the acorn jar was an acorn, rather like one of those hyacinth jars, you know, where you put a house in Balboa water.
[00:32:58] And it was only a little thing, about the size, and it was on the study table. I was praying in the desk, and I was looked across, and whilst we were praying, I saw that little acorn. And in a flash, the whole thing came home to me. It was just as the lord said to me, this is the secret of the whole thing. You see, that acorn has two kinds of unity. It has two kinds of pattern. One is the outward unity. The outward pattern, that's the shell.
[00:33:34] It's static.
[00:33:36] It is incapable of producing another acorn. It's perfect, but static. It's got all the look of the right thing, but it's static.
[00:33:45] Inside the shell is another kind of pattern, which, if you'll only let it. It's in the light. If you'll only let that light, it'll smash the outside shell and it will lose all its form altogether. But it will grow into a tree capable of producing thousands and thousands of acorns.
[00:34:07] It was the beginning of our understanding of the organic principle. Now, don't make any mistake on this. We'd always taught, as some of you can bear witness, who were there in the beginning. We'd always taught that the church was organic. But you see, like everyone in evangelical circles, we taught one thing and practiced another.
[00:34:25] The fact was that we had organized the church in the most perfectly spiritual way it was possible to do it. But if you do not observe a principle, no amount of spirituality will make up for it.
[00:34:41] You can be perfectly sincere, but going in the wrong direction.
[00:34:46] I mean, if you want to go to Glasgow, as I believe some might.
[00:34:53] If you want to go to Glasgow and you are on the road to Bristol, you are going in the wrong direction.
[00:35:04] You are perfectly sincere. It's no good someone saying to, oh, how insincere. You're perfectly sincere. Nothing to do with your sincerity, nor has it anything to do with the quality of your character.
[00:35:16] Your character may be perfect, nor may it be anything to do with your driving. Your driving may be absolutely marvellous, super. But you're driving in the wrong direction.
[00:35:31] And that's exactly how it comes. In this way, if we don't see this matter of the organic, the church is an organism, not an organization.
[00:35:42] Now, out of that come two things. To take the ground of the body of Christ means that we are committed to that which is organic. Oh, I might just add, by the way, to the other thing that after that day of prayer, we just. The Lord said to us, now then, you've seen it. Don't you do anything. You leave it to me. And what happened? He got rid of the whole thing. Two months, the whole thing went overboard. Then we reverted to just being brothers and sisters. Then the most extraordinary thing happened. The one person, not a soul in the whole company would have ever thought had anything of an elder in him, suddenly began to grow head and shoulders above all the rest. I won't mention any names.
[00:36:33] I mean, it was quite extraordinary when the one thing went, the other grew, and so it's gone on from that day. Now, if we take the ground of the body of Christ, that is to say that which is organic, if we're committed to that which is organic, that is, to the spirit of life himself.
[00:36:59] The spirit of life himself, then we must understand that it is an extremely costly way and that's why so few companies walk it.
[00:37:13] Why do I say that? Because a principle of the organic is travail.
[00:37:23] Now, this is precisely what the apostle Paul said. He didn't shout about it from the rooftops because not everyone can understand it. But the fact of the matter is, he himself knew what Travail was and his co workers knew what Travail was. And there were people inside those assemblies, inside those churches who knew what it was to travail with Christ. Now, if you take your Bible and look at Galatians chapter four and verse 19, my little children, of whom I am again in Travail until Christ be formed in you. You see what a wonderful form Christ be formed in you, all of you. And then he says again, mark me again. So he has already been in Travail over them once when they came into being. Now he's bothered about these churches in Galatia and he said, I'm in Travail again, that Christ be fully formed in you.
[00:38:27] Travail, an organism has to be born. Isn't that so? You can connect a whole lot of christians together and say, now, here we are, we're together, we're the church. Correct?
[00:38:37] Correct.
[00:38:40] But it is not correct in another way. Unless there are those who can travel, then the organic thing can never be born in the midst.
[00:38:50] It's got to be born. And I'll tell you this, once it's born, nothing on earth can overcome it.
[00:38:57] That's the wonderful picture we get of the man child born of the woman. And the devil actually does everything and the Lord just catches him up to heaven.
[00:39:07] It's a picture. I know it has another application, but what I'm saying is the abiding principle holds good, and that is that that which is born of God is invincible. Whatsoever is born of God overcomes the world. That's why so few companies that start out to be as it were, to see the Lord recover the church in their midst. How few go through because the thing is never born. It's a costly business. Every one of the assemblies in India came into being through nights and nights and nights of prayer. Brother Bak Singh himself told me that sometimes people used to come straight from work, get on their knees together with hundreds of others, and would wait the whole night and go vomit to work. 40 days and 40 nights before Madras came into being, and from Madras, the whole work spread over the whole of India.
[00:40:05] I'm only saying that's why this matter of the church as an organism is not understood. People are not prepared for the prize. They want much more entertainment, things, much more cheaply. They just want to be given it all, spoon fed it all.
[00:40:24] Then if you will, turn to colossians chapter one and verse 24. Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake and fill up on my part that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake, which is the church. Now, isn't that an extraordinary verse? I've often heard people refer to it as a mysterious verse, filling up that which is lacking of the afflictions of Christ.
[00:40:58] Is it not something to do with travail for his body's sake?
[00:41:05] You've got it again in Philippians 310, where Paul says that I may know him. The power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings. The word fellowship, koinonia again, sharing.
[00:41:21] I might share his sufferings. I might not, of course, his sufferings for our redemption, but the travail of our Lord.
[00:41:36] Now, I do want you to note that travail is not only a principle initially, but progressively. That is, every single new progressive step taken in a company, in a church has to have behind it some kind of travel if it's going to go through the fire.
[00:41:57] Otherwise the enemy will just come and blow on it and the thing will be destroyed.
[00:42:03] It is travail which brings the lasting value into every real move. Now, many of you are young.
[00:42:11] You can't travail when you're just born of God, because Travail is something to do with spiritual maturity. But let me say this. God has got to get men and women in this company, as in any other company, which he's going to use in his recovery moves in these last days, who know what it is to travail.
[00:42:35] And that doesn't mean you go around shouting about it or wear it on your sleeve so that everyone can say, oh, poor so and so. How marvellous it is that they suffer so much for us.
[00:42:53] You've got your reward if you go round like that. It's what the Lord said. You fast like that so that you can be seen. You have your reward. They've seen you precisely what you wanted. You wanted everyone to say, dear so and so how they suffer.
[00:43:08] You've got your reward. It's what you wanted. You won't get any other.
[00:43:16] Now, linked to this principle of Travail is another, and it is the principle of resurrection life.
[00:43:24] I don't know how to put it in any other way. The principle of resurrection life, the power of his resurrection, if you like. As we have said, everything is within the life of Christ, and that life is his risen life. That is, it is a life that has come through death.
[00:43:45] It is on the other side of the grave, in other words, that life and everything that is within that life. To know that life, we know it through his death, right? But we also know it through our death with him.
[00:44:01] And until little people prepare to lay down their lives, fall into the ground and die, there can be no corporate experience of life.
[00:44:12] And this principle of resurrection, God is very jealous over. In other words, every time he gets something, he says to the enemy, almost as it were. Now, come on, you can do your worst.
[00:44:23] Let it go back into death.
[00:44:25] Let it all come into heaviness, dullness, difficulty. See, there are people who would love to escape from that. They come to me and say, what's wrong.
[00:44:34] It's all so difficult. But it's a principle of the organic. Have you ever seen a tree sawn in two? Have you ever seen all the rings in it? Every ring denotes growth.
[00:44:51] And the growth has been through seasons, a fresh winter and a fresh spring and a fresh summer. And so it is with the organic.
[00:45:04] You see, if you've got something static, you can have it pegged at an artificial level of joy, joy, joy.
[00:45:12] And providing you've got one or two personalities that can peg it there forever, you'll have it there forever.
[00:45:19] But, my dear friend, the fact is you can have that, but it doesn't mean anything as far as God is concerned, because what God is interested in is essential, genuine spiritual growth.
[00:45:33] And that comes through the organic. Therefore, you will find with the organic that every time there is a growth, there is a contraction, and then a growth and a contraction. But each contraction is never less than the growth, so that all the time it's solid growth.
[00:45:56] That's what we call the principle of resurrection. And that's why the Lord is. So if you look into church history, you'll find again and again that every time he gets something, he lets it go into death.
[00:46:06] The devil may prove that there is something absolutely invincible, invincible in the life of God. Now, in the notes, when you get them, you will find some scriptures that I've given for you. So you can look at this matter of the principle of resurrection. I've given you Colossians two. And I said context. In other words, look at the context. It's not personal, it's corporate. Colossians two and Colossians three from verses one to four. I've also given you Ephesians two, five, six. And I said context again, because in the beginning, it is you did he who were dead and your trespasses you did he make alive. Then he raised you and made you sit together with Christ in heavenly places. And he talks about walking in works afore prepared. Then he goes on to make of one of two of twain, one new man. Then he goes on, you're being built, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. And then he talks out all the buildings going together into a habitation of God in the spirit. In other words, it's the church, and it's all to do with this matter of resurrection life.
[00:47:28] So let's get that clear.
[00:47:32] Well, as I said, there will be times when corporately, everything comes into death, a kind of spiritual winter time, that in that time there may be a pruning a purifying and a purging work, that there may be a fresh bursting forth divine life and power in resurrection. I think there's something so wonderful about resurrection because every time when you look at it, for those of us, you know here, I think in the company, especially those who know the whole history of it, you know, how again and again we've just looked and thought, it's impossible, it's finished, over.
[00:48:20] This really is the end. And yet it's amazing, amazing what the Lord has done. It's just divine life.
[00:48:29] Or we say, God is unto us, and God of deliverances, and unto Jehovah the Lord belongeth. Escape from death.
[00:48:42] Well, now, this evening, unfortunately, we're only going to be able to start this again.
[00:48:49] The fourth principle that I would like to talk about. What does it mean when we talk about taking the ground of the body of Christ?
[00:49:02] We mean the church. Let me put it this way. The church which is his body, is the fellowship of Christ.
[00:49:15] The fellowship of Christ. The word fellowship is often, I think, grossly misunderstood.
[00:49:24] And even where it is understood, it is understood only in part. I don't think it is, given its full depth, its full depth of meaning.
[00:49:37] Fellowship is not just acquaintanceship. You know, some people got the idea of fellowship is just acquaintance. We know one another. Acquaintanceship. It's not mere acquaintanceship. It's not bonhommie. Sort of a kind of, we're all friends, we all love each other here.
[00:50:00] That's fellowship. And fellowship is not talk or chatter. Some people have got the idea, you know, let's have a little bit of fellowship. We say so often, aren't we? You all often hear in Christian, so let's have a little bit of fellowship. What it means is a cup of tea and chatter. Now, that may be fellowship, but fellowship is not merely that.
[00:50:21] As if Fellowship's just having a little chit chat and a little gossip, sometimes on a higher level than that. Nor is fellowship informality. Now, some people think that as soon as anyone says something about fellowship, it's going to be a time of fellowship. That means it's informal.
[00:50:45] Another idea about fellowship is meetings. Well, I've often heard in certain circles they talk about having fellowship with you, which means that you trot along to one of the meetings and you have fellowship. Or in other circles I know it is, would you have fellowship with us? And that means, would you give a word?
[00:51:09] You see, would you preach? Would you have a fellowship with us? And fellowship is not even spiritual talk. Some people think that if they get someone sort of sitting on the sofa and really get dug into the book of Leviticus. That's fellowship, you see?
[00:51:29] But fellowship is not even only that.
[00:51:33] In fact, that might not be fellowship at all. It's a question of the kind of life that there is in it and behind it. Nor is fellowship a society.
[00:51:47] You know, we often speak of the fellowship. There's no such thing in scripture as the fellowship. It's always a description. It's not used in that way.
[00:51:58] Again, we have to begin. It's not, it's quite incorrect to refer to this company as the fellowship.
[00:52:03] If you look outside, carved in stone, you will see that the is not there.
[00:52:10] It's just christian fellowship. It's a description, not a title.
[00:52:15] The word koinonia means basically a having in common, a having in common, and is variously translated in the New Testament.
[00:52:30] It means essentially sharing.
[00:52:34] You share. Fellowship is you share something in common, you have something that you share together. That's fellowship. It means mutuality, it means partnership, it means participation in together.
[00:52:57] It is sometimes used in this way, contribution and in other ways. We think of the word just as fellowship.
[00:53:14] It is not a superficial matter to do with externals, a kind of something that's just as it were.
[00:53:28] Non essentials. Non essentials. That's fellowship. I've heard people say to me, I'm not one for fellowship.
[00:53:40] I am not one for fellowship.
[00:53:45] I've heard ministers say that I'm not one for fellowship. My, well, I don't know what they are then, because by our very salvation, fellowship should have been inherently within our constitution.
[00:54:01] And when someone says, I'm not one for fellowship, they look upon it as non essential.
[00:54:06] Oh, let me hear the preaching of the word. I'll be there.
[00:54:11] It's got a prayer meeting. I'll be there.
[00:54:15] But fellowship, I'm not one for fellowship.
[00:54:18] In other words, I'm an individualist. I find it very hard to really share or be linked together in a team of any kind. Fellowship speaks of something absolutely fundamental and essential, out of which all the rest comes. Now, all those other things are in some ways in the more shallow levels, fellowship. But right at the root of it, at the ocean bed, as it were, there is something absolutely fundamental and essential out of which all the rest flows and is produced.
[00:54:55] We have been called by God into the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ our Lord. We've been called into a participation in him.
[00:55:10] You have been called into a participation in him. I have been called into a participation in him. All of us who have been saved have been called into a participation in him, you see? One corinthians, one nine. It's glorious.
[00:55:22] What does it mean to be a participant in Christ? It means you're a member of him. You're part of him. You've become a partaker of his nature. You become a partaker of his life. You've been joined to his head. Head. One life, one body.
[00:55:38] You are now sharing Christ. That's the church.
[00:55:42] I have Christ, you have Christ. We share him. I haven't got my own Christ. You haven't got your own Christ. We've got only one Christ. We share the one Christ. There's no such thing as a personal saviour.
[00:55:56] It's a foreign word to the New Testament.
[00:55:59] A personal knowledge of our one savior is a different measure.
[00:56:04] There's no such thing as a personal saviour.
[00:56:09] We all have one Lord, one savior, one head, one life.
[00:56:15] We are participants in him.
[00:56:18] I, you, all.
[00:56:21] The fellowship of his son.
[00:56:25] Oh, if we could only just get hold of it. It's just so wonderful, really. You see, we have a common salvation, a common head, a common life and a common unity.
[00:56:39] That's what we're doing. God is faithful through whom ye were called into the fellowship of his son.
[00:56:49] Now, it is this basic, essential, fundamental sharing of one savior, one head, one life, one body, which produces all the other kind of sharing.
[00:57:11] You can't share your home with all the believers, you can't share your cards with the believers, you can't share your money with the believers, you can't share your time with the believers, you can't share yourself with the believers. Unless first you've recognized the essential bedrock out of which it all comes. Otherwise it's titillated, you know, a lot of little nice chatter, chatter, chatter. And then when we fall out, I'm going to talk to her, that kind of thing.
[00:57:56] But when we had a common law and a common saviour, we can't say goodbye to one another.
[00:58:04] Sometimes rather sad, but that's the fact that we have to get through, and that's the glory of it.
[00:58:14] The church is not a United nations.
[00:58:18] The church is a savior. It has a one lord and a one life, a one body.
[00:58:29] Now, you see, if you look in acts chapter two and verse 44, it says, and all that believed were together and had all things common. That's the word. Koenigse. The word, again, had all things common.
[00:58:44] Do you like in fellowship?
[00:58:48] Then again, if you look in chapter four and verse 32, and the multitude of them that believed would have one heart and soul. And not one of them said that all to the things which he possessed was his own. But they had all things common.
[00:59:03] It grew out of this tremendous sense of their one Lord and their one savior and the one life that had come to them by the spirit of God. On the day of Pentecost, they were no longer a congregation made up of units. They were a body of interdependent and interrelated parts.
[00:59:25] So they had all things in common. It was. I mean, in this case, they sold everything and more or less pooled it all together. But, I mean, the principle is the same. You look upon everything you've got as a steward, you're a steward of it.
[00:59:40] That's why sometimes the Lord will not come in on some people's homes and so on. You know, they say, why is it I've asked the Lord to help me in this and that and the other? Well, the fact is, you want the Lord, as a char, to put it rather crudely and almost blasphemously, you want him to all the time clear up the dirt. You want to have your own home, your own possessions, everything. And what you'll let him have, you'll let him have.
[01:00:08] But when you're in trouble, you want the Lord there instantly, clean it all up, get it all sorted out. I'm a Christian.
[01:00:21] I deserve it.
[01:00:24] Why doesn't it happen? Happens to those others there, doesn't happen to me, but the Lord won't, because the Lord, and this is a math that goes to health as well. Sometimes amongst christians, it's a question of whether you are your own or his.
[01:00:43] Once you're his, you can leave it with him.
[01:00:46] Like, Lord, I'm yours. My body, my time, my money, my everything, my home, it's yours.
[01:00:53] You do something, it's yours anyway.
[01:00:58] Responsibility.
[01:01:00] And the Lord does fellowship.
[01:01:05] It could well be said that one corinthians, chapter one and verse nine is the motto for one corinthians, as I've said earlier, the fellowship of Christ.
[01:01:15] It's been called an apt and comprehensive description of the church, the fellowship of Christ, and I think it is best defined in one corinthians, chapter twelve, in terms of the body. See, my body is a fellowship. It's a fellowship. Every single one of the large number of members I have in my own body, my personal body. Here is a participant in the life and body of Lance Lambert.
[01:01:49] All these members have one head, one life and one body.
[01:01:57] They're not yours, they're mine. You've got your own, yours are the participants in your name and life and body. You see, it's a fellowship. Now, my body isn't a finger and it's not a foot and it's not an ear, but it's made up all different parts, visible and invisible, or shall we say, outward and inward.
[01:02:21] But they're all there. They're all interrelated and interdependent parts, sharing one life, one entity, if you like. They're a body.
[01:02:36] Now, it says in one corinthians, chapter one, verse nine, God is faithful. What a wonderful word. At the beginning of the corinthian letter, God is faithful through whom ye were called into fellowship of his son, into the fellowship of his son, into participation in his son, into being part of him, being sharers in his life, in his headship, in his body.
[01:03:07] And it's written over the whole of this book, with all its dark undertones and its unhappy factions and divisions. Here it is. Here we've got it in this term, the body. Now, a body is not one member but many, all sharing one head and one life, one entity.
[01:03:28] There is great diversity and variety of function and position.
[01:03:35] My ear has a different position to my little toe.
[01:03:40] It would be an extraordinary mistake if my little toe was in the position of my ear. This difference of position and function and function.
[01:03:57] Yet every single part of my body is interdependent and interrelated, so that if I cut my hand off, I can still live, but I am that much restricted. If I cut my leg off, I can live, but I am that much restricted.
[01:04:15] I can cut both my legs off and I'll live, but I'm that much more restricted. I can cut both my arms off and live, but I'm that much more restricted.
[01:04:29] If I cut my head off, I'm finished.
[01:04:38] Now, it is rather extraordinary. I always think that the devil starts with trying to cut the head off it in the church, but when he can't do that, he starts on all the members, see if you can cut them off, and so bring about a paralysis in the body.
[01:04:57] You see, it is a fellowship of that person. My body is a fellowship. Your body is a fellowship. So it is with the church. Listen. Romans, chapter twelve and verse four and five. We've read it a little earlier. Listen to it again in the light of what I said. Even as we have many members and in one body, and all the members are not the same office, so we who are many are one body in Christ. Again, one. Corinthians 1212. For as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, being many, are one body. So also is Christ. Verse 14. For the body is not one member, but many. Verse 20.
[01:05:43] But now they are many members, but one body. Verse 27. Now ye are the body of Christ, and several members one of another.
[01:05:55] The church is a body, not a member.
[01:06:01] The church is a body, not a member. That's why when we talk about taking the ground of the body of Christ, we mean immediately members.
[01:06:15] The body is many members, yet one body.
[01:06:19] It is not a member, but many members, but one body.
[01:06:26] The church was never meant to be a one man band or a one man show, as if all were meant to revolve around and center in one member for the rest. But isn't that exactly what we see in the majority of churches? Of all descriptions, everything virtually surrounds one man.
[01:06:54] Why, in a service he'll lead, pray, give out the hymns, not always give out the notices that he does generally leave to someone else. And he doesn't take up the collection either. You might get it, but he doesn't take it up.
[01:07:12] But he does everything. He does everything.
[01:07:19] It's one member, one man show.
[01:07:22] Now, I'm not saying that people do that maliciously. Of course not.
[01:07:27] But the church is not meant to revolve around one member.
[01:07:32] Why have even been in some groups where he's either played the piano or the organ as well.
[01:07:42] But the church is not meant to be one member, it is many members. That's not the church.
[01:07:52] Nor was the church meant to be an elite, an elite few doing everything, like a kind of vicar and curate and the rest sort of thing. An elite few who do everything and the rest remain as spectators.
[01:08:09] They watch everything, listen to everything. And I say, oh, he was good this morning or so and so, oh, I did like the way he gave out the notices or. But it's in the hands of just a few, a few members for the rest, everyone else, spectators, a kind of pulpit pew relationship. You all sit there, you can't, you should be there on time, sit there and you. Everything's done for you and to you. And then you go off like a lot of people. Good sheep.
[01:08:47] I can't help feeling sometimes, like when we can't help feeling sometimes when we view so many so called churches, I can't help feeling that. Re echoing the words of the apostle Paul in one corinthians, chapter twelve and verse 19, changing the tents. And if they are all one member, where is the body?
[01:09:20] Because that is precisely what you have to ask. Where is the body?
[01:09:25] You see a lot of little drab people all sitting there.
[01:09:29] Some of them would not say boo to a ghost.
[01:09:33] Yet these are the witnesses to cry upon whom the Holy Spirit is supposed to have come with power.
[01:09:45] It is extraordinary. Now, don't blame the poor folk in the pews. They've been emasculated.
[01:09:53] Terrible thing.
[01:09:55] They've just been simply. They've been. They've been simply put into such a position that they are, that they're. The very life has been drained out of them. So the church has become one member and not many.
[01:10:09] It's all. And it's a tragedy. And no one can tell me that that is what the New Testament teaches. All right, you argue with me. You say you don't accept what I said. Very well. But do you accept the finality of the word of God?
[01:10:26] How do you explain one particular corinthians, chapter twelve? How do you explain romans chapter twelve? How do you explain one Peter chapter four? How do you explain one corinthians, chapter 14?
[01:10:40] We were never meant just to be so many spectators for whom everything's done rather like entertainment.
[01:10:50] We're spoon fed. Why, it is a tragedy in so many places, especially not quite so much in this country, but so often as well. Not a soul even brings a Bible.
[01:11:03] Not even a Bible.
[01:11:07] A most extraordinary state of affairs.
[01:11:10] But then I am told you can't blame the sheep.
[01:11:15] I've been told by many theological students, you start with the verse and depart from it. Thereafter, I'll never come back to it again.
[01:11:23] I'll expect people to read the Bible.
[01:11:27] The Bible is not going to be explained and interpreted and expounded.
[01:11:33] There is, and we will end here this evening. There is absolutely no scriptural warrant whatsoever in the New Testament for the distinction made between clergy and laity, a kind of priesthood of the few amongst the rest.
[01:11:59] On the contrary, the New Testament is quite explicit in declaring the priesthood of all believers. Now, most evangelicals give lip service to the priesthood of all believers, but many of them restricted to personal access to God in prayer, for which we're thankful that at least they give us that liberty.
[01:12:25] But the scriptures never did mean by the priesthood of all believers that it was just and only glorious as it is access, personal access to God in prayer.
[01:12:35] What is the priesthood of all believers? It is this. Every single child of God born of the spirit of God, every single member of the body of the Lord Jesus Christ, is a priest with the right of continual access into the presence of God himself in the holiest place of all, by the blood of Jesus.
[01:13:07] And not only that, but with a continual right to serve the Lord.
[01:13:17] Now you've got that if you want to, but perhaps we'll have to leave that to next week. I've introduced the subject, I think, and we'll leave it to next week. The fact is, what does it say? Ye are built up a spiritual house and holy priesthood, that ye might offer up sacrifices acceptable unto God through Jesus Christ.
[01:13:44] Now when you turn to romans chapter twelve, what do you find? I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice priesthood, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your spiritually intelligent worship priesthood.
[01:14:09] Then he goes on that ye may not be conformed to the world, but transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Then what does it go on? It goes on like this. It says, for as the body hath many members, yet it is one body and so it goes on. You've got the whole matter of the body and if you look at it, you will find that then you're told, let him that does this wait on his ministry and him on that, his ministry and the other one on his it's priesthood.
[01:14:47] Every one of you is constituted a priest. God has made us, by the loosing of our sins in his precious blood, a kingdom and priests under God. Every single one of us has the right not only to come into the presence of God, but to serve him the fellowship of Christ.
[01:15:11] Well, I think we better end there or we shall just go on point after point.
[01:15:17] I'm sorry we have to end again in the middle of a.
[01:15:22] Unfortunately we got into that last week and it looks as if we're going to go on like it, but we'll have to see.
[01:15:29] Shall we pray?
[01:15:41] Dear Lord, we do ask thee together that thou wilt really by thy spirit reveal these things to us, make us a people, Lord, who don't just take them because it's said, but rather those who search the scriptures as to whether these things are so.
[01:15:58] And o by thy spirit, Lord, reveal what is truth to our hearts in these days of confusion and disorder, Lord, and impoverishment. O father, wilt thou makest those who understand what thou art really seeking to do? And not only just the outward aspects of it, but Lord, the inward things that lie at the root of it. All those principles, Lord, in that life of thine which must be observed, if we would know the development and growth and increase of it. Lord, we commit ourselves to thee in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
