"I will destine you to the sword, and ye shall all bow down to
the slaughter; because when I called, ye did not answer; when I
spake, ye did not hear; but ye did that which was evil in Mine
eyes, and chose that wherein I delighted not" (Is. 65:12).
"Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things
that were heard, lest haply we drift away from them" (Heb. 2:1).
"Behold, I stand at the door and knock: if any man hear My voice
and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him,
and he with Me.... He that hath an ear, let him hear what the
Spirit saith to the churches. He who testifieth these things
saith, Yea: I come quickly. Amen: come, Lord Jesus" (Rev. 3:20,22;
22:20).
The Lord is constantly coming to His people. He comes to them
every time that there is a living Word from Him. This familiar
passage in Revelation 3 is impressive when you note that the
knock, the voice, the ear and "the Spirit saith" are all one. "I
knock"; and if you listen it is not a tapping, but a voice, a
voice that could only be heard by the inner ear because it is the
voice of the Spirit, and the Spirit says in all one language, "My
knock is My voice and My voice is what the Spirit says, and that
requires an inner ear giving heed to what the Spirit says". So
that every time a living Word comes, the Lord has come, and coming
in His Word by His Spirit, He comes expecting a response.
There is a practical issue bound with every drawing near of the
Lord in His Word and it is only as that issue is taken up
definitely that the real meaning of the Lord's drawing near is
entered into and secured. The Lord may be there in His Word, the
Spirit may be there speaking by that Word, the Word of the Lord
bringing the Lord near may visit us, may be with us; and all that
may be wonderfully true, as true as ever it was in those days of
which it is written "The word of the Lord came by the mouth of..."
this one and that one, as true as ever it was true as a prophet
said: "Thus saith the Lord". It may be just as true as that today,
and yet at the same time result in nothing; that is, so far as the
Lord's purpose and intention is concerned. That is always the
peril which lies alongside of a Word of the Lord coming, that it
may, after all, result in nothing so far as that which the Lord
intended is concerned.
"Herein is My Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit" - not
that ye know much truth, that ye hear many expositions of the
Word, that the Word of the Lord indeed has come to you; "Herein...
much fruit". And that can only be as we recognise the issue bound
up with the Word and definitely lay hold of it. The response which
the Lord expects when He comes in His Word is the response of
life, not merely of assent, agreement or pleasure.
We have from Him the parable of the sower, a fourfold response
from the Lord being present with His Word, for He is the sower,
and the seed is the Word. The Lord is present with His Word, and
He is sowing in expectation, and His expectation is disappointed
very largely whenever there is any kind of response to Him other
than the response of real fruit, and that is taking hold of the
issue into the heart. That is the very core of the parable, it is
taking it into the heart; I think I can say, taking it to heart.
There may be some kind of reaction that is not the response the
Lord is seeking. He wants a heart response not in emotion, but in
fruit, that which becomes the embodiment of the life that is in
the Word which He brings; so that the Word, having the life, being
planted in our hearts, means that that Word expresses itself in a
living way in us. Such is the response which the Lord is seeking
every time He comes to us in His Word.
The apostle said to Timothy, "Give thyself wholly unto them that
thy progress may be manifest to all... the things thou hast heard
and received of me, give thyself wholly unto them". As you give
yourself wholly to them, the fruit, the progress, shall be seen of
all. That is the only way to spiritual progress and it is the only
response which satisfies the Lord. That is the response which He
is seeking. Therefore it means utterness as well as immediacy.
Another peril is always present when the Lord comes with His
Word. It is somehow indefinitely in the mind to postpone the
issue. If it is not a deliberate postponement - for very few
perhaps do that - it is a postponement all the same, for every
failure to take hold and follow up is a postponement.
I do feel that there is much room with the Lord's people as a
whole for immediate transaction on the basis of every word which
comes to us, which we have any reason to believe is the Lord's.
This is the way of fruitfulness, this is the way of progress, this
is the way of enlargement. I am sure you are concerned very much
about the matter of spiritual growth, advancement, progress. I am
sure you, in your own life with the Lord, often ask Him for
spiritual increase in you, progress, that you might go on, that
you might come to maturity. I am sure there is much in your prayer
in that direction. Now may I suggest to you a way in which you may
co-operate with the Lord in answering such prayer? It is that you
make a practice, whenever the Word of the Lord has come, of going
immediately and dealing with the Lord on that matter, with the
practical issue bound up with that Word. If you wait until
tomorrow, you will get into that vicious course that there will be
another message presented and the last one has simply gone past,
and so you go on. Each message is intended to have an issue, but
it becomes an accumulation of messages, of words, with the weeks
and months and years, and the great responsibility being piled up
inasmuch as we are going to be judged by the Word, "The word that
I have spoken unto you it shall judge you" (John 12:48). The
piling up of a great responsibility, because for some reason or
other - not deliberately, not intentionally - we never square
immediately to the practical issue bound up with the Word.
If you will at once give yourself wholly for an application to
the Word as well as of the Word, your progress will be seen of
all, "Here is a man or a woman who deals with God at once upon any
issue raised by His Word". God takes that one on wonderfully; it is
honest thoroughgoing dealing with the Lord immediately. The Lord
is a Lord who requires prompt response. If you like to go through
the Word, you will see what is bound up with a prompt response to
the Lord. The blessing of the Lord is there. You will see the
trouble that is bound up with the postponement, the increased
difficulty, and you will see the loss that eventually comes when
the thing is passed: "Because I called and ye did not answer".
"Behold... I knock, if any man will hear My voice" - what the
Spirit says. That is speaking to the Church, as you know, not to
the unsaved; it may be true there, but this Word was a Word to the
Church.
It is only my purpose to help towards the end which I am always
trying to keep in view for myself and for you, how can we come to
that maturity, to that growth, to that enlargement? The Lord puts
His finger upon this point and just hedges it about and says, "Now
I want immediate and definite response in action, a transaction
with Me on the issue that is raised by this Word". If we would do
that every time instead of letting it go, and would beware of all
those things which are ever waiting to dissipate God's Word when
He has drawn near in His Word, we should grow. You need not move
out of your seat before someone will talk to you about something
of tomorrow or the past, something which has nothing whatever to
do with what the Lord has just been saying. You have only to get
to the door and find yourself in general conversation. That kind
of fellowship may be good and I am not in any way against the real
fellowship of the Lord's people, for it is a great help to be able
to meet and talk, but beware, because no sooner is the Word spoken
than it is snatched away and for all practical purposes it might
be as though it had never been spoken. That could never be if we
immediately got down before the Lord and said, "Now Lord, there is
a practical issue bound up with this and that issue has got to be
possessed!" That is the way of growth.
Bear the Word. As I say, it is only to help towards the end which
we have in view. There is a great value in immediacy, and that
response, of course, will call for utterness for the Lord. Such a
response will test our utterness. If anybody really does have the
Word of the Lord, seriously and immediately we must get before the
Lord about it, meaning business; not just attending meetings and
listening to addresses but out for the Lord, bringing up this
question: "What is it that the Lord has said? How does that apply
to me? What is the Lord after in me concerning that? I may see it
or I may not, but that is not the point. The point is, Lord is
there something there that I do not see? Is there something You
are trying to say to me and I am not yet alive to it?" How often
some time afterwards we have seen that the Lord said something at a
certain time and really it touched upon something in our lives,
but at the time we did not see it. Now we see how that was fitted
for our case. If we had gone to the Lord, might we not have seen
it? That is utterness for the Lord in our response to His Word.
There must be a taking hold and a keeping hold until the thing is
settled, until it is established, because it is possible even to
have exercise over a Word, to follow the point of the Word, to
feel the weight of it and feel it getting into us and touching us
and then for it to fade. We felt it and we always look back and
say, "Yes that was a Word that came to us; we felt something in
that Word; it moved us!" But we have to say that it fell short of
the actual issue. What we have to do is to take hold and to keep
hold. Has the Lord said something to us? Are we holding on to that
until the matter is secured and established, and the Lord has got
that in us?
Note that word in Hebrews 2: "Therefore we ought to give the more
earnest heed to the things which we heard, lest haply we drift
away from them." I have often pointed out that that word has
behind it the picture of a man in the boat taking up his moorings.
There is a current running and he comes up on his moorings,
reaches out with his boat hook, takes his moorings on his boat
hook, but he does it carelessly; he does it without all his
attention bent upon it. The tide is running fast, the current is
strong, and he has not given the more earnest heed and before he
knows what has happened, he has slipped his moorings inadvertently
and is drifting away. He had them, he came into touch with them,
they were on his hook, and he lost them. It is so often like that.
The Word of the Lord comes, we make contact, we even would say we
have got it, but where is it after a bit? After a while, what
about it? "Therefore... give the more earnest heed to the things
which we have heard, lest haply we drift away from them." That is
the kind of response that the Lord is seeking all the time.
Now, it would never be right to leave things there without
another word. Such a response to the Lord which He is seeking will
always be costly. The Lord will see to that. The things of the
Lord are not had cheaply; God's purpose is a costly purpose and
any fresh movement in relation thereto will be costly. You know
that Hebrews 13:13 is the summary of the practical issues of going
on. The exhortation throughout the letter is "Go on". The summary
is this: "Let us therefore go to Him without the camp, bearing His
reproach." That is what we are going to get for going on. Down
here that is just what you are going to get if you go on. It all
looks so glorious to go on, all that we are going on to is
wonderful. We can romance about the eternal purpose and reigning
and having dominion. Yes, but the present side of that is outside
the camp bearing His reproach. There is a cost attached to going
on with the Lord. There will be a cost bound up with every step.
It will make demands; it will only be men of faith who will go on.
That is what drives it in. It is that which makes it ours, makes
it a part of us.
The Lord comes looking for response; the Word demands it and
everything hangs upon it. There is nothing so established that it
cannot be set aside by God if it ceases to respond to His purpose.
"I... will remove thy lampstand out of its place, except..." (Rev.
2:5). God planted those churches in Asia, those lampstands; He
blessed them, He used them; they were vessels of testimony; and
then there came the crisis in which God said, "That which I have
planted, that which I have blessed, that which was the work of My
Spirit, and had My Spirit in it, I will move it out of its place".
There is a sense in which we are always on trial for our life and
the nature of the trial is this: immediate response to every
visitation of the Lord in His Word. "If any man will hear...".
Edited and supplied by the Golden Candlestick Trust.