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Levitical Ministry

by T. Austin-Sparks

Transcribed from messages given by T. Austin-Sparks in 1957. The spoken form has been retained.

Contents

Chapter 1 - Sanctification for God

Chapter 2 - Association With God

Chapter 3 - Satisfaction of God

Chapter 4 - A Vessel of the Testimony of Jesus

Chapter 1 - Sanctification for God

Will you follow with me thoughtfully through a number of places and passages in the Word of God, beginning in the book of Exodus chapter 32, at verse 25: "And when Moses saw that the people were broken loose, (for Aaron had let them loose for a derision among their enemies) then Moses stood in the gate of the camp, and said, Whoso is on the Lord's side, let him come unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered themselves together unto him."

In the book of Numbers, chapter 8 at verse 9: "And thou shalt present the Levites before the tent of meeting: and thou shalt assemble the whole congregation of the children of Israel: and thou shalt present the Levites before the Lord. And the children of Israel shall lay their hands upon the Levites: and Aaron shall offer the Levites before the Lord for a wave-offering, on behalf of the children of Israel, that it may be theirs to do the service of the Lord. The Levites shall lay their hands upon the heads of the bullocks: and offer thou the one for a sin-offering, and the other for a burnt-offering, unto the Lord, to make atonement for the Levites. And thou shalt set the Levites before Aaron, and before his sons, and offer them for a wave-offering."

In the first book of the Chronicles, chapter 15 verse 2: "Then David said, None ought to carry the ark of God but the Levites: for them hath the Lord chosen to carry the ark of God, and to minister unto him for ever." Verse 12: "And said unto them, Ye are the heads of the fathers' houses of the Levites: sanctify yourselves, both ye and your brethren, that ye may bring up the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel, unto the place that I have prepared for it. For because ye bare it not at the first, the Lord our God made a breach upon us, for that we sought him not according to the ordinance. So the priests and the Levites sanctified themselves to bring up the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel. And the children of the Levites bare the ark of God upon their shoulders with the staves thereon, as Moses commanded according to the word of the Lord."

Prophecies of Malachi, chapter 2 verse 4: "Ye shall know that I have sent this commandment unto you, that my covenant may be with Levi, saith the Lord of hosts. My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him that he might fear; and he feared me, and stood in awe of me." Chapter 3: "Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to his temple; and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye desire, behold, he cometh, saith the Lord of hosts. But who can abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap: and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer unto the Lord offerings in righteousness."

Book of the Revelation, chapter 1 verse 2: "...who bare witness of the word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ..." Verse 5: "...from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loveth us, and loosed us from our sins by his blood; and he made us to be a kingdom, to be priests unto his God and Father; to him be the glory and the dominion for ever and ever." Verse 9: "I John, your brother and partaker with you in the tribulation and kingdom and patience which are in Jesus, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus."

If you have been thoughtful in passing from one passage to another, through them all you will have discerned a common link and basis in every one. In the Old Testament: the links in the chain of the history and ministry of the Levites in relation to the Lord's testimony. None but the Levites ought to carry the ark of the testimony. Those passages lead us over into the New Testament and right at the end we find ourselves once more in the presence of this central thing of God's mind and interest: the testimony of Jesus. And it is significant and important to be noted that we pass straight on from chapter one of the Revelation into what is in chapter two and three, concerning the overcomers; a message to every church and in every case the issue is: "to him that overcometh."

It seems perfectly clear that this whole matter right through the Scriptures is the matter of that service of peculiar importance and value to the Lord: the bearing of His testimony. It is that which is called 'the service of God'. If we want to know what the Levites really are in representation and spiritual significance, that is made perfectly clear for us in the first three chapters of the book of the Revelation. The churches were brought into being by God for the testimony of Jesus. That is, I think, beyond dispute. They are, wherever they are, meant to be the vessels of that testimony. But here in these representative churches of the whole dispensation, in these first chapters of the Revelation, we find the churches, in general, failing in the matter of the testimony of Jesus.

Perhaps we have not been sufficiently impressed with this fact: that the book opens with the emphasis upon the testimony of Jesus. Really, the introduction to the whole book is that very phrase.

John tells us quite clearly that he was where he was, and that means that what he saw and what he set down in writing in Patmos related to the testimony of Jesus. He says that quite emphatically and quite clearly: it was for the testimony of Jesus. That phrase governs this book on its first page, and runs right the way through the book.

You can only understand the whole of the book of the Revelation if you see that everything there is centered in this that is called the testimony of Jesus. That is the explanation. Everything is accounted for by that. Then, when that is laid down as the foundation and the introduction to the whole book, the first movement of the Spirit, "I was in the Spirit"... the first movement of the Spirit is to the churches which, as we have said, were brought into being for the testimony of Jesus. That is what the Levites came into being for. Their whole history right the way through, related to the testimony - in type and figure of course, in the Old Testament as represented by the Ark of the Covenant, or the ark of the testimony. In spiritual meaning it's the same in both Testaments. They came into being as a people right at the very centre of the Lord's people in relation to the Lord's testimony.

You want to know what the essential service of the Lord is? It is that; it is the bearing and maintaining and carrying forward of the testimony of Jesus in the history of this world. I repeat: the Levites came right in for that very purpose, and it is that that explains their existence and their history. I go back again and if you want to know what the Levites represent in this dispensation, in our own day, they are presented to us in those who overcome.

If it is true that the purpose of the churches was to be vessels of the testimony of Jesus wherever they are, then when the churches are approached (and in every case, in every case, the final word is: "to him that overcometh") it is, I think, unmistakably clear and obvious that it is in such people, those who overcome, that you have the Levitical principle, service, and purpose carried on, carried forth. They are the people who are put in trust with the testimony. That is clear in both Old and New Testaments. They are the people who, in the first place and in the last place, are the people who react against all departure from what is called 'the testimony of Jesus.' They are the people in whom God's full thought concerning His Church is represented.

Saying these things I am saying a great deal supported and backed up by the Word of God. Whenever the Lord was going to take a new step, whenever a crisis was reached in the onward march of God in eternal history, the Lord called for the Levites to come to the fore and to sanctify themselves. They are the people of the crisis and of the crises, all the way through. We could say that the Lord was at a loss and a disadvantage when the Levites were out of their place and out of their condition. The Lord was unable to go on until the Levites came into their place and sanctified themselves. That, I think, is clear if I only touch on one or two of the instances of which we have read.

We do recognize that a very serious crisis was reached there at Sinai. Moses was in the Mount and, as we have read, the people broke loose. And that is a tremendously impressive bracketed sentence: "...they would be made a derision among their enemies". You can see through that, we can see through that: there is one thing that the enemy and all the hosts of enemies in the heavenlies are set upon, which is to make the church a derision in this universe. A derision. The universe could sneer at it saying, "That's your church, is it? That's your church."

When they had broken loose, everything in that onward march of God from Egypt to the land was brought to a standstill and the crisis turned upon the Levites, the prospect opened up through the Levites. There could be no movement forward, everything was in suspense until the Levites came forward and took up this issue of a derision among their enemies. They took responsibility to answer that challenge, to deal with that thing and get it out of the way, that the people of God should go on.

Passing over all those centuries to the time of David, another crisis in the onward movement of God has been reached. The testimony is to be brought to Jerusalem. We know of David's unfortunate, impulsive action, forgetfulness... making the Philistine cart for the testimony, creating a very link with this world and opening the door to death and everything is again brought to a standstill. The Ark was in the house of Abinidab a long time, all was weakness. But then David was exercised before the Lord about this whole thing when he had got over his offendedness with the Lord.

Dear friends, the Lord's dealings with us sometimes can bring about a controversy between us and the Lord and until we get through that, there's nothing going to happen. The Lord does not do things without a reason, does not bring everything up short and bring in judgment and discipline without a very good reason. And very often we take the whole thing personally and are disaffected toward the Lord: "David was grieved with the Lord that day." Well, David, you will have to get rid of that, however long it takes, before the Lord will move on. However, David, being the man that he was with a heart for God, searched the matter out and had a right kind of exercise about it all and found it in the Word. We shall always find it in the Word; somewhere it is there; it is there - the answer to all our difficulties and problems and controversies - it is there somewhere, clear and straight. And as David was exercised before the Lord, turning over the pages of the Word, he came on it, came right on it; the answer to everything: "None ought to bear the Ark save the Levites." When the Levites came into their place, were sanctified and resumed their work, things went on.

I just take those two instances, which are sufficient to indicate this: that every forward movement, every fresh advance in the great purpose of God is bound up with this Levitical idea, principle and people. You will not challenge me, I am sure, on this matter of the churches in Revelation. Was there a crisis? The Lord was saying, in effect, quite definitely and positively: "I can't go on any further with you. Indeed, I will have to remove your lampstand out of its place; we just cannot go on. We have come to a crisis. We have come to a standstill. We can go no further."

If there is to be any future, it will be with those who take up the Levitical principle of sanctification, of holiness amongst the Lord's people. And with them the future rests: "To him that overcometh will I, will I, will I." You see the "towardness" of the Lord is there and I feel that we are right in saying those who are in those chapters referred to as "those who overcome", are the people who spiritually and actually step right into the place and meaning and service of the Levites. So let us make it perfectly clear before we go any further that while in the old dispensation the Levites were a tribe, were a people by themselves, a separate community, in a sense they only embodied (as all other things in the old dispensation embodied) a spiritual truth which belongs to all the dispensations and which is the law of all God's movement forward to His end.

Today the Levites are not a separate class, a separate people, an association, an institution, a fellowship, or anything like that. Today the Levites are those people of God who do what the Levites of the Old Testament did in a spiritual way. They are the people who are the embodiment of all that thought and purpose of God, and whose hearts are given to that and who are prepared to react against everything that threatens that, that assails that, and it is usually, as we find in the Old and the New, it is usually a matter of corruption. Corruption! Constantly in the Old Testament the Levites had to sanctify themselves. Look in the book of Ezra for instance, how the Levites had to sanctify themselves for the service of the Lord.

A Sanctified People

It's impressive, I think significant again, that John the Baptist was said to go before the face of the Lord and that the result of his ministry would be to prepare a people sanctified for the Lord. To prepare a people, or that there should be a prepared people for the Lord. Now, that is the principle of the Levites.

The Old Testament and the New Testament meet in John the Baptist. The book of the prophecies of Malachi, "My messenger, sent before my face to prepare my way before me" has, on the authority of our Lord Himself, its fulfillment in John the Baptist. "This is Elijah, this is Elijah if you will receive it", going before the face of the Lord, preparing the way of the Lord, and the preparation of a people or securing of a people prepared for the Lord.

And then what? In Mark's gospel Jesus began to be. At thirty years of age He is, so to speak, precipitated onto the platform, onto the stage. Jesus began to be, about thirty years of age entering on His ministry, it was the year of the age of the Levite beginning his ministry. You see how we gather around this in all directions, in all connections, to make it clear, as it needs making clear, that the Lord's testimony, the onward movement of God, the reaching of His full end, rests with a people who embody all that is meant by the Levites. Well, if we have got that background we are able to go on.

The, the thing which the Levite or Levites in all time represent is a people sanctified for the Lord, set apart for the Lord, wholly the Lord's. And when the general mass of the Lord's people who are the Lord's people are not like that, the Lord cannot go on until He has got in the midst of them a people like that. He must have that which does represent His mind. He is not going on, He is not going on unless He has something that answers to His mind, though it be in the midst of His people. That is where He will go on; He demands that: a people set apart for the Lord.

That opens up one line of very instructive teaching right through the Scripture. It introduces us to that whole course of God reacting, reacting to situations by the Levite, or by this principle of the Levite. You see where they first came in, as we have read in Exodus 32; see what had happened. Moses, gone up into the Mount, was away too long for the people's patience and, as it is put, they "broke loose", they cast off restraint. They evidently, under the counsel or instruction of Aaron, made that calf. Of what? The golden calf. The gold that was to be for the sanctuary in which God was to have the whole place. There broke in that day the evil powers which said, in effect, "God shall not have that place, we will have it and we will take the very gold which was intended for God and make it the basis and instrument of our worship". It's very difficult, dear friends, to fail to see that behind all this, is this persistent breaking in from that evil world, the powers of evil against God's throne, against God having everything, at cost, if needs be, and to draw it away from God; take it from Him.

Well, it was the Levites who took the stand over that. Who, whether they understood all that it meant or not, we don't know, but it was the Levites who in effect said, "No, no! We will not permit anything to be taken from the Lord. The Lord is to have His rights in fulness; we stand for that at any cost, at any cost." It proved to be a very costly thing, as you know, they had to take the sword against their own kin; yes, in their own families, amongst their own children and brothers. A very costly thing... but they did it. They evidently did see the seriousness of this breaking in of evil and evil forces and what it implied, this touch of corruption.

A touch of corruption, for that's what it was, it was spiritual fornication and they saw something of the meaning of it. And that day all the sons of Levi said to that: 'NO! Positively and utterly: no.' God made His covenant that day with Levi. Later, He took the tribe of Levi and set them apart as the ministers of the sanctuary, to be in close touch with Himself in relation to all His purpose in His people.

Do you want to know what a Levite is? That's a Levite to begin with! But oh, tragedy of all tragedies, the enemy himself said, "Very well, the Levites draw this upon themselves, then the Levites must be the focal point of our attention and of our activity." It is one constant history of the Levites being corrupted and put out of their place, defiled, to arrest the whole movement of God. And I have said the call every time God wanted to go further was to bring the Levites into a new sanctification, a place of sanctification, of holiness unto the Lord. When that was done at any time, then the movement went on, God went forward.

Well, I could pile up the evidence, the data, the material, on this principle, this Levitical principle, but I think that's enough to begin with. This is a people in the midst of God's people who, whatever the cost and with an utterness for God, stand for His rights and the fulness of His thought and purpose concerning His people. I say again they are not a distinct cult, but they are a spiritual people amongst the Lord's people who are marked out and marked off by this: that they are not going to allow themselves to be touched with the corruption that is in this world and the hand of the defiler.

You have got to read those chapters of Malachi's prophecies with this one thought all the time before you. They are terrible chapters, aren't they? Terrible chapters! God is saying, "You are cursed with a curse, even this whole nation"; showing His fiery, fiery judgment, touching their lives in the family and in the fields and everywhere. There's terrible things in that book, but you notice the focal point of all those prophecies is the Levites and it heads up to this: "The messenger of the covenant will come suddenly to His temple, the Lord whom ye seek... He shall sit as a refiner of fire and purify the sons of Levi." And purify the sons of Levi, and with that you pass out of the Old Testament into the New, so far as our Bible is concerned.

And the Great Levite comes, the Great Levite: the Lord Jesus. And in Him we see the whole principle, the whole meaning of the history of the Levites summed up. He is the full-orbed Levite. The corrupter assails, the tempter attacks to draw away this Levite from His steadfastness: "If Thou be the Son of God…" but this Levite prevails to the last cost. To the last cost He overcomes and says to us as He said to those around Him: "Fear not, for I have overcome the world." The Great Levite, the Great Overcomer. And now to the churches: "To him that overcomes…" - the testimony of Jesus, He overcame, that testimony is deposited with the churches, "to him that overcomes."

I do trust you are seeing far more than I am saying... I present you with a matter that has far, far too much, too many details to compass in any one time. If you see, what does it amount to? Sooner or later this whole question of God's going on to His end in fulness will arise and then it will be a matter of our spiritual condition; whether He can go on with us. It's a matter of our spiritual condition whether He can go on with us and whether He has that necessary to Himself for going on in the midst of His people.

And I am speaking not condemnatory of anyone, I am simply taking out of history, and present history, this: that all those who are of the Lord's people are not after this kind, all who are the Lord's people are not in the spiritual sense, Levites. They are intended to be, they are meant to be, the Lord would have them be, but the fact is, they are not; for various reasons, some of which are mentioned in the messages to the churches, but the reason is what the Lord calls: defilement, corruption. That is a very, very large word. It covers a lot of ground, it embodies a lot of things. But it is a sanctified people prepared for the Lord, people who are really, really separated unto the Lord.

Now, dear friends, I'm quite sure that the Lord's disciplines are all in that direction. It's a terrible thing and you may not like it put this way, but sooner or later you will come to it if you realize what is involved, it is a terrible thing for the Lord not to discipline us. No greater loss could be suffered by us if the Lord's eyes of flame see something wrong and He should not deal with it. That would be a terrible thing, for Him and for His church, and for spiritual history. He must, and sooner or later, He will.

You may think this is a very solemn word. Why this? Well, I think for this reason. And I can tell you that this is not just a studied subject for this time, it is a deep and heavy burden. Think of this: The Lord wants to go on. He wants to carry His testimony further. He wants to do a new thing. He wants to bring His people on and in order to do so He must have that which is represented by the Levites. He must have a people in the midst of His people who really do embody the fulness of His thought and that people must be a holy people, a holy people.

These are strong words: "He will sit as a Refiner." A Refiner, as of gold and silver... Refiner. The picture has often been used, you know, in connection with those words, as a refiner of gold and silver who heats and heats under the crucible and looks in until the dross is consumed and he can see his own face reflecting in the metal and then he says, 'It is alright. It's finished.' Is that not just what the Lord would do? The fires... what for? The judgments... what for? To see His own face, to see His own face, the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, in our hearts.

There is a purpose why the Lord brings such a word to us at this time. It is, while solemn, perhaps challenging, let us realize that here is a word that is linked with prospect. The Lord is a Lord Who wants to go on, Who ever wants to reach new regions, to attain His full end; He wants to do that! He wants to do something new and ever new amongst His people. To do it (if I have not mis-read or mis-stated this whole history of this people) to do it He must have the people in the midst of His people who answer to Him on the one side concerning His desire, and answer the enemy on the other side, to deprive him of his desire. He would corrupt, he would pollute, he would cause this loss to the Lord; Levi says, 'NO! Never, never! Whatever it costs, never!'

We may talk like that over service for the Lord, "We will go where the Lord wants us, we will suffer whatever is involved in serving the Lord in any part of the world!" we talk like that, but dear friends, let us bring that into this realm. There is a cost of holiness, of sanctification - a great cost. And it is in holiness, in sanctification, that service rests; not in works, not in travelling about, not in meetings, but in holiness of life. That is the core and the heart of service to the Lord. He will bring you to that sooner or later. Sooner or later He'll bring you to that. You may go on for some time, but we will come to a terrible crisis. The Lord sees that which is not holy, but again, it is a positive not a negative word.

The Lord would say something to us gathered here this very day: He wants to go on, He wants to move, He wants to do things, because He is like that. But, even the Lord is held up by the Levites, that is so clear whenever the next step is to be taken, the Levites must come into their condition and into their position before the Lord. The Lord make us true Levites, to be able to serve Him.

Chapter 2 - Association With God

The prophecies of Malachi, chapter one verse 11: "For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my name shall be great among the nations, and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name shall be great among the nations, saith the Lord of Hosts."

Chapter 2, verse 4: "You shall know that I have sent this commandment unto you, that my covenant may be with Levi, saith the Lord of Hosts. My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him that he might fear; and he feared me, and stood in awe of my name. The law of truth was in his mouth, and unrighteousness was not found in his lips: he walked with me in peace and uprightness, and turned many away from iniquity. For the priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of the Lord of Hosts."

Chapter 3: "Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant whom ye desire, behold he cometh, saith the Lord of Hosts. But who can abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap: and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer unto the Lord offerings in righteousness."

We continue with the matter that the Lord brought us to face this afternoon, this matter of what is represented by the Levites in the Old Testament. And again, may I say what has often been said here: that we, in all these things, are dealing with spiritual realities and not just the forms of their embodiment and presentation.

When we speak about Levites, we naturally think of an Old Testament order and system of priestly ministry, but we need constantly to remind ourselves that whatever God has done, however He has expressed Himself from time to time in the history of this world, all the different forms and means of expression are only a means of conveying spiritual and abiding eternal realities. And that is very true of the Levites. We are speaking about them, we use their title, but let us realize all the time that we are in the presence of great, divine, spiritual realities that belong to us and to our time as truly as ever they belong to any people of God. So that this spiritual law of the Levite is something that comes right into this very hour, into this very place tonight.

We could not hope to comprehend and cover this whole matter, even though we were here for days, and I am not attempting to do that, only to lift out some of the most vital elements in this whole matter. Let us then begin by clarifying our minds on this one point: that we are dealing with a spiritual conception and not with a formal ecclesiastical system when we speak of priests and Levites. That latter does not obtain in our dispensation, but the spiritual conceptions do govern this dispensation.

Now, when we try to get to the heart of this matter, right to the very heart of it, asking ourselves this question: what is the innermost and deepest meaning and significance of this whole matter of Levitical ministry? I think the answer is: association with God in His work. That is a very simple way of putting it, but it is tremendously deep and searching.

Association With God for His Work

We have to bring up before ourselves all that the Word of God reveals as to the nature of God. God! And if we were to put the nature of God into one word, surely we would have to say: holiness. Holiness. You might say love, but love is governed by His holiness, love is qualified by His holiness, it is holy love. Whatever other words you may use to describe or define the nature of God - you may say truth and many other things - they are but the expression of this innermost thing: His holiness. His holiness.

An association with God... that is a tremendous thing to contemplate. In this book of Malachi's prophecies it is that that is governing, is dominant throughout. And the one charge that the Lord had against the people there and then was that they had lost a sense of His holiness. So much so that when they were charged with certain most conspicuously wrong things, they said, "How? How?" They couldn't see it, they couldn't see it. They had lost the sense of His holiness.

Then He brings them to the point, He says: "You offer on My altar the blind, the lame, the blemished". Then He puts it like this, "Go and offer that to your governor and see what he will say! What will he say? 'You dare to offer me a blind sheep, a lame oxen, a blemished animal? Who do you think I am? What sort of a person do you think I am?' See what your governor would say. But, am I not greater than your governor? And yet you do it to Me!" You see, the Lord has startling ways of bringing people face to face, I am only using this by way of getting at this whole matter: association with God.

Just think of it... the Levites were called into association with God. That was God's covenant with Levi, of life and peace. Think of it... come right into touch with such a God as He is! Come right into touch with His things, before Him, and live! And live! Why, it would be impossible to live in His presence, of life and peace... in touch with such as He is, in peace. Why, there would be war unto the death if there were not a right foundation and basis. "My covenant was with Levi, of life and peace, in association with Me in My work". I'm trying, dear friends, I know so imperfectly and falteringly, to impress you with the greatness of this vocation.

If it is true what we were trying to say this afternoon, that this is not a special cult, or class, or denomination of people, but this is what the Church as a whole is called into and when the Church as a whole fails the Lord, He looks inside to find those who will not fail Him in this matter. He has done that again and again, and that is the history of the Levites.

Now let us go back, and all the knowledgeable people will be patient, for everybody here hasn't got all the knowledge that you have.

What happened with the Levites? Well, first of all you know what we read this afternoon how they came into view with the Lord at all, the time of the golden calf, the breaking loose of the nation, and Levi's separating of themselves from that corruption and pollution and taint; standing right outside of it. And then, at great cost to their own souls, family and friends, in taking the sword against this breaking-in of evil powers. Well, that is how they came into view first of all.

And you know that later the Lord took the tribe of Levi in the place of the firstborn sons in Israel. The firstborn son in every household was the official priest of the household; he functioned as the priest of the household. When Israel defaulted as a nation and there was not that which the Lord required in priesthood in the whole nation, He separated the tribe of Levi on the basis of the half shekel of silver and made the tribe of Levi representative of all the nation, as the church of the firstborn ones. Representative, that is, in the Levites now, all the families of Israel are represented, but represented in holiness, in satisfaction to the Lord; a people in the midst of the people, giving God His satisfaction, for He must have it. You are familiar with that principle. I am not going on with the history of the Levites; you can pursue it, there's much more. That is enough for us to get right at the meaning of this.

This law of the Levite is the law of the innermost association with God for the work of God in a priestly way. When we say that we mean mediation, intercession, standing between God and His people to bring them together, to mediate from God what He wants His people to have, to bring His people into touch with God and His resources. It is a spiritual thing, and in that sense you are all called to be priests and Levites.

You are wondering, you are saying, "This is very technical and very ecclesiastical", but no, it is very simple. There is a piece of work going on in Denmark just now which is growing, expanding, bearing all the marks of a very real movement of God. For ten years five sisters, not by any means young, certainly not influential in this world, poor in the things of this world; for ten years those five sisters prayed this thing into being. Not until after ten lonely, patient years with much heartbreak and disappointment, coming to the place where sometimes they wondered whether ever anything could be, at the end of ten years the thing broke. I call that Levitical ministry. It was hidden; the world knew nothing about it, it went on - God knew all about it.

You may be a lonely soul in some place, you may be a lonely little group in some place, you may be larger. But whether alone, whether in larger, greater companies, the thing is, this is what you are called to: to be God's Levites in this thing, to stand, not between Him and the world, yes that, but between Him and His own needs in, and purpose for, His own people. That's a vocation which was the vocation of the Levites.

And, dear friends, if you need impressing with the importance of that to the Lord, it is not something that is optional, that is extra - you could take it or leave it. Let me take you back to what I read to you from the first chapter of Malachi. Do you not see the link? In my Bible I have got lines drawn across the pages, and those lines link things up, and I read to you in chapter one, "My Name shall be great among the nations... and in every place incense shall be offered unto My Name and a pure offering for My Name shall be great among the nations". My line runs across to Levi, first to the covenant made with Levi, and then from there to the purifying of the sons of Levi. I believe that is a right kind of link.

You see that if His Name is really to be great among the nations, He needs a Levitical body after this kind. He needs a people within His people. It may have to be that is not His appointment originally; He would have all His people on this basis as representing the Church of the firstborn, but if the whole is not like this, we have said so often, He looks inside for those who will serve Him in this way. But the purpose is: His Name is great among the nations.

Let us put it around the other way: if the Levites are corrupt and defiled and out of their place, the Name of the Lord is dishonoured among the nations. If the Lord has not got this kind of thing that He needs, this ministry by such a people, the nations suffer loss and the Name of the Lord suffers loss. You see, the Lord brings it right back here: the reproach on the Lord from the nations, His dishonour. He focuses it right down on the Levites; right down on them. And in order that the reproach on the Name of the Lord should be removed and that His Name should be great among the nations, He must purify the sons of Levi. He must do it.

Now, you see, we begin here: association with God. Let us take that to ourselves individually. I can think of nothing more searching for me than to have association with God. Well, of course, it would depend upon my idea of God, wouldn't it? But if I have any right conception of God, the kind of God He is, His infinite holiness; association with Him, being allowed to come near Him, to come into His presence, proximity to Him, that's a tremendous thing, a tremendous thing!

We should think it a great thing if we were allowed to have association with some people in this world; a high honour and responsibility for them to bring us into association with them. We think that a great thing, but association with God, for His work, that He'd do His work by us, oh, we need (and God grant it may be one of the fruits, upshots of this time, this very hour) a new conception on the one side of the holiness and greatness of God. Shall we say, the awfulness of God? And on the other side, the infinite, infinite mercy and grace of God to call us into association with Himself. What an honour, what a privilege, that He will do His work through us!

Oh we, dear friends, haven't got a right conception of God's work. We take it into our defiled hands. We project ourselves into it, spread ourselves over it, try to become something in it, strut about as though we were something. Well, Isaiah saw His holiness, "Holy, holy, holy!" and cried: "Woe is me, I'm undone." This we need to recover and then to realize He calls us into that association and for the purpose of fulfilling Himself and His work through us.

Now I want to pause there and put in brackets something. When we speak on this matter of holiness and sin and unrighteousness, and perhaps begin to feel something about it and ourselves, it is just possible for us to wrongly call to our rescue certain Scriptures; wrongly call to our rescue: "There is therefore no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus" and wrongly take the covering of that Scripture and such like Scriptures and hide behind them. There is a difference: "Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? God forbid!" See the point? Oh yes, we will always be very imperfect, there will always be much to be done in us until the end, in cleansing, sanctifying and saving... it has to go right on. And "if we walk in the light as He is in the light we have fellowship one with another", that is, Himself and ourselves, the blood of Jesus Christ His Son goes on cleansing us from all sin. But there is such a thing as not walking in the light and excusing it by saying, 'Yes, I know I am very imperfect and I am a sinner, but there is no condemnation in Christ.' You see what I mean? Well, you can't, we can't, get away with that.

These people in the churches in the Revelation, in the seven churches, in those where there was wrong, when it was mentioned to them their wrongs, "Thou hast there this and that and the other thing, this thing I hate..." they might have said: "But there's no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus; the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin." That won't do. That won't do!

If we are really going to be in association with God for His work, the refining fires have got to do their work, and the sons of Levi must be purified. We must be a purified people. We must be walking in holiness. We must, with all the value of the precious blood cleansing, and the Holy Spirit sanctifying, we must be walking in the light and we must correspond to the Lord for association.

It is the effect, it is the service, it is service that takes preeminent place here, as you see. Israel was called out of Egypt to serve the Lord: "Let My son go that he may serve Me." The whole idea of God in sonship is service. It is practical, it is to do His work, it is to minister to Him, and that in the midst of the nations.

Israel was called out from Egypt to serve the Lord on the basis of sonship. When the whole nation showed its weakness and its defilement, its divided heart, half toward the land (and that very largely, it became clear, for their own gain), and the other half back in Egypt (and that for their own convenience and comfort). And that was all dragged out into the light; the Levites were taken as the people of an undivided heart. That was the test, you see. Moses said, "Get every man his sword, gird every man with his sword on his side, go in and out, and slay your own brother, your own family, and your own friends". No man of a divided heart could undertake that. A man's heart must be whole to be able to do a thing like that. They were really put to the test about this in a very practical way and they stood up to it. They went through with it. They, therefore, right in the very center of the nation, represent the principle of the undivided heart, the heart that is wholly for the Lord. That is essential to association with the Lord; that is essential to this thing that the Lord calls His service; not what man calls the service, the work of God, but what God calls His service.

And mark you, dear friends, it is true, solemnly true, that sooner or later, if we really mean business with God, if we are honest with God, sooner or later we will be brought up against this. We may have gone on for a long time doing a lot of things for the Lord, and a lot of work for the Lord with things that the Lord did not agree with in our lives, but sooner or later the Lord says, 'You have gone far enough with this, now then...'. And at that time, all our life work is coming either to an end, or there is going to be something new, or something more. It is the crisis of our testimony and the crisis of our work. That is what Levi represents, you see, it is just that: God looking on the heart.

Oh, forgive me if I seem too heavy, severe; but I think the Lord is after something. What I am keeping my eye on is not the process, but the outcome. I am quite sure the Lord wants to do a new thing, a mightier thing, a thing for His glory, that He has purpose in view - something more, something more. And as I see it, this Levitical principle is just that; how God will go on, and how God will do greater things, and do more, and reach His end and it is with 'him that overcometh'. That is the Levite of our time.

The Levites stood and stand for what is most precious to God, most precious to God. And what is most precious to God is holiness of life. You can't dispute or challenge that. All this book of Malachi, these blemished offerings, these lame and blind offerings, the Lord says, 'Away with them! I have no delight, no pleasure in your offering at all. Take them away! These blemished things give Me no pleasure, there's no preciousness in those to Me.' It is what is most precious to the Lord and unblemished, unblemished... the thing that is holy before the Lord... what is most precious.

God is jealous, very jealous. He's a jealous God. In one sense God is the only Person who has a right to be jealous; our jealousy is all wrong, but God's jealousy is a holy and a pure thing and He has a right to be jealous. He is jealous for His Name, and jealous, therefore, for His holiness.

Now, do you see, do you recognize that all this explains the Lord Jesus? All this explains the Lord Jesus, it explains His coming into this world, it explains His life while He was here, it explains His cross. It all explains the Lord Jesus. We said this afternoon that He is the Great Levite. He commenced His ministry at the age of thirty as the Levites commenced theirs. He is the Great Levite.

Here you come to the whole matter of sonship again; sonship unto service to satisfy God. Here is One who is in the closest association with God. If Christ is our example, and if we are foreordained to be conformed to the image of God's Son, and if Christ really governs everything in life and work, then here we are, we are in the presence of One whose heart is not divided, whose heart is wholly and utterly for God, whose association with God is complete and absolute. Mark you, by His own choice. We are not thinking now of His identification with God in Godhead, we are thinking of Him as the Levite, the Man, representative amongst the Lord's people. One in real association with God, One fulfilling the purpose and doing the work of God. "I must work the works of Him that sent Me", or "we must work the works of Him that sent me while it is day"; here is the perfect Levite.

Now, what is the point? In order that we, we may work the works of God, we must be conformed to the image of God's Son. We must come into Christ-likeness. Now you see, that opens your whole Bible again because from beginning to end whenever God has taken a step in the history of this world, whenever He has taken a step and every successive step of the numerous steps, He has always taken that step on the basis of Christ. Do you see this?

Did He take a step with Abel, was Abel a step? Well, it is not difficult to see the feature of Christ that Abel represents - one who is separated unto God, whose heart is undivided where God is concerned. So we could go on now. But you see, every new step with every new man in the beginning, every new man: Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham and so on, came to the people of Israel, came to the Levites, and on you go. Every step that God took He took on the basis of Christ.

God has never moved on any other ground than His Son. You and I will be outside of the movements of God if we are not moving on the line of Christ. And Christ is this all-comprehending Levite who has a heart only for God; Who at any cost, any cost, will prove that His heart is wholly for God and He will react, violently react, against any insinuation from the enemy that would take something from the Father. Follow that, the Levites did that when they took the sword; it was a violent reaction against a breaking in to take something from God. That's Christ. So that being called into fellowship with God's Son is being called into a Levitical position of absolute separation unto God, wholeheartedness for God, reaction against everything that would take from God and dishonour His Name, and all the rest that the Levite stands for.

Now, I trust that you are catching the truth, the thought, the idea. The data is too much, all the details too many, to cover this ground, but here we are, we are faced with this: the Lord would take new steps, the Lord would go on, the Lord would lead His people on... but His way has always been, at all times, to find either a man or a people of this Levitical order; like that. When He's got that, He can do something more; He can go on.

He needs that today, and He needs that everywhere. We need not all be together in one place for that, we can be scattered over the earth, but the principle of holiness unto the Lord, the principle of the undivided heart, the principle of a jealous, red-hot jealous reaction against any touch of corruption from the enemy, the Lord will come along that line. He cannot do this willy-nilly. I think you know we have had too cheap an idea of the Lord's service and of our relationship to Him. Too cheap, just too easy... anybody will do, anything will do; generality. Oh no, if this says one thing to us it says, 'No! No! Not at all. God is jealous and God is jealous for His holiness, and for His Name.'

May He write that and put that into our hearts... and just explain Himself and what He means by speaking to us in this way. So much is at stake: "My Name... My Name... great in all the nations." I'm sure that appeals to our hearts.

Chapter 3 - Satisfaction of God

I shall not take time to turn you again to all those passages which formed the foundation of our meditation yesterday and which will be behind our continuance this morning. But I will just take those which were in the prophecies of Malachi, if you will kindly look at them, and then at one extra passage from the New Testament.

Malachi chapter 3: "Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord whom ye seek, will suddenly come to His temple; and the messenger of the covenant whom ye desire, behold he cometh, saith the Lord of Hosts. But who can abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? For He is like a refiner's fire, and like fuller's soap: and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver."

And now just a fragment from Paul's letter to Titus, Titus chapter 2 and verse 11: "For the grace of God hath appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us, to the intent that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly and righteously and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a people for his own possession, zealous of good works."

This has been a year of many and far-reaching ministries to Formosa, the Philippines, Hong Kong, India, Scandinavia, Holland, Switzerland, and others. And we come with this time here to the end of that particular series and programme and some of us are occupied with the big question: what next? What does the future hold?

As you have heard, quite a number will be going from us in the course of the next two to three weeks to many parts of the world and I feel this morning constrained to say something to you about the nature and the purpose of this ministry. Not with a desire to draw attention to, or speak about ourselves, or about anything that we are doing, but as to what we feel the Lord wants and the Lord is seeking to do. And I do feel that at this terminal point it is very necessary for all of us who have any fellowship and association in this ministry to be very clear as to what it is, that it should be redefined as to its nature and its purpose. Within the compass of the few minutes that I have, it is that with which I want to be occupied and want to occupy you.

Let me begin by saying what it is not, or some of the things that it is not. It is not a particular 'teaching' as such. That is, we are not concerned with some particular interpretation of truth. It may sometimes sound like that and I think many people have the idea that that is what it is. And I want to say that it is not that, as such and I underline that governing clause 'as such.' There is teaching, it may be in some respects different, it may be in some respects particular, but it is not a teaching, it is not a peculiar or separate fellowship of the people of God, a body of Christians gathered into some special association; it is not that, in any earthly sense. If it is an association, it's  quite spiritual, and I trust of a heavenly character, but not something to be set up on this earth as distinct from other true people of God.

Further, it is not a generally good or better level or standard of ministry and teaching and practice. There may be different levels of ministry and of teaching amongst the Lord's people, but our conception of this ministry is not just to be an improvement upon others - a little different and a little better, or a lot better - that is not the thought at all. The answer to the question on the positive side could not be better found than in the spiritual meaning of the Levites. The answer is there. If we could understand the meaning of the Levites in the Old Testament - see that they are but a representation or embodiment of a spiritual law or principle - then we would have the answer to our inquiry. Let us try, in a very broad way, to comprehend that.

We begin by noting that God has always had a very clear and a very positive mind as to what He wants and what He must have for His satisfaction and pleasure in His people. God is not just moving forward without a very clearly defined mind as to what He is after.

The Word of God makes it abundantly clear that from eternity God has moved with His plan, His purpose very clearly defined in His own mind and counsel. He knows what He wants, and He knows what He must have if He is to find His full satisfaction and pleasure in His own people. And that is where we begin: to recognize that.

God is not just stumbling on things as He goes along and then adjusting to the situation and raising up something to meet it, something that was not anticipated or in the plan. God knows from the beginning. We could quote the Scripture and much of it to bear that out. He knows exactly what He wants and how and by what means He will reach it and realize it. From the beginning... known unto God are all His works, from the foundation of the world. Now that is where it all began. But when the race as a whole turned aside from God and His intention, His purpose, His mind, as it did, God moved to take out of the race a nation, a part of the race in which He would recover and begin again to secure that first purpose, intention and mind. So, He looked into the nations and began to take out of the nations a people for His Name. Even in the old dispensation that was true: a nation in the midst of the nations, in which nation He would realize what was ever in His heart and His mind.

This part of the race, this chosen nation, had various features. First of all, of course, the great law had to be strictly enforced: the law of separation or sanctification. That part had to be hallowed indeed, unto God, set apart unto God, a separated, a sanctified people. The law of spiritual separation was the primary and foundation law of the existence of such a people. They had to be separated or sanctified (the same thing), firstly in an inward way, in spirit. They had to have a consciousness born in them. Their whole existence had to be constituted upon the consciousness that they were different. They were different; they were not of a piece with the other nations, spiritually and morally. They were different! They had that consciousness.

That consciousness, of course, gave rise to trouble within and without. Sometimes it went wrong, but there it was; you cannot fail to see that sense of being different by the very work that God had done, the act of God in their calling, in their separation, in their sanctification... they knew that they were different from all other people. It was in their very consciousness. You cannot account for many things apart from that fact, things that I have no time even to mention, but it is quite clear that even when out of the way and mixed up with other nations, they never lost that distinctiveness, they never have. And the consciousness of being different is a part of this very thing that we have to speak about.

And, of course, what was true in an inward way in the old dispensation was made true in an outward way, that is, in their very appearance in the world, and in their conduct in the world; they were different. These are, in the old dispensation, ways of indicating spiritual things.

The next thing about them was that they were a people whose heart had to be wholly for the Lord. Their history on this earth in a typical and symbolic way was all pointing to this: that they were not a people who could have one foot in the world and one foot in the things of God, but that God required of them that they have both feet and every part of their heart over in relation to His things and His end.

Then they were brought into being to be a testimony to the nations in the midst of the nations: a light unto the nations, to show God's mind to the nations, to let all men know what God requires and has set Himself to have.

Further, that nation was called to be a priestly nation or people, that is, to stand between God on one side and the needy peoples of the earth on the other side, and mediate in a priestly way, to bring men into touch with God and God into touch with men. That is the content of priesthood as a spiritual thing.

And then finally, for the moment, they were there in the midst of the nations to show the authority of God over the earth. There is one God, He is God alone, He is over all gods and over all peoples; He is the Lord, the Creator of Heaven and Earth, and they were there with His authority over all creation resting upon them and deposited with them, that they should secure for Him His rights in the nations. And, we can go further, because although this is only brought out in the New Testament in fulness, it is so clearly seen all the time right through the Old, that this authority extended beyond the earth. It extended into the realm of spiritual intelligences who were constantly seeking to break in and take away from God His rights in the earth. This was God's great corporate act in relation to His original purpose.

But then, that people as a whole, that nation as a whole, in general, came short... failed Him, disappointed Him. And then He moved again within that nation and we have that which has been occupying us so far and still is at this time: God's movement in relation to the Levites. In the place of all the firstborn in Israel He took the Levites, and they became within the nation the embodiment of God's thought concerning the nation, both as to its own nature and constitution, and as to its vocation and service in the midst of the nations. They were taken to supply the Lord with what His people as a whole had failed to give Him, in which they were a disappointment to Him.

God moves ever more inwardly, as you see. And so, within the compass of the nation, He took one out of every family and constituted that Tribe of Levi - the centre of His interests and His service.

Certain things come out in relation to the Levites, firstly, of course, their representative character and position. They were not separate from Israel. While spiritually separate from the wrongs in Israel, they represented all Israel. Their very constitution as being the tribe of the firstborn ones, the spiritual principle, they represented all the families in Israel and stood therefore representatively as God's thought concerning all His people. They were there to serve the Lord in this particular thing.

Again, I emphasize what I said last night: the necessity for our understanding what the service of God is. Dear Friends, you and I need to be very clear about this thing, what the service of God is.

The service of God has become all sorts of things. It's an omnibus thing with people today, the service of God, but the essence of the service of God (as made perfectly clear by the whole Word of God) is this: that it really does minister to the realization of the full purpose of His heart. It is only service of God as it does that. Only that which does that is the service of God. It is the service of God, more or less, according to how that end is served, but the whole idea of the service of God is this: God has, from the beginning, a full, complete, clearly-defined and rounded out purpose and intention concerning His people and service to God requires that we know what that is, and that we are in line with that, and that that is being realized by what we do. We must be very clear on that matter.

So the Levites were taken from the midst of the nation in order to be a concentration of the Lord's full thought in the nation. Their ministry, though it had various aspects, was mainly to do with the altar. Such ministry, such service, such a purpose, always brings us very closely into relation with the sufferings of Christ. There will be no mistake about it, when you really get right on the line of God's full purpose, you are precipitated into a life in which you are going to know the fellowship of His sufferings. It is a part of such a ministry.

Another thing for the moment, the Levites were the spearhead in battle. They were a warring tribe, strangely enough. A peculiar phrase, even in their relationship to the altar and the sacrifice, it says that they were to serve in "the warfare of the sanctuary". Strange isn't it? If any place and anything ought to be out of touch with warfare, it ought to be the sanctuary, but no, "the warfare of the sanctuary." To carry that further, it's not scriptural, but it means this: the warfare of the sacrifice, of the Cross, the altar. You are precipitated into peculiar conflict when you come into line with God's full purpose. These were the Levites and they embodied this word that I have read from Titus, "to purify unto Himself a people for His own possession."

Now, what was true in the old dispensation is ever true in God's thought, God's mind, and in spiritual principle. We may have passed from the time of the types, the figures, the symbols, and the outward systems embodying the principles, and coming to the pure, clear realm of spiritual reality, we have not passed out of the time or the realm of the principle of these things. And so we find in the New Testament God still moving on this same line. The Levites now are a spiritual company, a heavenly people and not an earthly and not a temporal; they are the people that God must have, even though it be in the midst of His people generally, who really do know what God's full purpose is and are committed to that and nothing less, whatever the cost may be.

Have I answered our first question? I am not saying, mark you, that we are the Levites. Don't misunderstand me. But I am saying this: that God is ever seeking for a people here, in whom He can find the fullest response to what is in His own mind from eternity. He is ever seeking that, and He will never be satisfied with anything other or less than that.

If I may be allowed to go so far, I would say that He has called into being this ministry (I don't mean my ministry) this ministry, to serve Him in that way; to, in a small way, as a part of something very much larger, perhaps larger than we know in the earth, nevertheless to serve Him in this way of seeking to keep alive a testimony as to the fulness of God's intention for His own people. The phrase "the fulness of Christ" is a common phrase amongst us, but that is what it is. That is what it is: the fulness of Christ... that is the true Levitical function and ministry.

And I want to say to you, dear friends, this morning, that the Lord wants that where you are concerned. He does want, and will take pains to have, where you are concerned (if I say "where we are concerned" you might misunderstand that, you might think that I'm talking about Honor Oak or something that is called "this fellowship", something like that), but I mean you, as the Lord's people. The Lord wants you to stand in that relationship to Himself, not as something superior or a kind of spiritual autocracy, certainly, certainly not a spiritual aristocracy, but just as a people here amongst His own people in this world. Not looking down on anybody, not feeling that anybody is, or thinking that anybody else is less - oh God forbid anything like that - but in a true heart way to represent for the Lord all that He would have in His people; an utterness for God and giving God a position and an opportunity for showing in you all His counsel and all His will, and all His purpose, and all His character.

It is a very holy calling. That is why we began yesterday in our first two sessions with the tremendous emphasis upon holiness. This cannot be, only by holiness of life. You see, holiness is not just a state which ends with itself; holiness in the Bible is vocational, always. It's vocational. It always relates to God's work: "Be ye holy, ye that bear the vessels of the Lord" - for His work! The work of which we are speaking, this work... holiness is vocational. Sooner or later, I repeat: sooner or later our work will be brought up short on the point of holiness.

If we are the Lord's servants, if we are joined to the Lord for His purpose, and if anything comes in that is unholy, He may bear, He may speak, He may exercise, He may for a time do nothing. But there will come a point in which He will say, 'I have spoken about that, I have spoken to you about that more than once. I have waited, I have been very patient. Look here, we are not going any further.' And some terrible crisis will arise which involves the whole question of our usefulness to the Lord; nothing less, if the Lord's going to do any more or go any further with us. I have to be serious again and solemn about that because, you see, the very governing principle of Levitical service to God is holiness. The whole dimension of the house is to be holiness unto the Lord because it's a priestly house, in the spiritual sense. Holiness... a people separated unto God in an inward way.

It's impressive when you stop to think about it, really sit down and think a little about it: all this all the way through the Bible about separation, about sanctification, about holiness. What does it imply? What does it imply? Well, surely the implication of it all is that it runs right through the Bible. From beginning to end it is the, shall I say the golden thread through the Bible. What does it imply? Well, it must imply that this whole realm of things is a corrupt realm, is corrupted, is defiled, is unclean; it's contrary to the nature of God. We are born into it; this realm of earth and the lower heavens: tainted and polluted, it's been touched by unclean hands, it's being energized by unclean spirits; it is unclean. The very heavens in the sight of God are not clean, the Bible says; shot through with uncleanness... the warfare against God of unholiness.

So it's quite clear that there can be no association with God and no real work for God, only on this ground of true holiness and practical holiness. God wants a holy people. I think that is the note of this weekend, the note in my heart: God wants, He must have a holy people and then see what He'll do! See what He'll do!

But oh, it is a suffering way because it brings us so deeply into the meaning of the Cross. The Cross ceases to be a teaching and a doctrine. It becomes almost an awful reality; terrible to the flesh is the Cross. We have got too cheap a Cross perhaps. We sing about it, talk about it, teach about it, think we know all about the Cross; but the Cross is a devastating thing in the realm of the flesh. You will find that sooner or later, the most awful thing is really to come into touch with the Cross in the flesh.

On the other hand, what a mighty, mighty power the Cross is, objectively, when you are in line with it, in tune with it, in fellowship with it, when it has nothing against you, when you are on its ground! What a tremendous power it is in this universe against the evil forces and in this world. Do you not agree with me dear friends, that that's the position we want to be in? On both its sides: holiness, holiness and power. Those two things always go hand in hand. Holiness and power. You cannot have the power; you know the power only by the holiness. But if we have the holiness, the power will spontaneously work. It will! You will not have to ask for power if the holiness is there.

So, to sum up this whole matter of Levites in all dispensations, it is a spiritual thought, it's a spiritual conception. It is the embodiment in the creation of the holiness, and therefore the power, of God. We read again and again last night from this prophecy of Malachi: "That My Name may be great among the nations... My Name shall be great among the nations," repeated by the Lord and leading straight to this: "He shall purify the sons of Levi and sit as a Refiner." The two things go together. The greatness of His Name among the nations and a people purified unto the Lord.

I close by reminding you of those other words, "My covenant was with Levi, My covenant of Life and Peace." I think we have got to know more of that divine Life, don't you? We have got to know more of that divine Life, the mighty power of that risen Life of the Lord Jesus. We need to know it, every one of us, and as a people we need to know it where we are, "My covenant of life"... victory over death in a spiritual way and, until the Lord has finished with us here, in a physical way. I still stand on that ground, the lifelong ground until He has finished with us, divine Life even for the body, we want to know more about that. And peace, where God is not against us, He has no controversy with us. The conflicts between us and the Lord and the Lord and us are settled. His covenant of life and peace is with Levi, Levi, mark you. These two things: God's full purpose for His people and absolute sanctification, holiness, separation unto the Lord.

Now you must ask the Lord how that applies, because it touches so many practical points. It may come into the family life, the domestic life, it may come into your business life - challenge and search out and judge all your business methods and transactions. Yes, you have got to be a Levite in business as well as in the assembly of the Lord's people. Holy unto the Lord. Be careful how you are involved in the devil's system of running this world, to take from the Lord; in your social life, in every department of life.

We are in a terrific business, no less than whether this great kingdom of darkness is going to hold its ground or whether the Lord is going to oust it. And that issue is going to be settled in the Church, make no doubt about it, make no mistake about it. That issue is going to be settled in the Church. It is going to be glory in the Church and by Christ Jesus in the Church. Now I must stop there.

Chapter 4 - A Vessel of the Testimony of Jesus

I am bringing this time together these days to a conclusion, by bringing you back again to the point from which we started; asking you again to look at the first chapter of the book of the Revelation, verse two: "Who bare witness of the Word of God, and of the testimony of Jesus Christ." Verse five: "From Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, ruler of the kings of the earth." Verse nine: "I, John, your brother and partaker with you in the tribulation, and kingdom and patience which are in Jesus, was in the isle that is called Patmos for the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus."

Just retain those fragments in your mind and glance down the following two chapters, two and three, and remind yourselves again of the seven-fold reiteration of one clause at the close of each message to the seven churches: "To him that overcometh."

Those of you who were with us on Saturday at the commencement of this time, will remember that we said these who are called 'the people who overcome', or who are exalted to overcome, they are all brought together in answer to what is meant by the testimony of Jesus. As you see, the book opens with this three-fold reference to the testimony of Jesus which clearly indicates that is the matter on hand for this whole book, that is the preface to the entire book. It is all going to be about the testimony of Jesus.

The testimony of Jesus is that which is going to explain everything in the book and, as we said, it is significant that immediately that is presented in the Person of Jesus, the next step is to deal with the churches, or the church as a whole, in a representative way in relation to that testimony.

The Testimony of Jesus

So we come back to this point this evening, that the Lord is ever, right to the end of the dispensation (and these messages to the churches do lead on to the end of the dispensation because, no doubt about that I think, the word is 'behold I come quickly', that is the end) if they represent the Lord's quest right to the end of the dispensation, these exhortations to people in the churches, or in the church, to overcome, mean that such people will be those who embody that testimony of Jesus in a full and unsullied way. If that is true, then surely we are gathered at this time in line with that, in relation to that. I mean, if God's quest for a vessel of the testimony of Jesus continues to the end of the dispensation, well, however near we may be to the end, we are not at the end yet and that quest goes on.

The Lord still seeks to have a people who really do embody and express what is called "the testimony of Jesus". I trust that your familiarity with the very terms, language, and phraseology does not take from the importance and seriousness of the matter. It therefore becomes necessary for us to give what time we have this evening to a review of what that testimony is.

The Testimony of Jesus... if that really is what God wants to have in a people, and you can see from these seven messages to the churches how serious a matter it is with God, how far He is prepared to go in order to have it in both ways. On the one side, in judgment; in judgment of that which is contrary to the testimony. On the other side, how far He will go with those who will overcome. You could not, I think, find it possible to go beyond what is said here as to what the Lord will do for such people. Indeed, He leads them right up to the throne at last, and says, "He that overcometh will I give to sit with Me in My throne." You can't get very far beyond that, can you? Surely that is the highest, that is the last and the ultimate.

So, how many more things are said here that He will do if He can get a people like this, if He can get a vessel for the testimony of Jesus according to His own mind? Some of the most terrible things, on the other hand, are said, not to the world, but to the churches, or representatively to the church, the most terrible things are said where things do not correspond to the testimony of Jesus. I say this simply to indicate how important a matter this is with God and that however many good and commendable things there may be, comparative things are not acceptable to God in the ultimate. He will not settle this thing upon a comparative basis.

There are good and commendable things mentioned in the church, but He comes back, "...nevertheless, nevertheless I have this against you and unless thou repent... I will remove your lampstand out of its place." You see, the comparative ultimate does not pass with God, He is for the absolute, He is for the utter!

So that is what faces us and so we have to look to see what is meant by the testimony of Jesus. And you notice this simple thing at the outset, that here He is given the simplest of all His designations: 'the testimony of Jesus'. It is not of the 'Lord Jesus' or any of His other titles, it is simply 'the testimony of Jesus'. That is the title of His manhood here on this earth. It then, first of all, is the testimony of:

Who and What Jesus on This Earth Was.

We here in this place tonight should have no quarrel on one matter: where this begins. It is almost commonplace with us, so wholly accepted, that you might wonder why it should be mentioned; the fundamental fact that Jesus is the Divine Son of God, God manifest in the flesh. God was in Christ, or utterly: Jesus was God and Jesus is God. That is a very striking word of the apostle Paul in his letter to Titus, "looking for the appearing of the great God our Savior, Jesus Christ." You can't get beyond that, can you? But I say to us it is not a matter of contention with Christian doctrine and yet, it is something that we should take account of again. John was in the isle of Patmos for that to begin with, he was in exile for that, he was a prisoner for that, he was suffering for that... that testimony. And that explains the suffering of the Church at the beginning.

You know that it was upon that very point that the Jews crucified Jesus. "He made Himself the Son of God," they said, made Himself, made Himself! That was the last thing with them and for that they put Him to death. And for that testimony the Church itself was thrown into the vortex of that terrible persecution. If you understand the persecutions from the Roman Empire and the Roman Emperors, it was purely on that point.

You see, the Caesars were deified, they were god, and often called by titles of deity and godhead and were worshipped as god. Jesus as God was a challenge to that whole system, to that whole authority, hence the persecution from the Roman world. As Christ had been put to death on that very score, so the Church was following in His train and being put to death on the same thing: Jesus is God.

There is a strange fragment of Scripture which is not easy to understand until you see it in that background, the apostle says: "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' but by the Holy Spirit." That sounds strange in itself if you take it out of its context, its historical context. Anybody can say 'Jesus is Lord' without the Holy Spirit; anybody can say that, you need not be a Christian to say that. But here it is, "No man can say 'Jesus is Lord' but by the Holy Spirit." You put yourself right into the Roman and Jewish world as it was at that time, and you stand up and say, 'Jesus is Lord' and you'll need all the power and courage and boldness of the Holy Spirit to do it. You put your very life into jeopardy when you use those words about Jesus! All the forces of evil, spiritual and temporal, will make you a marked man or woman in that world. If you say, 'Jesus is Lord' the cross waits for you and you will need the Holy Ghost for that. No one, in that realm, could dare to say it but by the power and support of the Holy Spirit.

It was no easy thing to declare the Deity, Lordship, Godhead of Jesus Christ in those days; it is not today in worlds of idolatry, in lands of heathenism where satan has his seat. Some of you know that. The fact is this: that this is a matter which, when it is really, really spiritually embodied in a people (not a part of a Christian creed, something that you just say over and over, week by week as a form and formula) but when that thing is as it was at the beginning, embodied in the power of the Holy Spirit; all Hell is out to destroy that testimony. So you can have the language and the phraseology of the testimony without the reality. Have the reality, and you are a marked people, you are marked down by the enemy to be crucified, whatever that may mean. The testimony of Jesus begins there.

The testimony of Jesus begins in the spiritual world which is set against the utter, undivided, unquestioned Lordship of Jesus Christ in this universe. It is there. I want to say this and pass on; it is in that realm that the Church really proves its testimony, its value, its significance, its power. It is in the realm of spiritual intelligences that the final proof of the Church's reality is known and manifested; not what we claim to be on this earth, but it is what we signify in that whole kingdom of animosity to Jesus Christ. That's where our accountability is decided and measured, that that world tests the reality of the testimony of Jesus. But then it is not alone His deity that remains, it is the testimony of Jesus... the Man.

Jesus the Man - what He was as the Man Jesus. You see, that other spiritual world of hatred - bitter, vicious hatred of God which is set and bent upon spoiling and destroying everything that is of God and everything that God has made; has made man its mark, by whom it will vent its spite upon God. Man is God's chief creation. Man is the crown of God's creation, or was. In man God saw His heritage, His inheritance. He was made for God's glory, he was made to be the vessel and vehicle of the manifestation of God in goodness, in grace, in power, in glory in this universe. Man's destiny is a very great destiny in the mind of God; very great indeed. God has made this thing, this wonderful thing, this beautiful thing, the crown of His creation which, when He has it He says, 'it is very good, very good.' And this evil, sinister enemy of God says, 'I will spoil the whole thing. I will wreck and ruin that!' That lies behind what we find of the work of satan in human history.

Here is a Man who satisfies God utterly and absolutely and is the Answer back to the evil one and the evil powers, and God's vindication. That is the testimony of Jesus, what He is; not only in His Godhead, but what He is in His humanity. We could long stay to dwell upon that, the perfections, the excellencies of that Man, that One on whom the eyes of the great Creator God could look and say, "I am well pleased, I am well pleased." It's no small thing for God, being such as He is, with all His high standards to say of any man, "I am well pleased," or, "in Him is My delight." So the testimony of Jesus as to what He was, to the satisfaction of God and the answer to God for all His desires concerning man - the testimony of Jesus - no wonder satan hated Him.

But then from His Person we pass to His work, for the testimony of Jesus extends to the great work that He did, because of what He was and who He was. The work that He did in the first place: the Son of God was manifested to destroy the works of the devil. It began with sin and He took this whole sin matter, this work of evil in human life, He took it, with all the curse that had come because of it, and grappling with that great, that terrible, that awful thing called "sin".

I don't know what you feel about sin. In this conference the Lord has tried to impress upon us the greatness of holiness because its opposite is so terrible. And He took the whole sin question, root and branch and everything; He bore our sin in His Body on the tree, He was made a curse for us, He was made sin, He who knew no sin - all the sin of all time, in every realm and every man - was taken up by Him, and fully, finally dealt with. Thank God! That's the testimony of Jesus.

But that is not all. While He dealt with the thing itself, He went to its source, that personal source, "the prince of this world" ... "the power of darkness" ... "the spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience" and all his mighty kingdom, and He dealt with that. He dealt with that. He cast out the prince of this world, "Now shall the prince of this world be cast out." Yes, He went to the source of all this, satan himself, and destroyed him! You say, 'it doesn't look like it...'. Well, it depends on how you look at it.

I have been much occupied through this day, indeed I have been wrestling between two messages for this evening. And I have been very much occupied today with an incident and its sequel in the Old Testament and I may as well mention it here in a moment or two and then I have given both messages. It is that terrible incident of Achan, when the people of God were moving more deeply into the land of covenant. We know how the enemy, the great spiritual enemy had, from the very beginning of that movement toward that land (they were in Egypt and then immediately on their exodus and then at Sinai) how he persistently sought to break in and arrest that movement by insinuating himself, impinging upon the people. One way or another, seeking to frustrate that movement; breaking in. Here they are getting in, they are moving in, and the enemy comes in again and finds some ground in this man Achan, a ground of covetousness.

It was understood clearly that nothing in that whole realm and domain was exempt from the curse that God had pronounced upon it. It, the whole thing - man, woman, and everything in that realm - lay under the curse for reasons which we have no time to explain, but it was all under a ban and under a curse and that was understood. It had to be completely "devoted" which meant destroyed; utterly destroyed. But Achan, in the covetousness of his heart, took of the devoted thing - a wedge of gold and a Babylonian garment, and hid it in his tent. And the next movement forward was a most disastrous thing. For all Israel it was disaster and the whole thing was brought to a standstill.

The leader, Joshua, of course, was distressed and disturbed and perplexed and bewildered; he wondered why the Lord had allowed this. He had a controversy with the Lord, but the Lord explained. He said Israel has sinned in the devoted thing and commanded that this thing should be tracked down to its very root and source. So, they pursued their course, their manner of discovering this sort of thing, and gradually sifted down, sifted down, tribe and household, until at last, by this divine way of guidance they came upon Achan and his family, at last, and he is taken.

Joshua said, "My son, give God the glory and confess what you have done." and Achan made his confession and Joshua, in the wrath and jealousy of God said, "Why have you troubled Israel? The Lord shall trouble you, my son." And they took him, his family, his tent, and all his belongings and everything that had to do with him and burnt with fire in the valley of Achor so that there was nothing of Achan and all that was left was ashes in the valley of Achor. That's the work of the devil; that's what the devil can bring about of a necessity, a necessity for God to judge like that, so utterly, because of a link with the devil's kingdom.

But what is the sequel? Yes, it looks as though satan triumphs; it does not look as though satan is a defeated foe, but pass over into Isaiah and into Hosea and what have you? "And I will give the valley of Achor as a door of hope". And in Isaiah 66: "and in the valley of Achor there shall be sheep and pastures." That is judgment passed and the very work of the devil becoming ground of a new hope, the way of a new hope. He is the God of Hope, you see, the God of Hope. He can turn the worst works of the devil to His glory.

Well, that is only one way of the foreshadowing and picture of Christ crucified being made a curse and suffering the wrath of God even unto ashes. But yes, the devil has made that necessary by his interference and his breaking into this race, making it necessary. In a sense that is the work of the devil. He has made it necessary for God to judge like that unto final devastation, but listen! Listen! That is not the end: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has begotten us again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ." That is the end of the story. It is not devastation and ashes - a living hope! That's the sovereign grace, wisdom and power of God that just is set in here.

Yes, it does not look as though satan is defeated and beaten and off the field, but there is another side to that story. He may be the blind instrument in the sovereign power of God to create a new prospect and a new possibility. Believe that. The testimony of Jesus is that He has gone to save and has gone to the source of sin and has gone to the result of sin. Through sin - death. All sinned and death passed upon all men... for all have sinned. Death, death, but He has gone there too. He has plumbed the depths of death. He has taken death at the plant and has conquered death. Oh, what a mighty thing Jesus has done; a mighty thing: the testimony of Jesus.

But then, what about His ministry? We have been thinking in these meetings very much about the Levites and especially and particularly that fragment in the prophecies of Malachi: "My covenant was with Levi, of life and peace" and the whole of what I have been saying to you tonight is gathered up into the history of the Levites - all that; I won't go over it again, I dare not. But it comes here, that because of the stand that the Levites took against sin and the breaking in of the evil powers at Sinai, and the stand that they took with God for His testimony, to carry the ark of the testimony - His testimony - forward to its final, glorious destination, God made a covenant with Levi, a covenant of life and peace.

That is, in effect: they shall be the ministers of life and peace in this world. They shall be a vessel, the embodiment of this two-fold great thing: Life and Peace. The effect of their ministry was that, you see, Life... Life, they were countering death all the time by the altar. Their ministry related to the altar and to the blood - countering death and countering sin, which meant preserving life and the way of life; countering the anger of God against sin and God's controversy with man because of sin, countering it by the altar... satisfying God in the propitiation for sin and therefore holding a ministry of peace with God and from God. Their ministry... they are only the Levites, a type of the Lord Jesus, Who is the great and all-inclusive Levite. His ministry... what is it? Because of that which we have spoken which He has done and that which He is, His ministry to us and to the world is Life and Peace.

Life and Peace

We here tonight are a testimony to the testimony of Jesus, I trust. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ and we have Life by Him, and in Him. That is the testimony of Jesus.

All that remains for us to do is to bring again into view these people appealed to, "to him that overcomes, to him that overcomes" that is, a people who will embody this testimony. I am quite sure that is what is here meant in these messages. It is the counter to the sin which satan himself has introduced amongst the Lord's people; it is the counter to spiritual death which is the result of corruption and pollution that we find there in the churches.

It is a people who stand clear of that, stand clear of it all, and who will stand against it and who will, by the help of God, resist the inroads of satan and his touch, his evil work to spoil what is of God. That, in brief, is what is signified by this, "he that overcometh, he that overcometh." They are not an elect body, they are not a spiritual aristocracy chosen for this purpose. Any, any true believer can be and should be one of those. Indeed, that is what the whole Church ought to be. As the Levites represented all Israel, they represented God's thought for all Israel. Although here in these churches we find that all the spiritual Israel is not like that, God moves in an inward way to have a Levite people in the midst of His people. He must have it. And these are they who overcome, the true Levites. And they are to take up what is true of the Lord Jesus Himself, firstly in themselves as in Him: a holy people. And then, because they are a holy people, they have a ministry of Life and Peace.

I believe, dear friends, that the measure of our ministry of Life, ministering Life to those who need Life and even to the Lord's people as we heard today, many of the Lord's people are not really in Life. And there are many, like Cornelius and his friends, very devout and sincere and, in a way, God-fearing, religious, but not in Life until the Holy Spirit comes to them. If there is going to be a ministry of Life to anyone who needs Life, who is without Life, it requires a people after this kind. This is a holy Life and this Life cannot be ministered through unholy channels: "Be ye clean, ye that bear the vessels of the Lord." It is an old Levitical command, isn't it?

Well, we are called to a great ministry, a wonderful ministry, the ministry of His Life, His Life and His Peace. It is committed to us. It's a wonderful thing to realize that it is possible for men and women in holy fellowship with the Lord to be the vehicles of His Life to others, ministering Life to them, taking the Life for them, as James puts it. Taking Life for them... it's a great ministry.

And Peace... ministering the reconciliation of God to souls. It is a wonderful thing. But the ministry rests upon the condition: a holy people, a holy people. The Lord make us like that, and really have in us as a few, many, many more, maybe multitudes more, but in us as a few... a vessel of the testimony of Jesus.