03.07. Directions Given By The Holy Spirit For The Present Condition Of Things

Directions Given By The Holy Spirit For The Present Condition Of Things The Spirit of God, foreseeing all that would happen in the church, has, in the word, given warnings, and at the same time, the needful assistance. If He tells us, that in the last days perilous times shall come, and if He pictures to us the men of that time, He adds, "from such turn away." If He says, "Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers" (2 Corinthians 6:14), and this warning is one of all ages; if He says that we are all "one body," and therefore partake of one bread; and, notwithstanding, I find no such union of the saints, He tells me at the same time, that there, where two or three are gathered together in the name of the Lord Jesus, He is in their midst. But His directions are even more precise than this. I have for comfort in all times, that the Lord knows them that are His, but for my own direction, that he that names the name of Christ should depart from iniquity: where I find this established, I must leave it. But there is more; I learn that in a great house, such as the professing church is become, there are vessels to dishonour, and that if a man purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel made to honour, fit for the master’s use. And the man of God is exhorted to follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

Those who have been endeavouring to form churches seem, though meaning well, to have entirely forgotten our need of power as well as of direction. When we are told that all the directions for the churches are for all times and places, I venture to ask if they are for times and places in which churches do not exist? and we are brought back to the inquiry-If the dispensation is in ruins, who is to make the churches? Again, I would ask, is the direction given by the apostle, as to the use of the gift of the tongues for our own times? Doubtless, if that gift exists; but that condition is assuredly a most material modification of your rule, and the very turning point of the discussion between us.