Job 5: 17
Acts 18: 24-28
Numbers 10: 1-10
AEM I wondered if we could look into the matter of chastening. The scripture in Hebrews presents it very clearly, that it is God who chastens. He does it in a particular way and He has a particular end in mind. I wondered if it is that which we could look into in these scriptures.
Chastening may include a wide spectrum of things and we may touch upon some aspects. I read the verse in Job as it is presented there as correction or adjustment. We have the thought in Scripture of chastising too, which according to the dictionary is a more punitive thought. I do not want to limit how God can chasten or how He can chastise in any way. The thought in mind is primarily as to correction and adjustment. God uses chastening as a means of doing that.
In Hebrews we have things that have to be set aside. It says, “laying aside every weight, and sin which so easily entangles us”. The weights and sin are things that we allow and we get caught up with. We allow our attention and our energy to be caught up and entangled in these things, and we are to lay them aside. In comparison, further down we find that chastening is something to be borne. Chastening is something that we are to bear and we are to learn from it. God is using things at the present time in a particular way to chasten His people in a positive way. Chastening has a positive end in view. It may colour our reading that it says here “whom the Lord loves he chastens” - whom He loves.
In the book of Job, we find something additional brought in by Eliphaz. I wanted to just touch on this; we will have to be sensitive to the Spirit as to how much time we spend on it. There is an echo here of the proverb quoted in Hebrews, that says we are not to despise the chastening. Eliphaz says, “happy is the man whom God correcteth”. That is not a natural thing. If you are corrected or chastened it can generally be a bit irksome. It says here, “happy is the man whom God correcteth”. That is a result of God’s chastening; that there is happiness in a man. I read in Acts because of the word in Job as to correcting. We find that Apollos is corrected by a brother and sister, who are able to do it with a very positive outcome. We will touch on the detail. The brethren know the scripture well but we find at the beginning that he was teaching accurately: he “taught exactly the things concerning Jesus, knowing only the baptism of John”, and by the end of the section having received adjustment and correction from Aquila and Priscilla he is convincing “the Jews publicly, shewing by the scriptures that Jesus was the Christ”. What an adjustment! He needed correction and the way in which it is done there seems to me to be very beautiful. We need to see the outcome God had in mind, that Christ is magnified by what He has done and the way the brethren act accordingly.
Finally, I trust this is a right application of the scripture in Numbers. It appeals to me that we have the children of Israel seen here through a variety of movements. Assembling, setting forward, in conflict, in a day of gladness; and it is all directed by priests blowing these trumpets. What has arrested my attention is the fact that these are “trumpets of silver; of beaten work”. These trumpets have been worked on and they have been adjusted and shaped until the sound is clear and they can be used by priests to indicate how the children of Israel are to proceed. I am applying the fact that it is beaten work in the sense of what is corrective and what is adjusting. There comes a point when these trumpets are clear and they are able to be used to direct the people.
DBB At the end of the section in Hebrews it says, “afterwards yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness”. Would that link with “happy is the man”, in Job? As we get the gain of discipline and chastening then there is happiness towards God.
AEM I think that is one of the key things we are to learn from God’s chastening. He does not always have just one end in view. Here there is what is yielded, what is fruitful from it. It is the “fruit of righteousness”. What is according to God is upheld. It is peaceful and it brings about a circumstance which we might think almost impossible, when we are passing through the chastening. God will bring about His end in a peaceful way and the happiness that is referred to in Job will be the portion of someone who has learned God through chastening.
DBB Apollos would be like that.
AEM It does not appear that he ever found it irksome.
MJW suppose it is not too obvious to say that the word chastening comes from the word ‘chaste’. You get the idea of the “chaste virgin” (2 Cor 11: 2); so you can see here what direction it is in. It is a process that results in a chaste condition.
AEM I was thinking of that. God does not do this needlessly -
Our Father’s hand will never cause
His child a needless tear.
(Hymn 210)
Chastening can be very difficult and can feel very onerous but I think what you point out is very important. We have to see where it is heading. Where and what is God moving towards as He chastens? He has a right to do it to. He has a right to test and to prove and to correct and adjust; not just for the sake of it, but with an end in view that there is that which is according to His righteousness.
DBB We can then enjoy the presence of God in greater liberty.
AEM Yes; there would be the two sides. He brings us into accord with what is for God. As we are in accord with it, the peaceful fruit that you have referred to becomes our portion.
RDP The subject here is the race, and running with endurance. The note to entanglement is “besets”. It is something that will not go away. Every time you move it is in front of you. Every time you try to do something it stops you. Every time you think it intrudes; it besets. These are particularly testing things. They take you out of the race.
AEM I think we see the two things that he introduces at the beginning, the “weight” and the “sin”, everywhere. Every way we look we see these things and it says they easily entangle us. The writer’s answer is that we are to lay them aside. We might think that if they usually entangle us we have really got to work to shake them off or unpick them or whatever; but he says here to lay them aside. Just deliberately take these things and lay them aside; this would be in contrast to the chastening. We do not have the ability or the right to lay that aside.
RDP I think that is right. Sometimes we have to stand back from the detail and lay aside every weight and sin. It is a deliberate action. These things are very real. It is in Scripture; it does not say it might happen, but it does happen. Sometimes every thought you have, everything is beset by something; there is something dignified about “laying aside”. There is something almost like the anointing in that really. You lay aside the thing.
AEM It is an example of the way that we can be dignified in these things. We are not to be agitated or worked up about the way that God passes us. As you say, if we can take a step back (and the Lord would help us to do that), we can lay aside the things that we know ensnare us. We know individually the things that entangle us. We all know; what entangles me may not entangle you. We know what they are and sometimes we still head straight towards them, and then we are surprised that they entangle us again. The writer here says, ’Just lay those aside’ because God has something maybe just to chasten and correct with and we need to learn the lesson of that.
JAT I wonder if it is His ownership that gives God the right to speak. If we know the one to whom we belong that is a great help in the whole process.
AEM You mean we are His? I think so, and He has a right. I cannot opt out of it; I cannot sneak away somewhere and not allow God to chasten me. I cannot physically do it and I do not have the right to do it. When it comes, what am I going to learn?
JAT Love lies behind it if we have to chasten. We might feel that we are not loved but the more you go into it, the more you realise that actually our love is because we are loved. We need to accept it as a blessed thing.
AEM The flesh reacts to chastening in a certain way. Naturally we do not like it. We fight against it, we push back against correction, adjustment and chastening. We push back and we may apportion blame, but when God chastens I believe those who are His creatures, those who are His children, have to listen and to learn from it.
ADP The word “weight” gives the impression that it could be some large thing. It could be a state of mind, it could be an attitude, jealousy, and or any of these things. It is still a weight and it is entangling us. You cannot necessarily see these things.
AEM That is helpful. I thought about that just as we got here this morning. I thought that, if I walk into the room and hold something against a brother or sister, that is a weight and it will entangle me. If I held something against you, for example, and you were to contribute in this reading, that would colour my view of the contribution, and that is wrong. It is to be set aside. All these things are to be laid aside and no one else can do that for me; I have to do it for myself.
BCB I can choose how I respond to chastening. It seems from this scripture that there are three responses; I can despise it, or faint under it, or I can be exercised by it. The chastening comes: how am I going to respond?
AEM That is good. The word here to the Hebrews was, “ye have quite forgotten the exhortation”. He says you have forgotten it, but you are not to despise it. That is our first reaction; as you say we can choose but I think our primary reaction is not to like it. You think, ‘Why can my life not be more plain and straightforward because I could have more time to praise God if I did not have to deal with the chastening’. The colour of the praise may be the more glorious as a result of the chastening.
RDP-r I wonder if we need to see that there are two things within us. One is the work of God and the other is self will. The will is really what causes the need for chastening. That needs to be dealt with. God would free us from will in order to be available for Him. He may have to do it through the spirit of chastening.
AEM I think so. My impression is that this whole area is so wide. God’s ways and His government, and the way He works, are so wide. I think it may be that if I pursue a line of self will and I do not listen to what God is saying, He may have to chastise me, and the definition of that word is punitive, it may be punishment. Doing that is His strange work. As far as chastening is concerned, God chastens; that is He just adjusts and corrects and moves all the time because we have need of it. He may just be adjusting His work in us as well as addressing what is of the flesh, do you think?
RDP-r Apollos clearly was seeking to go on in a right way but he needed greater light in relation to the truth and that may be how the chastening comes in.
AEM It may be how God works in me; I may just need to see things from a different stand point and God needs to chasten me just to bring me to that view.
GJR Partly linking with what has just been suggested, you are helpfully presenting this as the discipline of God. Discipline can actually be traced to each of the divine Persons and perhaps this is particularly the Father’s discipline. In 1 Corinthians 11 we read of the Lord’s discipline but I think in my experience I would say there is such a thing as the Spirit’s discipline.
AEM That is helpful. I would not want to limit this in any way at all. You would understand that. I think we have to submit ourselves to the fact that we are to be disciplined; we are to be chastened because we will never arrive at this through our own efforts. God has to do that.
DBB It says, “speaks to you as to sons”; what God has in mind is one of the highest thoughts of sonship.
AEM There is a very useful illustration here for us. Some of us were occupied recently speaking about the actions of the Father, and how we are to learn from them, and how they are in love. This is from the Father and it is with a view to us entering into something that is not obtainable any other way. God has these great thoughts for us and in affection, in His great love, He gently moves us towards entering into these blessed things. The thought of sonship is the highest honour He bestows on us.
DJW Is the Father’s chastening connected with the family? If I am a prince I am expected to act like one. It is not a legal thing. Love wants to be represented. A family man would act like the Father would act despite the circumstances.
AEM I think so; we are in God’s house. We find our part within God’s house. God may have to chasten us as to our behaviour. This is not legal in any sense; this is done in love. The scripture here is very clear about that and God continues to do it in love. He will continue to do it until the Lord comes.
JBI Is it part of the Father’s reception process, receiving us as sons? He wants us to come nearer to Him. There is a verse in Proverbs that speaks of “the son in whom he delighteth”, Pro 3: 12. It is in view of coming to know God in nearness to Him.
AEM That is helpful. To do that - to refer again to the two types of things we have here - there are those things we lay aside, and then there is something God is still going to have to do, just to bring me into full conformity with His presence.
JAT There was so much that was commendable about Job. God would not hear him spoken against in front of Satan by any means. The matter of holiness is such an important matter in our lives because to enter into divine things that must be with us.
AEM The words here are very encouraging to our hearts. He speaks of the fathers we have had in the flesh, chastening for a few days as seemed good to them. God chastens that we might be “partaking of his holiness”. What a portion that we have to enter into. I might have to endure some adjustment, some chastening to be a partaker of that. Surely that is as nothing compared with the prize.
SJH I was just going to ask if you could say something as to what is involved in enduring. It would seem from this passage that the way that we are to progress through chastening is enduring. The scripture in Romans says, “tribulation works endurance; and endurance, experience; and experience, hope”, Rom 5: 3, 4. Just help us as to what is actually involved in taking this on.
AEM I do not have much experience of it. We can do no better than to look at the one who is described here as the “leader and completer of faith”. Mr Darby comments as to the Lord Jesus in this section. He says, ‘He who has Himself run the whole career of faith’, Synopsis-Colossians to Revelation p253. That is quite an arresting expression. That meant He had to endure. One reason He had to endure was because what was due to me was laid upon Him. The word is used there in Isaiah “the chastisement of our peace”, Isa 53: 5. The Lord Jesus had that laid upon Him; do you think to look at endurance we have to have our eyes firmly on Him, One who endured? He endured everything; He had in Himself no need to, but He did.
SJH I think that is good and as we set our eyes on Christ there is an assurance that we can rest in.
AEM That shows us the end. As we look on Him we then see the end. A Man who is living and glorified comes into view, not the only One who endured and suffered but One who is living and glorified, and I think if we endure chastening in the light of One who is glorified, that will help us to come through it, because then chastening does not become an end in itself.
PWB What does it mean to be exercised by it?
AEM Say what you have been thinking about.
PWB would like some help because it seems that it is an additional thought to enduring it. We have to accept God’s ways; they are sovereign and we can accept them. Perhaps to be exercised by them is a little further on again. Would you accept that when Paul spoke about “a thorn for the flesh” (2 Cor 12: 7), there was an element of chastisement there? Paul had quite a conversation with the Lord about it. He was exercised by it. It is good that we are exercised. We can just say that is our lot in life and we will just carry on with it, but if we are to get what the Lord means by the chastisement or what the Father means by it we have to be exercised. We have to go to Him about it.
AEM I think so. The example you raise is very interesting. God did at least two things with the thorn for the flesh that Paul had. One is that He reminded him that he was still in the flesh; the thorn for the flesh. The other thing that He did was prove his faith by it. Chastening is to do that. Chastening reminds us that naturally left to ourselves we will take the wrong routes and make the wrong choices. If we are to prove our faith in it we become exercised as to what it is God is doing.
PWB Paul is absolutely definite as to why he was given it; “that I might not be exalted”, v 7. He got the reason, not naturally. The thorn for the flesh remained with him but he knew why it was there, and it really helps us if we can get to that point because it stops us being disappointed, and annoyed, and even angry at God, when we realise why He has put it there in the divine wisdom that is involved in it.
AEM “Despise not the chastening of the Lord”. I think if we despise it, even if we pray for it to be removed, that is almost erring in going against God. Paul asked for it to be removed three times and it was not. What I would suggest to the brethren is that we pray that we get the gain of what God is doing in each one of us, not in my brother or my brethren, but in me.
RDP On the same subject, he says “we have had the fathers of our flesh as chasteners … shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits”. That seems to be a remarkable expression. It is a small ‘s’ so it must refer to our spirits; “the Father of spirits, and live?”, a lovely expression.
AEM That takes us immediately to the word in Job: “happy is the man whom God correcteth”. Here is the challenge to our spirits: while we are enduring chastening most of us become a little grumpy and a little downcast. The chastening may involve these matters of sorrow. I am not setting that aside, and I think the brethren know that at the present time. It may involve deep matters of sorrow that go right to the heart of your Christianity and your faith. It says here “happy is the man whom God correcteth”.
RDP Clearly there was an external manifestation of the chastening in Israel’s day but it seems now as if there is an inward working. I was thinking about what was said about exercise. There is a working and we can get very angry sometimes about situations. He says to Jonah, “Doest thou well to be angry?”, Jonah 4: 4. We need to give time to allow the Father of spirits to work in relation to these inward things, not so much outward utterances but inward turmoil.
AEM Our spirits become agitated very quickly. One thing about chastening is - and we see it with Peter, and we see it in others too - that sometimes God allows Satan to do the chastening. It is very exercising when that happens. The Lord said to Peter, “behold Satan has demanded to have you, to sift you as wheat; but I have besought for thee that thy faith fail not”, Luke 22: 31, 32. God had allowed him to do it. God is in control. You think of Job here. Job lost all his family, he lost his health, everything that he had and still he would not accuse God. His friends tried to persuade him one way or the other but still he would not accuse God, and then God brings him right through to see that He can be hindered in no thought of His. What exercise Job went through! Just right here at the beginning of the book the word comes that the man whom God correcteth is happy.
AMcK Does it help us to get to the Person who does the chastening? You have been emphasising that this is something that God does. We often speak of what God might allow but this is intensely positive for us because it brings us closer to the One who is doing these things, do you think? On Thursday we were speaking locally as to Jacob, in Genesis. He was directed to go to the land of Padan-Aram, Gen 28. That was in view that he might learn God. Is that the result here?
AEM I was thinking of that, and I was confirmed on Thursday as to it. As he started moving, it appears he just started walking and when he came to the place that he would name Bethel there was not a fixed place, but he just happened to be there when it got dark, and he lay down and God says, ’I am going to have to do with you. You will not learn the entire lesson the first time, I am going to bring you back here’, as is pointed out five chapters later. ’I will bring you back here and it will become an altar but I am going to have to do with you and I need to start moulding you in that sense.’ I think the chastening of the Almighty is to that end. That God might mould us for His pleasure and how He wants us.
AMcK Is that the thought of partaking of His holiness. We become characterised by that.
AEM Yes; and that is the standard.
DJW I was thinking of this question of exercise. Rebecca says, “why am I thus?”, Gen 25: 22. In answer God really sets out a whole course of chastening and discipline that will come into her family relations. It is interesting that you get such a protracted view.
AEM It may be part of what being “exercised by it” means. It is something that has to be worked at. When something comes in, you may sense that God is having to chasten and having to say something. If the exercise went away the first time I prayed about it, and that happened every time, I maybe would not learn anything.
DJW Speaking from experience, perhaps God is working on a far wider front than the initial thing that I see that I am passing through at the time. He may be doing something on a much broader front.
AEM Is that not often the way? We find that God has something to say to us. Maybe for example He has to say something in our health, maybe He just touches our health, but that may stop us doing something else. That in turn may have been part of a course of action that I was intent on. The initial thing that God chastens us for may not be just the thing that He is saying to us. I think what has been suggested about being exercised is to really get to God and say to Him, ’What am I being taught in this? What am I to learn in what I am passing through?’
PWB I would like to add something that I read from Mr Stoney. He referred to God’s ways with us in discipline. I am not to despise the chastening, like a duck in the rain, indifferent to it, braving as it were everything; neither am I to "faint when ... rebuked of him", like a hen in the rain, which is a miserable object. I am neither to be miserable nor indifferent, but thoughtful and exercised, JBS vol4 p284. We feel the effect; we are not just to shrug it off. God means us to learn something but it is to bring us to Him, to bring us to that closer and nearer relationship and understanding of Himself. That is where we get happy rather than being miserable.
AEM I think so. The word “despise not the chastening” seems to be key. If we despise it we will be miserable. If we are irritated by it and it gets us down we will be miserable because God is not going to leave us alone in that respect. He will achieve His end. If we are happy and we pass through it as one who accepts it from God and seeks to learn what He is doing, then I think we will be brought into accordance with His mind.
RDP-r Would the refiner in Malachi be something of this? It says, “he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver; and he will purify the children of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver; and they shall offer unto Jehovah an oblation in righteousness”, chap 3: 3. They go through the exercise, through the refining process and the result is “an oblation in righteousness”.
AEM That is a helpful word, ’refined’; we need to use that in regard to God’s work. It is very appropriate.
RDP-r We are in mixed conditions at the moment but there is a work of God in the heart of every one which is inviolate, and God is really bringing that to light by chastening.
AEM Yes; if you will excuse me I will use an example (although a poor one!). We use a training company at work. They come in to a company and they take the raw material that is there, the people that are there, and they polish them up so that they are more effective. If we think of God refining as you say, and adjusting and making us more appropriate for His presence, what a work He has begun in me or you. You will see why we should not despise it.
JBI Do you think it is part of the refining process that I should realise that I am weak and mortal? The word for man here is ‘Enosh’ which means weak and mortal. Is that part of the refining process that I have to come to an end of what I am naturally and come to see a view of the work of God in me?
AEM Was it not Job who came to it at the end. He says, “I abhor myself”, Job 42: 6. Everything that he was, he finally came to it that in the sight of God it was nothing and that brings him to repentance, and then God can give him everything.
HJG James speaks beautifully about Job, he says “Ye have heard of the endurance of Job, and seen the end of the Lord;” and then he says, “that the Lord is full of tender compassion and pitiful”, James 5: 11. God is watching each one all the time, whether we are enduring, whether we are accepting the chastisement. He is watching all the time to bring us to His end.
AEM He watched Job every step of the way. He watched everything; I just come back to it because I am affected by it, and these things are real. He lost his health, he lost his property, and he lost his children. God watched him and God was with him and He brought him to an end of himself. God brought him into line with what He had in mind for him. He may not, and we trust that He will not have to, pass us all that way. He maybe has to pass us some way through chastening to bring us to His end.
BCB I would like to link on with what you were saying about refining. There is a lovely verse in Isaiah. “I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction”, then it goes on “I will not give my glory to another”, chap 48: 10, 11. God is refining something and it might be in the furnace of affliction; it might seem extremely hot and pressured but it is God’s choosing.
AEM I think that is what we have to come to. The beginning of accepting this is recognising it is from God’s hand. Who can say against God? Who is to go up against God and say it would be better done another way. We cannot do that. It is not to say we like it, but we learn Him.
ADP There is a poem called ‘The Refiner’s Fire’. There is a verse in that which says,
And His gold did not suffer a bit more heat,
Than was needed to make it pure.
AEM Yes; again that hymn -
Our Father’s hand will never cause
His child a needless tear.
There is nothing excessive in achieving what God would achieve. We could speak of Apollos in that way. What interests me in this man is the way that he is brought to a new view of Christ; a new view of the Lord Jesus, simply through a small amount of adjustment. It is interesting, and I find it in my own soul. We do tend to go immediately to the extreme. We go to what God does in extreme circumstances. God may have to just slightly correct us and sometimes we might miss that if we are not fully aware of what God is saying. Here Apollos “an eloquent man, who was mighty in the scriptures, arrived at Ephesus. He was instructed in the way of the Lord”. You say, ’That is fine, God has achieved His end with Apollos. He knows the Scriptures, he is taught in the ways of the Lord, and he can preach really well, people like listening to him’. God says, ’No, I have to make a slight adjustment’. I wonder whether we can ever say that God has finished adjusting us until the Lord takes us.
GJR It may not stop even then, because we will all be placed before the judgment seat. Even then we may need a slight adjustment.
AEM That is helpful. That would preserve us from ever thinking we have arrived at God’s full thought.
GJR I think my perception of everything here is filtered through the fact that I will always be a human creature, because I am in flesh and blood. Even Paul says, “we see now through a dim window obscurely”, 1 Cor 13: 12.
AEM That is maybe one of the weights of Hebrews.
GJR We will see everything clearly.
AEM That is a joy to our hearts to know that we will be brought to that. On the way there I do need continual adjustment. Here we find Aquila and Priscilla who are ready to bring that in, in a beautiful way.
JRB The word “unfolding” is very attractive. It is not being stopped in your tracks and told you have got to follow this line, it is unfolding.
AEM Yes it is; I take two things from that. Firstly is the one that you mention, that they “unfolded to him”. This was not hammering it into him that he might do things differently. The subject matter demanded that unfolding. It needed to be done sympathetically because he was about to preach that Jesus was the Christ. That must be done feelingly and in love.
The second thing was that we should remember what kind of a man he was. This is very similar to Ananias unfolding things to Saul as he did in the manner of a brother. Aquila and Priscilla do it in the house and they do it gently but effectively.
JRB It is interesting; in Luke’s words, “being fervent in his spirit, he spoke and taught exactly”; that fervency is protected so that the person of the Christ can be glorified.
AEM I think it is important that this happens. Aquila and Priscilla did not try and show him it was wrong and he should do things in a different way. In verse 28, he still spoke with great force; that may link with the eloquence. They did not take away what God had given him to use and the ability to do it, but they adjusted his gaze. Before he knew only the baptism of John; now he knows that there is an anointed Man.
JAT Psalm 119 was written by someone who really was totally taken up with God and the enthusiasm that we are speaking of. It says, “Before I was afflicted I went astray, but now I keep thy word”, v 67. That was the result of what we are speaking about.
AEM Yes; this husband and wife were very well equipped to do that. I think we know, for example, that they were converted Jews. This was a converted Jew also. They had been at various times in Corinth, in Ephesus, they then were in Rome; they knew Paul’s teaching and they had the qualification and experience to unfold a further view of Christ. That is what we need to be able to do. God may just have to correct us in our view of Christ and to use our brethren to do it is a very beautiful way to.
JAT Would you say that the marriage bond is a wonderful bond, and the household too, because they are referred to variously, as husband and wife: so it was a wonderful marriage. The household would be a wonderful place to be able to speak and help.
AEM I have no doubt that the environment in which this was done was conducive to the effect that it had. He could still go out in what was a very dangerous environment: “he with great force convinced the Jews publicly”. He did not then go into a house quietly. He went out publicly, using what God had given him by way of ability, using it under greater direction. He has been corrected by those who were able to do it feelingly.
RDP He was instructed in the way of the Lord and they unfolded to him the way of God. John the baptist came on the scene saying, “Make straight the path of the Lord”, John 1: 23. There was a certain distinction in the early Acts. I think you mentioned it is almost like an expansion of the truth. I wondered if it is important to see that if we are to be in the path of faith it involves that our view is expanded as to Christ. Not only Christ for me but to see the glory of Christ for God, and it is important that this man was not in any way defective. Perhaps the fulness of God’s thoughts needed to be unfolded to him. It is amazing how quickly he embraces this. If you go to Colossians it speaks about the mystery of God, the fulness of the truth.
AEM There was that in this brother and sister which recognised that there was something further to be developed in Apollos. They recognised that his view needed widening and it needed refining, to use the word we had earlier. They are able to do it. I think that is a beautiful feature because not all of us get to the same place at the same time. We are not all at the same point in our learning and our understanding of the truth. Sometimes we get irritated with one another because someone does not see something exactly as we see it or as clearly as we think we see it. This husband and wife did not get irritated by it; they took Apollos into their home and they unfolded the truth to him, and the result was that a view of the anointed Man came into the heart of Apollos.
PWB They took him to them. That is beautiful; it links with really acting as God acted. As we had in the first scripture He had done it in the environment of affection. They did it in the environment of affection. Metaphorically they washed his feet before they spoke a word of adjustment. They assured him that it was being done in affection before any adjustment was carried out.
AEM I think what you refer to is something that we do well to keep in our hearts. There is the truth, and there is the right view of it, and that will always be the end. They knew that there was a part of the truth that this man did not have the sight for in his heart and they wanted to show him. The way they showed him was in affection. The two cannot be separated. They have to be held close together and the way that it is done brings him to that view. I think it would have been wonderful to hear him preach once he had this view. All of the things that he had, including God-given gift to announce the word, would take on a whole new colour because of the service of this brother and sister.
MTBM There is sensitivity needed as to how we bring correction in, that we do not break someone’s confidence or affect them. A young person gives out a hymn in the morning meeting; it may not be quite the right hymn in the right place. How this is handled is important because you want to encourage participation. It may be just a suggestion made.
AEM I think so; one thing I take from this scripture with regard to that is that they did it in the home. That is often very helpful, because, as you say, confidence is very important in this. The fact remains, just to use the example you give, that you do not want someone giving out a wrong hymn every week. You do not want it to continue. It may be something just needs to be said but it is done in the home and it is done in a beautiful way here with an eye to the result. It is not with a view to just saying that it is wrong, it is not in line with my thought. It is done with an eye to the result that Christ is glorified in the heart of Apollos and he can then use that in service.
We should touch briefly on Numbers. I just wondered if these little touches and corrections of chastening that we have been referring to can be applied to the “trumpets of silver; of beaten work”. I am not thinking of beaten in terms of hammering out in a vigorous way, but as I understand it, when they are making instruments, and particularly when they are making brass instruments, the care needed to ensure that it makes the perfect pitch and the perfect note is extreme. Idols that were made of silver in these days were made of molten work. There was not much care needed, that is just poured in, but these silver trumpets were of beaten work: care had been taken to ensure that the note and the sound was going to be correct. I wonder whether the view of this was that the priestly service in blowing them would be clear to all the Israelites as they moved. It was not a levitical service, this is priestly, in the sense the movements were for God. The sound was clear whatever the circumstance. We are to be ready for that and the adjustment that leads up to this.
DBB Would Apollos be one that was beaten so that his note was absolutely clear afterwards?
AEM I think so. As we have already said there was - up to a point - nothing wrong with it before, but it was purer as a result of the service of Aquila and Priscilla. It needed a tap just in a certain part to make the note sound clear. If you look through this chapter, each sounding of the trumpet heralded something different. They called them together and then they assembled and then they moved. It was clear what they had to do.
DBB The priest would put things for God first. Then as coming out from God’s presence and through the experience of what he has been through he is able to do these other things.
AEM That is helpful. I can try all I like to try and rally the saints together but if the note is uncertain then it is not going to have this effect. If the note is true, if I have allowed the chastening of God to work upon me, then what I am by way of influence, which is what these trumpets really were, will be according to God.
RDP There were various occasions when they were gathering and assembling, and during the journeying of the camp. There was the alarm, and then they were blown when it was not an alarm and then “in your new moons, ye shall blow with the trumpets over your burnt offerings and over your sacrifices of peace offering; and they shall be to you for a memorial before your God; I am Jehovah your God”; but it seems that it was a clear call. Paul says, “if the trumpet give an uncertain sound”, 1 Cor 14: 8. It just seems to be in relation to all the movements of the saints and in relation to all their offerings of peace offerings, sacrifices of peace offerings, the alarm, the gathering and the journey. All of it was marked by this feature that there was clarity in the blowing of the trumpet.
AEM All the beating, all the work that was on these trumpets, all the chastening that God may have in mind for me is to an end. It is to an end that there is a certain note; it is to be clear and the same trumpet can be used whatever the circumstance. Whether it is time to move, whether the camp is to move or assemble, whether there is conflict as in verse 9 or a day of gladness as in verse 10, God may not have just one end in mind: He may have many.
AMcK I was thinking of what was referred to at the beginning of the reading as to what was chaste. That would have in mind purity. Does that link with the clarity of the trumpets sound?
AEM I think it does. That must ever be in God’s heart. He does not have another standard. If you excuse the expression, He never just says, ’Well that trumpet is just about right, that will be all right’. It was a trumpet of silver of beaten work. God’s grace and His faithfulness over the way that He has brought us will bring us to what is pure and what is chaste.
MJW It is going to make us more useful, because if I can make a sound in every circumstance I shall be a help to my brethren rather than perhaps being a specialist. All these different circumstances involve that the person had to be adjusted in various ways so that they could be useful under God’s hand in all sorts of circumstances.
AEM That chimes exactly with what I am thinking here. They would not have reached for a different trumpet in a day of conflict to when they were glad. On a day of gladness and in the set feasts, they did not then go and find another one, you might say one that was jollier. They used the one that had been worked on and the one that was tried and tested and could keep everyone together.
ADP There is no trumpet call for retreat. This was for how they were to move, how they were to assemble, how they were to gather, but there was nothing for retreat.
AEM That is good; the very last clause of the verse where we read, “I am Jehovah your God”; the testimony is not going to go backwards. Chastening and discipline is not to hold the testimony back or move it backwards. It is that it might go forward in the clarity of what God would have for us.
DJW What is collective is in view. I was thinking of your reference to 1 Thessalonians 4. We get the trumpet there but we also get the idea of an assembling shout.
AEM It says, “with an assembling shout, with archangel’s voice and with trump of God”, 1 Thess 4: 16.
DJW Do you think in that way Paul has in view what will be the final movement?
AEM Yes, and in that sense that is an instance where there will be no doubt as to the sound of the call. That is to be represented here now. It is to do with the Lord’s own movements and His own desires.
DJW I wondered whether Paul had that in view. If we have an assembling shout then we need to know how to assemble now. If we hear a trumpet we need to learn to listen for the trumpet now.
AEM I think so. We cannot say where He is working or why He is chastening me let alone anyone else. We are to be exercised by it and learn by it simply that the voice of divine Persons might be clear. We might say that the sound of the divine speaking is clear in heaven: so why maybe is it not clear when it is in my heart?
BCB During the recovery in Nehemiah’s time it says, “And he that sounded the trumpet was by me”, Neh 4: 18. The one who was in control of the building and gathering them together could say, “he that sounded the trumpet was by me”.
AEM It is interesting here that the priests would have been in that place. They would have been at the entrance of the tent of meeting. That is where they gathered. If we are to make any sound at all we have to ensure that we are of this calibre, you might say. There was a scripture this morning on the calendar, “leave not thy place; for quietness pacifieth great offences”, Eccl 10: 4. Leave not thy place. Where is our place? If our place is by Christ, if we are there as you suggested, then quietness there will pacify great offences. The clarity of the chastening, the reason for it, the next movement forward will become clear.
JAT “The trumpeters and singers were as one”, 2 Chron 5: 13. What a moment for God.
AEM That is a good note to finish on. That is in God’s heart. The voices, the singing, will we not come up to that tomorrow morning? The voices, the heart, the singers will be as one in the presence of God.
Birmingham
9th November 2013