RESTFULNESS AND LISTENING TO CHRIST

Luke 8:35; Luke 10:38 - 42; John 12:3 - 8

My desire is to seek to show how saints come into the good of the headship of Christ, and that in coming into the gain of it, Christ becomes known to us, not only as guiding us individually, but in regard of all that is in the mind of God. It has to be borne in mind that whilst His headship is special to us it also extends, in the principle of it, to all the creation. In this way we come to value the Lord not only according to what He is to us, but according to what He is to God. The Godhead has undertaken through Him to "reconcile all things to itself", and the more we know Him, the more we desire to see this accomplished; to see all things put under Him. The Lord Jesus Himself created different offices, thrones, principalities, powers, and He created them all in view of the reconciliation of all things. Others were placed provisionally in these offices only to show how incapable they were, and to make obvious the necessity for Christ to appear, so that He should take up each office and fill it efficiently. Now a right understanding of Christ as Head and of that which flows from it enables us in the way of education to take in that expanded scope, and hence we come to value Him the more.

I selected this passage from Luke 8, because it shows how souls begin, it shows how, normally, the soul begins with Christ. It is a great thing, beloved friends, I need not remind you, to have a good beginning; and what marks a good beginning, in one who has been relieved by Christ is, that there is a certain restfulness of soul. This man had been anything but restful hitherto; he had, as we all know, roamed at large. The world as it stands is a sort of theatre in which men, according to their measure of power, roam at large without restraint or rest. What has marked the world from the outset as having broken away from divine rule, from divine authority, is a certain violent spirit.

Now as to the world, it is just as well that things should be uncovered for us; but as to the saints, one would not uncover them, because God has covered them, and it is one of the most grievous offences known in Scripture to uncover one's brethren, to uncover the nakedness of their flesh. I dwell on it just for a moment. God has been pleased to take us up and cover us. First of all there is the covering of nakedness, then you have the idea of covering for adornment. He has covered us in order to hide up the nakedness, and woe be to the man who uncovers what God has covered! It is a terrible thing to dwell on what our brethren are or may be after the flesh, and that is what we are prone to, to dwell on what a brother may be after the flesh; that is to uncover his nakedness, and there is no more grievous offence known in Scripture than that. One would not be engaged in that; it is the work of the enemy. One has seen a history of the Lord's people written for the eyes of the world. Uncovering all their failures, all their nakedness! Think of that!

Alas! there is enough to say on that line, but it is Satan's work.

Now this poor man in Luke 8 was naked, and he represents, as we may say, the world in its moral nakedness which it cannot hide. The present terrible conditions in the world are simply an exposure of the world's nakedness. A certain veneer called civilisation has existed, but all that is torn to shreds and the world appears in its nakedness, and no one in sympathy with God would care to cover it; one would do all in one's power to expose it; the very salvation of the Lord's people from the world depends on the exposure of the world's nakedness; it ought to be seen just as it is. God is going to allow developments to proceed until it comes out in all its hideous nakedness; that is what the world is coming to, but the man who has the Holy Spirit sees it already. The apostle Paul saw it; John saw it; they saw the working of certain principles that would issue in a complete exposure of the world's nakedness. And so now we are able, as having the Spirit of God, to look at it as it is in its naked principles. As I was saying, the present conditions are but the exposure of it.

Well, this poor man in Luke 8 was naked, restless, violent, untameable. Now the Lord Jesus (how one dwells with pleasure on Christ as He is presented in Luke!) comes in as Man, in the midst of all that, and is entirely subject to God. All His inner springs were governed by the will of God, and that was the divine idea for Man: all is to be brought to that, beloved friends. God has brought out His thought in Christ and all have to come to that. "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good pleasure in men"; not "man" but "men"! The Lord Jesus is going to bring all that about. Well, the man is found; the people "went out to see what had happened", and they found the man. One would advise people to turn about to see what has happened; not what is happening over the water, but what has happened by the incarnation, beloved friends, by the death and resurrection of Christ and the gift of the Spirit. Those are the things that should occupy and engage our hearts; that is the kind of happening. How one delights in the thought of a company of people restful with Jesus! "They went out to see what had happened", and in coming out they found the Lord Jesus and the man there together! I want you to be just like that man. What about him? He was sitting.

There are very few Christians who are sitting; one is not accusing any one, but very few of us know how to sit; a restless spirit is what marks many of us. Martha was of a restless spirit. It is true that she loved Christ, and He loved her as much as He loved Mary; she owned the house and she opened it to Christ. The Lord did not overlook that. If you open your house to Christ He will not overlook it; however little you may do for Christ, whatever service you may take up for Him, He will take notice of. I was saying recently that Jacob's vow implied that he would think of God once out of ten times; but God would give him credit for that once. And so Martha's act was appreciated by Christ; she opened her house and it was His retreat; it was a sweet spot to Him; He found communion and rest there; He made use of that house. Anything you devote to Christ He will accept; He will make use of it. The Lord has wonderful means of using things; there is nothing wasteful about His ways; He will accept anything you give Him and find use for it, but depend upon it, He wants you. He wanted Martha.

Now this man was found sitting, and that, dear brethren, is what I would desire that we should cultivate; he was found sitting at the feet of Jesus. Firstly, he is restful; secondly, he is clothed, no longer naked; there are no unclothed people where the Lord is. The apostle dreaded lest any should be "found naked". It would be a terrible thing, in spite of all the pretension there may be of love to Christ and love to the saints, to find that, after all, it is only pretension. This man was covered over in the presence of Christ. He could not have been restful had he not been covered, and then, beloved friends, he had a right mind. Now a right mind is a very rare thing. A right mind is by the Spirit. You are not prepared for the headship of Christ without a right mind. "God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind".

A person who has a sound mind takes account of things just as they are. Men do not seem to be "as trees walking" in the eyes of a person who has a sound mind; you do not over estimate your brethren, neither do you under estimate them; you have a true estimate both of yourself and others.

In Mary is seen a person who has a sound mind, and she is using it: she is sitting at the feet of Jesus, hearing His word. That is what I want you to recognise. You can use your mind in no better way than in listening to Christ. We are living in a day of many books; it is the printing age; but books have been used to shut out Christ from the mind. The mind must certainly be fed, but God has given us a right mind, and that mind must be ministered to. But how ministered to? I think you see it in Mary. Supposing you had come to Mary with a novel as she sat at the feet of Jesus, what would she have thought of you? She would have said to you, No product of man's mind can minister to mine, you cannot feed my mind with that; you may feed the swine with that. The prodigal in the far country "would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat", but he was not satisfied. Mary was not going to feed upon that; she had a divinely given mind, it was a right one, and she would feed it on Christ. It is not simply that He was saying something to her. She was listening to what He was saying; if He spoke to Martha, she heard it; or if He spoke to Lazarus, she heard it. You want to hear every word of Christ, not only what He has to say to you. It is a question of the mind; the divinely given mind has to be ministered to, and the Lord Jesus has spoken, and is speaking, and the thing for us is to listen to what He is saying.

There are many voices in the world; there is the pulpit, and the platform, and the press; but if you have a right mind, you will listen alone to Christ. 

What does Mary learn from Christ? Do you think the Lord would limit anything -- do you think He would hold anything back from one who listened to Him? No; it was the delight of His heart to speak in her hearing all that was in His mind. Oh, beloved, think of the mind of Christ! Think of the infinite richness of that mind, coming out from the Father, freighted with all the Father's affections on the one hand, and with all the Father's thoughts on the other hand! She was listening to what He was saying; that is the right reading of the passage. He came out from God to make known what was in the mind of God; He was speaking about that; He was opening up that, and Mary is singled out by the Spirit as the example of a right minded person, and the proof of it is that she is listening to Christ.

We have in the epistle of Peter the thought of "the sincere milk", or "pure mental milk", as it may be read; it is that which the mind requires. Your mind, young though you may be, requires to be ministered to, and the Scriptures, the "pure mental milk of the word", are there, that you may grow, that you should not be dwarfed. You will not grow on husks. The thing, beloved friends, is to grow up unto salvation. That is to say, in the believer's mind there is growth, there is growth into manhood. The Spirit is superior to influences around, that is what it means. If you have grown up unto salvation, you find yourself arrived at a point where you are not influenced by any element of the world, and in that way you are prepared for headship. There has to be the development of the sensibilities of the person, so that there may be growth; there is maturity, and now you want only to listen to Christ; to listen to nothing else. Other things may have to be attended to, from a business point of view; but as regards your preferences, as regards the inmost desire of your soul, you only want to listen to Christ.  That is simple Christianity, beloved friends, to listen to Christ.

Well, now I pass on to John 12, because I want to show you how Mary progressed. The Lord watches over each one of us as a tender plant; He delights in our growth. In John 12 Mary had come to the full recognition of Christ, not only according to what He was to her, but according to what He was in relation to what was in the mind of God. I want to make that clear. She anointed His feet, mark you! not here His head. We have the anointing of His head elsewhere, and that has reference to His personal dignity. Mary was equal to that. But what we find here is the anointing of His feet. I do not know how you take account of the feet of the Lord Jesus. In Luke 7 we have His feet anointed; they were anointed in the house of Simon the Pharisee. His head was anointed in the house of Simon the leper. In the house of Simon the Pharisee His feet were anointed by a woman who was said to have been a "sinner". What I understand by the anointing in Luke 7 is that the woman appreciated the fact that those feet had carried the grace of God to her. The grace of God had been carried by those beautiful feet. "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings". They had brought good tidings to her; in that blessed Person she saw the embodiment of God's grace for man; her heart was melted in the presence of that, and "she loved much". I do not know of anything so touching as the Lord's comment on her. He says, "she loved much". He does not tell us why she did it as He does of Mary here in John 12, He just says, she loved much.

In John 12 Mary acted with intelligence as well as with love. The woman in Luke 7 acted out of affection; it was the Person whose feet she anointed that had attracted her. But then there is a greater thing, not only to love that Person, but to know that His feet have carried Him all the way to the cross for the accomplishment of the divine counsels. That is learned by headship; that is learned from Himself; only from the Lord could Mary have learned that, and she did learn it. She had come to know Christ from His words, from what He had said to her as the One whose feet would carry Him to the cross, and He says, "against the day of my burying hath she kept this". The Lord in Luke 7 vindicates the affections of the woman; in John 12 He vindicates the intelligence of the woman; the two things go together. First you love Christ, then you listen to His word, you become intelligent; your action now is not only the act of love, it is the act of intelligence.

That is what He looks for in the assembly.

In 1 Corinthians 12 you have the Spirit as the motive power, as it were, of things; in chapter 13 you have the love; and in chapter 14 you have the intelligence. It is in chapter 14 that it is said, "God is in you of a truth"; in the midst of a people who are intelligent, who are intelligent in God's word, by coming to listen to Christ; that is how we become intelligent. Everything that you do in the assembly now is not only the fruit of love, it is governed by intelligence. As I have often said in regard to actions in the assembly, the point is to be governed by the light that governs the position. Whatever determines the position, determines the light that governs it. There is light to govern every position.

Take the gospel of Matthew. One feature of it is that there is a new kind of legislation. The Lord says, "I say unto you". Well now, the point for us to inquire is, What has He said about this position; what is His mind about that difficulty? Whatever is His mind about it, that is the light that governs it, and your action is to be governed by that mind, and that is acquired by headship.

Well, I do not proceed further. I hope I have made my point clear. The Lord would have us, in this day of commotion and excitement, to sit down, and in sitting down to open our ears and listen to Him. There is speaking going on; depend upon it the Lord is speaking; let us listen to that. We may be very feeble now on account of the conditions that exist, but nevertheless the Lord is speaking. Sit in quietness in His presence and listen to what He says, for in listening to what He says, you acquire knowledge about everything. 

What I would say further, beloved friends, is that it is of much greater importance to get knowledge as to the limits of Canaan, the sphere of divine purpose, than to get knowledge as to the limits of any earthly territory. I do not despise prophecy, no one who loves Jesus will despise it, for "the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy". But how will you get light about it? By listening to what He is saying. What do you think the Lord Jesus would talk to us about now? What territory? Do you not think the Lord would occupy us with our own territory? We are Levites, and Levites have no earthly territory at all. We belong to "the assembly of the firstborn ones registered in heaven". You do not want to be engaged with what belongs to another man until you find out about your own territory.

The Lord would take us up as He did Moses to the top of mount Nebo, and He would show us all the land of Canaan; what a vista that is! He has made it all good for us; we owe it all to Him; He has given each one of us a place in it, and from that point of vantage, that altitude, as we may say, we can look down upon the earth. Genesis 10 is the great beginning of the prophetic line; all the families there you will see plainly marked out on the earth, and in the power of the Spirit from that high altitude we may be enabled to trace them all. In that we are not out of sympathy with God, because the earth is God's footstool; heaven is His throne, the earth is His footstool; it belongs to God; we hold it in faith for Him, but our place is on high, and if the Lord speaks to us about territory He speaks to us about heaven.

May we then be like Mary, restful. I would remind you of a beautiful touch in John 11. Of Mary it is said, she "sat still in the house"; she had the habit of being quiet. Whilst Martha rushed out to meet the Lord, Mary remained till He called for her "The Master is come, and calleth for thee". May the Lord give us that restfulness of spirit, so that we may listen to what He is saying.