I would just like to say a few words from my heart regarding this conference.
Every year when I come to this conference, I feel just like Ruth discovering the field of Boaz, gleaning among the riches of the Lord Jesus and finding such riches here.
The amazing thing is that Boaz told Ruth, “Do not go to another field, but remain here and glean.” Not only that, he told his workers, “Do not bother her. Let her gather as much as she can. But occasionally, throw some ears of corn on the ground and make it easier for her to gather.”
Now, brothers and sisters, I have been attending this conference for many years. I have to confess that I am a very lazy gleaner—not diligent—but thankful for His servants. From time to time, they throw down some of those ears of corn, making it easy for me simply to pick them up.
So what I have to share is not really of myself. It is what I have received from the Lord Himself and from many brothers and sisters right here in this room. I owe a great deal to them, and I thank God for those servants faithfully ministering God’s Word to us, from time to time and year after year, through this conference in Richmond.
I recall a series of messages from Brother Stephen Kaung some years ago called The Octave of Redemption. The first message began with Christ’s first coming, and the last message ended with His second coming, including all the events in between.
Now, to me, anything that touches the Lord Jesus touches fullness. We cannot measure God’s fullness in terms of quality or quantity. It is a Person. God’s fullness dwells in Christ bodily. It is in Him. Apart from Him, as all of Him, there is nothing.
Brother T. Austin-Sparks said that discovering the riches of Christ is like playing a universal scale. You begin with do, the first note, and you go up the scale. When you come to a certain note, you call that the end of the scale; but it is not really the end. The scale is not complete until you reach the octave note.
When you touch that final note, you may think you have a complete scale. But you are wrong, because the end is only the beginning of another set of scales. You go on and on forever. There is no end.
What we can hear is very limited. The scale of God is infinite. There is more than we can take in. All we can receive is only a small fragment, a fraction, of that vast musical scale God has voiced in creation and in the Lord Jesus.
The wonderful thing about discovering the fullness of Christ is that, when we think we have arrived at something, when we think we know something, the Holy Spirit says to us, “That is only the beginning.” Then we start all over again.
That is the beauty of the Christian adventure: there is no end. God has no end, and we have this exciting life to live—a life continually discovering the riches of Christ together as His people.
This afternoon, the Lord has laid a few things on my heart, and I hope they will be profitable to all of us. Let us turn to Psalm 25.
I am reading from the NIV, Psalm 25:14:
The Lord confides in those who fear Him;
He makes His covenant known to them.
If you have the Darby translation, it reads:
The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him;
And He will make known unto them His covenant.
I looked into Strong’s Concordance and discovered that the original Hebrew has many shades of meaning. It can be translated as council, as in Psalm 111:1. It can be translated as counsel, and it can also be translated as sweet counsel or confidence.
It may also describe something covered—a secret that can be uncovered only by the one who possesses it. When you find a trustworthy person, you uncover a little of the secret, and then cover it again. In other words, you take into your confidence those whom you consider trustworthy and faithful, and you allow them to have a glimpse of the secret in your heart.
The fullness of God lies in His heart. There is a saying: where His secret is, there His heart is; what His thought is, that is what He Himself is.
So God is a God who has something in Him that He wants to convey, to share, and to make known to us. This afternoon, we will consider some aspects of this precious thing that God wants to convey and share with us.
If I may digress just a little, God has no obligation, really. He is not obligated to share anything with us. He does so because it is His delight—His good pleasure.
I will quote a few things from a book I read recently by A. W. Pink, entitled The Attributes of God. Chapter one is called “The Solitariness of God,” and I think it is very significant.
When there was nothing, no one was there but only God. God alone was there. He was self-contained, self-sufficient, self-satisfied, and in need of nothing.
Had a universe, angels, and human beings been necessary to Him in any way, they would have been called into existence before all eternity. Their creation, when they did come into existence, added nothing to God essentially.
God is unchangeable. Therefore, His essential glory can neither be augmented nor diminished. In creating us, we add nothing to Him, because He is already quite complete in Himself.
He was under no constraint, no obligation, and no necessity to create. That He chose to do so was purely a sovereign act on His part, caused by nothing outside Himself and determined by nothing but His own good pleasure.
[He] worketh all things after the counsel of His will.
—Ephesians 1:11
Brothers and sisters, that is His delight. He owes us nothing. Yet He delights to create human beings, and somehow He has deposited in us this capacity to fellowship with Him.
That is His very nature. He has placed this in us so that we have the potential to grow in Him, and so that our capacity for fellowship may increase.
Even on a human level, this instinct is in us. Paul said that no one lives unto himself. We need someone with whom to share.
Loneliness is one of the deadliest diseases. The way people torture someone is not merely by beating him up. That is not necessarily the most agonising thing. But when they isolate someone in solitary confinement, that can become unbearable.
Why? Because even on the human level, we need someone with whom to share. We all have dreams, hopes, and aspirations, and we like to share these things with someone.
We have joys and happy times that we want to share with people. Yet human life is not all roses. We encounter many disappointments in life.
Life is a series of disappointments, conflicts, problems, sorrow, and the threat of death. We need to confide our problems in people and seek their sympathy. We seek someone who can bear and share our burdens.
Therefore, we pour out our hearts to some of our friends. But there are different levels of sharing. Some sharing is very general and superficial; some sharing is deep.
There are things you can share with most people. But there are things in your life that you can share only with a select group—not with everyone.
When something is very deep down here, you are looking for someone who understands down here, not someone who understands only up here. There are very few people with whom we can share heart to heart.
Today, God is looking for people who will share with Him—not merely superficial things, but the deep things, the concerns that are in His heart.
If we go back to history, when Adam sinned, the fellowship between Adam and God was completely cut off. Adam hid himself among the trees.
But God moved first. God came and asked the question, “Adam, where are you?”
Of course, Adam suffered loss. But compared with God’s loss, Adam’s loss was very small. God’s loss was the real loss. God wanted to restore that fellowship.
Brothers and sisters, God lost something through man’s fall. The Lord Jesus came so that He might recover that loss. That is why we are called back into fellowship now, in the Son, the Lord Jesus.
When you fellowship something that is deep in your heart, you are very selective. If someone can confide the secrets of his heart to you, you are an important person.
If someone in authority and power calls you and says, “I have something I want to share with you,” then you are not an ordinary person anymore. You are marked out for a secret.
Now imagine the Creator, God Himself. In His heart, He has something that He desires to share. I believe He is always looking for those among us who are in the right condition, those with whom He can share what is in His heart.
The problem with many of us is that our condition is not right. Therefore, we cannot receive from Him, and we hinder Him from revealing what is in His heart to us.
However, God is looking for that condition in us. Therefore, the operation of the Holy Spirit is for that purpose: to bring us to the right condition, where God can unveil the secrets of His heart to us.
That is the work of the cross: to remove all the obstacles that stand in the way of God so that He may reveal what He wants to reveal in our hearts.
Where the secret of God is, there is His heart, and there is God Himself.
In the Old Testament, we have a few examples of people to whom God allowed a glimpse of His secrets. But remember, whatever they saw in the Old Testament came in fragments.
Hebrews 1 tells us that everything we find in the Old Testament came in fragments. But when we come to the Son, it is complete, because everything is now in the Son. It is no longer in fragments. In the Son, we come to the full revelation of all that is in God’s heart.
Those in the Old Testament who walked with the Lord knew something of the secrets of God. Walking with God is the best way to know Him.
Just like friends: when they walk together, they naturally share intimate things. The longer they walk together through thick and thin, the more intimate they become, and the more they can share heart to heart.
The first example is Abel. When Adam fell, the way back to God was cut off. There was no way for mankind to approach God any longer because of sin.
But by God’s grace, Abel was allowed to discover the way back to God. The way back to God is a secret. Half the people of the world do not know it. It is a mystery to them.
After we accept the Lord Jesus, we know the way. We have discovered the way. But apart from that, it remains a mystery.
Abel was given the opportunity by God to discover that the way back to Him is through a sacrifice—through life laid down and blood shed.
Then we come to Noah. Noah was given a secret—what I think it is safe to call a top secret.
God revealed to Noah the judgment that was to come. At the same time, He revealed to Noah the way of escape.
God gave Noah the blueprint for how to build the ark, and it took one hundred and twenty years. While Noah was doing this, the people were mystified.
It was as though he was doing something unknown to them. Remember, in those days there was no such thing as rain, no flood. What Noah was doing mystified that generation.
They could not understand what he was doing. But Noah, deep within, had a secret from God. Brothers and sisters, to those who do not know the Lord, we are mystifying people. They can never understand what we are about.
For one hundred and twenty years Noah faithfully built and preached.
Another Old Testament person is Enoch. I love that story, even though it is very brief—only a few verses. But it is so beautiful.
He walked with God. That is all it says.
We are told that Enoch was taken, for he was not, because God took him. I have often wondered what that means.
His walk was so intimate. The fellowship was so sweet. The communion was so wonderful.
At least this is my thought, and if I am wrong, I welcome correction: God Himself found it impossible to part with him. His fellowship was so precious to God that God would not part with Enoch—God took him.
That is the kind of walk God is looking for among His people—not an occasional walk with the Lord, but a walk through hundreds of years, together day and night, constantly.
The Lord was so moved and touched. He valued that friendship with Enoch so much that He took him.
Brothers and sisters, sometimes it is easy for us to part with the Lord, but it is not easy for Him to part with us. When He commits Himself to us, He commits Himself utterly. He is faithful.
The next example is Abraham. This phrase is simply unbelievable to me:
Shall I hide from Abraham that which I do?
—Genesis 18:17
God was going to do something. He could have done it without telling Abraham. He is God. He does not need anyone to assist Him, approve Him, or advise Him. Yet God said, “Shall I hide from Abraham that which I do?”
Can you see the friendship there? How intimate, how real. Abraham is called the friend of God three times in the Bible.
Jehoshaphat, when he was in desperate need, prayed:
Didst not Thou, O our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before Thy people Israel,
And give it to the seed of Abraham Thy friend for ever?
—2 Chronicles 20:7
Then in Isaiah, God calls him, “Abraham My friend.” James also says that Abraham was called the friend of God.
In John 15, the Lord Jesus says:
No longer do I call you servants;
For the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth:
But I have called you friends;
For all things that I heard from My Father
I have made known unto you.
—John 15:15
That is friendship. God is looking for a friend who will walk with Him intimately, one who can share heart to heart.
God is not obligated to do anything, but He is delighted—somehow pleased—to do it. Brothers and sisters, this is beyond us. It is grace, and grace, and grace.
Let us dwell for a few moments on what this word secret means. The first translation is council. If you look into Young’s Literal Translation, it speaks of a secret meeting.
If there is a secret meeting, then there must also be an open meeting. There is a meeting for everybody, and there is a meeting for a select few.
This Hebrew word for council refers to a company of people sitting together. That is all.
There is no controversy, but one accord. There is one purpose, real agreement, and one will with another.
The secret meeting of the Lord is for those who fear Him. No words are spoken. Words are not necessary.
There is silence because there is mutual trust and mutual understanding. Silence is a real test of friendship.
Words are not needed because there is an inward understanding. Robert Schumann wrote a series of compositions called Music Without Words. It expresses understanding and friendship without words.
A good example is a husband and wife—of course, if husband and wife are also good friends. They can be together in the house and not say one word to one another, simply because she is there and he is there. They feel very good about each other.
No words need to be spoken, yet there is such sweetness in that family atmosphere.
That is God’s kind of fellowship and God’s kind of counsel. It is a long relationship. It is understanding, not merely mental understanding, but something deep within. There is a oneness.
There is a difference between friends and acquaintances. G. Campbell Morgan said that we may have many acquaintances, but very, very few friends.
If an acquaintance comes to visit, you have to entertain him. You need to occupy the time, talk with him, show him things, and take him out. But with a friend, you do not need to do all that, because your home is his home.
That is true with God. Are we God’s friends, or are we merely His acquaintances?
If we are merely His acquaintances, we will never know the deep things that God wants to share with us concerning His fullness. God is looking for friends.
The second meaning of the word secret is counsel. Sometimes there is sweet fellowship and sweet communion. It is heart-to-heart fellowship.
Now the silence is broken. Words are spoken. But these are not ordinary words.
Words that come from the heart are not ordinary words. They carry substance. Words coming from here are merely sounds, but words coming from here have substance.
Someone said, “Speech comes when friends understand each other well enough to be silent.” That is a beautiful statement.
When friendship can afford to be silent, the speech is the speech of friendship.
Of course, there must be openness. You cannot hide your heart. We have to be transparent.
Sometimes, even among friends, we are more likely to be careless. We know each other so well. If you do not know someone well, you are careful about what you say. But if you know someone very well, you can become a little careless.
The beautiful thing in our fellowship with the Lord Jesus is that He knows all about us. He knows that much of what we say to Him may be careless and may not have much substance.
But because He loves us so much, He seeks fellowship with us. Someone said, “He blows away the chaff, but He retains the grain.” That is our Lord Jesus.
This requires honesty of heart.
I am reminded of the home in Bethany. Before the Lord Jesus came into that home, there is no record in Scripture that they had family problems. But once the Lord came into the picture, there seemed to be a lot of problems.
Yet it was a home where the Lord loved to be, where He was at home, and where they were free to open their hearts to one another and to Him.
Martha, being the vocal one, complained. You remember that she complained. What was the Lord’s reaction? Did He rebuke her? No.
In a sense, when Martha complained to the Lord, she honoured Him as Lord. You have to know another person well enough before you can complain to that person and expect things to be resolved.
If you do not know someone well, you do not want to complain too much. But when you know someone very well, you dare to say something from your heart.
The Lord did not say that what Martha did was wrong. But He brought something very precious. He told Martha:
Martha, Martha, thou art anxious and troubled about many things:
But one thing is needful:
For Mary hath chosen the good part,
Which shall not be taken away from her.
—Luke 10:41-42
In our careless speaking and even in our complaining, the Lord comes through with words that have real substance—words to teach us, adjust us, and correct us.
I have learned some things in the past years, because living among saints is not always the most pleasant thing. We say, “How good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.” That is true, but sometimes it does not feel quite so true. We all have complaints.
But I have discovered one thing: there is no use complaining to anyone. The best way to complain is to go to the Lord, and He understands.
There has to be that heart-to-heart fellowship. You are talking, and He is listening. He is talking, and you are listening.
That is the kind of fellowship the Lord is looking for. That is how we catch something of the Person of the Lord Jesus.
You can never know a person until you come close enough to converse intimately with that person. Much of our fellowship may remain on superficial ground. We do not know that person too well.
Often we cannot draw close to the Lord in that way. We keep Him at a distance. We are never close together—close enough that, when He speaks, we are there to hear, and when we speak, He listens intimately.
If I have secrets from Him, then He cannot have secrets with me. This is one of the keys we need to learn: we must have nothing hidden from Him, so that He can speak to us freely.
Friendship with God means that we are able to pour everything from our hearts to Him, and at the same time allow Him to speak all that is in His heart to us.
Many of us, when we have a problem, want to pour everything out to Him, but we are not ready to listen to Him. We want Him to listen to us, but we are not ready to listen to Him.
Real friendship, real fellowship, real intimate friendship with the Lord means that we can pour everything out before Him, but at the same time we are prepared for Him to speak to us freely.
The next meaning of the word secret has to do with advice—receiving guidance from Him.
As we fellowship with Him, commune with Him, and know Him, we discover how unlike Him we are. Then the next thing comes in: we need correction, adjustment, and instruction.
This is the counsel and instruction that He gives us. It often comes in a small voice. Why? Because the fellowship and friendship are so intimate that a whisper is enough. A look upon His face is enough.
The only way we can be transformed, corrected, and adjusted into His likeness is through close fellowship with Him. When we fellowship with Him, we discover how unlike Him we are. Then a longing is created in us to become like Him, and He can begin the work of adjustment.
If that is the case, then the transformation, or conforming, will be unto His likeness—not into anything else, but into Christ.
At last, this is the most precious meaning. First, we meet together in secret council. Then we speak in sweet fellowship. Then we receive counsel. Finally, He takes us into His confidence.
This is the secret of secrets—the friend among friends.
We may have many friends, but we also have certain very special friends. There are secrets that we can share only with particular friends, not with everyone.
God could tell His secret to Abraham, while Lot knew nothing about it.
I believe there are still men and women today to whom God can confide what is in His heart.
In the New Testament, Paul was one of those people. God confided to him something that he was not even allowed to reveal.
Paul was caught up into Paradise. He heard unspeakable words that it is not lawful for a man to utter. It was as though God uncovered something for him, allowed him to look, and then covered it again, saying, “Now you have seen it, but do not tell anyone.”
That is what it means to be given a secret: to look, to hear, but not to disclose everything.
Another person is Mary, in the home at Bethany. Scripture says that she sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to Him.
As I read the Gospels, I do not find a record of what the Lord actually spoke to Mary. Was there something? I do not recall that anything is recorded. It simply says that she sat at His feet and listened.
What the Lord communicated to her was not even recorded. There must have been something very precious. Perhaps one day, in glory, we will ask Mary, “What did He say to you?” We do not know.
But we know that Mary was the person who anointed the Lord before His burial. The Lord said that wherever the gospel is preached, what she did would be told as a memorial of her.
Mary did something that no one else did or could do. She did it because she knew His heart.
So, brothers and sisters, there are people whom God is looking for—people to whom He can confide His heart.
To experience something of the fullness of the Lord Jesus, we must learn to sit quietly in His presence.
When you sit in His presence, you are full. You know you are full because you do not need to say anything anymore. When you are full, you do not need to say anything. Your speech is full; no words are necessary.
You can forget about yourself. You can put aside your past. You simply behold His face.
Certainly, this is a secret meeting with the Lord.
Then there is sweet fellowship and communion. There is telling, and there is listening, both ways. He wants to listen to us just as much as He wants to speak to us.
What a privilege—that we may speak to Him, and that He listens to us. Of course, we need His advice, His help, and His instruction in order to take in all that He wants to give us.
Now, the word Jehovah is a very personal name of God. It is not merely the Almighty in power; it is very personal. It is the same God whom we read of as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.
He wants to be your God. He wants to be your blessing. He wants to be your fullness.
But there is one condition. To be brought into this blessed condition, there is one requirement: the fear of the Lord.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
—Proverbs 9:10
We can put it this way: the fear of the Lord is the beginning of entering into His fullness.
In Isaiah 33:6, we read:
The fear of the Lord is thy treasure.
—Isaiah 33:6
The fear of the Lord is the key to His treasure. Some translations say, “to your treasure.” For our purpose, we can say that the fear of the Lord shall be your treasure—your fullness.
Treasure is something full, something of great value, something God wants to give to us.
Of course, there are two kinds of fear. There is the wrong kind of fear, which thinks that God is cruel, that you must be afraid of Him, that He is always looking to find fault with you, condemn you, and make you miserable.
That is the wrong kind of fear. But there is a right kind of fear. It is the fear that comes out of a love relationship. You dare not hurt His feelings. You dare not make Him uncomfortable or uneasy.
That is the good kind of fear, and that is the kind of fear the Lord is looking for.
In Proverbs, we have some very practical instruction. In Proverbs 8, we read:
The fear of the Lord is to hate evil.
—Proverbs 8:13
And in Proverbs 16, we read:
By the fear of the Lord men depart from evil.
—Proverbs 16:6
We cannot share God’s secret while we have a secret love for sin. It simply will not work.
To sit with Him in heavenly places, we must be delivered from the earth—to set our minds on the things that are above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of the Father, and not on the things that are below.
It is not merely that we hate evil in principle. We know that we should hate it. But there must be action: we must depart from evil.
Many of us know how to hate evil, but we are very hesitant to make the move and depart from it because we have a secret love for the things of this world. There is something we do not want to leave.
Those who sit in the counsel of the wicked cannot sit in the counsel of the righteous.
That is one condition. He is holy. He is true. Therefore, there must be no pretence when we come into His presence.
Silence can be a sign of disapproval. We know that. When heaven is brass and God does not speak to His people, then something is wrong.
But thank God, in His presence there is also the silence of His approval. God looks at His Son and is simply satisfied.
Sometimes words are unnecessary. Even though heaven opened three times to speak concerning the Lord Jesus, that does not mean God was satisfied with Him only three times. He was satisfied with Him all the time.
Words were spoken from heaven, and approval was made known to us. But the Son was always approved by the Father.
The most comforting thing, brothers and sisters, is the end of Psalm 25:14: “He will make known His covenant to them.” To me, that is the best part of the verse.
God says, “If you fear Me, all that I want to do in you—I will do it.” How can we do it? We cannot do it.
But God says, “Leave the how to Me. I have covenanted to do it. I have bound Myself, and what I have promised, I will do.”
“You cannot sit in My presence, but you have the desire. I will make it possible. You cannot fellowship with Me intimately, but if you want to, I will make it possible.”
“You will not listen to My correction, but if you want to, I will make it possible.”
You may say, “Who am I? How can I receive anything from You—intimate things, deep things?” But if you say you want to, that is enough.
That is what it means: He covenants Himself. It is all grace. He promises to speak.
God is full. He is full. He has so much to share, but He is looking and looking for the right condition in our lives.
For us, the way is to fear Him, believe Him, and say yes to Him. Then the Lord says, “I will do the rest.”
Thank God for such grace.
I always appreciate this phrase, which I repeat all the time: God has faith in Himself. That is why He calls you according to His calling—because He has faith in Himself, not because we are capable people.
It is not because we have faith in Him. No, He has faith in Himself. Therefore, He can do what He wants to do. That is grace. He has the power to do it, and He is doing it.
All we need to do is take our eyes upon the Lord Jesus. Just look at Him.
God says, “I am obligated to see to it that My Son is fully formed in you. It is My work. All you have to do is be willing, and I will do the rest.”
All God needs is a willing heart—the fear of the Lord.
The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him;
And He will make known unto them His covenant.
—Psalm 25:14
He will make it possible. May the Lord help all of us who are very weak, very feeble, and very confused people.
I appreciate this conference, because every time I come here, I experience something of what I have been speaking about. I should not say that the Lord takes me into His confidence in some extraordinary way, but simply by sitting here, it is so wonderful.
You do not need to say anything. You just sit here, and you are full. Do you experience that sometimes? Just being here, simply sitting here—it is so full.
Then sometimes the silence is broken, and you have a little fellowship with someone. You think, “Oh my, why did you speak that?” It is so full.
Thank God for this time when we can be together. Every time I come back here, I feel that the Lord has brought me back to this field of Boaz. We just glean and glean, and the servants throw some down—throw some down, throw some down—and we simply pick it up.
We just pick it up, and it is always grace. Shall we pray?
Lord, our words are so inadequate, but You are the living Word. We pray that You will continue to speak to us and draw us ever closer to Yourself.
Lord, make us willing to be Your friends—real friends, intimate friends—that we may have secret meetings together.
You can speak to us the deep things that are in Your heart, the things You long to speak to us.
Lord, bring us into such a condition where You can reveal Your heart to Your people. Thank You for grace.
We pray that You will make us willing. When we are willing, You will do all the rest, because You are faithful and You have the power to do it.
To You we give all the praise. We ask in the name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.