Before we resume the message, for this time I feel that I want to say a word, with the desire and intent to seek to bring what we are saying in these gatherings into the closest possible practical relationship to you, dear friends.
I am always afraid that these conferences might just be looked upon as some special meetings, and some particular aspects of teaching—that each conference has as its subject such-and-such a matter. And so we come, we hear, we go, and wait for the next one.
Now, to me, that is a very terrible possibility.
If you knew the spiritual history lying behind these times, you would be fully alive to the fact that we are really brought into relation to very serious responsibilities. That is, such a time is a build-up upon a tremendous responsibility to the Lord.
Sooner or later, given that it is the Lord’s word to us, sooner or later in some way we shall find that we are tested by its practical implications in relation to our very life; and it will be a matter of gain or loss in time and in eternity.
God forbid that I should attribute more importance to the ministry than should be attributed. But we do very, very much seek the Lord about these times. It is a very deep exercise and much prayer, and it is never, believe me, a matter of getting down to make up some addresses by research and so on.
It is always seeking to have it from the Lord Himself as His own word for the times.
I want to say that in order to seek to bring you into a very living relation with the Lord, and to say to you: if what is being said at this time has come from the Lord, and is coming from the Lord, the Lord knows it is not just a theory.
Somehow or other, it does affect you. It does involve you. It does mean that the Lord is saying this to you. In some way it touches your life where you are.
My own strong feeling is that this is a word for this local company at Honor Oak Road at this time, and also for those of you in other places.
Some are in assemblies; some are not in assemblies. Nevertheless, the spiritual principles hold good whether or not that is the case. In some ways, this has to be taken to where you are and have an outworking.
So we are here not just to be speaker and listeners. The word conference has more in it than that. We are here to confer about the serious business of God in relation to the time in which we live: to seek God’s interpretation of the time, and explanation and revelation of what it is that He is set upon in the day in which you and I live.
You will suffer that word, because though you may not share my fear, I have this fear, as one who is conscious of talking, talking, talking, that it will just be dead. And I have a horror of death.
Having said that, let us turn again to the message, and that part of it which is for this hour. We are, as you know, in the book of Nehemiah.
It is the basis and the background of what the Lord is saying to us, or what we want Him to say to us at this time.
It is too late—we are too far on—to survey the ground we have covered. But we have seen this book as representing, in a historical way, the straight highway of God’s eternal purpose.
God has, from before the foundation of the world, had in His own heart and in His own mind a purpose concerning His Son, Jesus Christ. That purpose is that in Christ, and through Christ, in those in whom Christ dwells, God may have a place, a vessel, or a presence for Himself, making Himself known.
That is, a sanctuary for God. That is His eternal purpose.
Now, this afternoon we come to that particular aspect of this matter which relates to the way in which God realizes His purpose.
This book, when it is read in the larger context of its spiritual meaning, is full of valuable instruction as to God’s way of reaching His end and realizing His purpose.
We have already spoken of one pervading thing throughout this book, which has only to be mentioned in order to be recognized. That is the spirit of leadership.
Now, we have to see that that is not something impersonal and abstract. However strong and energetic it is as found in this book—and it is unmistakable—the book simply throbs with a mighty energy in initiative and leadership.
There is a spirit of having a great business on hand, of supreme importance, calling out all the resources of spirit, mind, and body. I say, the book pulsates with that which we have called the spirit of leadership.
But I repeat: what we now have to see is that, in the larger setting than the merely earthly and historical, this is not something impersonal, and it is not something abstract.
We must see in the book of Nehemiah the energy of the Holy Spirit.
I think there is no doubt that the energy which is here corresponds to the energy of the Holy Spirit. It is not just an abstract energy; it is very positive. And it is not just the soul-force of a man, or of some men, behind it. There is the energy of God.
I repeat: as seen in the largest spiritual context, the Holy Spirit is very much in evidence in this book as the One who is carrying out this great enterprise and moving toward the realization of this great purpose.
And that is perfectly in keeping with all that we have said regarding Christ and God’s purpose.
We have pointed out that this temple, this city, and this wall, with which this book and the companion book of Ezra are occupied, are an earthly representation of Christ as the dwelling place of God, as the sphere in which God is to be found.
Christ it is who is here in this book in the terms of the temple, the city, and its wall: Christ in nature and character—yes, what He is in the mind of God.
The meticulous prescription for any dwelling place of God, whether it be tabernacle, temple, or church, is because God is so very careful and strict as to what it is to be like—its character, its components, and its constituents. It is simply because it is an expression of Christ, and Christ is the very effulgence of His glory, the image of His substance.
God dwells in His own character and nature, and comes through any expression of that. So He is very particular.
Well, it is Christ that is in view here. You would read the book from that standpoint, as to the nature and functions of Christ for God.
If that is true, we quite naturally make the transition from Christ to the Holy Spirit. Christ is presented as God’s pattern, God’s model, God’s idea and conception of His own dwelling place, where He will be present.
If that were all, and it were brought to us and imposed upon us, we would say, “Well, there you are. You have got the pattern. See what God wants, and now provide God with that.”
Every one of us would sink back and say, “Oh, impossible! Impossible! As far as we are concerned, it cannot be. It is quite hopeless to satisfy God in that way, or even for us to do anything toward fulfilling the purpose of God.”
That is our constant temptation: to despair of the realization of anything like this.
So the counterpart and complement of this is our salvation from despair: the mighty energies of the Holy Spirit. The phrase which has occurred more than once during these gatherings is, “The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall perform this.”
So here, in the energy which pervades this whole book, we must see the Holy Spirit working this thing through to fulfillment. It is the Holy Spirit who is the energy of all divine purpose.
It always was so. God could see the wreckage of this cosmos, chaos; and the Spirit of God brooded upon the face of the deep.
I have read that, thought about it, and brought it into this book of Nehemiah. Read the first chapter of this book. I have asked myself questions: What was the attitude and the feeling of the Spirit of God when He brooded on the face of the deep, when He hovered over that chaos?
If the first chapter of Nehemiah really does represent the disposition of the Holy Spirit, we see Nehemiah looking at the ruin and then telling us that he wept and mourned, and he fasted before he took action.
May we not conclude that when the Spirit of God brooded over that chaos, it was the spirit of grief, the spirit of disappointment, of sorrow, the spirit of tears?
It was a heart relationship to the situation, because of the way in which that situation must have been contrary to what God would have. The Spirit of God moved on that ground.
The energies of the Holy Spirit are the energies of a great concern for God’s pleasure and satisfaction. They are the energies which are a reaction against anything that does not honor and glorify God.
That is what this book says. The mighty energies here, working through Nehemiah and through this people, are all prompted by the Spirit of God, who says, “This is not for the glory of God. This is very—nay, it is utterly—contrary to what God ought to have.”
Remember, dear friends, that is the nature of the energy of the Holy Spirit. Whatever may be our thoughts about the Holy Spirit working in power and so forth, let us remember that the Spirit begins with a great heart concern and longing for the satisfaction of God.
You may pray to be filled with the Spirit. You may think many things as to what it means to receive the Holy Spirit, to be anointed by the Spirit, to be governed by the Spirit. Let me tell you this: if ever the Spirit of God gets a purchase upon your heart, the first thing, the continuous thing, and the last thing will be that you will become possessed of a great concern for the satisfaction of God.
Not that you may be something, or do something, or that there may be some things; but one thing only: anything that disappoints God or deprives God of what He ought to have touches your heart very deeply.
Yours will be a life that is dominated by this one thing: God must be satisfied. God must have His place. And if I see anywhere anything that is contrary to God, it gives me a pang.
That is the Holy Spirit. That is the energy of the Spirit: to make us deeply grieved about things contrary to God—in ourselves, in one another, in the people of God, and in the world.
That is the first mark and characteristic of the Holy Spirit’s energy: to link our hearts with God for His pleasure, His satisfaction, and His glory.
I was saying that this is how it was at the beginning. The Spirit of God was the energy of all divine purpose in creation. What was true in that initial instance has always been true, and is true today.
The Spirit of God is the energy of divine purpose, and the divine purpose is to find that satisfaction to which He can commit Himself forever.
So the Spirit is seen here initiating—just spontaneous.
No committee of men discussed this rebuilding of Jerusalem and the wall. No board of directors carried this through or laid the plans. We know nothing of that kind of thing. It simply comes about because God found a man with a heart—a man with a heart for Himself.
And so it is almost natural; it is quite spontaneous. The thing opens in that way and begins. Here is a purely spontaneous initiation of this thing by the Holy Spirit.
There is very much more in that than perhaps appears from what I am saying. If we were really thoroughly dealing with this whole matter, especially for the sake of responsible servants of God, we should say very much more. But this thing, which is indicative of what I mean, can clearly be seen.
You will look in vain for any laying of plans, drawing up of designs, and organizing of enterprises and schemes at the beginning of the book of Acts, so called, of the apostles.
I do not believe that those men intended in any way to do what they did afterwards. They had not even foreseen what they would be involved in.
The simple basis of everything there is that God got hold of the hearts of a band of men. They did not know where they were going, what they were going to do, or what it was going to mean at all.
The whole development had indications from the Lord, certain things they would do; but until the Holy Spirit really came and got His grip upon those men inwardly, they never moved as they did. It was a perfectly spontaneous movement.
Indeed, there are indications that they were settling in Jerusalem. They were building up in Jerusalem, increasing multitudes in Jerusalem; and although the Lord had indicated beyond Jerusalem, it took a real movement of the Spirit to get them out of Jerusalem and abroad.
The point is that the initiation of the purpose of God is in the hands of the Holy Spirit. If the Holy Spirit can really get hold of our hearts and our lives, He brings us into His own initiation of purpose and puts His own energy into us.
It will be like that—spontaneous things.
Might I say this? We, at the beginning of things so many years ago here, never foresaw how things would develop and what would happen. We had no plans, no schemes. We had not thought it out and put it on paper, how it would mean or how it would work out to the ends of the world.
Oh, that has happened. Pardon me, I do not mean to draw attention; I am only illustrating. We just did not have it. But God got hold of our hearts.
I think we can say, in such a way, in such a mighty way, that He could do progressively—not all at once, because He has still to get more ground—but progressively through the years, He could do what He wanted to do.
Those who know best would say, “Well, we did not foresee this and this and this”—the new stages and the new phases that would come from time to time. But they were quite spontaneous. We never planned them. We never decided this and that. They just came along the line of life.
Not that this is anything very much, but it is like that, I believe. The Holy Spirit has the initiative in His hands.
And not only the initiative to initiate: the Holy Spirit has the direction. The direction here in Nehemiah is very clear. Is it not wonderful if you follow this development?
There is movement, progressive movement, developing movement; the way, the wisdom, the insight—it is all there. It is not just human acumen and ability. It is the energy of the Spirit directing this whole thing from stage to stage and phase to phase.
He has it in hand, like a clearly defined course where He is concerned.
And not only initiating and directing, but we cannot explain the persistence to a conclusion on merely human grounds. Look at the discouragements, the oppositions, the difficulties, and the people themselves. They were always ready to give up, to throw up their hands.
One of the things constantly assailing them was discouragement—discouragement which did, for a time, suspend everything. Read the whole story. You find that there was a period, perhaps of twelve years, when they were just too discouraged to go on. Things were too hard, too difficult.
But nevertheless, the Spirit again energized and reinitiated, and then the thing was finished. You cannot explain it on the basis of merely human energy, persistence, and determination. It can only be explained by the energies of the Spirit of God.
What is true in this book is an illustration of the much greater work which the Spirit initiated at the beginning of this dispensation. Clearly He directed in those early years.
The continuance of the church, and the continuance of anything of God, can only be accounted for by an energy that is superhuman, that is not natural: persisting to the conclusion when it can be said, “So the wall was finished.”
Oh, what a tribute to the energy of the Spirit, to be able to say that in view of all that sought to make that issue impossible.
Initiation, direction, persistence, completion: all the story is the Holy Spirit’s energy.
So, looking into this book, we see as an illustration this great truth: the energy of the Holy Spirit in anything that is of God.
Dear friends, you and I may be committed to something of the Lord which is countered by many, many adversaries, and much discouragement, heartbreak, and disappointment. Quite surely Nehemiah was often disappointed with his people and with his brethren. There are more than signs of it—evidences of it. Time after time they failed him; they disappointed him.
We may find that disappointment in the directions where we should least expect to find it. All that, all that. But if the thing is of God, there is the committing of the Holy Spirit with all His energies to it, to see it through.
I take comfort from that, and you should do the same. Of course, the important thing is to be in line with God’s purpose. Then you are endowed with God’s power.
The thing does not rest with your weakness. Only be faithful and not disobedient, and the Spirit will see it through. That is Nehemiah’s energy.
But note this: the vision of it all was with Nehemiah alone to begin with.
He came, by the sovereign overruling and ordering of God, to Jerusalem. He went out by night. “I told no man,” he said. “I told no man.” He went out and surveyed the situation by night, and went home.
We are not told in as many words what happened when he got home, but we know from the issue what happened. Nehemiah surveyed and saw much rubbish, walls broken down, gates burned with fire—a deplorable situation.
He went home after surveying it, and the issue clearly indicates that Nehemiah did not say, “Yes, a hopeless situation. Nothing can be done. I give it up and go back to my job as cupbearer.”
In the silence of the night, he planned. He saw. He could see. He became possessed of and gripped by the vision of rebuilt Jerusalem, rebuilt walls, and an inhabited city.
It was with him alone to begin with. After that, he drew others in—two, then more—and inspired them with his own vision.
Now the point is this: the vision of all was with Nehemiah alone to begin with. If Nehemiah represents the energy of the Holy Spirit, this is the point: the Holy Spirit is the custodian of God’s purpose, of God’s plan. It is with Him, and to begin with it is with Him alone.
I am very glad of that, are not you? I am glad that I never conceived this thing. It was never my idea that I thought up this whole scheme of things and decided to carry it through. Well, it would have been short-lived—not gone very far. I am quite sure of that.
So the Holy Spirit has the vision of God’s purpose from eternity, and it is with Him alone to begin with. He only has it.
That means far more than my words indicate. You and I do not know the whole thing. We do not see, nor perhaps is it as well that we do not.
I wonder how many of us would have gone through it if we had seen all the coming years and what they would hold in the work of God. Probably, we would have said, “No, thank You. I am not going that way.”
The Holy Spirit has the whole pattern with Himself, and He will unfold it gradually, bit by bit, make it known; but it is all known to Him.
I am glad of that. The Holy Spirit is not making discoveries by experiment. Make no mistake about that. He is not finding out by trying to see if it will work. Not at all.
He sees the whole thing—all the environment, all the cost, all the demands. He sees it all; He has got it all before Him.
Have I said it? I am wrong. He sees Christ: the perfected Man, the perfected representation of God’s thought regarding a dwelling place. He sees all.
The Lord Jesus has told us, when He is come, the Spirit of truth, “He shall take of Mine, and shall declare it unto you. He shall not speak from Himself. He shall guide you into all the truth.”
The Holy Spirit has the whole perfected pattern of Christ fully in view, and He says, “God intends that to be reproduced in a people. I am committed to that. That can be because God wills it, in every detail.”
Take this to heart, dear friends: God really has a purpose He can carry out. No doubt about it. He can realize it. He can fulfill it. The Spirit of God has assumed responsibility for God’s eternal purpose. He has taken the responsibility.
But it is with Him.
That also carries with it this further fact: you and I, as believers and responsible believers, need to know that God never commits the whole pattern to us. He reserves it to the Holy Spirit, and we will only get any fragment of it as we live in and walk after the Spirit.
It is most essential that you and I are impressed with this fact: God does not hand over everything to man like that. But God says, “Walk with Me today, and you will know that which belongs to today. I am not going to tell you anything about tomorrow.”
Today, you walk in the Spirit today. You assume nothing, you presume nothing. You recognize that you have got to go step by step, hand in hand with the Holy Spirit; and as you do so, the pattern will unfold.
You are in the dark today as to what next week, next month, or next year may hold. Do not worry about that. The matter is tied up with the Holy Spirit, and you cannot know one fragment unless you walk in the Spirit.
That is a good thing. But you see, it makes great demands upon you. The developing purpose, the unfolding plan, requires that you and I who are related to it know what walking in the Spirit means.
Oh, that does mean much more than I have time to explain. But I do see, dear friends, that so much of the tragedy of the situation today amongst Christians—the chaos, the confusion, the weakness, and the spiritual limitation—is due to the positive fact that so many of the Lord’s people do not know what walking in the Spirit means.
They have got their idea of Christian life in an objective way. To be a Christian is so-and-so according to certain doctrines, beliefs, and practices. To be a Christian is to do a certain kind of work, to be concerned about the salvation of souls, and to be working for the Lord in many ways. It is so objective.
If I had the opportunity, I could take you back to the book of Acts and tell you that the basis was this mastery of the hearts of these men. They had a great concern for the salvation of souls, there is no doubt about that, and for the building of the church of God and the churches, and all that.
But the Holy Spirit has left it on evidential record that, with all that, they could not do what they decided to do. They could never act according to their own judgment, even with all that.
They knew God wanted men saved. They knew God wanted the Word preached everywhere. They knew in a general way like that, and their hearts were in it. But here it is: “The Holy Spirit suffered them not.” They were forbidden of the Holy Spirit to preach the Word in certain places.
What is this? What is this?
Well, it is clear, and perhaps we know it from our own experience, that if they had persisted in spite of the Holy Spirit, it would have been disaster. At least, it would have been disappointment—terrible disappointment.
Even with all that the Lord wanted and with all their concern, they had to move in each movement with the Holy Spirit and in the Holy Spirit, and it proved fruitful. It proved fruitful every time.
If you can ever detect that they did otherwise, you will find a different result. The law of the Spirit is that the Spirit retains the right and the prerogative to hold the pattern and plan of God to Himself, and only show it as He has men and women who are wholly governed by Him.
There is a vast amount of Christian work, activity, and organization all over this world that He is not getting through. Not getting through after two thousand years.
The last part of this earth has never yet heard the gospel.
No, in our own country—in this country—it is a deplorable situation of ignorance of God. Many, many there are in this country who do not know anything about the Bible, and many who do not know of the existence of the Bible. Think of that—a country like this.
To many in this country, if you speak of Christ, they say, “I do not know who you are talking about.” What is the matter?
A Spirit-governed church would not leave a situation like that. It did not at the beginning.
Well, you see a lot in this. The Spirit knows that He demands complete government by Himself in every detail of the purpose of God.
You notice again, in this spirit of leadership—the energy of the Spirit represented by Nehemiah—the discerning responsibility which characterized him. Discerning responsibility.
A real sense of responsibility rested upon him in this matter. You cannot get away from it. Read again the whole book in the light of that one thing: how Nehemiah held himself charged with a great responsibility to God.
It was the thing that saved him again and again. This was not something that he was doing for man. This was not something that he was doing for himself. This was something that was for God. He felt his responsibility to God all the time.
I wonder how much that conveys to you of importance. If you follow that through with Nehemiah, it was that which made him so alive, and so alive to everything.
This man—speaking of Nehemiah alone—was right on the mark all the time. You could not steal a march on him. You could not ensnare him.
He was alert. He was alive. He saw through every subterfuge. He saw the implications of every countermovement. He was just all eyes—just all eyes, alive.
That alertness, aliveness, discernment, perception, insight, and foresight was all born of this sense of responsibility to God.
You know it is true: if you have any sense of responsibility for a thing, a real sense of responsibility—that is your responsibility, and it is very important and vital—you are not caught asleep. You are alive to everything that is going to touch that or affect that.
Dear friends, how the Holy Spirit needs to create or impart His sense of responsibility to the people of God, as in Nehemiah.
People are caught—oh, how they are caught—by almost any little trick of the enemy. Christians are caught these days by anything that the enemy likes to put out, and very often he does not have to put up something very clever.
Of course, the Lord has something relating to His great purpose and His Son in view. They ought to be there in relation to it. They are involved; they are a part of it.
Well, some little thing arises—over the telephone, or a call, or a seeming demand—something to divert. The enemy puts up something, either simple or more complex, and they are caught. The trouble is, they are not there. They are not there at the time. They are not there at all. They have just been caught.
So afterward, there is still real power served in the other direction, and the purpose of God is entirely lost in this. What is the reason for that?
Oh, take this to heart: be alive to the wiles of the devil—the wiles of the devil. What is the thing that will counter that and save you from being tricked, snared, misdirected, and preoccupied, so that you cannot be in what the Spirit of God is doing?
It is a lack of a sense of responsibility to God. If we have that, it will create an alertness, an energy of discernment, and we shall see, “That is a move of the enemy to get me off, to keep me away, to cut across.” I see.
That is why the Apostle Paul links prayer with “watching thereunto with all perseverance.” Watching thereunto.
This sense of responsibility—ask the Lord to create it in you, to increase it in you. There is a serious need, an almost tragic need, amongst the Lord’s people for this: that they realize that they are responsible people in this whole matter.
“I am a part of this. If I fail in this, if I am caught, the whole thing is going to be somehow affected.” See it like that.
The Holy Spirit in this book was active all the time along two lines. He was active in His energy along the line of God’s “No,” on the one side: God’s “No.”
It is clear, as you read, that it became quite apparent and quite evident that God was taking a negative attitude toward a certain kind of thing, a certain state of things, and certain things. God was saying, “No.”
I cannot bring them all out to see; it would take months to empty this book of its content. But the Holy Spirit was making them aware of that toward which God took this attitude: “No. None of that. Not that.”
On the other hand, He is not only negative. The Spirit was saying, “Yes. Yes. Yes.”
There is a very great need in us, dear friends, to register that “No” and that “Yes” of the Holy Spirit if God is going to reach His end.
I hate to say things like this, but the Lord loses so much because so many of His people are not sensitive to the Holy Spirit saying, “No, not that. Not that way,” or sensitive to the Holy Spirit saying, “Yes, yes.”
Now, you have a greater than Nehemiah as your example. Look at the Lord Jesus: anointed, governed, filled with the Spirit. Notice that anointing again and again and again in His life, saying, “No. No.”
And He, saying amen to the Spirit: “No, not that way, not that thing, not yet.” The Spirit was saying no; but on the other hand, positively, “Yes, yes.”
Our Lord was governed like that, and He is the fulfillment of God’s purpose. It is very essential that it should be so.
Now, in order that it might be so, there is one tremendous thing that comes up in this book.
There were people round about who wanted to sponsor this thing, who offered their service and said, “Let us come and work with you, help you in this great thing that you are doing.”
Here the Holy Spirit came in with one of His “Noes.” This is where the Spirit of discernment and responsibility is so manifest.
Not only did Nehemiah say to these people, “You have no part or lot in this business,” but there was a point in this history when every man who was going to have any place had to prove his genealogy.
He had to provide his birth certificate. He had to have evidence that he was a pure-born Hebrew, a Jew of untainted blood.
These people who were offering were not such. They were mixtures—a mixture of Assyrians and Hebrews who had intermarried in the land. A subtle trick of the enemy: get in that way.
A discerning responsibility saw what that would mean—what that would mean. God hated mixture. And so the demand is: only spiritual men.
Spiritual men, born of the Spirit and governed by the Spirit, can come into this purpose of God. Pure-born, pure-bred heavenly citizens come into this city—men of the Spirit from their very beginning.
Is it not true to say that, in that particular thing, the history of the church has been paralyzed and crippled? People not born again, coming into the church and coming into the work of the church, and unspiritual people.
No, no. This is not something that, even in sincerity, can be taken up. Even in sincerity, though you might want to help along the work of God, you cannot do it.
Your motive, your meaning, your intention may be very good, but you just cannot do it until you are under the mastery of the Holy Spirit.
Christianity has drawn in people to help on the work because they have money, or a title, or influence in the business world, or considerable acumen in some branch of civil life or industrial life. They are great business people; therefore, bring them in. Let them serve the kingdom of God.
No—a thousand times no. The only basis on which anybody can have a place or a part is that they are filled with the Spirit.
That was the beginning of the church. They are under the control of the Spirit of God, born again. No matter whether they have millions, if they have not got the Spirit, they have no place. If they have the Spirit, of course, yes.
They may be the cleverest men in business, having been very successful in the things of this world; they have no standing here on that ground if they are not men of the Spirit.
Oh, the energies of the Spirit require men of the Spirit. The purpose of the Spirit requires spiritual men and women. That is a great declaration in this book.
Well, I stop there for the afternoon. It is not everything about the Spirit, as you can well see, but I would close with this.
The energy that is in this book, which is in figure the energy of the Spirit, did one wonderful thing. It may have been progressive, but it came out all right.
The energy through Nehemiah, a type of the energy of the Holy Spirit, gave the people one vision which united them as one man—as one man.
The people had a mind to work. It is said, “The people had a mind to work.” They were welded, melted, into a oneness, so that they were as one man.
The whole wall was united—united. All the people on the wall were united, and they were united in this man Nehemiah. He was the uniting, integrating personality of the whole thing.
See, in him then was represented the energy of the Spirit; and the energy of the Spirit creates a oneness of vision which makes the people of God one.
If you and I have diverse visions and conceptions, we will not be one; we will be apart. That will be our weakness, and that will be the defeat of God’s purpose amongst us.
We must be men and women with one vision which makes us one—not two visions, not pulling apart, not tearing us asunder, and wanting different ways and different things.
But we see clearly what it is that God has purposed and has in hand, what the Spirit is committed to; and we are in that without reserve or division. If you can get a dozen men and women like that, you have got a solid hold. That means so much.
The effort of the enemy in Nehemiah and this work was to divide these people—divide these people. By division, to weaken and eventually nullify this whole undertaking.
That is the enemy’s perpetual way: to divide.
But oh, may the Lord give us a clear perception of His Christ—not of a thing, but of His Christ—as His objective, His end, His purpose, His pattern, to which our hearts are committed.
May the energy of the Holy Spirit weld us as a people, wherever we are, set on that one thing: God’s satisfaction.