I’d like to ask you—they’re giving me hand signals to get going, I think. Translate, please.
I’d like to ask you again to turn to the book of Revelation, the last book in the Bible. There is this verse—or actually one and a half verses—that we have been sharing from. This is the third and final message in this series.
Turn with me to Revelation 1, the second part of verse 5 and all of verse 6. We will just read this:
Unto Him that loveth us,
and loosed us from our sins by His blood;
and He made us to be a kingdom, to be priests unto His God and Father;
to Him be the glory and the dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
Let me read that one more time. “Unto Him that loveth us.” I want you to focus on that phrase: loveth us. “And loosed us”—notice that—“from our sins by His blood, and He made us”—notice that part—“to be a kingdom, to be priests unto His God and Father; to Him be the glory and the dominion for ever and ever. Amen.”
Lord, as we come to Your Word, we know that Your words are spirit and life. We thank You for that. You intend Your Word to make change in our very being, and our testimony is that when Your Word comes to us by the Spirit, it does change us.
Thank You for the revolution that happens when we are conformed to the image of Christ, when Your Word is opened. Once again, we confess that You alone have the words of eternal life.
As Peter said on that day when You confronted Your own and said, “Will ye also go away?” he said, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life.” It is only to You that we come. It is only You whom we trust. It is only You whom we ask to speak and to make clear to us what is in Your Word.
Unlock Your Word. Loose Your Word. Cause it to be living, something that we can receive into our spirit, to make that change You desire it to make. You promise that Your Word shall never return unto You void, but it will always accomplish the work You send it to do.
We take that promise. We have been hearing this morning about the promises of God. We take that promise from the Lord—that it would be true this morning as we gather in Your name. We ask this in the lovely name of the Lord Jesus. Amen.
Well, I know some of you know where we have been, and possibly where we are going. Some of you may not. Let me just back up for a moment. I think I can do this rather briefly and give you sort of an idea.
We have been considering this thing called the essential revelation of God. There is something, brothers and sisters, we need to know about God that is essential. It is elementary. It is vital. If we miss that singular revelation of God, then we will not get anywhere as believers.
We said that in this book of Revelation there is a key. As you open it in the first verse, it says, “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him.” This is the revelation that John received.
Now, I think when we come to the book of Revelation, we get confused with all the revelations. You know, we see the beast, the war, the vials, the plagues, the bride, the overcomer, the dragon, and the false prophet. We begin to think these are the revelations.
But the Holy Spirit was very wise. This book is not called Revelations. It is called Revelation, singular. I believe that is for a reason. The whole of God’s economy, the whole of His unveiling, the whole of what He wants to show us, is founded in the Lord Jesus.
Out from that, we can come into a real understanding of who the false beast is, what the end times are, what the vials are about, what the conflict is over, and how everything will be summed up in the Lord Jesus. But first and foremost, we have to have this singular revelation of who God is.
This verse puts it so well: “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him.” We said before that this one and a half verses we have been considering is a small text with a great subject. It deals, I believe, with three things.
John was on the isle of Patmos, and God unveiled to him His Son, His beloved Son. He saw something—this man who had lain upon Jesus’ breast—that he had not seen before. Things were opened to him that he had never seen before.
Then he was caught up in a spirit of worship. When he ended his opening remarks, he said:
Unto Him that loveth us,
and loosed us from our sins by His blood;
and He made us to be a kingdom, to be priests unto His God and Father;
to Him be the glory and the dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
He was caught up with this person of the Lord Jesus, and he saw three things. First of all, he saw Him who loves us. Brothers and sisters, we said this is His ways. This essential revelation of God means that we have to see His ways.
He expressed it this way: “Unto Him that loveth us.” He saw something beautiful about God: all of God’s ways are summed up in this singular way, and that is love.
You remember John wrote in 1 John 4:8, and then again in 1 John 4:16, this astounding thing. He summarized all of what God was with a single phrase. Do you know what that phrase is?
God is love.
That is His ways. That is the first thing we need to see. We need to see who He is. When we see who He is, when we see His ways, we have real revelation of who God is.
We considered Moses. You remember Psalm 103:7: “He made known His ways unto Moses, His acts unto the children of Israel.” There is the difference. Do we know His ways?
When the children of Israel were judged during that period in the wilderness, the summation of that judgment was that God said, “They have not known My ways.” That was His issue with His people.
David prayed, “Teach me Thy way, O Lord; I will walk in Thy truth.” So we looked at the ways of God, this supreme way of love, and then the practical aspect of walking in His ways.
In the end, brothers and sisters, that way of God is to so get into the people of God that it becomes their distinguishing trait. You remember when the Lord Jesus said:
By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples,
if ye have love one to another.
That single trait is the distinguishing mark upon His people. When we read 1 Corinthians and see the body of Christ explained in chapter 12 and the body of Christ expressed in chapter 14, we find a secret in between, in 1 Corinthians 13. It is that secret of love.
We are to walk in His ways. Jim has been sharing with us from Ephesians: “Be ye therefore imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love.” That was the first message.
Last time we looked at this matter of the second phrase: “And loosed us from our sins by His blood.” Brothers and sisters, not only do we need to see who God is, we need to see what He does. This is His work.
We do not just see His ways to see what He is like. We have to see what He does, because by what He does, He brings us into a living relationship through all that He is, and He transforms us by that very work.
His work is incredible. I love the adjectives. In the Psalms it talks about His mighty works, His majestic works, His wondrous works—His wonderful works toward the children of men.
His supreme work in the New Testament is the work of the cross. At that place, the Lord God did the greatest work of all that was ever done, known to man. This work concludes the past. The past is completely dealt with. Is that not good news?
As far as the east is from the west, so far hath He removed our transgressions from us. We should rejoice: the past is completely dealt with.
Not only does He conclude the past, but He deals with the person. Can you imagine if He never changed us? If He only dealt with past sins, and we kept going in this repetitive motion of falling, sinning, being overcome, and being defeated, what Christian life would that be?
But in Romans 6, we discovered that He not only deals with sins, but He deals with sin, singular. He deals with the person, and He transforms us.
How does He do that? Well, maybe this will upset you, but He took care of it in a pretty dramatic way: it was capital punishment. He put you in the Lord Jesus that day on the cross, and there you died. You were eliminated as the source of the problem.
Then He raises us anew in Christ Jesus, and now we have the capacity for the first time to walk in newness of life. That is what Romans 6 tells us.
But not only did He conclude the past and change the person, He did something even more than that: He put the power to live within our very being. Can you imagine? He put the Holy Spirit within our very being so that we can live this Christian life.
I always tell people that the Christian life is impossible to live—speaking of you. But when it comes to the Holy Spirit, the Lord has put the energy within us. He has put the power in us. He has put the life within us.
The life of the Lord Jesus that is resident in us by the Holy Spirit is able to live out this Christian life. This is the work that He does.
Different translations probably render it different ways. Some say, “He has washed us from our sins in His blood.” Others say, “He has loosed us from our sins by His blood.” This work is so great that the prisoner who was once captive to sin is totally set free. The slave is totally liberated.
We are no longer slaves to sin. Romans 6 says that we are slaves to righteousness unto God. Is that not good news?
I remember a story about Abraham Lincoln. When he signed the Emancipation Proclamation, this was such an incredible document and made such an incredible statement that his hand literally shook. He caught his hand and said, “I must steady my hand. I do not want anyone ever to say I hesitated in signing this document.”
But do you know, not a single person was set free as a result of the Emancipation Proclamation? I do not want to take anything away—we have a history major here, and he may correct me—but not a single person was set free, because it was for the South, and we were a bit hardheaded.
It said, “You guys set free your slaves,” but not a single slave went free. When it comes to the work of the Lord Jesus, all the slaves go free. Is that not good news? That is the work.
Brothers and sisters, we need to see the mighty work. It is a great work of deliverance, and it sets us free that we might live the Christian life.
Today we come to this last section. I want to make you go to this phrase and look again: “And He made us to be a kingdom, to be priests unto His God and Father; to Him be the glory and the dominion for ever and ever. Amen.”
This last part has to do with His will. Or, put it another way, it has to do with His heart. Or, put it another way, it has to do with His purpose.
There is a reason He loved us. There is a reason He washed us with His own blood. There is a purpose behind it. He is to take us from our condition, where we were lost and dead in trespasses and sins, and so transform us by that great work that we would enter into His will and enter into His purpose.
This is the third point we want to look at: not only His ways, not only His work, great as it is, but His will. We need to see the will of God.
When we come to this matter of seeing the will of God, we often think of it on the personal level only. Many Christians say, “What is the will of God concerning my life?” There is a point in which that is true. You need to know the will of God concerning your life.
But sometimes—and most of the time; you may think this is an exaggeration, but I have been prone to exaggerate before—most of the time, Christians see the will of God only in relation to their personal life. That is all we see.
Brothers and sisters, that is not what we are talking about. It includes that. It encompasses that. But unless you see there is a greater will, a greater purpose, a greater end, you will always be stuck on what concerns you.
You go to the Christian bookstore—and I do not want to hit Christian bookstores too much, because thank God for the many books the Lord has made available to us and the power in those books—but you go there and you think you are in a self-help club.
It is all about my peace, my love, my health. It is all about me, me, me. To me, that seems to get away from the heart of the matter: His will. Do we see His will?
Now, do not get me wrong. I believe the Lord wonderfully meets every need. I believe that with all my heart. But I think there is a secret that Christians need to discover, and that is to be thinking of something other than themselves.
If our thinking as believers is always concerned around our own sphere and our own world, then, as far as our usefulness in God’s purpose, it will not be very much. God may wonderfully meet you. God may bless people through your life. But what we need to do is see what His purpose is, to see what His will is. It will make all the difference.
I remember riding down Huguenot Road, and I saw a young lady with a bumper sticker that said, “I am the center of the universe.” I thought, “My.” I thought it a few times, but I would not put a bumper sticker on my car.
“I am the center of the universe. Everything is for me. God is for me. All He does is for me. In the end, it is for me.” That is dangerous ground. May God be merciful to us, that we would see Him. It will make a difference.
Let me cite two examples. You will know both of them. One is the Lord Jesus. How much His whole emphasis was concerned with doing the Father’s will. How much that concerned Him from the beginning.
You remember the story when He was twelve years old. His parents had gone on the road home, and the Lord Jesus was not with the family. You can imagine: they did not have a sixty-five-mile-an-hour speedway, and they did not have GPS in their caravan. They had to go back, and it was quite a bit of trouble.
He said, “Knew ye not that I must be in My Father’s house?” Here is One for whom the will of God was everything.
It says prophetically in Psalm 40:7-8, speaking of the Lord Jesus:
Then said I, Lo, I am come;
In the roll of the book it is written of Me:
I delight to do Thy will, O my God;
Yea, Thy law is within My heart.
Not only was He consumed and concerned about the will of God, He delighted to do the will of God. Now, that is quite a bit different.
I do not always delight in doing certain things. Every Sunday night, Linda has to remind me, “Have you taken the trash out?” I never delighted in taking the trash out. But here, our Lord Jesus delighted to do the will of God.
The Lord’s own testimony in John 6:38—this was a verse our brother read to us this morning—was:
For I am come down from heaven,
not to do Mine own will,
but the will of Him that sent Me.
He came from heaven for a singular purpose: not to do His will, but to do the will of Him who sent Him. This was His own testimony.
Not only that, this was His own experience. When you look at the garden of Gethsemane, I do not know if you have meditated much upon it, but, brothers and sisters, I believe there is a place where we can hardly grasp what took place.
One writer said that this is equivalent to what the psalmist said: we are entering into things too wonderful for us. We can never fully contemplate what our Lord Jesus went through in the garden.
I still do not know—I have never had a medical person explain to me—what it meant that great drops of blood fell from His forehead to the ground. I cannot imagine such.
It says that the Lord was distressed and deeply depressed. I have been depressed before. You have probably been depressed. The most joyful of us have been depressed. Here the Lord Jesus said, “My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.”
What was all this about? It was about one thing. When He went to that garden with His own and said, “Tarry ye here, and watch,” He went into that garden and fell upon His knees.
He went into that unspeakable agony, facing the thought that this immaculate One, this sinless One, would have the sin of the whole world come upon Him. He would be made sin.
When He faced that moment, He said:
My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass away from Me:
nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt.
This was His experience. He went back, and these guys did not have a sleep problem—they were asleep. He went into that garden again. That must have been the greatest agony.
He prayed, “My Father, if this cannot pass away, except I drink it, Thy will be done.” Not My will—Your will be done.
Then it says He came back again a third time, and He prayed the same thing. Brothers and sisters, the demonstration of our Lord’s life is that He was caught up and concerned with one thing: it was the will of God.
Now, you might say, “Brother, that is fine. That is the Lord. Bring this down to my level, would you please?” I can understand the Lord. I do not think we can ever understand Gethsemane. I do not think we can ever understand that moment, we who so casually stand.
But when you come to another person, David, you discover the same thing. Turn with me, if you will, to Acts 13. We covered this Friday night in our meeting.
Acts 13 says an extraordinary thing about David in verse 22. It speaks first of Saul being removed, and then says:
Having removed him, He raised up David to be their king;
to whom also He bare witness and said,
I have found David the son of Jesse,
a man after My heart,
who shall do all My will.
“I have found David, a man after My heart, who shall do all My will.” This is what the Holy Spirit said of this man’s life.
You know that part does not occur in the Old Testament: “who shall do all My will.” But here the Holy Spirit gets to the heart of the matter and says, “Who shall do all My will.”
Brothers and sisters, this is what encourages me. If it were just said about the Lord Jesus, I would despair, because I know the Lord Jesus was consumed with doing God’s will and God’s purpose. But here was a man not too different from me.
You may think he was far different from you, brother, but nevertheless, here was a man who was not perfect. Here was a man who sinned grievously, and the Holy Spirit’s record of his life is, “He did all My will.” That gives me hope.
Then when you go on to Acts 13:36—I think some of you know by now this is my favorite verse—it says:
For David, after he had in his own generation served the counsel of God,
fell asleep,
and was laid unto his fathers,
and saw corruption.
The New American Standard says, “For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, fell asleep.” Brothers and sisters, this was a summary of a life. This was the greatest eulogy ever written.
Can you imagine having this on your gravestone? You can say what you want to, but having this on your gravestone would mean something: “He served the will of God in his life. He served the purpose of God in his life.”
Here is a man after God’s own heart—an imperfect man, a flawed man, a man who committed grievous sin, even murder and adultery. He even left his nation out in the battle where he should have been. Yet the summary of his life is that he did all the will of God, and he served the purpose of God in his generation.
I hope I have not put you to sleep. I have one rule: if you fall asleep, do not snore so loudly that you disturb the speaker. That is my only rule. You can sleep, but just do not disturb me, because I have a few more points to make.
This flawed man, this human man, did something extraordinary. The record is clear that his whole life was in serving the purpose and will of God.
Brothers and sisters, I have made that my prayer every day. This has been my plan as I move forward in the day. I am less than perfect, but I say, “Lord, if You will allow me, if You will enable me, I want to serve the purpose of God in my generation.”
I do not necessarily want to be known as a great husband. I would not mind that—Linda might have some things to say about that. I do not want to be known as a great engineer. I do not want to be known by any other thing.
May the Lord help us. This was David’s life, and this should encourage us. All those kings who were judged after David—there is an extraordinary phrase which occurs a number of times: “His heart was not perfect with the Lord his God, as was the heart of David his father.”
It is possible to have a perfect heart and not be perfect. That ought to encourage you. It is possible to have a perfect heart toward God while being flawed. That gives me hope. It is possible to serve the purpose of God in our generation and be human. David did it. This is our hope.
That is all the introductory material I want to bring to you. How is the purpose of God expressed and explained? These are familiar things to many of you, but, brothers and sisters, we need to get a hold of this in our day and generation.
Turn to Ephesians 1. How is the purpose of God expressed? First of all, how is it explained? In Ephesians 1, beginning in verse 9, it says:
Making known unto us the mystery of His will,
according to His good pleasure which He purposed in Him
unto a dispensation of the fulness of the times,
to sum up all things in Christ,
the things in the heavens, and the things upon the earth;
in Him, I say.
Did you notice certain words there? “Making known unto us the mystery of His will,” “which He purposed in Himself.” Brothers and sisters, this is the purpose of God. This is the will of God.
I do not know if you have ever been so caught up in this first chapter of Ephesians, but the beginning of this chapter is one great run-on sentence. It does not seem to ever end. When you look from verse 3 to verse 14, there is a continuum of thought.
The whole thought of God is summed up in this one thing: He has made known to us what His will and purpose are. That will and purpose are to sum up everything in the Lord Jesus. That is the explanation of His purpose.
Then it says some beautiful things. We have an inheritance, and we are to be unto the praise of His glory. In that same section, there is this wonderful explanation of the fullness of the Lord Jesus, everything being summed up in Him.
Then there is this secondary thought: we enter into an inheritance in that very purpose. We enter into joining with God in that very purpose.
Secondly, the purpose of God is expressed in Ephesians 3. I know you have heard this before, but I am not going to let you go before I get to my practical points. I hope this sinks into our hearts.
Ephesians 3:10 says:
To the intent that now unto the principalities and the powers in the heavenly places
might be made known through the church
the manifold wisdom of God,
according to the eternal purpose
which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Notice that similar phrase: “might be made known.” In the first passage, it is “having made known.” In the second expression of God’s purpose, it is “might be made known through the church, through the assembly, the manifold wisdom of God.”
This is the purpose of God expressed. Not only is it explained in that it has everything to do with the Lord Jesus; it is expressed through the church. What an amazing thing.
In the first place, when it speaks of the Lord Jesus, it says, “having made known.” It is a done thing. It is an accomplished work. But when it comes to the church, it says, “might be made known.” Do you see the difference?
Church history has not always held true to the purpose of God. The Lord is always true. So this is the purpose of God explained and expressed. May the Lord help us.
What then is the church? This is a fair question. If the church is to be the vessel through which the eternal purpose of God is to be expressed to the principalities and powers, what then is the church?
You may not think this is an important question, but I think it is a compelling question. What is the church? Is it the organization we see on the corner? Is it a building? Is it the congregation? What is the church?
When we come to our text, I think there is one phrase that gives us real understanding of what the church is: the church is to be a kingdom of priests unto God His Father.
The called-out ones, the gathered ones, the redeemed ones, the chosen ones—they are to be a kingdom of priests unto God.
Let me take you to Peter’s epistle. In 1 Peter 2:5, it says:
Ye also, as living stones, are built up a spiritual house,
to be a holy priesthood,
to offer up spiritual sacrifices,
acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.
This is what the church is: a holy priesthood, a spiritual house. Not only does it tell us what the church is, it tells us what the church does. We are to offer up spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ.
We need to see that we are a holy priesthood. Then, later in the same chapter, 1 Peter 2:9-10 says:
But ye are an elect race,
a royal priesthood,
a holy nation,
a people for God’s own possession,
that ye may show forth the excellencies of Him
who called you out of darkness into His marvellous light.
You are a royal priesthood. The reason this means so much to me is that priesthood is the only thing Peter repeats twice. The other points—a spiritual house, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession—stand alone. But when it came to priesthood, he so understood it to be essential to God’s purpose that he twice said, “You are a priesthood.”
Do you not think that tells us the importance? We are a holy priesthood. We are a royal priesthood. This is what the church is. Brothers and sisters, may the Lord help us to see.
This was God’s thought from the beginning. In the Old Testament, God’s thought was always that there would be a corporate priesthood. It was never His idea that it would be one family in one tribe.
Most of you know the story. When Moses went up the mountain and the people began to rebel, they said, “Aaron, here is the gold from Egypt. Make us a golden calf that we may worship it.”
When they made the calf, they said, “This is thy god, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.” Can you imagine? God Himself was on the mountain fellowshipping with Moses, and they said, “This is our god.”
Moses came down and said, “Who is on the Lord’s side?” The sons of Levi went and stood on the Lord’s side.
From then on in the Old Testament, it was Aaron, his sons, and the sons of Levi who were the priesthood. But, brothers and sisters, that is not God’s full thought. That is not God’s heart.
I love what our brother Stephen said years ago. It has stuck with me ever since. He said, “This is God’s emergency measure.” This is not His heart. His heart is that we would all be priests, every one of us.
Not only that we would all be priests, but that we would all function as priests. This is God’s heart.
The first thing we need to understand, after we see that priesthood is God’s purpose, is the principle of priesthood. What is the principle of priesthood? This is very simple. Even the youngest—even I—could follow this one.
The principle of priesthood is that every believer is a priest. That is the principle. Every believer is a priest. It is not that complicated.
There is one thing, brothers and sisters, for which we stand, and the reason we meet is to proclaim the priesthood of all believers. We proclaim that every brother, every sister, every young person—it does not matter your age—if you are redeemed of the Lord, if you know the Lord Jesus, you are a priest. Every one of you.
It was in the recovery of the Brethren movement in the 1800s that they made a marvelous discovery. They saw the priesthood of all believers. People who had collars, people who were ordinary, people who were highly educated, and people who were not so educated all came together and took no other name but brothers.
What a move of God that still has an effect upon our century. What was recovered—the vital revelation that every believer is a priest—affects the church to this day.
The Lord really needs to open our eyes. There are two extremes. I am not going to pick on anybody, because there is enough blame to go around here. But there is the Catholic system and other liturgical systems that say there is a certain priesthood.
You know who the priests are. There is no mistaking who is a priest, and all of your approach to God comes through the priest. These are the priests; you are the laity. That is one extreme.
I wonder if we do not fall into that extreme. We select certain people as special. But there is an even more subtle error, and I believe it comes closer to home with us Protestants. I am just glad I can say “Protestants.” It is a speech impediment; you will forgive me.
What do we do? We take those who are gifted. We take those who have special calling. We take those whom the Lord has raised up in a certain way and with a certain gifting, and we make those guys the priests.
We may not call them priests. We may not say they are priests, and they may not wear a little collar. But in fact, we make them the spiritual class, and everybody else is the laity. I think this is a huge mistake.
I do not take away for a moment from those who have special callings. If you read Ephesians 4, you see that He gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers. But it says that these are given with a view to the work of the ministry.
They are not the ministry. They are gifts of God to raise up the church. But we are the priests. I hope I am not losing you. This is important revelation, brothers and sisters.
If we do not get this, we are always going to have a special class of people and a congregation. That is not God’s heart. It does not mean everybody speaks. It does not mean everybody is a prophet, a pastor, or a teacher. But it means everybody is a priest.
We have made a select class the spiritual class, and the rest of us are laity. That is a mistake.
There is a word that occurs twice in Revelation: Nicolaitans. I can actually say it in Greek because Alan has helped me. I can even write it in Greek. You should be impressed. I have a little Greek class on Saturday.
What does that mean? There has been a lot of argument about what it means. A lot of people think it goes back to the heresy of the early church, involving Nicholas, one of the seven who served tables—Nicholas, a proselyte of Antioch.
They believe perhaps he got into some error and it entered the church. Let us leave it there; there is argument about that. But there is no argument about this: that word means something.
It means conquering the laity. It means victory over the people. In Revelation 2:15, the Lord says in condemnation, “Thou hast there some that hold the teaching of the Nicolaitans.”
When He speaks to Ephesus in Revelation 2:6, He commends them and says, “But this thou hast, that thou hatest the works of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.”
Brothers and sisters, do not make that error. We are all priests. May the Lord show us this first principle, that we may be those who fulfil our position of priesthood.
Here is a question I think is really important: How did you become a priest? How did you become a priest? Did you go to priest school? Did you get a priest diploma? Do you have a white collar? You may have a white collar; I do not know. You may have one.
How did you become a priest? It says simply that He has made us priests.
It is not that you studied for fifty years, got gray hair, and calluses on your knees, and all of a sudden someone said, “You are a priest. You finally arrived at priesthood.”
You were born a priest. You may have been an infant priest, but you were born a priest. How did you become a priest? He made you a priest.
This is the most essential thing. We need to see that God Himself made us priests and has made us a kingdom of priests unto God His Father.
One of my favorite stories is about Napoleon, the emperor. When his steed was about to get away from him and could have injured the emperor, one lowly soldier jumped in front of the emperor, took control of the horse, and perhaps saved the emperor’s life.
Napoleon said to this lowly private, “Thank you, Captain.” The private was stunned. “I am a private.” The emperor had spoken.
He threw down his weapon, ran to the captain of the guard, and said, “Captain, reporting.” The captain said to him, “Who made you captain?”
Are you a priest? Who made you a priest? Not Napoleon. God Himself. May that be the truth. This is the first principle.
Then we come to the final issue, which is the practice of priesthood. Brothers and sisters, it is not enough just to know that we are priests.
Priests do not just sit around and look at each other and say, “You are a priest.” “Probably a priest.” “How long have you been a priest?” “Well, I have been a priest since priest school.” Not preschool—priest school. Sorry for slurring my words.
They do not just sit around. Priests do something. Priests function. Priests are made for a purpose. Priests do not just get a title. Brothers and sisters, it is never a title; it is always a function.
You are a priest by birth, and you are to function as a priest. Here is the great tragedy in the Christian world: there are many priests—every Christian—but there are not many who function as priests.
We always tend to leave it to the more gifted. Gravity always takes us back to Ephesians 4. We say, “Let the prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, and gifted ones function as priests. The rest of us will just enjoy it.”
But do you know that is not God’s heart?
In the parable of the talents in Matthew 25, one went into a far country and gave one servant five talents, another two talents, and another one talent. He said, “Trade ye herewith till I come.”
When he came back, he went to the one with five talents and said, “What did you do with it?” He said, “I have gained five more.” The master said, “Well done, good and faithful servant. Thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will set thee over many things.”
Then he went to the one who had two, and he said, “What did you do?” He said, “I traded, and I have gained two more talents.” It is interesting: the Lord said the exact same thing to the two.
It does not matter how big your gift is or how small your gift may be. The issue is what you do with it.
The master said to the one with two talents, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant. Thou hast been faithful over a little, I will set thee over much.”
Then he came to the one with one talent and said, “What did you do with it?” He said, “Oh, I knew thee. I know thee. Thou art a hard man, reaping where thou didst not sow. Thou art hard. I buried it in a napkin. Here is thy one talent back.”
It may seem strange to you, the master’s condemnation, but he said, “Thou wicked and slothful servant. Thou oughtest therefore to have put my money to the bankers, and at my coming I should have received back mine own with interest.”
“Take away from him the talent, and give it unto him that hath the ten talents.” Here is the issue: are you a one-talent priest? I am. Most of us are.
What did you do? What do you think the question of the Master will be on that day? Did you function? Were you a priest that was faithful with one talent? Did you function in the house of God? Did you serve?
I told the brothers the other day, when we were fellowshipping, that perhaps in one way we had failed in visitation. Maybe that is true. But the good news is that we do not have just one person, or two or three people, who are in charge of visitation. You are priests.
Do you know that you can go to saints in need and minister the life of the Lord Jesus, and have the greatest impact on their life as a priest? We priests should function.
What should priests do? They should offer spiritual sacrifices to God through Jesus Christ. Do you come Sunday after Sunday for years and never open your mouth?
I was struck when Philip said, “I will be the last one to open my mouth.” Do not be the last one. We are to offer spiritual sacrifices. That is what Peter said priests do.
We are to show forth His excellencies, He who has called us out of darkness into His marvellous light. That is what priests do. Are you doing that? Are you radiating His glory?
Or are you saying, “Stephen will do that. Lance will do that. Dana will do that. Jim will do that. But not me. I am just a one-talent priest.”
The ones who will make the greatest difference in the church are the one-talent priests. Do you see this? I hope this word helps. This has been a burden on my heart.
That we would see this essential revelation of God. It is like a three-legged stool. Do you know what I mean? It is stable. You take a three-legged stool and cut off a leg—you do not sit on it. That is advice to live by.
Take a three-legged stool, cut two legs off, and do not sit on it. But in this threefold revelation, we see who God is, we see what He has done, and we see what His will is.
His ways, His work, and His will.
I am particularly burdened about this matter of priesthood. Saints, I do not believe we are going to grow much in the Lord as an assembly until priests begin to function.
The Lord has been speaking to the brothers lately on Sunday night, I believe, about this matter of passivity and fighting through—coming prepared and taking our place as functioning priests in the house of God.
Some people have a narrow understanding of priesthood. They think it always means going out and serving over there. Over there.
If you look at the Word of God in the Old Testament, priesthood was always associated with the house. A lot of what they did was pretty mundane.
A lot of us think, “Do not worry about that.” Yes, please do. Can you imagine all those priests when they had to wash the cups, pick up the boards, and load up the cart? It was not very glamorous, was it? But the work of God was being done.
Are you willing to serve as a priest? In that day, when that question is asked of you, “What did you do?” what will you say?
Will you be able to say like David, “I served the purpose of God in my generation”?
I remember when I was first brought into the assembly. I did not know what to do. I was twenty years old. Yes, I am only twenty-five or so now, but forgive me.
I did not realize what to do, but I had a sense, of course. I remember the Lord gave me a burden. I made it my aim every Sunday to pick up the chairs. I was the first one. I would not give anybody else that chore.
So we sit back and say, “She will take care of it. He will take care of it.” Is that God’s heart? I do not believe it is.
May the Lord help us to be priests unto His God and Father. Amen.
Lord, as we have laid out these thoughts, we know they are incomplete and imperfect. But, Lord, our whole desire is that You would open our eyes in a greater way.
We believe, and we are thankful, that our life has been touched by the living God. We believe, and we are thankful, that You saved us for a reason, that You loved us for a reason, that You washed us for a reason.
We want to serve You. Let every other occupation be an avocation, and let us serve the Lord in our generation.
Breathe into these words. Speak to our spirit as we wait on You. Amen.