We turned to a number of Scriptures this morning. First, in the Second Letter to the Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 11:2-3:
For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy: for I espoused you to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve in his craftiness, your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity and the purity that is toward Christ.
Then in Revelation 19:4-10:
And the four and twenty elders and the four living creatures fell down and worshipped God that sitteth on the throne, saying, Amen; Hallelujah.
And a voice came forth from the throne, saying, Give praise to our God, all ye His servants, ye that fear Him, the small and the great.
And I heard as it were the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of mighty thunders, saying, Hallelujah: for the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigneth.
Let us rejoice and be exceeding glad, and let us give the glory unto Him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and His wife hath made herself ready.
And it was given unto her that she should array herself in fine linen, bright and pure: for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints.
And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they that are bidden to the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are true words of God.
And I fell down before his feet to worship him. And he saith unto me, See thou do it not: I am a fellow-servant with thee and with thy brethren that hold the testimony of Jesus: worship God; for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.
Revelation 21:9-27 and Revelation 22:1-5:
And there came one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls, who were laden with the seven last plagues; and he spake with me, saying, Come hither, I will show thee the bride, the wife of the Lamb.
And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God.
Her light was like unto a stone most precious, as it were a jasper stone, clear as crystal.
Having a wall great and high; having twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels; and names written thereon, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel.
On the east were three gates; and on the north three gates; and on the south three gates; and on the west three gates.
And the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.
And he that spake with me had for a measure a golden reed to measure the city, and the gates thereof, and the wall thereof.
And the city lieth foursquare, and the length thereof is as great as the breadth: and he measured the city with the reed, twelve thousand furlongs: the length and the breadth and the height thereof are equal.
And he measured the wall thereof, a hundred and forty and four cubits, according to the measure of a man, that is, of an angel.
And the building of the wall thereof was jasper: and the city was pure gold, like unto pure glass.
The foundations of the wall of the city were adorned with all manner of precious stones. The first foundation was jasper; the second, sapphire; the third, chalcedony; the fourth, emerald; the fifth, sardonyx; the sixth, sardius; the seventh, chrysolite; the eighth, beryl; the ninth, topaz; the tenth, chrysoprase; the eleventh, jacinth; the twelfth, amethyst.
And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; each one of the several gates was one pearl: and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.
And I saw no temple therein: for the Lord God the Almighty, and the Lamb, are the temple thereof.
And the city hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine upon it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the lamp thereof is the Lamb.
And the nations shall walk amidst the light thereof: and the kings of the earth bring their glory into it.
And the gates thereof shall in no wise be shut by day, for there shall be no night there: and they shall bring the glory and the honour of the nations into it.
And there shall in no wise enter into it anything unclean, or he that maketh an abomination and a lie: but only they that are written in the Lamb’s book of life.
And he showed me a river of water of life, bright as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the midst of the street thereof.
And on this side of the river and on that was the tree of life, bearing twelve manner of fruits, yielding its fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
And there shall be no curse any more: and the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be therein: and His servants shall serve Him; and they shall see His face; and His name shall be on their foreheads.
And there shall be night no more: and they need no light of lamp, neither light of sun; for the Lord God shall give them light: and they shall reign for ever and ever.
Now, together in prayer.
Father, we come to the end of this conference together. We want to thank You, Lord, for all Your grace and all Your love shown towards us in these days. You have been so faithful, Lord, and we would just give to You all the glory and praise and honour.
And Lord, as we come to this final time this morning, we want once again to stand in that anointing which You have given us through the finished work of our Lord Jesus—that anointing of grace and power. We thank You that it can be a reality both in speaking and in hearing because of the Person of the Holy Spirit.
O heavenly Father, may this time live for every one of us. We pray that we may be delivered from all thoughts concerning the various journeys we must make, or the clearing-up operations that have to take place. Lord, deliver us from all those things, and help us in this hour to hear Your voice and to receive from You.
Lord, illuminate us in such a way that we shall be captured more deeply than ever before for Yourself. We ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus the Messiah. Amen.
It is amazing to me how quickly these conferences go. It always seems such a long time—a whole week, much longer than normal conferences. It seems as if we have such a lot of time and so many sessions, but suddenly it is Saturday, and then Sunday is upon us, and it is over.
I want this morning finally to say something about Christ as our Bridegroom. Of course, that is the most obvious meaning of this word in 2 Corinthians 11:2-3:
For I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy: for I espoused you to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ.
Bridegroom—Christ as our Bridegroom. We have considered Christ as our covering, as our justification, as our atonement. We have considered Christ as the Baptizer in the Holy Spirit and fire, the One who immerses us in the Person of the Holy Spirit and swallows us up in the greatness of the Godhead.
All the time, He is bringing us into living discoveries of His greatness, His beauty, His grace, and His love. It is a marvellous thing to know the Lord Jesus as the Baptizer in the Holy Spirit and fire.
We considered the Lord Jesus as the Head—our Head. Holding fast the Head and discovering the Body; finding one another as we have a living relationship to the Lord Jesus, the Head.
I have no doubt at all that the key to all genuine service and work, as far as God’s kingdom is concerned, is hearing the Lord. It is the ability to hear what the Lord is saying, to hear what the Spirit is saying to the churches at any given time in history.
We have considered Christ as King: King of kings and Lord of lords; King of the Jews; King of Israel; the One who finally is going to come. O, how wonderful it is to consider Jesus as King.
We have all understood, whatever Christian circles we move in, that we have moved into the age of the Spirit, the age of the heavenly, the age of the spiritual. Somehow, psychologically, this can form us to think that the coming again of the Lord Jesus will not be a literal, actual coming.
Now, there is no doubt about it: when the Lord Jesus comes, it is going to be as spiritual as anything in this world. But when the Lord Jesus comes, He is coming back with the body in which He walked on this earth for thirty-three years—His actual body; a colour to His hair, a complexion to His skin, a colour to His eyes.
He is actually coming back with the very marks in His hands, in His feet, and in His side, which He received in the very last part of His earthly life. The Lord Jesus is coming. I find it simply marvellous even to consider it.
It sort of ties everything down. It suddenly wakes one up to the fact that there is going to be a coronation one of these days that will blast any British coronation into the realms of shadows. Your inauguration of the President will not be anything compared with the coronation of the King when He comes back.
I just imagine it: the glory of the pageantry, somehow or other with bands playing—heavenly as well as on earth, I suppose—great standards being carried. I see Abraham walking with Isaac and Jacob, and their wives and children; then all the others all the way down. I see the apostles coming along, and finally the King Himself.
What a marvellous thing it is going to be when He comes. What about you? I just cannot wait for it.
Mr. Sparks always used to say, “Have you ever noticed that when people sing a hymn about the coming of the Lord, however depressed they are, they all rise?” It is as if they cannot help it. Even if they want to be depressed, something happens in their spirit. It is a kind of witness of the Spirit with their spirit that this is as certain and sure as the Word of God itself.
Well, my friends, it is a marvellous thing to consider. The Lord created a heaven and an earth—a universe which has been spoilt and subjected to corruption and sin. But God is going to redeem the actual earth itself and the heavens.
There will be a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. God’s purpose concerning the Jewish people is not just going to be flung away; He is going to redeem it. Something will happen in the nations. His glorious purpose for man is not going to be thrown away in defeat. He is going to have a redeemed man, a new man, joined to the Lord Jesus at the heart of that new creation.
Well now, what about this matter of the Bridegroom? You know, the Bible ends with a wedding. Everybody loves a wedding. People may fear funerals, and they may fear dedications—or christenings, as some would call them—but everybody loves a wedding.
And the Bible ends with a wedding: the wedding of the Lamb and the wife of the Lamb. Now, that wedding is not the end of everything, as if it were an end in itself. A wedding is not an end in itself. It is the close of one phase of life and the beginning of a new phase.
One whole series of experiences has ended for both the husband and the wife, and they are now entering into a new phase, joined together as one. That is really how the Bible ends.
We had it in Revelation 21. Listen to these words:
And I heard a great voice out of the throne, saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He shall dwell with them, and they shall be His peoples, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God: and He shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; and death shall be no more; neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain, any more: the first things are passed away.
And He that sitteth on the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And He saith, Write: for these words are faithful and true.
And He said unto me, They are come to pass. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.
He that overcometh shall inherit these things; and I will be his God, and he shall be My son.
One whole phase has ended: mourning, death, crying, pain—all this parenthesis of sin, all this glorious being brought into the salvation of God. That whole phase is closed. “The first things are passed away. Behold, I make all things new.”
Not just My baby, not just My child, but “he shall be My son.” As we have heard from our brothers through this week, he shall inherit these things because he has grown up. The first phase has passed away. Everything now is at the beginning of a new phase.
We do not even know exactly what is going to happen in the ages to come. We do not know what God is going to do in those ages to come. People have all kinds of questions that they ply servants of the Lord with when they touch on this matter.
They come up afterwards and say, “Could you tell me, will we eat in the ages to come?” As if that matters! I mean, really, does it matter? God has a vested interest in keeping us alive. He has not saved us so that we can fade away in the ages to come. If we do not have actual food of that kind, there will be some other way by which we will be kept alive.
Then they say, “Are we going to recognise each other?” Of course, some folk perhaps do not want to recognise some people—I do not know—but people are always asking, “Will we recognise one another?”
I have a feeling that you and I will intuitively know who is who. I do not think I shall ever have to have Abraham pointed out to me. I think the same with Moses. I shall not get it from one of Michelangelo’s portraits, or whatever else; he may look nothing like Michelangelo’s portrait. But I think inwardly I shall know, “That is Moses.”
I think we will know one another. I think it is even more remarkable: probably they will know you. I do not know whether the saints can see us down here, but if they do, they are very interested. You see, we are all family. Everybody takes an interest in the family. We are all family, really.
Even if we could not recognise each other right at the beginning, I do not think it would take more than a thousand years for us to get to know who is who. But these are ridiculous things. “Will we wear clothes?” people ask me. You would not believe what mature believers ask us—all kinds of things.
Yes, but these are nothing. What I want to know is, what are we going to do? That really does interest me. I wonder what we are going to do, because we are not told.
Some people have the idea that we are going to be forever in a kind of eternal Hallelujah chorus. But, as I said last night, I cannot believe that God is so egocentred that He will be satisfied by an endless, endless Hallelujah chorus. Think of it: there is no night, and it just goes on and on and on! I mean, even the Lord would want the record changed.
People have this idea in those Sunday-school hymns: we are going to be singing, strumming our harps, and floating around on clouds. No wonder people think it might be boring. I do not think so.
God created this universe, and it is so marvellous. Yet it is only a shadow of what He wanted—the merest shadow of what He wanted. What do you think it will be like when the whole thing is released from its bondage to corruption and begins to evolve and progress into what God originally intended? And then I wonder: has God got far greater schemes on foot?
The thing that excites me most of all is that the Bible ends with the wedding. It is as if God is saying, “Do not get your minds all filled with what you are going to be clothed in, what you are going to eat, or whether you will recognise one another. The main thing is to know that you and the Bridegroom are finally one.”
Because that is the heart of the whole matter. Do not get caught up in all the other things. The question is that it will end with a pure virgin being presented to Christ as her one Husband. Then the actual wedding takes place, and the two go out into eternity, as it were, to do the will of God.
If we can get our hearts fixed like that upon that goal, I believe it is going to determine a whole lot of things in our lives. A whole lot of issues are going to be suddenly seen in very clear, stark colours.
It is interesting that this bride, this wife of the Lamb, is described in Revelation 21 and 22 as a city. This city, this holy city, this New Jerusalem, is described in these same chapters as a bride and as a wife.
Because it is the Bible, most of us are somehow acquainted with this extraordinary combination of two matters. But actually, when you consider it, it is a very awkward, very abnormal, very unusual combination.
Have you ever heard anyone describe his wife as a city? I have never, ever heard anyone describe his wife as a city. She may be as large as New York or London, but he has never described her as a city. She may be as thoughtless as some of the great cities of the world, but I have never heard a husband say, “This is my city.”
If it were not in the Bible, it would be ridiculous. No wonder people have not got illumination or understanding of this. They can only consider this city as an actual city, speaking about treading its streets of gold and going through its pearly gates. But the human mind cannot conceive that this city, with its street, walls, and gates, is a bride.
At the end of the Bible, it is as if God has wedded two ultimate truths into one. The bride represents intimacy, union, communion, fellowship—the deepest love known to mankind.
Two people becoming one: sharing the same name, the same life, the same heritage and inheritance, the same future, the same family. There is nothing in the whole of human experience quite as intimate, as deep, as the significance of marriage.
Here, at the end of the Bible, we have this marvellous truth. We find it right back at the beginning of the Bible in Genesis 2. We find it in Genesis 1, when He created man: “male and female created He them.”
But in Genesis 2, we have the whole picture of how Adam could find no helpmeet, no one who corresponded to him. Finally, as we have heard this week, God put him to sleep and took something out of him, out of which He created woman. These two are the same; they are constituents of one life, complementing each other.
In other words, what God is saying in the whole of the Bible is this: “I am not interested in mechanics, or machinery, or knowledge. I am only interested in those who love Me with all the heart.”
“I will save those who do not love Me with all their heart. I will give them an eternal salvation because I love them so much. But no one will ever come to the side of My Son, I am sure, in the full glory of the kingdom to come, who does not love Him with all their love.”
“I will have no bride for My Son who is there for what she gets; there to manipulate Him, there to extract from Him every single thing behind her own fulfilment and glory and well-being. I will not have such a bride for My Son.”
The only ones who will be there will be those who have followed the Lamb whithersoever He goeth. They have laid down their lives for the Lamb. The bride will be there.
The other side is the city. May I add one other thing about this? Is it not interesting—is it fanciful?—that if you take this Bible and more or less open it right in the centre, where do you open it? In the Song of Songs.
Right at the heart of this revelation is this most remarkable little book called the Song of Songs. What is the Song of Songs? It is the story of God’s love for His people and their love for Him: the Bridegroom and the bride.
The Jewish tradition is that Solomon fell into a trance and God gave him a vision of His love for His people, and the love of Israel for Him—for God. I say that because you will see in some commentaries that some go so far as to call the Song of Songs a gaudy ditty. It is a revelation.
The other thing about this city, this bride, this wedding at the end of the Bible, is that it is a city. Now, what is a city—a capital city? This is not just a city; this is a capital city.
A capital city is where normally all the national administration is centred, where all the government is seated. That is the place of government; that is the place of administration; that is the focal point of national or imperial policy.
Here you have another picture. We have a picture of God wanting men and women who are able to govern, able to have dominion, able to reign with Him, able to administer His will, able to work His work.
Go right back to the very beginning of the Bible, and almost the first word that God said to man was, “Have dominion.” Then you go on and find the Garden, and He put man in it as if it were really a kindergarten.
God Himself planted the Garden. The rest of the world was a world of life, a myriad of life. People have the idea that when God created everything, it was all in its place. But why did God say to Adam, “Subdue the earth”?
It was a world of life. You cannot have life without it being a riot. Have you found that out? Fellowships that do not have much life—there is all of them, a graveyard. But as soon as you have got life, you have got a riot. It is bursting out every side, everywhere.
Life, life, life—it has to be pruned, it has to be trained, it has to be disciplined, it has to be kept in order.
This kindergarten into which God put Adam in Eden—I believe His real aim was that, once Adam and Eve had learned how to guard the Garden, to keep the Garden guarded, and to tend it and care for it, they would have added an allotment.
They would have added perhaps half again on one side, then half again on the other side, half again on the north side, and half again on the south side. They would have subdued that and trained it, then gone further to another allotment, until slowly they had won the whole world and turned the world into a garden.
Then God would have said, “Now you have learned the physical. Now we will move into another dimension.” Dominion, dominion, dominion. He wanted them to learn how, in fellowship with Himself, they could rule; how they could learn what His will was and then administer His will.
We come to the end of the Bible and find that this wedding is not only to do with a bride and a wife; it is to do with a capital city. In other words, God has finally achieved the thing that He longed for and wanted when He created men and women: people in fellowship with Him who can understand His heart, understand His mind and will, and are able to do it.
Now, my dear friends, it may be worth my saying something about the ancient Jewish custom of betrothal. Those of you who are Jewish in the audience will not need me probably to say too much about this, because the ancient Jewish customs are well known in Jewish families.
Very often, until only about fifty years ago in good Jewish families, a son was betrothed to a girl almost from birth. Families got together and said, “If you have a daughter, we would like your daughter to marry our son.”
The betrothal was when they were very young. It comes as a great shock to many people to consider the possibility that the Virgin Mary was only thirteen or fourteen when she bore the Lord Jesus. It is a terrible shock to most people. They think of her as at least in her twenties.
But the fact is, no Jewish girl betrothed to a husband would have gone into her late teens without a marriage. They were betrothed when young. That is what was so serious concerning Joseph when he found that Mary was with child.
It was a terrible shock to him, to begin with. It was the Lord who explained everything to him. But it was not that they were actually married; they had not had the wedding. That is why he thought the best thing at the beginning was to put her away quietly.
That did not mean murder, or anything like that. It meant very quietly, without any fuss, that the actual betrothal would be cancelled. Mary’s mother and father would then have had to find somebody prepared to marry her—probably someone whose parents were not wealthy enough to pay a large dowry.
This is because of these ancient customs of betrothal. When a person was betrothed, it was much more than an engagement. You never broke it. The two were absolutely bound—absolutely bound. It was like being married without the marriage.
But then, when the time came, and the bride had grown to the right age, and both sides felt that the son and daughter were ready, the wedding took place, and the marriage.
I hope that helps you in some little way, because here is the wonderful thing: we are all betrothed to the Lord, but the wedding has not taken place yet. The wedding is still ahead. The marriage supper of the Lamb, the marriage feast, is still ahead.
We are betrothed. We are not engaged in the Western manner. We are betrothed in the sense that Paul said, “I have a godly jealousy over you. I have espoused you. I have acted as go-between. I have espoused you that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ.”
Now, if we turn to Philippians 3, I find this testimony of the Apostle Paul one of the most remarkable things in the Bible—certainly one of the most remarkable testimonies in the Bible. Listen to this:
Circumcised the eighth day, of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as touching the law, a Pharisee;
as touching zeal, persecuting the church; as touching the righteousness which is in the law, found blameless.
Howbeit what things were gain to me, these have I counted loss for Christ.
Yea verily, and I count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but refuse, that I may gain Christ.
And be found in Him, not having a righteousness of mine own, even that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith.
That I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, becoming conformed unto His death; if by any means I may attain unto the resurrection from the dead.
Please notice the words, “that I may gain Christ.” Underline them. “That I may gain Christ”—or win Christ—is the actual word. There is no problem in understanding that Christ is God’s gift to us by grace. Yet Paul says, “That I may gain Christ.”
Then notice that he does not say merely “the resurrection of the dead,” but “the resurrection from among the dead.” Literally, it is this: “If by any means available, I may attain unto the out-resurrection from among the dead.”
Then Paul says:
Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect: but I press on, if so be that I may lay hold on that for which also I was laid hold on by Christ Jesus.
Brethren, I count not myself yet to have laid hold: but one thing I do, forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before,
I press on toward the goal unto the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Remember, this apostle had already written the First and Second Thessalonian Letters, the First and Second Corinthian Letters, the Roman Letter, and the Galatian Letter. I would have thought anyone who could write that kind of letter had obtained. I would have thought that anyone who could speak as he did in 2 Corinthians, who had been caught up to the third heaven, had obtained.
But he says, “Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect, but I press on.” That is tremendous when you think of the wealth that Paul has communicated to us. Think of 1 Corinthians 12, 13, and 14; think of Romans 5, 6, 7, and 8. Yet he says, “I do not count myself yet to have laid hold.”
My dear friends, I say this is one of the most remarkable testimonies in the Bible. What is the apostle talking about? What is this prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus?
Literally, it is “the prize of the upward calling of God in Christ Jesus,” or, as some people put it, “the prize of the on-high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Notice: it is in Christ Jesus. The calling is in Christ Jesus. It is an on-high calling in Christ Jesus, and there is a prize of that calling.
What is this? The apostle has opened his heart and drawn aside the veil, and suddenly we are looking in. Here is a man clearer on justification than any other writer of the New Testament. Here is a man who has made the nations understand that everything is of grace and not of our own works. Yet he is talking about winning Christ.
Now, as I have said in many places, this does not sound like good Reformed doctrine. What is the Apostle Paul doing? If we did not believe, as I do, in the absolute inspiration of the Word of God, we might think the apostle slipped here. He did not mean “that I may win Christ,” because we do not win Christ. Christ is God’s unspeakable gift to us. He is given to us by grace.
What is this attaining to resurrection? Everybody is going to attain to resurrection. Even the worst, most betrayed sinners of the world are going to be raised at the last day for the great white throne. There is a resurrection of believers, but we do not attain to it through works. We shall be raised first, and we shall be for ever with the Lord.
What is this special resurrection? I think of Hebrews 11, where it says that some refused deliverance when tortured, looking for a better resurrection.
Now, my friends, I do not want to make this last time heavy, but this is how I see it. Paul felt there was something he could lose, even as a believer. It was not salvation. He felt there was something concerning the Lord Jesus that he could lose, and it was not the Lord Jesus as Saviour.
Maybe put it another way: the Apostle Paul felt there was something he could win. What is the problem? I suggest to you that the prize is Christ as Bridegroom.
I want to be absolutely clear on this, so that nobody goes away saying, “Dear, dear, dear, I never heard a more un-Protestant teaching from a servant of the Lord.” Oh, it is all of God’s grace that the Saviour is given through the grace of God. The Bridegroom is won through the grace of God. It is all grace.
Every single born-again believer is a potential member of the bride. Every single one who is saved by the grace of God is a potential member of the wife of the Lamb. But, my dear friends, your salvation is given to you through the grace of God in our Lord Jesus; it is through your appropriating and exploiting the grace of God that you will win Jesus as Bridegroom.
This is what fired the Apostle Paul’s spirit. It was as if suddenly he saw, “I do not lose my salvation, but I could become a reject. Having preached to others, I myself could become a reject.”
“I count all things but loss, that I may win Christ.” He did not mean, “I am going to try and do every single thing I can to please God, so that in the end He says, ‘Well, maybe I should bring Paul through. He has done so well. Look at the long quiet times he has, look at the fast days he has.’” That is not the way God thinks.
God has given every believer grace. It is what you do with the grace that determines whether you finally become part of the bride. Have you noticed that amazing little clause in Revelation 19: “Blessed are they that are bidden to the marriage supper of the Lamb”?
You cannot be the bride and be invited to the marriage supper as the bride. At a normal supper, you have the bride and bridegroom, and you have those who are bidden. It is such a marvellous thing: even if you are not going to be the bride, there is still a thing to be had. I do not think it is angels. So who are these blessed ones that are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb? It cannot be the bride.
The exploiting and appropriating of the grace of God is the key to everything. It is the key to some of the parables of the Lord Jesus. He told the story of a man going into a far country who took three servants. To one he gave five talents, to one two talents, and to one one talent.
Do you remember the story? The man with the five talents went away and traded them. It sounds terribly commercial. We do not fully understand it, perhaps. But he went away, took the five, and traded them. What did he get? He got ten.
Then the man with two talents went out with his two and traded them. He got four. Now, who was the spiritual one? The one who said, “The grace of God is the grace of God. I will sing about it, read about it, study it, and bury it”?
That is what we do. Then the man came back. He called the three servants for a reckoning. The first said, “You gave me five talents. I traded them.” “Well done, good and faithful servant,” said the master. “I will make you responsible for much more now.”
Then he said, “What about you?” The servant with two talents said, “You gave me two talents. I traded them. I am afraid I did not get ten.” “What did you get?” “Four.” “Well done, good and faithful servant. I will make you responsible for much more in My kingdom.”
Then the third servant said, “Master, I had that talent you gave me. I had it properly wrapped up, in a box, and buried.” “You wicked and slothful servant,” said the master. “Take away from him the one talent that he hath, and give it to the one who had five talents and has turned them into ten.”
We think, “How terrible.” But the point of the parable is simply this: the Lord was talking about what He gives. All of them are given something by the Lord. He gives sufficient grace.
If your calling is a greater calling and you are called to do more, you will have more grace given to you commensurate with your gift and calling. If you have less, you will have less grace. But God always gives sufficient grace for the calling to which He has called you and the ministry He has given to you.
You have absolutely no excuse to bury everything. You can increase what God has given you, so that you have not five but ten, not two but four. Yet many of us have exactly the same grace as when we received it. We have done nothing with it.
To me, this is very, very important: exploiting and appropriating the grace of God. God has given you grace. You cannot just sing about it, study it, or merely remember it and bury it. You have got to exploit it to the full, appropriate it to the full.
This is the apostle’s testimony: “I count all things but loss.” How did the man count everything as loss unless he took hold of the grace of God? No one can suffer for the Lord, sacrifice his life for the Lord, lay down his life for the Lord, or go a way that is difficult and unpopular, and remain uncontaminated and unaffected in his relationship toward the Lord Jesus, unless he learns to take hold of the grace of God to the full every day, every hour of every day.
O, my friends, God does not call us to something impossible. It is not as if He says, “Now, if you want the Bridegroom, I want you to tie yourself in knots. I want you to get into such strain and strength.” This is religion.
God has given us grace. Why did He save us? He saved us that we might become the bride—the wife of the Lamb. That is why He saved us. Do you think God has a wasted interest in you not becoming part of the bride? Of course not. He has given every single bit of grace you and I need to become part of the bride.
What are the qualities the Bridegroom looks for in the bride? Some of you have heard a lot of this, I know, but I want to dwell on this matter and then finally conclude with one last thought.
I think the first quality the Bridegroom looks for in the one betrothed to Him, if she is finally to come to the wedding, is love—first, last, and all between.
Do you imagine that any bridegroom would take some interest in a bride who did not love him? That is asking for revolt. We are looking for the quality of absolute, devotional loyalty—actual, complete love.
First, last, and all in between. Nothing else will satisfy Him about you. You can have all faith to move mountains; it does not impress Him. I want to tell you something: you can move mountains—it is no big deal.
I wish some people actually did move a few more. But the fact is, as far as God is concerned, moving mountains is no big deal. People just do not use the faith God has given them. They do not have faith as a grain of mustard seed to move a mountain; they have to have faith as big as a mountain to move a mountain.
You can have such faith, but it does not impress God. It does not impress the Lord Jesus. You can have money, a better ministry, and hold forth about deeper truth—about the deep things of the Spirit. It does not impress Him.
He wants you to have knowledge, full knowledge, but that is not the thing that impresses the Bridegroom. You could sacrifice yourself, give your body to be burned, and give all your goods to feed the poor. It does not impress the Bridegroom if there is no love.
The one quality that must lie behind all the faith, knowledge, and sacrifice is love. That is the only quality, finally, that the Bridegroom looks for: a total, actual love that will lead to lifelong devotion to Him.
You will know where He goes. You will share His burden. You will follow His footsteps. Do not tell me that anything else will take you the whole way other than the love of God shed abroad in your heart.
No wonder John said, “Little children, keep yourselves in the love of God.” I suppose we could put it in modern colloquial language: keep yourself in love with God.
And, by the way, to those who are great feminists here: do I have to say anything about the Bridegroom Himself, about the love of the Lord Jesus Christ? His love for you is absolute. He has risked everything, as it were, and His commitment to you is loyal, faithful, absolute, and unconditional.
The second quality that the Bridegroom looks for in the bride is character. This is where I feel Christendom has fallen flat on its face—certainly Protestant Christendom. You would not think that we need to grow up at all in the Lord. We are just saying, “Convert—that is all. Everything—that is all that matters.”
Can you imagine it? The Bridegroom is King of kings and Lord of lords, and He is going to marry somebody who is immature, who cannot understand Him, who is insensitive, self-centred, and self-seeking.
She is saved, but she does not know how to read His heart. She does not know how to sense what He desires. She has no idea how to manage the things of the household. She does not know anything of the cost that brought her into the relationship. She is an empty head.
In the Song of Songs, at the end of it, when the bridegroom and bride are together, the bride turns to the bridegroom and says, “What shall we do for my little sister? She has not grown up.” Remember the story?
My dear friends, there can be no wedding unless there is some kind of work done in one’s character. There are three things that make this bride, this city: gold, precious stones, and pearl.
The gold represents the life and nature of Jesus. But it is not just the life and nature of Jesus; it is the life and nature of Jesus in you and in me. Jesus said to the church at Laodicea, “I counsel thee to buy of Me gold refined by fire.” What did He mean? It is all by grace, but at the cost of experience.
“My grace makes available the gold of My life and nature, but the cost is your experience.” It will not come cheaply into your life. We will come to circumstances and situations where the gold of the life and nature of the Lord Jesus is made a reality in us, and the dross, wood, and stubble of our own superficial nature are burnt out.
I cannot imagine that the most beautiful bridegroom would want to marry an ugly bride. Even if it were not physical beauty, surely he would look for beauty of character and personality.
Precious stones are formed by intense pressure and heat in the dark places of the earth. I believe that the precious stones represent the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings. Put it another way: they represent the excellencies and beauty of the Lord Jesus worked out when we share His sufferings.
My dear friends, so few of us want to know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings. We are all for the power, all for the riches, all for the life, but we do not want the fellowship of His sufferings.
This precious stone, out of which this city—the bride—is produced, is the excellency and beauty of the Lord Jesus. I have to be careful, but I have met some very ugly people who are saved by the grace of God. They cannot help their physical appearance, but my word, what a wonderful thing happens when God begins to burn the beauties, glories, and excellencies of the Lord Jesus into a life.
It radiates out of the person. It makes them beautiful.
The gates were pearl. Of course, you have all heard that a pearl is made out of a bit of worthless grit. A little bit of worthless stone or grit falls into the softest part of the oyster shell. Then all the life of the oyster is mobilised, and it puts a coat round the grit to try to get rid of it—then another coat, and another coat, and another coat.
Lo and behold, a pearl is produced—a pearl of wondrous beauty. No one would know that at the heart of that pearl is a worthless bit of grit.
That is what I call the inexplicable and exceptional suffering that God calls some of His saints to endure. The Apostle Paul spoke of it as that stake, that thorn in the flesh. Someone has described it as like the agony of an impalement.
There come into the lives of people, into the lives of believers, inexplicable things that no deliverance ministry will ever deliver them from. No amount of experience of the resurrection life and power of Jesus will ever expel it. It is a stake given by God, a messenger of Satan, to break and weaken.
And lo and behold, there is a worthless bit of grit at the heart of that servant of the Lord’s life, but all the life and grace of Jesus are mobilised in that life to coat the grit with beauty again and again.
“My grace is sufficient for thee.” And so a pearl is produced. Now, my dear friend, that is character. What does the Bridegroom look for in the bride? He looks for character. He looks for beauty.
Then maturity. I have already mentioned this, but I want to underline it. This word “maturity” in the New Testament is the word “perfect,” and actually in the Greek it means complete or fully developed.
How can anyone be married and fulfil all the responsibilities of marriage if they have not come to maturity? Physical maturity is the minimum requirement.
Those who go on to full growth—those are the ones. The apostle says in his testimony, “I do not count myself yet to have obtained, yet to have laid hold; but I press on. Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal unto the prize of the on-high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”
Growing up, my dear friends. You surely do not think that the Lord Jesus wants a queen who is immature? Do you really believe that He wants His throne shared by someone who cannot understand, who is insensitive, self-centred, and self-seeking?
No. The wife of the Lamb must be like the Lamb. He wants somebody who has grown up, someone who has capacity and ability, somebody with a capacity to share with Him in the burdens and responsibilities of the kingdom—someone who has the ability to shoulder those responsibilities and burdens.
I think this is why God puts some of us, when we say, “Lord, I will go the whole way,” into some very strange situations and circumstances, and with some very strange people. I think the Lord is stretching our capacity. He is enlarging our capacity.
He cannot do it any other way than by putting you into a situation that is too much for you. So you cry to the Lord. You think it is awful, but you take His grace and you come through. Then a month later you are back to square one, and you cry to the Lord again, and He brings you through.
You wonder, “What kind of life is this?” But do you know what the Lord is doing? He is extending and enlarging your capacity. He is creating an ability in you. He has a future in view.
Lastly, what are the qualities of life He looks for in the bride? I do not know whether this would normally be so among young women, but it is certainly true in a royal house. He looks for character, capacity, and ability to govern.
In the old days, they were very careful about choosing a queen. She had to have the right pedigree and the right match between royal houses. But much more important, she had to be someone able to produce an heir to that royal house who had intelligence, character, and quality.
You in America, being a good old republic, perhaps do not understand the practical thing of royal houses. For you, it is past history. But most of European history, and much of the history of the world, was built on matching royal houses and producing intelligence, quality, ability, and heirs to royal lands.
It was not one of these Hollywood things, where some prince saw a gorgeous Hollywood-style princess and decided he should marry her. That was not the way it was done, unfortunately for them. Their brides were chosen, generally speaking, very carefully.
Putting it into another dimension altogether, the Lord Jesus is looking for someone with the ability to govern. I think it is tremendous. Do you know what He is looking for? Someone who can understand Him.
There can be no real government if you do not understand the Lord. People think government is just authoritarianism. It is nonsense. Government begins with an understanding of the Lord, a full knowing, a deep knowing of the Lord.
He wants an ability to hear what He is saying. Some people hear words, but they do not hear what is being said. When the Lord begins to work in us, He wants us not merely to hear words; He wants us to hear what He is saying.
Then there is more than simply understanding the Lord and knowing the Lord. There is understanding His will—not only hearing what He is saying, but obedience.
The Bridegroom is looking for a bride who will move out into government—government with Him. What can we say in conclusion?
The prize is the Bridegroom. It is to know the Lord Jesus as Bridegroom, to lie at the heart of the Bridegroom—the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
My dear friends, I do not think anyone will ever be prepared for the discipline, the affliction, or the exceptional circumstances and situations into which we are brought unless we have caught a vision of the end.
Of course, the only thing that will make up for everything is that when the wedding comes and the marriage supper takes place, the bride will not spend her whole time talking about how much she sacrificed, how much she went through, all the afflictions and tribulations, the pimples that had to be got rid of, the bad complexion, and this and that.
I think that in that glorious wedding day, all the bride will be able to say is, “It was the grace of God that saved me, the grace of God that kept me, and the grace of God that enabled me to come right through to this day.”
She will be so taken up with the Bridegroom. What a future we have as well! And what room there is now for the Holy Spirit to be able to do a work in our relationship one to another, in our places of work, in our whole family life, in our personal lives, and in our personal circumstances and situations.
O, how gracious the Holy Spirit is. You know, almost the very last word of the Bible is this, in Revelation 22:17:
And the Spirit and the bride say, Come.
I hope every one of us, by the grace of God and in the power of the Holy Spirit, will be able to respond and say, “Even so, come.”