In the second chapter of Philippians there is a very simple passage that is often overlooked. It illustrates the attitude of ministries toward one another, and the attitude of the flock toward the ministries and their shepherds. I rejoice in the reality of what is coming forth among the people. When we come together, we are delighted with one another. None of us has a big point to prove. We don’t feel inadequate and in need of assuring ourselves, nor do we care about a place. We don’t care in what direction the Lord leads this Walk next year because none of us has anything to lose. We have everything to gain in following on with the Lord. We can’t lose anything because whatever the Lord has established cannot be taken away by man; therefore we don’t have to protect it. God has taken care of that.
There is no competition among the people because God has created unity in the Body dependent upon the diversity of the ministry of each member. If we were all hands, there would be rivalry; if we were all feet, the Body would be competitive. The unique, distinctive characteristic and function of each member assures the unity of the Body, and this unity did not result from conformity. This is where many denominations missed out. They agreed on doctrines, mode of worship, rule of conduct, behavior, and rituals; and when they all conformed, they had nothing. Unity in the Body is a result of diversity. I think it is good for the people to express themselves in different ways. We should constantly be tested by the creative truth that we are to be different. Let some wear beards and long hair; let others be shaved and wear short hair. Whatever is done, let us all accept one another in the unity of the Spirit.
Ephesians 4:3 talks about a unity of the Spirit before it talks about the unity of the faith. The unity of the faith is yet to come because the total faith is yet to be restored. We are contending for the faith that was once delivered to the saints (Jude 3). And while we contend for it in one heart, in one spirit, standing together, we prevail in the unity of the Spirit long before we arrive at any great unity of the faith. Therefore we have to be prepared to accept diversity of thinking and manifestation as long as it is true to the Word of God and to the revelation of the Walk. We love one another and are kind to each other.
Our Scripture is Philippians 2:17–30. But even if I am being poured out as a drink offering upon the sacrifice and service of your faith, I rejoice and share my joy with you all. In Philippians 4:1, Paul writes: Therefore, my beloved brethren whom I long to see, my joy and crown, so stand firm in the Lord, my beloved. These people had a joy in one another.
A father ministry looks upon his people and says, “These are my joy.” It is hard to express this because sometimes they can be a big pain in the neck, but usually they are your joy. It is something that God has given you that cannot be explained satisfactorily. You may have attained great accomplishment in other fields, but nothing equals the joy you have in the people of the Lord. I have found myself looking over people and feeling such a joy. It is a joy to me just to see them, so I understand what Paul was saying.
And you too, I urge you, rejoice in the same way and share your joy with me. There is an amazing difference in the sharing of joy and that of sorrow. Whenever someone shares a sorrow with you—your sorrow or theirs—it diminishes. But whenever someone shares the joy of the Lord with you, it multiplies the joy at both ends. Some things are joyful and have to be shared. And so, when you share them, the other person is blessed and you are twice blessed.
When Paul said, I urge you, rejoice in the same way and share your joy with me, he was talking about the reactions of ministries to the people, and the reactions of the people to the ministries. He clearly laid out his own reaction to the people when he said, “You are my joy. Oh, I rejoice in you.”
Then he talks about Timothy, But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly, so that I also may be encouraged when I learn of your condition. For I have no one else of kindred spirit who will genuinely be concerned for your welfare. For they all seek after their own interests, not those of Christ Jesus. Do you understand what he meant when he said he didn’t have any ministers? People looking after their own interests was a condition that existed in the early church as well as in the present-day church. One thing about the Walk is that there are no professionals among the ministers. A few of them are supported by their congregations, but most of them work, getting by with very little income. They are not looking after their own interests; they are looking after the interests that belong to Christ. When you do that, it is amazing how the Lord seems to look after your interests.
But you know of his proven worth that he served with me in the furtherance of the gospel like a child serving his father. Therefore I hope to send him immediately, as soon as I see how things go with me; and I trust in the Lord that I myself also shall be coming shortly. You see the reaction Paul had to Timothy. He could send him into a situation because he knew the motivation of Timothy’s heart where the people were concerned.
This is the difference, really, between old order and new order. You would have had to minister a great many years to realize that many ministers today are sincere men; but they are frustrated, unable to relate to the people, unable to relate to the Lord in His calling upon their lives, unable to take a true gift from God and use it wisely. Instead, they use some ulterior or selfish motivation. This Walk is the best thing that has come along, and by the grace of God and with fasting and prayer, if necessary, we will keep it clean and pure because there is even a greater purity that God can bring about in it. There is such a carefulness developing in the ministries. How many Timothys is God raising up in this Walk? how many young apostles—and some not so young—are able to relate to the people and love them and care for them so that everything is done for Christ’s welfare?
But I thought it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother and fellow-worker and fellow-soldier, who is also your messenger (the margin reads “apostle”) and minister to my need; because he was longing for you all and was distressed because you had heard that he was sick. That bothered Epaphroditus. The people had heard that he was sick and he didn’t want them to worry about him. The early church had a sensitivity that we must develop in this Walk. I believe they were so sensitive that they wept together over the same problems. But I believe that they also had the hide of a rhinoceros. The world and the devil could come against them and they would stand and slug it out, but they were very tender toward one another. Wouldn’t you like to see more of that today?
When I came into this Walk, I died every day, not in the sense that Paul did when he said, “I die daily” (1 Corinthians 15:31). It was just that I could hardly handle the fact that I was so sensitive to criticism. However, the Lord knew how to correct that problem. Now I am very sensitive to the people, but I’m not sensitive about what anyone says. Your defense must be such that persecution only makes you rejoice. The one thing that really used to bother me was when someone lied about me. Then one day I woke up to this fact: So they’re telling some terrible lies about me. What if they really knew the truth about my heart all these years—how unworthy I really am. They wouldn’t tell those little lies about me; they would come right out with the truth: “he’s unworthy; he’s not fit to be in the place he’s in.” Then I would be stuck—they would be telling the truth about me. But now I have a way of rejoicing when they say all manner of evil against me falsely (Matthew 5:11). I can rejoice and be exceedingly glad.
Epaphroditus was a good man and a good apostle. When he was ministering to Paul, he said he was longing after the people. For indeed he was sick to the point of death, but God had mercy on him, and not on him only but also on me, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. Therefore I have sent him all the more eagerly in order that when you see him again you may rejoice and I may be less concerned about you. Therefore receive him in the Lord with all joy, and hold men like him in high regard; because he came close to death for the work of Christ, risking his life to complete what was deficient in your service to me.
Paul said, “Receive him with all joy.” That’s what this message is about—all joy. There is a joy that comes in the presence of the Lord. In His presence is fullness of joy (Psalm 16:11). Isaiah prophesied a joy which is going to be a reality for us in this hour. This is one of the most important and significant prophecies for this day in which we are living. And the ransomed of the Lord will return, and come with joyful shouting to Zion, with everlasting joy upon their heads. They will find gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away. Isaiah 13:10.
You are going to face many problems when you come into this Walk with God. The Lord constantly puts you in a corner. Day by day you are aware of becoming more and more unhappy. Am I trying to talk you out of this Walk? No. I’m going to talk you into it even more. Don’t fail to get the point of this message. What made Paul go through all of those beatings and humiliations, those unhappy circumstances—unhappy according to human judgment. Why did he sing so many songs and why was he so happy in the Philippian jail? Was he some kind of kook? Was that the way he got his kicks, by being beaten? No, there was something more. Paul had an inner resource that was not based on the human sources of joy.
Let me point something out to you. We are living in an overlapping of ages. If you have experienced great joy over anything on a human level, you will begin to find that joy diminishing. You will find that suddenly you have problems with your family. “Oh, my family was a joy and a delight to me. Now everything is miserable confusion.” You see, God has to bring an end to the human level because it is vulnerable. When you seek the Lord, He will restore your relationship on a joyful plane that is in Him. A husband and wife may love each other on a human level, but they had better transfer that love into the joy of the Lord because there will be tests on that marriage with which the human level will not be able to cope.
We will all be tested, so the design is to have everlasting joy. Everlasting joy does not fade. It is sustained joy. What does everlasting mean? It means a long time—longer than a week at least. Everlasting joy is going to be upon their heads. This is the only way that people will make it through the period that the Bible calls “the time of great sorrows.” Without this joy, you won’t make it. You ask, “What shall we do?” Just begin to appropriate the joy of the Lord. Galatians 5:22 lists the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace.…”
Notice that joy is right up there at the top of the list. The joy of the Lord is your strength. It sustains you. In the days of Nehemiah, during the keeping of the Feast of Tabernacles, the law was read to the people all day long. They wept and cried and Nehemiah said to them, “Stop it! You are not to mourn. The joy of the Lord will be your strength” (Nehemiah 8:9–10).
There is something that is one step beyond repentance. After you have repented, take another step and appropriate the joy of the Lord. How many times, for lack of real joy when you were in a corner, did you get so harassed that you blew it? You say, “Yes, there was lust in my heart; there was anger in my heart; there was bitterness in my heart and that’s why I did what I did.” Did you repent of it? “Yes, I repented.” Did God forgive you? “Yes, God forgave me.” Now, let’s ask the next question. Are you happy? “Well, some of the same factors that made me unhappy before are still there.” Then you could do it again. Whatever you did wrong, you can do it again because the same contributing factors are still there and you don’t have anything in yourself to meet the problem the next time either. It is not enough to be forgiven, for the Lord can forgive easily. It is important that you do not let your heart be a vacuum. Fill it with the joy of the Lord.
You have a requirement to go in and possess the joy of the Lord. In the relationships within the church, this is very important. The ministers come to the place where they don’t just put up with their congregations; their congregations are a joy of the Lord to them. And the people come to the place where they are not just enduring their pastor; that pastor is a joy to them. Paul told the Philippians, “You are my crown and my joy.” Seek the joy of the Lord so that no one will be able to discourage you. No one will be able to put you down because you will have the joy of the Lord that will sustain you every day of your life. Everlasting joy shall be upon your heads (Isaiah 35:10).
I have found that many definite endowments of the Spirit seem to come and go at times. When I first came into the Walk, I entered into a rest that was unbelievable. But at times I would lose it and have to seek it again. I had times that I walked in this joy. But I will tell you one thing: it is not God’s perfect will for these endowments to come and go. Let us believe to move into the joy until it is an everlasting joy that crowns us. Enter into a rest and cease from your labors. Enter into that joy of the Lord.
Sometimes I think that prayer over circumstances is like praying, “Lord, help us to build the third story of this house,” when you haven’t put a good foundation under it. You can’t get up that high until you have built the first and second stories. When we ask the Lord to deliver us out of our circumstances, we really should pray, “Lord, let the joy of the Lord come to sustain us.” If any situation or condition can cause a heaviness and discouragement to your spirit, you have not entered into the joy of the Lord, and I believe God will not remove the circumstance until you pursue His joy.
Let us strive to get out of the human level and stop reacting as a human being and start reacting as a son of God. Enter into that appropriation of “all joy.” Persecutions require that you have this joy. Various situations of harassment may arise—from a foreman at work, a teacher at school, or some other source. Before you begin to pray against the situation or ask to be delivered out of it, first pray about your reaction to it. God has brought the harassment to show you some need in your life. When you overcome that, then the joy of the Lord comes and everything else is all right.