We have received much scriptural teaching on our relating and communicating with one another. The question is, “How close do we get? How close can we be to one another?” We realize that this is a very scriptural question.
We read in Matthew 20:20–21, Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to Him with her sons, bowing down, and making a request of Him. And He said to her, “What do you wish?” She said to Him, “Command that in Your kingdom these two sons of mine may sit, one on Your right and one on Your left.”
People were conscious that Jesus could have an inner circle of disciples, and they wanted to be in it. And it did appear as if James and John were in line for that. Peter, James and John were the three who always seemed to be closest to the Lord (Matthew 17:1; 26:37; Mark 5:37).
So the question was, of course, “Can they sit on Your right hand and on Your left in Your Kingdom?” The questions today are voiced the same way, and problems come up as a result.
Jesus gave the answer: … “You do not know what you are asking for. Are you able to drink the cup that I am about to drink?” They said to Him, “We are able.” He said to them, “My cup you shall drink; but to sit on My right and on My left, this is not Mine to give, but it is for those for whom it has been prepared by My Father.” Matthew 20:22–23. When the other ten disciples heard this, they became furious. They were indignant at the sons of Zebedee. Of course, there are other instances in the Gospels where the disciples argued over who was going to be the greatest in the Kingdom (Luke 9:46; 22:24).
Then the Lord told the disciples, “And whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave, just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:27–28. This incident becomes most interesting when we compare it with its counterpart today. I have seen so many couples who want a special relationship. Sometimes this has caused them a great deal of trouble. People may serve at a time when their shepherd has a real need, and they may serve him in some way that practically saves his life. Afterwards, they want to feel that they are a part of some inner circle, and that they always will be something special to him; and in truth they always will be.
There is always a danger of people becoming an inner clique. We have worked against that, as well as we could; and there have been numerous instances where only compassion, understanding and carefulness have prevented people from actually abandoning their serving God completely because they were looking for a special place which did not exist. They had interpreted all their prophecies, all their revelations, and all the sermons they had heard to mean that they would have the fulfillment of God’s will within some special relationship that they wanted.
Sometimes wives are more guilty than anyone else in being ambitious for their husbands and for a place; and they become disturbed if it does not develop. Sometimes a wife is guilty of manipulating and maneuvering in order to see that her husband, or the two of them together, can become very close to a leader. At times I have even seen that which was very un-Christlike in cutting off other people who seemed to be a threat or a rival to that place.
Husbands and wives should not try to manipulate or maneuver one another. A woman should not be related to her husband primarily for the purpose of becoming someone who is very important through her association with him. If this problem develops, usually the best answer is this: let the husband find the leading of the Lord with confirmation outside of his wife, and let her find a ministry and guidance and find her confirmation from some other source. In this way the two of them learn to relate to the whole Body, instead of being a private unit reaching for a place.
Learn to walk with God, for if we don’t learn to walk with Him, we cannot be a blessing to one another. We will always be looking for some special reward or place with someone; this we really cannot do, and still find that doing the will of the Lord is enough for us.
This is so important. Sooner or later, people become disgruntled because of those whom they think are an inner circle. And sooner or later those who thought they were an inner circle find out that there is no such thing, and they become quite depressed and disillusioned over it. For some, it takes quite awhile to recover from that. I have seen people start to work in the Word, in a job which meant that they would work close to me, and think, “Now I will be on the inner circle of things.” They soon discovered that they received little of my personal attention. They certainly were not privileged people. They were ordained and called by God and commissioned to do a great work, and it is very important. But it is not a preeminent position or a social level that they attain to—it is just a chosen place of labor in the Lord.
We strive to attain that oneness in our relationship. When people have reached for a special place and a closeness to me, there has always been good in what they were reaching for. Never was it a bad thing. But the problem was that it always fell short of the very best relationship, and sooner or later the Lord would deal with the relationship to bring it up to the higher level. It is very important for us all to understand this. People have accused me of being taken in, of not understanding that certain ones are trying to win a special place. Sometimes there are great needs in the ministry which certain people have a special anointing to fulfill. For example, one brother, in all of his problems, may become a very expert expediter for the recording, publishing, and printing of the Living Word. This does not mean that there is an inner circle and that he has a special place; it means that there is a special need which he has an anointing to meet. If the need is temporary, God may move him on to something else, for we are all His bond servants.
In Acts chapter 8, we see that Philip went down to Samaria because there was a special need. He met it, and then he went on down the road to the next service that God had for him, which was to the Ethiopian who was reading the scroll of Isaiah. From this one Ethiopian, the Coptic church developed and endured through the centuries. It was a fantastic thing. Do you think that seeing this Ethiopian converted and baptized was every bit as important as seeing the entire city of Samaria turn to Christ and be healed and delivered of demon possession? (Acts 8:5–8, 26–39.)
If we are truly led by the Lord, we are not looking for a position that seems more important than another. We are looking for that important thing God wants done, and we are saying as did Isaiah, “Here am I, Lord. Send me” (Isaiah 6:8).
We could say, “We ought to have a book written on how we are to relate to one another,” and we do need that. But above everything else, we just need to love and be open and honest with one another, and not be so sensitive that we are easily hurt. You realize that you can love everyone, and that you will not reject anyone. You understand them—you are not going to turn someone away because he has a problem or two. It dawns on you that they are seeing you in the same way, and you realize, “All of these people that I understand are coming to know me—I am coming to be known, even as they also are known to me.” When I was a child, I used to speak as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I shall know fully just as I also have been fully known. I Corinthians 13:11–12. There does not seem to be any partiality in revelation, does there?
Through all the times God has been leading us, the main thing He has taught us is that we are all in an equal position in His sight. We differ from one another only by virtue of His use of us. We submit ourselves to the Lord to be close to Him; but all other relationships come about as it pleases Him. And as it pleases Him we will be set into the Body, just as He wants us to be (I Corinthians 12:18).
God is not going to allow you to have a special relationship with me, or any other ministry of authority, that could destroy you because you feel as though you have some special position or a special “inside track.” God is not going to allow us to possess one another in any way except in the will of God; and then we do possess one another in a true way (II Corinthians 8:5). But we do not possess one another for a position of partiality. We are to have the same care, one for another; and if there is one who seems to have lack, upon him the Lord bestows the more abundant honor, that there be no schism—which is exactly what a special relationship becomes (I Corinthians 12:23–25). When two or more people are drawn together, and their bond is their mutual usefulness to the Lord, it can be taken to the point where they become a special clique instead of just good true yokefellows together.
As far as the social level is concerned, God is moving so that we relate almost at arm’s length from each other. It is good for us to remember this. A bond can be created by our going through the work of the cross together and having a deep work done in our spirits, so that we feel like comrades in arms; we are old buddies. Nevertheless the Word of the Lord may come that sends us in different directions. Then all that we have been anticipating in our close comrade spirit seems to be gone. Actually, it is not gone. God has a way of refining even the best relationship we can imagine and bringing it up into something beyond what we can even understand at the present time (II Corinthians 4:17–18). This does not mean that we learn to love one another and be close, and then draw back from one another. That is not to be. We simply realize that we cannot have a selfish or personal wish of what we are to be to one another. We do not realize how much input we have upon one another’s lives, and how carefully we ought to reach into what we can really be in Christ to one another.
This is a great truth, and it is to be a great revelation to our hearts. Do we realize, first of all, what others have made us? If it is good, it is because it has been in the will of God. All relationships are such that you have to say of yourself, “I am in a sense what others have made me.” A husband may jokingly say, “I am what my wife made me”; but he also may be restricted by what his wife has made him. She, too, may be suppressed by what he has made her.
Second, we begin to realize what each one of us has made others. Let us observe not only what other people have made us, but what we have made others too. We should seriously consider the fact that in a home, the children are a product to a great extent of what their parents have made them, and of what their friends around them have made them. We ought to weigh very carefully the influence that we have upon one another.
Third, we begin to realize what others have done to each other. Sometimes the wounds don’t heal, and the scars never go away. But there can also be an input in a person’s life that leaves him with a perpetual glow. He is made richer, he is made closer to God in his walk by what others have done. Oh, what we have done to one another, and what we can in faith do to one another!
Fourth, do we realize what God has made us? This is very difficult for us to see. Sometimes we become a little discouraged with ourselves because we look more at what is yet to be completed and we fail to see what wonderful things God has already done to us. Because He received us as His sons, He chastened us (Hebrews 12:6). And when you really take a look, you realize, “Yes, the Lord has done a pretty good job on me; I have come a long way.” Well, look around you; then you will begin to see the fifth point: what God has also done to others, as well as yourself.
Sixth, when we realize what God desires to make us, we have one of the greatest realizations of all. Yet there is perhaps a greater.
Seventh, and possibly the greatest revelation comes when we realize what God wants to make other people. We can then begin to cooperate with determined faith for the great purposes and the callings of God.
We do not know all the inputs into one another’s lives, or even into our own. But we know that we become the product of all the input that comes from God, from our brothers and sisters, from our family, our husband or wife and our children, from the Body: All of it adds up to the sum total of what we are. We realize that we could be a lot more if we all were careful about the way we believe to help one another, and the way we believe to be close to one another, but only in His perfect will, and in a relationship that He wants.
One of the problems of a hierarchy, or of organized religion, is that there is always the first great “in crowd.” On a lower rank is a second level of the “in crowd.” Then somewhere farther down the line is a third level of the “in crowd” again. Almost every group that specializes in qualifications for membership does so to be a little more exclusive. People think that they have to be or join something special, and then they are the “in” people—that has a pharisaic ring to it, doesn’t it? God is dealing with this through the destruction of position. Until we begin to relate to the callings and the commissions of God over not only ourselves, but our brothers, we will still think in terms of various levels of position. But there at the foot of the cross the ground is all level. Only the humble cross is to be exalted. But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. Galatians 6:14.
There are no levels in the Kingdom. God will bring us all to a place of devastation that will destroy any concept of position in our minds. When the Bible speaks about the mountains being brought low and the valleys being filled (Isaiah 40:4), it means that we will all be standing on level ground. There will be no men on the mountain top and no men in the valleys, if every mountain is brought low and every valley is filled, and He alone is exalted in that day (Isaiah 2:11, 17). This is revolutionary; it is destructive to the false human evaluations of life. Every one of us has been raised in a world where someone is vying for preeminence. It is a power trip to see who can dominate one another. Husbands and wives, parents and children, family against family, elders and people vying for position, pastors and prophets, prophets and elders, prophets and apostles—everyone in the past has had a measure of striving or at least looking for that place and position. But the only thing which will bring to us that place of blessing next to Christ is that we will be “able to drink of the cup” that He drinks, just as James and John were told. He said, “Yes, they will drink the cup, but it is still going to be My Father who gives them the place” (Matthew 20:20–23).
This can be a very profitable message for us, for there is something very simple in it. If you have found yourself wanting to be a little ambitious for a special place in the inner crowd, forget it; there is no such thing. But if there is, and you attain to it, you will soon find that it is a lesser relationship than God really intended for us to have together. This is what Satan throws up to us: “Why, you will be as God!” (Genesis 3:5.) We can be tempted to the sin of ambition, to the sin of greed, to seek possessions, or a special place with special people, and all of it is the old, old temptation. Take up your cross and follow Him (Matthew 16:24). It will be the humble and the meek ones who will make it in that hour of possessing the whole earth (Matthew 5:5). Let’s believe that. Let’s believe it with all our hearts. Let’s prepare ourselves for the new relationship that is coming to us. It may take us awhile for all of us to learn it, but we will learn it together.