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p208 MY DEAR BROTHER, - I quite agree with you as to kneeling, and do so unless standing up, so as to be heard when praying myself, and so do the brethren who are not used to American churches; indeed, all at prayer meetings. When close packed, it is sometimes more difficult, but my spirit goes wholly with you in it. I was myself the beginning of what the world calls Plymouth brethren, though we began in Dublin. The name Plymouth arose from the earliest publications which attracted attention issuing thence, and was so far harmless, as no human name was attached to them; one cannot help the world giving some. The great question is, what the word of God says. . . . We do not meet on the ground of churches, but of the unity of the body of Christ, and membership of that one body. Membership of a church I do not find in scripture, nor a number of separate assemblies in one place (though as to mere locality they may be several, and meet in private houses, as at Jerusalem, but still be one assembly), and discipline in the church affects the standing of the person externally in the whole church of God. The great truth I find in scripture on this point is that the coming down of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost formed believers into one body, members of Christ, the Head in heaven. God's assembly in each place represented this unity, undivided from all the rest, in that place. (See 1 Cor. - address of the Epistle.) The vital truth is the personal presence of the Holy Ghost, baptising into one body united to the Head. There is another character of the church, the habitation of God through the Spirit. The corruption of the dark ages has made the realisation of this more difficult, but has not altered the truth of the word. We have the promise which first led me to meet, that wherever two or three are gathered together in Christ's name, He is in their midst, only it must be in the unity of the body.

Let me recur to a point I touched on when speaking with you. I do not doubt the Spirit of God is graciously working and rousing saints to the consciousness that something more earnest, more true, more what Christianity was at first, is to be looked for. In this feeling more undivided holiness of heart and life is justly looked for. Where this desire is not accompanied by the divinely given knowledge of the hopeless character of the flesh, illusion and consequent weakness accompanies the effort after it, or thought of receiving it. There is another work, another truth besides forgiveness, the consciousness that we have died in or with Christ (not merely that He has died for our sins) and in this the neck of self is broken. I know I am in Christ, and Christ in me: Christ is my place with God, not Adam: I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." This is received in grace, and to me, then, to live is Christ; and I reckon myself dead indeed unto sin, and alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. It is not simply being born of God, but, through the anointing of the Holy Ghost consequent on redemption, the consciousness of being in Christ and Christ in me the state of Romans 8. in contrast with the state in chapter 7, which is a renewed but undelivered man still under the law. Now I ought always to walk and have every thought in the Spirit, and only so, but that does not change the nature of the flesh. "Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lusts of the flesh"; but that does not change the lusts of the flesh. It lusts against the Spirit, "is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be"'; its mind is enmity against God. I have ever the right to reckon myself dead; to have no thought but what comes from the Spirit. But as the flesh is lawless without law; breaks the law, is not subject to it, when law is there; rejects Christ when God is present in grace so, even in him who has the Spirit, it lusts against it, and if a man has been in the third heaven would, if not kept down, puff him up about it. I have no need to watch against it, if it be not always an evil thing. When this is lost, the truth of a new life from Christ is lost with it. It is not the old Adam reformed, which is our life, but the last Adam, Christ, is our life; and, He having died for us, we have a right to treat the flesh as dead but that, because it is evil and unchanged in its nature, as what we have received in grace is pure and holy in itself, and I am to manifest only this, the life of Jesus in my mortal body: for this I must always bear about the cross. I will not go further, dear brother: I regretted missing you, but all is well. As I did, I write these few lines, and shall be glad to hear from you. Peace be with you, and the gracious and constant help of the blessed Lord.

Your affectionate brother in Christ.

Boston [date uncertain].

[52128E]

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With the prayerful desire that the Lord Jesus Christ will use this God-given ministry in this form for His glory and the blessing of many in these last days before His coming. © Les Hodgett .