Epistle 281

Dear friends, the truth of God mind, and his pure holy power, which the Lord hath made you partakers of, by his good spirit [Neh 9:20]. Oh! let not his spirit be grieved by you. Let that be mortified that would get up to grieve or quench the spirit [Eph 4:10, 1 Th 5:19], for that will corrupt your reason, understanding, and knowledge; and that which gives you to know God and Christ, that is life eternal. And all have a care that you do not abuse the power [1 Cor 9:18], nor crucify to yourselves the seed afresh [Heb 6:6], but let that be crucified by the seed; in which seed you have life eternal.

And therefore prize the truth above all things. Now you have liberty to spread it abroad; for you are called to righteousness and holiness, without which none shall see God [Heb 12:14]. Therefore mind your high calling [Phil 3:14] in God, out of old Adam, into Christ Jesus, the second Adam [1 Cor 15:45]; and keep your meetings in the name of Jesus, and feel him in the midst of you [Mat 18:20], who is your life <31> and salvation; and that all occasions and stumbling blocks [Rom 14:13] may be taken away, so that the precious truth may be minded by you all, wherein all are to live in unity, and walk in peace, with the God of peace, and one with another; that all your springs may be kept open, and all your fountains may run with living water; and all your candles may burn, and every one may have bread on his own table in his temple, and his rod budding [Num 17:8] there, that he may be known to be a priest of the royal priesthood [1 Pet 2:9].

So that all may have salt in yourselves [Mark 9:50], that you may be good for something [Mat 5:13]; for if you be not the good salt, you cannot make the earth savoury. Therefore all keep in the sense of truth, and be digging for the pearl in your own field [Mat 13:44-46], and to find the silver in your own house, that was lost [Luke 15:8f], and the leaven [Mat 13:33] in your own hearts; that were it works, and is joined to, will leaven into its own nature. . . . And therefore it is the life that differs, and the new way differs from the old, and the religion that is above, from that which is below; and the worship Christ set up above sixteen hundred years ago, from all them that are made since, amongst the nominal christians; and the fellowship of God in the spirit and gospel, differs from all the fellowships that have been made since the apostles' days; and the liberty in Christ [Gal 2:4], in the gospel, in the spirit, is far above the liberty of old Adam in the flesh, in the sin, the wages of which is death [Rom 6:23]; here no false liberty can be in the spirit, and in the power of the gospel, and in Christ Jesus; nor any false freedom in the truth, for all false freedom is out of the truth; and therefore keep over all those false liberties and false freedoms, (in old Adam and his spirit, and dark power, and corrupt seed,) in the seed of life, and spirit and power of God, that is holy and pure, without spot [Eph 5:27]. So no more, but my love in the holy seed, that is over all.

G. F.