The Spiritual Meaning of Service

"The Belovedness of Christ

Exodus 32:1-6; Exodus 32:15-29; Malachi 2:4-6; Malachi 3:1-3; Numbers 4:1-3; Luke 3:23

The matter of the priestly service or ministry of the people of God, the service of God in terms of priestliness, is one which has been on my heart for a considerable time now. We will introduce the subject with a very simple consideration of what I am going to call the "belovedness" of Christ, in this particular connection - His priestly ministry.

In the passages which we have just read, to which a great many more could be added, two things are quite clear. One, that the Lord's people are called to be a priestly people - that is their vocation; two, that in that function they are peculiarly precious to the Lord. You cannot read the many passages in the Scriptures about the Levites without being impressed by that one thing, that they are very precious to the Lord. The last reference to them in the Old Testament, which we have read, indicates that. There is a tone of very real endearment in the words of the Lord about Levi at that point. At the end of the story of the Old Testament, after all that has taken place through the years, the Lord looks right back to that day of which we read in Exodus 32, and speaks of how precious and valuable the Levites became to Him, so much so that He entered into a covenant with them, a covenant of life and peace. "My covenant was with him of life and peace."

The Priestly Ministry of Christ and the Father's Love

And you will notice the connection between the statement in Numbers 4:3, that the active Levites started their ministry at the age of thirty, and the statement that Jesus was likewise thirty years of age when He began His public ministry; indicating not only in itself, but by other features which we shall notice, that His ministry was essentially a Levitical, that is, a priestly, ministry. We all believe that, and we know how much is made of that, especially in the Letter to the Hebrews. But notice that that statement in Luke 3 - "Jesus... when He began...was about thirty years of age" - follows immediately upon His baptism and the opening of the Heavens, and the Father's voice and attestation: "Thou art My beloved Son; in Thee I am well pleased." There is something about the Lord Jesus, just at this point when He takes up His priestly ministry, which draws out the love of the Father for Him in these affectionate expressions. It is true that He was His Son, and therefore He was beloved of God as His Son, but I believe there was a particular connection between His beginning of a priestly ministry, and this expression of the Father's love and appreciation for the preciousness of this upon which He was entering. That is the point of our concentration just now - the "belovedness" of the Lord Jesus, and so of the Levites, as entering into the meaning of Christ's ministry in terms of priesthood, precious to the Lord.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 2)