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[0:00] Let us, in humble dependence upon the God of all grace, direct you to the fifth book of Moses, Deuteronomy, chapter 33, and we read verses 24 and 25.

[0:22] Deuteronomy, chapter 33, verse 24. And of Asher, he said, Let Asher be blessed with children.

[0:44] Let him be acceptable to his brethren. Let him lift his foot in oil. Thy shoes shall be iron as brass.

[1:01] And as thy days, so shall thy strength be. And we had thought from early morning to have read only the latter part of this portion.

[1:19] That is to say, It is thy days, so shall thy strength be. But I felt in considering the little reviving in this sanctuary, that it might be the pleasure of God that we should read the whole portion.

[1:44] And see that by divine grace, we might dilate somewhat upon these five blessings.

[2:00] This cluster of divine blessing pronounced upon Asher. I might just initially make two observations.

[2:17] We thirst of all dine then that there is a particular purpose in this book of Deuteronomy, as in every book of the Bible.

[2:30] It really means the second giving of the law. Or rather, the illumination of the law.

[2:41] The explaining of the law. And seeing that we are so dull, so ignorant, how we need this in the ministry of the Word.

[2:57] That the ministry in our days may be as it was in the days of the Reformation in this country, namely a teaching ministry to the people.

[3:14] Whenever the Lord has restored or revived His nation or His people, we find the same pattern.

[3:32] There was a calling of the people to repentance. There was a reformation in their lives according to the pattern of the Word of God.

[3:47] And then the Lord was pleased to visit and bless His people. It has always been a return to the law.

[4:01] The law of the gospel. Well, I felt it wise just to make that observation. The Lord raised up these faithful men.

[4:15] And His law, they were very concerned about. I mean, after all, you may look on Britain today. You may look on the church of God and feel sadder still.

[4:34] You may look on your own case and feel comparatively barren and fruitless. The whole matter is we need to return to the Lord God.

[4:49] God's laws. God's laws. Oh, how far have we departed from His laws. It is popular to depart from the law of God today.

[5:06] And every decay or every season or period of decay has always resulted from a departure from the Word of God.

[5:19] From God's holy laws. So you will see how important this book of Deuteronomy is.

[5:31] Setting before the people of the Lord God and explaining it. And forcing it. So that the Lord might be pleased to accomplish that in our dying.

[5:49] Well then, I would like to say this. What an amazing consideration it is.

[5:59] That as we realize the whole race of mankind have fallen and realize something of the measure of the sanctions of the law to a guilty people that there should ever be this word blessing in connection with sinners.

[6:23] Aren't you just absolutely astonished and amazed that ever there should come into your ear and heart this word divine blessing?

[6:39] When, as ruined in the fall, we deserve the curse and yet God has spoken about blessing.

[7:00] Well, how is this possible? It is because of the love of God. Because the Lord has a chosen people and He loves you and the Lord Jesus with your surety has suffered for you and He is pleased to bless His people.

[7:23] Now, I am going to suggest to your minds that this is inconceivable. The blessing of God. Why?

[7:38] We'll take this for a moment. One droplet of divine love in your heart.

[7:50] The blessing of God. Now, there's an eternity in God's blessing. It's ceaseless, it's boundless, it's immutable, it's eternal, there's no end to it.

[8:10] We lose in this wilderness journey, we lose a sense of the blessing of God, that is the comfort of it, that there's no such thing as losing the reality of God's blessing.

[8:25] If He has blessed you, you are blessed forever. And the dimensions of that blessing are boundless and eternal.

[8:38] well, now, here we have Moses, the man of God, blessing the children of Israel before his death. I just want to make one observation here about Asher.

[8:55] you see, you see, a part of the blessing was that they had, after the wilderness journey and all their desolation, they had a portion allocated to them in Palestine or the Holy Land.

[9:16] that is one of the richest lands for fertility and fruitfulness in the whole world. And this Asher, as you will see from your map, he had, the tribe of Asher, had a portion allocated to him something like a hundred miles of coastline in the northern part of Palestine.

[9:46] And, when you get a word like this, thy shoes shall be iron and brass, it is evident that not only is there the accepted interpretation of it as we generally view it, as I shall come to later, but also, you may believe that it means that that land was very rich in iron and brass under the subsoil so that it was a rich and fruitful portion allocated to them.

[10:25] You may say to me, well, we're not very interested in this geographical turf. My friends, the whole point is this. Can't you see what this is the type of?

[10:42] The promised land. And the promised land means eternal glory and also it means to have a name and a place in his beloved desire.

[10:57] That's a rich and fertile land. But I thought just to make that observation to you. You know, after the wilderness for 40 years, after the incarceration in Egypt with all the bondage and the grief and sorrow, and then the wilderness for 40 years, brackish water, nothing edible growing and scorpions and drought.

[11:32] Now, after all this, think of this wonderful land flowing with milk and honey. And if the Lord was pleased to quicken souls into life and make them sick of this wilderness world, they would have a taste of the land of promise in Zion, in the house of God, in the church of God, in the gospel.

[12:01] It's a land flowing with milk and honey. Very well. Now I want to come immediately to the language before us.

[12:14] And that these are specific blessings ordained of God from eternity. And of Asher, he said, Asher means blessedness.

[12:32] Let Asher be blessed with children. I feel to go back for a moment here to look on the economy of God.

[12:46] and I hope to lead your minds into this particular channel by introducing it in this line. Now, in the economy of God, he said, when he had created the first man, it is not good for the man that he should be alone.

[13:12] I will make a held meat for him. And he made woman brought into the man.

[13:26] Now, what was the purpose of God in this? institution what is the purpose of God in this institution and ordinance?

[13:40] It is to build a family. It's to build a human family around the world. That was his purpose.

[13:53] And what I'm going to suggest to you is this. What is the purpose of God in the ministry and the church? It's to build a family.

[14:07] Why does he send ministers? Why is the church as a wife and mother? What is the economy of grace here? It's to build a family.

[14:19] Let Asher be blessed with children. And if I may, and I say this in great humility and with much exercise, there's no crown put on the head of any ministry until a soul has been quickened into life under it.

[14:46] when one soul has been born into the church of God under a minister, God puts a crown on the head of that ministry.

[15:03] Now take this thought with you then. The whole purpose of God, in this holy ordinance, man and woman, holy matrimony, was to build a human family.

[15:19] Let me repeat this to you. The purpose of God in anointing ministers and having a little remnant, a church, which church is, and I shall open that a little further, his bride, and mother.

[15:39] The purpose is that the relationship between the ministry and the church is to build this family so that children should be born in Zion.

[15:58] And Zion it shall be said, this and that man was born in there. now you can see the potential, the holy potential of this specific promise, that Asher be blessed with children.

[16:24] I have a number of times said this to my own flock, I say it to you, this may more especially relate perhaps to those who are older in the church of God.

[16:40] Are you exercised in this way, that before you die, before your place is located in the church militants, that you shall be favoured to wrestle and travel in your soul and bring forth one, at least one to leave in your place.

[17:07] Now if this had been so through the decades past, we shouldn't have the empty seats we have today. Many people have spoken to me about the wonderful prosperity of a century ago.

[17:26] I don't believe it was anything like the degree of prosperity that some people think it was. You'll say why, what do they leave behind? I think it was just the order of the day and it was proper to go to a place of worship and they went.

[17:46] But there was not the travel of soul that one would anticipate. Otherwise we should not see the paucity of none as we do today.

[17:56] Now this is one of the stirring things that I want to bring before you people. You're not in a church just to be and I'm using that word in this sense just to be an ornament.

[18:12] Yes, an ornament in one sense. The ornament of a meek and quiet spirit and so on. But not to be just an ornament. Something looked at on the shelf and dusted and put back.

[18:24] you're there to seek this. That you might be led on in your spiritual life until you know what it is to be married to Christ.

[18:39] And then being married to Christ that you may travel in birth as spiritual children. so that there is a relationship between the ministry and you resulting in children.

[19:02] I'm putting this before you just plainly because God has no other method. I know that there are those cases where God may go out and immediately work in some force sinner but his method according to the economy of Christ is the church is another or she should be and when Zion traveled she brought forth her children and you won't get any with that.

[19:35] Let Asher be blessed with children. So I speak this word to myself, to my brethren in the ministry, to this church, and to all the churches of God.

[19:58] Let Asher be blessed with children. many people have said to me this, how wonderful it is when you come to the early spring in the country, wonderful sight for a Londoner, in any case, to look over in the meadows and see the frisking lamps.

[20:26] Oh, yes. What about this here? Church of God. There's no more beautiful sight than to look over the wall into the sacred area of God's church and to see that through Christ's self.

[20:47] Let Asher be blessed with children. Now, I want to be very guarded and I would speak with spiritual decorum, but I must say this, one of the things that has downright staggered me is this, not only a comparative lack of prayer for these children, but if there is any appearance of a child coming forth or being brought forth, many people are ready to throw them the other side and cast them away.

[21:38] Standing in doubt of them and looking on them with almost disdain, well, that's a measure of the sad state that some are in.

[21:54] Oh, yes. It's no easy matter for some ministers to take a lamb in his arms and bring that lamb before the church.

[22:06] No easy matter. You might think everyone would be rejoiced for an heir of glory to come into the church of God and yet some, oh, it's suspicion.

[22:24] They don't know what they're talking about. They're too young and I don't know what all. I know we need a measure of gracious caution, I admit that. But it's all that sort of thing.

[22:38] Oh, they must be put back. They mustn't be allowed to come now. Well, I don't understand it. I just do not understand it.

[22:52] Let Asher thee bless with children. Now, you remember the test of Solomon's God-given wisdom was put to the two women with this child.

[23:10] Now, the point is this. The mother knows. And if you're one that travels in birth for a soul, you know.

[23:23] You know. You've got the exercise. Well, now, this is rather sweet to me this evening.

[23:36] Let Asher be blessed with children. and I just want to say two things to you. What is necessary under this?

[23:49] Well, the first thing is to be married to the Lord of the Lamb. It must be this first.

[24:00] God is I don't know whether you can make out that in your spiritual experience, but I humbly trust that it was very clear to me 36 years ago now that the Lord delivered my soul.

[24:19] I'm married to the Lord of the Lamb, whose beauties I can ne'er explain, nor half his glory shall. they must be married to God.

[24:33] And then you may say, well, how is it after that? Look at God's economy. There's the church.

[24:43] Is there a mother in Israel there? Some might say that place is low. It may be. There may be only a few there, but if there's a mother in Israel there, there'll be little future.

[25:01] Then you may say, what is this in God's gracious economy? There must be something else. A living ministry.

[25:16] Yes. Now, with this living ministry, and these that are married to Christ, let Ashley bless the people who are married to Christ, well, I don't know.

[25:31] It looks as if I know he even brings the sermon from this, but I don't know it. My friends, the Lord give you two things.

[25:47] If you are responding mentally and say, I don't know what it is to be married to Christ, the Lord give you an urgency in your prayer that he might deliver your soul and bring you into this holy relationship.

[26:03] and the second thing is this, the Lord stir up in your breast prayer that you may be made fruitful, that you might rely over souls.

[26:25] There's nothing without it, you know. There's nothing without it. how wonderful it would be in this place, because I don't know really of you, this is my first visit, that I just judge and observe.

[26:47] You see that there are just a few in church fellowship together. Now what a wonderful thing it would be to you if the Lord tied at you with this brother and you saw here glory born in this place.

[27:08] You say, well now we remember that day, let Asher be blessed with children. Have you ever? Is the one, is the one on the face of the earth to die, or one in heaven that the Lord took home early, that you could say of, that this child I pray, and the Lord has granted me the petition that I desired?

[27:33] Is the one my friends? These are the things of God's holy order.

[27:46] You see, it's not a matter of ministers going all over the place, preaching a sermon and someone saying that was quite a nice sermon and all finished with, I know that we appreciate the good wishes of our friends, but this is the basic thing, it's God's purpose to build a family.

[28:08] I know when they're born they'll need some training, they'll need some handling and they'll need some discipline, and I know they'll need feeding, and that comes afterwards.

[28:25] so let Asher be blessed with children. Why, if every godly, gracious person had one child in the church, we should soon see a vast difference.

[28:43] Okay. I, I do not apologize for speaking like this to you. I think really, or I'm almost in that conclusion sometimes that sterility is the sort of order of the day, popular.

[29:08] The Lord favor you with this, let Asher be blessed with children. that I would know and tend to hasten, and I know you'll want this.

[29:28] Give me children or else I die. Lord, give me a soul. Put one on my heart and let me wrestle for the night and day until they're brought forth.

[29:42] Are you in it now? This way you are not yet? Now look, you can't produce it.

[29:52] Travel is something that's spontaneous and irresistible. But if the Lord gives it to you, shall he bring to the birth and not give strength to bring to all?

[30:09] Let Asher they blast with children. I ought not to mention myself because now often I feel very fried and very dire.

[30:30] But I suppose it was almost 30 years ago now when I paid my first visit to a chapel in Beth this year in the John Bunyan country.

[30:50] And of course 30 years ago you see I was quite a young man and they said in this chapel there was a father being praying for a son that was refractory and he said to him now we've got a young man preaching today.

[31:15] So I suppose he thought well I don't see what he got to say. So he came in the afternoon. I didn't know anything about it at what.

[31:29] sat in the gallery and I believe during that well I know that during that sermon the Lord fired the arrow and that went into his arrow.

[31:48] And he said to me afterwards he said I was in such a rage he said I could have been near enough to you I could have been near and of course the service was concluded and he was out and he said to himself he said no I'm going to get rid of all these things I'm going to drown this in alcohol and so when the time came for the paddling house to open anyway when you get rid of this but he said that he got there he just put his hand on the door knob couldn't go in couldn't go turn away now you see as a soul bore quick

[32:51] I'm not naming that because I was associated with it his father and his stepmother they both and the Lord sent me to fire the arrow but you see the God's order in building them let Asher be blessed with children for this first blessing my friend would make an enormous difference to the church religion today I don't know how I would preach to you on this in some connections I would think that some would be like Rachel he gave her Joseph he heard her prayer he took away her reproach I wonder of any soul feels reproach they thought about

[33:55] Darren as well they look on his reproach he took away her reproach he heard her prayer he gave her Joseph meaning adding adding he gave to her another son that she her soul was departing so I don't know whether I would preach to you on it there I would there would be those my friends like Rachel you would bring forth one God would add another to be God stay in this world night to be in this heart that you believe two precious souls in the church others would be there for some of these my friends as it was with her son of my sorrow fellow night saw the golden dead so it could well be that some of you will depart this night in this that leaves of precious souls and church and

[35:17] Asher he said let Asher be blessed with children let him be acceptable to his brethren and let him dip his foot in oil and I tell you how to begin in your meditation on this second blessing well it's a cluster there one let him be acceptable to his brethren your meditation begins here accepted in the beloved that is to say you're accepted by the father and his beloved son complete in his sins washed away clothed in white clothes in that blistering purity for road of righteousness and accepted in the bed life and then your meditation would develop this way

[36:21] I feel that as we read of saint Lysimeon in the city of Jerusalem waiting for the consolation of Israel we have this significant turn news the holy ghost was upon him rooding upon him rooding upon him conferring upon him all his sacred influences and races the holy ghost was upon him let him be acceptable to his brethren this is where acceptability to the choice family of God comes accepted in Christ and the holy ghost upon you so that all those precious graces have been conferred and are activated in you for instance take one sweet evangelical humility no there's nothing like that to be attractive to the people of God they say the choice the excellence of the earth the saints of God they say does that young man or woman or that person it's not a lot of religious talk it's not a lot of empty notion it's not pushing to the front it's their humility that I love how this weed humility makes you acceptable to the breath and another thing is love the sweet immortal grace of divine love you see love is an effusion the nature and essence of God is love and the gift of

[38:56] God to his people is love and where love is there is an effusion on it it permeates and it effuses you feel it how wonderful is this love here's acceptability with the breath love well in a word because I know that I I must soon roar to a close in a word the acceptability to the breath relieves this as to how like your dear master you are you know if a person comes and their little life their dear master oh how acceptable they are to their breath how precious how wonderful and this of course especially relates to the

[40:05] Lord's servants let him be acceptable to his brethren my friends I suppose with some of you here today you've only got to think of certain nights they're in glory now and those dear ministers were made such a blessing to your souls all the acceptability to their brethren the graciousness the life the holy unction in their ministry they were made acceptable to their brethren may the Lord grant us this great and rich favour let him be acceptable to his brethren one or two things

[41:06] I would like to name there one is this it's amazing how the Lord can break down the prejudice and ill feeling entertained by son against the minister it was only this year I was preaching on the southeast coast in a certain chapel and there was a minister there and I had heard of him for thirty odd years he said to me I've heard of you for thirty years now and I believe the Lord favoured me to come right into his heart into his deep heart he didn't know how to contain himself afterwards but he said to me this he said you know

[42:16] I've heard about you for thirty years and he said I've been full of prejudice that I can hold well you see what I have out of the Lord he lost it all and I went right into his heart and the spirit let him be acceptable to his breath oh this acceptability really the more this is wrought out by the spirit the more you'll see the breaking down of those God dishonouring barriers of bitterness and prejudice and pride and the church of God being united together as we were singing this afternoon in that hymn concerning the increase of the church well let him be acceptable to his breath and let him dip his foot in oil now oil in the

[43:41] Bible is a symbol of divine love and grace and the unction of the spirit of God generally let him dip his foot in oil I shall only make just a brief reference let him be saved with an increase of this rich grace let let there be an abounding of divine love in his grace and let him know heavenly unction upon his spirit so that he walks in life walks in humility walks under the influence of the blessed spirit and according to the power of grace goes through this wilderness let him dip his foot in oil

[44:48] I would suggest to your minds how this could be expounded in a practical way let him dip his foot in oil they took knowledge of them they bring with Jesus let him dip his foot in oil my friends they'll know if you've been with Jesus a few times this year a very knackway where we've had two services in between that is after the tea interval I've gone off on my own once especially in Bethesda I suppose I had over an hour and I thought now I I've felt help this afternoon but I want to find my Jesus my

[45:50] Jesus this is what I want you know what I mean you that preach the gospel I wanted to find my Jesus I went right out through the meadows alone praying pleading crying to the Lord presently I felt him for all the years now this is the blessed thing all we could know it more often I believe I can say this to you I long for that pulpit that night you know why because I got it in my heart and I took him into the pulpit in my heart now let him dip his foot in oil I know when you dip your foot in oil this is something like that precious ointment with the woman the whole house was filled with the odour of it it is odour it for it oh the fragrance say let him dip his foot in oil there's nothing mechanical about the ministry and we can't get it from books

[47:21] I'm not speaking against being informed rightly but not rely on it the only way my friends to live your foot in oil is to have Christ have to be filled over this heavenly ancient let him dip his foot in it then how beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of them that publish the gospel of these thy shoes shall be iron and grass I meant to make this not as I did originally from the geographical viewpoint but as is felt in us in our souls it's a rough journey hard and rugged is the way the bright the thaw the stone the bold love

[48:32]  My garden will help the Protect the money are in the Unless it's a like this will be słys but