The truth of separation is taught in Scripture in many ways, and if we keep to what God teaches all will be well, but if we introduce human ideas into this subject, as into any other on which God has spoken, we shall get away from God and His will. There were those in Israel who separated themselves from God to practise idolatry (Ezek. 14:7), and there are those in Christendom who have shut themselves up in monasteries and nunneries with the idea of living holy lives, and others who would not eat with other Christians, virtually saying, “I am holier than thou.” God separated the children of Israel from the nations to be a holy people, apart from the pollutions of the nations, but He also separated the priests and the Levites from Israel to serve Him in a special way. From these few facts we can see that there is the divine principle of separation, but also the abuse of the principle that God has given.
The Veil of Separation
Even the priests of Israel were excluded from the holiest by the veil, which is spoken of as the covering veil, or the veil of separation. Under the legal economy there was no access into the immediate presence of God, the high priest alone being able to enter on the day of atonement, not for communion or worship, but to sprinkle the blood of the sin offerings on and before the mercy seat (Lev. 16). Through the work of the Lord Jesus upon the cross, Christians have the privilege of entering the holiest to commune with God, and to worship Him. In Hebrews 10, where this privilege is spoken of, it does not speak of a rent veil, for Israel will never have the access into God’s presence that belongs to the Christian company.
In Matthew 27:51 it has been recorded that “the veil of the temple was rent from the top to the bottom,” surely teaching us that God has come out in all the grace of His heart through the death of His Son, offering His richest blessings to men on the ground of the atoning work of Jesus. Luke, 23:45 tells that “the veil of the temple was rent in the midst,” which teaches us that the whole Jewish system has been set aside in the death of Christ, and that a new system was about to be introduced where there was access into God’s immediate presence It was not the incarnation that secured access to God, but rather His death, so that “by the blood of Jesus,” and “through the veil, that is to say His flesh,” we can now enter God’s presence (Heb. 10:19-20), and Hebrews 2:9 shows that Jesus became flesh in order that He might die.
The Nazarite’s Separation
Essentially, the vow of the Nazarite separated him “to the Lord” (Num. 6:2). It was not for his own pleasure that the Nazarite took the vow of separation, he desired to give pleasure to Jehovah. Indeed, he undertook to separate himself from the natural joys of men, pleasures that were right in themselves, but which were voluntarily denied while the days of his separation lasted.
Nothing belonging to the grape, or produced from it, was to be eaten or drunk, indicating that he was not to find his pleasure, excitement or stimulation, not even his nourishment, in what was pleasurable to man by nature. Does not this indicate that those who seek the will of the Lord, in this day, are prepared to refuse the passing pleasures of the world to please Him who has so richly blessed them with pleasures in Christ that are for ever?
The separated Nazarite was not to make himself unclean, for contact with a world of death is defiling to one that seeks to live for God. Moreover, he was to let his hair grow, and nature teaches that “if a man have long hair, it is a shame unto him” (1 Cor. 11:14). The faithful Christian is to be prepared to suffer reproach and shame as different from the men of this world for the sake of Him who has called him to be for His will and pleasure.
The Water of Separation
God, in His goodness, provided through the death of the Red Heifer a “water of separation” for the cleansing of the defiled (Num. 19). Different kinds of defilement are mentioned in the Old Testament types, and some require sacrifices, others washing by water and the application of blood, as in the cleansing of the leper. The “water of separation” required to be applied to those who had been defiled through contact with death. True believers in the Lord Jesus Christ become defiled if in association with the dead, with those in whom there is not the life of God.
For a believer to find his life with the men of this world is defiling, a defilement that hinders his enjoyment of the things of God and his service for God. Such as Lot discovered that to be in association with the ungodly is vexing to the soul, and at last requires that separation from those under judgment is compelled by God. The blood of Jesus Christ has set us free from our guilt, and justified us before God, but the death of Christ has also provided the cleansing to keep us in communion with God when passing through this defiling world.
Separate from Sinners
Our great High Priest in heaven is “holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners” (Heb. 7:26), and these precious features were manifest in the Lord while here on earth. His separation from sinners did not consist in not having contact with them in any way, for the Pharisees and scribes who practised legal separation reproached Him with the words, “This man receives sinners, and eats with them” (Luke 15:2). Jesus had not come to call the righteous, but sinners, and how often sinners were found in the company of the Master. Yet though in the company of sinners, Jesus was separate from them, a Man out of heaven, all His thoughts and desires relating to the glory of God and the blessing of those whom He had come to save from their sins.
In Jesus there was the grace that attracted sinners, and the holiness that repelled sin. How beautifully the Spirit of God portrays in Luke 7 a sinner in the presence of Jesus, grace attracting one thoroughly defiled by sin to Him who was intrinsically holy. Jesus allowed a poor sinner to wash His feet, and to wipe and anoint them; the repentant sinner receiving the forgiveness of sins and the knowledge of salvation, the Saviour undefiled though touched with the hand of a defiled sinner. It is not the physical contact that defiles the Christian, but moral contact, even as Jesus taught His disciples when the Pharisees and scribes complained about their eating before washing their hands (Matt. 15:1–20).
Nor does true separation for the Christian consist of that Pharisaical practice that holds aloof from sinners. Like his Master the Christian will be found in the company of sinners, not to have His life with them, not to be defiled as sharing their sinful pursuits, but testifying to them the Gospel of God, and seeking to win them to the Lord. If one of the unbelievers bids us to a feast, and we are disposed to go (1 Cor. 10:27), it will surely be with the object of bringing Christ and His things before the one who has bidden us. Only one who is truly separate from sinners would have the moral power to speak of Christ in the presence of sinners.
Be Ye Separate
If the Lord Jesus on earth was separate from sinners, He desires His disciples to follow in His steps. Therefore we are commanded by the Lord not to be “unequally yoked together with unbelievers” (2 Cor. 6:14). It is altogether wrong for a believer to be in any association whatsoever with unbelievers. We have however to notice that the Lord Jesus has given special instructions in His word for the position of a believing brother or sister who entered a marriage association before becoming a Christian. Moreover, if in ignorance, the believer has married an unbeliever, the instructions relating to husband and wife are still binding. These instructions are still binding if a believer, spite of the Lord’s commandment, enters wilfully in to an unequal marriage yoke. The wilful Christian has usually to suffer grievously for entering such an association.
Where a believer has entered into a voluntary association with unbelievers, the word of the Lord is, “Come out from among them, and be ye separate” (verse 17). It would often mean much for a believer to separate himself from the social, religious and other associations he had formed while unconverted, but there was rich compensation promised, for the Lord said, “I will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty” (verse 18). With the care of God as Father, and all the affection belonging to that blessed Name, and with the support and protection of the Lord almighty, what had the separate Christian to fear?
This divine call for separation from unholy alliances is still binding upon any who are converted among the heathen, as those who first received the call had been, but it is also binding upon those who have been converted in Christendom. We are not at liberty to join any association we please. God has called us into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord (1 Cor. 1:9), and this is the only association that He recognises for His saints. Alas! today many are joined in partnerships, directorships, and unions of one kind or another, for personal gain, for religious pursuits or special aims, for intellectual or social improvements, and many other things. The saint of God has no business in such associations with the men of the world, and the call of the Lord to such is still, “Come out from among them, and be ye separate.”
Separation in the Last Days
Hebrew Christians were exhorted to go forth to Jesus, who had been crucified outside the gate of Jerusalem, having been rejected by the religious system of Judaism. Outside the camp of Judaism they were in nearness to their beloved Lord. Affection for Christ not only takes the believing Jew outside the Jewish religious camp, but will take the Gentile believer outside the imitation camps that have been formed in Christendom, even the great religious systems, whether catholic, national, independent or called by any other name. So far as the Jew is concerned, the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus virtually ended any association between the Christian Jews and the Jewish system that had centred at Jerusalem.
Already, in Paul’s closing days, evil doctrines were being introduced among them that professed the Name of the Lord, and there has been a dreadful increase in this direction in these last days. The teachers of evil are viewed as vessels of dishonour in the great house of Christendom (2 Tim. 2:20), and those who are true to the Name of the Lord are exhorted to “depart from iniquity,” and to purge themselves from the vessels of dishonour (2 Tim. 2:19, 21). How can those who value the Name of the Lord remain in fellowship with those who dishonour the Name of the Lord? If a gathering professing the Name of the Lord have not the power to deal with evildoers, as taught in 1 Corinthians 5:13, the Christian who would be true to the Lord must separate himself from that gathering that has been leavened by the evil of the teachers of evil (1 Cor. 5:6-7).
Those who separate from the evil of Christendom are instructed to “follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart” (2 Tim. 2:22), and this is the word of the Lord for us still. To follow righteousness and faith we need the instruction of the Scriptures, for we have nothing else to guide us in the path of the Lord’s will. The church may be ruined, but two or three gathering to the Name of the Lord can have the presence of the Lord in their midst, and can seek in all lowliness, and weakness, to answer to the will of the Lord as expressed in His directions for the assembly.
R. 28.12.70