Where Two Or Three, With Sweet Accord

The Apostle Paul instructed the believers at Colosse to teach and admonish one another in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. That is what I hope to do by explaining the meaning of this hymn, against the backdrop of the Framework of Sovereign Grace.

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[An automated transcript of the teaching video]

The Apostle Paul instructed the believers at Colosse to teach and admonish one another in psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. That’s what I intend to do by explaining the meaning of this hymn—Where Two Or Three, With Sweet Accord. And I’d like to explain the meaning of the hymn against the backdrop of the Framework of Sovereign Grace. This is God’s master plan for the ages.

You’ll notice the hymn was written by Samuel Stennett. This was a particular Baptist preacher during the 18th century. For 37 years, he pastored a little church in London called Little Wild Street.

I’d like to read for you the two stanzas of the hymn:

1 “Where two or three, with sweet accord,
Obedient to their sovereign Lord,
Meet to recount His acts of grace,
And offer solemn prayer and praise,
“There,” says the Savior, “I will be,
Amid this little company;
To them unveil My smiling face,
And shed My glories round the place.”

2 We meet at Thy command, dear Lord,
Relying on Thy faithful Word;
Now send Thy Spirit from above;
Now fill our hearts with heavenly love.
“There,” says the Savior, “I will be,
Amid this little company;
To them unveil My smiling face,
And shed My glories round the place.”

This is speaking about the church of Christ (the assembly or congregation of Christ) and we’re therefore talking about the third branch of the gospel—the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit. Give me just a few moments to lay out the backdrop for you.

At the appointed time in history, the Spirit of God will conquer the souls of every one of God’s elect people, and He will unite those souls with the Lord Jesus Christ. By virtue of that union, the Spirit of God will then communicate into the soul, the life and virtues of Christ, thereby making the soul alive unto God and filling the soul with the love, joy, peace, and faith of Christ. And it is that which enables the regenerate sinner to savingly believe on Christ.

Now, what I’ve just explained to you is called regeneration, and it’s the beginning of the Spirit’s sanctifying work in the soul of a believer. And, it’s a very personal, intimate and individualistic experience. However, God has not designed His people to live alone or apart from other Christians. Far from it. When the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world, He organized the first church during His earthly ministry. The word church means assembly or congregation. So, if one dot (pointing to the onscreen notes) represents a regenerate sinner, and the circle that surrounds them, the assembly, they’re gathering together. That is the meaning of a church. It’s an assembly or a congregation, of God’s people, and there are certain requirements given in order for a person to become a member of an assembly of Christ.

Perhaps the best thing for me to do is just to mark out for you a basic definition for a church, or an assembly, of Christ. A church is a body of baptized believers, covenanted to follow the gospel of Christ. I believe that is the quintessence of an assembly of Christ, or a church. It’s a body—that is, this assembly, with members, (each regenerate sinner that is a part of that body, that assembly) is a member of the body, a member of Christ’s body. It’s a body of baptized—those who are immersed in water in the name of the Father, Son and Spirit. Believers—that is, they must be regenerate sinners. Covenanted—that is, each of these people have agreed with each other, they’ve covenanted, to follow the gospel of Christ. That’s an assembly of Christ. That is a church.

And please listen to me. The bare minimum required in order for a church to exist is two or three people. That’s it! So long as there be at least two regenerate, baptized believers covenanted together around the gospel of Christ, they are a true church, or assembly of Christ.

Now, with that said, I want to read for you the words of the hymn, and I’ll then have further comments to make on the stanzas:

Stanza 1

“Where two or three, with sweet accord,”

So, here we have two or three regenerate sinners, with sweet accord. The word accord means agreement, harmony or covenant—where two or three with sweet covenant, or agreement,

“Obedient to their sovereign Lord,”

In other words, under what authority have these Christians organized themselves into an assembly? It’s the authority of their sovereign Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ is the head of this assembly. Now, please listen. There are many in this world who believe the only way for a church to come into existence, is if it has the sanction and blessing of a mother-church. Those who believe that are usurping the authority of Christ; they’re replacing the headship of Christ with the headship of their mother-church. And that, my dear friends, is antichrist! It is Christ who is the head of His church. It is He who commands His two or three people to gather together in covenant, with sweet accord. And they are simply being obedient to their head. In doing so, as they gather under the authority of Christ, they meet for three reasons laid out in this hymn. First, they—

“Meet to recount His acts of grace,”

Now, this is done by the preachers and teachers of the gospel. They recount the holy Scriptures and expound them and explain the gospel. But it’s also done through the testimonies of the other Christians gathered. We share testimonies on how God is working in our lives. We recount His acts of grace to us experientially, and that’s one of the big reasons we gather together. When we assemble, we want to talk about Christ and His gospel acts.

“And offer solemn prayer and praise,”

We also gather to pray, or commune with God, and praise. We commune together to worship God. When we gather together like this, my dear friends,—

“There,” says the Savior, “I will be,
Amid this little company;”
To them unveil My smiling face,
And shed My glories round the place.”

Let no one despise your smallness. If you be but two or three believers gathered together, and that’s your congregation as an assembly of Christ, rejoice, my dear friends, let no one despise your littleness, your smallness. And I tell you why. Because to you, to this little company, these two or three—to you, the Lord Jesus Christ will unveil His smiling face. He smiles upon you and He will shed His glories around your place. That’s the reason you’re gathering. You’re not gathering to impress other Christians; to brag about the number of people attending your Sunday services. No, no! You care about very simple things. You care about recounting the acts of God’s grace; you care about praying together; you care about praising God together; you care about the smile of the Lord looking down upon you; and, you care about His glories shining round about you. That’s what you care about and that’s all you need to be focused on. Look at stanza two.

Stanza 2

“We meet at Thy command, dear Lord,”

Do you see, where two or three are gathered together—it’s by the command of Christ! What if you’re not baptized? How can you organize yourself into a church then? Well, my dear friend, under the authority of Christ, baptize each other. You don’t need a pastor or deacon; you don’t need an existing church to come and administer that to you; you baptize each other in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, under the authority of Christ and His word. And that is your authority for doing all things as a church, including constituting yourselves as a church. We meet it Thy command, dear Lord,—

“Relying on Thy faithful Word;”

Christ is the head and He administers His headship through the holy Scriptures. So we do rely on the holy Scriptures.

“Now send Thy Spirit from above;
Now fill our hearts with heavenly love.”

That’s poetic language, because technically, the Spirit of God indwells the souls of each of the regenerate sinners in this assembly. So, the Spirit of God doesn’t have to come down from heaven. The Spirit of God indwells our souls. But, the point being made here in the hymn is this—the Spirit of God is the One who fills our hearts with heavenly love. What does that mean? That’s His sanctifying work. It is the Spirit of God who takes the heavenly love of Christ and He communicates that to our souls. He fills our souls with the virtues of Christ. And, unless the Spirit of God is pleased to bless His people by communicating those virtues to us, moment by moment, we will be living a life as if we’re walking in a desert land without water, without food; we will be thirsty and dry and hungry, and dying, as it were. We need the Spirit of God’s continual witness to our spirit and the communications of the virtues of Christ to our souls, in order to retain, to maintain our spiritual walk with the Lord. And that is why we pray that the Spirit of God will fill our hearts with the virtues of Christ.

“There,” says the Savior, “I will be,
Amid this little company;
To them unveil My smiling face,
And shed My glories round the place.”

If you’re a sovereign grace believer, you need no introduction to a man named a A. W. Pink, a very popular writer. He lived during the first half of the 20th century. He was a sovereign grace preacher and prolific writer. But, during his time, very few people knew his name. He had a magazine and for decades, he published articles in his magazine, and this magazine was distributed to various subscribers around the world. Pink died in the 1950s. After his death, various publishing houses took his magazines, they collated the articles and they turned them into books, which is why there’s a lot of books available now by A. W. Pink. He never wrote them himself. He wrote the content, but they were never designed to be books. They were just separate articles written for his magazine.

Now, you may be surprised to learn that around 20 years before Pink died, he came to a point where he stopped attending church. He removed his membership from a church and he met at home with his wife, conducting private services. And the reason he did that is because he could not find a church with which he agreed. He did not believe those churches were preaching a pure gospel. So he stayed away from them.

Do you know, over the last several years, I’ve come to meet a lot of Christians that are following a similar path? They cannot find a church in their location to join. They don’t agree with those churches, so they stay at home many times, and they conduct private services or watch a sermon in their house.

Now, please listen to me. I have something to say by way of commendation and something to say by way of criticism. By way of commendation, I think it is good. Rather than attending a church with which you disagree, it is better you separate and you do not attend such places. Better for you to stay at home, conduct your private services, worship the Lord in that way. So I commend that. However, here’s the criticism. You have a responsibility, my friend, if there is not a gospel witness in your location, I believe God has placed you in that location in order for there to be a gospel witness. You have a responsibility, as a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, to organize a new church in that community. That is your job! That is your responsibility! You cannot say, well, I’m not a pastor; I’m not an evangelist; I’m not a missionary; I’m not a deacon; I’m not a teacher; I’m not a preacher. No, no! To organize a church in your house requires you to be none of those things. The only requirement needed in order for you to organize a church in your house is that you are a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you are a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, you should be communicating this gospel, your gospel, to your family, to your friends, to your community. You should be reaching out to the various people that you know and on Sundays, invite some of them to your house and allow them to sit with you as you conduct a worship service. You might listen to a sermon online; you might sing one or two hymns; you’ll have one or two prayers; you might even share some testimonies. And you see, when you then find at least one other brother or sister in Christ who shares your understanding of the gospel, then my dear friend, where two or three with sweet accord, there Jesus is in the midst of them. You organize yourself into an assembly of Christ.

How do you do that? Well, you can ask another church to assist in the process if there be other pastors that you know, or you can just do it on your own. Seriously, you can just schedule a service on a Sunday and there you have a set of articles of faith, you’re going to agree to a little covenant, that you’ll put together with the other persons of the assembly, and you agree to it and there you’ve constituted yourself an assembly of Christ. It’s a very simple process and a very God-honoring process. It doesn’t have to have a lot of hoopla, and ornaments, in order for you to become a legitimate assembly of Christ.

I like to leave that with you to think about, to pray about. Perhaps God has placed you in that particular community in order that you might spearhead the organization of a new church. Well, if you feel at any measure, on any level, that God may indeed be leading you to that work, then I believe you have an opportunity now to rejoice and to thank God and to find encouragement to your soul, by singing the words of this hymn.

May the Lord bless you!

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