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Scripture Reading: Rom. 12:2b; 2 Cor. 3:16, 18
Prayer: Lord, how we thank You that we can come to You through Your Word and Your Spirit. We thank You that today You are so much to us. You are the Word of life, and You are also the Spirit who gives life. Lord, we do trust in You. You are not only with us; You are now indwelling us as the Word and as the Spirit. This morning we have come to a point that is high and difficult for us to touch. Lord, be our help in this matter, and cover us and cleanse us with Your precious blood that we may enjoy Your anointing. Do anoint us richly that we may have the understanding and may have even the revelation with a vision. Lord, do visit each one of us in this way. Thank You, Lord. Amen.
In the previous two chapters we covered the renewing of the believers by the Holy Spirit. In this chapter we will consider the transformation of the renewed believers.
The transformation of the renewed believers takes place through the renewing of the mind, that is, in the soul (Rom. 12:2b). Here again, the matter of renewing is crucial. According to my knowledge, those philosophers, such as Confucius, who stressed human ethics and morality also stressed renewing. However, their renewing is carried out by self-effort. On the contrary, our renewing does not depend on our effort. It depends on the renewing element, that is, the divine element. That element is nothing less than divinity ministered into our being as the very element that renews us. A chemical compound is not formed by man’s effort. It is formed by the addition of a new element to another element that is already present. In the same way, renewing is not carried out by our work or effort. Renewing is accomplished by the renewing element.
Actually, renewing is not a work at all. The process of renewing can be illustrated by the digestion of food. Strictly speaking, digestion is not a work. Whenever we take food into us, the food itself works along with our digestion. While the food is being digested within us, the nourishment enters into our blood. Actually, that is not a work; it is the nourishing of the food element. We need to be impressed that in the Bible the God-ordained and God-required renewing is not by our work; neither is it by God’s work. In carrying out the renewing, God does everything by dispensing Himself into our being as the divine element. This element within us means everything. The subjective sanctification is by this divine element, which is the holy nature, the holy element, of our Triune God.
Such a thought is divine, spiritual, and abstract; thus, it is not a part of our natural logic. According to our logic, we must work for everything that we want to obtain. Without working, we will get nothing. This is our thought, our logic, and we apply this logic to everything. We would even think, “How can I be regenerated?” That means, “What should I do so that I can be regenerated?” A question often asked by people in the Bible was, “What shall I do?” (Matt. 19:16; Mark 10:17b; Luke 10:25b; John 6:28; Acts 16:30). In the same principle, we may ask, “What shall I do to be holy?” or “What shall I do to be spiritual?” or “What shall I do to be victorious?” or even “What shall I do to be renewed?”
Recently, I received a very brief letter that consisted of only one question: “Dear Brother Lee, Can pray-reading affect our transformation?” My answer is definitely yes. Pray-reading can affect our transformation because pray-reading keeps us in the presence of the divine element. As long as we stay in the presence of the divine element, we will absorb the divine element into us. That element will transform us. The longer we stay in the presence of the Lord, the more we will spontaneously be transformed.
In order to be renewed and transformed, we do not need to do anything, but we do need to absorb the divine element into us. There is no other way to absorb the divine element but to remain in the presence of the Lord. Furthermore, while we are remaining in the presence of the Lord, we need to breathe by calling on the Lord’s name. To call on the Lord makes a great difference. If every morning we call “O Lord Jesus” only a few times, we will become a different person. Then, if we would open the Word and pray-read two or three verses, we will taste something in the word. By further masticating the word, we will taste the word even more, and we will receive more of the divine element. This element will enter into us and will be digested and assimilated by us. To say that the word nourishes us in such a way is not a superstition. The word nourishes us in the same way that food nourishes us.
Renewing is the divine element being dispensed into us. As long as this element gets into us, it is organic; it spontaneously enters into a union with us. Before food enters our stomach, the organic process of digestion cannot take place. But after the food enters into our stomach, the organic process of digestion causes the food to have an organic union with our being. This does not mean that our stomach does a work or that the food does a work. Rather, it means that an organic moving occurs in us. This moving is digestion. Although we have a stomach that is organic, if we do not eat any food for three days, there will be no organic moving within us to cause the food to be digested and assimilated.
Especially in the New Testament, our spiritual life is likened to our physical life. In John 6:57 the Lord Jesus said that He is eatable and that whoever eats Him will live because of Him. Moreover, in 7:37 the Lord said that He is drinkable. He said that He is the bread of life and the living bread (6:35, 48, 51), and He also said that He is the living water (4:14; 7:38). When we receive the Lord as the organic foodstuff, this foodstuff comes together with our organic “organs,” and an organic moving takes place within us. As a result, we are sanctified, renewed, and transformed.
Concerning our spiritual experience, there are six main items: first, regeneration, and then sanctification, renewing, transformation, conformation, and glorification. It is very difficult to find anything concerning these six items in Christian teaching today. But these items are all part of the apostle Paul’s teaching. Paul touched these six items in a very detailed way.
Regeneration is to have the divine life added to our human life. Sanctification is to be separated unto God and for God from anything other than God. This causes us to become holy, not by our doing but by our receiving the holy divine nature. When the holy element enters into us, it sanctifies us. In addition, because of the devastation of Satan and sin, we became old in the three parts of our being — spirit, soul, and body. Thus, we need to be renewed. God’s intention is to make us His new creation, beginning from our spirit. At the time of our salvation, the Spirit of God entered into our spirit to regenerate us, to make us new in our spirit (3:6). That was a renewing of the Spirit in our spirit. Then, from our spirit this renewing spreads into our mind, that is, into our soul. Finally, from our soul it reaches our body and eventually causes our body to be glorified. These are the steps of renewing to make us God’s new creation.
Renewing issues in transformation. Second Corinthians 3:18 says, “We all...are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory.” The Greek word for transformed in this verse is the same word as in Romans 12:2. This word refers to an inward metabolic change. Such a metabolic change requires a new element to be added into us to replace and discharge the old element. This results in our transformation.
In the word transformation the word form is included. Genesis 2:7 tells us that God formed man, that is, man’s body, out of dust. To form something is to make a new form out of a substance that already exists. Before God created Adam, there was no creature like Adam. There was only dust, which, when mixed with water, produces clay. God used dust plus water to make a new form, that is, Adam’s body with all its distinct parts, which did not exist prior to that time. In comparison, to transform is to form something further out of an existing form. Our present form is the form of the old man. Out of this old man’s form God is making a further form. This is to transform, to produce another form out of an existing form.
Before we received the Lord Jesus, we had a certain form, but after we received the Lord Jesus, we became another form. This new form came out of the original form. Renewing results in transformation, a change in form. When we are renewed, our form changes, not by our doing but by the organic divine element moving within us organically. The more we are renewed, the more we are transformed into another form.
Before we are transformed, we have a certain kind of form already; however, we need to have another form. To have our present form changed into a new form is to be transformed. Before we experience transformation, we are simply ourselves; what we are is our present form. But God wants to produce another form out of this existing form. He does this by putting Himself as a new element into us, first, to regenerate us, second, to sanctify us, and third, to renew us. The steps of regeneration, sanctification, and renewing result in the changing of our present form into a further form. I am thankful to the Lord that many of the saints, after remaining in the recovery for some time, have experienced a change in form. Some amount of transformation has taken place within them. This transformation is the aggregate of regeneration, sanctification, and renewing. When these three things are added together, the sum is transformation.
Of course, we do not need to be regenerated every day, but we do need to be sanctified and renewed every day. However, sanctification and renewing need a base, and that base is regeneration. From the day of our regeneration we need to be sanctified a little more each day, and we also need to be renewed day by day. I have the assurance that after they remain in the training for two terms, when many of the full-time trainees return to visit their parents, the parents will be surprised and happy to see that something further has been formed in their son or daughter out of what they previously were. In the two terms of training, the trainees do not try to adjust or improve themselves. They simply go along with the atmosphere in the training. When others say, “O Lord,” they also say, “O Lord.” When others pray-read, they also pray-read. After following such an atmosphere for one year, when they return home, their parents see in them another form.
Transformation takes place when God’s divine element is dispensed into our human element. Prior to that time, our human element did bear a certain form. The new divine element, after being added into our old element, participates in an organic moving with our old organic “organs.” This produces God’s new creation. In God’s old creation there is no divine element. After being regenerated, day by day as we are being sanctified and renewed, a kind of organic moving takes place within us by and with the divine element plus something from our old yet regenerated, sanctified, and renewed element. The result of such a moving is something new, a transformed form. This is not by our working; neither is it by God’s working. In such a process God does not do that much. However, as I mentioned previously, we may still pray and even beg the Lord to do something to sanctify us and transform us. In response, the Lord may say, “Do not beg Me to do something. I will simply put Myself into you as an element. I created you in a certain form with all kinds of organic organs. Now I will put Myself into you as another element, a higher element, and this element will touch your organic organs; then an organic moving will take place, and you will be sanctified, renewed, and transformed into something else.” This something else is God’s new creation, and this new creation is a transformed form.
The foregoing definition of transformation is based on two verses, Romans 12:2 and 2 Corinthians 3:18. First, in Romans 12:2 Paul says, “Do not be fashioned according to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind.” Then, in 2 Corinthians 3:18 Paul says, “We all with unveiled face, beholding and reflecting like a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, even as from the Lord Spirit.” Based on these two verses we can see that transformation is to re-form us. By God’s creation we were formed already, but that form is too old. With it there is no glory but only oldness. Yet today God has taken away all the veils from our face. Now we have an unveiled face to behold and reflect the glory of the Lord. Early in the morning, the first thing we need to do is to go to the Lord with an unveiled face to look at Him, to behold Him, and to reflect Him for a period of time. To linger in the presence of the Lord while beholding Him and reflecting Him affords us a real taste, a real enjoyment. During such a time in the Lord’s presence, as we behold and reflect the Lord, He transfuses Himself into us, and that transfusing brings into us the divine element. That divine element matches our inward organic “organs.” As a result, we are transformed into the image of the Lord from glory to glory. This transformation is from the Lord Spirit, who is the consummated Lord as the life-giving Spirit.
After taking a healthy breakfast in the morning, I feel strong and energetic. But after four hours I am tired and hungry again. Then, after eating lunch, again I am full of energy. However, after another five hours, I need another meal. Do not think that if you have a good morning revival, that will be sufficient. After three or four hours you need to say, “O Lord, I am empty. Lord, I am hungry now; I am thirsty.” To go to the Lord in this way is to contact the very source, which is the processed, consummated Triune God. When we look at Him, lingering in His presence, we behold Him, and He transfuses Himself as the life-giving Spirit into us.
In the Old Testament economy the Angel of Jehovah was with Israel through the forty years of their wandering in the wilderness (Exo. 14:19; 23:20, 23). That Angel was Christ. Even in Zechariah 1, while Israel remained in their captivity in a low condition, at the bottom of the valley, there was One riding on a red horse among the myrtle trees, and that One was called the Angel of Jehovah (vv. 8-12). As the Angel of Jehovah, Christ was among, around, and over the children of Israel, but He never entered into them. But today, after the processes of incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection, this Angel of Jehovah has become the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b). Furthermore, this New Testament life-giving Spirit is altogether condensed, or embodied, in the living word. Thus, three persons — the Lord Christ (Rom. 8:10a; 2 Cor. 13:5b), the life-giving Spirit (Rom. 8:11), and the personified word of Christ (Col. 3:16) — all dwell in us. Actually, these three — the Lord, the Spirit, and the word — are one. We do have the threefold indwelling of the Lord Jesus Christ, the life-giving Spirit, and the word of life. Every day these three are not only with us but also in us, and They even indwell us. They will never leave us.
The Lord as a person indwells us. Then, His life-giving Spirit indwells us, and His word also indwells us. In His indwelling He does not do something within us, but He is something within us. He is continually dispensing Himself as an element into our being. The food we eat, the water we drink, and the air we breathe are all elements that are dispensed into us every day. We eat three meals daily, drink water even more often, and breathe continually. The dispensing of the elements of food, water, and air accomplishes a great deal in us. The principle is the same with our spiritual life. This is why in John 6 the Lord Jesus likened Himself to food; in John 4 and 7 He likened Himself to water; and in John 20 He likened Himself to air, or breath (v. 22). Eating, drinking, and breathing all bring a solid element into our being. In our spiritual life this element is the processed and consummated God as a life-giving Spirit, and this consummated Spirit is the all-inclusive dose that nourishes us, heals us, and rescues us. Not only so, He is also present within us. His presence within us means a great deal. This presence is the sanctifying, renewing, and transforming element.
The transformation of the renewed believers is by the dispensing of the Lord’s divine element in His resurrection life into His believers’ inward element. We do have a natural element, and this natural element is not altogether evil. Because Christ’s redemption has dealt with the evil element, our natural element is a redeemed element. Into such a redeemed element the divine element is now being dispensed. When the divine element is added into our redeemed and uplifted natural element, we are sanctified and renewed. The result is that we are metabolically transformed, and the image of the resurrected Lord in the glory of His divine life is formed in us.
Christians are not a group of working people but a group of eating and enjoying people. We Christians need to learn to keep ourselves away from work. We should stay away from the “office,” the place of work, and come back “home” to eat and enjoy. The teaching in today’s Christianity produces a group of working people. Husbands are taught to love their wives, and wives are taught to submit to their husbands. It is possible to pick up hundreds of commandments in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. Brother Nee once said that any teaching that helps us to work is wrong, but any teaching that ushers us into Christ for enjoyment is right. We do not need to work for transformation, but we need to behold and reflect the glory of the Lord in resurrection. Then some element from Him will be dispensed into us and be absorbed by us. He dispenses, and we absorb Him, the very processed and consummated Triune God, as the life-giving, compound, indwelling Spirit into our being. Then we praise Him with Hallelujahs all the day long. If we praise our Lord all day long, we will be blessed; we will be an enjoying people.
