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In this message we will consider the aspects of the experience and enjoyment of Christ revealed in chapters two and three of John.
In John 2 Christ is presented as the Life-changer and as the temple.
In verses 1 through 11 we see that Christ is the Life-changer.
Christ, the Life-changer, is the One who Himself is life. This is clearly revealed by the word of the Lord Jesus in 11:25a: “I am the resurrection and the life.”
For Christ to be the Life-changer means that He changes the fallen man’s death into the divine life. This is indicated by Paul’s word in 2 Timothy 1:10b, where he tells us that our Savior Jesus Christ “nullified death and brought life and incorruption to light through the gospel.” Life here is the eternal life of God, which is given to all believers in Christ (1 Tim. 1:16) and which is the main element of the divine grace given to us (Rom. 5:17, 21). This life has conquered death (Acts 2:24) and will swallow up death (2 Cor. 5:4).
Christ’s being the Life-changer is indicated in John 2:1-11 by the sign of His changing water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee. In this portion of the Word, wine, the life-juice of the grape, signifies life. When the Lord Jesus learned that the wine had run out, He told the servants to take the six stone waterpots that were lying there and to fill them with water. The number six represents the created man, for it was on the sixth day that man was created (Gen. 1:27, 31). Thus, the six stone waterpots signify the natural man who was created on the sixth day. Furthermore, water here signifies death (cf. 1:2, 6; Exo. 14:21; Matt. 3:16). The fact that all six of the stone waterpots were full of water signifies that all humanity is naturally full of death. Just as the waterpots were filled to the brim with water, so we were filled with death. According to John 2:8-9 the Lord Jesus marvelously changed the death water into wine. This miracle shows that, as the Life-changer, the Lord Jesus can change our death into life.
Today we may experience and enjoy Christ as the Life-changer. The genuine Christian life is a life of having our water changed into wine, of having our death changed into life. The Christian life is not a character-changing life nor a behavior-improving life. The Christian life is altogether a matter of the Lord’s changing our death into life.
John 2:19-22 reveals that Christ is the temple.
The body of Jesus, the temple, was destroyed and then raised up in resurrection. In verse 19a the Lord Jesus said to the Jews, “Destroy this temple.” As verse 21 makes clear, He was speaking of “the temple of His body.” When Christ became flesh, He took on a physical body. John 1:14 tells us that His physical body was a tabernacle. According to chapter two of John, His physical body was also the temple. Hence, when Jesus Christ was in the flesh, His body was the tabernacle and the temple of God, both of which are God’s dwelling place. Realizing this, Satan did his best to destroy the Lord’s physical body, and he did destroy it on the cross through the Jews.
After speaking about His body being destroyed, the Lord Jesus said, “In three days I will raise it up” (v. 19b). The words in three days signify in resurrection. After Satan destroyed the Lord’s physical body on the cross, His body was put into a tomb and rested there. The Lord Jesus then went into death and came out in resurrection. When He arose, He Himself raised up His dead and buried body. After His resurrection, His body, the temple, was reared up on a much larger scale. The body that the enemy destroyed by crucifixion was merely the body of Jesus. What was raised up by the Lord Jesus in resurrection was not only His physical body but also everyone who is joined to Him by faith (1 Pet. 1:3; Eph. 2:6). Since the day of His resurrection, the Lord Jesus has been enlarging His Body in resurrection life. What an immense Body Christ has today in His resurrection!
The Christian life consists of two matters: changing death into life and building up of the Body of Christ, the temple, in resurrection. We may summarize our Christian life by saying that the Christian life is the changing of death into life for the building up of the Body of Christ. This is the proper, genuine, and complete Christian life.
Chapter three of John reveals that we may experience and enjoy Christ as the bronze serpent, the light, the Bridegroom, and the immeasurable Son of God.
Verses 14 and 15 speak of Christ as the bronze serpent.
In verse 14 the Lord Jesus said, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.” In Genesis 3 Satan, the serpent, injected his nature into man’s flesh. When the children of Israel in the wilderness complained and were rebellious, speaking against God and against Moses, “Jehovah sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died” (Num. 21:6). Then the people came to Moses, confessed that they had sinned, and asked him to pray that the Lord would take away the serpents. When Moses prayed for the people, God told him to lift up a bronze serpent on their behalf for God’s judgment, that by looking upon that bronze serpent, all might live. That was a type. Here in John 3:14 the Lord Jesus applied that type to Himself, indicating that when He was in the flesh, He was in “the likeness of the flesh of sin” (Rom. 8:3), which likeness is equal to the form of the bronze serpent. The bronze serpent had the form of the serpent but was without the serpent’s poison. Christ was made in “the likeness of the flesh of sin,” but He did not participate in any way in the sin of the flesh (2 Cor. 5:21; Heb. 4:15). When He was lifted up in the flesh on the cross, by His death Satan, the old serpent, the devil, the embodiment of sin and death, was destroyed (John 12:31-33; Rev. 12:9a; Heb. 2:14).
As the bronze serpent, Christ destroyed the devil that the believers may have the eternal life of God. Concerning this, John 3:15 goes on to say, “That every one who believes into Him may have eternal life.” This is the divine life, the uncreated life of God, which not only is everlasting with respect to time but also is eternal and divine in nature.
The eternal life received by the believers is for their regeneration (vv. 3, 5-8). Regeneration is accomplished in the human spirit by the Holy Spirit of God with God’s life, the uncreated, eternal life. Thus, to be regenerated is to have the divine life, the eternal life (in addition to the human, natural life) as the new source and new element of a new person.
Through regeneration the believers have the eternal life of God in addition to their natural life, that they may live by this life while denying their natural life (vv. 15-16; Matt. 16:24). It does not matter whether a person is gentle or rough, or whether his natural disposition is quick or slow; his salvation does not depend on improvement or refinement. According to the truth in the Bible concerning the union of the Spirit of God and the spirit of the believers, it is altogether wrong for the believers to improve their behavior. To increase gentleness is wrong; to improve roughness is also wrong. This is because the natural life, whether gentle or rough, must be completely denied. The regeneration revealed in the Bible is not a religion, nor is it a set of moral teachings for improving oneself. Regeneration is to have God as life in addition to our original human life. Hence, we should not live by our original life, our first life; rather, we must deny our first life, the natural life, and live by our second life, the eternal life.
John 3:19 through 21 speaks of Christ as the light.
Referring to Christ, verse 19a says that “the light has come into the world.” According to 1:9 this was “the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man.” Christ came into the world as light so that men might be enlightened for salvation.
In order to save us, Christ, the Son of God, came as light to enlighten every man. But, unfortunately, “men loved the darkness rather than the light, for their works were evil. For every one who practices evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his works be reproved” (3:19b-20).
Verse 21 goes on to say, “But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be manifested that they are wrought in God.” According to the context, truth here denotes uprightness (as opposed to evil), which is the reality manifested in a man who lives in God according to what He is, and which corresponds with the divine light, which is God, as the source of the truth, manifested in Christ.
for those who receive christ as light, the light becomes their life (vv. 16, 36). This life is the eternal life, the divine life, the uncreated life of God.
The word of John the Baptist in verse 29 indicates that Christ is the Bridegroom: “He who has the bride is the bridegroom.” The bridegroom is a most pleasant person, who comes for the bride. The believers in Christ as a corporate bride are prepared for Christ as the Bridegroom. To us He should be the attraction, the pleasure, and the satisfaction. All the believers should experience and enjoy Him as the pleasant Bridegroom.
As the Bridegroom Christ has the regenerated ones as His bride. Whereas verse 29 speaks of the bride, verse 30 speaks of the increase. The increase in verse 30 is the bride in verse 29, and the bride is a living composition of all the regenerated people. This indicates that in John 3, a chapter on regeneration, regeneration not only brings the divine life into the believers but also makes them the corporate bride for Christ’s increase. Regeneration, therefore, is for the increase of Christ; it is for the producing of the bride. Regeneration is for us to be a part of the bride of Christ.
The bride as the increase of Christ is related to the spiritual part of our being (v. 6b). Our regenerated human spirit is part of the increase of Christ, and this increase is Christ’s multiplication and reproduction. Through regeneration we have become part of Christ’s increase.
The bride of Christ is the increase of Christ. All of the reborn people are the increase of Christ, and this increase is the bride, which becomes the counterpart of Christ. The bride of Christ is the church, the composition of all the regenerated people. All those who are regenerated are composed together as the corporate bride to match Christ. Without regeneration, Christ cannot have His bride as His increase. Hence, Christ increases by regenerating the redeemed sinners, making them His bride, His wife.
Adam and Eve are a type of Christ with His increase. Adam was a bachelor, a single man, but one day the Lord opened His side, took out a rib, and built that rib into Eve as a wife to match Adam (Gen. 2:20b-24). Eve was Adam’s increase, and through his wife Adam has billions of descendants, who are also his increase. Adam is still increasing today because the earth’s population is continually increasing. All the upcoming new babes are parts of Adam’s increase. Adam is a type of Christ (Rom. 5:14), and Eve is a type of the church as the bride of Christ (2 Cor. 11:2-3; Eph. 5:31-32). Not only the wife but also all the children are the increase of the husband. The increase of Christ today on this earth is immeasurable. Christ is still increasing.
In order for Christ to increase, we need to contact people individually to get them regenerated. Then gradually and steadily with the proper care, we as their parents should feed, nourish, and cherish them day by day through the small groups. For Christ to increase continually, each of us must be in a small group to produce new spiritual children.
In John 3:30 John the Baptist said, “He must increase, but I must decrease.” The increase and the decrease depend on who has the following. For Christ to increase and for John the Baptist to decrease means that John had to withdraw from the scene and from having a following; he had to allow Christ to be the only figure on the scene and to have all the following. All the following should go to Christ; none of it should go to John the Baptist or to anyone else. We all must decrease and let Christ increase. The entire following must go to Him.
We should all desire to see Christ increasing and ourselves decreasing. For this we need to speak the Lord’s word. The real significance of speaking the word of God is to spread God. When we speak the holy Word, the truth, the divine revelation, we spread God. Christ speaks God through us, His members, by defining God, explaining God, and eventually expressing God. To express God is to spread God. Christ is One who speaks the words of God and who gives the Spirit not by measure (v. 34). When someone receives His words, the Spirit follows to be the reality of what is spoken. Christ increases Himself by speaking God’s word to spread God and by giving the Spirit of God to be the reality of what He has spoken in order to dispense the eternal life into people, making them Godkind, the children of God, the species of God, the family of God, to be Christ’s increase. This is how Christ becomes the increasing Christ.
Verses 31 through 36 present Christ as the immeasurable Son of God. These verses reveal an unlimited Christ. He is all-inclusive and immeasurable; He is higher than the heavens and broader than the universe. The Christ whom we may experience and enjoy is unlimited and immeasurable.
“He who comes from above is above all; he who is from the earth is of the earth and speaks out of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all” (v. 31). Christ is from above, from heaven; His source is heaven. Because His source is from above, He is above all things, all matters, and especially all people.
“The Father loves the Son and has given all into His hand” (v. 35). The Son is the object of the Father’s love. In love, the Father has made the Son to be above all and to be all in all. The Son’s all-inclusiveness is a matter of the Father’s love.
The clause the Father loves the Son implies that apart from Christ, or besides Christ, nothing is pleasing to God. The Father loves only one person, and that person is Christ. God’s love for the world (v. 16) is related to Christ. Apart from Christ, God does not love anyone or anything. Although God loves the world, if we did not have Christ, we would miss God’s love. Only in Christ can we enjoy the love of God the Father. If we are outside of Christ, we have nothing to do with the Father’s love. We can meet the love of the Father only in Christ.
Verse 35 says not only that the Father loves the Son but also that the Father has given all things into the Son’s hand. The Father has given all things, including us, to Christ. The entire universe has been given to Christ, whom God the Father loves. He is the unique recipient of the Father’s love and gifts. This implies that if we are not in Christ, we cannot receive any gifts from the Father. If we would enjoy God’s love, we need to be in Christ. Likewise, if we would participate in what God gives, we also need to be in Christ, the unique object of the Father’s love and the unique recipient of the Father’s gifts.
“He whom God has sent speaks the words of God” (v. 34a). The One who is from above, who is above all, who is loved by the Father, and to whom all things have been given by the Father has also been sent by God. Christ is God’s Ambassador, God’s Apostle; He was sent by God and from God.
As the One sent by God, Christ speaks the words of God to impart the riches of God into His believers. In verse 34 the Greek word translated words is rhema, which means the instant and present spoken word. Christ ministers the living word to nourish all His believers. Christ does not speak His own words or someone else’s words — He speaks only the words of God. These words are spirit and life (6:63) as the essence of God Himself.
John 3:34b says, “He gives the Spirit not by measure.” Christ the Son gives the Spirit without measure to God’s people. The unique way for us to become the increase of the unlimited Christ is to receive the Spirit and be filled with the Spirit. The more we have of the Spirit, the more we will be Christ’s increase. This increase begins with our regeneration, and it consummates with our being filled with the immeasurable Spirit.
“He who believes into the Son has eternal life” (v. 36a). Everyone who believes in Christ the Son and is regenerated receives and enjoys Him as the eternal life (v. 15; 1 John 5:11-12).
