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In this message we will consider the aspects of the experience and enjoyment of Christ in chapters eleven and twelve of the Gospel of John.
Chapter eleven presents Christ as the light of the world and the resurrection and the life.
The Lord Jesus is the light of the world for us to walk in that we might not stumble (vv. 9-10). When the Lord wanted to go into Judea (v. 7), He encountered the frustration caused by man’s opinion, which is a sign of walking in darkness. Whereas in other chapters of this Gospel the frustration came from those in the Jewish religion, in this chapter the frustration came from human opinion expressed first by the disciples (vv. 8, 11-16). The disciples said to the Lord that the Jews were seeking to stone Him and therefore He should not go into Judea. The Lord’s word to His disciples in verses 9 and 10 indicates that their opinion was a sign that they were walking in darkness. “Jesus answered, Are there not twelve hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of the world. But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.” This indicates that all opinionated persons are in darkness. Opinions are a sign of darkness because to utter an opinion is to speak nonsense. The reason a person speaks nonsense is that he is in the darkness. But the Lord Jesus is fully in the light, and He Himself is the light. Furthermore, whenever Christ is present, there is day. In other words, as long as Christ is present, we are not in darkness; if Christ as the light of the world is present, it is daytime.
Whenever we express an opinion that is contrary to the Lord’s will, that opinion signifies that we are not walking in the day but in the darkness. If we are following the Lord, we should say “amen” to whatever He says and not express any opinion. As long as we express an opinion of any kind, that opinion will be a sign that we are in darkness and that we do not know what we are saying. Only the Lord knows what to say. When He says, “Let us go,” that is something in the day, in the light. The Lord’s guidance is always light. If we follow our opinion, we shall be in darkness. But if we follow His guidance, we shall be in the day and we shall walk in the light. This is the experience and enjoyment of Christ as the light of the world.
In verses 25 and 26 we see that Christ is the resurrection and the life. In verse 25a the Lord Jesus said of Himself, “I am the resurrection and the life.” Christ as the resurrection has been tested by death and has conquered death, and Christ as the life remains unchangeable and lasts forever. This is indicated by Paul’s word in 2 Timothy 1:10b that says, “Our Savior Christ Jesus...nullified death and brought life and incorruption to light through the gospel.” Christ nullified death, making it of none effect, through His devil-destroying death (Heb. 2:14) and death-swallowing resurrection (1 Cor. 15:52-54). Life in 2 Timothy 1:10 is the eternal life of God, which is given to all believers in Christ and which is the main element of the divine grace given to us (Rom. 5:17, 21).
The Lord Jesus is not only life but also resurrection. By itself, life can only have existence, but resurrection can withstand any kind of attack, even the attack of death. Death cannot hold Him because He can conquer death (Acts 2:24). Death cannot retain Him, because He is not only life — He is also resurrection. Life is the power to exist, but resurrection is the power to conquer everything that is against life. As the resurrection, Christ can defeat every attack against life. Christ as the resurrection is mainly to overcome death and all the things belonging to death such as blindness, dumbness, deafness, and all kinds of sickness.
According to the Scriptures, death is a great power. When death comes upon a man, he cannot escape it. Only the Lord Himself as the resurrection can defeat death. Since He is the resurrection, He can break the power of death. Even Hades is unable to confine our Lord to the tomb (Rev. 1:18). Because Christ is not only life but also resurrection, He can deliver all of the dead persons from death.
After speaking of Himself as the resurrection and the life, Jesus said, “He who believes into Me, even if he should die, shall live; and every one who lives and believes into Me shall by no means die forever” (John 11:25-26). This indicates that we may enjoy Christ as the resurrection and the life by believing into Him, that is, by receiving Him into us so that we may have an organic union with Him.
We must learn to apply Christ as the resurrection life day by day. We must not only live by the Lord as life, but we must also conquer by the Lord as resurrection. Many times our circumstances affect us like death. But all matters which contain the touch of death are a test because these matters prove whether or not the Lord is the resurrection. Nothing can confine us, for we have the Lord as our resurrection life. Regardless of the pressure or trouble we are bearing, we can stand it because we have resurrection life. According to 11:25, the Lord did not say that we will not die, but that we will prove to the whole universe that the Lord into whom we believe is the resurrection! Satan will try his best to put us permanently into death. One day, though we all may die, we will all be resurrected. Throughout the whole universe this will be the greatest victory, the victory that will testify that the Lord is the resurrection. However, even in our daily life we may have the foretaste of the ultimate victory of that resurrection. This is why the apostle Paul said, “To know Him and the power of His resurrection” (Phil. 3:10).
Today with His believers everything that the Lord accomplishes is the exercise of Himself as the resurrection. Regenerating, sanctifying, renewing, transforming, conforming, and even glorifying are the exercise of Christ as the resurrection who is life eternal. Every aspect of God’s salvation involves resurrection. After resurrecting us through regeneration, the Lord is now continuing this process of resurrection by sanctifying and transforming us. Eventually, Christ will glorify us. That glorification will be the consummation of resurrection. God’s salvation, therefore, is a process of resurrection. May we experience and enjoy this Christ as the resurrection and the life day by day so that we will be no longer a natural man but a resurrected person.
John 12:23-24 reveals that Christ is a grain of wheat for His divine multiplication. In verse 24, Jesus likened Himself to a grain of wheat: “Unless the grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” As such a grain of wheat, Christ is the divine seed to produce many grains (the people who receive Him) to become His many members who constitute His organic Body which consummates in the New Jerusalem.
In this chapter, according to the worldly view, Jesus was in His golden time. A great crowd of Jews esteemed Him highly and welcomed Him warmly (vv. 12-19), and even the Greeks were seeking after Him (vv. 20-22). However, the Lord neither accepted this kind of exaltation, nor took this opportunity to get a name for Himself; nor did He seize the golden opportunity as the means to have His increase. Rather, knowing that the way for a grain of wheat to multiply is not by being welcomed and honored, but by falling into the ground and dying, the Lord preferred to fall as a grain of wheat into the ground and die that He might produce many grains for the church.
The Lord Jesus was the unique grain that contained His divine life with the divine glory, and His humanity through His incarnation became a shell to conceal the glory of His divinity. Christ’s all-inclusive death released the divine life and glory that were within the shell of His humanity. Just as a grain of wheat releases its life by falling into the ground, so Christ released the divine life within Him through death. Through His death on the cross, the shell of His flesh was broken, and the divine life contained and concealed within it was released. If Christ had not fallen into the earth to die, He would have remained one grain. But He fell into the earth and died, and He brought forth many grains as His multiplication.
Christ, who as a grain of wheat fell into the ground and died, grew out of death to produce many grains, which are the believers. The Lord Jesus fell into the ground and died that His divine element, His divine life, might be released from within the shell of His humanity to produce many believers in resurrection (1 Pet. 1:3), just as a grain of wheat has its life element released by falling into the ground and growing up out of the ground to bear much fruit, that is, to bring forth many grains.
After unveiling Himself as a grain of wheat falling into the ground to produce the many grains, in John 12:32 Christ goes on to reveal Himself as one being lifted up from the earth to draw all men to Himself. “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all man to Myself.” In one respect, the Lord’s death was His falling into the ground, as revealed in verse 24; in another respect, it was His being lifted up on the tree (1 Pet. 2:24). His falling into the ground was to produce the many grains; His being lifted up was to draw all men to Himself. The many grains produced by His falling into the ground are the believers, the “all men” drawn by His being lifted up on the tree. On the one hand, we the believers are grains produced by the death and resurrection of Christ. On the other hand, we are those who have been drawn to the Lord. We are the grains, and we are the drawn ones. All those who are drawn to Him eventually become the many grains, the fruits produced by His death and resurrection. This indicates that the church life has been multiplied! In fact, this multiplication is still taking place today, for many are still being drawn to Christ.
Christ is the grain of wheat that fell into the ground and died, that grew out of death to produce many grains for His multiplication, His glorification. According to John 12:23-24, the Lord’s glorification is a matter of His multiplication. Verse 23 indicates clearly that the Lord was concerned for His glorification, and verse 24 explains what this glorification is. In verse 23 He said to the disciples, “The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” In verse 24 He went on to say, “Unless the grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it abides alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” This indicates that glorification is a matter of dying and rising so that many grains may be brought forth. This means that the Lord’s glorification was His multiplication, and His multiplication was His glorification. Since a field of ripe wheat has a certain kind of glory and all the ripe ears of wheat are the glory of the grains of wheat that have been sown into the ground, the multiplication of a grain of wheat is its glorification. Likewise, as a grain of wheat, the Lord Jesus died on the cross to bring forth the multiplication of Himself, and He is glorified in the producing of many grains, which are for the building up of His Body. As a grain of wheat, a container of the divine life, Christ was sown into the earth through death in order that He might be multiplied and thereby glorified.
The believers may enjoy Christ as the life essence through His death and resurrection; that is, they may enjoy Him as the life essence released through His death and dispensed through His resurrection. The Lord, as a grain of wheat falling into the ground, lost His soul-life through death that He might release His eternal life in resurrection to the many grains. As the many grains, we also must lose our soul-life through death (v. 25) that we may enjoy the eternal life in resurrection. To lose our soul-life is to follow Him that we may serve Him and walk with Him on this way, the way of losing the soul-life and living in His resurrection. This is indicated by the Lord’s word to the disciples in verse 26a, “If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there also My servant will be.” Thus, we need to pray, “Lord, grant me the grace to be willing to die. Lord, I want to follow You. You said that wherever You are, there will Your servants be. Lord, since You are in death, we must be in death also.”
One difference between Christ as the one grain and us as the many is that He was willing to fall into the ground, but we are not. Instead of falling into the ground to die, we like to be uplifted. However, if we are lifted up, there will be no multiplication. The only way for a grain to multiply is to fall into the ground and die. Otherwise, it will remain alone, perhaps in a high place. All genuine Christians are grains, but not many are willing to fall into the ground and die. There might be a huge crowd, but there might be very little life because few are willing to experience the death of Christ. Since nearly everyone is unwilling to die and prefers to receive glory, no life is imparted into others. It is easy to have a crowd but difficult to impart life into others. To do this, we need to die. In the Lord’s recovery we do not need a crowd; we need the death that releases life. We need to experience this aspect of Christ’s death.
The Lord’s death not only releases the divine life but also multiplies it. The shortage of life among the believers is due to the fact that we have not died enough to minister life to one another. Life comes out of death. The divine life is within us, but how much this life is multiplied depends upon how much death we undergo. The more death we experience, the more life will be released from us. Only death can bring about the multiplication of the divine life; power cannot do it. Today’s Christians devote their attention to power instead of to life. But only the death of Christ can multiply life. He is the unique grain of wheat, and we are the many grains of wheat. In our function we should be the same as Christ for His multiplication. Hence, we need to enjoy Christ as the grain of wheat by experiencing His life-releasing death for the multiplication of the divine life.
In verses 35, 36, and 46, we see that Christ is the light. In verses 35 and 36, the Lord Jesus said to the crowd, “The light is still among you a little while. Walk while you have the light so that darkness may not overcome you; and he who walks in the darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe into the light, so that you may become sons of light.” In verse 46, the Lord then said of Himself, “I have come as a light into the world, that every one who believes into Me would not remain in darkness.” This indicates that the Lord Jesus came to this world as the shining light that man might not remain in darkness. Christ is the manifestation of God as light, and if people receive Him as light, they will have God. If a man believes into Him, he will not remain in darkness. However, if a man refuses to receive Him as light, he simply rejects God and will be overcome by darkness. Christ comes as light. If a man receives Him, he will have God and will become one of the sons of light, the children of God. Here the Lord was making a declaration to the religious crowd that He is the manifestation of God coming to them as light. If they receive Him, they will become sons of light, and if they do not receive Him, they will be overcome by darkness. Christ is the light into whom we believe, that we may become sons of light who do not remain in darkness and are not overcome by darkness.
