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Scripture Reading: John 1:4; 10:10b; 11:25; 1 John 5:12; Col. 3:4a; Rom. 5:10, 12, 17-19, 21; 6:4; Phil. 3:10a
We have seen the tree of life, the water of life, the breath of life, the seed of life, and the Spirit of life. In this chapter we come to life itself. Nothing is as hard to define as life.
We should remember that Genesis 1 and 2 are a record of life. There are four categories of life in Genesis 1 and 2: the vegetable life, the animal life, the human life, and the divine life. The vegetable life, the animal life, and the human life are lives created by God. Only the divine life is uncreated and eternal. It is the life from eternity unto eternity. With all the other categories of lives there is a beginning and ending because they are created lives, but only one category of life, one unique life, the divine life of God, is eternal and uncreated with no beginning or ending.
In Genesis 1 and 2 all the lower lives are for the higher lives. The plant life is for the animal life, the animal life is for the human life, and the human life is for the divine life. Only the human life is qualified to be for the divine life. Why is only the human life qualified to contain the divine life? The best illustration of this marvelous divine reality is that of a glove and a hand. A person’s hand cannot fit in a handkerchief because it does not have the image or form of the hand. Because a glove is in the image, the likeness, and the form of a hand, it is able to contain the hand. A glove is made in the form of a hand for the purpose of containing the hand. The human life was created according to the likeness of the divine life so that God could dispense Himself as the divine life into the human life. Only the human life is qualified to contain the divine life because the human life is in the likeness of the divine life. God created us in His likeness because His purpose was that we would contain Him. To fulfill this purpose, God created us with a human spirit. Our human spirit is the organ for us to receive God and contain God. Thus, the human spirit is the means and the organ to fulfill God’s divine purpose.
The vegetable life, the animal life, and the human life are not the real life. They are shadows, figures, or pictures of the real life, the divine life. They show forth different aspects of the unique life, the divine life. The beauty of certain flowers points to the beauty of the divine life. The divine life is actually more beautiful than anything that can be seen in the plant life. The many fruit trees which bear many types of fruit are a shadow showing us how fruitful the divine life is. The forest, which is full of trees, is a picture of the abundance of the divine life. Furthermore, the human life has the likeness of the divine life. Man’s wisdom in scientific endeavors is a picture of the wisdom of the divine life. All the positive attributes, features, and aspects of the vegetable life, animal life, and human life are shadows or pictures of the divine life. According to the divine concept, if we do not have the divine life, we do not have life. The human life that we possess is not the real life but is only a figure, a shadow, of life. We need to have the life that is really life (1 Tim. 6:19). This is why 1 John 5:12 tells us that if we have the Son, we have the life, and if we do not have the Son, we do not have the life.
Now we need to ask what life is. Life is God Himself; life is God in Christ; life is God in Christ as the Spirit; life is Christ with God; and life is the Spirit with all the riches of Christ in all the fullness of the Godhead. John 1:4 says, “In Him was life.” The One in whom there is life is the One who was the Word in the beginning, who was with God in the beginning, who was God in the beginning, and through whom all things came into being. In this One was life. This life was the light of men (v. 4). John 10:10b tells us that the Lord Jesus came that we might have life and have it abundantly. This is the purpose of Christ’s coming. First Timothy 1:15 says that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” He came into the world to save us from our sins, to deal with the negative side (Matt. 1:21). The positive purpose of Christ’s coming, however, is that we may have life and have it abundantly.
This life is life with resurrection power. The life we have received from God through Christ is a resurrection life. We have to differentiate life from resurrection. Resurrection is life that has been tested by passing through death. The life that we possess is a life with resurrection power. This life has been tested by being put into death and by passing through death. Christ is the resurrection and the life (John 11:25). Because Christ is the resurrection, it was not possible for Him to be held by death (Acts 2:24). Death cannot hold the resurrection life. If we have the Son, we have this life. If we do not have the Son, we do not have this life. Because we have received the Son, we can declare that we have this life. We can say, “Christ our life” (Col. 3:4a).
Romans 5:10 says, “If we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled.” The two main items in this verse are the death of the Son of God and the life of the Son of God. In addition to the death and the life of the Son of God, there are the two matters of reconciliation and salvation. Reconciliation is through His death. Salvation is in His life. Reconciliation to God through Christ has been accomplished already, but to be saved in His life from many negative things is still a daily matter. We also need to pay attention to the words much more in this verse. We have been reconciled, but much more we will be saved in the Lord’s life. As sinners we need justification, but as enemies we need reconciliation. Because of the enmity between us and God, there was the need of reconciliation. We were not only sinners but also enemies. When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of Christ. We can say that we have been saved from the lake of fire and from God’s condemnation through the redeeming blood of Christ. But according to Romans 5:10, we still need to be saved in His life, which is the divine life, the real life.
After we have been saved from God’s condemnation and from the lake of fire, we need to be saved first from the law of sin. The law of sin is the besetting power of sin. Romans 8:2 says that the law of the Spirit of life sets us free from the law of sin. The second item that we need to be saved from is the flesh. The third negative item that we need to be saved from is death. Death includes all negative things. Our sloppiness, looseness, weakness, negative thoughts, and failures are included in death. We need to be saved from the law of sin, from the flesh, and from death. The law of sin, the flesh, and death are prevailing and powerful negative items that trouble us even after we have been regenerated with the divine life. If we are going to know what it is to be saved in His life, we have to be saved from these negative items.
Death always goes with sin. Death is the issue of sin. Sin is the cause, and death is the effect. Whenever we have sin, death is there. Death is the shortage of ability to fulfill God’s requirements according to His divine standard. God requires that we honor our parents. If we cannot honor our parents, that is death. In the eyes of God, death is with us because we cannot fulfill His requirements. The Lord also tells us, “You shall be holy because I am holy” (1 Pet. 1:16). If we cannot be holy, this means that we are dead. God wants us to be diligent. If we are sloppy, this is death. God requires that we be watchful, but we may always be sleeping. This means that we are short of the ability to fulfill God’s requirements and that death is with us. God desires that we be careful persons, but we may be careless day after day. Many young brothers may seem to be living, but actually they are dead because they are short of the ability to fulfill God’s requirements according to His divine standard.
From 1920 through 1925, the Lord did something miraculous in China by saving a number of college and high-school students. During that time, a real change was taking place in China due to the young generation. Their concept was being revolutionized with the thought that man has to be free. The Chinese people had many teachings, customs, habits, traditions, and regulations. Young people in the early 1920s in China desired to abandon these regulations so that they could be free. In the 1920s in China a young person was required to rise up when an older person entered the room. A teenager did not have the freedom to say anything in the presence of his elders, and he could not sit down until they left his presence. It was under this kind of environment that we young people in China were saved by the Lord. Because of the desire to be free from regulations, some who were saved had the concept that Jesus never regulated others and that He was not under any regulations. To them real freedom meant no regulations. Actually, however, to have no regulations is looseness and death. By reading the Scriptures, we can see that the Lord Jesus was a very careful person. He was neither sloppy nor loose.
The Gospels give us a record of the Lord’s feeding five thousand people at one time (Matt. 14:14-21). These people were enjoying the Lord’s teaching, but the hour became late, and they became hungry. The disciples asked the Lord to dismiss the people so that they could go and get something to eat. But the Lord charged the disciples, “You give them something to eat” (Mark 6:37). The Gospels record the miracle of the Lord’s feeding five thousand with only five loaves and two fish, but we can also see that the Lord did everything in a very careful way and in a good order. The disciples presented the Lord Jesus with the loaves and the fish, and He told the disciples to have the people sit down in companies of hundreds and fifties (John 6:10; cf. Mark 6:39-40). This shows how orderly the Lord Jesus was. Before the people ate, He required that they sit down in an orderly way in companies.
After such a great miracle of feeding the five thousand, the Lord Jesus instructed the disciples to pick up what was left over of the bread and of the fish. Mark 6:43 tells us that the disciples “took up twelve full handbaskets of the broken pieces of bread and of the fish.” If we were there with the disciples, we probably would not care about the fragments of bread and of fish. But the Lord Jesus was not careless. When He was on this earth, He was so orderly and did everything in a careful way. God’s creation testifies of His orderliness. There is nothing chaotic about God’s creation, but everything is in order.
If we are sloppy, careless, or loose, this proves that we cannot fulfill God’s requirements according to His divine standard, so death is with us. We need to be saved in His life. We need His life so that we can be living, capable, and full of energy and ability to fulfill God’s requirements according to His divine standard. To be living does not mean that we are merely active or lively but that we are able to fulfill God’s requirements. It is good for us to say, “Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!” But suppose that God wants us to be quiet. If we cannot be quiet, that means that death is with us. If we are required to be at certain places on time and cannot be there on time, this is death. The shortage of ability to be on time means that death is with us. When the Lord tells us to jump and shout, we should be one with Him. When the Lord wants us to be quiet, we need to be quiet. Our being one with the Lord proves that we are full of life because we are full of the ability and capability to fulfill the Lord’s requirements. If we are short of the ability to fulfill God’s requirements, that is a strong proof that we are dead. How we all need to be saved in His life!
We need to have some fellowship with the Lord concerning our need to be saved in His life. In our daily life, do we have the ability to fulfill the Lord’s requirements? If we do not, we are short of life. A shortage of ability to fulfill the Lord’s requirements according to His divine standard means that we are short of life. It means that death is with us and that we need the Lord’s life to save us. Much more, we shall be saved in His life. To be saved is not a matter merely of being justified, forgiven by God, and saved from the lake of fire. We need to be saved from the shortage of ability to glorify Him, to please Him, and to fulfill His requirements. We need more life. We need life abundantly. We need to be saved in such a rich way. We need to bring the fellowship in this chapter to the Lord in prayer so that we can be saved in His life in our daily life.
