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Scripture Reading: Eph. 1:7, 18; 3:16, 19; Rom. 9:23; 2:4; Gen. 1:26
I. The meaning of the fullness of God:
А. The fullness of God being the overflow of God’s riches to become His expression.
B. The fullness of God being the expression of the riches of God.
II. The riches of God:
А. The riches of God’s grace — Eph. 1:7.
B. The riches of God’s glory — v. 18; 3:16; Rom. 9:23.
C. The riches of God’s kindness, forbearance, and long-suffering — 2:4.
III. The creation of man being for the fullness of God:
А. The fullness of God being the expression of the riches of all that God is.
B. Man being created in God’s image for the expression of all that God is — Gen. 1:26.
In this series of messages we will use four chapters to consider the fullness of God and another four chapters to consider life, truth, the church, and the gospel. Many newly saved and baptized brothers and sisters may not have a clear understanding of the phrase the fullness of God. It is easier to understand God’s power, authority, and greatness. It may also be easier to understand God’s mercy, His abundant grace, and His deep love. A believer may also have a partial understanding of some deeper matters, such as God’s holiness, righteousness, salvation, and redemption. However, even believers who have been studying the Bible for years find it difficult to understand the fullness of God. After many years of studying the truth and consulting the works of renowned writers throughout the centuries, I discovered that even Bible expositors have different views of this term, and their understanding is generally not according to the pure divine revelation in the Scriptures.
The Bible was written in human language. The Old Testament was written in Hebrew, and the New Testament was written in Greek. These were then translated into other languages. A language is a means of communication. It is easy for a person who reads the Bible, whether in the original text or a translation, to have a natural understanding of the Bible if he only understands it literally. This is a common mistake among Bible readers. For example, the Bible speaks about faith. The Chinese translation of faith literally means “a believing, trusting heart.” This definition is accurate according to a natural understanding, but it is not accurate according to the revelation in the Bible.
When some people read the word faith in the Bible, it is easy for them to understand it as a kind of determination and resolution from a strong will. Hence, they use the example of Columbus to explain faith. They say that during the time of Columbus very few people believed that it was possible to cross the ocean and find land, but Columbus had “faith.” Hence, even after he sailed across the ocean for a long time and was in many storms, and his sailors conspired to kill him, Columbus firmly believed that they would find land and proposed that they sail on. He was unshaken in his faith and therefore kept saying, “Sail on!” According to our natural understanding, that was an example of Columbus’s faith, which was the result of a strong will. His faith together with his courage became an effectual resolve. However, this is not what the Bible means when it speaks of faith.
According to common understanding, faith means to believe, to depend on, and to trust in, but in the New Testament, faith means to receive. This differs from the common understanding of faith. The Bible says, “As many as received Him,...to those who believe into His name” (John 1:12). To believe in Jesus is not merely to believe that He exists and that He is truly the Savior who was crucified to accomplish redemption for us; it is not merely to believe and be convinced of these facts. This type of believing or being convinced is inadequate. This is not the faith referred to in the Bible. The faith referred to in the Bible is to receive, that is, to receive the One in whom we believe into us, to receive the facts that we believe into us. When we believe, we receive Jesus Christ, and we also receive the redemption that He accomplished for us on the cross. Therefore, according to the Bible, faith means to receive. We believe and are convinced because we have received.
This illustration shows that we should not understand the words in the Bible merely according to their common meaning. After understanding what is written, we still need to go further to see the revelation in the Bible. Let us now apply this principle to the phrase the fullness of God.
In everyday language the words riches and fullness can be similar in meaning. For example, if a person has plenty of food in his house, we would say that his house is rich in food or full of food. In our understanding riches and fullness are more or less the same.
The book of Ephesians has only six chapters, but it contains the words riches and fullness. Riches is used in 3:8, which speaks of “the unsearchable riches of Christ,” and fullness is used in 1:23, which speaks of “His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.” In Greek riches and fullness are two different words. However, because of the similarity of these two words in Chinese, almost everyone who reads the Bible in Chinese understands fullness as riches. But fullness and riches are two different things. I hope that this fellowship will help us to see this matter clearly.
Some of you may wonder what my intention is in speaking to you concerning these particular and profound words. My intention is to release the profound revelation in the Bible. It is a pity that Christianity releases only ordinary doctrines to people instead of the fundamental and profound revelation and truth in the Bible. When I was young, I studied in a Christian school run by Americans, and every Lord’s Day we had to dress neatly and walk to the chapel for Sunday service. In those days the Chinese people had the impression that Christianity spoke only concerning matters such as “Jesus loves me; this I know,” going to heaven, and going to hell. This aroused much disgust among the Chinese because they had a long history of hearing about heaven and hell, and therefore, they did not need Western missionaries to speak to them about these things in imperfect Mandarin.
I am a fourth-generation Christian in my family. Hence, the things they taught me in school were fairly clear. When I was twelve or thirteen years old, I heard a British missionary say that the Bible speaks about benevolence, justice, morality, women’s submission, and virtues in nearly the same way as the philosophy of China’s Confucius and Mencius. After hearing this, I was disgusted and thought that if this was the case, the Chinese did not need the missionaries to teach them; rather, the Chinese should be the ones teaching the missionaries. Therefore, I became annoyed with Christianity, and by the time I was about fifteen years old, I no longer went to the chapel. I felt that the teachings of the Chinese philosophers were more profound than the preaching of the Western missionaries. During those few years, I stayed away from Christianity and did not attend any of their meetings.
By the Lord’s power I was saved when I was nineteen, and the Lord planted within me a heart that loves the Bible. Therefore, I studied the Bible diligently for eight years, between the ages of nineteen and twenty-seven. This is the period of time when a person’s comprehension and memory are the strongest. I truly loved the Bible, and the more I read the Bible, the more I loved it, because no book in English or Chinese could compare to the Bible. I felt that the Bible is profound and that every verse contains an important meaning. I also collected many Christian books as reference material for the things that I did not understand. I later came across the expository magazines published by Brother Watchman Nee. I thought that he could expound the Bible in such a marvelous way because he was an elderly man. It was only when I began to write to him that I found out that he was only two years older than I. This increased my eagerness and motivation to understand every word and verse in every chapter of the Bible. I asked Brother Nee which book could teach me to understand the Bible. He replied that as far as he knew, the book that was the best exposition of the Bible was the Synopsis of the Books of the Bible by J. N. Darby. He added that it was difficult to read because of its long sentences. Hence, a person needed to read it four or five times before he could begin to understand it; unless a person made an effort to study, he could not enter into it. Brother Nee and I eventually became co-workers.
When I began to serve full time, I visited Brother Nee in Shanghai. One day he came to me with two large sets of books and indicated that they were for me. One of the sets was Darby’s Synopsis of the Books of the Bible, and the other was Henry Alford’s New Testament for English Readers. That was in 1933, fifty-two years ago. During these fifty-two years these two sets of books have always been with me, and they have been a continuous help to me. From the time that I received these books, I have made an effort to study the most particular and profound words in the Bible.
I have been studying the phrase the fullness of God for more than forty years. It was not until the last twenty-five years that I began to understand the difference between the fullness of God and the riches of God. This is a crucial matter that every new believer needs to understand. I want to supply you with the basic and profound truths in the Bible, and I hope that you can obtain light, truth, life, and a rich supply from these truths.
Let us begin with the meaning of the fullness of God. The fullness of God is the overflowing of God’s riches to become His expression. The fullness of God is also the expression of God’s riches. For example, here is a cup with water in it, but you do not know how much water is in the cup. There may be a small amount of water in the cup, or there may be much water. If I pour water into the cup until the water overflows, the cup becomes rich with water to the point of overflowing. This overflowing is the fullness. Inside the cup are the riches, and what flows out is the fullness. The cup first has the riches and then the fullness. Therefore, the fullness is the issue of the overflowing of the riches. This issue is the expression of the riches. Unless the cup overflows, we can only guess concerning what is inside the cup. Once it overflows, we know that water is inside the cup, because the water is expressed.
Hence, we should never consider the riches as the fullness. These two things are absolutely different. The riches are the quantity of an object, whereas the fullness is the flowing out, the overflow, of the object to become the expression of the object. God’s fullness is the overflow of His riches, and this overflow is God’s expression. God is abundantly rich. He is so rich that His riches overflow. This overflow is the expression of God.
The riches of a wealthy man are in his abundance of money, and the riches of a wealthy farmer are in his abundance of land. What are the riches of God? In what can God’s riches be seen? We can find a few items in the Bible. There are the riches of God’s grace (Eph. 1:7), the riches of God’s glory (v. 18; 3:16; Rom. 9:23), and the riches of God’s kindness, forbearance, and long-suffering (2:4).
According to the revelation in the entire Bible, the riches of God are seen in life. Among the many items of God’s creation, life is the richest. Mankind began with one person, Adam, who propagated and multiplied. Now mankind covers the entire earth because the human life is rich. The life of our God is even richer than the human life.
God’s riches are also seen in the manifestation of His life and nature. Man possesses love, honesty, endurance, purity, and forbearance as human virtues. Man was made in the image of God and according to God’s likeness (Gen. 1:26). This means that God has forbearance, and therefore, He created forbearance in man. God also has long-suffering, and therefore, He created long-suffering in man. All of God’s attributes are the source of our human virtues. Man’s greatest characteristic is not in having an intelligent mind, in developing huge potentials, or in achieving a great career; the greatest characteristic of man is that his virtues can express God’s attributes.
In other words, human virtues are the greatest characteristic of mankind. Philippians 4:8 says, “What things are true, what things are dignified, what things are righteous, what things are pure, what things are lovely, what things are well spoken of,...take account of these things.” “These things” are the human virtues that are derived from God and are made according to God’s likeness. The source of every human virtue is God. God is rich in love, rich in mercy, rich in forbearance, and rich in many other attributes.
During the past two thousand years of human history, ancient philosophers acknowledge that there is a sovereign “One” in the universe. For example, Confucius said, “He who offends Heaven has none to whom he can pray.” Confucius referred to this sovereign One as Heaven. This is similar to the prodigal son likening God to heaven when he spoke to his father in Luke 15:21, saying, “I have sinned against heaven and before you.” Before the Lord Jesus’ incarnation, before He dwelt among men, mankind always wondered about God. They wondered whether God is forbearing or generous, narrow or broadminded, strict or loving. However, it was not until the Lord Jesus was incarnated, that is, when God was expressed through Jesus Christ, that human beings could see God.
The record in the four Gospels of the Lord Jesus’ life on earth shows that the virtues of the Lord Jesus were the expression of God on earth. The Lord Jesus was meek, caring, compassionate, forbearing, and upright. His love was the love of God, His mercy was the mercy of God, and His compassion was the compassion of God. The life of Jesus on earth was the practical expression of God. Men saw the expressed God in Jesus. Before Jesus came, people did not know God. They wondered whether God was lovely or detestable, generous or narrow, loving or strict. However, in Jesus, God was openly manifested before men. Hence, 1 Timothy 3:16 says, “Confessedly, great is the mystery of godliness: / He who was manifested in the flesh.” When Jesus came, God was expressed. Everything about the Lord Jesus, what He did, His speaking, attitude, conduct, behavior, and the way He treated others, fully expressed God.
God’s attributes and virtues are His riches. God is so rich that His riches overflow. When God’s riches overflow, they become His fullness, and this fullness is the expression of God.
Some of the new believers may wonder how the fullness of God is related to them. Concerning this we would present two crucial points. One point is the meaning of God’s fullness, and the other is that man was created for God’s fullness. Genesis 1:26 says, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness.” God created man in His image. Romans 9:23 says, “In order that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy, which He had before prepared unto glory.” God not only made man in His image; He also made man as a vessel. This vessel has God’s likeness in order to contain God. Any valuable object is usually contained in a box, and the shape of the box is determined by the object it contains. Man is a vessel to contain God. It is for this purpose that God created man. Therefore, man is not a coat hanger to be draped with clothes or a food bag to contain food. The meaning of human life is not related to clothing, food, housing, or transportation; it is not related to eating three meals a day and sleeping at night. The meaning of our human life is in the content of our human life.
Man is a vessel created by God to contain God; therefore, man is an empty vessel if he does not contain God. For this reason we need to realize that we are precious vessels, just as a box that contains a diamond is a precious box. As vessels created by God to contain Him, we are very precious. Hence, many believers testify that there was meaning in their human life after they received the Lord.
When I was thirteen or fourteen years old, I had a few good friends, and even though we encouraged one another to strive for the best, we still felt the emptiness of life. Many elderly brothers and sisters have had this feeling. Whether a person is a government official, a teacher, or a businessman, whenever he is calm, he has the feeling that life cannot merely be a matter of food, clothing, and work. People have had many considerations concerning the meaning of human life, but they have never found an answer.
One day God caused the wind of the gospel to blow on the earth. Throughout the past two thousand years this gospel wind has been blowing everywhere on the earth through the continuous preaching of thousands of believers. There was a time when it was considerably difficult for a Western missionary to go to China to preach the gospel. Some of them spent six months sailing in a boat and suffered nausea and illness during their journey only to die after they arrived in China. Today, however, transportation is convenient, and the various means of communication are even more convenient. This environment is favorable for the preaching of the gospel. Hence, the gospel wind is blowing everywhere. When this wind blows on a person, it causes him to receive the Lord, and he immediately feels that life is no longer empty. He feels that life is full of content and meaning. Although there are different races on the earth with different skin colors — yellow, brown, black, white, and red — the need within everyone is the same. Jesus is mankind’s common need. He is the all-inclusive dose that is suitable for every kind of person.
Genesis 1 shows that man was created by God and for God. God created man according to His likeness so that man could receive Him. God is now the life-giving Spirit, and all the riches of God are in the Spirit. His love, grace, life, light, holiness, righteousness, kindness, forbearance, forgiveness, mercy, compassion, and care are all in the Spirit, and the Spirit is God Himself. We not only need to believe in God; we also need to receive Him. We receive Him simply by opening our mouth to pray. This can be compared to receiving air through breathing. Our calling is our breathing. When we say, “O Lord Jesus,” He enters into us. We can all testify that even when we softly call on the name of the Lord in a meeting, we are changed. It is by calling on the Lord that we receive Him. In this way God enters into us, His vessels, and His riches are contained in us. After God enters into us, He desires to fellowship with us. The more He fellowships with us, the more living we become; and the more we call on Him and breathe Him in, the more He fills us.
Man was created in the image of God to express all that God is (Gen. 1:26). All that God is refers to the fullness of God. Hence, man was created for the fullness of God. After we receive God, we continue to take Him into us by breathing Him in until we are filled with all that God is, all His riches. These riches in us eventually overflow. This overflow is the fullness, the expression of God.
Even though some of you are new believers, this message is for you and is focused on your need. If we all receive this word, we will realize that when we believed in the Lord Jesus, we did not receive a philosophy or religion, nor did we learn a different kind of ritual for worship. These are all in vain and are a waste. Instead, we believed into a true and living God who is the living Spirit. We call Him God, Jehovah, Jesus Christ, the Lord, and the Holy Spirit. This One, who entered into us through our believing and receiving, is rich, and His riches are His attributes. His attributes include life, light, holiness, righteousness, grace, meekness, loving-kindness, sincerity, and glory. The more we call on His name, the more He enters into us. The more we gain Him, the more He fills us until He overflows from within us. The issue of this overflow is God’s fullness, His expression.
After some of the young brothers and sisters have been saved for a period of time, their parents notice that they are “different.” After six months their parents say, “Our child is not the same. It seems as though he is both weighty and virtuous.” Although the parents do not know what happened, they see an expression in their children.
What is the expression of God? God’s expression is His fullness. The fullness is derived from God’s riches, and God’s riches are within Him. God is now in us; hence, our need is to daily call on Him. Even though students in Taiwan have much schoolwork and a busy schedule and are exhausted from their studying, they should not forget to call on the Lord. The most important thing in our day is to call on His name every morning. Whether it is a holiday or a school day and whether or not we are busy, we should rise early every day to call on the Lord’s name. Perhaps we do not know how to pray long prayers, but short prayers are sufficient. Furthermore, even while we are in class, we can call, “O Lord Jesus.”
There is an immense difference between calling on the Lord’s name and not calling on His name. When we lack wisdom, we receive wisdom by calling on the Lord’s name. We are able to remember things when we call on His name, and our anger dissipates when we call on His name. We must believe this. If we call on the Lord’s name, our days will not pass by in vain or be wasted. Moreover, we will not speak nonsense, because the Lord within us will keep us calm. We all have the Lord within us; hence, we need to learn to call on His name every moment of every day. Then His riches will become our enjoyment. The Lord is rich to all who call upon Him (Rom. 10:12). When we enjoy His riches and are filled with His riches, they will overflow from within us to become God’s fullness. God will thus be expressed through us.
