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Scripture Reading: Phil. 3:10; 1:19-21; 4:13; Rom. 8:4; Phil. 4:12
I. Pursuing to know Christ — Phil. 3:10a.
II. Pursuing to know the power of Christ’s resurrection — Phil. 3:10b.
III. Pursuing to live a life of dying with Christ to be conformed to His death by the power of His resurrection — v. 10c.
IV. Living Christ to magnify Him through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ — 1:19-21a.
V. Living and walking in the empowering Christ — 4:13.
VI. Living and walking in and according to the mingled spirit — Rom. 8:4.
VII. In everything taking Christ as the secret — Phil. 4:12.
This being:
А. To live out the processed and consummated Triune God.
B. To live out the pneumatic Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God.
C. To live out the consummated Spirit as the consummation of the processed Triune God.
D. This being equivalent to living in the resurrection (denoting a person) of the consummated Spirit.
This also being:
А. To live out the reality of the Body of Christ.
B. To become an unprecedented revival among all the Christ-pursuing God-men today.
C. To be the means for the Lord to close this age and bring in His kingdom age.
Prayer: Lord, we have been under Your visitation for many years and have been brought into Your recovery. But, O Lord, we truly regret that due to our dullness we have hindered You. We have lived in the natural realm; we have lived in our religious understanding, our ethical understanding, and our own understanding. We ask for Your forgiveness. We really do not want to remain veiled as we were in the past. We pray to You as the blind man did: “Lord, that I may receive my sight!” Today, since the age has changed, cause us to have a change that we may catch up with this age. O Lord, enable us to forget the things that are behind, as the apostle Paul did, so that we may press forward to the things that are before us — Your vision and revelation.
We pray that You would visit us here again that we may earnestly pursue not only to see or know something but also to see a vision, even Your present vision. O Lord, grant us Your visitation. We also need the covering and protection of Your precious blood from the enemy’s attack. We truly recognize that You have put us in the days of warfare to wage a long-term battle. O Lord, cover us again and resist the enemy’s attack for us. Amen.
Based on the fellowship in the preceding three chapters, my burden in this chapter is to speak concerning the proper living of a Christ-pursuing God-man. Very few in Christianity have a proper understanding of the term God-man; some of them even oppose the use of this term. They reject not only the teaching concerning our being God-men but also the teaching concerning Christ’s being a God-man. However, if you do not believe that Christ is a God-man, this is tantamount to not confessing that Christ has come in the flesh (1 John 4:2-3). Only a small number of people confess that Christ is a God-man, and among this small number, there are some who do not acknowledge that today we are God-men. They say that we are Christians, believers, and saints but not God-men, and that to say that we are God-men is blasphemy. Hence, there is a great debate regarding the truth concerning the God-man.
In A.D. 325, Athanasius, a young theologian who was a student under the church fathers and who assisted in the drafting of the Nicene Creed, made a statement: “God became man that man might become God.” This statement became an aphorism in Christianity for generations. But in the past several hundred years it has been seldom referred to in Christian literature.
Now let us see the proper living of a God-man who pursues Christ. Paul refers to this in the book of Philippians. He wrote to the church in Philippi, referring to his life of living Christ to magnify Him, of pursuing Christ to gain Him, and of taking Christ as the secret of his contentment. In such an Epistle with experiencing Christ as its subject, we can find out that the first thing in the proper living of a Christ-pursuing God-man is to pursue to know Christ. In Philippians 3:10a Paul says, “To know Him [Christ].” Christ is unlimited, and His riches are unsearchable (Eph. 3:8). Our knowledge of Christ is, on the one hand, by revelation and, on the other hand, by experience. In these last forty years most of my messages have been centered on Christ. I searched out from the Holy Scriptures all the items concerning Christ in the types, Christ in the prophecies, and Christ in plain words. However, we still need to increase our pursuing of Christ so that we may apprehend with all the saints the dimensions — the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth — of Christ. Christ is exceedingly rich; He is all-inclusive and all-extensive. We need to pursue to know Him.
The proper life of a Christ-pursuing God-man is also a life of pursuing to know the power of Christ’s resurrection. In Philippians 3:10b Paul refers to “the power of His resurrection.” We should pursue not only to know Christ but also to know the power of His resurrection. Christians talk about resurrection, but their general view of resurrection is too shallow. Lazarus was resurrected, but his resurrection was not the same as the resurrection of Christ. Lazarus’s resurrection was a genuine resurrection, but later he died again. His resurrection was not the same as the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. The resurrection of the Lord Jesus means that he who believes into Him, even if he should die, shall live and even live forever (John 11:25-26).
The resurrection of Lazarus was merely his being made alive again by the power of God. This kind of resurrection was there already in the Old Testament, as seen in Elisha’s raising the dead (2 Kings 4:32-35; 13:20-21), which was raising people from the dead merely by the power of God. But it is not so with the resurrection of Christ. Christ has the Spirit of holiness, God Himself, in Him. He was resurrected not merely by the power of God but even more by the very God who was in Him. In the resurrection of Lazarus God was not there; only the power of God was there. However, in the resurrection of Christ, there was God; not only so, the resurrection of Christ was the very God. This is the resurrection power of God. Although we can speak about these things, we do not have enough experience of them. Hence, we still need to do our best to pursue to know the power of Christ’s resurrection not only in revelation but also in experience.
The proper life of a Christ-pursuing God-man is also a life of pursuing to die with Christ to be conformed to His death by the power of His resurrection. In church history Mrs. Penn-Lewis stands out as one who stressed the death of Christ; many of her books are on this aspect of Christ. The death of Christ that she referred to was not the objective death but the subjective death. Christ’s death on the cross has an objective aspect and a subjective aspect. Christ died for us for the forgiveness of our sins; this is the objective aspect of His death. However, when Christ died, He brought us with Him so that our old man died together with Him (Rom. 6:6). This is the subjective experience. The emphasis of Mrs. Penn-Lewis’s books is on the subjective effectiveness of Christ’s death.
Paul says that we should be conformed to Christ’s death. However, to experience the power of Christ’s resurrection and be conformed to His death, we need to participate in His sufferings (Matt. 20:22-23; Col. 1:24; 2 Tim. 2:11). Hence, Paul says, “To know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death” (Phil. 3:10). To fellowship is to participate in; to fellowship in His sufferings is to be conformed to His death. With Christ there is a mold, the mold of His life of thirty-three and a half years on the earth, which is the mold of the cross. In God’s eyes Christ’s death did not happen only when He was crucified on the cross before men; rather, from the time of His birth He was bearing the cross daily. What did it mean for Him to bear the cross? It meant that death was upon Him all the time; He lived under the cross day by day.
The Lord Jesus told us, “If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me” (Matt. 16:24). To deny the self is to take up the cross. When the Lord Jesus was on the earth, He lived a crucified life daily. Although He was holy and without sin, He still denied Himself by putting Himself to death that God might live in Him and be lived out of Him.
Christ took up His cross daily by dying to Himself. Likewise, as God-men who pursue Him, we should bear the cross and live under the cross daily. This means that we should put our natural life on the cross by daily dying to our self and putting to death all the practices of our natural man and our flesh. We have a short hymn (Hymns, #631) that says,
This kind of living requires our pursuit. A God-man is one who lives under the cross daily. Hence, to have merely the teaching of the cross is not enough; the cross must become our experience.
Such a living in the shadow of the cross touches the deepest part of our being and every detail in our life. We all know that we need to be careful when we talk to others. We brothers who are married, however, realize that we become very careless when we are talking to our wife. If we are those who live in the shadow of the cross, even our talking to our wife needs to be checked. Are we under the death of the cross when we talk to our wife in a certain way? If we are willing to check in this way, we will see that ninety-nine percent of the things that we say to our wife should never be said. They are things that we speak out of ourself; they are not spoken by the indwelling God in us but by our natural man. It may be that we do not criticize, judge, or condemn others; instead, we speak nice things about others. But is it Christ who speaks, or is it we who speak? We have to admit that most of the things that we say are by ourself without passing through the cross.
If living in the shadow of the cross can be practiced among us, all troubles will disappear. This not only means that we should not engage in gossip, speaking idle words, but also means that we should not even speak nice words, because we are those who need to die and be in the shadow of the cross. We should not speak but allow the Lord to speak. If we truly have this experience, regardless of what we say, we have the cross checking in us: “Is this spoken through the cross? Is the mold of the cross here?”
The principle is the same in our shopping. We all like to buy things. It is not a matter of whether we should buy a certain item but a matter of the cross. Even in small matters such as buying a necktie, we need to be in the shadow of the cross. We are those who belong to Christ; in other words, we are God-men. Therefore, we should live under the death of the cross in all things. It is in this way that the resurrected Lord can manifest His power from within us.
The proper life of a Christ-pursuing God-man is also a life of living Christ to magnify Him through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. We must not only know the power of Christ’s resurrection and be conformed to His death daily, but we must also know the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. By this bountiful supply we can live Christ to magnify Him (Phil. 1:19-21a). Paul wrote this word during his imprisonment in Rome. Under that difficult circumstance he wrote that by the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, he was enabled to live and magnify Christ. When he was to be martyred, knowing that he was going to be with the Lord, he wrote in the second Epistle to Timothy, “I have fought the good fight; I have finished the course; I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness” (4:7-8a). Hence, he rejoiced. Under that condition and situation he overcame the threatening of death and martyrdom and lived out Christ to magnify Him. Paul was able to live out that kind of life because he did it by the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.
We do not yet have adequate experience of the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. Hence, we need to pursue. Since we are God-men, we should live out God. God’s desire is that we become Him through the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ so that we can die to ourselves and Christ can live out of us and be magnified through us.
The proper life of a God-man who pursues Christ is to live and walk in the empowering Christ (Phil. 4:13).
Furthermore, we should live and walk in and according to the mingled spirit (Rom. 8:4). Paul says that we are approved and justified before God because we live, walk, and have our being according to the mingled spirit. A person who walks according to the mingled spirit is one who lives and walks in the empowering Christ.
A Christ-pursuing God-man should live by taking Christ as the secret in everything (Phil. 4:12). This is a very deep pursuit and experience. What is a secret? A secret is the key or skillfulness to do something. This is just like a key being the secret to a lock. Without the key we cannot open the lock; to open the lock we must have the key. In accomplishing anything we must have the secret; otherwise, we will waste our effort. Paul did everything by taking Christ as his key to open his “locks.”
If we engage in the above pursuits, the issue will be that we live out the processed and consummated Triune God. We live out not only the Father and the Son but also the Spirit. Furthermore, we live out the pneumatic Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God. Christ is the embodiment of the Triune God; He is also the Spirit Himself. Christ Himself is the Spirit and the Triune God.
We also live out the consummated Spirit of the processed Triune God. Christ passed through resurrection to become the life-giving Spirit; this Spirit is the consummation of the processed Triune God. Hence, the Spirit, the life-giving Spirit, is the consummation of the Triune God, and Christ is the very Spirit. If we live a life according to the preceding seven items, we live out not only the Triune God and Christ but also the consummated Spirit.
When we thus live out the consummated Spirit, this is equivalent to living in the resurrection of the consummated Spirit. This resurrection denotes a person, not a power or a thing. This is why the Lord Jesus said that He is the resurrection (John 11:25). Furthermore, the reality of resurrection is the Spirit, the consummation of the Triune God. Therefore, we have this conclusion: The Triune God, Christ, the Spirit, and resurrection are one. When we live according to the preceding seven items, we live in resurrection. This resurrection denotes a person — God. Hence, to be in resurrection means to be in the Triune God, in Christ, and in the consummated Spirit.
As the new creation, we should not live in the old creation. If we live in the old creation, we are not in resurrection but in our natural man. Once we live in the Triune God, in Christ, and in the consummated Spirit, we are in resurrection. This is a life that lives out the reality of the Body of Christ. Today, in general, people have the term the Body of Christ, yet very few know what the Body of Christ refers to. The Brethren teaching says that the church is the Body of Christ. This is literally according to Ephesians 1:23: “Which [the church] is His Body, the fullness of the One who fills all in all.” But what is the Body of Christ? The Brethren did not have a clear explanation.
Based on his knowledge of the Bible and his own experience, Brother Watchman Nee spoke a word that probably had never been spoken by anyone else. He said that the Spirit is the reality of resurrection. When we live in this resurrection, what we live out is the Body of Christ. The Body of Christ is the issue of the God-man life lived out by all those who believe in and belong to the Lord as the new man. Only such a God-man living is Christ. In our daily life we should speak and do things in resurrection. If we are not in resurrection, we are not the Body of Christ; rather, we are natural. We may live and walk in a proper manner, but if we do not live out the reality of Christ, we are not in the Spirit or in the reality of resurrection; hence, we are without the reality of the Body of Christ. This touches something very high. If we have not seen this, we have not seen the Body of Christ.
Where is the Body of Christ? Some say that the Body of Christ is universal and appears in different localities. This explanation is still a doctrine, even a good doctrine, but it has not yet touched the reality. Where is the Body of Christ? The Body of Christ is in resurrection, and this resurrection is first, the Triune God; second, the pneumatic Christ; and third, the all-inclusive Spirit. The Body of Christ is in the Triune God, in the pneumatic Christ, in the all-inclusive Spirit, and in resurrection. Hence, when we live out a situation of resurrection, that is the manifestation of the Body of Christ. Using this as the yardstick for measuring, can you find the Body of Christ? You need to be careful in your daily life to see whether you speak and act in resurrection or in your natural man. If you are not in resurrection, whatever you say is not in resurrection. If you say something that is not nice, it is not in resurrection; if you say something nice, neither is it in resurrection. Then what shall you do? You know what to do only by being on the cross. When you are going to talk about something, are you on the cross? If you are on the cross, you are in resurrection.
If we live in resurrection, this will become an unprecedented revival among all the Christ-pursuing God-men today. It will be a genuine revival brought forth from within us. It will also be an unprecedented revival, a revival that has never occurred in the two-thousand-year history of the church. I believe that before the Lord comes back, there will be such a final revival. What is this revival? It is the corporate living of the overcomers; it is also the reality of the Body of Christ. This revival does not necessarily refer to the preaching of the gospel with enthusiasm to bring people to salvation; this revival is the corporate living of the overcomers in resurrection.
This revival will be the means for the Lord to close this age and bring in His kingdom age. This age is really coming to a close. Look at the development in the world situation. The nation of Israel has been restored, and Jerusalem has been returned to the Israelites. Hence, this age should be ended. But it seems that the Lord still has no way to close this age. The reason that the Lord still has not closed this age is that He is still waiting for the overcomers. He is waiting for a group of overcomers to live in His Body in resurrection to be the means for Him to usher in His kingdom age.
In Luke 18:8 the Lord said, “When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” This means that when the Son of Man comes, He will be looking for the overcomers on the earth, a group of people living in faith, but can He find them? If you answer, “He can,” then this age can be closed for the Lord to come back. However, no one today can say this. I often ask myself solemnly and even ask the Lord with weeping, “O Lord, am I Your overcomer today?” I dare not say that I am not, but I am afraid that I am not, because I still do certain things in my natural man and not in resurrection, and I still do certain things not by faith but by myself.
Recently, we said that to have faith is to believe that God is and we are not. Hebrews 11:6 says, “He who comes forward to God must believe that He is.” Today the people in the world, even Christians, and even the leading co-workers among us, mostly act and behave by believing that they themselves are. You can seldom see a brother who shows, in his attitude and expression, that he does not believe that he is but believes that only God is. A person who does not believe that he is but believes that only God is, is the Lord’s overcomer. With this as a measuring yardstick, I tell the Lord, “Lord, in the last part of the journey of my human life, may I receive Your mercy and grace to be one of Your overcomers.” Without such a group of overcomers, how can the Lord close this age? The Lord has spent six thousand years to work on the earth. In the adamic age the Lord did not find this group of overcomers. Then generation after generation through the age of the law, He was not able to find these overcomers. Likewise, in the church age He cannot find this group of overcomers in Christianity. It is only in His recovery that He can find a small number of overcomers. In Revelation 14 we see that even though many have been saved, the overcomers number only a hundred and forty-four thousand. May the Lord have mercy on us to make us the overcomers in the present age for Him to close this age and bring in His kingdom age.
