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Scripture Reading: Rom. 12:1-2; Eph. 4:22-24; 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29; 11:17; Phil. 1:19; John 6:57
The most wonderful aspect of the Lord’s salvation is that He works Himself into us. The Lord does not save us from the outside. He saves us by entering into us. Not only does He enter into us, but He also mingles Himself with our entire being. His salvation does not go from the outside to the inside but from the inside to the outside, not from the circumference to the center but from the center to the circumference.
We can testify of this from our experience. Often when we pray, we embrace the religious concept that salvation will come from the heavens outside of us. Therefore, we lift our head and look upward while praying and calling. However, our experience shows us that at other times when we pray in a more informal way and even when we do not seem to be praying at all, we experience salvation breaking out from within us. According to our concept, we think that salvation will come from above, but instead, the Lord’s salvation comes to us from within. Why is this? The Lord’s salvation comes from within us because on the day that we were saved, at the very moment that we repented, confessed, believed, and prayed to the Lord, the wonderful Lord entered into the center of our being, our spirit. We may have had no consciousness that this happened, and we may not have sensed anything, but because we believed in Him and prayed to Him, He entered into our spirit. This mysterious reality is altogether not based upon our feelings. Some may experience great joy, sweetness, and release when the Lord enters into them, but with most people this is not the case. With most people, the Lord enters into their spirit in a quiet way, even without their knowledge. We may not have sensed anything and may not have known that anything happened, but when we believed in Him, the Lord Jesus entered into us.
Allow me to give a few examples to prove this to you. There are some people who repented, confessed, believed, and prayed to the Lord and then expected that something would happen. Thus, when it appeared to them that nothing had happened, they were disappointed, concluding that the gospel is not real and that the preaching that they heard was not reliable. Although they came to this kind of conclusion, within a few days (with some it is three or four days, and with others it may be seven or eight days) something rose up within them without their knowledge. Some may call it a power, some may say that it is salvation, and others may say that they have experienced a change, but regardless of what terminology is used to describe it, this experience is very real. Something powerful rises up from within them to save them.
Forty years ago I preached the gospel to a man named Mr. Du, and he got saved. Mr. Du liked to drink. He had been in Christianity for many years but had never repented or believed until he heard our gospel preaching. When he heard our gospel preaching, he repented, believed, and called upon the Lord. Thus, he was truly saved. Mr. Du had a good friend and neighbor named Mr. Yang. Mr. Yang also had been in Christianity for many years, but he still liked to play cards and go to the opera. He seldom went to Christian meetings. He would go maybe only once every three to six months. Some years he went only on December 25 to attend a Christmas service. Mr. Yang was about thirty years old, and he and Mr. Du were good friends who enjoyed drinking together. After Mr. Du believed in the Lord, Mr. Yang was influenced by him and also genuinely believed in the Lord and was saved into the church. Now he was no longer merely a nominal Christian. Mr. Du and Mr. Yang were happy that both of them had believed in the Lord and had come into the church life. One day one of them laughed and said to the other, “Let us have a little wine together.” The other answered, “No. It is not good to drink.” But the first answered back, “We can just drink a little ‘Timothy wine.’ In 1 Timothy 5:23 Paul told Timothy, ‘No longer drink water only, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.’ Thus, if it was all right for Timothy to drink a little wine, why can’t we have some also?” After this, the two of them raised their glasses and began to drink. However, when Mr. Du took a sip of the wine, it did not taste right to him, so he looked at Mr. Yang, and after Mr. Yang took a sip, he said to Mr. Du, “This wine has changed. It tastes bitter.” The two of them each took another sip, and then without saying anything further, they both put down their glasses at the same time; neither of them could take another sip. This story demonstrates that even if you follow the letter of the Bible, the Christ who is within you may not agree with you. According to the Bible, it may be okay to have a little “Timothy wine,” but something within you may object. This illustrates that salvation does not come from outward teaching; salvation comes from within.
Let me give you another example. When I was preaching the gospel forty years ago, another person got saved. His last name was Jing. He worked at the customs office and was about the same age as Mr. Du. Mr. Jing was tall and strong. He came from Manchuria, had a good sense of humor, spoke with a loud voice, and liked to smoke and drink. His colleagues at the customs office often had parties. If Mr. Jing did not attend these parties, his colleagues did not have much fun, so they always made sure that he came. Mr. Jing was known for being kind and also for being a chain smoker — he smoked from the time that he arrived at the office until the time that he left. This was the kind of person that Mr. Jing was before he got saved. One day, however, he came to listen to the gospel. At that time we were holding a series of gospel meetings at the beginning of the new year. After listening to the gospel for a few nights, on the last evening Mr. Jing came to see me. He said, “Mr. Lee, I understood your preaching, and I am also very touched by it. Now I would like to ask you, how can I get saved?” I answered him, “It is very simple. You have to repent, confess, believe, and pray. Go home and pray to the Lord Jesus. Tell Him, ‘Lord Jesus, I am a sinner.’ After you pray this, whatever sin you sense within, just confess that sin, and after you confess, say, ‘Lord Jesus! Thank You. You were crucified on the cross for me. I believe in You, and I receive You as my Savior.’” When he went home, he did what I had instructed him to do, but when he prayed in this way, it did not seem to him that anything had happened. The next morning he went to work as usual. It was his habit to bring two packs of cigarettes with him every day, but on this morning, for some unknown reason, he forgot to bring them. One of Mr. Jing’s colleagues who sat across from him at the office was also a chain smoker. When the two of them would arrive at their desks each morning, they would look across at each other and give each other a certain look that seemed to say, “I have my cigarettes, and I intend to smoke them. You better have brought your own, for I am not going to let you take advantage of me by asking me for my cigarettes.” However, on this morning when his colleague took out his cigarettes, Mr. Jing realized that he had forgotten to bring his. At that moment he also remembered that the night before he had believed in Jesus, so he told his colleague, “I have forgotten to bring my cigarettes, but last night I believed in Jesus.” When his colleague heard this, he replied, “Forget about it, my dear Jing. You are good at joking around. I know that you must be up to some new trick by saying that you have believed in Jesus. Do not think that you are going to be able to take advantage of me this morning. Whether or not you brought your cigarettes is your business. I am not going to give you any of mine.” Then Mr. Jing’s colleague waited to see what would happen. To his surprise, the whole morning went by, and Mr. Jing did not smoke. Then the colleague observed Mr. Jing further. The whole afternoon went by, and still he did not smoke. Mr. Jing’s colleague was now quite surprised. He knew that even if Mr. Jing were joking, there was no way that he could have maintained the joke for this long. This was the way in which Mr. Jing quit smoking.
That evening the employees of the customs office held a party as usual and invited Mr. Jing to come. It was difficult for him to refuse, so he went. When he got to the party, he simply remained quiet and just smiled at everyone. As a result, people began to make fun of him. But no matter what they said, he remained quiet and smiled at them. Eventually, someone said, “Everybody look. Dear Jing is up to something new today.” Still, regardless of how others teased him, he remained quiet. Then he told his friends, “I have believed in Jesus. I do not smoke anymore, I do not drink anymore, and I will not fool around anymore.” When they heard this, everyone just laughed and said, “Forget about it! Who are you fooling? You are up to some new trick!” Then everyone came to give a toast for him, but instead of drinking with them, he simply said “thank you” and smiled. Within him there was a power that enabled him to stop drinking. This is how Mr. Jing was changed.
When the employees of the customs office had parties, their wives always accompanied them. Once Mr. Jing had been saved, he stopped going out with his colleagues, and as a result, his wife also could not go out with them. Therefore, his wife became very angry with Jesus and blamed those who had preached Jesus to her husband. When Mr. Jing got saved, he became very burning for the Lord. One day he invited seven or eight of us to his home for a love feast and asked his wife to prepare a meal for us. Little did he know that his wife was very angry and had no intention of preparing anything. I was also invited to his home that day. When we arrived at his house, we saw that there was nothing on the table to eat but cold leftovers from the day before. Brother Jing sat down in tears, but we said to him, “Brother, this is really a love feast. Let us eat!” On another occasion when Brother Jing was at a meeting, his wife waited for him impatiently at home. The moment Brother Jing walked in the door, his wife began taking paintings off the wall and throwing them at him. Nevertheless, he still smiled and praised the Lord. He was able to respond in this way not because he had received some power from without but because there was a power within him.
I can tell you many stories of preaching the gospel and seeing the Lord save people not from without but from within. We may think that when the Lord saves us, He is like someone who is standing on solid ground pulling someone else out of a deep pit. This is not the Lord’s way. When we open our mouth to pray, the Lord enters into us and pushes us out of the pit from within us. The Lord enters into us and saves us from within.
In reality the Lord’s saving power is the Lord Himself. Today He is the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit. He has both the element of divinity and the element of humanity within Him. In addition, God’s divine attributes, the human virtues, the elements of redemption, His all-terminating crucifixion, His all-inclusive death, His resurrection, His ascension, and righteousness, holiness, light, life, love, and victory are all in Him. Everything is in the Spirit. The composition of the Spirit is rich and bountiful. This is why we call Him the all-inclusive Spirit. Our Lord is such a Spirit.
When the all-inclusive Spirit enters into us, first He becomes our life, and second He becomes our life supply. These two steps involve a great deal. We can illustrate these two steps with the food that we eat. The Lord Jesus likened Himself to food in John 6:57. He said, “He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.” We all know that food is for our inward supply. A proper meal contains many vitamins and nutrients. After these nutrients have been digested by our stomach, they are absorbed and transported to the different parts of our body to become our many elements. The food that we eat is organic. Thus, by being metabolized into our body, it produces an organic change within us.
If a brother is very weak, his face will be pale and skinny. If this is the case, how can we help him? If we expend some effort to improve his outward appearance by rubbing some white powder or some red or black make-up on his face, this is not organic but artificial. This will not help him to become healthy. It may even damage him. What then is the proper thing to do for him? The proper thing to do is to have him drink the best drink and eat the most nutritious food. If he eats in this way for four consecutive weeks, his complexion will become fair, ruddy, and healthy. This is an illustration of inward organic transformation. This is metabolism.
Please forgive me for speaking about myself. I am one who ministers the word all year round. For every one hour that I speak, I must have three hours of sleep. I also have to eat well. In America even the young people who are in their twenties or thirties cannot catch up with an old man like me. I can speak for five to six hours straight, but this would totally exhaust them. You ask me what the secret is. It is the Lord’s mercy that I am able to eat, drink, and sleep. What I eat and drink becomes a supply to my body. In 1948 I went to Foochow and lived there for two to three months. The schedule that the brothers arranged for me was very tight. There were at least three meetings a day — morning, afternoon, and evening. It was really tiring. However, Foochow produces a certain kind of mandarin orange. After every message that I gave, they would give me a glass of mandarin orange juice. Two minutes after I drank the juice, I would be energized again. I was energized because I had received an inward supply.
Today the Lord Jesus is the all-inclusive Spirit of life. The ingredients in Him are much richer than any food or drink. Whatever we need is in Him. He is truly a bountiful supply. His supply comes into us not only to give us power but also to work His elements into us so that we can be transformed metabolically. Change is outward, but transformation is inward. Your goal may be to receive power, but His goal is not to merely give you power but to transform you.
Suppose I have a plain cup of water. Now suppose that I add a little bit of lemon, tea, and honey to it. If I do this, I will now have a cup of lemon tea, containing the ingredients of water, honey, lemon, and tea. When these ingredients are mixed together, they have an organic, nutritional capability of supplying you with energy. The Lord enters into us with all His elements; however, His goal is not just to supply us with power. His goal is to work His elements, His essence, into us for us to be organically transformed within.
We cannot obtain the Lord’s elements just by listening to messages, because messages, even when repeated over and over again, can only give us a kind of knowledge, understanding, and comprehension. They cannot give us the Lord’s essence, the Lord’s elements.
For example, suppose a brother catches a serious cold, and after being sick for six weeks, he is pale and thin. Suppose I wish to help him, but I know only how to talk and do not know how to do anything else. I only know how to tell him about nutrition, but I do not know how to cook for him. From morning to evening I just lecture him from a book on nutrition, telling him that he is missing this and that, and that he should do this and that. I tell him all that is relevant regarding nutrition. If I did this, would it do him any good? Actually, he probably would be better off if I did not speak to him so much. The more I speak, the skinnier he becomes. He receives a lot of knowledge, but it is all useless to him. Now suppose his mother comes to see him. She loves him very much, and without saying a word to him, she just cooks three good meals for him each day. The result of eating these meals will be that he will become healthy.
What is the problem with Christianity today? The problem is that Christianity has nutritional talk without actual cooking. I include myself in this. I am afraid that I may be just speaking on nutrition and not cooking for you to eat. I am afraid that many who have come from different localities to listen will say, “Brother Lee is still giving the same messages as he gave before. He is still talking about calling on the name of the Lord and pray-reading the Lord’s Word. We have heard all this before.” Dear brothers and sisters, I am not asking if you have heard this before. I am asking you whether or not you have eaten. I am not here to give you make-up lessons. I am here to nourish you. Messages will do you little good; only the Spirit is profitable. The Spirit is the Lord Himself, the Spirit is food, the Spirit is life, and the Spirit is the life supply. The supply of the Spirit is a bountiful supply that meets every need.
It is difficult for us to make a turn and to enter into this point. From birth we have been in our naturalness, and as we grew up, we got into culture; after we believed, we entered into religion. These three things — naturalness, culture, and religion — are wrapped around us. They have become three layers of veils. We do not have just one layer; we have three layers of veils. One is our naturalness, another is human culture, and still another is religion. I am afraid that even after hearing a thousand or even ten thousand messages, you will still have your religious concept.
The Spirit is missing in religion. A religion is a set of beliefs with corresponding teachings. Religion always teaches us to do this and to do that. Religion is full of teachings. However, religion never supplies us. We may think that the church is the same. We may think that the church is nothing more than speaking the word and listening to the word. This concept is wrong. Hence, within me there is a heavy burden. I have been before the Lord, looking to Him from deep within. I have prayed, “Lord, open the understanding of the saints in the churches in every locality so that they can see that what they need today is not just the word but also the Spirit.” Today we need not only the word; we need the Spirit also. The word teaches you; the Spirit supplies you.
God’s goal is not merely to supply us; God’s goal is to transform us. My burden in this chapter is on transformation. We need to pray, “Lord, transform us!” The religious concept is that if a person has a quick temper, he needs to be taught so that he can make a change. Religion tells him, “You are a quick-tempered person. You do everything hurriedly. Thus, you must understand that you need to make a change.” However, the Lord is not like this. The Lord wants you to eat a little bit of Him every day and receive a little bit of Him into you every day. He is Spirit, and as the Spirit He can be received into you. He has no intention to change your quick disposition, but when He enters into you — a little bit today, a little bit tomorrow, and a little bit the following day — His essence, which is the Spirit, enters into every part of your being, including your natural disposition. As a result, your being is spontaneously changed. He does not deliberately change you from being a quick person to being a slow person, or change you from being a slow person to being a quick person. This is not the way He works. Instead, He transforms your being, your essence. Romans 12:2 says that we are being transformed by the renewing of the mind, and 2 Corinthians 3:18 says that we are being transformed into the Lord’s image. The Lord’s way is to transform us into His image by supplying us with Himself.
Romans 11 says that we, the Gentiles, are a wild olive tree. By believing in the Lord we are grafted into the true olive tree and are able to partake of the fatness of the root of the olive tree. Within the root of the true olive tree is the sap, the life-juice, which is the fatness. When the wild olive branch is grafted into the true olive tree, the life-sap enters the branch, and the branch receives the supply. I believe that as a Christian, you have this kind of experience — the experience of being a wild olive branch who has been grafted into the true olive tree and who receives the life-sap of the true olive tree to supply your whole being. If you do have this experience, then I exhort you to forget outward teachings and to pay attention to the inward supply of the sap.
The supply of the life-sap is not only to give you power but also to transform you. How does transformation take place? The nature and essence of a branch from a wild olive tree are that of a wild olive tree. However, once this branch is grafted into a true olive tree, the sap from the true olive tree supplies this wild olive branch and transforms it. Eventually, olives come forth. In the past the olives from the wild olive branch tasted bitter and sour, but now that the sap of the true olive tree has passed through the wild olive branch, the essence of the wild olive branch has been transformed, and the olives are now sweet and fragrant. Even the shape of the olives from this wild olive branch will now be just like that of the true olive tree.
The process of bearing olives is a process from glory to glory and from day to day. Last week the olive was still tiny. After two weeks it is bigger. And after yet another two weeks it is even bigger. In the initial stage there was not that much glory, but in the end after it has matured, you will see an olive that is full of glory. In the process it went from glory to glory. The expression from glory to glory in 2 Corinthians 3:18 means from one degree of glory to another degree of glory.
Our desire is that in this age we would see churches being raised up from locality to locality and that these churches would not put their emphasis on teaching but on opening up the believers’ eyes to give them a vision. In these churches light would shine, enabling the believers to see that what they need is not outward teaching but the inward life supply. They would also see that when they believed and were saved, the source of life — the all-inclusive Christ, the all-inclusive Spirit — came into them. They would learn to live in this all-inclusive Spirit, enjoy this Spirit, and receive His bountiful supply daily. In this way day by day the supply would change the essence of their being. Month by month and year by year in every local church, we would see brothers and sisters who regularly come to the meetings and are being transformed day by day. They are just like the wild olive branches that were grafted into the true olive tree. When a branch is first grafted in, you cannot see much happening. The branch is just there absorbing the fatness from the true olive tree and inwardly receiving the supply. Gradually, you will see a new sprout, then a few flower blossoms, and finally a little fruit will come out. When you look again after two weeks, the fruit will have grown a little bigger. After yet another two weeks there will be more growth, and in the end the fruit will be matured, and there will be sweet and fragrant olives. I hope that all the local churches will be like this so that year after year the brothers and sisters will receive Christ, enjoy His riches, obtain His bountiful supply, and be transformed in essence. Transformation is not a sudden change in outward appearance; it is a slow change in inward essence. By being transformed in this way, the brothers and sisters will eventually be altogether different from what they were before they were saved. Transformation is not sudden; it is a continuous metabolic process in life that eventually produces manifest results.
This is the church that the Lord wants today. The church that the Lord wants is not just a church with saints who are standing on the ground of oneness. The church that the Lord wants is a church in which the saints are standing on the ground of oneness and also eating Christ, enjoying Christ, absorbing His rich supply, and receiving His bountiful supply. This bountiful supply first enters into their spirit, then into their mind, emotion, will, and every part of their being, transforming their very essence. What we believe in is not a doctrine but the living Spirit. I am not just preaching messages of doctrines. I am preaching a living Christ. After speaking to you for an hour, I do not care if you do not understand what I am saying. What I do care about is that your spirit has touched Christ. I do not expect you to remember everything you have heard. My only hope is that your inner being has been touched by Christ. Once your inner being has been touched by Christ, your spiritual understanding will increase, and when you go home, you will be able to contact the Lord yourself. You will also fellowship with Him a little, pray to Him a little more, and spend more time with Him so that your inner being will get the supply. Then little by little His essence will enter into your essence and transform your essence. This transformation is not the result of a change in behavior but of organic metabolism. Transformation goes together with growth. Actually, transformation is growth. The result of transformation is conformation. When we are transformed, we will be conformed to the image of the Lord Jesus. At this juncture God’s original intention in creating man will be achieved. When God first created man, He created man in His image so that man would express Him. Eventually, those who are redeemed by God will not only have His image but also His life and His essence. His essence will be mingled with us, causing our entire being to undergo a metabolic transformation. Moreover, after we have been transformed continuously, we will grow into His image.
Every living thing has a definite life, and every life has definite characteristics, a definite power, and a definite shape. The seed of a henna flower, for example, has a life and a power with a particular shape. All you have to do is to plant this seed into the ground and allow it to grow. The seed not only has the power to grow, but after a period of growth, it has the power to form that seed into the shape of a henna flower. A flower is different from a factory-made plastic product. Something made in a factory must be pressed into shape by an outward mold. The shape of a henna flower, however, does not come from a mold. The shape of a henna flower comes through growth. The shape of a chrysanthemum also comes through growth. This is true for plants as well as for animals. When a puppy or a kitten is first born, it may not be easy to distinguish whether it is a dog or a cat. However, there is no need to worry. You simply need to allow the puppy or the kitten to grow, and while the puppy or the kitten is growing, you need not find a carpenter to make a mold to put on its body. If you just allow the puppy or the kitten to grow, eventually, it will grow into the shape of a dog or a cat. No matter how a puppy grows, it will never grow two horns like a cow, and no matter how a kitten grows, it will not grow into the shape, image, of a horse. This is because the life within each one of them has a definite shape.
God’s image is in God’s life. The image of the Lord Jesus is in His life. Thus, if you just let the life of the Lord Jesus grow within you, His life will produce an image. After a period of growth, His image will be manifested through you. Therefore, you may call this process growth, transformation, or conformation. We were all created, and we have all been redeemed and regenerated. Thank and praise the Lord for this. Now we are in the process of enjoying His bountiful supply and receiving His rich essence. His supply and His essence cause our natural element to have a metabolic transformation. This organic transformation causes us to grow, to be transformed, and to be conformed. No doctrine can accomplish this; only the Spirit can. Hallelujah that He is the Spirit and that He is in us as our bountiful supply!
Dear brothers and sisters, from deep within I hope that every one of you would put aside the messages that you have heard for so many years. It does not matter whether or not you remember those messages. What you and I have to see today is that the all-inclusive Spirit with His bountiful supply is within us. This supply is an organic supply, a supply that is able to transform us. As long as you enjoy Him continuously, allowing Him to add Himself into you more and more, then spontaneously you will grow, you will be transformed, and you will be conformed into His image. May the Lord have mercy on us. We all should pray for this, and look to the Lord for this.
