Search
Scripture Reading: Phil. 4:13; John 14:19; 6:57, 63; Gal. 2:20; Rom. 12:5-8; 1 Cor. 12:12, 14-16; Eph. 4:13; 1 Cor. 10:17
Philippians 4:13 says, “I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me.” This word was spoken by the apostle Paul. He said this to show that in his living and in his work he did not do anything in himself, by his own strength, or by his own life. He did everything in Christ who empowered him. This word shows that he took Christ as life.
John 14:19 says, “Because I live, you also shall live.” In saying “I live,” the Lord referred to His living after His resurrection. The Lord was put to death, yet He was resurrected, so He still lives. After His resurrection He does not live in Himself alone, but He causes all who belong to Him to live also. Hence, the Lord said, “Because I live, you also shall live.” This word of the Lord implies also that the reason we live is because He not only lives but lives in us. Because the Lord lives in us, we also shall live.
John 6:57 says, “As the living Father has sent Me and I live because of the Father, so He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.” This word means that just as the Lord did not live by Himself but by the Father because the Father lived in Him, so we who eat the Lord, who receive Him as food into us, also live because of Him.
Verse 63 continues, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.”
These three verses in John—14:19; 6:57; and 6:63—mention live and life. Galatians 2:20 also mentions live and lives. This verse says, “I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” I like to read these four passages together. The first passage says, “Because I live, you also shall live.” The second passage says, “He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.” The third passage says, “It is the Spirit who gives life;...the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” And the last passage says, “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” These verses show how Christ is life to us.
In the previous chapter we said that a person who serves the Lord must see the central vision of God in the universe—Christ and the church. This central vision in the universe is the great mystery of God. If we have truly seen this central vision—Christ and the church—our entire being will be under its direction and control. This vision must not be just a doctrine to us; it must be a reality in our living. If we have such a vision, it will not be possible for us to live by ourselves apart from Christ, and it will also not be possible for us to live independently apart from the church. The result of seeing this vision is that Christ becomes our life and the church becomes our living.
To take Christ as our life is to live by Christ. The verses listed above show how we can live by Christ. In John 14 the Lord said that because He lives, we also shall live. This word of the Lord indicates that after His resurrection, we would be able to take Him as our life and thereby live by Him and because of Him. How can this be? In John 6 the Lord pointed out that he who eats Him shall live because of Him. This means that if we want to live because of Him, we need to receive Him into us by eating Him. How can we receive Him into us? When the Jews heard the Lord’s word at that time, they also asked the same question. They asked, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?” (v. 52). What the Lord said in verse 63 was the answer. He said, “It is the Spirit who gives life;...the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.” We all know that the Lord is the Spirit. Therefore, it is the Lord Himself who gives us life and causes us to live. Today the Lord is living in us as the Spirit. Hence, if we want to eat the Lord, we must learn to turn to our spirit to eat Him. This is because the Lord is the Spirit, the Spirit gives us life and enables us to live, and the Spirit is in our spirit. Therefore, in everything we need to learn to turn to our spirit to touch and contact the Spirit of the Lord. In this way we will receive the supply from the Lord and thus live by Him.
The Lord also said that His words are spirit. We know the Lord Himself is the living Word. Hence, to eat the Lord, there is not only the matter of the Spirit but also the matter of the word. In other words, the Lord is the Spirit, and He is also the word. The Lord is in the Spirit and in the word. Thus, in order to receive, to obtain, the Lord, we have to contact His Spirit and His word. It is for this reason that we have to pray and also to read the Scriptures. To pray is to contact the Spirit, and to read the Scriptures is to touch the word. We pray so that we can touch the Spirit in our spirit and thereby receive the Lord Himself. We read the Scriptures so that we can touch the Lord’s word and thereby receive the Lord Himself. Today our Lord is in the Spirit and in the word as well. Therefore, our contacting Him, touching Him, obtaining Him, and eating Him all depend on these two aspects. On the one hand, we need to turn to our spirit to touch the Spirit; on the other hand, we need to come to the Scriptures to touch the word. If we learn to constantly touch the Spirit in our spirit and touch the word in the Scriptures, we will constantly eat and drink the Lord and thereby receive and gain the Lord so that we can live by Him and because of Him.
If we want to take Christ as our life and live by Him, we also need to see that “I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me,” as the apostle Paul says in Galatians 2. Whereas the three verses we quoted from the Gospel of John all focus on how we can eat and drink the Lord to receive His supply, Galatians 2:20 shows that we also need to go on to experience the co-death of the cross and to reject our own life. In order to experience Christ as our life, on the positive side, we need to absorb and enjoy the Lord and thereby live by Him; on the negative side, we need to see that we have to be put to death on the cross so that we will continually reject ourselves, deny ourselves, and not live by ourselves. Both sides are necessary.
Our emotions, preferences, opinions, ideas, insight, intelligence, ability, and capability are all our self, our natural life. To not live by our self is to not live by all these things of our natural life. Hence, in everything that we do in our daily life, we must deny all these natural things and not live by them. This is a serious lesson for every one of us.
We should learn this lesson not only in our daily life but even more in our work for the Lord and in our service in the church. Whether in ministering the word from the podium or in visiting people, we must learn the lesson according to this principle. For example, when you are going to give a message from the podium, you must immediately and seriously say to yourself, “I must not speak according to my preference, thoughts, opinions, insight, ideas, knowledge, eloquence, or boldness. I must speak only according to the Lord whom I have touched in spirit and in the word.” After you have such a strict dealing, when you stand on the platform, you will be able to completely reject all that is natural. You will also be able to turn to your spirit to touch the Lord as the Spirit and to turn to the Scriptures to touch the Lord as the word. In this way, while you are standing on the platform to release a message, you will not be doing so by yourself but by the Lord, that is, by taking the Lord as life. The principle is the same when you go to visit people. Whenever you go to visit people, you should always come back to your spirit and to the word to touch, to contact, the Lord. This is a serious lesson. Only those who have learned this lesson can have the experience of taking the Lord as life and living by Him.
Brothers and sisters, if we take the Lord as life and live by Him, the result will be that we will be built together by the Lord to be His church. It is not doctrine that builds us together. Doctrines cannot cause us to be built up together as the church. If we truly desire to be built up as the church, we must take the Lord as life and live by Him. If we have truly learned this lesson in a serious way, living not by ourselves but by the Lord and taking not ourselves but the Lord as life, then spontaneously we will be built together with all the saints to be the Lord’s church. This is why we say that the church is our living. Such a living is the issue of Christ’s being lived out of us. Such a living is altogether the result of our living by Christ, taking Christ as our life, and allowing Christ to live in us.
Therefore, the basic lesson we have to learn is to strictly deny ourselves and live by Christ. When you take Christ as life, allow Christ to live in you, and allow Him to live out through you, the issue will be the church. When you allow Christ to live out through you, this is the building, the coordination. Anyone who takes Christ as life and lives by Him will not be individualistic but in coordination, and he will not only be horizontal but will also be vertical. When we live in this way, our living is the church.
Therefore, if we want to know whether a person is taking Christ as life and whether he is living by Christ, we just have to see whether or not the church is the issue of his living. If in his living and work he is not coordinated with the brothers and sisters but rather is individualistic, this is proof that he is not living by Christ and not taking Christ as his life. If you live by Christ and take Christ as life, the result will be that you will be coordinated with the brothers and sisters and that you will not be able to be independent. Furthermore, the relationship between you and the brothers and sisters will not only be horizontal but will also be vertical, having the authority and the order.
Hence, in the Epistles there are many verses telling us how the apostles took Christ as their life and how they lived by Christ. There are also many verses telling us how they lived in the Body. What they lived out was the Body of Christ and the house of God. They were coordinated together in one Body and built up into one dwelling place. Therefore, they were not horizontal but vertical, not individualistic but coordinated.
Romans 12:5 says that we are one Body in Christ and individually members one of another. Being members one of another is the living of the church. In such a living, there are some who teach, some who exhort, some who lead, some who serve, some who show mercy, and some who give. Whatever you do, however, you have to be coordinated with the brothers and sisters as members one of another.
In the previous chapter we said that Romans 12 is a continuation of Romans 8. It is only by passing through the experience of Romans 8 and living absolutely according to the spirit that a person can come to Romans 12 to be a member of the Body of Christ. Therefore, this also shows us that the church life is based upon our experience of taking Christ as life. If we take Christ as our life, living by Christ and allowing Christ to live out of us, the issue will definitely be a living in which we are members one of another.
The living referred to in Romans 12 is altogether a living of the brothers’ and sisters’ experience of being members one of another as one Body. Whether or not this one Body can be realized, whether or not it can be practical, and whether or not it can manifest its functions altogether depend upon our being members one of another. If the brothers’ and sisters’ experience of being members one of another is insufficient, improper, or problematic, then the Body cannot be realized and the functions of the Body cannot be manifested. The reason for this insufficiency is that the brothers and sisters do not adequately take Christ as life or live by Christ. If we still live in ourselves and by ourselves, there is no way for us to be joined together.
Since we live by Christ and thereby have the church life, we cannot be separated from one another and cannot be independent. First Corinthians 12 says that the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor the head to the feet, “I have no need of you” (v. 21). In the church today we often quote these verses, yet in our heart we still may say, “I can do everything by myself; I do not need you.” This shows that we are not taking Christ as life nor living out the church life. If our life is not Christ, then our living is not the church. If I live in Christ and take Christ as my life, I cannot help but live out the church life, and I cannot help but say to the brothers and sisters, “I need you.” I will surely say that I need all the brothers and sisters. I am just an eye, so I need the ears, the nose, the mouth, the hands, and the feet. I need every brother and every sister, and they all need me too. I know that just as I cannot live apart from the Lord, so also I cannot live apart from the brothers and sisters. If as a member I leave the Head, I will become a detached member, a dead member. Likewise, if as a member I leave the Body, I will also become a detached member, a dead member. Christ is my life, and the life of Christ is a corporate life. He came not to be life to a single member, to an individual, but to be life to the Body. Therefore, I cannot take Him as life nor live by Him independently and not live in the Body. I cannot live only an individual member’s life and not the Body life. If I take Christ as life and live by Him, what is lived out will be the church.
Do we actually have the church as our living? This is a real test. Many times we think that we are not wrong, but we realize that we are individualistic. Although we are not wrong, we are in ourselves—we neither live by Christ nor live in the church. The reason we are individualistic, acting as if we do not need the brothers and sisters, is that we feel that we are quite right and quite good. The result is that we are very individualistic. We have individuals but not the church. We do not have the church as our living, because we do not have Christ as our life. He who does not take Christ as life cannot live out the church life. That kind of living is not a coordinated church but an independent individual.
The apostle Paul shows in Ephesians 4 that when Christ lives and grows in us, eventually we will become a full-grown man (v. 13). The original text of this portion of the Scriptures does not refer to many full-grown men but to one full-grown man. We think that as we are in Christ individually and Christ is in us individually, gradually each one of us will become a full-grown person. You become a full-grown person, he becomes a full-grown person, and I also become a full-grown person. There is not such a thing. The apostle said that we all become a full-grown man. Therefore, if we truly have grown up, although we are many, we become one man. This one man is a great man of mystery, which is Christ and the church.
Perhaps some will ask, “In John 12 did the Lord Jesus not say that if a grain of wheat falls into the ground and dies, it will bear many grains? Are these many grains not individual grains?” Please do not forget, however, that when we come to 1 Corinthians 10, it tells us that “there is one bread,” and that “we who are many are one Body” (v. 17). Previously there were many grains, but now these grains have become one bread. In other words, every one of the grains has to be ground; there is not one grain that is preserved whole. The grains are not only ground to powder but also blended as one dough and made into one bread. Hence, although individual grains were produced, eventually they become one bread. Therefore, although we are many, we are one bread, one Body.
This is Christ in us as our life and the church outside of us as our living. We cannot look at only one aspect. We cannot say, “As long as I stay away from sin, do not love the world, and act according to the will of the Lord in all things, that is good enough.” Neither can we say, “As long as I live in the presence of God every day, and as long as everything I do is spiritual and pleasing to God, that is enough.” We cannot look at just this one aspect. We still have to ask whether what we live out is one bread and whether it is one Body. Do we live out the church? Or do we live out our individualism—our individual victory, individual spirituality, and individual holiness? Are we members one of another with the brothers and sisters to the extent that we cannot live without one another? Or do we say in our heart to the brothers and sisters, “I do not need you”? If we feel that we cannot live without the brothers and sisters, that we need the brothers and sisters, then our living is the church. If I am an eye, then I need the feet, the hands, the ears, and the mouth. I need every part of the body. This is a builded situation. This is oneness, and this is harmony. This is what it means for us all to arrive at a full-grown man.
We often say that we all are like one man, but this is not enough. We should say that we all are one. Do we have one thousand brothers and sisters? These one thousand brothers and sisters are just one. Do we have two thousand brothers and sisters? These two thousand brothers and sisters are still one. Regardless of how many brothers and sisters there are, they are just one. If we all live by Christ and allow Christ to grow in us, the result will be that we all will become a full-grown man. This man is the church.
Now we need to apply these words to ourselves. Please consider: How much of the element of coordination do we have among us? What is the degree of coordination among us? Or we may ask, How much of the element of the church life do we have in us, and how high is the degree? I believe that by asking ourselves in this way, immediately we will discover that although it seems that we are not wrong and we love the Lord very much, the weight of the church life is very light, and the measure is very little. In fact, there is almost no measure. It seems that basically we do not know what a coordinated life is, what the church life is, and what the Body life is. Since we do not know these matters, we do not know what authority and order are. This is why we are poor, weak, dull, and stale. Although I dare not say that we are in darkness, I do dare to say that we are not bright; instead, we are dim within, having shadows and veils. We lack power in our prayer, in our ministering of the word, and in our preaching of the gospel. Furthermore, our meetings are neither fresh nor living. People cannot sense the Lord’s presence when they come into our meetings. All these conditions show that we lack Christ as our life and the church as our living. We do not have enough Christ as life, so we do not adequately have the church as our living. The reason for this is that we always remain in ourselves and always try to preserve our wholeness, being unwilling to be broken. We always try to keep ourselves as a grain of wheat and are not willing to be ground. Hence, we cannot get along with others, be in coordination with others, and be built up together with others.
Brothers and sisters, the vision concerning Christ and the church is not a doctrine; rather, it is God’s central purpose in the universe. By His mercy, may all of us who serve the Lord see this vision that in all things we may take Christ as life and live by Christ so that the church can become our living and our testimony.
