In the past few chapters we have covered two main points concerning how to live Christ. First, we pointed out that we have to pray before doing anything. The New Testament charges us to pray unceasingly, so we have to pray before doing anything. Prayer must be prior to our doing. Do not do anything without first praying. We know too definitely that without prayer or without praying quite often, no one can live Christ. The only way to live Christ is to pray. If you do not pray, you have no way. Second, we have gone on to see that not only do we need to pray before doing, but even while we are doing something, at that time we need to pray. Our prayer must go along with our doing. This means that we need to pray unceasingly.
In the Cleveland conference I continued to give more messages on the experience of Christ and how to live Christ. In those six messages I was more and more deeply impressed that, no doubt, practically speaking, the Lord has really shown us the right way to live Christ. We all know that not only the New Testament but also the Old Testament was written in the way of a puzzle. This is why so many teachers of the Bible like to systematize the things in the Bible. Isaiah 28:10 and 13 tell us that God speaks His word here a little and there a little. He spoke a little to Moses and a little to Joshua and a little to another one and a little to David. In the Bible God did not speak in the way we do. Whenever we speak, we like to have a completion to our speaking. But God did not speak in that way. God spoke just a little bit to Abraham. Then, of course, God spoke a lot to Moses. At least two full books were God’s speaking to Moses, especially the book of Leviticus. From the first verse of chapter 1 to the last verse of the last chapter, it is altogether God’s speaking. That speaking of God to Moses was longer than God’s speaking to anyone else. Even Psalm 119 has only one hundred seventy-six verses. The book of Exodus has forty chapters; Leviticus has twenty-seven; Numbers has thirty-six; and Deuteronomy has thirty-four. This means that there are one hundred thirty-seven chapters of God’s speaking just to one man, Moses. Yet still that was only a little of God’s entire speaking. Why? Because it was not completed. After speaking to Moses it may be that the Lord spoke to over forty different people in different places at different times. Still God’s speaking was not completed until Paul. Paul says that his commission was to complete the word of God (Col. 1:25). Paul was bold. No other one ever had the boldness to tell people that he had a commission to complete the word of God. In the Bible not one chapter is complete in revealing God’s economy to us, but a little is here, a little is there, piece after piece, like a big puzzle. All the pieces are scattered and mixed up, so you need to spend many hours to put the pieces together. Then you can see the picture.
The New Testament never tells us how to live Christ. You have to realize that there is not even such a charge—to live Christ. The first time the matter of living Christ was referred to by the Lord in John 6:57, He simply said, “He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.” This was not a charge. He simply mentioned it. The second time is in John 14:19: “Because I live, you also shall live.” That means Christ will live in resurrection. When He lives in resurrection, we live Him. Again this is not a charge.
The third verse is Galatians 2:20: “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” The fourth time is found in Philippians 1:21: “To me, to live is Christ.” Two of these verses were written by John, and two of these verses were written by Paul. Paul, of course, wrote them first because he was a completing minister. John wrote later because he was a mending minister. He mended the same thing that Paul had written. Paul had written something in Galatians 2:20 about thirty-five years before John wrote something in his Gospel. Paul wrote something concerning the living of Christ, but that was broken. Later John came in to mend the broken matter of living Christ.
You cannot find a verse that charges us to live Christ; we are only told that there is such a thing. After Christ came and after He went through all the process of incarnation, human living, death, and resurrection, He is here to live with us so that we can live Him. There is no charge to live Christ, so, in a sense, the New Testament does not tell us how to live Christ. However, in the New Testament, according to all the words and experiences, you surely can see that there is a way demonstrated and presented to us. By reading the New Testament carefully we can find out how to live Christ. Years ago I did not have the light that we need to live Christ. So I did not pay attention to the matter of how to live Christ. Within the past few years we have seen the new light that we have to live Christ. Very few other books have used such an expression—to live Christ. Recently, though, I was told that a Brethren teacher used this term—to live Christ. Anyhow, it is in the Bible. Because we have paid much attention to this matter of living Christ, I have been bothered because it has been hard for me to live Christ. Because it is hard to live Christ, I got into the New Testament concerning how to live Christ. Gradually, I picked up one piece of the puzzle here and another piece of the puzzle there, in this book and in that book. I found many pieces, and I put all the pieces together. By putting all these pieces together I have seen a full picture of this matter of living Christ.
We know that the entire desire of the Triune God is to work Himself into us so that we may live Him. God’s desire is that we live Him. God created us in this way. Now we can understand Genesis 1:26. God created us in His image and according to His likeness because His desire was just to put Himself into us. We have repeated this kind of word for many, many years. In 1950 I went to the Philippines, and right after my arrival, I began to speak concerning the mingling of God with man. Today I am much clearer concerning the mingling of God with man than I was thirty years ago. God created us in His image and according to His likeness because He wants to work Himself into us to be our life and to be our nature. He even wants to work Himself into us to be our disposition, our character, our living. First He becomes our life, then our nature, then our disposition, and eventually even our character and our living until we live Him. This is the central thought of the divine revelation in the Bible. This is the life pulse of the divine revelation.
The situation among Christians today is altogether too poor. Not only do they not know that God wants to put Himself into them to be their living, their character, their disposition, and their nature; they do not even know that He wants to be their life. What they have is simply an objective religious God in a remote place. Most of them just have God as an object of worship. They just have a religion. But this is not the Bible. The Bible says, “Abide in Me and I in you” (John 15:4). If anyone loves the Lord, the Father and He will go to him not just to have a visit but to make Their abode with him (14:23). Then it says that Christ lives in us (Gal. 2:20), and even the more that Christ will make His home in us (Eph. 3:17). Furthermore, he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17), God is Spirit (John 4:24), and we are one spirit with Him.
We have a clear picture in the Bible that we are a vessel made in God’s shape, God’s image, God’s likeness, and through Christ passing through so many processes, He has entered into our being and made us one spirit with Him. For what purpose? That we may live Him. He comes into us to be our life, our nature, our disposition, our character, and our living. We need to remember these five things: life, nature, disposition, character, and living. He first becomes our life, and He wants to travel through three things—our nature, our disposition, and our character—to become our living. He needs to become our disposition, our nature, our character, and eventually our living. Life is different from nature, nature is different from disposition, and disposition is different from character. Disposition is something within, and character is something expressed with our disposition. Life implies nature, nature implies disposition, and disposition expresses character. All this added together is just our daily living. According to the Bible, I can say strongly that the Triune God today should be not only our life but also our nature, our disposition, our character—and eventually and ultimately—our living. So we have to live Him.
How could this objective God become our life subjectively? And how could He become our nature not only subjectively but very intrinsically? He becomes our nature, and then He becomes our disposition. I like to see your disposition changing year after year because God is being subjectively and intrinsically added to your disposition.
In the New Testament we have four strong pictures. We have Paul, Peter, John, and James. These are four big characters. In the four Gospels you could see Peter’s old disposition. It was not Peter; it was Simon. But when Peter wrote 1 and 2 Peter, you could see a kind of Petrine disposition. It is quite different from Paul’s, but both are quite divine. The third is the old apostle John. When he wrote the Gospel of John and the book of Revelation, you can hardly find any trace of the old disposition. You just see a kind of disposition that is transformed and becoming very divine. James also has his kind of disposition, which may not be as shiny as John’s. They are all precious but in different degrees. It was Paul who said, “To me, to live is Christ” (Phil. 1:21). God’s desire is to be our life, our nature, our disposition, our character, and our living. Hallelujah! At least God could succeed in these few persons. Not even the angels could deny that God succeeded in Paul, Peter, John, and James. There are four people with such a history that God became man’s life, man’s nature, man’s disposition, man’s character, and man’s daily living. How could this be? You must realize that all four of these assimilated God. They absorbed God all their life by two things: by the divine Word and the divine Spirit. Actually, the very subjective God becomes our portion by these two things: the Word and the Spirit.
Electricity is a good illustration. With a small wireless microphone there are two wires, the antenna and the ground wire. In the Chinese language these are called the heavenly wire and the earthly wire. When these two wires work together, you get the transmission of electricity. Today electricity is still a mystery. Although it is very real, material, and scientific, it is still a mystery. There is at least one point concerning electricity that no one understands. God is even more mysterious than electricity. Although electricity is mysterious, it is very real. Electricity is more than crucial for our daily life. In America almost everything depends upon electricity. It is mysterious, yet it is practical. This is a good illustration of our God. Our God is the pneuma, the Spirit, altogether mysterious yet very practical. How can this mysterious yet practical God be transmitted into our being all the time? By the Word and by the Spirit.
Now we come to the point of how to live Christ all the time. We must be plugged into the contact with these two wires, the Word and the Spirit. We must be kept in contact with these two wires. Although electricity has been installed into this building, if a certain utensil is insulated even by something small, it will receive no electrical current. If we are going to live Christ, we must have ourselves plugged into this current. We must have no insulation at all. There must be no stopping and no ceasing of the current. Now we can understand what it means to pray unceasingly—it is to keep ourselves plugged into that heavenly current. Once we are cut off from the heavenly current, we are through. It does not matter how many years of experience we have in Christ. Although this room may have received electricity for fifty years, once it is insulated, the current is cut off.
First Thessalonians 5:17 says, “Unceasingly pray.” Colossians 4:2 says, “Persevere in prayer.” In addition to these expressions Ephesians 6:18 says, “Praying at every time.” This means praying at every second—not only praying at every hour or every minute but every second. We have already seen that praying in the Bible is spiritual breathing. Among all the matters that maintain our human life, our breathing never ceases. So the New Testament says to pray unceasingly, pray continually, pray at every time, and pray at every time in spirit. How could we pray all the time? By putting Ephesians 5:17-20 and Colossians 3:16-17 together, we can be clear. These two portions are parallel portions, sister portions. Ephesians says, “Be filled in spirit.” No doubt this surely refers to prayer. There is no other way for you to be filled in your spirit. You cannot just sit and think and meditate and be filled in the spirit. You have to pray. To pray is to put more pneuma into you. If I do not pray before I come here to speak, I am like a flat tire with no pneuma within me. I have to pray twenty to thirty minutes. If I pray, constricting my whole being to the spirit, twenty minutes might be sufficient. I get pneumatic, filled with the air, so that when I come to speak, I am not flat. I have some pneuma within me.
Ephesians 5 also says, “Speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and psalming with your heart to the Lord, giving thanks at all times” (vv. 19-20). This word pins us down and exposes us. I believe many among us do not give thanks to God more than ten times a day. If you are a person giving thanks at all times for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, surely you are a person praying. You are singing, psalming, thanking all the day long. Hymns, #308 says, “This is my story, this is my song, / Praising my Savior all the day long.” Thousands of Christians have sung this hymn, but few have ever practiced praising their Savior all the day long. Whoever practices praising the Savior all the day long must be the one who lives Christ. The way to live Christ is to praise Him. We have to sing, we have to praise, and we have to psalm. Nearly nobody practices this. Although some may praise their Savior in a gospel campaign, they do not praise Him all the day long.
Colossians 3:16 says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.” How do you let the word of Christ dwell in you? It should be in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to God. Then verse 17 says, “Whatever you do in word or in deed, do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” The very next verse says, “Wives, be subject to your husbands.” This is a hard job. For years I have not liked to speak at a wedding. Nearly everyone who speaks at a wedding would say something so sweet, so pleasant, so colorful, and so full of scenery. I do not like to say this kind of thing because, in some sense, it is a cheating. The marriage life may not be that straight, not that colorful, not that pleasant, not with so many beautiful pictures. So if I were to speak, I might say, “Your wedding is a warning to you, the beginning of lamentation. This is not the beginning of your honeymoon but the beginning of your vinegar week.” Since I realized that nobody likes to hear this kind of word, I did not speak at the weddings. Forty-five years ago I spoke at every wedding and painted a picture so sweet, so pleasant, so joyful, and so beautiful. Eventually, after every wedding I regretted it. Later I still spoke, but I changed my tune. I said you have to realize that marriage is not a thing so happy as you dreamed. Marriage causes you to put your neck into the yoke. I did this a few times and convinced them that my word was right, but in a wedding it is better not to say this, so I made a strong decision that I would not be a performing, acting, wedding, marrying pastor. Mostly I did not go to the weddings. Sometimes when I did go, I would not speak.
You have to realize that in the whole universe the hardest job is to be a wife or to be a husband. It is not that difficult to be a teacher or a nurse or an electrician, but to be a wife needs the whole universe to sustain you. To be a husband is really hard. I have done many things, but not one of them is so hard as being a husband. But what shall I do? I have to be a husband. I have no choice. This is my destiny. So to be a wife you need the Triune God to be in you as your life, your nature, your disposition, your character, and your daily living. If you do not have the Triune God to be your life, nature, disposition, character, and living, you can never be a proper wife. It is the same with the husband. To be a good husband, we need Christ.
Colossians says, “Whatever you do in word or in deed, do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God” (3:17). How could we do all things in the name of the Lord? There is no other way but by praising, thanking, and praying. When we do all things in the name of the Lord, that is to live Christ. When you do everything in His name, you have become Him, and He has practically become you. If you are not one with Him, how could you do things in His name? If you do things in His name but are not one with Him, you are cheating people. If you are not one with me, but you do things in my name, you are deceiving people. But if you become me, whatever you do, you do it in my name. This is to live me. The way to live Christ is to plug yourself into the Word, into the prayer, and into the singing, the praising, and the psalming all the day long. If you remain in this plugging, you live Christ. All day long you need not only to pray-read the Word but also to sing-read the Word. It is not so adequate just to pray-read. You have to sing the Word.
The Psalms were written not mainly for speaking or reading but for psalming and singing. If we only read Psalm 119, that may kill us and tire us out. But if we psalm this psalm, singing it all the day long, the psalming will keep us in that plugging. Spontaneously, the heavenly electrical current will come through us all the day long. So we will just live Christ. An electrical instrument lives electricity. Whatever it does, wherever it moves, it acts electricity. This is the right way; there is no other way. Then you may think, we do not need to do anything; we can stay home and kneel and pray and praise and do nothing. We cannot. God did not ordain it in this way. We have a lot of duties and responsibilities. But we have a good illustration that regardless of how busy we are, we still breathe. While we do things, we breathe. We must build up such a breathing habit. We all need a clear vision; we have to condemn our prayerless life; we have to condemn our praiseless life; we have to condemn our psalmless life; we must have a prayerful life, praiseful life, and psalmful life all the day.
We have the Spirit as the antenna wire and the Word as the ground wire. The antenna wire is in us, in our spirit, and the ground wire is in our hand; we just need to remain here with these two wires. Then we will get the transfusion and the transmission. We will get the permeation and the saturation; then whatever we do, we will do it in His name. This is to live Christ. This is not a kind of teaching and doctrine. This is a little vision with some instruction. It altogether depends upon our daily practice. We must practice continual prayer and continual praising and continual psalming and singing and thanking because we are breathing Him in, making Him our saturation and making ourselves practically one with Him. Spontaneously we will live Christ. This is not a matter of doctrine and teaching but a kind of practice. Everything apart from this is vanity.
The Life-study messages and even the study of the Bible are vanity if you do not practice this. If the Bible remains letters of death killing you, it is vanity. The Bible could be living to you only when you breathe it, when you pray it, when you praise it, when you sing-read it, when you psalm-read it. All the lines of the Holy Writings will become the living God to you, the living pneuma, to you. Then you will get the transmission, the transfusion, the permeation, making Him everything to you and making you one with Him. Then whatever you say and whatever you do will be Christ. This is to live Christ. You must put this into practice.
