Romans 8:14 says, “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” Have you noticed that Romans 8 does not charge us to seek after the leading of the Spirit? It only mentions the fact of our being led. Most of the verses in chapter 8 just speak the facts. Verse 1 says that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. There is no charge. Verse 2 says that the law of the Spirit of life has freed me in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and of death. Again, there is no charge. Verse 3 speaks of God sending His own Son in the likeness of the flesh of sin and concerning sin, condemning sin in the flesh.
Verse 4 says that the righteous requirement of the law could be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the spirit. Again, just a fact is mentioned. Verse 6 says that the mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace. Again, this is just a kind of mentioning of a certain fact. Verse 7 says that the mind set on the flesh is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, for neither can it be. There is no charge here. Verse 8 says that those who are in the flesh cannot please God. Another fact is mentioned.
Verses 9 through 11 say that “you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Yet if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not of Him. But if Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you.” In these three verses there are facts mentioned but no charge.
Verse 13 says that “if you live according to the flesh, you must die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the practices of the body, you will live.” Then verse 14 says that “as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” In all these verses there is the mentioning of facts, but there is no charge, no commandment, no exhortation.
Through experiences plus much study I have learned one thing: If you are going to enter into Romans 8, you must stay with this chapter. You have to forget about other references. Every other reference is a kind of distraction to Romans 8. You have to confine yourself to Romans 8. Do not bring in the cross references, the inner feeling, or the outward circumstances. Just stick with the leading in Romans 8:14. Otherwise, you may be distracted. You may use verses in Romans 8 other than verse 14, but do not go to other chapters. Later on, you will see why this is absolutely necessary.
Most believers have misunderstood the leading in Romans 8. It is not so easy, once a habit has been built up, to get away from that built-up habit. Sometimes, for example, we say some words habitually. After saying those words, we realize that we said something according to our habit. When we talk about the leading of the Spirit, or the leading by the Spirit of God, we spontaneously understand it in a habitual way. The most damaging thing, and yet such a hidden thing, is our spiritual habit. Over fifty-five years ago I began to seek after the spiritual things, but I did not get the proper help.
Besides the improper help, we ourselves have brought in a lot of religious things from our background. Even before I got saved, I learned a lot of Christian things. But I was not saved until I was nineteen years of age. I was not saved, but I was in Christianity. I attended the Sunday school, and I studied at Christian schools. I heard the Bible stories, and I heard the name of God, and I knew that God was the unique Creator. Even I defended our family’s religion, Christianity. I fought against the idols, yet I did not have God. I had God just in my mentality. I had picked up so many things from my Christian background before I was saved, and once I was saved, I put them into my Christian practices.
Also, I brought in a lot of cultural things. So I had the improper help plus the things from my Christian background plus even the best things from my culture. All these things were added into my Christian practices. I loved the Lord, and I was really seeking after Him. Yet I did not get the proper help, so all these three categories of things were added into my practice of the Christian life. When I studied the Bible, I studied with colored eyeglasses. I had three pairs of “colored eyeglasses”: I treasured those eyeglasses. Sometimes I took a lot of notes, and when I studied Romans 8, I would go back to those notes. So my reading of Romans 8 was with this first pair of colored glasses. Another pair of colored glasses was the things I picked up from my Christian background. The third pair of colored eyeglasses was my culture.
Finally, after about ten years I began to realize that these things were not so right, not so genuine. But all of them were good. Not one item was bad. All these things were good, but I began to realize that they were not so genuine. So I spontaneously became a real seeker, seeking after so many things. This was the reason I traveled through many kinds of Christianity: organized Christianity, fundamental Christianity, Pentecostal Christianity, and inner-life Christianity. But in all these regions there was not something to satisfy the inner longing. There was a kind of aspiration within that was not satisfied.
Christianity has been on this earth over nineteen centuries. It has gone through many generations and many regions. It has gone through Europe, through Asia, through America, through most parts of the earth. Whenever Christianity went through a certain section, it picked up something. This was true not only with the Catholic Church but also with the other groups. If you look at today’s Christianity, you can see that a lot of things have been picked up since the apostle Paul was on this earth. Most believers think that the things they have picked up are helpful to their Christian life.
But if you come to Romans 8 with anything you have picked up, you can never enter into it. You must be unloaded. If you want to enter into Romans 8 and touch its depths, you must be so pure, so clean, and so simple.
The components of the leading of the Spirit are the law, the Spirit, and life. We need to understand these components of the leading of the Spirit in a pure way with nothing added. It should not be the law plus some definition. And it should not be the Spirit with some means or channels or organs to touch the Spirit. It should be just life itself. Although you may consider that you are clear concerning the components of the leading of the Spirit, I would ask whether you have walked and lived according to these three things. The leading of the Spirit is just the composition of these three things: the divine life plus the spontaneous function of this life plus the divine person who is this law and who is also this life.
These three things all are within us simultaneously. Whether you are a new believer or an aged, experienced believer, they are within you. Whether you feel that you have these three, or you do not feel that you have these three things, they are in you. The divine life is in you, and its function, the law, is in you, and the divine person is also in you. These three can never be separated. They remain all the time together, and they remain in you. These three things remaining in you are the leading. You do not need to seek after a leading, and you do not need to create or build up a leading. Such a leading is in you all the time.
If you are willing all the time to put to death the practices of your mortal body, not only is the leading in you, but also you are led. You do not need to seek after the leading, and you do not need to take the leading. As long as you put the practices of your mortal body to death, you are led. It is somewhat like the air. Wherever you go, the air is here. It is with you, and it is in you. You do not need to seek after the air. What many Christians call the leading of the Lord actually is not the genuine leading. It is a kind of leading built up by themselves.
The genuine leading is nothing less or nothing more than the divine life plus its function, the law, and the divine person, the Spirit. These three things, which remain in you all the time wherever you go and whatever you do, are the leading. You do not need to seek to be led. It is in you already. As long as you put to death all the practices, all the deeds, all the doings, of your mortal body, you are led. You are in the genuine leading.
Let me say something very soberly and very carefully. If you consider a little concerning your past, you would realize that many of the so-called leadings were not so genuine; they were made up by you. The genuine leading was there, yet you would not take it. You left the genuine leading, and you were seeking some other kind of leading. Sometimes you even came to the Word in your seeking the Lord’s leading. If you needed some leading concerning your marriage, perhaps you read Ephesians 5. So that kind of leading was made up by your choosing of the verses you preferred.
After the leading you found in the verses, you added your prayer, also out of your preference. You read the verses and you prayed, and then it seemed that the Lord’s leading was confirmed by your prayer. Surely you got some confirmation because your prayer built up the kind of leading you preferred to have. So the genuine leading was there, but you would not care for it. Sometimes you may have been careful because you heard that God would not do anything in haste. So after reading the verses and after praying, you felt that you should wait a few days. The waiting and waiting eventually strengthened and confirmed the leading you got.
Your reading of the Bible, your prayer, and your waiting are all the different steps of your making up a kind of leading. Is this not a picture of your past Christian life? For such a long time you built up a lot of leadings, but the genuine leading was mostly ignored. This is why many have been seeking after the Lord for years yet without much growth. The divine sonship within us did not increase much over the years. In other words, we may have been seeking, studying the Bible, praying, and waiting on the Lord, yet for so many years we did not live a life as a son of God. We may have lived a life that was much regulated and that was much improved, but it was not so much a life that designated us the sons of God. We may have had a lot of improvement and a lot of adjustment, yet we did not have that much growth in life. Our divine sonship did not increase much.
The four Gospels portray a picture of how the disciples were under the Lord’s leading. The leading to the disciples in those days was just the presence, or the stay, of the Lord. The Lord’s leading to the disciples was His stay, His remaining, with them. As long as He was there, that was the leading. But if you read the Gospels again with this view, you could see that all the disciples, including Peter and Mary, did not realize the Lord’s genuine leading.
For example in John 11, after Lazarus died, Martha and Mary sent the information to the Lord. Do you think that was under the Lord’s leading? That was altogether not needed, so the Lord did not respond to that call. Instead, He remained in the place where He was for two more days. Surely the disciples wondered why the Lord Jesus would not do anything. Perhaps they discussed why the Lord would not go to Lazarus. Do you think their wondering and their discussing were under the Lord’s leading? Surely that was their “brotherly love.” Peter and John and James all had brotherly love, but it seemed that Jesus did not have brotherly love. But then to their great surprise, suddenly the Lord said, “Let us go into Judea again” (v. 7). Right away their response was that the Jews were seeking to stone Him. Again, was their response under the Lord’s leading? By reading John 11 you can find very few of the apostles’ or the disciples’ doings that were under the Lord’s leading. Mostly whatever they did and whatever they said were far away from the Lord’s leading. They all were distracted. Even Martha got distracted by her religious knowledge. The Lord Jesus had told her that her brother would rise again, and she responded that she knew he would rise again in the resurrection in the last day (vv. 23-24). All these things eventually caused the Lord to weep. The Lord was there, and He was the leading. His presence, His stay, should have meant everything to them. They should not have said anything; they should not have acted in any way. They should have just put to death all the practices of their mortal body.
This must be our attitude also. When our lips want to speak, we have to put them to death. Whenever a part of your body wants to do anything, put that to death. Then you are spontaneously led by the Lord. This kind of description gives us a picture of how much we are out of the Lord’s leading. Even in His presence we may do a lot of things contrary to the Lord’s leading. Today the Lord is much closer to us than He was to the disciples in the four Gospels before His death and resurrection. At that time He was only among the disciples and outside of the disciples. Today He is much closer; He is within us. His abiding in us is the leading. But we are Marthas and Marys and Peters and Johns. Do not think that you are better than they were.
Of all those disciples, not one was led by the Lord. Every one of them did something other than the Lord’s leading. Even when the Lord was going to call Lazarus out of the tomb, Martha indicated that he was stinking. This means she had a leading according to the circumstances. She knew that four days had passed already. She knew too much. This is a picture of our situation also. You cannot say that those disciples did not love the Lord. Perhaps they loved the Lord more than we do. They had dropped everything, and they were following the Lord every day. Yet they were ignoring the Lord all the day. Although the leading was there in His person, they were ignoring it. They did not need anything else. They just needed Himself. He Himself is all-inclusive.
We have to practice putting to death the practices of our mortal body. Then we are led. If He is staying, we stay. If He is drinking, we drink. If He is eating, we eat. We do not ask, and we do not pray, and we do not read His Word to create a leading. It is so strange that the Lord did not answer Martha and Mary’s prayer, and the Lord did not tell Peter and John and James what to do. When He wanted to go, He simply said, “Let us go” (v. 7). When He goes, we have to go also. This is to be led.
I have the burden to show you how much we have been deceived in the past. Do not put the blame altogether upon the enemy, Satan. We have been self-deceived. We have built up many leadings in the past just by our preferences. The leading is here within us. His stay in us today is very close and very subjective; it is very dear, very precious, very real, and very practical. Yet in our daily life it seems that He is not with us. We behave, we walk, we do things, we see things, we talk. We do not have the deep sensation that the Lord is with us. A person is with us who is more real and more practical than we are, yet we do not have such a sensation.
If my wife and I are together, mostly I do not have the sensation that another One was there already. My wife and I were not the first ones there. We were the second and the third. The first One is He. We do not have this sensation. So when we want to do certain things, we pray for the Lord’s leading. Many of us could testify that the more we prayed in this way, the more we were distracted, the more we did not know what was the leading. The more we prayed for the leading, the more the leading was gone. So we all learned the skill of how to build up a leading by reading the Scriptures, by praying and waiting, by checking with the circumstances, and sometimes by asking the Lord for a sign.
This shows us where we have been and perhaps where we still are. It also describes the genuine leading, which is the processed Triune God to be the all-inclusive, indwelling, life-giving Spirit. With Him is the divine life. With the divine life is the law of the Spirit of life. These three things can never be divided. They remain simultaneously within you. They are the leading. All the time they are leading. You do not need to seek after the leading. As long as you, by His grace, put to death all the practices of your mortal body, you are led by the Spirit.
