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Prayer: Lord, we extol You again. Essentially You are the second One of the Trinity, yet economically You first became flesh, then You became the life-giving Spirit, and now You are the intensified sevenfold Spirit. We thank You that, essentially, You have never changed. From eternity to eternity You remain the same. We thank You also that, economically, You have changed. You changed by becoming flesh. Then as the last Adam in the flesh, You changed again by becoming the life-giving Spirit. As the life-giving Spirit, You changed again, and now You are the sevenfold intensified Spirit. We praise You for what You did to accomplish God’s judicial redemption. We praise You for what You are doing to accomplish God’s salvation organically and for what You are doing in Your intensification to carry out God’s economy. How we worship You! Lord, we ask You to teach us concerning all these things. We believe that this is Your complete and perfect theology. Lord, save Your people so that they may be transformed and become the precious materials—gold, silver, and precious stones—and not remain in a situation of wood, grass, and stubble. Lord, we fear and tremble, fearing that we might be in the second category. Lord, we want to be in the first category, having all the precious, transformed materials. We pray that You will cover us. Lord, You are the Alpha and Omega. You have given us a good beginning, and now we ask You to give us a good conclusion. Amen.
The secret of the intensified work of God’s organic salvation is something in addition to God’s organic salvation. As we have seen, God’s organic salvation is of eight sections, from regeneration through glorification. However, in order for God’s economy to be completed and consummated, that is, for God to have the New Jerusalem, something further is needed. After His resurrection and in His heavenly ministry, the Lord Jesus established many churches, but not long afterward, the churches became degraded. This made it necessary for Christ, who had become the life-giving Spirit in resurrection, to intensify Himself to be the sevenfold intensified Spirit. This is clearly revealed in the book of Revelation (1:4; 3:1; 4:5; 5:6).
Christians often say that Christ’s ministry is of two parts or sections—His earthly ministry and His heavenly ministry. However, Christ’s ministry is actually of three sections. The third section of His ministry is the sevenfold intensified heavenly ministry. This ministry is still His heavenly ministry, but it is a heavenly ministry that has been intensified sevenfold.
The first section of Christ’s ministry was His earthly ministry. This ministry was accomplished by Him judicially in the flesh from His incarnation to His death. In His flesh He died for us according to the righteous requirements of God’s law.
The second section of Christ’s ministry is His heavenly ministry. This ministry is carried out by Him as the life-giving Spirit, organically in the mystical realm, from His resurrection to the end of the millennium. Christ’s ministry in this section is altogether organic, for it is carried out by Him in His resurrection life.
The third section of Christ’s ministry is His sevenfold intensified heavenly ministry. This ministry is carried out by Him as the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit, sevenfold intensified organically in the mystical realm, from the degradation of the church to the full consummation of the New Jerusalem. Now Christ is not only the life-giving Spirit—He is the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit carrying out His sevenfold intensified heavenly ministry. The first section of Christ’s ministry was judicial, the second section is organic, and the third section is sevenfold intensified.
Very few Christians realize that today we should not be merely in Christ’s heavenly ministry but in His sevenfold intensified heavenly ministry. We all need to be in the third section of Christ’s ministry. Today the Lord is working not only as the life-giving Spirit but also as the sevenfold intensified Spirit. This Spirit may be compared to the shining of the sun spoken of in Isaiah 30:26, which says that in the millennium “the light of the sun will be sevenfold.” Today the Spirit who is filling us and saturating us is the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit. We all need to see this and then pray, “Lord, I worship You that You are working in me as the sevenfold intensified Spirit.”
In the past some have tried to argue with us, saying that Christ cannot change and quoting Hebrews 13:8, which says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, yes, even forever.” Regarding this, we would point out that Christ has not changed essentially, but He has changed economically. Essentially He is the same from eternity to eternity, but economically He has changed in three ways—by becoming flesh in His incarnation, by becoming the life-giving Spirit in His resurrection, and by intensifying Himself to be the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit in His intensification.
In considering the secret of the intensified work of God’s organic salvation, the first matter we need to pay attention to is the degradation of the church. If there had been no degradation, there would have been no need for Christ to be intensified sevenfold. Christ’s sevenfold intensification is due to the degradation of the church.
The degradation of the church took place at the end of the apostle Paul’s ministry, around the A.D. 60s.
All the believers in Asia turned away from Paul (2 Tim. 1:15). They turned away not from Paul’s person but from his ministry.
Hymenaeus and Philetus said that the resurrection had already taken place (2:17-18). They taught the heresy that there would be no resurrection.
Demas, a co-worker of the apostle Paul, loved the present age and abandoned Paul (4:10). This also was an aspect of the degradation of the church.
Alexander the coppersmith, who might have been quite close to Paul, did many evil things to the apostle and greatly opposed the apostle’s words (vv. 14-15).
At the apostle’s first defense no one was with him to support him, but all abandoned him (v. 16).
The degradation at the end of the apostle Peter’s ministry also took place around the A.D. 60s.
False teachers were teaching heresy, denying the Lord’s redemption (2 Pet. 2:1).
The evil ones forsook the straight way, that is, the New Testament way, going astray and following the way of Balaam, who loved the wages of unrighteousness (v. 15).
Mockers were mocking, not believing in the Lord’s coming back (3:3-4).
The unlearned and unstable ones twisted the teachings of the apostle Paul (vv. 15-16).
The degradation at the end of the apostle John’s ministry took place around the A.D. 90s.
Many antichrists lied, denying that Jesus is the Christ, the One anointed by God (1 John 2:18, 22).
Many false prophets, by the spirit of deception, did not confess that Christ came in the flesh (4:1-2, 6).
Many deceivers as antichrists, not confessing that Christ came in the flesh, taught beyond the teaching of Christ (2 John 7, 9-11).
Diotrephes, who loved to be first in the church, did not receive the apostles, babbling evil words against them, and forbade those intending to receive the brothers and cast them out of the church (3 John 9-10).
From all the foregoing we can see what kind of degradation had come in. At the end of the ministry of the three main writers of the New Testament—Paul, Peter, and John—there was degradation. Because of this degradation, the life-giving Spirit, that is, the pneumatic Christ, had to be intensified sevenfold.
Christ as the life-giving Spirit was intensified to be the seven Spirits, the sevenfold intensified life-giving Spirit (Rev. 1:4; 4:5; 5:6).
In Revelation 1:4 and 5 the Spirit becomes the second, the center, of the Divine Trinity. The sequence of the Divine Trinity in Matthew 28:19 is the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. There the Father as the source is the first, the Spirit is the last, and the Son is the center, the second. In Revelation 1:4 and 5 the sequence is changed: “Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is coming [the Father], and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful Witness, the Firstborn of the dead, and the Ruler of the kings of the earth.” This change of sequence reveals the importance of the function of the sevenfold intensified Spirit. There is a sense, however, in which the sequence actually has not changed, for as the Spirit, who is the consummation of the Triune God, Christ remains the center of the Divine Trinity.
The sevenfold intensified Spirit, as the seven Spirits, is the seven lamps burning before the throne of God (4:5). Because of the degradation, many things should be burned. However, the lamps are not mainly for burning but for enlightening. When the lamps enlighten, they also burn.
The sevenfold intensified Spirit, as the seven Spirits, is the seven eyes of the Lamb sent forth into all the earth, searching and infusing all the churches and all the saints with His eyes (5:6).
As the seven eyes of the Lamb, the seven Spirits are one with the Lamb. Your eyes are not separate from you yourself. When you look at someone, your eyes look at that one, and when your eyes look at someone, you yourself look at that one. The fact that the seven Spirits are the seven eyes of Christ the Lamb indicates that Christ and the Spirit are one. It is heretical to say the Spirit is not one with Christ. Just as the eyes of a person are not separate from the person, so the seven Spirits as the seven eyes of Christ are not separate from Christ. The seven Spirits are Christ Himself because They are the eyes of Christ. The seven Spirits are just Christ Himself pneumatically.
The seven Spirits as the seven eyes are for both searching and infusing. While your eyes are searching a person, they are infusing something of yourself into that person. With the seven Spirits as His eyes, Christ is searching all the churches and all the saints and also infusing Himself into the churches and the saints. On the one hand, we may fear His searching, but on the other hand, we should welcome it and be thankful for it because it is always followed by His infusing. Actually, His searching and His infusing go together, for His searching is accompanied by His infusing. As He searches us, He infuses Himself into us.
We may experience this searching and infusing as we are praying. While we pray, the Lord searches us and infuses us with Himself. Suppose, for example, a brother speaks to his wife with right words but with a wrong spirit. Later, while he is praying, the Lord searches him and rebukes him for being wrong with his wife. The brother repents and says, “Lord, I was wrong with my wife, yet it is hard for me to repent to her and ask her to forgive me.” However, the Lord not only searches and rebukes this brother but also infuses Himself into him. As a result of this infusing, the brother has the supply to go to his wife, confess, and ask for her forgiveness.
As the sevenfold intensified Spirit, Christ saves the believers from the things related to the degradation of the church.
The sevenfold intensified Spirit saves the believers from the formal church life, the loss of the first love to the Lord, the loss of the shining capacity of the lampstand, and the loss of the enjoyment of Christ as life in the church in Ephesus (2:1-7). The church in Ephesus had lost four things: the genuine and proper church life, the first love toward the Lord, the shining capacity of the lampstand, and the enjoyment of Christ as life. Such a loss is very serious.
Some of the churches in the Lord’s recovery may have lost these four things. Instead of a real and genuine church life, the saints in these churches have only a formal church life. The saints still love one another, but their love is quite formal. They do not have the real and genuine love toward the brothers. Furthermore, the saints in these churches still come to the meetings, but they attend the meetings merely in a formal way. A good number of saints have this kind of formality. We need to be genuine, and to be genuine is to be in the spirit and do everything in the spirit.
If we have lost our first love to the Lord, we will not be warm toward Him. Although we may continue to serve Him, we will be cold in our serving. We need to be saved from a formal church life and serve the Lord with a burning spirit (Rom. 12:11).
The believers need to be saved by the seven Spirits from the defeat that leads to the taste of the second death spoken of in the Lord’s word to the church in Smyrna (Rev. 2:8-11). Those who are defeated in the way described in verses 10 and 11 may taste of the second death, the lake of fire. We need to realize, therefore, that it is possible for a saved person to be hurt by the lake of fire as the second death.
The believers need to be saved also from the worldliness in union with the world as a marriage and the teaching of Balaam and the Nicolaitans in the church in Pergamos (vv. 12-17).
Next, the sevenfold intensified Spirit saves the believers from the fornication, idolatry, demonic teaching, and satanic depths in Catholicism, signified by the church in Thyatira (vv. 18-29). In the Catholic Church today, there are many demonic teachings—for example, the teaching that one’s prayers can shorten the time that someone else will spend in purgatory. Even though the Catholic Church correctly teaches certain things regarding God, Christ, and redemption, this teaching has been “leavened” by being mixed with pagan practices, heretical doctrines, and evil matters. Many of these are enumerated in the book entitled The Two Babylons.
Furthermore, the believers need to be saved from the spiritual death—from being dead and dying—in Protestantism, signified by the church in Sardis (3:1-6). Spiritual death is prevailing in today’s Protestantism. Some in the denominations are quite good, but the majority are either dead or dying.
Next, the believers need to be saved from the losing of the crown, which has been gained already in Brethrenism, signified by the church in Philadelphia (vv. 7-13). Philadelphia means “brotherly love.” Some in Brethrenism had gained the crown but eventually were defeated and were in danger of losing the crown at the Lord’s coming back. Thus, the Lord warned them, saying, “Hold fast what you have that no one take your crown” (v. 11).
Finally, Christ as the sevenfold intensified Spirit saves the believers from the lukewarmness and the Christlessness in degraded Brethrenism, signified by the church in Laodicea (vv. 14-22). We know that the church in Laodicea was Christless by the fact that He was outside the church, standing at the door and knocking (v. 20). This indicates that we may have Christ in name but not in reality. We need to be careful lest this become our situation today. We all should consider these matters not for others but for ourselves.
Now we need to see the means by which the believers are saved from the degradation of the church.
Christ saves us from degradation by His speaking. In Revelation 2 and 3 the speaking of the unlimited life-releasing sevenfold intensified pneumatic Christ to the seven churches at the beginning of each epistle respectively becomes the speaking of the sevenfold intensified, all-inclusive, life-giving Spirit to all the seven churches at the end of each epistle universally (2:1, 7, 8, 11, 12, 17, 18, 29; 3:1, 6, 7, 13, 14, 22). At the beginning of each of the seven epistles, it is Christ who is speaking, but at the end of each epistle it is the Spirit who is speaking. The speaking of Christ therefore becomes the speaking of the Spirit. From this we see that Christ’s speaking and the Spirit’s speaking are one speaking. Christ speaks to a particular local church, and the Spirit speaks to the universal Body. By this speaking, Christ saves us from the degradation of today’s church.
Christ saves the believers also by the participation of the overcoming saints who are living in their spirit drawn by the Lamb (1:10; 4:2; 17:3; 21:10; 14:4). Christ and the Spirit speak, and the overcoming saints respond and say yes to the Lord. The believers who respond in this way will be saved.
For what are the believers saved from degradation by the sevenfold intensified Spirit? In order to answer this question, we need to see the goal of the intensified work of God’s organic salvation.
This salvation is for producing the overcomers to build up the Body of Christ for the initial consummation of the New Jerusalem in the kingdom age (2:7) and the full consummation of the New Jerusalem in the new heaven and new earth (21:2). As we look at the situation of today’s Christians, we may wonder who will build up the Body of Christ. Without the overcomers the Body of Christ cannot be built up, and unless the Body of Christ is built up, Christ cannot come back for His bride. Christ will come back not only as the Savior but also as the Bridegroom to marry His bride, who will be the totality of the overcomers. The building up of the Body of Christ is by the overcomers produced by God in the intensified work of His organic salvation.
The building up of the Body of Christ by the overcomers in this age is for the initial consummation of the New Jerusalem in the kingdom age and eventually for the full consummation of the New Jerusalem in the new heaven and new earth.
The intensified work of God’s organic salvation is also for the complete preparation of the bride of Christ so that the Bridegroom may have His triumphant wedding in the millennium for His satisfaction according to His good pleasure (19:7-9). John 3 indicates that Christ is the Bridegroom coming for the bride, who is composed of all the regenerated people. But nearly two thousand years have passed, and the bride still has not been prepared. The overcomers produced by Christ’s intensified work will build up the Body of Christ, which will become the bride of Christ. Thus, Christ’s wedding will take place as a result of His intensified work.
Next, Christ’s intensified work is for the formation of the bridal army for Christ to defeat and destroy His top enemies in humanity, the Antichrist and his false prophet (Rev. 19:11-21; 17:14). At the end of this age Antichrist and his false prophet will rise up to be the top enemies of Christ in humanity. Who will defeat them? These enemies will be defeated by Christ’s bridal army, formed with the overcomers. Christ and His bride will fight against His human enemies and destroy them.
Furthermore, Christ’s intensified work is for the binding of Satan and the casting of him into the abyss for one thousand years (20:1-3).
Finally, Christ’s intensified work is for the bringing in of the kingdom of Christ and of God, which will be the millennium (vv. 4-6).
The final outcome of Christ’s intensified work will be that the ultimately consummated Spirit as the consummation of the processed Triune God becomes the Bridegroom, and the aggregate of the overcoming saints becomes the bride of the universal romance between the redeeming God and His redeemed man as the conclusion of the entire Scriptures (22:17).
The words, listed as follows, concerning the compounded, all-inclusive, life-giving, and indwelling Spirit, unveil also the secret of God’s organic salvation:
A. The consummated Spirit as the second Paraclete (the Comforter), the realization of Christ as the first Paraclete, takes care of the believers, especially in the matter of the Divine Trinity being the main, life element of the organic salvation of God (John 14:16-18).
B. The indwelling Spirit joins in to help the believers in their weakness, and He Himself intercedes by groaning in the spirit of the believers that all things may work together for good to those who love God, that they may be conformed to the image of His Son, and that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers (Rom. 8:26, 28-29).
C. The believer who is joined to the Lord can experience the Lord to the climax, even to be one spirit with the Lord (God) (1 Cor. 6:17).
D. The Father strengthens the believers, according to the riches of His glory, with power through His Spirit into the believers’ inner man, for Christ to make His home in the believers’ heart that they may be filled unto the fullness of the Triune God for His corporate expression (Eph. 3:16-19). When Christ has the freedom to make His home in our heart, we will be filled unto all the fullness of the Triune God to be the Body to express the Triune God corporately.
E. The apostle who sought to know Christ and gain Him was enabled to do all things in Christ who empowered him by His Spirit with the bountiful supply (Phil. 3:10a, 12; 4:13; 1:19).
