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The Holy Spirit Himself is our spiritual life. When we touch the Holy Spirit inwardly and experience the Holy Spirit, He becomes our spiritual life and our spiritual living. The spiritual life is spiritual reality. All spiritual reality is the issue of the Spirit of God touching our spirit. The resulting expression is love, humility, work, power, wisdom, brightness, revelation, and vision. Hence, the entire Christian living and work is an expression of spiritual reality.
Spiritual reality is the Spirit of God touching our spirit and being our life in our spirit. Such a life produces various kinds of expressions. These expressions are our spiritual living and even our spiritual work.
What is the expression of the spiritual life? Suppose there is a brother who is humble and meek. Suppose another brother admires the way he lives such a life of humility and meekness and resolves to make himself live in the same way, being humble and meek in all things. He even prays to the Lord that he would live a life of humility and meekness. He has morning watch, reads the Bible, prays, acts carefully and cautiously, and does not get puffed up or irritated. Thus, by receiving the supply and help from that humble and meek brother, he also becomes humble and meek. In other words, because he is close to the humble and meek brother, he also becomes a humble and meek person.
This, however, is not spiritual reality or a genuine spiritual living. This is merely an imitation. Although humanly speaking this kind of behavior seems precious, normal, and proper, in terms of spiritual reality, it is not spiritual, and it is not the expression of the living out of the Lord’s life. Instead, it comes entirely from man’s own effort of self-cultivation. Only when the Spirit of God touches our spirit is something genuine produced—spiritual reality, the expression of life, and a genuine spiritual living.
Suppose there is a saint who decides that he will open his mouth to pray in the prayer meeting. Thus, before the meeting he remembers to prepare himself well and to ask the Lord for strength. Then when he comes to the meeting, in his heart he is thinking all the time that he has to pray. After the first hymn, due to his nervousness and considerations, all the opportunities for prayer are taken away. Then after the second hymn, because too many people are touched to pray, when he stands up and is about to open his mouth, other people are already giving thanks and praising. So he sits down again and waits for another opportunity. Then before the end of the last hymn, he suddenly stands up to pray using nice phrases in a loud and clear voice. When the people hear this, they echo with loud Amens. However, such a prayer is not the expression of life or the living of spiritual reality. Rather, it is the result of human effort.
There are some people who are always thinking of other brothers and sisters, and they want to have more fellowship with them. They fellowship with someone one day and talk with another one the next day. They never stop fellowshipping and talking with people day after day. For others, visiting people is a burden, but for them, visiting people is not a burden at all. For others, it is inconvenient to go to visit people, but for them it is miserable to be unable to go to visit people. Others are reluctant to visit people, but they spontaneously visit people. They sympathize with those who are weak, those who have stumbled, and those who have difficulties. Thus, they fellowship with one person one day and comfort another one the next day. They talk to one person in the morning and speak to another one in the afternoon. They are always diligently visiting and fellowshipping with the brothers and sisters. The responsible brothers may even praise them for their zeal. However, this is neither spiritual reality nor the expression of genuine spiritual living. Rather, it is the zeal of the flesh. This kind of zeal and diligence is of the flesh. It is not produced from being touched by the Spirit of God, nor is it the expression of the spiritual life.
Perhaps some people may turn around and say that if humility and meekness are not spiritual reality but only cultivated behavior, then we should not be humble or meek. Although this kind of living would eliminate cultivated behavior, it would result in an unruly kind of living, which would be even worse. Perhaps some people may think that if deciding to open our mouths and pray in the meeting is only human effort, then we should not pray in the meeting. Instead, we should neglect our responsibility and just sit there comfortably, fully at ease without opening our mouth. While this would eliminate human effort, it would bring in human looseness. In response to this fellowship, we should not say that we are merely criticizing everything we do, saying that we are wrong whether we move or do not move. On the one hand, if we fellowship with people and visit them wherever they are, others will say that this is the zeal of the flesh. On the other hand, if we stop all our activities and do none of these things, others will say that we are loose. How then should we live and work?
Genuine spiritual living is the issue or expression that is produced by our spirit touching the Spirit of God. When our spirit touches the Spirit, the issue or expression is our humility, our meekness, our prayer, our love toward the saints, and our visiting the saints. When all these human virtues are expressed in our daily living as the issue of the Spirit of God touching our spirit, they are spiritual reality and the genuine spiritual living.
Hence, spiritual reality is the issue that is produced from the Spirit of God touching our spirit. God as the Spirit comes to contact us, and when the Spirit enters into us to be touched and experienced by us, He becomes our spiritual life.
John 10:10 says that the Lord came that we may have life. In chapter 1, verse 4 says that in Him was life, and Colossians 3:4 says, “Christ our life.” We are all familiar with these verses, and we often say that the Lord is our life and that once we touch the Lord, we touch life. However, the saints may still find this matter vague. How is it that when we touch the Lord, we touch life? How can the Lord be our life? How can we practically experience the Lord’s life? All the saints have these questions. According to the revelation in the Scriptures, we see that God causes us to receive His life through Christ, in whom is life. One day this life flowed out from Christ. In the Old Testament a rock was smitten and cleft, and out from the rock came the living water (Exo. 17:6). The rock signifies Christ, while the living water signifies the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 10:4; cf. John 7:37-38). The rock being cleft and living water coming out signify that Christ was crucified and that the water that came out of Him was the Holy Spirit. When the Holy Spirit comes into us, He is life, and this life is the Holy Spirit. Just as God and the Spirit are one, the Spirit and life are also one (Rom. 8:2). We must see that the Holy Spirit who comes out of the Lord is the life that enters into us. The Holy Spirit is life.
God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and life are not separate entities. God is Christ, Christ is the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is life. This means that God is in Christ, Christ is in the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is in life. When we touch life, we touch the Holy Spirit. When we touch the Holy Spirit, we touch Christ. When we touch Christ, we touch God. Regarding the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of life that causes man to have life. Life is in the Holy Spirit, and when we touch the Holy Spirit, we touch life. Regarding life, life is God, life is Christ, and life is the Holy Spirit. Specifically, life is the Spirit, the Spirit is Christ, and Christ is God. Therefore, life is God. One thing we need to mention, however, is that it is in Christ that God becomes our life and that it is in the Holy Spirit that Christ is received by us. When we receive Christ in the Holy Spirit, we receive life, and when we touch Christ in the Holy Spirit, we touch life.
God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, and life are not four separate entities but one. When we have one, we have the other three. God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit are experienced and received by us in life. Specifically, life is in the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit enables us to receive life, touch life, and experience life. Hence, when we touch the Holy Spirit, we experience life and touch life. Therefore, we must realize that we cannot touch the Spirit by thinking in our mind, feeling with our emotion, or deciding in our will. Only when we turn to our innermost part can we touch the Spirit. This innermost part is deeper than our mind, emotion, and will. This innermost part is our spirit. Only when we are in the spirit can we touch the Spirit of God.
We should be Christians inwardly, not merely outwardly. The outward things refer to our mind, emotion, and will and to all the outward activities. This is similar to the two levels of Chinese boxing. On one level you develop the outward skills, learning the correct postures and stances, but after learning these things, you still may not hit the mark. On the other level you develop the internal strength that enables you to hit the crucial point of your opponent with a fist. It is the same with Christians. Some people preach unceasingly and at great length, but you may feel that the words they speak float in the air and do not touch your deepest feeling. Some people, however, may not speak much, and their words may be simple, but their words can enter into your deepest part. When you go home, their words and their messages still prick you in your heart. Why is that? It is because those words came from their inner being, their spirit, which is deeper than their mind, emotion, and will.
As Christians, we should first develop our “internal strength” and then our “outward skills.” For example, when a person kneels down to pray in the morning, he may have a set prayer. Either he does not pray, or once he prays, he recites a whole set of prayers. In the past the Chinese had to read books such as The Three-Character Classic, the Book of Family Names, The Analects, and the Book of Mencius and had to memorize them one by one. The prayers of some Christians are similar to the reciting of The Three-Character Classic or the Book of Family Names. Although this may not be wrong, the question is whether the Lord is “wearing” them and praying in them in their prayers, or whether they are praying according to their own will. The elders have their own set of prayers, the ones who are responsible for the home meetings have their own set of prayers, the deacons have their set of prayers, the brothers have their set of prayers, and the sisters have their set of prayers. Once they open their mouths, we know almost exactly what they are going to say. This kind of prayer may be only a religious prayer, a religious ritual, and a religious formality.
Our prayer should come from our turning to our spirit and touching our spirit. Many of our prayers are formal—not in spirit but apart from our spirit. Formal prayers are surely of the mind, emotion, and will. Hence, we must rid ourselves of these formalities and turn from the outside to the inside. When we pray from the deepest part of our being, we spontaneously touch the intention of God and cooperate with Him outwardly in action.
When we come to the Lord, we should not stay in our mind. Rather, we should pray directly to the Lord according to our inner sense. For example, in the Lord’s table meeting the prayers of the brothers and sisters are precious, but they often just repeat one another. One time a brother stood up and prayed, “O Lord, we thank and praise You. We are here around Your table and see how great Your love is!” After he finished his set of prayers, a sister stood up and prayed, “O Lord, we really thank and praise You. We break the bread to remember You.” These words were not from the spirit but from the mind. They were set prayers. Some brothers and sisters are more capable. They are able to memorize many doctrines concerning the Lord’s being born as a man, His living on the earth for thirty-three and a half years, His crucifixion, His death, His resurrection, His ascension, His becoming a High Priest and a Mediator, His interceding for us in the heavens, and His second coming. The more they pray, however, the lower the spirits of the saints sink. Eventually, no one is able to even say Amen. For this reason we need to have our mind, emotion, and will broken so that we may enter into our innermost part to pray.
As saved ones, we have been enlivened in our spirit. The Spirit of the Lord, Christ, the almighty God, and the resurrection life are all in our spirit. When we turn from our mind, emotion, and will to our spirit, we touch God. Although sometimes it is not that easy to touch Him at the beginning, we do not need to be anxious. When a car is first started, the engine is cold, but after a short while the engine begins to warm up. Hence, the more we pray, the more our spirit will be stirred up, and the more we pray, the more our spirit will be burning. Throughout the day we have to exercise to turn from our mind, emotion, and will to our spirit and learn to stay in and be calm in our spirit to touch the Spirit. Once we touch the Spirit, we touch life, and we receive life. This is spiritual reality. Only what comes from within, from the spirit, is genuine spiritual reality.
