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Scripture Reading: Phil. 1:19-20; 3:10; 4:6, 9, 4:13; 2:12-13
In this chapter we want to see how to enjoy the subjective salvation of the Triune God, which we covered in the previous chapter. We especially use the word enjoy because enjoying is higher than experiencing. We not only experience but even more enjoy the subjective salvation of the Triune God.
The Bible reveals that man is a vessel created by God to contain Him. Our body needs to be satisfied with the outward physical things, such as food, clothing, shelter, and transportation. Our soul also needs to be satisfied with some form of relaxation and entertainment. The outer part of man is the body, which belongs to the physical realm. Within the body is the soul, which belongs to the psychological realm, and within the soul is the spirit, which is the innermost part of man. Many people have satisfied their need for food, clothing, shelter, and transportation, and they also have found solace and happiness in their soul, yet they are still empty and unsatisfied deep within their spirit. The spirit of man, which is the deepest part of man, is his true “I,” his true self.
A large part of man’s spirit is his conscience. People often say that they speak according to their conscience. This means that they speak according to their true “I.” Whenever we argue with others, we always say that we are right. This is to speak from our soul. However, in the midst of our reasoning, something deep within tells us, “No, you are wrong.” Sometimes our intellect allows us to do a certain thing and our emotion also delights in doing it, yet our deepest part, which possesses an innate ability to distinguish right and wrong, tells us, “That is wrong. Do not do it.” This innate ability to distinguish right and wrong is actually our conscience, which is part of the spirit in man. Just as man’s body and soul have their own needs, so man’s spirit also has its needs. Because of the need that is in man’s spirit, man invented religion. What the spirit of man needs is to worship and contain God.
Human history throughout the ages contains records of the worship of God both among the barbaric nations and the civilized societies. The barbaric nations worship God in a wild way, whereas the civilized people worship God in a refined way. The objects of worship of the barbaric nations are lowly; their idols are crudely made. The objects of worship of the civilized nations are noble; their idols are fine and exquisite. The higher the civilization, the higher the worship. This is similar to saying that the higher the culture, the more particular the food. Therefore, there are inferior religions, and there are also superior religions; there are backward religions, and there are also advanced religions.
Religion is the most noble thing in the entire human culture. We may say that without religion, the human race becomes barbaric. Religion indeed occupies a high position in human culture. Man drinks because he is thirsty. Man eats because he is hungry. Man puts on clothing to keep himself warm. Then, why does man need religion? Because man’s innermost part has a need. Religion meets that need in man. We eat and drink to satisfy the needs of our body, but religion is to satisfy man’s inner need. The Chinese people say that man has four basic needs: food, clothing, shelter, and transportation. These needs, which are all outward, do not comprise all the needs of our human life. We human beings are not simple. Not only do we have a body, but we also have a spirit and a soul. The soul is what we commonly refer to as our psyche. Some people have fully satisfied their need for food, clothing, shelter, and transportation; however, they still have their psychological needs. They listen to music, watch dramas, and read books and newspapers to be refreshed and comforted. However, after they have met their psychological needs, they are still not satisfied, because they still have a spirit within them that has its need.
Many people have achieved success and acquired fame and prominence. In man’s eyes, they should have no lack at all; they can have whatever they want. However, they are still not satisfied, because the need in their spirit has not yet been satisfied. Although they have no lack physically and psychologically, their innermost part still has a need that can be satisfied only by the Creator of heaven and earth. This is because man was created for God, for the purpose of containing God.
In Chinese, the term religion literally means “to have an object of worship and to teach accordingly.” Man worships God and teaches according to what he worships. This is religion. In brief, religion presents God for people to worship and exhorts them to do good according to the God whom they worship. The crudeness or refinement in the practice of a religion varies according to the degree of civilization and the status and qualifications of the individual, but the principle is the same. Because most people consider Christianity a refined and high-class religion, when they read the Bible, they consider the Bible to be a religious book. They think that the Bible teaches people to worship God and to do good accordingly. Today thousands of Christians cannot divorce themselves from this kind of thinking. When they read the Bible, they consider the Bible to be a book that presents an object for worship and teaches people to do good. Actually, doing good according to the object of one’s worship is not the truth in the universe.
The truth in the universe is that there is only one true God, the Creator of all things. He created man with a particular purpose that man may express Him. In order for man to attain to this purpose, God must enter into man to become man’s life so that man may live out God. This universal truth does not exist in any religion even though it is very clearly recorded in the Bible. Moreover, the majority of Christians have lost this truth. Because Christianity has become a religion, our attitude should be that we care only for Christ and not for Christianity. We only want Christ; we do not want the rituals, letters, traditions, and regulations of Christianity. This statement may puzzle some people. They may wonder how we can say that we do not want worship meetings, traditions, or rituals and that we only want Christ. Indeed, this is very difficult to comprehend, but we still declare that we only preach Christ; we do not preach Christianity.
The Bible tells us that in the universe there is only one sovereign Lord. This fact is undeniable. It has been proven by science, by your heart, and by the longing in your spirit that there is one unique sovereign Lord in the universe. You may call Him Jehovah; you may call Him Jesus; you may call Him the Triune God; you may also call Him the Lord of heaven and earth, the God of all things. He is the origin of the universe and the source of all things.
God created all things in the universe for man. The heavens are for the earth, and the earth is for man. If there were no heavens, then there would be no sunlight, air, or rain, and the living things would not grow. These things are for the earth and for the men on earth. Thank the Lord that the earth produces everything we need for our existence. The earth produces all the things that our bodies need. Therefore, the heavens are for the earth, and the earth is for man. Man’s living on earth is not meaningless. Man was created for God. Therefore, God created man with a spirit that man may contact and receive Him. God is Spirit, and those who contact Him must contact Him in spirit. Just as only metals can conduct electricity, so only the spirit can communicate with the Spirit.
In order to contact God in spirit, sometimes we have to stop the activities of our body and our soul, and then we have to cry out to God and call on the Lord Jesus from our deepest part. If we do this, immediately there will be light within us. Whenever we stop the activities of our body and our soul, allow the Spirit to work in us, and call from our spirit, “O God, O Lord Jesus,” then, instead of being in our outward activities, we remain in our spirit, the innermost part of our being. At that moment we know for sure that the existence of God is a reality. This may be compared to breathing. You may not feel that air exists, but it is very convenient for us to enjoy air today. We neither sense that air is here nor feel that we need it. However, when we are deprived of air, we begin to realize that air is real. Just as our body needs air, so our spirit needs God. Therefore, the Bible says that our life and breath depend on Him (Job 12:10). Our physical body needs air; without air, there is no life. Likewise, God is man’s true breath. Therefore, when the Lord Jesus came to His disciples after His resurrection, He did not charge them to be zealous, instruct Peter to change his quick disposition, or ask John to listen to Peter. The Lord came to the disciples to breathe into them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, the holy breath (John 20:22). The Holy Spirit is the life-giving Spirit, and the holy breath is the breath of life. Consequently, the disciples received the life of God.
God is our spiritual life. We have a spirit in us, and God wants us to use our spirit to contact Him, and not only to contact Him but to receive Him. The more we contact Him, the more we receive Him, and the more we receive Him, the more we have life. Religion teaches us according to what we worship. However, this is not what the Bible teaches. The Bible tells us that we must receive God as our life. The Samaritan woman in John 4 was a religionist, yet she had no satisfaction. She had sinned and had changed husbands five times, and even the one whom she had at the time was not her husband. However, the Lord Jesus did not rebuke her. Instead, He told her to bring her husband to Him. As soon as the matter of her husband was brought up, the woman’s conscience was touched. Immediately, she tried to avoid the issue by asking some religious questions. The Lord Jesus turned her back to her spirit and showed her that man worships God neither on Mount Gerizim in Samaria nor on Mount Zion in Jerusalem. The worship that God desires is in the human spirit.
We must be in spirit and receive Christ as truthfulness; only then can our worship of God be true, real, and not empty. John 4:24 says, “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truthfulness.” We must worship God with Christ as truthfulness. The Bible does not speak about religion; it speaks about God. God did not come to teach but to enter into us to be our life. This is the fundamental truth in the Bible. We are not preaching a religion, nor are we trying to make ourselves different from others. We only preach the truth because, by the mercy of God, we have seen the truth in the Bible. Not only are the Gentile religions futile, but even Judaism and Christianity, including Catholicism, are useless. All religions are empty; only Christ Himself is reality. Christ is the embodiment of God; He is God. To receive Christ is to receive God. This is the true worship toward God.
If we see this, it will be a great help to our enjoyment of the subjective salvation of the Triune God. The Bible does not teach us how to behave. Rather, it tells us to enjoy the Triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. The Triune God is neither a doctrine nor a designation in theology; rather, the Triune God is to be received as our life that He may become our enjoyment. The Bible shows us that God is our food, our living water, and our spiritual breath; all these are for our enjoyment. No one ever says that he has to experience eating. Eating is not an experience but an enjoyment. God saves us not only for us to experience His salvation but also for us to enjoy Him.
The Triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit—is a mystery. The Father, the Son, and the Spirit as the three in one are not for our doctrinal understanding of theology but for our enjoyment. God has to be the Father, the Son, and the Spirit so that He can work Himself into us. I met in a Brethren assembly for many years, and the teachers there told me, “When you pray, you should not pray to the Spirit. The most accurate way of prayer is to pray to the Father, in the name of the Son, by the precious blood of the Son, and through the moving of the Spirit.” Therefore, I tried to pray carefully according to their instructions. Sometimes, if I made a mistake due to carelessness, I had to confess my sins and rectify my error. Gradually, I checked my own experience and realized that that was not right. However, the Brethren teachers said that the heavenly Father is in heaven, the Son is sitting beside the heavenly Father, and the Spirit is sent to us. They were not very clear, however, about who the Spirit is. If you read the King James Version of the Bible, you will see that Romans 8:16 uses the pronoun itself to refer to the Spirit, yet itself is a pronoun that refers to a thing. Over three hundred years ago in the translation of the King James Version, the most authoritative English version, the translators considered the Spirit to be a power, a thing, but not a person. In the recent one hundred years, when other versions were being translated, the translators changed the pronoun itself to Himself, acknowledging that the Holy Spirit is indeed a person.
God the Father made a plan. God the Son came to be among mankind through incarnation and accomplished the great work of God’s redemption by His death on the cross. After He accomplished redemption, He entered into resurrection. In resurrection, as the last Adam, He became the life-giving Spirit. He had to become the life-giving Spirit in order to enter into us. When the Lord Jesus was on the earth, He was with the disciples for three and a half years, and the disciples enjoyed His presence. However, one day the Lord suddenly told them that He was going away. He also said that it was expedient for them that He go away, because if He did not go away, He could only be in their midst, but He could not enter into them. Therefore, He had to go away that another Comforter might be sent to them. This other Comforter was the Spirit of reality as the transfiguration of the first Comforter. The first One was in the flesh; the other One was the first One transfigured as the Spirit of reality. When the Spirit of reality came, He entered into them to be their life.
Today God is not only the Father and the Son, but He is also the Spirit. He is not only the Father who planned in eternity. He is also the Son who in the flesh accomplished God’s plan. Now He is the Spirit who brings and applies to us what the Father planned and what the Son accomplished. The Spirit as the consummation of the Triune God is now in us to be our life for our enjoyment.
We need to enjoy the Triune God, and we need the subjective salvation of the Triune God; we do not need religion. We do not need to work out something for ourselves or to reform our behavior; we need to enjoy the Triune God. The Triune God is the consummated Spirit, and He is also Christ, who is God Himself. Now we want to see the way to enjoy the subjective salvation of the Triune God through the verses in the book of Philippians. These verses cover three main points: first concerning the Spirit, second concerning Christ, and third concerning God.
Philippians 1:19 says, “I know that for me this will turn out to salvation through your petition and the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.” The second half of verse 20 goes on to say, “With all boldness, as always, even now Christ will be magnified in my body, whether through life or through death.” These two verses contain profound meanings. According to the context, we see that the Spirit of Jesus Christ is Christ Himself because the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ enables us to magnify Christ. The bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ is for Christ to be magnified; therefore, the magnified Christ is the Spirit of Jesus Christ.
The bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ is in us, but do we magnify Christ? The secret to the enjoyment of the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ is to magnify Christ. For example, there can be a sumptuous feast before me, but if I refuse to move my hands or open my mouth, then the abundant supply has nothing to do with me. Likewise, God has a rich supply completely prepared for us, and He is inviting us to come to the feast. Are we willing to accept His invitation and come to dine at the feast? The bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ is the riches of the gospel; the entire gospel is incorporated in the Spirit of Jesus Christ (Gal. 3:14). The riches of the gospel are not only in the Bible but also in the Spirit. Today God works through the Holy Bible and by the Holy Spirit. The Bible is the clear word with black letters printed on white paper; the Holy Spirit is the living reality in our spirit. We have the Holy Bible, and we also have the Holy Spirit. What we preach is the content of the gospel, and the Holy Spirit has a bountiful supply, which is also the content of the gospel. However, it is not enough merely to have the bountiful supply as the content of the gospel; we must still eat. It is by our eating that Christ may be magnified in our body.
The truth in the Bible is different from the teaching of religion. Religion teaches people to do good and encourages them to do it by themselves. But it is not so with the Bible. The truth in the Bible is that the bountiful supply of God is available through the words of the Bible and through the Spirit of Jesus Christ. You are not required to do any work; rather, you just need to receive and enjoy. The bountiful supply of Jesus Christ is here. What matters now is that you enjoy Him and allow Him to be magnified.
Philippians 3:10 says, “To know Him and the power of His resurrection.” The power of resurrection is the content of the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. The bountiful supply is the power of resurrection. The two are synonyms; both refer to the same thing. Without the resurrection power, the bountiful supply is empty. Then 4:13 tells us the way to enjoy the bountiful supply. This verse says, “I am able to do all things in Him who empowers me.” Christ is powerful; He has the power of resurrection. You must be in Him to enjoy His bountiful supply in power. However, too often you are not in Him. Although you have believed in the Lord Jesus, you are not in Him but rather in your mind, in your thoughts, and in your flesh. Therefore, it is not possible for you to enjoy His bountiful supply. Christ is the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit, dispensing all His riches into us. Hence, we need to remain in our mingled spirit to enjoy all His supply.
Philippians 2:13 says, “It is God who operates in you both the willing and the working for His good pleasure.” The willing is within; the working is without. The willing takes place in our will, indicating that God’s operation begins from our spirit (cf. 4:23) and spreads into our mind, emotion, and will. As a Christian, you have God operating in you. What you need is to cooperate with Him by obeying Him. However He moves, you just obey. Do not make up your mind to not lose your temper again; this is futile. If you do not make up your mind, you probably will not lose your temper. However, once you make up your mind, you can be assured that you will lose your temper. You have to realize that there is no way to reform yourself. God does not want you to reform yourself; He wants you to enjoy Him. Today God is the life-giving Spirit with a bountiful supply, and He wants to enter into you to operate in you. You must cease all your activities and let Him work in you.
Philippians 4:6 says, “In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.” Prayer is general, having worship and fellowship as its essence; petition is special, being for particular needs. We should tell God of all that we want. Some people might say, “I tell God, but He does not answer.” This is because they want things outside of God. God never answers this kind of prayer. Of course, I cannot represent God to tell you that He will never answer this kind of prayer, but my experience has been that it is irrelevant whether or not He answers this kind of prayer. I can testify that if He desires to give you something, He will give it to you whether or not you pray for it; if He does not want to give it to you, you will never receive it even if you pray for it. This is because the Lord said, “Therefore do not be anxious, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, With what shall we be clothed?...But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matt. 6:31, 33).
We should pray for such matters as our not having spiritual growth, our being short of the divine life, our not living an overcoming life, our not walking according to the Spirit, and our not living Christ. Moreover, we need to pray with thanksgiving. Instead of begging, we should pray and petition with thanksgiving. To pray with thanksgiving means that although your request has not yet been answered, you believe that you have already received it. You have faith that God will grant you what you have asked for. The result of this kind of fellowship with God in prayer is seen in Philippians 4:7: “The peace of God, which surpasses every man’s understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus.”
The way to enjoy the subjective salvation of the Triune God is to cooperate with Him. He has the bountiful supply, but you have to allow Him to supply you. He has power, but you have to be in Him. If you are not in Him, even if He has the bountiful supply and the resurrection power, they cannot be your enjoyment. Furthermore, He is operating in you, but you have to cooperate with Him and obey Him. The best expression of obedience is prayer. A proper prayer is always accompanied with thanksgiving. This means that you need to pray and petition with thanksgiving. Consequently, God can operate in you to protect your inner man and guard your heart and your thoughts. In this way you will enjoy His peace and presence.
In conclusion, we need to cooperate with God. He has the bountiful supply, but we need to cooperate with Him. In other words, we need to submit to His moving within us, and we also need to pray and petition with thanksgiving. When we do this, immediately we will sense that He is operating within us and guarding us. Not only is He protecting us outwardly, but He is also guarding our hearts and our thoughts. Thus, we enjoy the subjective salvation of the Triune God. When we have this kind of enjoyment, what we live out is Christ being magnified in our body.
You have to go before the Lord and pray, “Lord, I thank You that You are the rich Spirit, who is all-inclusive and supplying bountifully. I thank You also that You are the resurrected Lord with the power of resurrection. Lord, I thank You even more that You are the God of peace who gives me peace. I want to stop all my activities; I will no longer struggle, strive, or expect to change myself. Lord, I do not want to love the world or the things that are outside of You. I just love You; I love You in singleness of heart. Lord, thank You that, as the Triune God, You are operating within me. I desire to cooperate with You to enjoy Your bountiful supply and experience Your resurrection power in me. Much more, every moment I desire to pray and petition with thanksgiving and make known to You all the things that I desire concerning being spiritual, sanctified, and victorious.” Dear brothers and sisters, if you pray in this manner, you will have peace within you, and immediately you will enjoy the presence and the operation of God within you. You will truly sense that there is a power supporting you. This is enjoyment. Do not wait until a prayer time to have this enjoyment; you need to maintain a prayerful spirit the entire day.
This is why the Bible tells us to pray unceasingly. If we remain in a prayerful spirit, then we will continuously enjoy the Triune God. Today the Triune God—the Father in the Son as the Spirit—has imparted into us all that He has accomplished, all that He is, and all that He can do. Today we need to cooperate with Him, to obey Him, and to let Him work within us; moreover, we need to pray and petition always with thanksgiving and to speak to Him always in a prayerful spirit. Then we will enjoy Him as life and peace. This is the enjoyment of the subjective salvation of the Triune God.
