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If we want to take the way of enjoying God, we must have a change of concept. Everything that a person does is according to his concept. A person’s concept determines how he does something. Likewise, the way we handle spiritual matters depends on our spiritual seeing. This principle also applies to our enjoyment of God. If we want to enter into the reality of the enjoyment of God, we must see a controlling vision.
By the Lord’s mercy I experienced a dynamic salvation when I was young. This was over thirty years ago. Afterward, the Lord’s grace to me was so rich that I was willing to pursue Him at any cost. For this reason I spent much time praying and reading the Bible. I spent more time to read the Bible than to do anything else. I was devoted to studying the Bible. However, even though I exerted much effort to read the Bible and pray, I did not receive much benefit.
It was not until I was forty years of age that the Lord revealed to me the way of enjoying Him. I was disappointed that for twenty years most of my time and energy had been wasted. Most of my prayers were of no value, and the time that I had spent reading the Bible and other spiritual books was also of no value. This is when I realized that our way of working was wrong and that our way of spiritual pursuit was also wrong.
Because I suffered a great loss from taking the wrong way, I do not want others to repeat the same mistake. I hope that others can take the way of enjoying God. I implore the saints to no longer take the wrong way. We should consider our former way of pursuit. We must have a drastic change of concept. We need to have a controlling vision.
The relationship between man and God that is presented in the Bible is different from the worship rendered to God in Islam. The sincerity of Muslims can put Christians to shame, because Muslims are more pious than most Christians when they worship God. However, the worship of Muslims is derived from a natural concept. They worship God, but they do not know what it means to enjoy God. They worship a God who is outside of them; they do not understand that God can enter into them and have a life relationship with them.
It is a pity that many Christians do not know that we worship a God who has entered into us and has a life relationship with us. Some may understand this as a doctrine, but in their experience many Christians worship a God who is outside of them. They have the sentiment that their worship, prayer, and service are toward a God who is outside of them.
There are verses in the Bible that tell us to worship the God who is in heaven and to come into His presence and make our requests known to Him (Exo. 20:1-5; Phil. 4:6). However, the Bible also says, “In this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, that He has given to us of His Spirit” (1 John 4:13), and “I am the vine; you are the branches. He who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). These verses speak of God’s desire to enter into man and have a life relationship with man. The Bible contains many such portions.
The Bible reveals that worshipping God is a matter of abiding in Him. Unless we worship God by abiding in Him, our worship is of no value in God’s eyes, because He has said, “Apart from Me you can do nothing.” The phrase apart from Me may also be rendered as “outside of Me.” Hence, worship to a God who is in heaven is not considered by God as worship. John 15:7 says, “If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you.” This shows that even when we pray to the Lord, we need to abide in Him. Only the prayers that we utter when abiding in the Lord are valuable to Him.
Bible students acknowledge that the word in is used many times in the New Testament. For example, John 15:4 says, “Abide in Me and I in you,” and 1 John 3:24 says, “He who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him.” There are many such instances in the New Testament. Regrettably, this thought is not in our natural concept; hence, many people do not notice this word when they read the Bible. When people read the book of Ephesians, they are not impressed with the phrases in Christ and in the Lord. But they are impressed with the verses concerning husbands loving their wives and wives being subject to their husbands (5:22-33), and with the verses concerning children obeying their parents and parents not provoking their children to anger (6:1-4), and with the verses concerning slaves serving their masters faithfully and masters treating their slaves properly (vv. 5-9). Ephesians is a short book with six chapters, but the phrases in Christ (1:3, 10, 12; 4:32), in Christ Jesus (1:1; 2:6-7, 10, 13; 3:6, 11, 21), in Him and in whom (1:4, 7, 10-11, 13; 2:21-22; 3:12; 4:21, 30), and in the Lord (2:21; 4:1, 17; 5:8; 6:1, 10, 21) are used many times. According to the Bible, loving one’s wife, being subject to one’s husband, honoring one’s parents, teaching and caring for one’s children, serving one’s master faithfully, and treating one’s slaves properly need to be done in the Lord (5:20-25; 6:1-9). It is a pity that most people do not have this realization. The problem is that God’s children have not had a change in concept. Having a change in concept depends on seeing a vision.
The God whom Christians worship is different not only from the objects worshipped in Gentile religions but also from the God who was worshipped in the Old Testament. People in the Old Testament worshipped the true and living God, but in the New Testament we worship the God of resurrection. The main difference between the living God and the God of resurrection is that the living God is outside of man, whereas the God of resurrection is within man and is mingled with man. When the Israelites were in the wilderness, they followed God, who did things for them outwardly. He was the living God. The New Testament, however, presents not merely the living God but the God of resurrection, because in the New Testament God dwells in man and is mingled with man. The New Testament does not present a God who is outside of man or who merely accomplishes miracles by His great power to manifest Himself as the true and living God. Rather, in the New Testament we see the God who is joined and mingled with man as one and who manifests Himself as the God of resurrection. He is God, yet He is a man. This is the God of resurrection. The living God does not have the human element, but the God of resurrection has the human element. We worship the God of resurrection, and God wants us to bear the testimony of the God of resurrection.
We must ask ourselves whether our worship of God is an outward matter or an inward matter. In order for our worship to be an inward matter, we need the Lord to change our concept. Our spiritual pursuit, prayer, and enjoyment of God do not depend on how much time we set aside nor on our learning to be quiet before God. We need a change in concept. We do not worship a God who is outside of us, nor do we pray in order to ask Him to do many things for us. We need to break out of such concepts.
After I received mercy from the Lord, I would sometimes linger before the Lord for a considerable length of time without praying for things. If you were to ask me what I would do during such a long period of time or how I would pray, I can testify that my prayers did not have a subject. I did not take the work as my subject; instead, God was my subject. I would take Him as the focus and subject of my prayers. I would behold Him, praise Him, absorb Him, and enjoy Him and thus take Him as my subject.
It is difficult to find an example of the Old Testament saints or of the Lord Jesus and the disciples in the New Testament praying to ask God for so many things, as God’s children do today. The Bible reveals that the people who knew God rarely petitioned for things. Rather, they drew near to God, contacted God, and enjoyed God.
If we would read the book of Acts carefully, we will realize that even when the disciples were seeking God’s leading, their prayers were not like the prayers of Christians today. There is no record of Philip praying, “Lord, how shall I preach the gospel? Do You want me to go to the desert or remain in the city?” However, we must believe that Philip was a man of prayer. The subject of Philip’s prayer was not the Lord’s leading; his prayer was his enjoyment of God. Philip was a person who touched God and lived in God. Hence, when it was necessary, God could lead him to the desert (8:26) or take him away (v. 39). These matters were God’s concern, not Philip’s. Therefore, prayer is not a matter of persons who are outside of God seeking the leading of a God who is outside of them so that they may know what to do. Rather, prayer is a matter of enjoying the God who indwells us and of being mingled more with Him. A person of prayer is disarmed before God; he follows God according to His leading. Hence, Philip would not have sought God’s leading about a particular matter; he would have received God’s leading because he enjoyed God.
We must have a change of concept and learn this lesson. We are not dealing with a God who is outside of us, nor should we petition Him for many things. We do not need to tell Him when we are sick or when we have a need, because whether or not we tell Him, He already knows. Rather, we must learn to contact Him, absorb Him, enjoy Him, and linger in His presence. When God comes, the supply for our lack comes, the healing for our sickness comes, and the solution to our problem comes. When God comes, everything we need comes.
Prayer is not focused on things; prayer is for breathing God. Hence, we should forget other things when we go to the Lord. There is no need to pray for many things. The Lord Jesus said, “Do not be anxious, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, With what shall we be clothed? For all these things the Gentiles are anxiously seeking. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matt. 6:31-33). Hence, when we go to the Lord, we should do our best to put other matters behind us and forget them, and we should learn only one thing: to absorb God, breathe God, and enjoy God.
Seeking and zealous Christians worship God, serve God, and pray to God. They are much better than Christians who are not seeking, who are cold, and who do not worship God, serve God, or pray to God. When zealous Christians enter into the Lord’s presence, they often pray concerning the church, the work, their family, and their career. However, even though they might pray for half an hour, they may not have spent one minute to absorb God. This is our condition; this kind of worship is according to the human concept. If we have a vision, we will realize that this is not the way to worship God. The proper way to worship God is to be in God and to absorb and enjoy Him.
The same principle applies to our reading the Bible. We read the Bible to contact God and enjoy Him. Reading the Bible is not for us to receive teachings. Many people zealously pursue the Lord, but they cannot escape studying doctrines and teachings when they come to the Word of God. It is easy for people to fall into this snare when they read the Bible.
If we do not use the Bible properly, it will become a snare in our spiritual pursuit. When the Lord Jesus was on the earth, the scribes and Pharisees did not know Him simply because they were well versed in the Old Testament, which was a snare to them. They understood and highly regarded the Scriptures, but they were not willing to come to the Lord so that they might have life (John 5:39-40). Likewise, many people read the Bible, but they are not willing to come to the Lord and receive Him. They may have a thorough understanding of the Bible, but they do not touch God. Hence, it is one thing to read the Bible and another thing to contact God. It is one thing to receive teachings from the Bible, but it is another thing to absorb God. There is a distinction between receiving teachings and absorbing God.
Let me use my testimony as an example. After I left my job to serve the Lord, I would take only a few clothes whenever I traveled for the work, but I took many books. My luggage was almost filled with books. Some brothers teased me and said that I had a mobile library. When I studied the Bible, there were books in front of my bed, on the desk, and on the chairs. I used at least seven versions of the Bible, various Bible commentaries, and an encyclopedia of the Bible. However, after 1943 I did not take any reference books when I traveled; I took only one book—the Bible. Some might think that I no longer needed the reference books because I had already read them. The fact is that those reference books could impart only knowledge to me. They did not bring me to God so that I might enjoy Him.
I have observed some brothers reading reference books with the intention of bringing traditional Christian theology into our midst. However, to bring in the things of Christianity is to take the old way. There are more books on Bible exposition in Christianity than there are books on other fields of knowledge. When I was young, I read and treasured a book that explained the seventy weeks in the book of Daniel. I spent much time to read the book, memorize it, and speak it to others. Later, I learned that there were many different expositions of the seventy weeks and that there are at least a hundred interpretations of Revelation. A person who reads only one interpretation will be deceived. A senior co-worker once told me that if we do not want to be deceived by books on Bible exposition, we must read them thoroughly. This word was spoken from his experience.
It is regrettable that most of those who have studied the Bible have fallen into the trap of reference books. As a result, they merely studied the letter of the Bible. When George Müller was raised up, he read the Bible to touch God’s presence. However, he was not able to tell people that to read the Bible is to absorb and enjoy God. But in recent years the Lord has given us this revelation: to pray is to breathe God, and to read the Bible is to absorb God. Both our prayer and our reading the Bible should be our enjoyment of God.
When Christians hear a word concerning fellowshipping with the Lord, they immediately think that this means to go before the Lord in prayer in order to tell Him everything and to converse with Him. They compare this to conversing with a friend—two separate persons coming together to talk. This, however, is not what the Bible refers to as fellowship. According to the Bible, the Lord’s fellowship with us is not an outward matter. Rather, it is a matter of His being in us and our being in Him; He and we are mingled together. We absorb Him into us and allow the Spirit to bring us into Him. This is fellowship.
We will now consider what God desires to gain in man, as revealed in the Bible. We will consider two points in a way that is simple and easy to understand.
The Word of God clearly reveals that God’s intention is to give Himself to man for man to enjoy and thereby for Him to be everything to man. According to the Bible, God put Himself before the man whom He had created in order for man to eat Him (Gen. 2:9). God did not present Himself as the great and awe-inspiring God who is sitting on the throne in heaven and asking the man whom He created to worship and serve Him. Instead, He presented Himself as the tree of life. Through such a picture God seemed to be saying to Adam, “I do not want you to adore Me, nor do I want you to serve Me. I want you to eat Me, to receive Me, so that I may be your enjoyment and become your content and your everything.” This is the significance of God presenting Himself as the tree of life to man. We must keep in mind that this is God’s desire for man. The human concepts of worshipping and serving God are natural concepts that were brought in after man’s fall. These concepts are not what God desires.
To this day people still have the concepts of worshipping God, serving Him, and doing something for Him. They do not have the concept that God wants to be man’s enjoyment. God does not want man to serve Him or to worship Him outwardly. He only wants man to give Him a way to enter into him as food. God wants to be what man eats, drinks, breathes, enjoys, and lives by. God wants to be man’s life, nature, and everything.
We need our concept to be changed. God has no desire for us to worship Him or to serve Him outwardly. His intention is to enter into us to be our content and our enjoyment. However, most believers have the concept that to remember the Lord is to meditate on the numerous sufferings that He experienced on their behalf, that is, on His life from the throne to the manger, from the manger to the cross, and from the cross back to the throne. The Lord does not want this kind of remembrance. Such remembrance is a human concept and is like the remembrance of one’s ancestors. The remembrance that the Lord spoke of is this: “Take, eat; this is My body...Drink of it, all of you, for this is My blood of the covenant” (Matt. 26:26-28). Our eating and drinking the Lord are our remembrance of the Lord. How much we remember the Lord depends on how much we eat and drink Him. The Lord’s intention is that we would receive more of His element every time we remember Him. When we remember the Lord according to our natural concept, our gratitude toward Him is what increases. There is a great difference between these two kinds of remembrance.
In the same principle, God has no intention for us to worship or serve Him outwardly. God’s intention is to enter into us, men of clay, to cause us to have a change in nature and become men of gold. He has no other intention. For this reason the tree of life is spoken of at the end of the Bible. In the New Jerusalem God’s created and redeemed people have tasted and enjoyed Him, and their nature has been fully changed. Initially, they were men of clay, but now they have been transformed into a city of pure gold that shines forth the light of the glory of God (Rev. 21:10-11, 18). This is God’s intention. If we see this, our concept related to God’s work will change. In the New Jerusalem there is no worship and service according to the human concept. In the New Jerusalem there will only be God as the tree of life to be the enjoyment of His redeemed people. The God whom we enjoy will flow into us to become our constituent so that He may be expressed through us. Then God’s intention will be fulfilled.
God does not want us to do something for Him. God wants us to enjoy Him. The issue of our enjoying Him is His responsibility, not ours. The branches of a tree bear fruit not by their effort; it is the spontaneous issue of their enjoying the tree’s sap. Whether a tree bears peaches, apples, oranges, or pears is not the concern of the branches but the responsibility of the sap within the branches. Likewise, the work we should do, the places we should go, and the actions we should take are not our responsibility. Our need is to enjoy everything that is in God. The spontaneous outcome of God becoming our enjoyment is that we will bear fruit.
Hence, we need a change in our concept. It should not be that we first decide to visit some brothers and then kneel before the Lord to pray for them. Rather, it should be that we go before the Lord to enjoy Him, appropriate Him, and breathe Him. We are not considering the brothers but considering God, nor are we considering the work of visitation, but we are eating, drinking, and enjoying God. After we have enjoyed Him in such a way, He will spontaneously bear fruit in us; He will lead us to visit a certain brother or several brothers. Such visitation is fruit borne by God from within us.
To see that God wants us to enjoy Him and that He does not want us to do anything for Him is to see that the Christian life is a matter of enjoyment. Our salvation is for us to enjoy God, and our spiritual growth depends on our enjoyment of God. Even our service and labor depend on our enjoyment of God. God has no intention for us to do something for Him; He only wants us to enjoy Him. Moreover, He is not outside of us. He has entered into us to be our enjoyment as our food and drink.
If we realize that God wants us to enjoy Him and that He does not want us to do anything for Him, we will be able to enjoy, absorb, and appropriate God. If our concept is changed so that we see these two points, it will be easy for us to live a life of enjoying God.
The burden of this chapter is for us to see a vision. God has given Himself to us for us to enjoy so that He may become our content. God does not want us to do something for Him; He wants us only to enjoy Him, absorb Him, and appropriate Him moment by moment. If we will enjoy, absorb, and appropriate Him more, fruit will be manifested through us spontaneously. Our service and worship before the Lord should be the fruit that we bear; our service and worship should not be a work that we do. Our ability to bear fruit depends on our enjoying God, absorbing God, and appropriating God, thus allowing His element to produce fruit within us. Such enjoyment, absorption, and appropriation are what the Bible refers to as fellowship.
Fellowship is not merely communication between man and God; rather, it is the mingling of God and man. Fellowship is our absorbing God, letting Him mingle Himself with us, and letting Him bring us deeper into Himself so that we are mingled with Him. He and we are mingled with one another. This is real fellowship. Fellowship does not depend on our praying for many things, uttering many words, knowing many verses, understanding many teachings, or receiving much instruction. Fellowship depends on how much we breathe God when we pray and how much we absorb God when we read the Bible. It is possible to not understand many portions of the Bible but still absorb God while reading the Bible. This is the true meaning of fellowship between us and God.
We truly need a clear vision and a change of concept. Perhaps after having a change of concept, a brother may no longer “know” how to pray. Whether we know how to pray is of no consequence; it is not important. What matters is that we realize what God is doing and what God wants so that we know what kind of prayer, Bible reading, and fellowship we should have in order to absorb God and enjoy Him. Without this vision our worship, prayer, and Bible reading will merely be religious activities. May the Lord have mercy on us so that our vision would be clear.
