BEING ANOINTED WITH THE COMPOUND SPIRIT
BY CALLING ON THE NAME OF THE LORD
The book of Romans speaks of sanctification, transformation, conformation, and glorification. All of these are carried out by the anointing of the Spirit, and the Spirit is Christ Himself (2 Cor. 3:17). Some may ask, "Where is Christ?" Romans 10 says that there is no need to go to the heavens to bring Christ down or to go to the abyss to bring Christ up (vv. 6-7). Christ as the word is in our mouth (v. 8). He has become the living word, the Spirit, to be in our mouth like the air, the breath, that can be taken into our being. Christ today is the compound air, the life-giving Spirit, and we have to breathe Him in.
Romans 10 tells us the way to breathe Him in, that is, by calling on the name of the Lord. Verse 12 says that He is rich to all who call upon Him. In order to participate in the Lord’s riches, we have to call upon Him day and night.
According to the priestly service in the tabernacle, the priests had to light the lamp and then burn the incense (Exo. 30:7). The lamp signifies the Word (Psa. 119:105), and the incense signifies prayer (Psa. 141:2). Whenever we come to light the lamp, we have to offer the incense. This shows that whenever we touch the Word, we have to pray. Praying should never be separated from dealing with the Word. Dealing with the Word needs the real praying. To light the lamp, you need to burn the incense.
The simplest way to pray is to call upon the name of the Lord. When we call on the name of the Lord, we get His person, and His person is the compound Spirit with all the ingredients of Christ’s being and work. If we mingle our reading of the Word with calling on the Lord’s name in prayer, we will be anointed with the compound Spirit, and spontaneously we will become holy.
Today what we need is not the teachings but the anointing. Every part of the church life needs to be anointed. This is why we have to call on the name of the Lord. The more we call on the name of the Lord, the more we are anointed with Him as the compound Spirit. Under this anointing we have the reality of the tent of meeting, the tabernacle, and the priesthood.
We have to turn away from the doctrinal teachings and cleave ourselves to calling upon the name of the Lord that we may be anointed. We have to be renewed and revolutionized. The anointing is always fresh, but the teachings are always old. We need to be freshly anointed with the Spirit continually by calling on the name of the Lord all day.
By this anointing we are sealed with the Spirit (2 Cor. 1:22). Actually, the anointing is the sealing. The seal is a mark that marks us out as God’s inheritance. How can people realize that we are people of God? It is only by the anointing, the sealing, of the compound Spirit. When we are under the continual anointing and sealing of the Spirit, we give others the impression that we are the people of God, that we belong to God. If you dye a white shirt again and again with blue dye, eventually everyone is clear that it is a blue shirt. Similarly, if we are anointed with the Spirit continually, everyone will be clear that we belong to God, because we will be His expression. How can we know that we are saved? The more we are anointed, the more we are sure that we are saved. We doubt our salvation because we have not been anointed that much. The more we are anointed, the more we have the mark of the Spirit as the living seal, causing us to bear God’s image.
Furthermore, the more we are anointed, the more we receive the pledge, the guarantee, the enjoyment, the foretaste, of the Spirit (2 Cor. 1:22). When we enter into eternity in the New Jerusalem, we will completely and eternally enjoy the compound Spirit. Today we have the pledge, the guarantee, the foretaste, of this Spirit.
If we are going to have a proper church life, to be built up together, and to serve the Lord as the priesthood, we need the anointing. Every part of the church life and everyone in the church life has to be anointed. We cannot have the building or the priesthood without being anointed. When we are under the anointing of the compound Spirit, we have the priesthood and the service in the Body. The way to be anointed is to call upon the name of the Lord continuously. The result is the building up of the tent of meeting, the dwelling place of God, and the priesthood in today’s church life.
(The Experience of Christ as Life for the Building Up of the Church, Chapter 11, by Witness Lee)
