I. CAUSING MAN TO HAVE
THE DIVINE NATURE—GOLD
In message eleven we saw that this flow of living water brings forth three kinds of materials. The first of these is gold, which typifies God’s divine nature. All Bible scholars agree that in typology gold signifies the divine nature. Gold itself is not a transformed substance; it is an element. Unlike gold, pearl, and precious stones are transformed materials, for they have been changed from one form into another. Gold is a created element and can never be transformed or changed. This is meaningful. Iron or steel can change through the years, but gold remains the same. It is the strongest and the most unchangeable element. Therefore, gold is precious, expensive, and valuable. Thus, in typology God used gold to signify His divine nature. This divine nature has been brought into our being. The element of gold has been added to us (2 Pet. 1:4; 1 Cor. 3:12; Rev. 21:18, 21).
Whenever you worship God or pray to Him for a period of time, you will have the sensation that you are golden. You will sense that you are shining, precious, and weighty. Gold is weighty. Before you prayed in such a way, you were light and loose. However, after praying for two hours, you have an element in you that is precious, shining, and weighty. Have you not had this experience? When you pray to God the Father or call on the name of the Lord Jesus, the divine life flows within you to bring forth gold.
At this point, I would like to talk to the sisters about shopping. Suppose you sisters pray for two hours. After your prayer, you have the sensation that you are precious and weighty. Then you go to the department store and do your shopping carelessly, unconcerned about the inner gold. If you shop in this loose manner, you will sense that your gold has gone. It disappeared. Although it remains within you, it has disappeared as far as your sensation is concerned. On the contrary, suppose you intend to go shopping after a two-hour period of prayer, and the inner sense of the divine gold does not agree. If you say, "Amen, Lord. I will not go," you will have the sense that the gold within you has increased in weight. If we walk in the spirit continually, we will sense that the inner gold is increasing constantly. The divine nature will increase within us.
How much "gold" do you have within you? Perhaps some will have to admit that they have just a little. If we pray and walk in the spirit, the inner gold will increase daily. The flow of the divine life will add more of the divine nature to us. Although we were made of clay, God’s intention is to impart His gold into us by the flow of His life. In this way the process of transformation begins.
Transformation requires a new element to be added to the original element. Suppose I am a person with a pale complexion. If you color my face with make-up, that is outward beautification, not inward transformation. If I am to have a real change, a new element must be added to me. How can it be added? By my eating. If I eat healthy meals day after day, I will undergo an inward transformation, an inward metabolic change in life. When a metabolic change occurs, new elements are added and old elements are discharged. This is transformation.
(Life-Study of Genesis, Chapter 12, by Witness Lee)
