HIS PERSON, NATURE, EXPERIENCE, WORK, ACCOMPLISHMENTS, AND ATTAINMENTS ALL BEING EXCELLENT BEYOND COMPARISON
We all know that the person denotes the being of a man. Our person is very insignificant. Only the person of the Lord Jesus is excellent beyond comparison. First, He is God: the Lord Jesus is God. Outside of Him, we cannot find God. In addition, He is omnipresent. He is unlimited in what He is. He is power, He is authority, He is light, and He is love. All the positive things in the universe are types of God Himself. Greatness, authority, honor, glory, and nobility are all expressions of what God is. Human language can never describe in full the wonder of what God is. Second, He is also man. The Lord Jesus is not only God; He is also man. This makes His person complete. Before the incarnation of the Lord Jesus, God was merely God; He was not a man. But today, this God has become a man. The One whom the prophets in the Old Testament worshipped was only God; He was not a man. But the birth of the Lord Jesus was God taking up humanity to become a God-man.
During the last three and a half years, when the Lord Jesus was fulfilling His ministry in preaching the gospel, those following Him always asked the question: “Who is this One? Is He God, or is He man?’’ In our natural concept, there is a clear distinction between God and man. But here is One who is God mingled with man. He is man, yet in Him is God. In Him, God and man are mingled together as one. Hence, He is a God-man.
Mark 4 records one time that the Lord Jesus crossed the sea. Suddenly, a great storm arose, and the waves beat into the boat. But the Lord Jesus was asleep in the stern on a cushion (vv. 35-38). We know that God does not slumber; neither does He need to sleep. But the Lord Jesus slept peacefully in the stern of the boat, where the tossing was the most severe. The waves rolled in, one after another. All the disciples were frightened. They awoke the Lord and said to Him, “Teacher, doesn’t it matter to You that we are perishing?’’ (v. 38). When the Lord rose up, He rebuked the winds and the waves, and there was a great calm. At the same time, He rebuked the disciples for their fear and lack of faith. The disciples feared greatly and wondered whether the wonderful One before their eyes was God or man.
One day, the Lord told Nicodemus that He was the One who descended out of heaven and who is in heaven (John 3:13). He was not in heaven first, then on earth; rather, He is in heaven and on earth simultaneously. This is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is our Savior. He is also the One we believe in, the One who is now our life. Today, not only is He in heaven and on earth, but He is even in you, in me, and in everyone here who has believed into Him. Ephesians 4:6 tells us that He is above all, through all, and in all. He is omnipresent. Like the air around us, He can be everywhere. These are His all-inclusive, unlimited, excellent, and unsearchable riches.
God’s nature is also rich beyond measure. Holiness and righteousness are God’s nature. If we believe into God, we have holiness and righteousness. The more you say that there is no God, the less holiness and righteousness you have. We can never explain this matter. It is the same with the air. We do not know all about the air, yet daily we are breathing it. If we stop breathing for five minutes, I am afraid that we will be through. Air is very important to us. For our daily life we also need food and water. But to get these two things, we have to pay a price. However, there is no price for breathing the air. Air does not need to go through any special process, and we can enjoy it without exerting any conscious effort. Furthermore, among these three things, the most important one is the air; we cannot live without it for a moment. Praise the Lord! The thing that is most necessary is also the thing that is most available. This is the way the Lord Jesus is to us. He is the One that we need the most, and yet He is also the One most available to us. He is so available because He is limitless. We can enjoy His riches because He is everything to us.
(The Riches and Fullness of Christ and the Advanced Recovery of the Lord Today, Chapter 1, by Witness Lee)
