LIVING BY THE SPIRIT
The matter of living by the Spirit is mentioned in Galatians 5:25. To live by the Spirit equals to have Christ living in us. Although we all are persons, we should not live by our self as the person; we must live by another person. The Christian life is a life in which we live by another person. As long as we live by our self as our person, that is not the Christian life. As Christians, we should not have only one person; we must have two persons. One person is our self, and the other is Christ. This Christ who is our person within us is pneumatic; He is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:17).
The Spirit by whom we must live is Christ. As the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b), Christ is pneumatic. He is not only our life (Col. 3:4) but also our person (2 Cor. 2:10). To speak of living by Christ as our life may be somewhat abstract, but to speak of living by Christ as our person is more definite. A person is very definite, whereas life is somewhat abstract. Whether we live by Christ as our life or not is difficult to know, but whether we live by Christ as our person or not is very clear. To speak of living by our self or living by Christ means that there are two persons by whom we can live. We should not live by our self; we should live by another person—Christ.
Equaling to Have Christ
Living in Us, That Is, to Live Christ,
the Pneumatic Christ in Resurrection,
That Christ May Be Magnified in Us
To live by the Spirit equals to have Christ living in us (Gal. 2:20a), that is, to live Christ, the pneumatic Christ in resurrection, that Christ may be magnified in us (Phil. 1:19-21a). For Christ to be our person within us, He surely must be pneumatic, and He must be in resurrection. Before His incarnation He was God as the Spirit already, but the Spirit in the stage before incarnation was not the life-giving Spirit. The life-giving Spirit, who is the reality of Christ, is the Spirit after Christ’s resurrection. In His resurrection Christ as the last Adam became the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b). Today this life-giving Spirit is the pneumatic Christ, the resurrected Christ.
We live Christ that Christ may be magnified in us. To magnify Christ and to live Christ are not two different things; rather, they are one. To live Christ is to magnify Christ, and the magnification of Christ is the real manifestation of God. Without the magnification of Christ, it would be impossible to have the manifestation of God. When we live Christ, surely we magnify Christ.
Our living by our self can be likened to copper. In comparison, our living of Christ can be likened to gold. The best copper may look very much like gold. In the living of some saints it may be difficult to discern whether they themselves are expressed or whether God is manifested. Copper and gold look somewhat alike, but they are different in essence. Because of their quiet and careful natural makeup, some of the saints may resemble Christ in their living. Actually, however, their living may not be the living of Christ but the living of themselves. In contrast, it is easier to discern whether a person who is very active and makes many mistakes is living Christ or living himself.
(The Christian Life, Chapter 11, by Witness Lee)
