MINGLING
Life issues in fellowship. Fellowship leads to mingling. We are mingled with God!
Do you object to saying that God is mingled with humanity? Some think it is blasphemy to say that the almighty God is mingled with His creature. They claim we are uplifting ourselves into the Godhead.
Has God not lowered Himself down to our level? He as the Word in eternity became flesh (John 1:14). Philippians 2 says that He was in the form of God yet did not “regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself.” He was God, yet He humbled Himself to become a man. He was on the throne, yet He condescended to be born in a manger. Not only did He lower Himself to become a man; He lowered Himself even to the lowest standard of humanity, growing up in a carpenter’s home. How we thank Him!
Have we not been uplifted? We were in a dungeon. One day He came where we were and entered into us. He has uplifted us to where He is. We are now with Him in the heavens (Eph. 2:6). He has become part of us, and we have become part of Him. Are we not members of Christ (1 Cor. 12:27)? Is my little finger not a member of me?
God is mingled with us, and we are mingled with Him! The objection has been raised that such a statement implies that God loses His divinity and we lose our humanity. Not so. When we make tea by adding tea leaves to water, there is no change in the substance and nature of the water nor of the tea. If we evaporate the water, the tea is still present. Nonetheless, the two are mingled into one drink. We do not drink water and then tea. When we drink the water, we drink tea. When we drink tea, we drink the water. They are one drink. The divine and the human are mingled into one spirit. Our being joined to the Lord in one spirit neither annuls His divinity nor destroys our humanity. Humanity still exists in divinity; divinity still exists in humanity.
God’s intention is to become one with us. The vast majority of Christians do not realize this. Christianity has largely missed the mark. They are familiar with redemption and regeneration. God’s economy, however, goes far beyond this. He has made us one with Himself. This is not to say that we are deified and are objects of worship. It is to say that we have God’s life and nature, but not His deity, not that we have become part of the Godhead.
THE WAY TO ABIDE
Taking our oneness with God as a base, we now consider how to abide in Him and have Him abide in us.
By His salvation he has regenerated us. To be regenerated is to be grafted into Him. Once we were wild, sinful, and far away from Him. But one day His redemption brought us back and His regeneration grafted us into Him. This means that now we are in God. We are now in God! And God is now in us!
To abide in God and have Him abide in us is to remain in this very position. Remain in the vine! Do not slip away. Do not be apart from Him. Apart from Him we can do nothing (John 15:5). We must stay in Him.
Paul’s word is even stronger than John’s on this point. In Ephesians 3:17 he speaks of Christ making His home in our hearts. “To make home” in Greek is the verb form of the noun “house.” Christ wants to house Himself in us! This meaning goes further than that of abiding. To make a home means more than to stay or remain in a place. Many times I have stayed in motels or hotels. Whatever condition they are in, I leave them as they are. They are not my home. After a few hours I shall be gone; there is no reason for me to fix anything. With my own house it is another story. I want to see that everything is kept in good condition to fit my living because it is my dwelling place. I do not simply stay or abide there. I make home there!
Not only are we to abide in God; we have to make Him our dwelling place. Do not simply stay there overnight! Try to live there. Settle down in Him. Do not move out, even for eternity! Our dwelling is our God. Our house is the eternal God.
We must also let Him make us His home. “Lord Jesus, make Your home in me. Don’t just stay here. Settle down and make me Your home.” Young people like to go camping overnight. Are we camping out in God? Are we simply letting God camp out in us? No! This is not a temporary, overnight stay. It is a matter of making home.
Have you made God your home? At best you probably only abide in Him. There is no other place on earth as sweet as home. God must be your home, not merely a place where you stay.
You must also let God make you His home. The Lord Jesus said, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him” (John 14:23). The “We” here means the Father and the Son. They will come to the one who loves the Lord Jesus. Their coming is not simply for a visit. They will “make an abode with him.” The very God whom you love will come, not to visit nor even just to stay, but to make you His abode. You will be His dwelling place.
(The Mending Ministry of John, Chapter 8, by Witness Lee)
