THE EXPERIENCE OF HAVING ETERNAL LIFE
Christ is the Spirit, and the Spirit is life. Therefore, we have not only Christ and the Spirit within us, but today this life is also in us. Thus, since this life is in us, all the spiritual realities are in us. When we believed in the Lord, we may not have been clear about what we believed, but one thing is clear: When we prayed, Christ, the Spirit, and life all came into us. This can be proven by our experience. There are many among us who were very corrupt. However, when they believed in the Lord, prayed, and were saved, they immediately sensed something within them that gave them an indescribable feeling of joy, exaltation, and brightness. I myself had such an experience. After I was saved, as I was walking home, I prayed, “O Lord, even if You were to give me the whole world and make me an emperor with great authority, I would not want it. I only want You.” This is Christ, this is the Spirit, and this is also life entering into us as our life and our everything. This is what gives us such a sense.
PURSUING THE EXPERIENCE OF LIFE
Man’s real need is not morality, etiquette, or ethics. It is Christ, the Spirit, and life. If we do not have Christ, then we need the teachings of morality, etiquette, and ethics, but when Christ comes, we do not need them. Christ is the Spirit who is within us as life, and this life spontaneously teaches us. However, it is one thing to have this life, and it is another thing to remain continually in this life. The matters of life are all continuous. The necessities of life, such as breathing, eating, and drinking, must be carried out continuously. If we are willing to exercise constantly, then the life within us will be strong and well-supplied.
Reading the Bible is our “eating.” Reading the Bible is not for gaining doctrines; it is for receiving the supply of life. Thank the Lord that today we have not only the Bible but also the Life-studies and the Recovery Version of the New Testament. Every time we open the Recovery Version, exercise our spirit to pray-read the verses with the footnotes, and then consult the Life-studies, we receive the supply of life. After reading for a few minutes, we can open our mouth to praise with rejoicing and exultation. This is the difference between the Lord’s recovery and Christianity. It is true that many Christians read and expound the Bible. Our reading of the Word and our preaching, however, are for people to receive the supply of life. We are not like Christianity, which teaches people how to be good children, good husbands and wives, and good parents. There is rarely a message in Christianity that enables people to touch life and receive the supply of life. The situation among most Christians today may be considered as total darkness, where there is no light, life, or truth. Light, life, and truth are almost entirely in the Lord’s recovery. This is why we must receive the burden to do our best to go out and preach the gospel, teach the truth, and minister life. If someone is unsaved, we must preach the gospel to him; if someone is saved, we must present the truth to him; and if someone is pursuing the Lord, we must minister life to him.
THE ENTIRE PERSON— SPIRIT, SOUL, AND BODY—BEING LIFE
Christ is the Spirit, and the Spirit is life. Man has three parts: spirit, soul, and body. When we were saved, this life entered into our spirit, making our spirit life. This is why Romans 8:10 says, “If Christ is in you, though the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is life because of righteousness.” However, we still have the psuche life, the soul-life, within us. Our mind, emotion, and will still remain in the realm of the psuche. Therefore, we must continue pursuing to give the Lord the room within us by setting our mind, emotion, and will upon Him. The more we love the Lord and pursue Him, the more room He will have within us. His life will not only fill our spirit but also overflow into our soul to saturate our mind. This is to set our mind on the spirit, and the result is that our mind is life, which issues in peace. This is why Romans 8:6 says, “The mind set on the spirit is life and peace.” When the mind becomes life, the soul becomes life.
If we pursue and exercise further, life will grow a little more. The result will be that the Spirit of the One who raised Christ from the dead, who dwells in us, will be able to give life to our mortal bodies, as spoken of in Romans 8:11. In this way our entire person of three parts will be life; our spirit is life, our mind, the leading part of the soul, will be life, and our mortal body will also have life. This means that our entire being will be life.
The law of the Spirit of life in Roman 8:2, which frees us, is the aggregate of verses 6, 10, and 11. This aggregate life-giving Spirit has already been sown into the soil of our heart as the seed of life. Therefore, we do not need to pray and beseech; we only need to diligently pursue and exercise, and life will grow out from this seed. It is just as 1 John 3:9 says, “Everyone who has been begotten of God does not practice sin, because His seed abides in him.” We have been regenerated by God in our spirit. Since our spirit has been born of God, we do not practice sin because His seed, that is, the divine life, has been sown into us. According to the revelation of the Gospels, this seed is Christ Himself, and according to the revelation of the Epistles, Christ is the Spirit and life. Thus, all the riches of the divine life will grow out of this seed within us. Every life grows from within; the growth of life is not something added outwardly. Likewise, the life within us will continue to grow to maturity.
(Four Crucial Elements of the Bible, The—Christ, the Spirit, Life, and the Church, Chapter 8, by Witness Lee)
