Being Diligent to Maintain and Keep the Oneness of the Spirit in All Lowliness

Today we are toward the end of the age of the church, and what the Lord is bringing into being is the one new man. In the church life we need to have some crucial experiences, and one of them is how to realize the church life in a practical way in the reality of the one new man.

The joy of the one new man is the greatest joy, since the one new man is a glorious exhibition of Christ being all the members and in all the members of the one new man (Col. 3:10-11).

In the church life as the reality of the one new man the first thing of our Christian walk that is worthy of God’s calling is that we must be diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit.

All believers in Christ already have the oneness of the Spirit – they don’t need to gain it, attain it, or receive it; they simply need to keep the oneness of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace.

We need to enjoy and live in the oneness of the Spirit, taking Christ as our confining and limiting factor, and we need to practice the oneness by having the one accord, the master-key of all the blessings in the New Testament.

Praise the Lord, we have the oneness of the Spirit: it has been installed in our spirit when the life-giving Spirit came into us to regenerate us!

However, we need to practically keep the oneness of the Spirit, and in Eph. 4:1-3 we see some practical ways of keeping the oneness: in all lowliness, meekness, long-suffering, bearing one another in love, and in the uniting bond of peace.

The most practical way to keep the oneness is in all lowliness, that is, not setting up a higher standard for others but loving them and accepting them as Christ loves us and accepts us.

We need to enjoy the Lord by exercising our spirit so that the Spirit of Jesus mingled with our spirit would saturate and permeate us with the uplifted humanity of Jesus, and we will live out the wonderful humanity of Jesus.

To be meek and lowly is to be like the Lord Jesus, who loved all men with no distinction and was willing to save even the robber crucified together with Him.

Being Diligent to Keep, Preserve, and Maintain the Oneness of the Spirit

The first item of a walk that is worthy of God’s calling is being diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit (see Eph. 4:3).

Through believing into the Lord Jesus we have received the Spirit; now we are joined to the Lord as one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17; 2 Cor. 3:17), and the Spirit Himself is our oneness in reality.

The oneness of the Spirit is ours: it is already within us, so there is no need for us to attain to it, gain it, or receive it; we simply need to keep this oneness, preserve the oneness, and maintain the oneness of the Spirit we already gained.

When Paul was encouraging us to keep the oneness he introduced himself as a “prisoner in the Lord”; he was not merely a prisoner in a Roman prison but he was a prisoner of and in Christ Jesus. The more we love the Lord, the more we will be in Him to such an extent that He will become our prison and we will have a walk worthy of God’s calling.

If Christ is our prison, our eyes will be open to see the heavenly vision of God’s economy. We will realize that the Spirit Himself is with our spirit and He is our oneness; we need to use this oneness, apply it, practice it, and keep it by practicing the one accord, the master-key to all the blessings in the New Testament.

Just as the current of electricity is the electricity itself, so the oneness of the Spirit is the Spirit Himself. Since the time we believed into the Lord Jesus we have the wonderful inexhaustible Spirit with our spirit as oneness.

A proof that we have the eternal life in us is that we love the brothers (see 1 John 3:14-15). Our standing as the church in our locality is our choosing to love all the brothers in the world with the love that the Lord loved us.

Every real Christian has the oneness of the Spirit, and this oneness is nothing less than our living Lord Himself as the wonderful all-inclusive life-giving Spirit who is within us.

We now only need to endeavor, strive, and struggle to keep the oneness, maintain the oneness, and preserve the oneness of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace.

This requires a practice and an exercise; we need to be diligent to keep, maintain, and preserve the oneness.

Lord Jesus, praise You for coming into us as the Spirit bringing us into oneness with God and with all the brothers and sisters. We want to have a walk that is worthy of Your calling by being diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit. Lord, we thank You for coming into us as the wonderful life-giving Spirit to be the oneness in reality. We want to keep this oneness by struggling and striving to maintain and preserve the oneness of the Spirit!

Practically Keeping the Oneness in all Lowliness

The matter of keeping the oneness of the Spirit is not merely something spiritual or something that we do only in the meetings. Rather, according to Eph. 4:1-3 there are at least five practical ways to keep the oneness of the Spirit: in all lowliness, with meekness, long-suffering, bearing one another in love, and in the uniting bond of peace.

These practical ways are a test to whether or not we are in the church life in practicality.

These virtues are not in our natural man; they are the transformed virtues strengthened and enriched by the divine attributes. In resurrection, Christ’s humanity was glorified by being brought into His divinity, and now His humanity is in us (see John 7:37-39).

In this uniting Spirit of the glorified Jesus there’s the transformed humanity of Jesus. When we call on the name of the Lord and feed on Him we will enjoy Jesus as a Man and all the virtues of His uplifted humanity will be ours in the Spirit of the man Jesus!

One of the first of these virtues is lowliness, that is, not setting up a higher standard for others but loving the weaker ones and the younger ones.

As long as we take something other than Christ as our standard, we do not have lowliness but rather consider ourselves as better than others.

Even though we have a lot of truths from the Bible being opened up in the Lord’s recovery in all the local churches, we should not put forth a high standard or be puffed up by knowledge but be lowly in mind and attitude. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.

Regardless how good a practice we may have to touch the Lord or have the church life, if we emphasize on that practice we will end up in division.

Having the subjective experience of the cross, experiencing the resurrection life of Christ, pursuing the gift of speaking in tongues or healing, doing a mission work for the Lord, calling on the name of the Lord, pray-reading the word – all these are not bad in themselves, and there’s nothing wrong with them. But if we emphasize these so as to make them a standard in the church life, they will cause division in the Body.

Regardless of how good, how heavenly, or how spiritual a practice or a truth in God’s word is, as long as it is something other than Christ Himself, it will cause division. Therefore, we should only emphasize Christ, live Christ, minister Christ, and speak Christ in the church life.

Toward all the saints and especially toward the weaker ones, the young ones, and the backsliders, we need to show love and appreciation. Condemning, criticizing, or pointing out the faults of the weaker ones – according to “our standard” – will not solve their problem but rather distance them from us and render us unhelpful to them.

Loving others with a spirit of lowliness will solve most of their problems; otherwise, we will set up a high standard out of pride and not lowliness.

The Lord Jesus is the Son of God coming to save us, and the first one He saved while on the cross was an outlaw, a robber; also, throughout His life He showed more love to the sinners and tax collectors than to the “good ones”.

He was lowly and meek in heart, and we can learn from Him (Matt. 11:29) by not setting up a high standard but loving others with Christ’s love in our spirit.

Always be reminded: the church life is not a police station, a court-house, or a prison; the church life is a home in which we all love one another, a hospital where we all are sick in need of the loving care of our Physician-Savior, and a school where Christ is the Teacher who teaches us, edifies us, and builds us up in love.

Lord Jesus, thank You that Your wonderful humanity is now in the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit mingled with our spirit. We want to keep the oneness of the Spirit with all lowliness by not setting up a higher standard for others but in lowliness loving the weaker ones. Lord, how we thank You that You came to rescue us, save us, heal us, and teach us in love. We open to You and we come to You to have Your lowliness be expressed through us in the church life as the living of the one new man.

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Ed Marks’ sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1965, vol. 1, “The Vision, Practice, and Building Up of the Church as the Body of Christ,” ch. 13, as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Vision, Practice, and Building up of the Church as the Body of Christ, week 6 / msg 6, Crucial Experiences in the Practice of the Church Life (3) How to Realize the Church Life in a Practical Way in the Reality of the One New Man (you can buy this morning revival book here).
• Picture credit for 2 Cor. 3:17 and more spiritual quotes on this topic via, Christian Pictures Blog.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # O Lord, Thou art the Son of man, / Our human nature Thou didst take; / Begotten of a virgin true, / Of flesh and blood Thou didst partake. / In bondman’s form, with lowliness, / Thou walkedst on this earth of woe; / The human living Thou didst have / And all its suff’rings undergo. (Hymns #61)
  # I beseech you brothers as a pris’ner in the Lord, / To walk worthily of your calling, / The calling with which you were called, / With all lowliness and meekness, / With long-suffering, / Bearing one another in love, / Being diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit / In the uniting bond of peace. (Song on Eph. 4:1-3)
  # How we love one another! / We are sisters! We are brothers! / How our hearts fill with love / When we think on things above! / Let’s mingle and blend… / Our hearts knit again… / In the spirit of love… / In the fam’ly of God. (Song on Loving one another)