Hallelujah, the Christian life is a life of living Christ – all the time – and not living our culture.
By the Lord’s mercy, we can see that our culture is a substitute for Christ, for we live our culture instead of living Christ; however, we should not “drop our culture” but live Christ, and Christ will replace our culture with Himself. Amen!
According to Col. 3:10-11, the one new man is composed of all the believers in Christ, but Christ is all in all in the new man.
This means that Christ has to become me and I have to become Christ, and Christ has to become my person and my life so that it is no longer I but Christ.
When we speak of the new man, we particularly refer to the living of the new man.
And when we speak of someone’s living, we need to realize that our living is spontaneous, not deliberate, and it is based on what we are.
Based on what we are by nature and constitution, we live a certain kind of life. As believers in Christ, we are members of the Body of Christ and as such ones, Christ is our life.
Furthermore, we are members of the one new man, components of the universal new man that Christ has created on the cross; as such ones, Christ needs to become our person, and we need to live Christ.
For us to be the one new man in reality, we need to live the all-inclusive, extensive Christ instead of our culture.
In our daily living, we do certain things and live in a certain way that we have done for a long time; we eat certain food, we are engaged in certain activities, and we behave in a certain way – everything is according to our habits, our customs, our ways of living, our culture.
Paul wrote the book of Colossians bearing in mind that the church in Colossae was plagued by culture, and Christ was replaced in their living with culture.
It is so easy for us to refine our culture and have a “spiritual culture” or even a “church life culture”, which is not Christ living in us but just us improving our behavior based on the principles in the word of God.
If we look at the life of the Lord Jesus and prayerfully study His living we will see that He was not just moral, ethical, or spiritual; He lived by the Father, He expressed the Father, He spoke the Father’s words, He did the Father’s work, and He sought the Father’s glory.
Christ depended on the Father for everything, and He ate the Father to live because of the Father.
The only way we can live Christ is by eating Christ so that we may live because of Him.
We need to open to the Lord, come to Him, enjoy Him, be filled with Him, and take Him as our life and person; as He grows in us, as He spreads from our spirit into every part of our soul, as He gains more ground in our being, and as more and more capacity in us is given to Him, He can live in us.
And such a living is spontaneous, not deliberate; the living of Christ in us is spontaneous and it is for the church as the one new man.
The Christian Life is a Life of Living Christ all the Time, not Living our Culture
When we became believers in Christ we did not merely accept a set of principles for our living, neither did we merely gain a Friend that will help us in our work, our problems, and our tribulations.
When we became a believer in Christ by faith and baptism, we were cut off from the old way of living, the living of the old man, and we were intimately connected through grafting into Christ so that we may no longer live our own life or the old life but live Christ.
The Christian life is a life of living Christ, and this living should not be sporadic or deliberate, when we remember – living Christ should be all the time, even when we sleep. This is the normal Christian life.
However, many times we may be in the meetings, singing with the saints, enjoying the Lord, and even declaring the stanza of a hymn that says, Christ liveth in me!
But then, when the meeting is over and we go home, is it Christ living in us, or are we the ones living?
Do we realize how much it is still us living our own culture, and how much our culture replaces Christ in our living? Oh, Lord!
When we really see that Christ lives in us, we will stop our doing and simply let Him live in us. It is such a blessing to do nothing but let Christ live in us!
He doesn’t want us to be a good student, a good child, a good husband, or a good wife; He wants us to live Christ.
The Christian life is Christ living in us; the Christian life is a life of living Christ all the time.
When we try to live the Christian life, we fail; when we turn to the Lord, enjoy Him, abide in Him, and let Him live in us, we spontaneously live the Christian life, without any effort.
We desperately need to see the vision of Christ living in us; we desperately need to realize that God doesn’t want me trying to please Him but Christ living in me.
Christ is not here to help us do our job or to enable us to perform something for God; He is here for our living, for us to live Him.
Our living is a non-stop matter, a 24/7 thing; every moment, whether awake or asleep, we are living. Our living touches our mind, our thoughts, our logic, our feelings, our concepts, and everything about us.
Our living is driven by how we see things, perceive things, conduct ourselves, how we eat food, how we play, how we conduct ourselves toward others, how we think, and how we behave.
Christ has come into us to be our life, and He wants us to let Him live in us; this touches the way we think, we see things, we apply our affection, we love or hate things, and we decide.
We need to see that the Christian life is not us trying to please God or doing our best to live according to God’s word so that we may have a victorious, holy, and spiritual life; rather, the Christian life is a life of living Christ all the time by allowing Christ to live in us.
When we see this, we will terminate our efforts and our doing; we will turn from any outward effort and struggle to the inward Christ, the indwelling One, and we will take Him as our life and person so that He may live in us.
Lord Jesus, show us the vision that God wants only one Person: He only wants Christ living in us. May we live a proper Christian life by living Christ day by day, hour by hour, even moment by moment. Amen, Lord Jesus, live in us today! We stop all our striving and struggling, and we terminate our efforts to please God. We simply turn to You, dear Lord, to be one with You, enjoy You, experience You, and allow You to live in us. Live in us, dear Lord Jesus! Live in us a normal Christian life for the church as the one new man, for the fulfillment of Your purpose!
Don’t Drop your Culture: Live Christ, and Christ will Replace your Culture with Himself for the one new man!
According to Colossians, we need to beware of philosophy, tradition, and the elements of the world; we need to beware of culture in every one of its forms.
We need to beware of the racial culture, the national culture, the self-made culture, and the self-imposed culture, for culture is a substitute for Christ.
When we realize that culture is a substitute for Christ, we may want to “drop our culture” so that it would no longer replace Christ; we may even try to do things against our culture, just so that we drop our culture.
But this is not what is needed. We should simply stop appreciating our culture and start appreciating Christ!
We have been planted in Christ, we have been rooted and grounded in Him, and we should simply enjoy Him, grow by absorbing the riches of this all-inclusive One, and we should walk in Him as the living land. What a Christ we have!
He is our allotted portion, and in Him, we’re rooted, we’re grounded, and we find all that we need.
When we spend time with the Lord in His word day by day, He infuses us with the riches of Himself, and we grow in Him.
The more we grow in Christ, the more the Body grows with the growth of God. The more we grow in Christ, the more Christ grows in us as we give Him more ground in our inner being, automatically our culture will be replaced by Christ.
The way we no longer live according to our culture is not by dropping it or suppressing it; rather, it is by living Christ, for the Christian life is a life of living Christ.
Instead of trying to drop our culture, we should simply live Christ, and Christ will replace our culture with Himself for the one new man.
When we live Christ, we are spontaneously delivered from culture, and automatically the Christ by whom we live replaces our culture; this is what the book of Colossians reveals to us (see Col. 1:15, 18, 27; 2:2, 9-10; 3:4, 10-11).
The solution to our culture, the plague that is so subtle that we hardly can recognize it as being a problem, is our living of Christ; when we live Christ, spontaneously He becomes everything to us, and culture is replaced by Christ.
We may still continue to live similarly as before outwardly, but we live not according to our culture but according to Christ, for our Christian life is a life of living Christ for the one new man. This Christ is all-inclusive and extensive.
He descended from the heavens to the earth, lived on earth, and through death He descended into Hades; then in His resurrection, He was raised from the dead, and in His ascension, He ascended to the heavens.
By this traveling that He did, from the heavens to the earth to Hades to the earth and then to the heavens again, He fills all things; He is an extensive Christ who fills all things!
The more we enjoy Him and let Him live in us, the more we will have our culture replaced by Him, for Christ lives in us.
We will no longer treasure anything of our culture or of any culture; we will treasure Christ, the indwelling One, who is the portion of the saints, the image of the invisible God, the Firstborn of all creation (both the old and the new), the One in whom and unto whom all things were created, and the One who is our life in the one new man.
Such a One, the all-inclusive, extensive Christ, who lives in us, He replaces our culture with Himself as we live Christ!
Lord Jesus, grant us to have a vision of the indwelling, all-inclusive, extensive Christ. Hallelujah, we have been rooted and grounded in Christ, and we can now enjoy His riches to absorb Him and be constituted with Him. Amen, Lord, it is our desire and yearning to just live Christ by allowing Christ to live in us. May Christ live in us, for only Christ can deliver us from culture. Amen, may the Christ who lives in us and by whom we live replace our culture with Himself for the one new man! Lord Jesus, we just want to enjoy You and experience You as the all-inclusive, extensive Christ until You live in us and every part of our culture is replaced by Christ!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by James Lee for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Colossians, msgs. 44-45 (Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The All-Inclusive, Extensive Christ Replacing Culture for the One New Man (2020 Thanksgiving Conference), week 2, Living the All-inclusive, Extensive Christ instead of Our Culture.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Once far from God and dead in sin, / No light my heart could see; / But in God’s Word the light I found, / Now Christ liveth in me. / Christ liveth in me, / Christ liveth in me; / Oh! what a salvation this, / That Christ liveth in me. (Hymns #507)
– It is God’s intent and pleasure / That His Christ be wrought in me; / Nothing outwardly performing, / But His Christ my all to be. (Hymns #538)
– The Christian life is a life, / A life of living Christ / For the constitution and building up / Of the Body of Christ; / The Christian life is a life of living Christ. (Song on, The Christian life is a life)
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