God’s way of heading us up in the church life is by life and light; He imparts Himself as life into us to bring us out of death, and He shines on us to bring us into His kingdom of light.
Light and life operate in us to head us up, bringing us out of any darkness and death and into Christ Himself as life and light.
So we need to remain under the divine dispensing to enjoy all that comes from Christ in our fellowship with Him, in the organic union with Him.
How we thank and praise the Lord that He not only has redeemed us from the curse of the law and forgiven us of our sins, but He has also brought us into an organic union with Him!
We are joined to the Lord as one spirit, and as long as we remain in this organic union in spirit, we receive the divine dispensing, we grow in life, light shines in us, and we are headed up in Christ.
God’s will is to head up all things in Christ, and He does it through the church. Firstly, however, the church itself needs to be headed up in Christ.
Yes, we are in Christ – it is of God that we are in Christ Jesus – but how much of our daily living is in Christ and with Christ?
We are joined to the Lord to be one spirit with Him, but how much time do we spend in the mingled spirit throughout the day?
May we realize that, as believers in Christ, we need to stop our striving and trying and simply be open vessels to the Lord, those who are just open to His divine dispensing day by day.
God in Christ is dispensing Himself as the Spirit, and we need to have ordinary days under the divine dispensing.
The dispensing of the Triune God into the believers in Christ issues in the heading up of all the believers in Christ.
God’s dispensing is different from the way that Satan does things; Satan doesn’t ask for our consent or permission – he simply injects himself into us and works in us with his evil element to bring us into darkness and death.
God’s way, however, is to dispense life and light into us; He wants to give us life and shine on us as light, and for this He needs our willing cooperation.
God wants us to cooperate with Him so that He may work in us. He won’t force Himself on us.
He simply comes to us with a sweet dispensing, for He has a comfortable household arrangement to dispense all that He is into us.
The church life is a life of being headed up in Christ, and this takes place through a sweet dispensing of the Triune God into all the saints.
We all have been given an intimate stewardship to minister Christ to one another; first we need to enjoy Christ, be under His dispensing, and be filled with Him, and then we need to minister Him to others in God’s house.
God’s Way of Heading us up in Christ in the Church Life is by Light and Life
God’s way of recovering us is Christ versus Satan, life versus death, light versus darkness, and order versus confusion.
Even in the present situation, when we see darkness reigning around us, God’s way is Christ, life, light, and order.
The collapse comes from the factor of death injected by Satan into mankind; the heading up comes from the factor of life received by the believers in Christ to be headed up in Christ (Ezek. 37:4-10).
The factor of death is operating all over the earth, but we as believers in Christ need to enjoy and minister the factor of life, allowing it to operate much more through our prayer, through the church, and through our being headed up.
God’s way to recover the oneness among His creation is to impart Himself into us as life (Rom. 8:6, 10-11, 19-21).
We need to grow in life and be under the Lord’s shining light. The light that the Lord shines on us is the light of life; when we’re under His light, everything is kept in order, and life grows.
But where there’s darkness, there’s the collapse.
When darkness rules, nobody knows what is happening, all is in a universal collapse, and many negative things take place. But when light comes, darkness is dispelled and removed, and life comes in.
When we believers in Christ are in light and life, when we are in the Lord’s shining and we allow His life to grow in us, we are being headed up in Christ practically.
When the Lord grows in us day by day and light shines in us and through us, we are no longer in the heap of collapse, there is no more confusion or darkness, but there is heading up and light and life.
When the Lord Jesus came, in Him was life, and the life was the light of men (John 1:4); this light is the light of life (John 8:12).
Whenever the Lord shines on us and we are in the Lord’s light in the church life and in our daily living, things are kept in order.
It is not men who keep things in order by having an organisation or hierarchical rules and regulations – light keeps things in order, and life grows to head up all things and people.
In the church life we don’t have regulations, but we do have the regulating life and the controlling light.
When we in the church life are full of life, we are also full of light; then everyone is regulated by the inward life (not by outward regulations) and is everyone is controlled and kept in order by the light of life (not by any rules).
In life and in light we are headed up; in light and life we are practically brought under Christ as the Head.
There’s such a contrast between the saints in the light and life, and the people having no common sense!
Especially during this pandemic, seeing people fighting over hand sanitiser and toilet paper in the store, you realize how much darkness is there.
But the saints – who also need these items – are in a different situation; they are full of light and life, they are in peace and in order, and they are being headed up.
In order for us to be delivered from the heap of collapse in a practical way, we need to grow in life; the more we grow in the divine life, the more we will be headed up and the more we will be rescued from the universal collapse (Eph. 4:15; Col. 2:19).
God’s will is to head up all things in Christ, and He does this through our growth in life; since God’s will is to head up all things and the way to accomplish this is through His divine dispensing, we need to remain under God’s dispensing for us to grow in life daily.
God’s will for us today is that we would have a day’s worth of growth in life; we may not know what this is, but it is little by little, day by day, until we are fully headed up in Christ!
When God comes into us as life, the light of life shines within us (John 1:4; Eph. 5:8-9). In His light we see light; the church is a realm of light, and in this light we see light.
When we are in light and life, light and life spontaneously head us up. This life swallows death, and this light dispels the darkness.
God’s will applied to us is light and life; He wants that there would be no more darkness in us but light shines everywhere, and there would be no death in us but His life is growing unto maturity.
If we are in the life and under the light, we will be delivered out of confusion and brought into order, harmony, and oneness.
This is the way we should live before the Lord all the time, telling Him,
Lord Jesus, give us today’s portion of grace so that we may grow in the divine life and walk in the divine light. Grant us to have today’s portion of growth in the divine life so that we may be headed up into Christ in all things. Amen, Lord, keep us in life and under the light so that we may be delivered out of confusion and brought into order, harmony, and oneness! May any death be swallowed by life, and may any darkness be dispelled by Your light! Make us people of light and life, people who are being headed up in Christ practically by growing in life and walking in the light!
In the New Jerusalem Everything will be Saturated with Life and will be Under Light
The complete fulfilment of Eph. 1:10 is the new heaven and the new earth with the New Jerusalem as the center, where all things will be headed up in Christ (Rev. 21:2-3, 23-25; 22:1-2).
Because the New Jerusalem is saturated with light – God shines in Christ as the Lamb-Lamp – it has no need for the light of the sun, for the glory of God illumined it (Rev. 21:23).
Hallelujah, in the New Jerusalem we shall have the glory of the Triune God as our shining light, and there will be no more death, no more darkness, and no more night!
Instead, there will be light and life, and everything will rise up to be in a good order.
God in Christ is on the throne, and out of the throne of God flows the river of water of life to water the city and nourish it by the tree of life growing on each side of the river.
The entire city is like a diffuser to shine forth the light of God shining through Christ as the lamp, and all the nations walk in the light of the city (Rev. 21:24).
The new heaven and new earth will be a bright sphere: the New Jerusalem is the center, all things are headed up in Christ, and light and life are everywhere!
Today in the church life we can have a foretaste of this; in the church life we have a miniature of the New Jerusalem.
We are cooperating with the Lord to grow in life and walk in the light, and we enjoy the dispensation of life with light to be headed up in Christ.
The more we cooperate with the Lord to be headed up in Christ by light and life, the more we have a foretaste of the New Jerusalem, and we are saturated with life and live under the divine light.
In Rev. 21 we see the Head (God in Christ on the throne), the Body surrounding the Head (all the components of the city and of the wall), and all the nations walking in the light of the city; the whole universe will be headed up in the light shown through the transparent city. Amen!
If we realize that we are practically being headed up in Christ by living in light and life, and in this way we have a foretaste of the New Jerusalem, we will seek not to solve problems but to come in God’s light, and we will not want to improve ourselves but grow in life.
And when we see other saints having problems or needs, we will not try to correct them or help them improve, but we will minister Christ to them so that they would grow in life and walk in the light to be headed up in Christ.
Nothing can resist God’s light, for even God’s most fierce hater and persecutor is subdued under His blinding light.
Nothing can be better than God’s life in causing us to be headed up in Christ, for even our best improvement and self-perfecting is nothing but filthy rags in God’s eyes.
May we walk in light and grow in life, and may we help the saints to do this also so that together we may be headed up in Christ in the church life today!
Dear Lord Jesus, we pray for Your will to be done on earth right now. We live here for the will of God, for which we were created, redeemed, and brought into the church life. We pray for all the churches and all the saints all over the earth, that every day we will experience life saturating us and light shining in us. Amen, Lord, head us up in Christ day by day in the church life! Give us special mercy to be willing for You to touch anything in our being which hinder this heading up. By Your grace we choose to be the way for God to move on the earth right here and right now, so that His will may be done and His kingdom would come. Oh Lord, we pray this in oneness with You and in the spirit of the Body. Thank You for hearing us and for responding to us. We place ourselves in Your hands: head us up, Lord, fulfill this ultimate aspect of Your will, cause Your enemy to suffer great loss, shame him, destroy his kingdom, build up Your Body, and make the bride ready for the wedding! Amen, Lord Jesus!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ron Kangas for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Ephesians, msgs. 8, 10 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Will of God (2020 spring ITERO), week 1, The Mystery of God’s Will in the Universe Ultimately Being to Head Up All Things in Christ through the Church as the Body of Christ.
- Hymns on this topic:
– By the light and blood which cleanses, / The anointing we shall know; / Then the life of love Thine essence, / More and more in us will flow. / By Thy love we are Thy children, / Abba Father calling Thee; / Light disperses all our darkness, / Till, like Him, Thy Son, we see. (Hymns #13)
– O Life of life, pour in! / Expel this death of sin, / Awake true life within: / O Life of life, pour in! (Hymns #359)
– Oh, Lord, grant us revelation, / Grant us light and sight to see / That as life, within our spirit, / Thou art our reality; / And that from within our spirit, / Now You must possess each part / Spreading out to all our being, / Making home in all our heart. (Hymns #1136)
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