Cooperating with the Inner Operating and Motivating God by Outwardly Serving Him

What is the service that is from God? What is the service that we can offer to God and is according to God’s desire, has God as its source, and is pleasing to God? The service that is from God takes God (and not ourselves) as the source, and it is by the Spirit of God (and not by the letter or by our own efforts).

God doesn’t want us just to serve Him; He wants to be the One who initiates, motivates, and sustains our service to Him, so that we may be one spirit with the Lord as we serve Him.

The service that is from God requires that we have fellowship with God and be intimately connected to Him, not being detached from God (1 Cor. 6:17). God called us into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, and in this fellowship we need to remain one spirit with the Lord, abiding in Him, and doing everything in Him, through Him, and unto Him (John 15:5).

To serve God by taking Him as our source requires that we have a moment-by-moment contact with God, a fresh touch with God all the time.

Actually, serving God is contacting God, and contacting God is our serving God; serving God is not merely doing many things outwardly for God and in His name but our contacting Him, enjoying Him, abiding in Him, and being one with Him as He in us is doing things.

If we serve outside of God, no matter how great the work is or how much a zeal and effort we put into it, our service is not from God, and therefore it has no spiritual value. Oh Lord Jesus!

May we be those who offer God the service that He desires, a service that is from God and which has spiritual value, the service in which we are joined to God and in fellowship with Him by abiding in Him moment-by-moment! May we follow the inner anointing, always in touch with the Lord, not doing anything apart from Him!

God is Operating Inwardly in us, and we are Serving Him Outwardly

It is God who operates in us both the willing and the working for His good pleasure; on the one hand, God operates within us, and on the other hand, we serve Him outwardly (Rom. 1:9; 7:6; Phil. 2:13).

He operates in us, and we serve Him; as we remain one spirit with the Lord, we cooperate with Him as the inner operating God, and He within us enables us and empower us to serve Him. This kind of service is an activity issuing out of God’s operation within us; outwardly we are serving Him, yet inwardly He is operating.

We need to be open to the Lord’s constant operation in us, allowing Him to work Himself into us and to mingle us with Himself, and the result will be that we will serve Him by allowing Him to serve God in us.

We first need to give the Lord the full ground in us, and then He in us will serve God in us and through us. We can’t just read the Bible and serve the Lord; it’s not by stirring up our zeal for Him that we can serve Him, nor is it by our thinking of Him that we’re motivated to serve Him.

Our service to God has to be of God as the source, in God as the element, and with God as the means; we need to be mingled with God, saturated with God, and yielding to Him from within so that He in us may serve God through us.

The Apostle Paul didn’t serve God because he was happy and convinced, and therefore he made up his mind to serve God; no, he allowed God to control his mind, emotion, and will, and he let God saturate and fill his inner being with Himself; the result was that God in him motivated him and enabled him to serve God.

When we cooperate with the Lord who operates in us and we allow Him to mingle Himself with us, we will forget about ourselves, we will lose our soul life, we will spontaneously deny the soul, and we will become one with Him as the inner operating God; inwardly, He is operating in us, and outwardly, we will spontaneously serve Him.

Our God is in us as the inward operating God, and He operates in us according to His power; this power is a resurrecting power, seating power, heading up power, and enthroning power so that we as the church may tread over any enemy and serve God by taking God as the source.

May we be those who labor for the Lord, struggling according to His operation which operates in us in power. May we allow the Lord to occupy and fill our inner being with Himself, and may we let the Lord control our mind, emotion, and will, so that we may be filled with God and possessed by Him; when we are filled with God and possessed by Him, He has the full ground in us and He can operate in us both the willing and the working according to His good pleasure, and we will serve God.

When we serve God as a result of His inner operating, our service will not be of ourselves but of the God who operates in us, motivates us, enables us, empowers us, and sustains us to serve Him.

We need to let God strengthen us with power through His Spirit into our inner man so that Christ may make His home in our heart through faith, so that we may apprehend with all the saints the height, depth, breadth, and length of the all-inclusive Christ, and be filled unto all the fulness of God with the result that we serve God by taking God as our source.

Lord Jesus, we open to Your operation in our inward being; operate in us both the willing and the working according to Your good pleasure! Lord, without Your inner operating and motivating we cannot serve You! We simply want to cooperate with Your operation. Fill us, saturate us, and permeate us with Yourself. Lord, take over our inner being, and subdue our mind, emotion, and will. Strengthen us with power through Your Spirit into our inner man so that Christ may make His home in our heart and we would cooperate with You by simply serving God by taking God as our source.

Cooperating with the Inner Operating and Motivating God by Outwardly Serving Him

Before Paul served God by taking God as his source, he was Saul, a man who was zealous for the law, a man who served God from himself and according to the letter of the law.

Saul was zealous for God according to his religious education; he had a strong will, a great passion, much talent, and great courage, and he served God according to the Jewish religious ordinances.

However, in his service he gave no ground for God, and he had no element of God in him; he simply served God by his own zeal, courage, and talent.

After he was saved, God lived in him and he was joined to God. He and God were no longer two, but the two became one. God’s life became his life, God’s nature became his nature, God’s feeling became his feeling, and God’s view became his view. God’s everything became his everything, his content. When he gave God the ground in him in this way, and when he and God fellowshipped together, God operated in him, giving him a sense that motivated him to serve God by preaching the gospel. His service was from God and by God. It issued from his passing through God and allowing God to pass through him. This kind of service was not just a work or an enterprise but the flowing out of God and the overflow of God’s life. (Witness Lee, The Spirit and Service in Spirit, ch. 8)

We need to be those who serve God by being joined to God in spirit and by giving Him the full ground to operate in us. We need to realize that God’s life is now our life, His nature is our nature, and we need to allow His feeling to be our feeling, and His view to be our view.

We need to allow God to operate in us and become our everything, giving Him the full ground in our being; we simply need to cooperate with His inner operating, and He will give us a sense that will motivate us to serve God by preaching the gospel.

Our working for God and serving God should be a result of our cooperation with His inner operation. We cannot and should not do things out of our enthusiasm for the Lord, based on our determination, and according to our capability and the way we were taught.

The source of our service should be God Himself – it should be the Spirit with our spirit, based on God’s operation in us, and it should be the operation, direction, and leading of the Spirit of God in our spirit.

This is so true, and there’s a deep AMEN to this in our being, even though this is not our reality yet.

But we all are learning to cooperate with the inner operating God so that He may work Himself into us, make His home in our heart, and operate in us both the willing and the working according to His good pleasure, so that we may offer Him the service that He desires, the service that is from God and by God.

Lord Jesus, save us from serving You out of our enthusiasm, determination, or capability. May the source of our service be God. May our service be of the spirit as a result of the inward operation of God in us, and may our service be under the direction and leading of the Spirit in our spirit! Lord, we put our mind, emotion, and will under Your control to be occupied and filled with God; saturate us, permeate us, and move us inwardly so that You may compel us to serve You outwardly! May the living God who operates and lives in us mingle Himself with us and motivate us to serve God!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message for this week, and The Spirit and Service in Spirit (ch. 8, by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Service for the Building up of the Church (2016 Spring ITERO), week 4 / msg. 4, The Service that is from God.
• All Bible verses are taken from, Holy Bible Recovery Version.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Person, Person, Jesus is our Person, / Living now in us. / He’s our tastes, our attitudes and actions; / Oh, how glorious! / Our Person, Lord, Thou art / Make home in all our heart. / As life in every way / Be our Person, Lord, each day. (Hymns #1240)
  # I open now, / With all my heart. / Lord, more and more possess each part. / Oh Lord, I pray / Subdue my soul. / Until You have the full control. (Song on opening to the Lord)
  # We’ll dwell with the King for His work / And work thru each day of the year. / Perhaps ere it passes, the King / In glory Himself shall appear. / Oh, then in some closer embrace, / Oh, then in some nobler employ / We’ll dwell with the King for His work / In endless, ineffable joy! (Hymns #904)