Dealing with our Concepts and our Hypocrisy by Caring for the Living Christ in us

We need the Lord’s light to shine on us that we may see the obstacles that God’s life encounters in our heart, such as the darkness of our human concepts and hypocrisy; we need to take care of the living Christ in us and deal with any obstacles to His life. Amen!

The Lord as life came into our spirit to regenerate us and fill us with His life; we believers in Christ have Christ as the Spirit in us, and our spirit is life.

However, this life, the life of God in our spirit, wants to grow, spread, and flow out, and our heart is the key to releasing the life of God.

With God in Christ as the Spirit in our spirit there is no problem; with our heart, however, there are many problems.

Our heart is a conglomerate composed of our mind, emotion, and will, together with our conscience.

In order for the life of God to flow freely into our inner being, we need to deal with every part of our heart.

We need to deal with our mind by not allowing it to wander but focusing it on the Lord and being pure in heart.

It is easy in this modern world to be complicated persons, persons who have a divided attention and who cannot focus on one thing at a time.

We need to deal with our heart by having many conversations with the Lord concerning the impurities in our heart, and we need to be purified so that we may be single and pure for the Lord.

We need to deal with our will; sometimes our will is strong for things that are not of the Lord and weak in the things of God.

We need to have a soft heart toward the Lord, being submissive in our will toward Him.

May the Lord save us from being stiff-necked people, those who always rebel against God and are hardened in their heart toward Him.

We need to deal with our emotion by loving the Lord; God wants our heart to be loving toward Him.

We love so many other things, and even after spending time with the Lord in the morning, it is easy for our flypaper-heart to get stuck to this or that thing, situation, or matter. Oh, Lord Jesus!

We need to turn our heart to the Lord again and again, asking Him to cause our heart to turn to Him to behold His beauty.

Once we behold the Lord, that’s it: the course of our life is changed. Once we see His lovely face, we love Him, and we give Him our best love.

It is our love for the Lord that qualifies us to serve Him and gives us the authority to nourish others with Christ.

Finally, we need to deal with our conscience so that we have no offense, condemnation, or reproach in our conscience. Amen!

May we confess our sins in the Lord’s light and seek to have a clear and pure conscience before God and man.

May the Lord as life grow in us and have an unhindered way in our being!

Realizing the Darkness of our Human Concepts and Taking care of the Living Christ in us

We need to see the obstacles that God’s life encounters in our heart.

We may think that we are not rebellious toward Him but rather, we are good Christians who do their daily Bible reading and regularly attend the meetings, but there are many obstacles in us which need to be dealt with.

Actually, everything we have – whether it is good or bad, approved or disapproved – can be an obstacle to God’s life.

The first obstacle to God’s life in our being is our concepts.

The first problem that God’s life encounters in us is that we don’t realize the darkness of our human concepts (2 Cor. 3:14; 4:4).

We may consider that, now that we are Christians, we don’t think about evil things or in evil ways, so our thinking should be alright.

Whether we are wise or foolish, whether we’re highly educated or uneducated, all our human concepts are in darkness, and they keep us from knowing Christ as life in us.

May the Lord have mercy on us and shine in us to expose the darkness of our human concepts, and may we take care of the living Christ in us more than our opinions and concepts.

We need to see that the only thing that matters in the Christian life is how we take care of the living Christ in us (Gal. 1:16; 2:20; 4:19; Phil. 1:19-21; 2 Cor. 3:18).

What matters to God is just Christ. Nothing else matters. He wants Christ to be everything to us and to be lived out of us.

We, however, have many concepts, many of which are quite good and scriptural, and we’re oblivious to the fact that these concepts are darkness, hindering the life of God from spreading and growing in us.

After we’re saved, we have the concept that we need to try to do good things, be zealous, and preach the gospel.

However, if we touch the Lord and fellowship with Him, He in us may have a different feeling.

We may think we need to do this or that for Him, but He may touch us concerning our attitude toward our spouse or the way we react toward our workmates in the office.

If we follow the Lord’s leading and inner speaking, we will get more life and peace; however, if we follow our concepts, we will be in darkness, no matter how much we think we do for the Lord.

The Lord continually operate in us, and He is a living person; He does not operate in us according to our concepts.

We just need to contact the Lord, pray to fellowship with Him, and open to Him, and we will take care of the living Christ in us.

Being a Christian means not taking anything other than Christ as our aim. Christ is our only goal and aim.

Many people, however, have difficulty in their spiritual life after they are saved because they do not know the pathway of life, and they don’t take Christ as their life.

May we be those who actively choose to set our mind on our spirit and not on the flesh (Rom. 8:6).

When we set our mind on the spirit, we get life and peace.

May the Lord shine on us and expose the darkness of our human concepts.

May the Lord expose any darkness in us and may we stand with Him, not with our concepts and ideas.

May we see that Christ is our life, and may we take the pathway of life.

When we contact the Lord and remain in fellowship with Him, taking care of the living Christ in us and not living according to our concepts, the Lord in us will touch us concerning different matters in our living and in our being.

As He operates in us, we will realize that some things we did in the past were inappropriate, and we may have mistreated those around us, blamed them, and complained to others. Oh, Lord.

Under the Lord’s light, as He shines on us, we confess and repent.

This will release the Lord’s life to grow in us and flow in more parts of our inner being.

If we follow the inner sense of life within us, taking care of the living Christ in us and not doing things according to the darkness of our human concepts, the living Christ will move in us and touch us, and He will have a way in our being.

We will feel that we need to apologise to certain ones whom we have offended in the past, and we may seek forgiveness from some whom we have mistreated. Oh, Lord.

May the Lord be so real to us, and may we focus only on Him, putting aside our human concepts and touching the living Lord throughout our daily life!

Lord Jesus, have mercy on us and expose the darkness of our human concepts. May we be those who care not for doing what we think we should do for God but for contacting God and taking care of the living Christ in us. Hallelujah, God in Christ came into our being to be our life and our life supply. Amen, Lord, we open to You as the living Christ who indwells us. We choose to set our mind on our spirit. Shine on us. Have Your way in us. We want to care for the living Christ in us and pay attention only to Christ. Amen, Lord, may we know the pathway of life by taking Christ as our life! We drop our human concepts and all religious things and we focus only on Christ, the living One in our spirit. We want to follow the sense of life and peace and not care for our concepts or opinions. Amen, Lord Jesus, we love You and we want to remain in fellowship with You!

Hypocrisy is an Obstacle to God’s Life in us: may we take Care of the Indwelling Christ and not our Outward Appearance!

The second main problem that the life of God encounters in us is hypocrisy (Matt. 6:2, 5; 7:5; 23:13-29).

Hypocrisy is in all of us, for we all want to appear better before others than what we are on the inside.

Sometimes you may meet a brother who you know is not doing well but rather, is backsliding from the Lord; however, he puts on an outward appearance that gives you the impression that all is well with him. Oh, Lord!

This doesn’t mean that we should be sad when we meet with the saints, thus reflecting how we feel inside; it means that we need to be delivered from hypocrisy by taking care of the indwelling Christ and not for outward appearance.

Our spirituality as believers in Christ is not determined by outward appearance but by how we take care of the indwelling Christ.

Some people are naturally good, gentle, kind, and loving; when they become a Christian, they still express their natural characteristics, but now they think that these are good, for the Lord can use them.

Actually, our natural goodness is false spirituality, and it is a great hindrance to life.

We may be naturally gentle, modest, uncontentious, caring, and sympathetic toward others; we may have many good points and virtues, and we may think that these are something that the Lord can use.

Unless these go through death and resurrection, they are false.

From the point of view of ethics and morality, it is good to have these wonderful virtues humanly; from God’s point of view, from the point of view of the divine life, they are false. A

nything that is not Christ Himself lived out through us is false.

Anything we express and is not Christ living in us is a facade, something like a spectacle that we put on but is not real. Oh, Lord.

May we care more for the indwelling Christ, the living Christ within us, than for anything that we manifest outwardly.

The expression of the divine life in us involves the rejection of our natural disposition and preference and simply allowing Christ to operate in us and break us.

If we do not go through the cross and live in the Spirit, one with the Lord, we are not expressing the Lord, no matter how hard we try.

If we always do things according to our disposition and our natural being, the outcome will always be hypocrisy. Oh, Lord.

If we behave according to what we are by nature, thinking that it is OK as long as we don’t offend others and are not gossiping, the result is hypocrisy, not the living out of Christ.

We will be one way on the outside and another way on the inside; we are one way with the left hand and another way with the right hand.

Such a living is more than being dishonest: it is not genuine.

The Lord spoke to the Pharisees and the scribes that they were hypocrites, for their fathers killed the prophets, but they were whitewashing their graves.

The Lord hates hypocrisy. He hates a hypocritical heart.

May we be genuine and not hypocritical when we meet with the saints.

May we be saved from being political toward others, always trying to do the right thing and say the right words but without contacting the Lord.

May the Lord shine on us and expose how much we live in the self, how much we behave according to our natural disposition, and how much we express our natural man.

May we take care of the indwelling Christ, the living Christ in us, and forget about anything else. He wants to be expressed through us.

So He needs to operate in us and have the freedom to break us so that He may flow through us and be expressed in our living.

Lord Jesus, deliver us from hypocrisy. Deliver us from having only an outward appearance of being spiritual without contacting and caring for the indwelling Christ. Oh Lord, how much we need You! We don’t know what is in us, and we don’t realize how much we live according to our disposition and in our natural man. Shine on us. May Your living light expose any pretense in our being. May we be saved from our natural goodness, which is false spirituality and is a great hindrance to life. Oh, Lord. We just want to enjoy You. We care only for the living Christ in us. We stand against our natural disposition and we allow You to operate and break through in us so that You may live in us and be expressed through us. Amen, Lord Jesus, save us from always doing things according to our natural disposition, thus ending up in hypocrisy in our life. Lord Jesus, live in us today. Be expressed through us.

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Minoru Chen in the message for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1953, vol. 1, “Knowing Life and the Church,” pp. 133-138, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Enjoyment of Christ and our Growth in Life unto Maturity (2023 Thanksgiving Blending Conference), week 3, entitled, Dealing with Our Heart for the Growth of the Divine Seed of Life within Us unto Our Maturity in Life for God’s Building in Life.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – A Christian’s Attitude toward Reforming Society, via, Shepherding Words.
  – 4 Characteristics of Blessed People You Might Not Expect, via, Holding to Truth in Love.
  – The source of our concepts, a portion from, Life Messages, Vol. 2 (#42-75), Chapter 10, by Witness Lee.
  – Being Renewed unto New Jerusalem, via, New Jerusalem blog.
  – Changing our Concepts and Habits to Take the God-Ordained Way (Part 1), via, Living to Him.
  – Reviews of misaimings in Christian books, via, Affirmation and Critique.
  – Not religion but the living Christ, a portion from, The All-Inclusiveness and Unlimitedness of Christ, Chapter 3, by Witness Lee.
  – 6 Functions of the Living Word of God, via, Bibles for America blog.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Dig away, dig away, dig away, / All self seeking in my heart dig away! / Dig away, dig away, dig away, / All self-seeking in my heart dig away!… When my heart’s wholly free, / Christ can flow through me… Hallelujah! / Life can flow, praise the Lord, life can flow! / From the fountain in my heart life can flow! (Hymns #1214 stanza 5 and chorus for stanza 6)
  – By this Person being formed in me, / I’ll a member of His Body be, / No more acting individually, / But with the saints. / More and more our Person He must be; / That our natural personality / Be eliminated thoroughly / Till Christ is all. (Hymns #1180 stanza 2)
  – I hardly know myself; / Deceived so much by pride, / I often think I’m right / And am self-satisfied. / I know Thee even less; / In doctrine, shallowly; / True revelation lack / Of Thy reality. / Oh, may Thy living light, Lord, / Scatter all my night, Lord, / And everything make bright, Lord, / For this I pray to Thee. (Hymns #426 stanzas 2-3 and chorus)