Our need as believers in Christ is to labor on the all-inclusive Christ to have something of Him that we gain, experience, enjoy, and are constituted with so that there would be a surplus to bring to the church meetings for the worship of God our Father in a corporate way.
This week we come to a new topic in the 2021 fall ITERO series, with the title of, Our Need to Labor on the All-inclusive Christ to Have the Produce to Exhibit Christ in the Church and to Have a Surplus of Christ to Bring to the Church Meetings for the Corporate Worship of God Our Father.
May the Lord shine on us and show us our need to labor on the all-inclusive Christ in our daily life. Many times we don’t know what we really need; a physician may know of our needs more than we do, and our spouse may know of our needs more than we do.
The Lord knows what we need, and one of our deepest needs is related to laboring on the all-inclusive Christ; this is the need of all the saints in the church life.
There is a difference between working and laboring. For example, we work at a job, we have responsibilities and necessities, and we need to earn a living to provide for the needs we have for ourselves and for our family.
So we may go to the office, work from home, or work on the land, or we may be stay-at-home pneumatic mothers with a 24h job to care for our family.
Someone may work as a cook or as a truck driver, but this is their job, not a labor. Laboring is more intensive and weighty, requiring more than what working does.
A farmer, for example, labors on the land; he labors diligently day and night so that he may gain a rich produce of the land and have healthy cattle.
Laboring is to produce something, and when the final produce comes, it is more than worthy than all our labor.
Our need is not just to work a little here and there, or just in the meetings, to gain something of Christ; we have been allotted a portion of the all-inclusive Christ, and we need to labor on the all-inclusive Christ to obtain a rich produce of Christ.
We need to ask ourselves before the Lord if we labor on Christ daily, if we labor on this rich all-inclusive One to gain something of the riches of Christ to bring the surplus to the church, or if we just enjoy Him here and there.
We shouldn’t be introspective or subjective but rather, we should come to the Lord again and again to enjoy Him, experience Him, and contact Him in situation after situation so that we may gain something of Christ.
We need to not only have some time with Him in the morning and read our Bible before going to bed at night; throughout the day we need to contact the Lord and enjoy Him so that something of Christ may be wrought into us.
We need to Diligently Labor on the All-inclusive Christ to Enjoy His Riches
As believers in Christ who have been led into Christ and have been given the all-inclusive Christ as the good land to be our portion, we need to diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ to enjoy His riches (1 Cor. 1:30; Col. 1:12).
God has qualified us for a share of the allotted portion of the saints in the light, and Christ as the all-inclusive One has been given to us as our portion for our enjoyment.
However, we need to labor on Christ so that we may gain the riches of Christ for our nourishment and enjoyment, and we need to labor on the all-inclusive Christ to have a produce with which we worship God.
Our need is to learn how to enjoy Christ and how to experience Christ day by day so that we may gain something of Christ, a rich surplus, for the worship of God and the building up of the church.
If we look at the picture of the children of Israel who were allotted a portion of the good land, after they entered into its possession, each of them had to labor on the land.
After the people of Israel entered into and possessed the land of Canaan and received their allotted portion, they labored on the land (Deut. 8:7-10; 12:6-7, 11-12, 18).
If they didn’t labor diligently on the good land, they had nothing to eat, for there was no produce for their life supply.
If they didn’t labor on the good land, on their allotted portion, they didn’t have any surplus which they could bring to the feast of the Pentecost or the Feast of the Tabernacle, so they had to go empty-handed.
This would have been a pitiful situation. Many believers in Christ are like this today: they don’t diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ to enjoy His riches, so they are poor in the riches of Christ, and they don’t have a surplus to bring to the church.
Whether we labor on Christ is a serious matter, for if we don’t cultivate Christ, grow Christ, and gain Christ, we have no life supply for our daily Christian life, and we have no surplus to bring to the church.
If we don’t draw near to the Lord every morning to talk to Him, enjoy Him, and partake of Him, and if we don’t experience Him during the day, we remain poor and undernourished.
But if we’re diligent to fellowship with the Lord in the morning and seek to experience Him during the day, especially during the difficult times, we will have a rich portion of Christ.
God doesn’t think as some of our “liberal politicians” think today, that everyone should benefit from the riches of the state, so everyone will get some money whether they want to work or not.
Rather, we need to labor on Christ by seeking to experience Him and enjoy Him, and we will gain something of the riches of Christ.
We need to diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ so that we may enjoy His all-inclusive riches (Eph. 3:8; 1:7; 2:7; 1 Cor. 15:58; Phil. 3:10).
Humanly speaking, many mornings we don’t want to get out of our bed to get ready and go to work, because we’re so tired; yet we still need to do it every day, week after week, month after month, and year after year.
We may want to sleep a little more, but we still have to get up.
Similarly, we may not feel like it when it comes to enjoying the Lord in the morning and experiencing Him during the day, but we still have to do it; we need to exercise our spirit to contact the Lord and diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ to enjoy His riches.
Even in the midst of sufferings, trials, and difficulties, our focus shouldn’t be merely to try to fix the situation or get out of problems but even more, to gain more of Christ.
If we only have a time with the Lord in the morning in the morning revival, it’s like having a nice breakfast and that’s it; we still need to labor on Christ, seek Him, contact Him, and enjoy Him, turning to our spirit again and again, so that we may gain more of Him.
Thank You, God, for giving us an allotted portion of the all-inclusive Christ for our enjoyment and experience. Hallelujah, we have been allotted a portion of the good land, Christ, for us to labor on, gain the riches of Christ, and have a rich surplus of Christ! Amen, Lord, we give ourselves to You to diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ as the good land so that we may gain the riches of Christ. We don’t want to be lazy in the land; we don’t want to remain poor and undernourished when we have such a rich Christ. Keep us turning to You today to enjoy You and experience You. Amen, Lord, even in our difficulties, we want to experience and gain more of Christ until we gain a rich surplus of Christ for the worship of the Father and the building up of the church!
Our Real Business is Christ: our Christian Life is a Laboring on Christ to Gain Christ
After entering into Christ as the good land, our Christian life is a life of laboring on Christ (Col. 1:12; Rom. 15:16; 1 Cor. 15:10).
Outwardly we may study in university, drive a truck, be a chef, be a stay-at-home mother, work in an office, teach in a school, or be a welder, but our real business is Christ – our real job, our real work is laboring on Christ.
As we drive the truck we need to realize that our real occupation is not truck-driving but working on Christ to gain Christ.
As we stay at home to take care of our family in the Lord, we need to realize that our real job is not that of a housewife but laboring on Christ to enjoy Him and gain Him.
The company we work for is not our family or the corporation we work for outwardly; it is Christ Incorporated, for we are daily learning to diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ to enjoy His riches and gain Him.
Day and night we need to be diligently working “on the farm of Christ” to gain a rich produce of Christ.
In the church life we may be so used to this expression of “laboring on Christ” and “enjoying Christ” but we need to enter into the reality of doing this, and we need to do this all the time.
When shall we labor on Christ? Is it just in the morning, then at lunch, and then before goign to bed? No, it should be constantly, every moment, even as we breathe every moment and as our heartbeats every second.
As the Lord’s people who are living in the all-inclusive Christ, we need to labor on Christ, seeking Christ and enjoying Christ in every situation (Col. 1:12; 3:1, 4, 10-11).
Some situations are good while others are quite constraining, difficult, and unpleasant; we need to contact the Lord again and again, not waiting until things get better but just enjoying Him.
If we don’t labor on Christ today because we’re not in the mood for it, we will lose hours, which become days, weeks, and months. We don’t want to lose any more time – we want to seek to enjoy Christ and experience Him in every situation.
We are in a very rich land, but if we don’t labor on it, there’s no produce for us to experience and enjoy (Eph. 1:7; 2:7; 3:8; 1 Cor. 15:58).
Our Christ is so rich, and so many of the saints enjoy His vast riches; what about us – do we enjoy Christ, or we enjoy Him only when we feel like it or when we remember?
If the Israelites didn’t sow the seed, water the plants, remove the weeds, and take care of the land day and night, they had nothing to eat.
If we today don’t pray-read the word in the morning, contact the Lord throughout the day, and speak Christ to others, there’s nothing of Christ that we gain for our supply and for others’ nourishment.
We are rich in resources, for the all-inclusive Christ is very rich and vast; however, we may be poor in produce due to the lack of our labor on the all-inclusive Christ.
If we don’t cultivate Christ, work on Him as the good land, and obtain something of Christ by experiencing Him throughout the day, we don’t have a rich produce of Christ, and there’s no surplus to bring to the church for the building up of the church and the satisfaction of God. Oh, Lord!
Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to enjoy You, experience You, and gain You day by day in our experience. We want to not only live in this rich land but also labor on it so that we can gain rich produce of Christ. Amen, Lord, we want to enjoy You today. Save us from not experiencing Christ. Save us from not laboring on Christ to enjoy Him in all situations. Save us from enjoying Christ only when we feel like it. Strengthen us into our inner man so that we may enjoy Christ, experience Christ, and gain Christ in all the situations we go through every day. Amen, Lord, we want to diligently labor on the all-inclusive Christ so that we may have a rich surplus of Christ to offer God and bring to the meetings of the church for the saints’ enjoyment!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, a message given by Ron Kangas on this topic, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1961-1962, vol. 4, “The All-inclusive Christ,” pp. 342-344, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Meeting God’s Need and Present needs in the Lord’s Recovery, week 5, entitled, Our Need to Walk in Newness of Life, to Serve in Newness of Spirit, and to Be Renewed in Our Inner Man Day by Day.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Laboring on Jesus, the good land so real, / Plowing and planting and watering the field. / He yields the produce of reality, / God reaps a harvest of Jesus in me. (Hymns #1168)
– Laboring on the good land, laboring in the morning, / Laboring through the noontime to the early eve, / Laboring for a harvest, reaping all the produce, / Coming to the meeting, bringing in the sheaves. (Hymns #1167)
– All we need to do is labor, / Working on the land each day; / Not expecting ’manna’ blessing, / Working in a normal way. / God and man cooperating / While for harvest we are waiting. (Hymns #1166)
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