Have Discernment in our Activities and Receive God’s Word with much Reconsideration

We can eat the Lord Jesus by contacting the proper people, in particular contacting those who have discernment in their activities and receive the word of God with much reconsideration, for contacting people means taking in things that affect us and even become our constitution.

Eating the Lord Jesus is more than just coming to Him in His word; we eat all the time, for our being is dependent on what we eat.

Many times even without knowing it we eat things; when we travel, we take in things, when we’re at home, we take in things, and when we’re on our phone, we take in things again and again.

Our being is always hungry and thirsty, and only the Lord Jesus as the living water and bread of life can quench our thirst and satisfy our hunger.

As believers in Christ, we need to be careful what we eat, that is, what we take in. Our eating affects the way we live and it changes our constitution.

We need to choose to eat the tree of life all the time.

The tree of knowledge is everywhere around us, so available and pleasant to the sight…but we need to come to the Lord and choose to eat Him.

When He was on earth, the Lord Jesus ate the Father, for He ate God’s word, He depended on the Father’s fresh speaking, and He constantly retreated in the wilderness or on the mountain to spend time with God.

Many times the Lord spent the whole night in prayer with the Father.

When the devil tempted Him in the wilderness, after He fasted forty days and forty nights, the Lord must have been reading and enjoying the book of Deuteronomy, for all His answers to the devil were from that book.

And He had food that we didn’t know about, which is to do the work of the Father to glorify Him.

Though the Lord Jesus was physically hungry and tired, He still ate the spiritual food by quenching the Samaritan woman’s thirst.

Similarly we today can eat Jesus by doing the work of the Father, that is, by learning Christ as the reality is in Jesus and by living out a God-man life for others to eat of Christ and have their hunger satisfied.

Our top service to the Lord is to express Him in glory. How can we express God? It’s not by trying harder to be a good Christian and a model citizen; it is by eating the Lord and learning Christ as the reality is in Jesus.

This becomes our food and this is also food for others to eat. It is so nourishing to see someone live out Christ for His expression and manifestation!

We can Eat Jesus by Contacting the Proper People, by having Discernment in Diet

One way we can eat Jesus is by contacting the proper people, for our contact with people causes us to take something in, and that thing can change our inward constitution.

To eat is to take something from outside of us and receive it into us.

Eating is not just contacting something but even more, receiving something into our being for our nourishment and supply.

Once we receive something into us, that thing can be digested into our being to become our inner constitution.

We as people of God need to live a holy life as required by our holy God, so we need to be careful about our contact with people.

Yes, we do need to speak to others and especially minister Christ to them, but our association with certain people can negatively impact our inner being and can change our inner constitution.

Our regular contact with certain kinds of people can cause us to be reconstituted, and thus make us another kind of person.

In Phil. 1:9 Paul prays that our love may abound yet more and more in full knowledge and all discernment.

In Lev. 11 we see the animals that God recommended His people to eat and not to eat; these animals signify different kinds of people, and eating signifies our contact with people.

We see this in Acts 19:8-14, 27-29, where Peter had a vision and then an application of it.

While he was waiting for food to be prepared, Peter had a trance and saw a great sheet with all kinds of animals, and a voice told him to rise, slay and eat.

He, however, being raised as an orthodox Jewish person, said that he never ate anything unclean. The Lord, however, responded that he shouldn’t call unclean what He has made clean.

This vision was repeated three times. Later, after he went into the house of Cornelius, he realized that God wanted to tell him that He made the Gentiles clean, so he should not be afraid to contact them and be associated with them.

1 Cor. 15:33 makes this very clear: we should not be deceived, evil companionships corrupt good morals.

We may love the Lord and His word, and we may love the saints and the church life, but we may still hang out or regularly contact a particular kind of person, and in time that will change our inner being and cause us to deviate or backslide.

No matter how good our morals are, evil companionships will corrupt them.

We need to have discernment in diet because, without being aware of it, contacting people will cause us to take in certain things which can affect our being for the worse.

Prov. 13:20 says that he who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will be troubled. King James version says that, the companion of fools will be destroyed.

We should not trust ourselves and be presumptuous in thinking that we love the Lord so much, we’re so constituted with the truth, and we’re so much involved in the service of the church, that we don’t need to have discernment in diet but we can have evil companionships.

We all have to testify that our contact with some people leaves us with a taste of death, and sometimes even our contact with some saints affects us negatively, for they are not in the line of life.

We need to have discernment in diet, not taking in things that affect our holy nature and spoil our holy living.

May we be before the Lord concerning this and tell Him,

Dear Lord Jesus, we love You and we want to stay on the line of life by eating Jesus all the time! Amen, Lord, grant us to have a proper discernment in our diet so that we do not eat things that will spoil our holy life and stain our holy living. Keep us open to You and closed to any attack of death as we meet people, contact others, and talk to them. We want to live a holy life that matches the holy nature within us. We want to eat You by contacting the proper people and by staying away from those who are not proper. Dear Lord Jesus, keep us eating You all the time and staying away from anything of death!

Eating Jesus by Contacting those who have Discernment in their Activities and who Receive God’s Word with much Reconsideration

In Lev. 11 there are five categories of animals covered, signifying our contact and association with people, which is a kind of eating.

First, we see the beasts (including the cattle); second, the aquatic animals (the animals in the water); third, the birds or animals in the air; fourth, the insects; fifth, the creeping things.

Among the animals on the land, the beasts – including the cattle – there is a particular category that is clean, which are the beasts that divide the hoof and chew the cud (Lev. 11:2-3).

These signify persons who have discernment in their activities (divide the hoof) and who receive the word of God with much reconsideration (chew the cud).

For example, a horse doesn’t have a divided hoof; yes, a horse has the power and is very strong, but it cannot discern things.

There may be persons that we meet and know that are very strong and powerful, but they are not discerning things, and they don’t receive the word of God with much reconsideration.

Some people cannot discern what things are from God and what things are of Satan, what things are heavenly and what things are fleshly.

To them the spiritual things and the earthly things are the same things; yes, they may discern the good and the bad things, but not the things of the spirit and of the flesh or the things of the old man and the new man.

They may think it is OK to go to the movie theatre or watch Youtube for extended periods of time, for they don’t think it’s an evil thing.

At the same time, they may not have much taste for reading the word of God, and they don’t take in the word of God with much reconsideration.

To a person who doesn’t have divided hooves, there’s little difference between going to a theatre and going to a church meeting; he lacks discernment in his activities.

We need to be careful in contacting such persons, for our contact with them may defile us.

Yes, we need to pray and minister life to them, but being their companion may cause us to be defiled.

There are people who do not appreciate the heavenly things; to them, heaven and earth are the same.

They have no concept or thought of the unseen things; they only see the seen things.

Some people care only for temporary things and focus only on what is in front of them. But we are people of eternity.

Some people consider evil as being good and good as being evil (Isa. 5:20); they take darkness for light and light for darkness.

They take bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter. If we contact such ones carelessly with no discernment, we may be affected.

We have seen some who were affected by such contact.

We need to have the ability and strength to discern what is of God and what is not of God, and we need to be together with those who do the same thing as us.

Chewing the cud signifies receiving the word of God with much consideration and reconsideration.

A cow chews the cud; we should consider and reconsider and muse over God’s word.

We may pray-read the word in the morning, and we may prayerfully consider and reconsider it during the day.

Our prayerful consideration and reconsideration of God’s word cause us to receive nourishment from God’s word, and we will have much discernment in our diet.

This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t talk to our co-workers, our relatives, our neighbours, or the people we meet.

This means that we need to exercise discernment in our eating, realizing that we do not have to take in and eat what others speak to us, and we should always prayerfully consider and reconsider God’s word.

For example, we may have a conversation with one of our workmates or classmates and we may take in what they say, their lifestyle, and their concepts, and we discover that we do not have an appetite to read the Bible or to go to the home meeting with the saints.

We may eat from what our Twitter feed or Facebook news feed serves us, and we find ourselves that we don’t want to pray to contact the Lord or have morning revival with a brother.

Words affect us. Words of death affect us. We need to be careful in our eating.

We need to be careful in our contacting people. We may even tell the Lord,

Lord Jesus, grant us to have discernment in our activities and receive the word of God with much reconsideration. Save us from being careless or lose in our contacting others. Save us from taking in the words that impart death into our being. Grant us to have good spiritual discernment and clearly see the things of God from the things of the enemy. May we be those who contact those who have spiritual discernment and do not take in things of death. We come to You in Your word, dear Lord, and we take Your word in with much prayer consideration and reconsideration. We want to receive nourishment by reconsidering what we receive from Your word. Amen, Lord, keep us enjoying You in Your word and grant us the discernment we need to not take in anything of death. Keep us on the line of life, eating Jesus as the tree of life!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother Ricky Acosta in the message, and portions from, Life-study of Leviticus, msg. 36 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Taking the Way of Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life (2022 Memorial Day Weekend Conference), week 5, entitled, The Secret of Living the Christian Life to be an Overcomer – Taking the Way of Eating and Enjoying Christ as the Tree of Life.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – Here, O my Lord, may I feast upon Thee; / Flood with Thy Spirit and fill by Thy Word; / May, Lord, Thou be such a feast unto me / As man hath never enjoyed nor e’er heard. (Hymns #811)
  – It is the inner sense in us, / The inmost consciousness, / Discerning matters inwardly, / God’s will to thus express. / ’Tis by this sense that God we know, / The sense of inner life; / ’Tis pow’rful and spontaneous, / And not of any strife. (Hymns #738)
  – Christ Jesus is the food we eat; / He is our bread, He is our meat; / He is our life-supply complete; / We daily eat of Him. / We daily eat of Him, / We daily eat of Him. / He is our life-supply complete; / We daily eat of Him. (Hymns #1145)