We need to Experience the Spirit of Jesus to have the Humanity of Jesus for God’s building

The key for us to experience the humanity of Jesus for God’s building, that is, the secret for us to be Jesusly human for God to gain a corporate expression, is for us to experience the Spirit of Jesus.

What God is after in this universe is a building, a corporate expression in humanity, and the unique material for God’s building is not just God and not just man, but the uplifted, resurrected humanity of Jesus mingled with God’s divinity.

The only way for God to gain an expression in the universe is for Him to work Himself into man and become everything to man, so that God and man would be mingled together, and God would shine out and be expressed through man.

God will gain His building: as seen in Rev. 21-22 – and John saw it! – God will gain the holy city, the New Jerusalem, where the God on the throne (God as light in the Lamb as the lamp) shines through the city to be expressed to the whole universe, and all the nations will walk in the light of this city. Hallelujah, God will gain it!

Now we are in the process of becoming the same as Christ not only in life and nature (which we become through regeneration) but also in expression.

Again and again all throughout the Bible we see that God is on the throne, but His appearance is of a man; in Ezekiel in particular we see both at the beginning and at the end that the One on the throne has the appearance of a man and the glory of God.

This is what God is after: a man-God, a God-man, that expresses Him in glory. How can He gain this? How can we, sinful and corrupted human beings, become the glorious expression of God?

In ourselves with our own efforts this is impossible; we are a hopeless case, and not even a cell in our body is inclined to do the will of God or become His expression.

So God Himself became a man; Christ brought God into man, lived a perfect human life, died a vicarious death on the cross, and resurrected to become a life-giving Spirit, so that as the Spirit He would come into all those who are willing to receive Him and make them the same as He is.

God wants to obtain a mass reproduction of Christ, the first God-man, so that He may be expressed through His many sons, thus gaining a building, a corporate expression of Himself. The secret to becoming God’s corporate expression is for us to experience the Spirit of Jesus.

We need to See, Know, and Experience the Spirit of Jesus for God’s Building, His Expression

The only humanity that is useful to God for His building, His corporate expression, is the new, uplifted, resurrected, divinized humanity of Jesus; only Jesus with His humanity is the One qualified to be part of God’s building.

And today Jesus is in the Spirit, which the Bible calls, the Spirit of Jesus. The Spirit of Jesus is a particular expression concerning the Spirit of God, referring mainly to the Spirit of the incarnated Savior who, as Jesus in His humanity, passed through the process of human living and death on the cross.

In this Spirit we have not only the elements of divinity and humanity, but also the elements of His human living (which was approved by God, pleasing to Him) and His suffering of death.

The apostles experienced such an all-inclusive Spirit in their ministry of preaching the gospel and suffering for the Lord.

Before His incarnation, Christ was already the Son of God (John 1:18; Rom. 8:3), but by incarnation He put on an element – the human flesh, which had nothing to do with divinity. This human part needed to be sanctified and uplifted by passing through death and resurrection.

Jesus Christ was designated the Son of God in power according to the Spirit of holiness out of the resurrection from the dead (Rom. 1:4). He was already the Son of God in His divinity, but through resurrection Christ was made the Son of God in His humanity, that is, by resurrection His human nature was sanctified, uplifted, and transformed.

His resurrection was His designation – He was designated to be the Son of God in His humanity, the Firstborn Son of God. By incarnation Christ brought God into man, and by resurrection He brought man into God, that is, He brought His humanity into the divine sonship. This is amazing!

Now Christ is both the Son of God in His divinity and the Son of man in His humanity, and God uses such a Christ – the firstborn Son of God – to be the model, the prototype, and the producer, to produce many sons of God (Rom. 8:29-30).

All those who believe into Christ are sons of God, born of God, and they have the divine nature within them; furthermore, the human nature of Christ is also being wrought into them for God to gain a corporate expression in man.

We need to be impressed by the Spirit of Jesus who, in a way, didn’t exist in eternity, in the Old Testament, and when Jesus was living on earth; so in John 7:39 John said that the Spirit was not yet, for Jesus was not yet glorified.

When Christ resurrected and became a life-giving Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus came into being; this Spirit was not just the Spirit of God but THE SPIRIT – who has many ingredients.

In the Spirit we have divinity and humanity, His human living, the suffering in His human life, His death with His crucifixion, His resurrection, and His ascension with His entering into glory. All this is in the Spirit of Jesus. The way for us to express Christ is to experience the Spirit of Jesus.

Lord, we want to see, know, and experience the Spirit of Jesus for God’s building, His corporate expression. Hallelujah, God passed through a process to become a man, live a perfect human life, die on the cross, and resurrect to become a life-giving Spirit! Now in this Spirit is all that we need for us to live a proper Christian life and be part of God’s building, His corporate expression. Lord, may Your humanity with all Your human virtues enriched by the divine attributes be wrought into us as we experience the Spirit of Jesus for God’s building!

We need to Experience the Spirit of Jesus with His Resurrected, Uplifted Human Nature

The Spirit with our spirit today is the Spirit of Jesus, the Spirit which contains His humanity; we can possess His humanity by drinking the Spirit, by receiving the Spirit, by living by the Spirit, by walking in the Spirit, by being filled with the Spirit, and by being saturated with the Spirit.

In the Spirit of Jesus there’s not only the divine element but also the human element of Jesus, and the elements of His human living and His suffering of death as well.

As seen in Phil. 2:5-8, the Lord was found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and He was obedient to the Father to death, and that the death of the cross.

This human mind which was in Christ is in the Spirit of Jesus, and only this Spirit can renew our mind to give us this mind, a different human mind – the mind of Christ. Only when we experience the Spirit of Jesus can we have the proper and uplifted human emotions, the emotions in resurrection; only when we experience Him can we have a proper human will in resurrection.

Everything is in the Spirit. The uplifted, resurrected human nature of Jesus is in the Spirit of Jesus (Rom. 1:4; Acts 16:7). The all-inclusive Spirit is with our spirit, and we need to see Him, enjoy Him, and experience Him as the Spirit of Jesus.

The virtues of lowliness, meekness, and long-suffering, which are required for keeping the oneness of the Spirit, are all included in the Spirit of Jesus (Eph. 4:2).

For us to be saved and receive the Spirit is one thing, but for us to go on for God’s building for the church, and keep the oneness of the Spirit in the church life and in the Body, a lot more is required. We need the proper, uplifted, resurrected human virtues.

We need to be diligent to keep the oneness of the Spirit by means of lowliness, meekness, and long-suffering; today, for the building of God, we need another humanity that is filled with these virtues, and only with these virtues we can keep the oneness of the Spirit, so that we can be fitted and framed together to be built up into the dwelling place of God in spirit.

The uplifted humanity of Jesus is in the Spirit of Jesus and can become our experience so that we may become Jesusly human, having the humanity of Jesus for God’s building (see Phil. 2:5-8; Matt. 16:18; Eph. 2:21-22; 4:16).

We need to drink the humanity of Jesus to experience the Spirit of Jesus with His resurrected, uplifted human nature; we drink Him by calling on His name and by pray-reading the word of God.

To partake and experience this humanity of Jesus is by eating the word of God; as seen in John 6, Christ is the bread coming down from heaven for us to eat and live because of Him.

The only way to live by Jesus, expressing His humanity and living Him us, is for us to eat this Man, eating Jesus in His word. And to eat Him we need to not just “swallow Him” by pray-reading the word, but masticate Him, savor Him, chew Him, assimilate Him, digest Him, and enjoy Him.

We need to pray-read the word of God, especially the verses that have to do with His humanity, so that the element of His humanity may be received and absorbed by us; in this way, we will live Him in His humanity.

As we drink the Spirit of Jesus and eat the Lord’s word to partake of His humanity, His humanity in us will be very active to lead us, guide us, and govern us what to say and what not to say, how to behave, and how not to behave.

We will not live according to a code of ethics or morality, but inwardly, as we experience the Spirit of Jesus, He within us is operating and we cooperate with Him in our daily living, and the result will be the building up of the church as the building of God, the Body of Christ!

Lord Jesus, we want to experience the Spirit of Jesus with His resurrected, uplifted human nature for the building of God, His corporate expression. We want to drink the Spirit of Jesus by calling on the Lord’s name, and eat the Lord’s humanity by eating the word of God through much and thorough pray-reading. Make us those who masticate the Lord’s word, chew the word, and absorb and digest the Lord’s humanity through pray-reading the word. Lord, we want to have the humanity of Jesus wrought into us and lived out of us for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1971, vol. 2, “Christ as the Reality,” chs. 16-17, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-study of Ezekiel (2), msg. 6 (week 18 in the HWMR), The Son of Man and the Humanity of Jesus for God’s Building.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # The Spirit of Jesus has / All elements human, divine, / The living of man in Him / And glory of God combine. / The suff’ring of human life, / Effectiveness of His death, / His rising and reigning too / Are all in the Spirit’s breath. (Hymns #242)
  # Turn to your spirit, where the Spirit of Jesus is, / Turn to your spirit, calling upon His name— / Now and forever, Jesus is the very same. / Turn to the Lord. Oh, turn to the Lord! (Song on turning to the spirit)
  # We must eat Jesus till God can / Have the fulfillment of His plan— / One man expressed for all to see, / One church in each locality. / We’ll masticate Jesus! / We’ll masticate Jesus! / Then to the tent of meeting bring / Jesus, our real meal offering. (Hymns #1146)