The church is a corporate warrior fighting for all of God’s people to enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive good land.
The good land of Canaan has two aspects: on one hand it is a type of the all-inclusive Christ with His unsearchable riches for us to enjoy, and on the other, it signifies the aerial part of the kingdom of Satan, which involves spiritual warfare.
Fifty-six years ago brother Witness Lee gave a conference on the matter of, The All-Inclusive Christ, and since that time, the thought of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land has permeated the Lord’s recovery.
We have many hymns on the all-inclusive Christ, we speak of enjoying the Lord as the all-inclusive One, but in reality, the recovery as a whole is in the wilderness – not in the good land.
We speak to Christ as the rock and He gives us water to drink, we enjoy the Lord daily as the manna (though it may not be our choice, yet this is God’s provision); however, we don’t just walk into the good land, and we don’t simply ease into the all-inclusive Christ.
We may say in faith that Christ is everything to us, but is the Lord Jesus as the all-inclusive One really everything to us? Is the Lord really our life, our person, our faith, and our everything?
The only way for us to possess, experience, and enjoy the all-inclusive Christ is to fight to gain our portion of the good land.
If there is no army fighting, if there’s no Joshua leading the army into the fight, we can sing and say many great things like “Christ is everything to me” but actually He is not really everything to us, and we are not enjoying the good land.
We may have Christ wrought into us and we may enjoy Christ as a few things such as our food, our drink, our comfort, our joy, our peace, and our health, but if we really hour by hour the all-inclusive Christ is everything to us and we experience and enjoy Him, then He will overflow from us, He simply is lived out of us, and when we get together we simply open our spirit and our heart and we have much praise….Oh Lord Jesus!
May we see that there’s the need for a fight to enjoy the all-inclusive Christ, and may we fight for our enjoyment of all the people of God.
We are here not only for ourselves but for all the members of the Body – we want to enjoy the Lord not only ourselves but that all the members of the Body would enjoy the riches of Christ and partake of the unsearchable riches of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land.
Amen, may we realise that the good land of Canaan has two aspects – one positive and one related to fighting, and may we be matured by the Lord and formed into an army fighting for ourselves and for all the saints to enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ.
Positively we need to Enjoy the All-inclusive Christ and Negatively we need to Fight the Spiritual Warfare
On the positive side, Canaan was a land of riches (see Deut. 8:7-10), typifying the all-inclusive Christ with His unsearchable riches (Col. 1:12; Eph. 3:8).
Positively, the good land of Canaan is a type of the all-inclusive Christ with all His unsearchable riches, the rich Christ as the God-allotted portion of the saints in the light.
However, simply knowing about Christ and about who He is and what He can be to us doesn’t mean that we enter into the experience of this One.
We may have the knowledge, the vision, and even some experience of the unsearchable riches of Christ, but we need to realise that we still need to fight the spiritual warfare to enter into the full enjoyment of Christ.
We should not live in a spiritual self-deception, thinking that we have a certain reality which we do not yet possess; rather, we need to be humbled, sobered, motivated, and encouraged, realising that the good land is still ahead of us, and we need to be formed into an army to take the land.
On the negative side, Canaan signifies the aerial part, the heavenly part of the kingdom of Satan, and spiritual warfare is necessary so that we enter into the enjoyment of the good land.
When we enter into the good land, we are invading the satanic realm – we are fighting principalities and powers in the heavenlies, wrestling with them in the spiritual realm.
As the ruler of this world (John 12:31) and as the ruler of the authority of the air (Eph. 2:2), Satan has his authority (Acts 26:18) and his angels (Matt. 25:41), who are his subordinates as principalities, powers, and rulers of the darkness of this world (Eph. 6:12); hence, Satan has his kingdom (Matt. 12:26), the authority of darkness (Col. 1:13).
Satan not only systematized the whole world into a cosmos, a world system, but he also has his authority and his angels, and there is an authority of darkness over the earth, and this evil kingdom hinders the believers from enjoying the good land.
The Canaanites typify the fallen angels, the rebellious angels who followed Satan (see Rev. 12:4, 7), who have become the powers, the rulers, and the authorities in Satan’s kingdom (see Dan. 10:13, 20).
The children of Israel had to fight against the Canaanites so that they may possess the good land; this typifies the spiritual warfare of the church as a whole, including all the members, against “the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenlies” (see Eph. 6:12) so that the saints may enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive land.
In the people of Israel some of the tribes made their choice to remain on the land on this side of the Jordan river, and eventually Moses yielded to their request if they agree that they will not settle down in the portion of the land until they fight for the portions that belong to all the people of God.
The principle is that we are not fighting for our own spirituality but for all the saints to enter into the all-inclusive Christ – every one of the saints. On one hand we ourselves need to enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ, and on the other we need to fight for others’ enjoyment of Christ.
Lord Jesus, bring us into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land. Grant us a vision of the unsearchably rich Christ with all His unsearchable riches so that we may be formed into an army to fight to enter into the good land. Amen, Lord Jesus, may we as the church rise up to participate in the spiritual warfare of the church as a whole so that all the saints may enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive land. Lord, we fight for our enjoyment and experience of Christ, and we fight for the enjoyment and experience of all the members of Your Body!
The Church is a Corporate Warrior fighting so that God’s People may Gain Christ for the Body
In the matter of the spiritual warfare, we do not give up on anyone, we do not judge anyone, we do not have a critical spirit, and we do not criticise; rather, as believers in Christ and members of the Body of Christ, we need to have a heart for all the Christians to enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ.
There is an enemy who is determined to hinder us from experiencing and enjoying the all-inclusive Christ, for he realises that if we do this, we will be the Body of Christ, the new man, the bride of Christ, the kingdom of God, and the army, which means that he is finished.
So we need to unmask his strategy and go in to possess the land! We need to be formed as an army trained to move to possess the land under the leading of Christ as our Joshua, and we will fight to possess the land, with the spirit of Caleb, and we are well able to take it!
The church must be such a corporate warrior, fighting against Satan’s aerial forces so that God’s people may gain more of Christ for the building up of the Body of Christ, establishing and spreading the kingdom of God so that Christ can come back to inherit the earth (Matt. 16:27-28; Rev. 11:15; 12:10).
The church MUST be a corporate warrior who fights against Satan’s aerial forces so that all of God’s people – all the believers in Christ – may gain more of Christ for the building up of the Body of Christ.
On His side, God is ready; on our side, we still need to give Him our cooperation, so we need to fight together for Him to get what He needs.
Before the children of Israel were formed into an army to fight for God’s interest, the whole earth had been taken over by God’s enemy; but when the army was formed and the people marched into the good land, God began to gain ground on earth, and the enemy was put to shame.
When God’s people are arranged into an army, when they are formed in the army that God needs – the corporate warrior fighting for all of God’s people to gain Christ for the Body – the enemy is put to shame, and God gains more ground on the earth.
We want to be the church as the corporate warrior fighting one with God for all of God’s people to enjoy the all-inclusive Christ and gain Christ for the Body of Christ.
If we read the book of Numbers we see God’s mind, His way of forming an army composed of His people who are qualified to fight with Him to subdue and regain the earth; the way God forms His army is like no other on earth.
We as the ones whom the Lord wants to gain for His army need to be those who take Christ as our everything – our meaning of life, our testimony, our center, and our Leader, our way, and our goal.
The entire Bible shows us one thing – that God’s intention is to have a people formed into an army to take Christ as their meaning of life, testimony, center, Leader, way, and goal and to proceed on and fight for God so that He may have the ground on earth and have a people built up as His kingdom and His house, which Will consummate in the New Jerusalem – Gen. 1:26-28; Exo. 12:41, 51; 13:18; Matt. 16:16-19; Eph. 6:10-12; Rev. 17:14; 19:11-16; 21:2, 10-11. Wow, Amen!
Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to You to be the church as a corporate warrior fighting against Satan’s aerial forces so that God’s people may gain more of Christ for the building up of the Body of Christ! Amen, Lord, we want to enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ, and we want to fight for the enjoyment of Christ of all of Your people – all the genuine believers in Christ! We are here for this, Lord, for You to gain Your lovely bridal army and return to have the wedding feast, then go to war together with Your bride to defeat the enemy and bring in Your kingdom!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Ron Kangas for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Numbers, pp. 6-7 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallisation-Study of Numbers (1), week 1, Being Formed into an Army to Fight with God for His Interest on Earth.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Let’s take the land! The land that God has given us; / In all our living, Christ can be so much: / To take this land, we have th’ equipment that we need— / The blood, the Word, the Spirit, and the church. / Let’s take the land! O Christian brothers, / The land that God has given us. / Be strong and take it, for we can make it / And gain this land so glorious! (Hymns #1287)
# Backward drive the Evil One! / Force him out of every hold; / Smite until the sinking sun / Sets upon the warrior bold! / In the Overcomer’s Name / Be an overcomer too! / Stand and put the foe to shame / All the livelong battle through! (Hymns #883)
# Soon the earth cries out, exalting / Our returning, shining Lord; / Until then we praise and sing; / All the glory’s to our King. / Consummated corporate warrior, / New Jerusalem are we, / One with our ascended Husband, / Lord of lords and King of kings. (Song on, Living Christ, Our Victory)
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