God Obtained the Church Through His Own Blood – the Blood of the Incarnate God-man

God obtained the church through His own blood, for through His incarnation He became a God-man with genuine human blood to redeem us and obtain the church; today we can enjoy the Lord as the Holy Spirit – in particular, as the Spirit of Jesus leading us, limiting us, and guiding us in all things. Amen!

As believers in Christ, our entire Christian life and living is wrapped up with the Divine Trinity, for the Triune God is operating in us and around us to work Himself into us and become our everything for us to cooperate with Him for the fulfilment of His eternal purpose.

However, the way we cooperate with God is not by our ability or zeal but by the way of ministry.

There are many capable ones today, especially in Christianity, and they seem to thrive in so many ways, for they speak mightily and do all kinds of great works for God.

What God is after, however, is not gifted ones but those who have the genuine ministry, the ministry of life and of the Spirit.

The ministry that is produced in us is the ministry of the Spirit, and this is through much suffering and breaking.

As we go through so many things sovereignly arranged by God for the breaking of our outer man and the release of our spirit, we need to open to the Lord and remain open to His divine dispensing.

How wonderful it is for us to just gain God inwardly and be constituted with Him as we go through so many things in our daily living!

The Father is the source, the planner, and the origin; He is expressed and comes out in the Son, who is the embodiment of God, and the Son reaches us as the Spirit.

When we exercise our spirit to contact the Lord, we contact the entire Triune God as the Spirit, and we gain God.

We can all testify that we have a living person in us – God in Christ as the Spirit lives and dwells in our spirit! Hallelujah!

This One is making His home in our hearts, He is strengthening us into our inner man, and He is dispensing all that He is into us.

We just need to open to Him, seeking not to do things for Him primarily but open to Him from within so that He may work Himself into us and for Him to gain our inner being.

As the Lord gains our inner being, as we allow Him to strengthen us through His Spirit into the inner man so that Christ may make His home in our hearts, we have the ministry of the Spirit, and we minister to others not just teachings or doctrines but even more, something of the life-giving Spirit for their growth in life and edification in the Body.

God Obtained the Church Through His Own Blood – the Blood of the Incarnated God-man

Acts 20:28 tells us that God obtained the church through His own blood. Wow, God has blood!

On the one hand, the Triune God is from eternity to eternity, without end, being almighty, the Creator and the Sustainer of all things, having nothing to do with anything limited by time and space.

On the other hand, in His economy, God was incarnated to be a man. Hallelujah! God purchased the church by paying the price of His own blood!

How can God have blood? God is not a man, nor is He a creature; how then, can God who is the Creator, have blood?

It is through the incarnation of Jesus Christ. In this matter we see the Divine Trinity being involved and operating in oneness.

God was incarnated in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the second of the Divine Trinity, and Christ offered Himself on the cross to obtain the church through His own blood, and this He did through the eternal Spirit. Wow!

In other words, the entire Triune God works together to obtain the church; He works in oneness, in one accord, for Him to gain a corporate expression among man today.

In His economy, God became a man. In His person, God can never change, nor does He have any need or lack.

But in His economy, God was incarnated to be man, and the eternal Word became flesh and tabernacled among us (John 1:1, 14).

Because God became a man, now this Man has blood, genuine human blood.

When He was on the earth, Jesus Christ was a God-man, and He had blood with which He could obtain and acquire the church.

On the one hand, Christ died on the cross for our redemption. On the other hand, by shedding His blood on the cross, God in Christ obtained the church through His own blood. How wonderful is this! How mysterious is this!

God can never have blood, but by being incarnated, He now has blood for purchasing the church. Jesus Christ is the God-man, having the element of God and the element of man in Him.

When He died, He died as a God-man; His divinity could never die, so He simply took a tour of Hades and then took the keys of death and Hades and walked out in resurrection, having full victory over death.

But as a man, Jesus Christ shed His blood and obtained the church through His own blood, which is God’s own blood.

God joined Himself to humanity to be the Savior (Luke 2:11), and He died and shed His blood for us.

We need to be clear that, in His Godhead, God can never change; He has no lack or need, nor can He ever change.

But in His economy, God desired to gain something – He wanted to gain the church.

He treasured the church so much that, like the man who sold everything to buy the most precious pearl and like the man who sold everything to buy the field where the treasure is, God in man died on the cross to obtain the church through His own blood.

When the Lord Jesus, the God-man, died on the cross, he died not only as man but also as God.

The blood He shed was not only the blood of the man Jesus but also the blood of the God-man. Wow!

Therefore, His blood, through which God obtained the church, is “His own blood.”

In 1 Pet. 1:18-19 Peter tells us that we were redeemed not with gold or silver or any such things but with precious blood as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, the blood of Christ.

The Lamb of God without spot or blame came and died for us to shed His blood for our redemption.

With this blood, there’s the element of eternity, and this element ensures the eternal efficacy of His blood.

Christ offered Himself to God through the eternal Spirit (Heb. 9:14-15).

This means that His blood has an eternal efficacy; it can be applied in time to everyone who believes into Him.

This is why we can repent and believe into the Lord today, and the blood of Christ is applied to us to cleanse us.

When the Lord shines on us as believers in Christ and we see our sins and trespasses, repent and confess our sins, the Lord can wash us, cleanse us, and bring us into the light to be one with Him because of His eternally effective blood (1 John 1:7-9). Hallelujah!

How we thank the Lord for becoming a man to be Emmanuel, God with us, the Lord Jesus Christ, to have human flesh and blood for our redemption!

How we praise Him for purchasing the church through His own blood! What a precious blood! How precious we are in the Lord’s eyes, for Him to shed His own blood for the church!

Lord Jesus, thank You for becoming a man to die for us on the cross for our redemption and for the purchasing of the church! Hallelujah, God obtained the church through His own blood! Praise the Lord, Jesus Christ is the spotless Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world and who shed His own blood for the purchasing of the church! Wow, Lord, thank You for redeeming us not with gold or silver but with precious blood as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot, the blood of Christ! Hallelujah, God became man in order to redeem us and to purchase the church by His own blood! How can this be, that God died for us to obtain the church by His own blood! How wonderful is this! Amen, Lord, we love You. We thank You for Your incarnation and Your death on the cross. Thank You for being our Redeemer! Thank You for purchasing us with Your own blood! Hallelujah, we are part of the church purchased by Christ with God’s own blood!

In the Spirit of Jesus we have the Human Element of Jesus, His Human Living, and His Suffering of Death

Acts 16:6-7 mentions the Holy Spirit and the Spirit of Jesus; the disciples were forbidden by the Holy Spirit to speak the word in Asia, and when they tried to go into Bithynia, the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them.

In these verses the Holy Spirit and the Spirit of Jesus are used interchangeably, revealing that the Spirit of Jesus is the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is a general title of the Spirit of God in the New Testament (Acts 9:17, 31).

As a vessel containing the Triune God, Paul was fully constituted of the Holy Spirit and of the Spirit of Jesus (Eph. 3:14-17; Luke 1:35; Acts 2:32-36; Phil. 1:19).

In a general way, the apostle Paul had the Holy Spirit; however, in a particular way, the Holy Spirit functioned as the Spirit of Jesus to do certain things in him and around him.

The kind of work that we do today for the Lord depends on the kind of Spirit by whom we are guided, directed, and constituted.

What kind of Spirit are we guided by? What is the Spirit by whom we’re directed and instructed? What kind of Spirit constitutes us?

We need to know the Lord not only as the Holy Spirit but even more as the Spirit of Jesus.

When the all-inclusive Spirit becomes our constitution, our work will be the expression of this Spirit (Acts 16:6-7; Rom. 8:9; Phil. 1:19).

The Spirit of Jesus is a particular expression concerning the Spirit of God and refers to the Spirit of the incarnated Savior who, as Jesus in His humanity, passed through human living and death on the cross. Amen!

It is a particular aspect of the all-inclusive Spirit that refers not only to the divinity or divine element of God but even more, to the human living of Christ, His being limited, His suffering, and even His death on the cross.

As we carry out our ministry before the Lord and serve Him in our daily living, we go through suffering.

Sometimes the suffering is self-inflicted, for we do certain things that bring in a certain amount of suffering arranged by the Lord, but many times the suffering we experience is for the carrying out of our ministry.

The suffering we go through is not for punishment; God is not out there to punish us but to help us further develop the ministry.

We may go through particular suffering, maybe related to our health, and in the midst of all this, as we see the enemy attacking, we remain in the Body, we enjoy the Lord in spirit, and we experience the Spirit of Jesus in the midst of limitation and suffering.

We do not know why something is happening and we do not understand what is going on, but we open to the Lord to experience the Spirit of Jesus in the midst of limitation and suffering.

The Lord Jesus Christ is the Shepherd of our soul in our spirit, and He knows what is our need and what is our particular situation; He comes to us as the Spirit of Jesus to be experienced by us.

In the Spirit of Jesus, there’s not only the divine element of God but also the human element of Jesus and the elements of His human living and His suffering of death as well (Acts 1:3).

In Paul’s case, the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them to go somewhere and the Holy Spirit forbade them to do something.

This all-inclusive Spirit is needed for the preaching ministry of the apostles, for this ministry was of suffering among human beings and for human beings in the human life.

Thank the Lord for the supply of the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of Jesus in our daily living, even in our ministry in and for the Lord!

Lord Jesus, thank You for being the Spirit of Jesus in us and with us to supply us in our ministry in the Lord and for the Lord. We open to You. We do not want to do things according to a plan or a schedule; we simply open to Your leading and Your supply. We need You. We don’t know why certain things happen to us and we don’t understand why a particular measure of suffering is allotted to us, but we open to You. Supply us as the Spirit of Jesus in our life of suffering, even as we carry out our ministry today. Hallelujah, in the Spirit of Jesus, there’s not only the divine element but even more, the human element of Jesus and the elements of His human living and His suffering of death as well! Keep us open to You, dear Lord, as we go through sufferings, limitations, and constraining situations. May we enjoy the supply of the all-inclusive Spirit in all things for the carrying out of our ministry! Grant us the experiences we need for the ministry to be produced in us for the building up of the church!

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 Ron Kangas in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Acts, msg. 44, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Experiencing, Enjoying, and Expressing Christ (2024 July Semiannual Training), week 12, The Divine Trinity, the Spirit of Jesus, and the Kingdom of God.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – In incarnation, a portion from, Living In and With the Divine Trinity, Chapter 1, by Witness Lee.
  – The Ministry Bearing the Mark of Death and Resurrection (7), From chapter seven of The Ministers in the Lord’s Recovery – Genuine Ministers of the New Covenant, Shepherding Words.
  – The church purchased with God’s own blood, a portion from, Life-Study of Acts, Chapter 54.
  – New Jerusalem: No Blemishes, No Spots, via, New Jerusalem blog.
  – The confirmation of the church and other factors, a portion from, New Believers Series: Seeking God’s Will #17, Chapter 1, by Watchman Nee.
  – 4 Key Verses About the Blood of Jesus Christ, via, Bibles for America blog.
  – The only true God – the God of life, article by Ron Kangas in, Affirmation and Critique.
  – How Precious is the Blood of Jesus Christ to You? via, Holding to Truth in Love.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – I am redeemed, but not with silver; / I am bought, but not with gold; / Bought with a price—the blood of Jesus, / Precious price of love untold. / Nor silver nor gold hath obtained my redemption; / The guilt on my conscience too heavy had grown. / The blood of the cross is my only foundation; / The death of my Savior I only can own. (Hymns #303 stanza 2 and chorus)
  – And can it be that I should gain / An int’rest in the Savior’s blood? / Died He for me, who caused His pain? / For me, who Him to death pursued? / Amazing love! how can it be / That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me? / Amazing love! how can it be / That Thou, my God, shouldst die for me? (Hymns #296 stanza 1)
  – Of the Spirit, born of Spirit— / This the source of Jesus is; / Filled with Spirit, all of Spirit— / This the essence truly His. / In the Spirit, with the Spirit, / As the Spirit Jesus came; / Now the Lord is just that Spirit / And in spirit we’re the same. (Hymns #1123 stanza 1)