God’s Economy is that God became Man to make Man God for His Corporate Expression

When God created man in His image and according to His likeness He had a specific purpose in mind: He wanted this man to become the same as God in life and nature but not in the Godhead so that God would corporately be expressed through man.

Man was created with a spirit and was put in front of the tree of life; if he partook of the this tree, he would have lived forever one with God and expressing God. But because man partook of the wrong tree, the man created in God’s image and with His likeness became fallen to be “mankind” – no longer God-kind but man-kind, fallen mankind.

Four thousand years after the fall of man, God became a man and lived a perfect and wonderful God-man life on earth for 33.5 years. In His living the Lord Jesus established the pattern of a God-man, and through His death and resurrection He opened the way and became the means for many people who would believe into Him to be brought back to God’s original intention.

Now whoever calls on the name of the Lord and is saved by God through believing into Christ becomes a God-man, a man who is born not of the will of man or of the flesh but of God. Through regeneration by believing into Christ we are born of God, and we become the reproduction and continuation of Christ, the first God-man, on earth today, and together we are the Body of Christ, the corporate expression of God on earth through the many God-men.

Now we are Jesus Christ living again on earth as He lives in us, and we should live not by our human life but by the divine life in our spirit to be sons of God led by the Spirit (Rom. 8:4). The corporate living of the God-men is the reality of the Body of Christ, the corporate manifestation of God in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:15-16).

In this age God desires to gain the reality of the Body of Christ – the corporate God-man living – which will consummate in the New Jerusalem, the ultimate universal divine-human incorporation of God and man, the living of God in man and of man in God, and the eternal corporate expression of the Triune God in humanity.

Praise the Lord, today we are in the process of being deified to be the same as God in life and nature but not in the Godhead so that we may be the Body of Christ consummating in the New Jerusalem!

We are Becoming God in Life and Nature for the Corporate Manifestation of God in the Flesh

If we read the New Testament carefully we will see what the Apostle Paul also saw on his way to Damascus, a clear vision of “the Christ”, the corporate Christ.

In the Gospels we see the Lord Jesus as the Head of the Body; He lived a life depending on the Father, expressing the Father, speaking the Father’s words, doing the Father’s work, and seeking the Father’s glory.

The Lord Jesus lived a God-man life by the divine life; He had a perfect sinless human life, but He denied His human life to live by another life, the life of the Father (John 6:57a). He didn’t trust in His perfect human life but exercised to live by the Father’s life, take the Father’s will, seek the Father’s glory, speak the Father’s words, and do the Father’s work.

In Acts we see the Body of Christ, the continuation of Christ on earth; the book of Acts is not merely “the acts of the apostles” but the acts of Christ as the Spirit through His apostles, disciples, and many believers – through the Body of Christ.

What the New Testament reveals to us is a great universal corporate man, Christ as the Head and the church as the Body of Christ, which later is called, “God manifested in the flesh” (1 Tim. 3:15-16).

The Lord Jesus set up a pattern of the God-man living in His human life on earth, and this life is today being repeated in the millions of believers in Christ as the Body of Christ. He died and resurrected, and in resurrection He regenerated us as His many believers, the many sons of God, and the corporate reproduction of Christ, the many God-men. No matter our skin color, language, country, background, gender, or age, all believers in Christ are God-men and each one of us is a God-man.

We today should live not by our natural life but by the divine life in our spirit so that we may be the corporate manifestation of God in the flesh. Great is the mystery of godliness: He who was manifested in the flesh (1 Tim. 3:16). “Godliness” here is not merely being pious but the living of God in the church, that is, God as life lived out in all the members of the Body of Christ.

Great is the mystery of godliness: God became flesh so that we, men of flesh, would become God in life and nature but not in the Godhead for the corporate manifestation of God in the flesh.

As we eat Christ, enjoy Christ, fellowship with Him, pray-read His word, and abide in Him, we are being deified to be the same as He is, and we live a life that is the reproduction of the God-man life that Christ lived on earth, so that we may be the manifestation of God in the flesh.

We need to deny our self, lose our soul life, take up our cross, and learn to live not by our human life but by the divine life in our spirit so that we may have a God-man living, the exact copy and authentic reproduction of the life of Christ, the first God-man, for the manifestation of God in the flesh.

Lord Jesus, thank You for coming to establish a pattern of the God-man living by living not by Your natural human life but by the divine life. Lord, live in us again today. Repeat in us the same kind of God-man living that You had while on earth. Make us the same as You are in life, nature, and expression so that we may live no longer by our natural human life but by the divine life in our spirit. Lord, gain your corporate manifestation of God in the flesh through Your Body! Gain a corporate God-man living in the church life today!

God’s Economy is that God became Man to make Man God for His Corporate Expression, the Body of Christ

Many believers and unbelievers alike have their own concept of what the Bible speaks about, and most of them are in the line of God wanting man to be good, worship God, do good things, help the poor, stand for righteousness, have a good family life, be blessed, prosper, and eventually God will take us to heaven where there’s gold, pearls, precious stones, heavenly mansions, and all kinds of riches and glories.

We need to ask the Lord to shine on us and expose our natural concept and our human philosophy and religion based on Bible, and we need to see a clear revelation of God’s economy.

God’s economy, as recorded in the Bible, is that God became man to make man God in life, nature, and expression so that we may have a God-man living and become the Body of Christ, the corporate expression of God on earth.

For the fulfillment of God’s economy God Himself became a man and came in the likeness of the flesh of sin and concerning sin, and He condemned sin in the flesh through His death (Rom. 8:3).

In His resurrection, Christ brought His humanity into divinity, was glorified by the Father, and became the Son of God in power – the firstborn Son of God possessing both divinity and humanity (Rom. 1:3-4).

Now Christ is the life-giving Spirit entering into us and living in us, and as we allow Him as the Spirit to lead us and as we walk by the spirit, we fulfill all the righteous requirements of the law (Rom. 8:14, 15) and are truly God-men, sons of God.

Christ as the Firstborn Son of God is leading us as the many God-men, the many sons of God, into glory (Rom. 8:29), and together we become the Body of Christ, the corporate manifestation of God in the flesh to be the universal organism of Christ consummating in the New Jerusalem (Rom. 12:4-5).

Today God can be manifested in the flesh through the Body of Christ for the fulfillment of His eternal economy. In ourselves and by ourselves we cannot express God or be God’s manifestation, but when we live by the divine life in our spirit we live a God-man life, a mingled life, and we build up the Body of Christ as God’s manifestation.

This is the clear revelation in the Bible, and this is the highest peak of the divine revelation. If we see that God became man to make man God in life and nature but not in the Godhead for the producing and building up of the Body of Christ as His corporate expression, then everything in the Bible will make sense, and everything comes into place in God’s economy.

Lord Jesus, unveil us to see Your economy as revealed in the Bible. Lord, may we realize that God became man to make man God in life, nature, and expression so that we may have a God-man living and become the Body of Christ, the corporate expression of God. We choose to walk by the spirit and follow the leading of the Spirit with our spirit. Lord, thank You for making us God-men who are now growing and are being built up to be the Body of Christ for the manifestation of God and for the fulfillment of God’s economy!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. James Lee’s sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, The God-men, ch. 1 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Need for a New Revival, week 2 / msg 2, Reaching the Highest Peak of the Divine Revelation (2) – Becoming God in Life, Nature, and Expression to Produce the Body of Christ Consummating in the New Jerusalem.
• All Bible verses are taken from, Holy Bible Recovery Version.
• Hymns on this topic to strengthen this burden:
  # Deep in God’s heart there’s been, / Before the time began, / God’s desire to be expressed, / This He planned in eternal past. / God eternal had a purpose / In eternal past. / He created man in His image / that man would God express. (Song on God’s Purpose)
  # Flesh He became, the first God-man, / His pleasure that I God may be: / In life and nature I’m God’s kind, / Though Godhead’s His exclusively. / His attributes my virtues are; / His glorious image shines through me. (Song on Being a God-man)
  # The church is the house of the living God; / The church is the pillar and base of the truth. / And great is the myst’ry of godliness; / That God was manifested in the flesh. (Song on the Church)