God’s history in man began with the incarnation of Christ and continued with His processes of human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension; these are cords of a man, bands of love, with which He drew us to Himself in love.
Hallelujah for our wonderful Lord Jesus Christ, the first God-man, the One who brought God into man and mingled the Triune God with the tripartite man!
This one created in Himself on the cross the one new man, and we are all part of the new man. Humanly speaking, regardless of the colour of the skin and the features that we have, we are one humankind, for there’s one blood, one Adamic kind.
But because we fell at Babel, man is now scattered, adopting different languages, different kinds of living, different ways of relating to each other socially.
Furthermore, man adopted different kind of norms and social norms, different traits and ways of life, and humanity today is very divided and separated.
But praise the Lord for God’s salvation! In His heart, He had a purpose in the creation of man: He wanted man to be one to express Him and represent Him; the first man, Adam, failed God, but Christ created in Himself on the cross the new man, who will express and represent God in full!
However, if we look outwardly at the so-called church, what we see is division based on different ordinances, ways of worship, doctrines, teachings, creeds, and we see many superimposing culture, racial differences, and even social statuses, so that today the church of God is broken, divided, separated, and even segregated. Oh, Lord Jesus!
The only solution to this is Christ Himself; He is the answer to all the enmities and division, and He is the response to the antagonism and hatred among the races, peoples, and tongues.
The only solution for us believers in Christ is that Christ replaces all the culture, so that, by our being joined to Him, mingled with Him, united with Him, and even incorporated with Him, He becomes our essence and our everything.
Our focus today should be on Christ and the kind of person He was, the living He had, and the work He did, so that He may replace our culture and fill us to become our very constitution.
Christ needs to be so one with us and He has to fill us to such an extent that He becomes us and we become Him; He needs to be in us and we need to be in Him for the church, the Body of Christ, and the one new man.
This is why we need to see what is the universal history according to God’s economy and realize that there’s the divine history taking place within the human history to fulfil the Lord’s heart’s desire to have the one new man in reality.
The universal history according to God’s economy is simply the divine history (which is God’s history) within the human history (the outward, physical history of man).
This divine history started with the Lord Jesus, for in Him God became a man. In the Old Testament, God moved among men and with men, but in the New Testament beginning with the Lord Jesus, God moved in man.
God’s History in Man began with Christ’s Incarnation and continued with His Human Living, the Cords of a Man, the Bands of Love
The Bible is the autobiography of God; it was written by God through many writers inspired by the Spirit, and it shows us what we need to know concerning the history of God.
We can say that the history of God has two main parts: the history of God with and among men in the Old Testament, and the history of God in man in the New Testament.
In the Old Testament, God moved among His people and with His people, and He even had a way to move with some of the Gentiles who were used by Him or inspired by the Spirit.
However, many times His people forsook God, for they had God only among them and with them but not in them; therefore, the fall of man went lower and lower.
In the New Testament, however, God moves not only among man and with man but even more, He moves in man.
The Lord Jesus is not only God with man: He is the first God-man, God in man, God mingled with man, God living in man, and God being manifested in man.
The Lord Jesus came as God incarnated; in the beginning, was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God; this Word of God – who is God Himself – became flesh by being incarnated (John 1:1, 14).
God’s history in man began with the incarnation of Jesus Christ, and it continued with His processes of human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension.
In this way God came into man; the Triune God was incarnated to be a man, and in the Lord Jesus we have both the divine life and the human life, and both the divine nature and the human nature were present.
According to Micah 5:2, these are the goings forth of God from eternity; the eternal, uncreated, almighty, ever-existing and self-existing God chose to step out of eternity and be conceived in the womb of a virgin with the divine essence and the human essence. Wow!
And His human living was not only different: it was amazing, it was wonderful, for it was God being lived out in a man, God being manifested in man, and God being expressed through man.
In Hosea 11:4 the Lord said that He drew us with cords of a man, with bands of love; in the Lord’s incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension, we are drawn by God not with His amazing and splendid divinity but with His aromatic, fragrant, and delightful humanity which expressed the divine life and nature.
When we read the Gospels we cannot but be drawn by God to this wonderful One, for His human living was superb, His deeds were so wonderful, and His words were God speaking in man to draw man.
Wherever He went, people were drawn to Him; they followed Him not merely because of the miracles He performed or for the free food He would give them sometimes, but because God was expressed through Him, and He had the words of life.
Even today, as we read the Gospels and open to the Lord, we are drawn by God with Christ’s incarnation, His human living, His crucifixion, His resurrection, and His ascension.
By these steps of Christ in His humanity, God’s love in His salvation reaches us.
On one hand, what we see is that Christ is the most wonderful Person, and He is so attractive and aromatic; on the other hand, we see God’s love in His salvation, and we cannot but love the Lord, open to Him, receive Him, aspire to be like Him, and desire to be one with Him.
God draws us with bands of love and with the cords of a man through the Lord Jesus and the processes He went through so that we may enter into His salvation, partake of what God is, and become one with the Lord Jesus.
The divine history – which is God’s move in man – is with the processed Christ, the God-man; He is the prototype, and we’re the new man as His reproduction and continuation, consummating in the New Jerusalem, the great God-man, the ultimate fulfilment of God’s eternal economy.
Hallelujah, our destiny is that we would be fully one with God, manifesting God in humanity for eternity to fulfil God’s eternal economy for eternity!
Thank You Lord Jesus for becoming a man, living a perfect and wonderful human life, being crucified, resurrecting, and ascending! We appreciate Your amazing incarnation, Your aromatic human living, Your redeeming crucifixion, Your death-overcoming resurrection, and all-transcending ascension. We are drawn by You, Lord, with cords of a man and with bands of love as we enjoy all that You have done in Your earthly ministry. Thank You Lord for bringing God into man and bringing man into God for the history of God in man. Hallelujah, we are now part of the history of God in man, for we have Jesus living in us as we are joined to Him in spirit!
Christ brought the Infinite God into the Finite Man and Expressed in His Humanity the Bountiful God in His rich Attributes through His Aromatic Virtues
There was something different about the Lord Jesus and His human living. Everyone who reads the Gospels, whether believers or unbelievers, cannot but be impressed with the wonderful human living this One had.
Christ in His incarnation brought God into man; this means that the infinite God was brought into the finite man. God is infinite and incomprehensible; we cannot comprehend or fully grasp Him, yet somehow this infinite God became a finite man in the Lord Jesus.
The Triune God is mysterious, and we as tripartite men are difficult to understand; however, Christ united and mingled the Triune God with the tripartite man.
In Christ God became man, the infinite God was brought into the finite man, God was joined to man, and God was mingled with man.
What we see in the Lord Jesus with His wonderful human living is both God and man, but God and man were united and mingled together in a wonderful way.
The entire Triune God – God the Father as the source, God the Son as the expression, and God the Spirit as the issue and flow – was mingled with the tripartite man – who is made of body, soul, and spirit.
The result was a God-man, a man who is doesn’t just have the human life but also the divine life, a man who has not just the human nature but also the divine nature.
The living of the Lord Jesus was like no other, for He expressed God in everything. Christ did not just express God; He expressed in His humanity the bountiful God in His rich attributes through His aromatic human virtues.
As a human being, the Lord Jesus was perfect, and His human virtues were perfect and untainted with sin or evil.
However, the Lord Jesus denied Himself and allow God to fill Him and be mingled with Him, and in His human living He expressed the bountiful God in His rich attributes which were expressed through His aromatic human virtues.
The Christ we see in the Gospels is not someone who merely came to accomplish redemption or do a work for God; He is an aromatic person, a sweet and fragrant One, One who attracted and captivated people.
As He lived and walked on earth, people were drawn to Him; He called certain ones to follow Him, and they couldn’t say no: they were attracted and captivated by Him to the extent that they left everything and left Him (see Matt. 4:18-22).
God has His attributes, and His attributes are rich, wonderful, and bountiful; man has his virtues, and in Christ, the human virtues were filled and saturated with the divine attributes.
When Christ lived, He expressed in His humanity the bountiful God in His rich attributes; He not only had compassion on others but loved them with the love of God expressed through His human attribute of love, and His compassion expressed the divine compassion.
He was not “good-looking” humanly speaking but He was attractive and aromatic, for He denied Himself and lived God in His human living.
Christ did not live His human life in the flesh but lived His divine life in resurrection; He lived in the flesh, but He didn’t live by the perfect human life He had – He lived by the divine life in resurrection.
This is mysterious, wonderful, and truly aromatic and fragrant; such a One is the immense magnet drawing all His seekers to Himself.
We have been drawn to Him; we love Him, we are drawn by God with cords of a man and with bands of love, and we are learning to not live by our own life but live by the divine life even as He did.
As the many God-men who follow in His footsteps, we are His continuation and reproduction; we all need to get out of the realm of the flesh and enter into resurrection to live by the divine life in resurrection.
We need to live our daily life by being one with the Lord Jesus, living in the divine and mystical realm, even living the same kind of life that He lived, which is the living of the one new man.
We love You, dear Lord Jesus! Thank You for bringing the infinite God into the finite man and mingling the Triune God with the tripartite man. Amen, Lord, we love to be infused with Your wonderful and aromatic human living, for You expressed in Your humanity the bountiful God in His rich attributes through Your aromatic human virtues. How we love You, dear Lord Jesus, and how we appreciate Your marvellous God-man living. We want to learn from You as Your continuation and reproduction to live by the divine life in resurrection so that we may express God in our daily living. We come to You again and again, Lord, to be infused with You and filled with You, so that You may live in us and be expressed through us!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of 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, 1994-1997, vol. 5, “How to be a Co-worker and an Elder and How to Fulfill Their Obligations“, pp. 223-227, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The All-Inclusive, Extensive Christ Replacing Culture for the One New Man (2020 Thanksgiving Conference), week 6, The Universal History according to God’s Economy — the Divine History within the Human History to Fulfill the Lord’s Heart’s Desire to Have the One New Man in Reality.
- Hymns on this topic:
– God in Christ drew me—Sweet is the story: / Though we were fallen, God sent His Son! / Christ stooped to woo me, leaving His glory, / With “cords of man, and with bands of love.” / God in Christ drew me, God in Christ drew me, / With “cords of man, and with bands of love,” / God in Christ drew me, God in Christ drew me, / With “cords of man, and with bands of love.” (Song on, God in Christ drew me—Sweet is the story)
– I’ve found a Friend, oh, such a Friend! / He loved me ere I knew Him; / He drew me with the cords of love, / And thus He bound me to Him. / And round my heart still closely twine / Those ties which naught can sever, / For I am His, and He is mine, / Forever and forever. (Hymns #288)
– Oh! Christ, expression of God, the Great, / Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet! / God mingled with humanity / Lives in me my all to be. / The fulness of God dwells in Thee; / Thou dost manifest God’s glory; / In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought; / As Spirit, oneness with me sought. (Hymns #501)
