Inheriting the Grace of Life and being Good Stewards of the Varied Grace of God

The grace of life is the inheritance of all the believers, whether strong or weak, for we are vessels to contain God as grace; as we enjoy grace, we become stewards of the varied grace of God, ministering the varied grace to others and receiving their portion of grace.

Grace is the processed Triune God received and enjoyed by us; as we enjoy the Lord as grace every day, this grace is manifested through us.

The processed and consummated Triune God as grace received and enjoyed by us becomes visible and expressed through us for others to see in our holy living (on the personal side) and in the church meetings (on the corporate side).

When Barnabas visited a particular local church, he saw the grace of God; they not only enjoyed God as grace but also manifested grace in a visible way.

Many times we are in the church meetings and we sense the grace, we see the grace, and we touch the grace of God; our meeting together is to enjoy the Lord and manifest His grace.

On one hand, we enjoy the grace of God personally in our intimate fellowship with the Lord through the exercise of our spirit.

As we do this, the result is that we have a holy living in which others see the grace of God being expressed.

On the other hand, when we come together and minister the varied grace of God one to another, both receiving and ministering grace, grace is visible among us, and the Triune God is being manifested through us.

Though we may be in suffering and in trials, we can enjoy the grace of God; we are called to both enjoy and express Christ as grace in the midst of sufferings so that we may be His reproduction.

The Lord Jesus was the first who took the lead to enjoy the Father, live by the Father, and be one with the Father; He was grace itself, and in everything, He expressed the Father and did the Father’s will.

We have been called to follow Him by taking up our own cross every day and living by the grace of God so that we become a copy of Christ as our model according to His God-man living.

His living can be reproduced in us and among us on earth by our enjoyment of Christ as grace; the more we enjoy and experience Christ as grace, though outwardly we may suffer or may be in difficult and trying situations, inwardly we enjoy the grace of God, and Christ has a way to manifest Himself through us.

Christ is our model; His God-man living is full of grace, and He as the Spirit of grace is in us to impart grace to us and live in us the same kind of life that He lived while on earth.

We are Heirs together with the Saints to Inherit the Grace of Life and Vessels to Contain this grace

In 1 Pet. 3:7 Peter speaks to the husbands concerning the grace of life; he exhorts the husbands to dwell together with their wives according to knowledge, as with the weaker, female vessel, assigning honor to them as also to fellow heirs of the grace of life.

This is a unique expression, the grace of life, found nowhere else in the Bible.

The grace of life is God as life and life supply to us in His Divine Trinity – the Father as the source of life, the Son as the course of life, and the Spirit as the flow of life, who flows within us, with the Son and the Father, as grace to us (1 John 5:11-12; John 7:38-39; Rev. 22:1).

Whether strong or weak, all believers inherit the grace of life and are vessels to contain this grace.

The husbands need to love and to sympathize with their wives because the wives are the weaker vessels, but together they are fellow heirs of the grace of life.

The husband is not a strong vessel – the husband is a weak vessel, and the wife is a weaker vessel; however, both the husband and wife are created in the image of Christ to contain and inherit the grace of life.

The husbands need to appreciate the preciousness, the valuable worth, of the wives; they need to apportion it, assign it, as honor to them duly and reasonably as to the weaker, female vessel.

Both man and woman were made as a vessel to contain God (Rom. 9:21, 23). As believers in Christ, we are vessels to contain Christ as the treasure (2 Cor. 4:7).

By creation, the female is weaker than the male physically and psychologically.

However, both are still vessels of the Lord and can be vessels unto honor (2 Tim. 2:21), deserving a certain honor.

The husband and the wife are fellow heirs of the grace of life; they are to inherit and enjoy God as life and life supply to us in His Trinity.

Hallelujah, all believers are inheritors of the grace of life, and we all are vessels to contain the grace of life!

The Triune God is now within us as the grace of life, and especially in married life, the husbands and wives are joint heirs of this grace of life, for they inherit the grace of life together.

This inheritance is part of the inheritance that is incorruptible and undefiled and unfading (1 Pet. 1:4), and all the items in our eternal inheritance are related to the divine life.

By receiving the divine life and experiencing and enjoying the divine life throughout our Christian life, we inherit the grace of life.

In particular, the husbands and wives are co-heirs of the grace of life. If a brother is unmarried, he will lack a particular aspect of grace; a married brother can experience and inherit grace as the grace of life together with his wife.

If a brother’s wife is naturally good, he may be short of a rich aspect of grace; but if his wife is difficult and even somewhat stubborn, he will have the opportunity to enjoy a very rich and specific aspect of grace.

If the wife is naturally kind and nice, the husband may miss a particularly rich aspect of grace; but if the wife is not naturally submissive but rather difficult, he can enjoy a rich aspect of grace.

Similarly, when the couple has children, they can enjoy a rich aspect of the grace of life.

May we know and enjoy this varied grace of God and realize that we inherit the grace of life together. May we not despise someone who may seem to be weaker than us; may we remember that we are fellow heirs of the grace of life.

We are heirs to inherit the grace of life and vessels to contain the grace of life (1 Pet. 3:7; Eph. 1:14; 2 Cor. 4:7).

As members of the Body of Christ, we inherit the grace of life together; without our fellow members in the Body, we would be lacking in inheriting the grace of life.

If some members seem to be weaker or lacking in beauty, we cover them with more beauty and assign them more honor, for every weak member is necessary.

The members of the Body which we consider to be less honourable, these we clothe with more abundant honor, so that there would be no division in the Body, but that the members would have the same care for one another.

May we learn to care for one another in the Body by ministering the varied grace of God to the saints, and may we learn to inherit and enjoy the grace of life together with the saints.

Lord Jesus, we want to enjoy the grace of life as our inheritance together with all the saints. May we enjoy God as life and life supply to us in His divine Trinity, flowing into us as grace. Hallelujah, we are heirs to inherit the grace of life and vessels to contain the grace of life! Amen, Lord, may we realize that, whether we are strong or weak, we all are inheritors of the grace of life! Praise the Lord, we have been given an incorruptible, undefiled, and unfading inheritance, and we are co-inheritors with the saints of the grace of life! Amen, Lord, may our married life be filled with the enjoyment and partaking of the grace of life. May the church life in the Body be filled with the enjoyment of the grace of life!

Being Good Stewards of the Varied Grace of God by Speaking the Words of Grace and Ministering Grace to others

In 1 Pet. 4:10 Peter tells us that each one of us, as we have received a gift, we should minister it among ourselves as good stewards of the varied grace of God.

On one hand, we enjoy and partake of the grace of life; on the other hand, we are ministers of the varied grace of God.

The grace of God is not only rich, abundant, and grace upon grace; it is varied, which means that it meets all our needs in different aspects and situations.

The varied grace of God is the rich supply of life, which is the Triune God ministered into us in many aspects (2 Cor. 13:14; 12:9).

When we are in a difficult situation, grace is there to meet our needs. When we have a thorn in the flesh and we suffer, grace is sufficient.

The riches of God come to us to meet our needs in many varieties according to our situation and condition.

Even more, we are members in the Body, and the grace we experience and inherit directly is relatively little; but when we come together, we can minister the varied grace of God and enjoy the grace of God being ministered to us in its variety.

The end of all things is drawing near, so we need to be watchful and preserved to live in the reality of the kingdom of God by ministering the gift we each have received.

We minister the gift that God gave to us by being stewards of the varied grace of God. When we come into contact with someone, we need to be a good steward of the varied grace of God.

God’s economy is to work out and obtain the organic Body of Christ; He wants to gain an organism for the Divine Trinity, and this can be done by our enjoying the grace of life and ministering the varied grace of God to one another.

As we enjoy God as grace and have multiplied grace, and as we live Christ and minister the varied grace of God to one another, the church as the Body of Christ is being built up.

God’s economy is to gain a living organism for the Divine Trinity, which organism is the Body of Christ.

This organism needs to be sustained and to grow, even to be built up; this is done by all the members of the Body learning to become stewards of the varied grace of God, each ministering grace to others. You minister grace to me and I minister grace to you.

When we contact the saints to shepherd them, we need to allow them also to shepherd us.

We need to learn to minister to others in the Body of Christ; in our small groups and in our vital groups, we pray for one another, and the Lord may put some names on our hearts.

As we pray and have some feeling to go and visit them, we need to fellowship with our vital companions and coordinate to go visit the backslidden ones, the new ones, and the dormant saints.

When we visit, we pray, and there’s much prayer behind the scenes; there is no condemnation toward others when we go – we simply go to minister the word of grace to them.

This should be our living; we need to have a shepherding life of ministering the varied grace of God to others.

When we come together on Lord’s day for the prophesying meeting, we need to minister the varied grace of God to one another.

We need to not be silent or reluctant; rather, we should just exercise our spirit and use our renewed mind to function in the Body by testifying for the Lord and ministering the varied grace of God to the brothers and sisters.

Amen, may we learn to do this!

We need to be good stewards of the varied grace of God, speaking the words of grace as the oracles of God and ministering out of the strength and power of grace, which God supplies (1 Pet. 4:10-11; Luke 4:22; Eph. 3:2; 4:29).

Lord Jesus, thank You for your rich supply of life, the Triune God ministered into us in many aspects to be the varied grace of God. Keep us enjoying You and experiencing You as grace in our daily life. Make us the good stewards of the varied grace of God by speaking the words of grace and ministering out of the strength and power of grace which God supplies. We open to Your inner strengthening and supplying and we open to the fellow members in the Body to enjoy grace with the saints. Amen, Lord, keep us in prayer and fellowship with the saints in our vital group and in the area where You placed us. Lead us to who to visit and minister the words of grace to. Make us those who function in the church meetings by using our spirit and testifying for the Lord to minister the words of grace to the brothers and sisters for the building up of the church.

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brothers, and portions from, Life-study of 1 Peter, msg. 22-23, 27 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Grace of God in the Economy of God (2022 International Chinese-speaking Conference), week 4, entitled, Grace in Peter’s Epistles.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – When we have exhausted our store of endurance, / When our strength has failed ere the day is half-done, / When we reach the end of our hoarded resources, / Our Father’s full giving is only begun. / His love has no limit, His grace has no measure, / His power no boundary known unto men, / For out of His infinite riches in Jesus, / He giveth and giveth and giveth again. (Hymns #723)
  – Lord, Thy love is the expression / Of Thy loving self divine, / Making life so full of meaning, / Harmonized with God’s design. / Grace of life, how all-sufficient, / Is my portion day by day; / I’m the object of Thy favor / And Thy sweetness taste alway. (Hymns #152)
  – Splendid church life! His green garden! / He has brought us, praise the Lord, / To experience the Christ Who’s growing here! / He is full of rich enjoyment / To His saints in one accord; / He is new and fresh, available and dear. / I’m so happy in this lovely place, / In the garden growing in His grace! / There is no finer pleasure / Than to eat the living tree / And to get the living water into me. (Hymns #1237)