Journeying Onward to Enter into the Good Land and have a Corporate God-man Living

The history of the people of Israel in Exodus is a type and figure of our spiritual history with the Lord, and Moses being called by God is a pattern for our being called by God.

The purpose of God’s calling of Moses was to deliver God’s people out of Egypt and bring them into the good land flowing with milk and honey (Exo. 3:8-17). The three stations on the fulfillment of the purpose of God’s calling of Moses were the wilderness, the mountain of God, and the good land. The final destination and the goal of God’s calling of Moses was to bring His people into the good land of Canaan.

In our spiritual experience, the goal of God’s calling is to bring us fully into the enjoyment and experience of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land so that we may have a corporate God-man living for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ and the kingdom of God.

We should not remain too much in the wilderness – as good as it is to be here temporarily in order to be rescued from the world and reconstituted with Christ as the heavenly manna and the living water. We should not remain or linger too much on the mountain of God, the place where God reveals to us who He is, what is on His heart, and what is His economy.

We should journey onward to the good land to enter into the possession of the all-inclusive Christ. The land of Canaan doesn’t signify the “heavens” (as many believers think), neither does it signify a shallow or superficial enjoyment of the unsearchable riches of Christ.

The good land into which we are called is the corporate God-man living where there’s no longer I but Christ, and where we experience Christ in His death and resurrection for the building up of the church as the Body of Christ and the kingdom of God.

We need to be brought on in our Christian experience until we all enter into the good land, having a corporate God-man living with the denial of the self and dealing with the flesh so that Christ would live and be expressed through us for the building up of God’s habitation on earth.

The Ultimate Goal of God’s Calling: entering into the Good Land

The purpose of God’s calling of Moses was to deliver the children of Israel from the usurpation and tyranny of Pharaoh in Egypt and bring them to a good and spacious land flowing with milk and honey, the land of Canaan. In fulfilling the purpose of God’s calling there were three main stations: the wilderness, the mountain of God, and the good land.

In the wilderness the people of Israel were delivered and separated from Egypt and Pharaoh, and they were learning to follow God’s leading, being reconstituted with a heavenly diet: the manna and the living water. In our Christian experience we need to be delivered from the world and from the usurpation of Satan, we need to learn to follow the Lord’s leading in our life, and we need to be reconstituted with Christ as our heavenly diet: He is the living bread and the living water for us to eat and drink and be filled with Him.

The second station is the mountain of God, where the people of Israel received a revelation of who God is, what is on His heart, and what is the living they should have to match Him; here they received a vision of the pattern of the tabernacle, and they built God a dwelling place.

We need to not remain in the wilderness but journey on to the mountain of God, an elevated place under the clear sky, where we can receive a revelation of who God is, what is God’s economy, what kind of living we should have to match Him, and what is the pattern of God’s house, His tabernacle. At the mountain of God we receive revelation after revelation, and we build up a movable temporary dwelling place of God in the church life as we journey through the wilderness.

The third station is the good land of Canaan, where the people of Israel entered after they crossed the river Jordan following the ark of the covenant and after they got circumcised (Josh. 3:3, 6, 8, 13-17; 4:10-19). We need to journey on from the wilderness to the mountain of God and from the mountain of God to the good land through dealing with the self (burial in the Jordan river) and with the flesh (being circumcised) so that we may enjoy the unsearchable riches of Christ.

The fulfillment of God’s goal in calling us is to enter into the full enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ as the good land flowing with milk and honey; this enjoyment and experience issues in the God-man living of no longer I but Christ, a living in oneness with Christ in His death and resurrection for the building up of the Body of Christ.

In the good land Christ is everything to us: He is the center and circumference, the centrality and universality of God’s economy and our being (Col. 2:9; 3:11). The books of Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, and Colossians show us Christ as the all-inclusive land into which we can enter and whom we can experience in order to have a corporate God-man living for the building up of the church.

Lord Jesus, thank You for delivering us from the world and bringing us into resurrection to enjoy You as the heavenly manna and the living water. Reconstitute us with Your element as we walk through the wilderness today. Lord, bring us onward to the mountain of God where we can receive a clear revelation of who You are, what is Your economy, and what is the church. Lord, we give ourselves for the building up of the church! Oh Lord, bring us all the way into the good land, the full enjoyment and experience of the all-inclusive Christ, the centrality and universality of God’s eternal economy!

Journeying Onward to Enter into the Good Land, the All-inclusive Christ, to have a Corporate God-man Living

As good and necessary as they are, the wilderness or the mountain of God is not the goal of God’s calling. God calls us to enter into a rich experience of the unsearchable riches of Christ and have a walk of a God-man for the building up of the Body of Christ.

It is not enough for us to have a church life in the wilderness experiencing the heavenly manna and the living water. The goal of God’s calling is not for us to remain on the mountain where we have the revelation of God, His economy, and His house, and where we build the miniature of the house of God as a movable tabernacle.

We need to go on with the Lord, journeying on to have the church life that is in the good land. In the good land we live not in our culture, environment, disposition, good behavior, but we live Christ day-by-day, expressing Him and magnifying Him corporately.

How many saints practice the God-man living in the church life today? Where can we see a model of the corporate God-man living as the reality of being and walking in the good land? We have to admit that we are not there yet.

We may have a church life as an initial experience – we have a “movable tent” church life, and this is good; but we need to go on to live the God-man life. When all of God’s people enter into the good land by dealing with their self and their flesh, living a life of no longer I but Christ, when we all know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, we corporately all together are in the good land.

In the good land we can build up the temple of God as a solid permanent building of God, and in the good land we become the kingdom of God. We should not remain or linger in the matter of eating and drinking the Lord or receiving a revelation of His building, but we should go on with the Lord to enter into the enjoyment and experience of the all-inclusive Christ in order to have a corporate God-man living in the good land.

The good land of Canaan is not the heaven nor a superficial enjoyment of the unsearchable riches of Christ but a daily walk of living Christ, expressing Christ, and experiencing Christ in His death and resurrection.

We need to have the aspiration that our church life would go on and move into the corporate living of the God-man, which is the experience of the all-inclusive Christ as the good land. Also, we need to help others also experience Christ in all His unsearchable riches so that God may be able to establish His kingdom and have His dwelling place on earth today (Eph. 3:8; 2:21; Rom. 10:12; 14:17).

Lord Jesus, bring us on all the way into the good land, the enjoyment and experience of the all-inclusive Christ resulting in a corporate God-man living. Save us from wandering in the wilderness or lingering on the mountain of God. Bring us all on into the good land to live Christ, magnify Christ, and express Christ corporately by being one with Him in His death and resurrection. Lord, bring in a new revival, the corporate living of the God-men. We want to practice the God-man living by dealing with the flesh and the self and living a life of no longer I but Christ!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my Christian experience, bro. Andrew Yu’s sharing in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Exodus, msg. 12, as quoted in, the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Exodus (1),  week 3 / msg 3, The Purpose of God’s Calling.
• # Lift your eyes up and look from where you are. / When you see the Christ, our all-inclusive land, / Then we walk in this blessed land, enjoying all we see, / Getting saved eating milk and honey. (Song on Christ, the good land)
  # God has set the land before us, / And the land we will possess. / God has finally found a people / Tired of the wilderness. / Down with every weight and sin; / Let’s go up and enter in. (Hymns #1166)
  # By the cross discern the spirit / And the Jordan River cross; / Enter then the Land of Canaan, / And enjoy Christ thru the cross. / By the cross discern the spirit / And within the spirit move; / As good land, on Christ e’er labor, / And His riches thou wilt prove. (Hymns #748)