Today God speaks in Christ, the Son of God, and Christ is embodied in His Word; we need to have the Lord’s speaking every day and let the word of Christ dwell in us richly, allowing Him to make His home and be rooted deeply in all the inward parts of our being. Amen!
In the book of Jeremiah we see a wonderful crystal, a gem, as seen in Jer. 15:16; in the midst of his complaining, pouring out his heart before the Lord, and asking God to avenge him, Jeremiah uttered something truly from God’s heart for us.
He said, Your words were found and I ate them, and Your word became to me the gladness and joy of my heart.
We are like Jeremiah in many respects; things happen to us, we go through trials, tribulations, sufferings, and unpleasant things, and some people may cause us a lot of trouble.
So we pray to the Lord about this situation, that person, this suffering, that trial…and then, suddenly, when we truly touch the Lord, we come to His word and eat His word.
The Lord is not in the business of removing the problems or stopping the suffering; His desire is to dispense Himself into His people, and when we exercise our spirit to contact Him in His word, we eat Him, we receive Him, and we are constituted with Him.
From the beginning to the end of the Bible, God presents Himself to man as food; the tree of life is in the center of the garden of Eden (the garden of pleasure, where God put man after He created him), and it is on both sides of the river of water of life in the New Jerusalem.
The tree of life is so available that you can’t miss it; God in Christ as the Spirit is life and food to us in His word, and we can’t and shouldn’t miss it!
When we contact the Lord, open to Him, and allow Him the thoroughfare in the inward parts of our being as we read and pray over His word, we will become what we eat – we eat God, we digest and assimilate what is of God, and we will look like God, talk like God, and be like God, for God lives inside of us!
The way God makes us the Body of Christ as His corporate expression on earth is not by perfecting us outwardly or correcting and adjusting us, but by coming into us in the form of food to constitute us with His very element; then, He in us can live the Christian life, He can be expressed through us, and we continually feed on Him and live because of Him.
When we eat the Lord in His word, His word – His spoken, living, instant, fresh word to us – becomes to us the gladness and joy of our heart!
We all can testify that, after we pray over the word of God, we are filled with joy and gladness, even though the word operates in us to deal with all kinds of things and remove all kinds of elements with which the Lord does not agree. How we thank the Lord for His living word, His speaking to us!
The Lord’s Word Spoken to us is the Spirit and the Spirit gives us Life
The Lord Jesus said in John 6:63 that the words that He speaks to us are spirit and are life.
Christ spoke the word, and this word is the Spirit, and the spirit is life. So these three – the word, the Spirit, and life – are one, they are three-in-one.
Christ speaks the word, His speaking transmits the processed Triune God into us in the form of the word; after the word comes into us, this word becomes the Spirit, and the Spirit is life.
When we hear the word of God, when we read the Bible with the exercise of our spirit and we have the Lord’s inner speaking, this word becomes the Spirit, and the Spirit gives us life.
Then, when we speak this Spirit out to others, when we exercise our spirit to minister the Spirit to them, what comes out is the word of God, for the Spirit is the word.
When others receive he word of God into them, it becomes the Spirit again, and the Spirit gives them life. How wonderful!
So the Word of Christ is the person of Christ, Christ Himself, and He is the Spirit coming into us to give us life.
We all can testify that, when we have the Lord’s speaking in His word, that is, when we exercise our spirit and pray over the word of God, He speaks to us, and this speaking imparts life to us; what we gain is more Spirit, more life.
This is the way that the Triune God transmits Himself into us in the form of life; He becomes our life supply, first in the form of the word, then in the form of the Spirit, and ultimately in the form of life.
The result is that we enjoy the Triune God. How can we enjoy God today? How can we see God, know God, touch God, enjoy God, and receive God? It is through the word of God.
But if we merely read the Bible and do not exercise the proper organ to contact the real, living Person behind the words, we get only knowledge and doctrines.
When we “strike the word with our spirit”, that is, when we exercise our spirit to touch the Lord in His word, we receive the Spirit, and the Spirit gives life to us.
This is what happened to us initially when we received the Lord; we had a little opening to Him, our heart was softened and our spirit was open, and the Lord’s word came into us and brought in the Spirit who gave us life.
We may not have realised what happened at the time of our regeneration, and many Christians do not realize there is a way for them to continue to receive life and Spirit throughout their Christian life.
We need to know the secret of receiving spirit and life from the word of God. God is embodied in Christ, Christ is realised as the Spirit, and the Spirit is in the Word of God; when we call on the name of the Lord, pray, and prayerfully consider the word of God, the Lord will speak to us.
He may even speak to us one word from the whole chapter that we read, but that one word becomes our nourishment and supply, and this word brings in the Spirit, who gives us life.
Then, when we speak to others, we minister to them the Spirit, and what we speak to them is the word of God; then, the Spirit as the word enters into them, and the Spirit gives them life.
Lord Jesus, we come to You in Your word with much prayer and consideration so that we may receive spirit and life. Save us from merely getting knowledge (which puffs up) or doctrines from Your word. May we exercise our spirit to touch the Spirit in the word, so that we may receive life! Amen, Lord, we want to receive Spirit and life in Your word. Speak to us, Lord, as we come to Your word. We treasure Your speaking; we do not rely on Your speaking from yesterday or from last month: we want a fresh, new, instant, living speaking from You so that we may receive Spirit and life!
Our need to Let the Word of Christ Dwell in us Richly so that Christ may be our Life and Life Supply
Paul tells us in Col. 3:16 that we would let the word of Christ dwell in us richly; the word of Christ is the word spoken by Christ, and this word is Spirit and life (John 6:63).
This is not merely the word about Christ or concerning Christ, but the word spoken by Christ to us.
Has Christ spoken to us today? We may read the Bible, we may read the Holy Word for Morning Revival, and we may read some good spiritual books, but did Christ speak to us today?
Until God speaks a word to us, we may read a lot, but we may get only knowledge; however, even one word from Him will sanctify us, renew us, supply us, and work in us all day long.
In His New Testament economy, God speaks to us in the Son (Heb. 1:1-2); in the Old Testament He spoke in many ways in the prophets and the fathers, but now He speaks to us in the Son.
Christ, the Son of God, didn’t just bring to us God’s speaking, but He Himself was the very word of God!
Whatever Christ spoke was God’s word, and He was the embodiment of the Word of God.
The Son speaks not only by Himself in the Gospels but also through His members, the apostles and prophets – see the book of Acts, the Epistles, and Revelation; all these speakings can be considered God’s speaking, His word.
Today God speaks to us in the Son, and this Son is now corporate – it is the Body of Christ with many members, and all the members speak one thing, the word of Christ.
The word of Christ includes the entire New Testament, and we need to be filled with this word, even allow it to dwell in us richly.
When Paul says, Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, he almost personifies the word of Christ, for he tells us to let this word dwell in us as if were a living person.
In Col. 3:16 he says let the word of Christ dwell in you, and in Eph. 3:17 he says that Christ makes His home in our heart.
The word of Christ is the person of Christ, it is Christ Himself (John 15:4, 7); He abides in us when His words abide in us, when His words dwell in us richly.
Through His indwelling as the word of Christ there are many riches, and when we allow the word of Christ to dwell in us richly, He moves into our being, He rearranges things, He brings in the riches of God, and He does many things in us.
He makes His home, He settles down, and He moves into our inner being as the word of Christ, even as a person would make a house his home.
First, we have Christ as our life, then we have His living word personified as His person dwelling in us (Col. 3:4, 16); Christ as the word wants to indwell is and make our heart His home.
Since the word of Christ can dwell in us, it must be a living person; therefore, to let the word of Christ dwell in us indicates that we allow a living person – Christ Himself – to dwell in us, and He becomes our life and life supply.
The name of this person is Jesus, and the reality is the Spirit; when we call on the name of the Lord Jesus, we receive the Spirit, and when we allow the word of Christ to dwell in us richly, we get more of the Spirit.
Hallelujah, when the word of Christ dwells in us, the Spirit inhabits us!
A normal Christian life should be one that is filled with the word of Christ so that the Spirit may bubble from within us in praises to the Lord, melodies of praise, and lauding melodies to the Lord.
May we not only read the Bible to get through a reading schedule, and may we not only read the Word of God to get knowledge, doctrines, or even answers.
May we come to the Lord having the inward attitude that we want to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly in all wisdom, so that the word of Christ would inhabit us, dwell in us, and make His home in our heart.
When we open to the Lord in such a way, allowing the word the adequate room in our inner being, the word of Christ will operate and minister the riches of Christ into our inner being.
In this way Christ becomes our life and life supply, and we live because of Him, for He as the word dwells in us and makes His home in our heart, and our speaking, living, and attitude is an expression of what He is in us and to us.
Lord Jesus, we choose to let the word of Christ dwell in us richly in all wisdom. Hallelujah, Christ is the Spirit, the Spirit is in the word, and we can open to the Lord in His word to let His word dwell in us richly to minister spirit and life to us! We open to You, dear Lord, all the rooms of our inner being; we welcome You in us, we give You the space and the ground in us to move, live, redecorate, remodel, rebuild, tear down, and deal with what You want to deal with. Have a free way in us, Lord; dwell within our heart as Your home. May we have such a normal Christian life that is filled with the Word so that the Spirit may bubble from within us with songs of praise, lauding melodies, and much speaking of the word of Christ!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by James Lee for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1985, vol. 3, “Elders’ Training, Book 6: The Crucial Points of the Truth in Paul’s Epistles,” p. 531, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization Study of Jeremiah and Lamentations, week 4, God’s Words — the Divine Supply as Food.
- Hymns on this topic:
– May the mind of Christ my Savior / Live in me from day to day, / By His love and pow’r controlling / All I do and say. / May the Word of Christ dwell richly / In my heart from hour to hour, / So that all may see I triumph / Only through His pow’r. (Hymns #401)
– When we the Word in spirit touch, / As life the Spirit it becomes; / The Spirit, when expressed from us, / As words of life to others comes. / Our spirit we must exercise / To take the Word most inwardly, / And then to give the Spirit forth; / The two as one with us should be. (Hymns #815)
– All the knowledge of the Scriptures / Into life must be transformed, / All the mental understanding / In the spirit must be formed; / All the Scriptural understanding / Must become the life received, / All the knowledge of the letters / In the spirit be conceived. (Hymns #816)
