Letting Christ make His Home Deep Down in our Heart and Living in His Inward Parts

The apostle Paul was a pattern in taking Christ as our person for the one new man; like him, we need to let Christ make His home deep down in our heart, long for the saints in the inward parts of Christ, let the mind of Christ be in us, do everything in the person of Christ, and walk according to the spirit.

Paul became a pattern to us, he, the one who had so many ordinances and was so zealous for the law, for he met the Lord and the Father revealed His Son in him. It pleases the Father to reveal His Beloved Son in us so that He would live in us, be formed in us, and be expressed through us.

When Christ appears to us, when we see Him as the great corporate Me, the Head with the Body, the one new man, we are saved, we are infused with Him, and He begins to be formed in us.

In our time with the Lord, in our personal and intimate contact with Him, He draws us, we are involved with Him, and we have an appreciation for Him; this bring us into an organic union with the Lord, and it is here that we live our daily life.

In the organic union with the Lord, the old man is put aside, and the new man is being renewed to live in us and be formed in us.

Oh, may we be those who hold to Christ in our organic union with Him so that He may be able to make His home deep down in our heart, that is, to house Himself into all the rooms of our inner being!

As the Lord is making His home in our heart, He moves into us and we move into Him, He lives in us and we live in Him, and He becomes our person in a practical way.

In the organic union with the Lord, as we live in the index of His eyes and in His inward parts, we have the same tender feelings for the saints, the same sentiments toward others and toward things, and we are taking Christ as our person in a practical way.

This will bring us to have the mind of Christ, for we behold Him and are infused with Him; in the index of His eyes, we can forgive others, we can yearn for the saints, and we can have the mind of Christ. Amen, Lord Jesus!

As we let the Lord make His home in our heart, we spontaneously walk in the mingled spirit, and it is this walking by the Spirit in our spirit that fulfills all the requirements in the New Testament. When we walk by the Spirit, the law is spontaneously fulfilled in us, and we live Christ by taking Christ as our person.

Christ makes His Home Deep Down in our Heart as we Take Him as our Person Daily

In his second prayer in Ephesians Paul bowed his knees to the Father, of whom every family in the heavens and on earth is named, that He would grant all the saints, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit into the inner man, so that Christ may make His home in their heart through faith.

This expression, make His home, is one word in Greek, kataoikeo, which means not merely to build a house but to make His home downward. Kata means “down”, while “oikeo” means house; the Lord wants to house Himself down in our heart.

Just as in big cities there are “underground cities” deep down under the actual city, so the Lord wants to make His home downward or “underground” in us.

He is not merely after outward things, the outward manifestation – He wants to make His home deep down in our heart. So the Father, according to His wisdom, is exercising His sovereignty to strengthen us through His Spirit into our inner man, so that Christ may make His home deep down in our heart.

We simply need to be open to Him and allow Him to make His home deep down in our heart.

Through regeneration we have been rooted into Him, and now the Father works to strengthen us through God the Spirit so that Christ, God the Son, would make His home deep down in our heart. He wants to make His home in our mind (Heb. 4:12), our will (Acts 11:23), emotion (John 16:6, 22), and conscience (Heb. 10:22).

Before we were regenerated, our heart was devoid of Him; our mind, emotion, will, and conscience didn’t have God in them.

But praise the Lord, the Father is working to strengthen us into our inner man so that Christ would gradually begin to occupy our mind, take over our emotion and will, and possess our conscience, so that Christ make His home deep down in our heart.

This is to take Christ as our person. Our heart is like a house with four rooms – our mind, emotion, will, and conscience – and Christ desires to occupy every room of our heart, even to occupy every corner of every room in our heart.

As we take Christ as our person, He makes His home downward in our heart to occupy every part of our heart, and we become strong to apprehend with all the saints the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth of Christ (Eph. 3:18).

As we take Christ as our person daily, He makes His home deep down in our heart and we apprehend with all the saints the immeasurable Christ, whose dimensions are the dimensions of the universe.

This is how the Lord builds up His church; He promised that He would build His church (Matt. 16:18). For Him to build His church, we as the many members of the Body need to allow Christ to make His home deep down in our heart so that our entire being would be saturated within with Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God.

We need to let the Triune God saturate and possess our inward being, occupying every corner and every avenue of our entire being. In this way we have the subjective experience of the Triune God, and the Triune God is mingling Himself with us, His chosen and redeemed people.

Praise the Lord, through regeneration we have entered into the Triune God and the Triune God has entered into us, and now we are still entering into Him, as He is making His home deep down in our heart.

May we learn to open to the Lord and allow Him to house Himself in us by taking possession of all our inward parts; may we give Him the thoroughfare in every corner and avenue of our entire being, so that He may mingle Himself with us more for the one new man.

Thank You Father for granting us to be strengthened with power through Your Spirit into the inner man! Amen, Lord, we open to be strengthened with power through the Spirit into the inner man so that Christ may make His home in our heart. Praise You, Father, for exercising Your sovereignty to cause us to be strong through Your Spirit so that Christ may make His home deep down in our heart. We open to You, Lord, for Your downward making of Your home in our mind, emotion, will, and conscience. We open every door to the rooms of our heart, and we give You the thoroughfare to make Your home deep down in every part of our heart.

Living in the Inward Parts of Christ, Letting His Mind be in us, and Living in the Spirit

When we allow the Lord to make His home deep down in our heart, we will no longer live in ourselves but in the inward parts of Christ.

Paul as a pattern said that God is his witness how he longed after all the saints in the inward parts of Christ Jesus (Phil. 1:8). This means the Paul didn’t live a life in his natural being but rather, he lived a life in the inward parts of Christ.

We need to experience Christ in His inward parts and even be one in His inward parts, and we need to live in His inward parts. This is a result of Christ making His home in our heart; as He is housing Himself deep down in our heart, we need to allow Him to saturate our inward parts with Himself.

We shouldn’t keep our inward parts but take Christ’s inward parts as ours; in this way, our inner being is reconstituted with the inward parts of Christ, and we will live in the Lord’s inward parts.

One of these inward parts is the mind of Christ; we should let the mind which was in Christ Jesus also be in us (2:5). This means that we need to take Christ as our person by denying our natural mind and by taking His mind; this is to let Christ’s mind be in us.

When we spend time with the Lord in His word, when we contact the Lord and enjoy Him, and when we remain in this organic union with Him, He makes His home deep down in our heart; this means that the mind of Christ becomes our mind, and this mind includes Christ, His Spirit, and the constituents of the new man, all of which invade our mind and cause us to have a new consciousness, a new concept.

If we intend to take Christ as our person, we must be willing to deny our mind and have our mind replaced by the mind of Christ. If we do this, we will think as He does; His person is expressed through His mind.

When we forgive someone, we forgive in the person of Christ (2 Cor. 2:10). Paul lived Christ in the closest and most intimate contact with Him, acting according to the index of His eyes.

Paul was a person who was one with Christ, full of Christ, and saturated with Christ; he was a person broken and even terminated in his natural life, softened and flexible in his will, affectionate yet restricted in his emotion, considerate and sober in his mind, and pure and genuine in his spirit toward the saints for their benefit.

Amen, may we be such ones by constantly beholding the Lord and taking Him as our person! This all can be done when we live according to the spirit; when we walk not according to the flesh but according to the spirit, the righteous requirement of the law is fulfilled in us (Rom. 8:4).

In practicality, to take Christ as our person is to have our being wholly according to the mingled spirit. In our daily life we should not have our being according to teaching, feelings, concepts, or circumstances but according to the mingled spirit, taking Christ as our person for the universal one new man.

May we have an advancement of taking Christ as our person so that we may become part of the new man with Christ as its everything – life and person!

Lord Jesus, we want to live a life in the inward parts of Christ and experience Christ in His inward parts, not keeping our own inward parts as our own but being one with Christ in His inward parts! Amen, Lord, may the mind which was in Christ also be in us! Strengthen us into our inner man so that Christ may make His home deep down in our heart until His mind replaces our mind, and we do everything in the person of Christ! Amen, Lord Jesus, may our daily living and even our being be according to the spirit and not according to the flesh, so that we may have the living of the one new man in practicality!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by bro. Rick Scatterday for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1984, vol. 3, “God’s New Testament Economy,” ch. 39, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The One New Man Fulfilling God’s Purpose in Creating Man (2019 fall ITERO), week 4, Taking Christ as Our Person for the One New Man.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – So, Lord, I give my heart to Thee today, / That it may be Thy home in every way, / A place for Thee to come and settle down, / And all Thy grand recovery work to crown / In one new man. (Hymns #1179)
  – Make home in my heart, O Lord Jesus, / Make home in my heart, I pray; / That we may be filled with Your fullness, / Make home in my heart today. (Hymns #1134)
  – Lord, we want to live You / In the most intimate / And the closest contact, / Closest contact with You. / Acting according / To the index of Your eyes; / A person one with Christ, / Full of Christ. (Song on, Lord, we want to live You)