In His economy God has planned that we should do everything God requires of us, but for this we need another life – the divine life, and we need to live by the divine life of God, taking Christ as our life and life supply.
In order for us to inherit the good land promised by God to His people – the all-inclusive Christ – we need to be a certain kind of person, a person that matches God in what He is.
We cannot enjoy God if we do not match Him; we cannot enter into the possession of the all-inclusive Christ if we as the inheritors do not match the Giver of the inheritance.
How can we be those who are qualified to inherit the good land? Can we improve ourselves, better ourselves, or perfect ourselves to become more up to God’s standard?
The only way we can do this is by coming to God and having Him wrought into us; only when God with His element is wrought into our being can we be the same as He is.
God is holy; we are the holy people of our holy God, and for us to become as holy as He is holy, we need to be infused with the element of God and be separated unto God to be as holy as God is.
Holiness is not merely being separated but also being saturated with God, for God is holy, and when He is working Himself into us, we become holy as He is holy!
Those who are qualified to inherit the good land know both God’s heart and His government; they know both God’s system of grace and love, and His system of government and ruling.
Christ is the One who can be such a person, and by Him and through Him and in Him we also can be such ones.
Christ makes us those who love God, trust in God, fear God, subject ourselves to God’s ruling, mind the tender feelings of God, and live in the presence of God.
God wants us to bring us, His people, into the full enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ, but we need to be a certain kind of person to enter into the land and possess it.
May we turn to Christ, be one with Christ, live in Christ, live by Christ, take Christ as our life, and be so organically one with Christ that He would supply us, sustain us, and qualify us to inherit the land.
Christ is the One who makes us those who love God, trust in God, fear God, subject ourselves to God’s ruling, mind the tender feelings of God, and live in God’s presence.
When we are one with Christ and live Christ, when we are in the organic union with this One, we are made those who can inherit the good land together with all the saints.
Carrying out the Will of God and doing what God Wants by the Lord and by His Life
For us to be qualified to enter into the good land and possess it, we need to be a certain kind of person; there are many rules, statutes, commandments, and laws that need to be fulfilled.
The Lord requires many things of us; He asks that we do many things to please Him and be qualified to be in His presence, but He does not intend that we do those things by ourselves.
It is an insult to God for us to try to keep His commandment in ourselves and by our own energy.
Yes, He has many things that He wants us to fulfill, and yes, He knows that we cannot fulfill these things, for in ourselves we don’t have the strength or the ability, and we don’t have the willingness to do these things.
God never asks us to do things for Him in ourselves; He wants us to do things by Him and in Him, even by His life that is within us.
We need to learn to have faith in God and trust in God, and He will do everything in us and for us. We simply need to participate in His operation; He operates, and we cooperate.
So we need to turn to Him again and again, especially as we see that we’re about to enter into the good land and we realize that in ourselves we cannot do it, and we need Him to do it in us!
If we cooperate with the Lord, He will be able to do what we cannot do. In ourselves and by ourselves we cannot do anything for God; we don’t have the ability, the strength, or the willingness.
Even more, it is impossible for us to please God or do things according to His standard; however, what is impossible with man is possible with God!
What is pleasing to God is that we would do things for Him but not by ourselves but by Him.
Our flesh cannot please God, no matter how hard it tries; in God’s view, despite of the nice appearance of our efforts to please Him and do His will, such a thing is abominable and evil.
It is like Cain trying to please God not by offering a sacrifice with the shedding of the blood but by bringing to Him the fruit of his work, the produce of the ground; this was not accepted by God.
For us to please God we need another life – the divine life! We need to be reborn with the divine life; we must be regenerated with the divine life, and we must live by the divine life.
With our human life – as high and good as it may be – we cannot please God; but if we live by the divine life in our human life, we have the capacity to fulfill God’s will, we can obey His commandments, and we can be pleasing to Him.
Even if our mind is clear, our love is balanced, and our will is strong, we still do not have the capacity to keep God’s commandments or do His will.
How can we human beings express God? Just as a dog cannot express a bird unless it has the bird life and it lives by the bird life, so we can’t express God unless we have God’s life and live by the divine life.
We need to have this realization that we cannot in ourselves fulfill God’s commandments, we cannot please God, and we cannot fulfill His requirements; we need another life, we need to live by the divine life, and we need Christ to live in us.
Lord Jesus, save us from trying to please You in ourselves and by our own efforts. Save us from trying to keep your commandments by our own energy. We turn to You, Lord, and we take You as our life and person. We trust in You and we have faith in You; we just want to cooperate with You as You operate in us. Do what You want to do in us, Lord, and gain what You are after in us. We want to be pleasing to You; we want to fulfill Your requirements, so we come to You, we take You as our life, and we live by You!
Not Trusting in Ourselves but Taking Christ as our Life and Life Supply to Express Christ
In fulfilling God’s requirements, we should not have any trust in ourselves but rather, we should learn to take God’s desire as our desire and take Him as our life and life supply (Eph. 4:20-21; John 11:25; 6:57).
We shouldn’t put our trust in ourselves, for we fail again and again; we should trust in the Lord, come to Him in His word, and allow Him to infuse us with Himself so that He in us may fulfill the requirements which He has for us.
This means that we need to live by another life; we need to live by the divine life in our spirit. However, we are not really accustomed to live by the divine life; by default we live by the human life, and we need no effort to express the natural man.
So we need to come to the Lord again and again to ask Him to teach us to live by the divine life. We need to take His heart’s desire as our heart’s desire, and we need to live one spirit with Him.
On one hand we need to see that in the book of Deuteronomy God is manifested, we are exposed, and Christ is unveiled as our life, our life supply, and our everything.
On the other hand, we need to put this knowledge into practice, that is, we should no longer live by our old life but live by the divine life, the only life that can fulfill God’s requirements.
This requires our daily practice of turning to the Lord and living one spirit with Him. It is not easy to live by another life; it is so easy to express ourselves and do things in ourselves, but it is quite impossible to live by the divine life.
We need to realize that we have been grafted into Christ, and we simply need to abide in Him; He is in us and we are in Him, and He in us wants to live, be expressed, and be manifested.
This is the real Christian life – a life of expressing God (and not expressing ourselves) by living by another life, the divine life in our spirit.
Just as the living Father sent the Son and the Son lived because of the Father, so we need to exercise our spirit to eat Christ in His word, breathing Him in as the living word of God, so that we may no longer live by ourselves or in ourselves but by Christ and in Christ!
God’s word in the Bible must not only be read, understood, acknowledged, and agreed with by us; we need to inhale God by breathing in the breathed out word of God in our contact with Him, and He will become our very inward constitution and will make us be qualified to enter into and possess the good land.
He is the qualified One; He is the good land, and He is also the One who qualifies us to enter into the possession and enjoyment of the good land.
When we turn to Him, breathe Him in by praying over the word of God, and learn to live by the divine life, He in us will bring us into the full enjoyment of Himself as the good land. It is good to tell the Lord along these lines,
Lord Jesus, we desire what You desire. We do not trust in ourselves, for in ourselves we are not able to be pleasing to You or fulfill Your requirements. Lord, we take You as our life and life supply. We come to You in Your word to inhale You, breathe You in, and be filled with You, so that You in us may bring us into the full enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ as the good land. Dear Lord Jesus, we desire what You desire, that we all would enter into the enjoyment and possession of the good land! Amen, Lord, do it in us! We fully open to You and we take You as our life and life supply today!
Read this article in the Romanian language / citiți acest articol și în limba română la următorul link, Nu ne încredem în noi înșine ci-L luăm pe Cristos ca viață și rezervă de viață pentru a-L exprima pe Cristos.
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, Life-study of Deuteronomy, msgs. 2, 9, 21, 23 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Deuteronomy, week 5, The Goodness of the Land — Its Minerals.
- Hymns on this topic:
– Oh, what a thought! Oh, what a boast! / Christ shall in me be magnified. / In nothing shall I be ashamed, / For He in all shall be applied. / In woe or blessing, death or life, / Through me shall Christ be testified. (Hymns #499)
– All things are possible to God; / To Christ, the power of God in man; / To me when I am all renewed, / In Christ am fully formed again, / And from the reign of sin set free, / All things are possible to me. (Hymns #535)
– In the flesh I need no effort to express / Marks of Adam’s nature and its sinfulness; / In the spirit I need not to strive or strain, / I can live as He is and in spirit reign. (Hymns #593)
