Being Ruled by the Lord to Grow in Life and have the Abundance of the Life of Christ

The more we are willing to be ruled and restricted by the Lord Jesus out of our love for Him, the more we will grow in life, and the more we will have the abundance of the life of Christ with us, thus experiencing Christ as the pomegranate. Wow, amen!

This week we come to a new topic related to the enjoyment of Christ and labouring on Him as the all-inclusive good land, A Land of Pomegranates.

In Deut. 8:8 the Lord put together wheat and barley and fig trees and pomegranates; the good land is a land of such rich items.

Christ as our all-inclusive good land is a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and pomegranates.

We may have never thought about what do the pomegranates represent or what experience of Christ do they signify; this week we want to dive deeper into the significance of this item.

We can see the pomegranates in many locations in the Old Testament, and we can realize what the spiritual significance of the pomegranates is through the ministry of the age.

In the Bible, pomegranates signify the fullness of life, the abundance and beauty of life, and the expression of the riches of life (Deut. 8:8; Exo. 28:33-34; 1 Kings 7:18-20; S. S. 4:3b, 13a).

Pomegranates are mentioned in Deuteronomy, Exodus, 1 Kings, and Song of Songs, and in each of these portions they signify the abundance of life, the beauty of life, the fullness of life, and the expression of life.

We have seen that the good land is a type of the all-inclusive Christ who is the all-inclusive, life-giving Spirit with our spirit.

This is a rich land in our spirit, even a land of the Spirit, and this Spirit is the Spirit of life.

We can also say that this land is a land of life; the doctrine of life is the Spirit, and the experience of the Spirit is life.

The very good land into which we are entering for our living, enjoyment, experience, and fulfillment of God’s purpose, is a land full of life in abundance, a land full of life!

The pomegranates in particular signify the abundance of life, the fullness of life; it is life brought to the fullness, the maturity in abundance.

The Lord’s recovery is a recovery of life; it is not only a recovery of the truth, but even more, a recovery of life.

The truth is always for life; the truth is the base, but we do not stop with the truth; we go on to enjoy Christ as life based on the truth we are constituted with.

The Lord wants to deliver us from mere doctrines and doctrinal understanding of God’s word and bring us into the enjoyment of Himself as life together with all the saints.

In the Lord’s recovery, we are not just in some kind of a movement; we are recovered back to the truth in the Word of God to live by the life of God and grow in the life of God to mature in His life and have the fullness of life and the abundance of life.

Experience and Enjoy Christ to have the Abundance of the Life of Christ and bear the Beauty of Christ

When you look at a pomegranate you immediately realize the abundance and beauty of life. When we experience Christ and enjoy Him, we will enjoy and receive the abundance of life and bear the beauty of the life of Christ.

A ripe pomegranate with its many seeds gives the impression of the fullness of life and of the abundance and beauty of life.

Some people have never seen a pomegranate; when you see it and cut it open you will be amazed at the riches and abundance you see there.

And actually, as human beings, if we want to take care of our health in a proper way, pomegranates are very good for us.

Not only the pomegranate juice is good for us but even more, the pomegranate itself with its seeds is very healthy for us.

In this article we’re not talking about physical food, though; spiritually speaking, a ripe pomegranate with its seeds signifies the fullness of life, the abundance of life, and the beauty of life.

God used this illustration of this fruit to signify that God wants His life to be in abundance toward us and in us.

We should not be satisfied just with a little enjoyment of Christ here and there; we need to enjoy the abundance of the life of Christ and bear the beauty of Christ as a result.

If we experience and enjoy Christ as the wheat, barley, the vine, and the fig tree, the abundance of the life of Christ will be with us, and the beauty of Christ will be about us; this is the experience of Christ as the pomegranate.

May we go on with the Lord and enjoy Him more until we are mature in life and have the abundance of life, even have the beauty of the life of Christ about us.

It is not sufficient for us to enjoy Christ just a little here and there; we do not discard the enjoyment of Christ day by day, but we need to advance in our enjoyment and experience Christ until we have the abundance of life.

We want to be saturated with Christ as life. Christ came not only so that we may have life but may have it abundantly (John 10:10).

We want to be filled with Him and partake of His riches in full so that we may be overflowing with His divine life to others also.

The Lord wants to return and marry His bride, but for this to happen, there has to be maturity in life, for the Lord will not marry an immature church.

Eph. 4:13 needs to be fulfilled; we need to arrive at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

We all need to arrive at the oneness of the faith and the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

We all need to be filled with life, have the abundance of the life of Christ, and overflow with life, being mature in life. We need to go on with the Lord all the way to maturity!

Only our maturation in life can satisfy the Lord, for when we are mature in the Lord, having the abundance of the life of Christ, we will be part of the bride, the prepared bride that is fully mature to match our Bridegroom.

May we go on with the Lord day by day, enjoying His life and having the abundance of the life of Christ.

We need to daily enjoy Christ as the resurrected One and by the power of His resurrection live the life of Jesus on earth to manifest the beauty and the abundance of life to others.

When others touch us, they will sense the loveliness and attractiveness of Christ, and there will be an abundance of life that will be imparted to them.

May we enjoy the Lord even in the midst of pressure, persecution, trouble, and conflict, and may we have the abundance of the life of Christ to overflow this life to others also!

Lord Jesus, we want to enjoy and experience You day by day until have the abundance of life and the beauty of life! Amen, Lord Jesus, fill us with Yourself today. We want to enjoy the resurrected Christ and by the power of Your resurrection life the life of Jesus on earth, having the sweetness and satisfaction of Christ within us! Amen, Lord, take us on to maturity and fill us with Your life until we are mature in Your life and we have the abundance of the life of Christ! May there be the loveliness and attractiveness of Christ about us, and may there be an abundance of life being imparted into others. May we all arrive at the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man, at the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ! Amen, Lord, may we all be enjoying the abundance of the life of Christ and pursue arriving to maturity so that we may be prepared to be Your bride for You to return!

Grow in Life unto Maturity by being Ruled and Restricted by the Lord Jesus out of our Love for Him

On one hand, we need to enjoy and experience Christ as the reality of the land of pomegranates; on the other hand, by enjoying Him as such a One, we become pomegranates.

If we grow in life to maturity, we will become pomegranates, having the abundance of the life of Christ and the beauty of life (Col. 2:19; 1:27-28).

A practical way we can grow in the life of Christ to have the abundance of the life of Christ is to be willing to be restricted and ruled by the Lord Jesus out of our love for Him.

Life grows by regulations; the more regulated a life is, the more it can grow properly.

Spiritually speaking, we grow in life unto maturity to have the abundance of the life of Christ by being willing to be restricted by the Lord, ruled by Him, in the realm of our love for Him.

We have been delivered out of darkness into His marvellous light, and we have been transferred out of the kingdom of Satan into the kingdom of the Son of His love (Col. 1:13).

Now we are in this realm of love and light and life, where Christ is everything to us in love and light. If we just come to Him and enjoy Him, even hold Him as the Head, we will grow in life unto maturity.

But if we hold on to our philosophy, ethics, asceticism, and ordinances, we will remain under the authority of darkness.

There are so many things in us, good things and good ordinances and practices, that keep us in darkness.

God has delivered us out of this authority and has transferred us into a kingdom of love, where we have life and light.

Here we have Christ, the Son of God’s love, to be our everything, and we have love, light, and life.

It’s not easy to explain doctrinally what happens when we love the Lord, but it is easy to testify of our experience of loving Him.

When we see how lovable and loving the Lord Jesus is, we begin to love Him, and we realize how sweet He is.

We enter into this realm of loving the Lord, and this love is mutual, for we love Him and He loves us, He’s the object of our love and we are the objects of the divine love.

As we love the Lord and enjoy Him in this way, we are spontaneously under a certain control or ruling; we are no longer free to do whatever we want to do.

We used to be free to go wherever we wanted and do whatever we wanted to do, but when we started to love the Lord Jesus, we were limited and restricted.

When we say, Lord Jesus, I love You! we lose a lot of our freedom, for we are no longer free to do what we want to do – we now want to live to Him and to please Him.

There’s no rule or regulation about it; we simply are willing to be ruled and restricted by Him because of our love for Him.

Before, we used to be involved in worldly entertainment without any sense of inward restriction; now, we desire to love the Lord and be with Him, and worldly entertainment is no longer attractive to us.

We used to mistreat people and get a lot of things for ourselves; now, because we love the Lord, we love others and want to minister Christ to them as the real riches.

This is to be in the kingdom of the Son of God’s love, being limited and restricted by the love of Christ and by our love for Him.

As those who love the Lord Jesus, we are now under His rule; His love and our love for Him is a restriction for us, and as we remain under this rule and restriction, we grow in life unto maturity to have the abundance of the life of Christ.

The Lord rules and reigns in us not in a harsh way but in a very pleasant way; He loves us and He constrains us with His love.

Because of the pleasantness of the Lord’s rule in us, we don’t speak vain words or think thoughts that displease Him.

We are ruled and restricted to the uttermost in the sweetness of the Lord’s love.

How wonderful it is to be here, ruled by the Lord’s love and growing in life unto maturity to have the abundance of the life of Christ!

We love the Lord and we want to live to Him; we no longer want to live to ourselves but to Him who loved us and gave Himself up for us (2 Cor. 5:14-15).

We want to live by Christ, not by anything else.

As we walk and live with the Lord in this way, we realize that sometimes we still live under some form of control established by the self – a control set up and carried out by the self, and therefore we are in darkness.

So we return to the Lord from any aspect of our natural being and refuse to be held under any reach of the authority of darkness, and we just love the Lord!

We live by the Son as our life in resurrection, and we live in His kingdom; this causes us to grow in life unto maturity, and we have the abundance of the life of Christ, and there’s the beauty of Christ manifested through us.

We love You, Lord Jesus. Thank You for bringing us into the kingdom of the Son of God’s love to enjoy and love the Lord Jesus, the most wonderful One! Amen, Lord Jesus, You are so lovable and so loving. We love You. We have a sweet sense of love toward You, and we sense that we are the object of Your love. Oh Lord, because we love You, we do not want to do certain things or speak certain words, simply because we don’t want to offend You. We love You, Lord, and we allow You to rule and reign in us. Keep us under Your rule and authority in our daily life. Make us willing to be ruled and restricted by the Lord Jesus out of love for Him so that we may grow in life unto maturity and have the abundance of the life of Christ. Amen, Lord Jesus, we want to live by Christ and to Christ, no longer by ourselves and to ourselves! We love You and we give ourselves to You to grow in life, have the abundance of life, and bear the beauty of the life of Christ!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by brother James Lee in the message for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Colossians, pp. 32-34, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Laboring on the All-inclusive Christ Typified by the Good land for the Building up of the Church as the Body of Christ, for the Reality and the Manifestation of the Kingdom, and for the Bride to make Herself Ready for the Lord’s Coming (2023 Winter Training), week 9, entitled, A Land of Pomegranates.
• Similar articles on this topic:
  – The kingdom in the acts, in the epistles, and in Revelation, a portion from, The Kingdom, Chapter 1, by Witness Lee.
  – Listen to radio broadcast 4 on, Delivered out of the Authority of Darkness And Transferred Into The Kingdom Of the Son Of His Love, on, life-study on radio.
  – The heart of our spiritual fathers toward us and how they have served us, via, Living to Him.
  – Knowing the All-inclusive Christ and Growing with the Growth of God, via, The Church in New York City.
  – Love—The Basis and Power of Authority, via, Shepherding Words.
  – What is the Kingdom of God and How Can You Be in It? Read more via, Holding to Truth in Love.
  – How Does God’s Light Help Us Grow? More via, Bibles for America blog.
  – The need of maturity, a portion from, The Kingdom, Chapter 39, by Witness Lee.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – By divine regeneration / We the sons of God became, / But we must mature to fullness, / Thus the birthright to obtain. / Born and fully grown to manhood, / God’s adoption we may share; / By the measure of full stature, / We God’s sonship will declare. (Hymns #741 stanza 2)
  – In the Spirit of this Jesus / Is His human life so fine. / Human virtues have been added / To the Spirit all divine. / What abundance in this Spirit, / Rich supply for all mankind! / How mysterious! Yet how real! / Such a man now lives in me. / Into all my heart He’s spreading— / He, my human life, to be. / Hallelujah! Hallelujah! / I will praise unceasingly. (Hymns #1174 stanzas 3-4)
  – Thy mighty love, O God, constraineth me, / As some strong tide it presseth on its way, / Seeking a channel in my self-bound soul, / Yearning to sweep all barriers away. / Shall I not yield to that constraining power? / Shall I not say, O tide of love, flow in? / My God, Thy gentleness hath conquered me, / Life cannot be as it hath hither been. (Hymns #431 stanzas 1-2)