Sanctification through the Word of the Truth brings us into the Oneness of the Triune God

The more we are sanctified in the truth, the more we are one; sanctification through the word of the truth results in oneness by dealing with all the factors of division.

This is seen in the Lord’s prayer in John 17, where He prayed that His disciples and all those who believe into Him would be one, even as the Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father, that they may be in “Us” (in the Triune God).

The more we are sanctified by the truth, the more we are one intrinsically and organically.

This is why we need to come to the Lord in His word every day, taking the written word into us by means of all prayer and petition so that it becomes the living word, which is applied to our being all throughout the day.

The Bible is not a book of knowledge, history, prophecies, and teachings; the Bible is the word of God, and the very essence of God is contained and embodied in the word of God.

When we exercise our spirit to contact God in His word, we have the divine reality – the very Triune God processed and consummated to be the life-giving Spirit – applied to us and infused into us.

Our coming to the word of God should not be the same as coming to any other book; we need to come to God’s word by exercising our spirit and having an open heart to contact the Lord and receive His element into us.

We can muse on the word of God; we muse on God’s word not by merely meditating on it, pondering what it means, or analyzing and studying it. We muse on God’s word by worshipping God with His word, conversing with ourselves with His word, speaking His word out loud, and praying His word back to God.

The word of God – the entire Bible – is the breath of God, and we can breathe in the very element of God by our prayerful reading and consideration of God’s word. If we do this, if we have such an attitude toward God when we come to His word, there will be a transfusion of the element of God into us.

The infusion of God’s element into us will free us from anything that is negative and will add more of God to us for us to be sanctified.

We cannot sanctify ourselves; we can’t get rid of our jealousy, hatred, pride, or temper, but when we enjoy the Lord in His word, all these negative things are spontaneously dealt with.

We are set free from any falsehood and hypocrisy when we come to the Lord in His word, for the element of God is wrought into us.

And we don’t realize this or feel this right away; rather, as we keep coming to the Lord in His word in a living way and take Him as life, opening to Him from the deepest part of our being, we will spontaneously be freed from the negative things and we are saturated with the element of God.

In such a way, we are made one with Him.

Sanctification through the Word of the Truth Results in Oneness by Dealing with the Factors of Division

How can we have genuine oneness? If someone would ask us this question, what would we answer?

According to John 17:14-24, we can have genuine oneness only by being sanctified through the word of the truth. Sanctification through the word of the truth results in oneness, for this deals with the factors of division.

The more we are sanctified in the truth, the more we are one.

Our being sanctified issues in our entering into the oneness of the Triune God, and this is genuine oneness; genuine oneness is the oneness in the Triune God.

Sanctification through the word of the truth is the way for us to be one. If we are not sanctified, we spontaneously have problems with the oneness.

We may think that this is the problem or that is the problem, but the real issue is not being in the sanctification through the word of the truth.

We may identify the symptoms of the real problem, and we may realize what the factors of division are, but unless we are sanctified in the truth, we can’t be one.

We need to get to the heart of the problem: we are short of sanctification, for we are too much in ourselves and we’re not enough in the Triune God; the result is that there’s a problem with the oneness.

If I am in myself and you are in yourself, how can we be one? It is only when we get out of ourselves and into the Triune God that we can have no problems with the oneness; we don’t even have to talk about the oneness – oneness is simply there.

Truth sanctifies us, and this sanctification issues in oneness; knowledge doesn’t issue in oneness, neither do teachings or doctrines – only sanctification issues in oneness.

It is very important for us to touch the truth in a proper way so that the result would be oneness, not more opinions, divisions, or sects.

The Lord Jesus – the Son of God – is the truth; the Spirit is the Spirit of truth; and the Father’s word is the truth (see John 1:14, 17; 14:6, 17; 17:17; 1 John 5:6).

The truth is simply the Triune God and His word; this is what we mean when we speak of the truth.

The Father is embodied in the Son, the Son is realized as the Spirit of truth (the Spirit of reality), and the Spirit is one with the Word; the Spirit is embodied in the Word (Col. 2:9; John 14:17; 16:13; Eph. 6:17-18).

God the Father is embodied in God the Son; Christ is the embodiment of the Triune God, and in Him, all the fullness of the Godhead dwells.

Christ went through death and resurrection, and in resurrection, He became a life-giving Spirit; this Spirit is the Spirit of reality, which is the realization of the Triune God, and this Spirit is embodied in the Word of God.

When we touch the Word of God, we touch the tangible Spirit.

Whenever we come to the Word with an open heart and an open spirit, we immediately touch both the Word and the Spirit as the truth; we need to have an open heart, an open spirit, and an open mouth to enjoy the Lord in His word.

The sanctifying word, the sanctifying Spirit, the sanctifying life, and the sanctifying God are all one; therefore, if we are being sanctified, we are one spontaneously because all the factors of division are taken away.

Lord Jesus, sanctify us through the word of the truth so that all the factors of division would be dealt with and we would be kept in oneness. Amen, Lord, bring us into the genuine oneness by sanctifying us in the truth. We come to You in Your word to be sanctified by You. Thank You for being processed and consummated to be the life-giving Spirit embodied in the Word. Hallelujah, we can come to the Word of God with the exercise of our spirit and an open heart to be sanctified in the truth. Have a way in us, Lord, through Your sanctifying work through the truth; sanctify us in the truth and make us one by bringing us into the enlarged oneness of the Triune God!

Sanctification Issues in Oneness by Keeping us in the Triune God, by Bringing us into the Oneness of the Triune God

In His prayer in John 17:17-23, the Lord asked the Father to sanctify us in the truth, and He ends by asking the Father to bring us into the Triune God so that we may be one.

Sanctification in the divine truth issues in oneness by our entering into the Triune God and being included in the enlarged oneness of the Triune God.

Sanctification issues in the genuine oneness because this sanctification keeps us in the Triune God; v. 21 says, That they all may be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us. The way for us to be one is to be in the “Us”, that is, in the Triune God.

How can we be in the Triune God so that we may be one in a genuine way? The only way to be in the Triune God is by the sanctifying truth that deals with all the factors of division.

John 14:21 shows that, for us to be one, we need to be in the Triune God; later, the Lord said that He has given us His glory so that we may be perfected into one (v. 23).

This means that there are levels of oneness, just as we see in Eph. 4, where we have the oneness of the Spirit which we have and need to be diligent to keep, but then we need to arrive at another level of oneness, the oneness of the faith and of the full knowledge of the Son of God, at a full-grown man (v. 13).

First, we need to be in the Triune God by being sanctified through the word of the truth, and then we need to be perfected to be one in the divine glory.

Glory is God’s expression; in ourselves, we have our own expression, for each one of us expresses himself.

When we are in the glory of God, we express only one thing, which is God Himself; this requires us to grow and be brought on not only into God but also into glory.

When the Lord was on the earth, He was in God the Father, but He was not in the Father’s glory, for He was not glorified yet; after death and resurrection, He was brought in the divine glory to express God in full.

Now we have His glory, and we are being perfected into oneness by being in the divine glory.

Today we are in Christ, but we still need to be perfected into one, that is, to be brought into the same expression, to be brought into the glory.

May we give ourselves to the Lord to be sanctified in the truth so that we may be brought into the Triune God and kept in the Triune God.

By being kept in the Triune God, we are one; whenever we are out of the Triune God, however, we are immediately divided.

We need to contact the Lord every morning and touch the living Word so that we may have the divine reality infused into our being.

As we contact the Lord in a living way in His word, all the factors of division are overcome; they are not wiped out once and for all but rather, day by day our outer man with the factors of division is being consumed.

When the factors of division in us are put to death by the sanctifying truth, we are brought into the genuine oneness, for sanctification keeps us in the Triune God.

Amen, we want to be in the Triune God through the sanctifying truth, so that we may express God in oneness with God and with one another.

Sanctification through the word of the truth results in the oneness of the Body of Christ, which is the enlarged oneness of the Triune God.

There’s no problem with the oneness between the Three of the Divine Trinity, so when we are brought into this oneness, we also have no problem with the oneness; however, we need to arrive at that point by being sanctified in the truth.

Lord Jesus, we want to contact You every morning, touch the living Word, and have the divine reality infused into our being so that all the factors of division may be overcome. Sanctify us in the truth – Your word is truth. Bring us into the genuine oneness by our being in the sanctifying truth day by day. Save us from not being sanctified; save us from not being in intimate contact with Christ, the living word of God. May we be in the sanctifying Word day by day so that we may have the genuine oneness and be kept in the Triune God! Amen, Lord, sanctify us in the truth until we are in “Us”, in the enlarged oneness of the Triune God!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Mark Raabe for this week, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1978, vol. 3, “Truth Messages,” ch. 7, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Knowing the Truth, being Absolute for the Truth, and Proclaiming the Truth in this Present Evil Age (2021 Memorial Day Weekend Conference), week 2, Being Sanctified by the Truth to Move out of Ourselves and into the Triune God for the Genuine Oneness.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – How we thank Thee that Thy holy Word / With Thy nature, saturates us; / From the world it separates us. / Thank Thee, Father, for Thy holy Word. / Through Thy Word, through Thy Word, / We have oneness through Thy Word. / Through Thy Word, through Thy Word, / Through Thy holy Word we’re all made one. (Hymns #1081)
  – Just to enjoy Thy word; / Thy truth doth sanctify, / Become our full reality, / And oneness bring thereby. (Song on, Just to enjoy Thy word)
  – By His will He sanctifieth, / By the Spirit’s power within; / By the loving hand that chasteneth / Fruits of righteousness to win; / By His truth and by His promise, / By the Word, His gift unpriced, / By His own blood, and by union / With the risen life of Christ. (Hymns #825)