I love the title of this week’s morning revival – being sanctified by the truth to move out of ourselves and into the Triune God for the oneness. The Bible reveals that the truth in the Bible has two main functions – the truth sets us free (John 8:32) and the truth sanctifies us (John 17:17).
As we get into the word of God in a prayerful way, being open to the Lord’s shining on us, the truth frees us and releases us from any negative thing and it also saturates us with the divine element of God, causing us to move out of ourselves and into the Triune God!
In times of degradation, we need the truth
The apostle John wrote his gospel and his epistles in a time of degradation and of darkness, and he emphasized the light and the truth. In the period of darkness, there’s the need for the shining of the light – which is the truth – and the expression of the light.
In his second and third Epistles, John speaks about walking in the truth, loving in the truth, knowing the truth, the truth abiding in us, and the truth being with us forever. This is his greatest joy, to see his children walk in the truth (3 John 4)!
The two functions of the truth in the Bible
As mentioned before, the Bible mentions at least these two functions of the truth – the truth sets us free (John 8:32) and the truth sanctifies us (John 17:17). The Lord Jesus told us, You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. When we don’t know the truth and when we don’t read the Bible for a while, we are deprived of the truth and we are in bondage, in slavery.
This is why the Dark Ages happened – and this period ended as soon as the Bible was recovered by being translated into the language of the people! To know the truth is to be set free and to be released!
Also, the Lord Jesus said in John 17:17, Sanctify them in the truth; Your word is truth. To sanctify is both to separate us from anything else unto God and to saturate us with the element of God. When we pray-read the word of God, the very divine element of God is saturating our whole inward being, and we are saturated with God. On the one hand, we are separated and set aside from anything else unto God, and on the other hand, we are slowly being saturated and reconstituted with the element of God contained in the Word.
the Spirit and the Bible, the Spirit of truth
As Christians we have the Spirit within and the Bible without, and in these last days of the age, in the age where the church is degraded, we need to learn to walk in the truth. Paul encourages us to walk according to the Spirit (Rom. 8), and John is made happy when the believers walk in the truth (3 John 4). The Spirit is within, and the truth is without – these two are one! To walk in the truth is to walk according to the Spirit; we shouldn’t separate the two.
This is why we need to exercise our spirit when we come to the Word – we need the word of God to become living and operative to us, and we need the Spirit to be the Spirit of truth setting us free and sanctifying us! The Spirit of truth is the truth itself which is being constituted into us and is part of us. Something wonderful, mysterious, and organic happens when we pray-read the word of God: we are freed and released, we are separated and saturated with God, and we walk in truth, that is, we walk according to the Spirit!
[sharing inspired from, Truth Messages msg. 1 (by brother Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Four Great Pillars in the Lord’s Recovery.]
Lord, make the Word of God living and operative to us whenever we come to it! Shine on us in Your Word, and set us free! How we need to be released from anything else that holds us down and entangles us! Lord, set us free indeed by the truth in Your Word! Also, continue to saturate us with Your element! O, Lord, we praise You for the functions of the truth in the Word of God! Praise You we can be separated unto You and we also can be saturated with Your element!
