Day: November 6, 2022
二零二二年七月半年度训练列王纪结晶读经 第二周 借着紧紧跟随那有时代异象的时代执事，而进入时代的职事—四段要紧的路程
Crystallization-study of 1 & 2 Kings– Week 2
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Four Crucial Journeys to Enter into the Ministry of the Age by Closely Following the Minister of the Age with the Vision of the Age
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Corporate Reading: The Meaning of Human Life and a Proper Consecration, Chapter 6, Section:
Exercising the Spirit
The Proper Concept of Consecration
Consecration Being to Take the Lord as Our Person
Being Delivered from a Mistaken Concept
Receiving the Help
Being Filled and Having a Thorough Consecration
The Meaning of Human Life and a Proper Consecration, Chap 6, Section 2 of 2
RECEIVING THE HELP
It seems as though the help that we have received in the past was fragmented. For example, we heard a message that focused on the ears, a message that focused on the nose, and a message that focused on the lips. We also heard a message that focused on the two hands. Such messages can give only fragmented help. However, once we receive the complete person, we will have the ears, the nose, the lips, and the hands. As long as we receive the Lord as our person, we have everything.
Even though the messages that we heard in the past seem to have been fragmented, our need today is to receive the Lord as our person. When the Lord comes in to be our person, the old man will have no place, and we will have everything. We should not be influenced by complicated and natural thoughts and concepts; neither should we be influenced by religious traditions. When we receive the Lord Jesus, not only do we receive His whole person, but we also receive Him once for all. Hence, immediately after we receive Him, [177] we can and we should consecrate ourselves to Him. There is no need to wait. However, since many of us did not have a proper consecration when we received the Lord, we need to make up for it today.
We need to have a proper understanding. Christ desires to make His home in our hearts (Eph. 3:17). He entered into us the day that we were saved, but He still has not made home in us. In the past we did not speak concerning Christ making His home in our heart, because we thought that people would not understand. Now we need to change our concept. Even when we preach the gospel, we must tell others that they are in a pitiful condition because Christ does not dwell in them and has not made His home in them.
We must also change the way that we give messages. We were unable to stir others up, and we also lost our vigor. We should no longer preach such a low gospel. When we preach the gospel, we can say, “Dear friend, you are a vessel created by God for Himself. Although you are lovely, you are empty. I know that you are empty because you do not have the Lord Jesus in you. The Lord Jesus is the real Lord, the real God. He desires to enter into you and dwell in you. You need the Lord Jesus. Please pray with us.”
BEING FILLED AND
HAVING A THOROUGH CONSECRATION
We must look to the Lord in order to be filled by Him. Then we can go out and preach the gospel. When we are strengthened into the inner man, Christ will make His home in our hearts so that we may be filled unto all the fullness of God (vv. 16-19). Then we will be able to tell people that they need Jesus and that the Lord desires not only to be their Savior but also to enter into them and indwell them. It is glorious for people to hear this kind of gospel and be saved. We should also speak concerning consecration. Actually, to preach the gospel is to speak concerning consecration. Every person needs Jesus, and the Lord Jesus wants to dwell in every person. Therefore, they should yield their inner being to the Lord so that He can enter into them and be their person. We must not say that people cannot understand this. If we would only speak in this way, people would understand.
Do not say that consecration does not allow a believer to study abroad but requires him to serve full time, stand on the ground of the church, or preach the gospel. This is our concept. A brother said [178] that consecration helps believers to be spiritual, to overcome, and to be holy. He said that consecration is for us to be spiritual. Such a religious concept is harmful because it implies that they need to consecrate themselves so that they might be spiritual. It is rather simple for the unbelievers, who have never heard the things in Christianity, to comprehend the gospel and consecration. Hence, we can tell them, “You are empty inside; you need Jesus. He desires to enter into you and dwell in you. Open yourself, hand yourself over to Him, and let Him occupy you.” This is very simple, but this is consecration. Many saints have been saved for a long time but have not had such a proper and thorough consecration.
Ephesians 3:16-19 says, “That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit into the inner man, that Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith,…that you may be filled unto all the fullness of God.” When we are strengthened into the inner man, Christ will make His home in our hearts, and we will be filled unto all the fullness of God. Therefore, once Christ makes His home in our hearts, we will be filled. This is the genuine filling of the Holy Spirit. This is not a partial filling. When we let Christ make His home in our hearts, the result is that we will be filled with the Holy Spirit unto all the fullness of God.
Let me add a word of explanation. We must differentiate between man and person. I am a man, a human being, but within me there is a person. Our inner man refers to our regenerated spirit. The Lord Jesus is in our spirit, our inner man, to be our person. Our inner man is our regenerated spirit, and its person is the Lord Himself. The Lord is the person in our inner man. We need to know the difference between these two phrases: our regenerated spirit is our inner man and the Lord is the person in our inner man.
May we all consecrate ourselves absolutely to the Lord. I am saying this not only to the young saints. The older saints should also practice this. We need an absolute consecration. By the Lord’s mercy, we need a thorough salvation so that the Lord can enter into us, occupy us completely, and be our person. This is a very simple matter. We need such a genuine consecration. We should pray, “Lord, I will receive Your salvation. This salvation is Yourself. Come into me and be my person.” This is a simple prayer. The Lord is the Spirit, and He is God. When we take Him as our person, He will [179] occupy us and fill us. This is the way to be filled with the Holy Spirit. A genuine and thorough consecration is to receive Christ as our person, letting Him make home in us. As a result, we will be filled with Him unto all the fullness of God.
The Meaning of Human Life and a Proper Consecration, Chap 6, Section 1 of 2
CHAPTER SIX
CONSECRATION BEING
TO TAKE THE LORD AS OUR PERSON
EXERCISING THE SPIRIT
I would like to touch a few things. First, our spirit needs to be fresh so that we will not be old. When we are in the meetings, we must exercise our spirit and open our being to the Lord. We should not follow any forms. Second, we should not pray-read the Bible in an old way or make it a ritual. We should exercise our spirit so that it will be strong and fresh; otherwise, the spirit of the meeting will sink. In our earlier meetings all the saints were beside themselves. Now, however, none of the saints are beside themselves. We must consider whether their being beside themselves was genuine. If it was genuine but could not stand the test of time, then we need more practice. We should not have the Spirit today and lose Him tomorrow. Hence, we must practice being proper and skillful in the exercise of our spirit.
Some saints are rough in their pray-reading, but the spirit is gentle, not rough. As long as we are rough, we will not be able to follow the spirit. The Bible compares the Holy Spirit to a dove (Matt. 3:16), not to a wild bull. For this reason, it is easier for a gentle person to cooperate with the Spirit. Some of the saints even pray-read 1 Corinthians 6:17 as if they were wild bulls. This proves that they still need more practice. Although our spirit needs to be strong, living, and fresh, it still needs to be fine and gentle. We should not be too quick.
THE PROPER CONCEPT OF CONSECRATION
Many of us have spent sufficient time with the Lord and have thoroughly consecrated ourselves to Him. Perhaps we feel that since the Lord loves us and since He died and lives for us, we also need to love Him and give ourselves to Him for His use. We may be willing to do whatever the Lord wants us to do. We are even willing to make [174] great resolutions in our heart. Perhaps we resolve that one day we will preach the gospel overseas or declare the Lord’s love to the aborigines. We may even be resolute and ask the Lord to cleanse us, fill us, and equip us for His use, even though we are not qualified, useful, or gifted. Nevertheless, this kind of consecration is religious.
Suppose a brother is weak, lazy, impatient, and cannot overcome his temper, and therefore he consecrates himself to the Lord in order to receive grace. He feels that without consecration he has no way to receive grace in order to become a spiritual giant. This is the consecration of a pitiful Christian. This is not a religious consecration; it is a pious consecration. Some Christians are diligent, gentle, pious, patient, and good-tempered from birth; therefore, their family, neighbors, and classmates say that they are perfect. According to our natural, pious thoughts, Christians who are gentle and patient and who never lose their temper do not need to consecrate themselves. Some consecrations are even based on strange concepts, such as being a ball for the Lord to throw wherever He wants.
These examples should help us to understand what is a religious consecration, what is a pious consecration, and what is a consecration that is based on strange concepts. Now we should consider our own consecration. If we ask the Lord to be our person so that we will not lose our temper, then we are still the person; the Lord is not our person. This kind of consecration is a pious consecration. Religion means that a person has something to worship and believe in and that he develops a set of teachings based on his beliefs. This is religion.
CONSECRATION BEING
TO TAKE THE LORD AS OUR PERSON
We want neither a religious consecration nor a pious consecration. Our consecration must take Christ as our person. Every consecration should be to take Christ as our person. Consecration is not for us to do something for the Lord but for us to hand ourselves over to the Lord. We give the Lord our bad parts as well as our good parts. This means that we let the Lord be our person, and we acknowledge that we are finished. Furthermore, we no longer ask the Lord to tell us what to do; rather, we let Him do things in us. We should not deal with our temper. In fact, we do not even know how [175] to deal with it. We should let the Lord handle our temper because He is our person. We do not bear that responsibility.
Some saints may be concerned about the uncertainty of their future but say that the Lord, not they, should worry about their future. Such a thought is a religious concept. Concerning our future, we need to be simple. The Lord is among us, He is in us, and He is our person. We simply need to say, “Hallelujah! It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” There is no need to explain further. Any explanation is religion.
The Word says that we are vessels to contain the Lord (Rom. 9:23). We are also His house for Him to dwell in (1 Cor. 3:16-17; Eph. 2:22) and be our person. It is easy for a person to go in and out of a physical house that is lifeless and void of a will and a personality. However, as the Lord’s house, we are living creatures with a personality, a will, preferences, and inclinations, all of which are our person. In other words, even though we are the Lord’s house, we are persons. Consecration means to let Him dwell in us by taking Him as our person; hence, our original person has to “move out.” The Bible says that our old man has been crucified with Christ, dealt with. Now we have a second person, Christ. Even though we are the Lord’s dwelling place, we have life, a personality, a will, preferences, and inclinations; hence, we are still our person. Now that we have received the Lord as the person, our former person must “move out.”
Giving ourselves to the Lord means that we neither do anything for Him nor ask Him to do anything for us. We give ourselves to Him so that He can live in us, that is, make His home in us, to be our person. Although the old man is buried, in our experience he continually returns. The old man is buried, but we always seem to resurrect him. Even though our old man may be crucified and buried in the morning, he often is resurrected in our experience before noon. The next day we have the same experience: he is dead in the morning but returns in the afternoon. The old person frequently returns to be our person. This is where our problem lies.
BEING DELIVERED FROM A MISTAKEN CONCEPT
By the Lord’s mercy we were brought into the light of His Word to see that His salvation is practical, complete, thorough, and simple. The influence of tradition and our Christian background [176] have given us a mistaken concept. Our concept is that we need salvation because we are sinners destined to perish in hell. We say that we need His salvation to be forgiven of our sins, to be delivered from hell, and to be spared from God’s judgment. We also say that we need another life because our life is corrupt and evil. When we believe in the Lord, He gives us another life, His eternal life. Not only does the Lord give eternal life, but He gives His Spirit to live in us as our power, sanctification, and everything. For this reason, we should love Him and give ourselves to Him. All of the above are right. Nevertheless, in our subconsciousness we still have a religious concept that we should do something for the Lord.
May the Lord have mercy on us so that we would be completely freed from tradition and religious concepts. The Lord’s wonderful way of salvation is to work Himself into us. We are vessels created by Him. He puts Himself into us not only to be our life but even more to be our person. As soon as we receive Him, He enters into us to be our person and our everything. This means that as soon as we receive the Lord as our person, spontaneously our sins are forgiven; we are delivered from the lake of fire and spared from God’s judgment. Furthermore, we have God’s life and His Spirit. As long as we receive the Lord as our person, we have everything.