GOD BEING THE FATHER, THE SON, AND THE SPIRIT 
FOR THE PURPOSE OF ENTERING 
INTO HIS CHOSEN PEOPLE

The Gospel of John is a book that we love very much, yet it is also a very mysterious book. In particular, the portion in John 14 concerning the truth of the mystery of the Divine Trinity is not easy to explain.

What is the purpose for God to be triune—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit? It is so that He can enter into us as the Spirit. If God were one and did not have the aspect of being three—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit—He would have no way to reach us and dispense Himself into us. The story of the Trinity, God being triune, is altogether for God to enter into us, His chosen people. [382]

Many Christians have not seen the truth of the Divine Trinity in the Bible. Why does God have to be triune? God does not have to be triune to be worshipped by us. The reason He is triune is that He may work Himself into us. For example, if some wheat wants to enter into us, it must first pass through a process. Of course, we can be like the Lord’s disciples and eat raw ears of wheat from the grainfields (Matt. 12:1), but that is not the proper way of eating. It is not proper to eat the ears of wheat because they have not been processed. Instead, we should eat the wheat that has been processed. What is the process that the wheat has to go through? First, a grain of wheat has to be sown into the soil so that ears of wheat can be produced. Then the wheat has to be ground into flour and made into bread or noodles for us to receive. Originally it was wheat, but in order to become our food, it has to be ground into flour and then made into bread or noodles. Hence, both the bread and the noodles are made with flour, and the flour comes from the wheat. This does not mean that once you have the bread, the flour is gone, or that once you have the flour, the wheat is gone. What has happened is that after being processed, the wheat has become flour and has been made into noodles for the purpose of getting into us.

THE DIVINE TRINITY BEING FOR US TO EAT

The above illustration helps us to see that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one God—the Triune God—to be our food. This is not man’s word but the word of the Bible. John 6 tells us about a little boy who had five barley loaves and who came to the place where Jesus and a great crowd gathered. Eventually, the five barley loaves went into the five thousand people who ate them. Later the Lord said, “I am the bread of life” (v. 35). This means that the barley loaves signify the Lord Himself. Then in chapter 12 the Lord said that He is the grain of wheat (v. 24). He is the wheat, and He is also the bread, for the wheat has to be ground into flour before it can be made into bread. He is the wheat, He is also the flour, and He is even more the bread for us to eat. Therefore, when He is the wheat, He is still the bread, and when He is the bread, He is still the wheat.

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF BREAKING THE BREAD

Eating, drinking, and enjoying the Lord are basic truths in the Bible. When the Lord Jesus established His supper, He took the [383] bread and said, “Take, eat; this is My body” (Matt. 26:26). He also said, “This is My body which is being given for you” (Luke 22:19). The Lord’s body, signified by the bread, is the Lord Himself. What the Lord meant was that He would go to the cross and give His body for us to eat. He had not yet gone, but in a short while, at dawn, He would go. Therefore, He gave the bread to the disciples, saying that it was His body and that they should take and eat it. This meant that He wanted them to eat Him.

However, today many Christians make the breaking of bread a religious ritual. The Catholic Church calls it a “mass,” whereas the Protestant churches call it “holy communion.” They do not understand that the real spiritual significance of bread-breaking is that Jesus as the embodiment of God is the bread. He was a grain of wheat that went through a process to become flour and a further process to be made into bread for us to eat. Today when we believe in the Lord Jesus, we eat Him. The One in whom we believe is the processed Triune God, and the One of whom we eat is the processed grain of wheat. The Lord as the processed grain of wheat is the bread, and the processed Triune God is the Spirit.

THE BELIEVERS BECOMING 
ONE BREAD, ONE BODY, THROUGH EATING

Today the truth of Christ being the Spirit is crystal clear, but I am afraid that you still do not have a complete comprehension of this matter. Please bear in mind that God’s economy, God’s dispensing, God’s union with us, and God’s corporate expression are all included in this truth. Regarding the bread in the Lord’s table meeting, we are all clear that the wheat has to be ground into flour, and the flour has to be made into bread before it is ready for us to eat. Christ, who is the Triune God, said that He Himself is the bread of life for us to eat. Our partaking of the bread indicates that we participate in Christ, and as a result, we are all made one to be His one Body. Therefore, the Bible tells us that although we are many, we are one bread, because we all eat Him (1 Cor. 10:17). This bread is the Body of Christ, which is the church, His one corporate expression.

Therefore, in the story of the Divine Trinity we see God’s economy, God’s dispensing, and God’s union with us. Ultimately, we see that we all become one bread, expressing Christ as the embodiment [384] of the Triune God. This bread, which was originally the individual Christ, has now become the corporate Christ. Christ is the embodiment of the Triune God, the fullness of God, and we all are the expression of the fullness of the Triune God. He is the embodiment and the fullness; we are the expression.

CHRIST AS THE ELEMENT OF THE CORPORATE BREAD

The wheat is ground into flour, the flour is made into bread, and this bread denotes Christ as the individual bread, which after being eaten by us, constitutes us a corporate bread. What we eat spontaneously becomes what we are. When we eat bread, we spontaneously become bread. Therefore, Paul said that although we are many, we are one Body, one bread. As the one large, corporate bread, we have exactly the same elements as Christ, the individual bread. As the corporate bread, we are just the enlargement of Christ as the individual bread. There is no change in element, and the element is nothing less than Christ Himself.

THE ELEMENTS OF THE ALL-INCLUSIVE CHRIST

Now we will see what the elements of Christ are. The elements of Christ comprise all that the Father is in His divine nature and all the elements that Christ obtained in passing through His process. In other words, Christ possesses both the divine element and the human element. He went through a process not only with the divine and human elements, but He also had many other elements added to Him. He was God incarnated. Thus, incarnation is an element. He passed through thirty-three and a half years of human living. Thus, human living is also an element. When He died on the cross, the elements of His death and the effectiveness of His death were added. When He was resurrected, the elements of His resurrection and the power of His resurrection were added. What He passed through was quite a process. This can be compared to a grain of wheat falling into the ground, dying, sprouting and growing, and finally bearing grains to be ground into powder and made into bread for our enjoyment.