O glorious Christ, Savior mine

Yet man in time, finite to be. (Hymns, #501)

Therefore, every morning when you get up, you should call, "O Lord Jesus!" to begin your spiritual breathing. You should call in this way all day long. Also, you cannot separate the word of the Lord from the Spirit of the Lord. Even the more, you cannot separate the Spirit of the Lord from the Lord Himself. The Lord is the Spirit, and the Spirit is the word. Not only did God come down to the earth from the heavens, and then from the earth to Hades; He also ascended to the heavens from Hades and became a life-giving Spirit. In the universe, among the human race, there is also the word of God written and printed here, and it has been left in our hands. Therefore, every morning as soon as we wake up, we need to call on Him and also receive His word. During the day, we simply do these two things: contact the Lord and receive His word. This is what is spoken of in Hymns, #501, stanza 4, which says:

The Spirit of life causes Thee
By Thy Word to transfer to me.
Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received,
Thy life in me is thus conceived.

Since this is a fact, then we should be filled in spirit with the Triune God, as recorded in Ephesians 5:18, so that out from within us can flow rivers of living water. How do these rivers of living water flow out? This is through the speaking to one another as mentioned in verse 19. With what should we speak to one another? With psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. Throughout the years many experienced ones among us have spent a lot of effort to compile many psalms and spiritual songs. These are printed in our hymnal and are ready to be used, without the need at any time for us to compile or to consider. For example, Hymns, #501, says:

O glorious Christ, Savior mine,
Thou art truly radiance divine;
God infinite, in eternity,
Yet man in time, finite to be.
Oh! Christ, expression of God,
The Great, Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet!

The second is speaking words of praise, of teaching, and of admonition (Eph. 5:18-19; Col. 3:16). These words are already in the Bible, which is the "word of Christ" mentioned in Colossians chapter three. The psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs mentioned in Ephesians chapter five are not only in the Bible, but also in our hymnal. For example, Hymns, #501, says:

O glorious Christ, Savior mine,
Thou art truly radiance divine;
God infinite, in eternity,
Yet man in time, finite to be.
Oh! Christ, expression of God, the Great,
Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet!

In addition, in the same chapter, the Lord shows us a little clue that the Spirit of reality whom the disciples were to receive was to be the Son who received all that the Father had (16:15). All that the Son has is to the Spirit, and all that the Spirit receives is opened up and disclosed to us. All that the Father has is to the Son, all that the Son has is received by the Spirit, and all that the Spirit receives is all that the Triune God is. Furthermore, the Spirit also opens up and discloses to us all that the Triune God is. This is the truth that the Spirit reveals to us when the Spirit of reality comes. Its content is the Triune God, who has passed through all the processes to be wrought into those who believe in Him, to make them sons of God and the members of Christ, that they may be constituted the Body of Christ.

Hymn #501 in Hymns says,
All things of the Father are Thine;
All Thou art in Spirit is mine;
The Spirit makes Thee real to me,
That Thou experienced might be.

According to 1 Corinthians 14:26, the saints may have five categories of items to minister to others in the meeting: a psalm, a teaching, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. A saint may have a psalm for both singing and speaking in a Christ-filled spirit, not only to praise and thank God the Father but also to edify and build up the attendants. According to Ephesians 5:18-21, psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs are not only for singing but also for speaking. We should learn to speak the hymns. Hymn #501, "O Glorious Christ, Savior Mine," is a wonderful hymn for singing and speaking. We should read and study this hymn and learn to speak it privately in our homes. Then we can come to the meeting and speak this hymn with others. This one hymn will become a marvelous message full of nourishment, revelation, and edification if we speak it properly. But we have to learn not merely to read but to speak. We have to sing or speak either a psalm, a hymn, or song in a Christ-filled spirit. We must come to the meeting with a spirit filled with Christ to praise and thank God the Father and to edify and build up the attendants.

In our meetings, we must have some psalms, not only for psalming but also for speaking. I hope that in every meeting at least one-fourth of the speaking would be speaking on psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. A hymn, like the cream of milk, is the cream of a certain composition. The best way for us to learn how to speak is to learn how to speak with the hymns. We should learn to use a hymn like "O Glorious Christ, Savior Mine" (Hymns, #501). That hymn will help us in speaking, but we have to learn to speak in a living way, in a very refreshing way, and in a very inspiring way. We should not just read the hymns, but speak in a Way to stir up the saints and inspire every attendant of the meeting. We need to practice speaking the hymns in this way again and again. Then we will be equipped to render much help to the meeting. We can have a very good Lord's table meeting just by speaking one hymn. After speaking this hymn, we can sing it, and after singing it, we can speak it again. We would not need to call another hymn. By singing, speaking, singing, and speaking one hymn, the riches of Christ will be released into the meeting.

This should be the condition of our meetings. Sometimes the weather is not good, but we still come to the meetings, because the purpose of our meetings is to eat the Lord, to drink Him, and to enjoy Him. We also meet to supply one another with the flow of living water. Stanza 4 of Hymns, #501 says, "Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received, / Thy life in me is thus conceived." When we receive the word, we touch the Spirit in the word and are inwardly supplied. We should eat, drink, and enjoy the Lord not only in the meetings but also in our daily life so that He can become our supply. This is a practical way to experience the Triune God as life.

I also hope that more people will be able to write some hymns of good quality for all the saints to enjoy. In 1961 I wrote eighty-five new hymns within two months. Among them are "Spirit begets spirit, spirit worships the Spirit" (hymn #450 in the Chinese hymnal), "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (Hymns, #501), and others. These hymns contain expressions that have never been used in Christian hymns throughout the ages. Altogether 1 wrote more than two hundred hymns in English and more than one hundred fifty hymns in Chinese. Although I cannot say that every hymn is good, they all contain solid spiritual meaning and truths.

For the home meetings we also need the high standard of hymns. The hymns must be high in significance and in expression. Hymn #501, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine," is a hymn of a high standard. When I was young, I was taught the song, "Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so." Even the unbelievers were able to sing that hymn, and some young boys on the street would mockingly sing it to the Christians. This short hymn is good, but too low. Our hymnal, entitled Hymns, was compiled in 1964 with one thousand and eighty selected hymns; two hundred sixty-eight more have since been added. We have had these hymns for over twenty years, but we have mainly used those which were written by ourselves. Nevertheless, all those hymns were included, and a detailed table of contents was composed in a proper theological way. After reading the table of contents, one could realize that we do have a proper understanding of theology.

Stanza 1 of Hymns, #501 says concerning Christ: "God infinite, in eternity, / Yet man in time, finite to be." He was God in eternity without limitation, but He became a man on this earth limited by time and space. He was limited to the village of Nazareth in His living for about thirty years. Can we be limited in such a way? We may have the burden to visit many places, but the Lord may not want us to. We must learn the lesson to be limited.

Stanza 4 of Hymns, #609 says, "All that the Father is and has/In His beloved Son doth rest,/And all the riches of the Son/Are by the Spirit now possessed." This is based on John 16:15, which says, "All that the Father has is Mine; for this reason I have said that He receives of Mine and will declare it to you." Verses 13-14 say, "But when He, the Spirit of reality, comes, He will guide you into all the reality; for He will not speak from Himself, but what He hears He will speak; and He will declare to you the things that are coming. He will glorify Me, for He will receive of Mine and will declare it to you." The "He" in verse 15 is clearly the "Spirit of reality" in verse 13. The Spirit's declaring to the disciples is His glorifying of the Son in verse 14 and His guiding of them into all the reality in verse 13. Therefore, the meaning of verses 13 through 15 is that all that the Father has is the Son's, and all that the Son has is received by the Spirit, and after the Spirit receives, He declares everything to the Son's disciples. Such a declaring is the glorifying of the Son, and it is the guiding of the disciples into all the reality. This reality is all that the Son has and all that the Father has. Therefore, stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 says, "All things of the Father are Thine;/All Thou art in Spirit is mine;/The Spirit makes Thee real to me,/That Thou experienced might be."

As we have seen, the Holy Spirit, who is the consummated Triune God, is of two aspects—the essential aspect and the economical aspect. This is not for doctrine but for our experience. We have at least two hymns on this matter, Hymns, #609 and #501. Hymn #609 not only speaks of our spiritual experience but also has many references to the Bible. Stanza 3 says, "The Triune God the Spirit is,/And comes as breath and wind to me." In John 20:22 the Holy Spirit as breath is of the essential aspect, while in Acts 2:2-4 the Holy Spirit as wind is of the economical aspect. Essentially, the Holy Spirit as breath enters into us as life; economically, the Holy Spirit as a rushing violent wind is poured upon us as power. Therefore, the Holy Spirit as the consummation of the Triune God is as breath and wind.

I have studied and even experimented with the new way very much. I can assure all of the saints in the churches that they will be successful if they will be faithful to go out for two to three hours every week, week after week, for forty-four weeks a year. While the saints are practicing this, they will learn many things. In the past sixty years, I did not learn many things from others. I learned simply by my practice. No one taught me how to write the footnotes. No one taught me how to write a poem, a song, or a hymn. Over sixty years ago I began to write; I wrote a tract on the wonderful way to save souls. That writing was somewhat childish, but I continued throughout the years to practice and practice and practice. Eventually, I wrote the hymn, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (Hymns, #501). If you will practice persistently, you will eventually learn the proper way.

If we have not seen God's economy and dispensing, even if we were to abandon everything of the world for the Lord, He would still ask us one day, "For what purpose do you want Me?" Perhaps we would say that we want Him because we want to enjoy Him. But if we remain in the first two layers, we may enjoy the Lord, but the Lord cannot have His enjoyment. If we remain only in the first two layers, even if we love the Lord, enjoy Him, are revived every morning, and overcome every day, and even if we love the church and are for the church, when the crucial moment comes, we will be exposed and will be shown to be only for ourselves and not for the Lord or His church. If we see God's economy and dispensing, we will not care for our own achievements and gains. God's economy is not for our achievement, but for us, the chosen and regenerated ones, to be filled by the Spirit to the extent that the Lord becomes everything in us, so that we may be delivered from the old man and may be built up with all the saints to be God's habitation (Hymns, #501). This is a matter of God's habitation; it has nothing to do with our personal gain or loss. In the church we must have the discernment and the insight to see God's economy and dispensing. Never listen to or talk about right and wrong. All rights and wrongs are based on personal profit and loss. Those things that are profitable to a person will be considered by him as right, and the things that are disadvantageous to a person will be considered by him as wrong. How terrible this is!

Ephesians 1 reveals the Father's choosing and predestinating, the Son's redeeming, and the Spirit's sealing (v. 13b). The sealing of the Spirit can be likened to a seal with ink being pressed upon a sheet of paper. The more the ink is applied, the more the paper is saturated and permeated with the ink. Eventually, the entire paper will be sealed, saturated, and permeated with the substance of the ink in the image of the seal. In the same way, the Spirit is saturating and permeating us. The last stanza of hymn #501 in Hymns says:

Thy Spirit will me saturate,

Every part will God permeate...

The secret of learning anything is to do it again and again. In learning to do something, we make mistakes, and we are perfected by learning from those mistakes. I wrote hymn #501—"O glorious Christ, Savior mine"—and then I polished, corrected, and adjusted it close to one hundred times. Now it is very hard to improve this hymn because it has been polished and adjusted to the uttermost. Some of the hymns that others among us wrote in the past were written in a quick and light way. This is not proper. The spiritual songs and hymns are the cream of a person's writing, thought, learning, life experience, and spiritual experience. If I did not have the experience of living Christ, I could not have composed that hymn—"Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!" That hymn is the cream of my experience, my thought, my learning, and my writing.

We need to learn to speak the hymns in many ways. Sometimes we need to repeat and stress. In the chorus of hymn #501 there is the phrase, "Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet!" We need to read this phrase by stressing it and by repeating it. We all have to learn to stay away from our natural way, that is, our natural reading and our natural hearing. We need to learn something new according to the Scriptures. Do not speak too loud, too low, too fast, or too slow. Exercise to speak like an expert. A person who takes piano lessons from a teacher and who practices frequently will eventually be able to play the piano properly.

The hymns are especially rich in life experience and in truth. The poetic language is so pure. In our ordinary speaking none of us can utter the purified words that are in the hymns. This is because the hymnal was written with much consideration. Hymn #501 has seven verses. If we read and speak it to one another, we will see the riches. If we speak properly, we can render a message by our speaking. We should learn to use complete clauses, phrases, or expressions in our speaking and speak so that others can follow our speaking.

In his ministry Brother Nee emphasized Christ as our life (Col. 3:4). In the introduction to some of his books he expressed that his burden was not on other matters, not even on the normal practice of the church life. Instead, he strongly stated that all our co-workers must know Christ as life. When I began to minister in Taiwan, my stress was always on Christ and the church. After I came to the United States, we began to compile our hymnal. Previously, Brother Nee had selected one hundred eighty-five hymns for our use out of about ten thousand that he considered. I realized that we were short of proper hymns on Christ, the life-giving Spirit, life, and the church as the Body of Christ. In order to fill the gap, I wrote approximately two hundred hymns. Within two months in 1961 alone, I wrote eighty-five new hymns, many of which were translated into English. These include "Oh, what a life!" (Hymns, #499), "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (Hymns, #501), and "Not the law of letters, / But the Christ of life" (Hymns, #541). These hymns stress Christ as life very much. In addition to those selected by Brother Nee, I selected six hundred more from the hymns of Christianity. Including the new hymns that I had written, the number of hymns in our new hymnal was one thousand eighty. At the beginning of the hymnal we added an introduction and a table of contents. By reading the table of contents of our hymnal, anyone can see that we have a proper knowledge of theology. Among the denominations there is not a hymnal with as complete a collection of hymns as ours, covering many items of truth and experience from the preaching of the Triune God to the consummation of the New Jerusalem. Thus far, no one has been able to criticize or condemn this collection.

Colossians 2:9 says, "In Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." In one of our hymns we say, "The fullness of God dwells in Thee" (Hymns, #501, verse 2), but Colossians 2:9 says "the fullness of the Godhead," not the fullness of God. Godhead means God Himself. The Godhead is triune. That the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ really denotes that the divine Trinity is dwelling in Christ in full. The fullness of the Trinity dwells in Him bodily.

In 1961, within a period of two months, I wrote eighty-five new hymns in Chinese. These hymns include "Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!" (Hymns, #499), "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (Hymns, #501), and "What mystery, the Father, Son, and Spirit" (Hymns, #608). In the same year I studied Ezekiel thoroughly in order to see the revelation concerning the move of the Spirit. In my fellowship with the co-workers and elders I also emphasized the need to be filled with the Spirit. However, I still did not feel that the saints in the churches in Taiwan were filled with the Spirit to a sufficient degree.

After we bade farewell to Brother Nee, we came to Taiwan. When we first came to this island, we practiced to strictly follow the leading that we had received in the past in mainland China. We did not want to deviate from this leading in any way. We brought this way overseas. By the Lord's mercy we have not departed from this way, and by His gracious supply we have helped the saints to enter into this way and to walk on this way. Although much trouble was caused by a recent turmoil among us, the co-workers and many saints have been led to stand firmly and properly in this way. After 1958, because of the turmoil among us, I began to feel that we needed a deeper seeing. What we had seen was not sufficient to meet the need. The messages that were given at that time did not meet the need. The turmoil among us was caused by the messages given by Brother Austin-Sparks when he visited the churches in Taiwan. Those messages were very high. Later, however, I realized that if we merely have these messages, not only will we not have a testimony in the Lord's work, but we also will be unable to see the cross or resurrection in the living of those who follow our ministry. Therefore, I began to question the use of these messages. The more I considered this, the more I recalled that Brother Nee eventually emphasized two points: the Holy Spirit and the believers' human spirit. Although I did not purposely search the Bible, 1 Corinthians 15:45 began to shine in me afresh: "The last Adam became a life-giving Spirit." Before I went overseas in 1961, I had not quoted this verse in my messages. This verse shined in me when I was speaking in the United States, strengthening my feeling and messages. Then I emphatically pointed out that the last Adam became the life-giving Sprit. In the hymns that I wrote in 1961, I used the expressions such as Christ in the Spirit and the Son in the Spirit. 2071 However, after I went to the United States to release messages concerning the Spirit, I gradually saw that the New Testament does not say that Christ is in the Spirit. The revelation of the New Testament is not that the Son is in the Spirit but that through resurrection the Son became the Spirit. This thought is clearly and plainly stated in two verses in the New Testament. First Corinthians 15:45 says, "The last Adam became a life-giving Spirit," and 2 Corinthians 3:17 says, "The Lord is the Spirit." To this day, however, most of traditional Christianity cannot fully explain these two verses. Although many in organized Christianity oppose me for declaring that Christ is the Spirit, most of them have not dared to speak concerning these verses. Recently, I have been coordinating with some brothers in the United States to write a very powerful message challenging the opposers and asking them to reply. Instead of arguing with those who oppose me for declaring that Christ is the Spirit, I would like to ask them whether the life-giving Spirit in 1 Corinthians 15:45b refers to the Holy Spirit and whether the Lord in 2 Corinthians 3:17 refers to the Lord Jesus. The Bible is extensive in its scope. Even the truth concerning justification by faith is not easy to understand. The book of James says that it is not sufficient to have only faith; one must also have works. However, all the believers need to acknowledge the truth concerning justification by faith. This truth cannot be denied. Similarly, in an attempt to argue against the truth concerning Christ being the Spirit, some

Among those hymns related to Christ, the ones I like the best are hymn #501, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine"; hymn #499, "Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!"; and hymn #539, "O Lord, Thou art in me as life and everything to me!" After singing these hymns, I am full of enjoyment, touching the Spirit and receiving the life supply. Where can you find this kind of hymn among Christians today?

Calling on the Lord will also cause us to be rooted and grounded in love and to taste the knowledge-surpassing love of Christ (vv. 17, 19). We will be submerged in the ocean of His love. His infinite love will completely inundate us, and we will be rooted and grounded in this love. At this juncture, we will be filled with all that God is and has. We experience all these things not through good behavior, self-cultivation, or self-improvement but by loving the Lord Jesus and allowing Him to completely possess us within so that our whole being is filled unto all the fullness of God. The last stanza of Hymns, #501 matches this thought. The first two lines of this stanza say, "Thy Spirit will me saturate, / Every part will God permeate."

The divine transmission of the Divine Trinity to the believers is revealed in John 16:13-15. This transmission is just like the transmission of electrical current. When the electricity is switched on, there is a current of electricity, a moving of electricity, and that moving is the transmission. First, all that the Father has is the Son's (v. 15). This means that what the Father has is transmitted into the Son. Second, all that the Son has is received by the Spirit (v. 14b). This is a further step of this transmission. The Father transmits to the Son, and then there is a transmitting from the Son to the Spirit. Third, all that the Spirit has received of the Son is disclosed to the believers (vv. 13, 15b). Eventually, all that the Trinity is and has is ours.

Verse 3 of hymn #501 in Hymns talks about this transmission. This verse says:

All things of the Father are Thine;
All Thou art in Spirit is mine;
The Spirit makes Thee real to me,
That Thou experienced might be.

By Thy Word to transfer to me.
Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received,
Thy life in me is thus conceived.
In spirit while gazing on Thee,
As a glass reflecting Thy glory,
Like to Thyself transformed I'll be,
That Thou might be expressed thru me.
Thy Spirit will me saturate,
Every part will God permeate,
Deliv'ring me from the old man,
With all saints building for His plan.
Hymns, #501

In just these few verses, then, we have the tripartite man—spirit, soul, and body—and the Triune God. It is only in these last few years, even since we did the Life-study of Romans, that I have seen the Triune God and the tripartite man in Romans 8. For Him to become our life, He first enters our spirit, making it life. Then our soul is made life by the mind being set on the spirit. Lastly, our mortal bodies are made life. The divine life thus saturates our whole being.

SATURATED WITH GOD
Thy Spirit will me saturate,
Every part will God permeate.
Hymns, #501

Our relationship with God should reach to this extent. Our whole being must be saturated with Him. We should not be content with outwardly worshipping Him, loving Him, fearing Him, and doing things to please Him. This mysterious God has passed through a process: creation, incarnation, human living, death, resurrection, and ascension. Now He has returned as the Spirit to enter all who believe in Him. Such is our God and our Savior.

[Editor's note: The hymns referred to in the following letter are Hymns, #837, 608, 501, and 499, respectively.]

I became interested in preaching the gospel from my youth, after I received salvation. I did not know what a tract was, much less where to obtain one. Nevertheless, I wrote a tract, printed it with large Chinese characters, like a production of the countryside, and went by myself to the people in the countryside. The subject of the tract was "The best way for a soul to be saved" or "The wonderful way for a soul to be saved." That was my first experience in writing concerning spiritual things. Even though today I laugh at my composition of that time, I eventually reached the standard of being able to compose Hymns, #501: "O glorious Christ, Savior mine,/ Thou art truly radiance divine; / God infinite, in eternity, / Yet man in time, finite to be." This illustrates that if we labor by practicing every day, we can find out the secrets to laboring in the gospel. Every task has some secrets that cannot be discovered if the task is not attempted. However, as soon as one carries out a task, he gains an entrance into discovering its secrets. Thus, we need to practice preaching the gospel.

In addition, the Lord's recovery has a hymnal. Hymns and spiritual songs are not ordinary compositions. A person's ability to compose determines his ability to write good hymns. You must therefore pursue the knowledge of the Bible so that what you know can be composed into a hymn. For example, based on an accumulation of sixty years of Bible study and on my knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, I wrote Hymns, #501. This hymn does not only contain knowledge, but it is knowledge that produced this hymn.

Verse 4 of Hymns, #501 says, "The Spirit of life causes Thee / By Thy Word to transfer to me. / Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received, / Thy life in me is thus conceived." By the word and by the Spirit, Christ's life is conceived within us. Therefore, we need to daily spend time in the Word. When we spend time in the Word, we need to exercise our spirit to touch the Spirit within by prayer. We need to not only read but also pray by exercising our spirit. In this way we will have the two "wires" for the spiritual transmission of Christ with His death and resurrection into our being. Then we will daily experience the killing and the nourishing that we need. This is the way to grow spiritually, and this is the way to abide in Christ. This is not a mere doctrine; we all need to put this into practice every day. Until the Lord comes back, we all need to daily contact Him by taking in the word and by touching the Spirit in order to receive Christ with His killing and nourishing elements. Then the spiritual metabolism within will cause us to grow.

I moved to the United States in 1962 to bring all the things concerning the Triune God, the all-inclusive Christ, the compound Spirit, the experience of Christ as life, our human spirit, and other scriptural truths to this country. These truths can be seen in the approximately two hundred hymns that I wrote in 1963, such as Hymns, #203, #499, and #501. These hymns represent the second age of the Lord's recovery. Some of my helpers who listened to my messages came up to the standard of the second age and responded by writing more hymns. For example, #1174 says,

What a victory! What a triumph!
God Himself became a man,
Clothed Himself in human nature
To fulfill His mighty plan.
He through death destroyed the devil;
Risen now, the Son of Man!

Verse 15 says, "All that the Father has is Mine." This shows us that all that the Father has is received by the Son and becomes the Son's. Furthermore, whatever the Son receives, He gives it to the Spirit. Therefore, the Spirit displays to us what He has received from the Son, which is what the Son has received from the Father, in order that we may understand. Stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 says, All things of the Father are Thine; All Thou art in Spirit is mine; The Spirit makes Thee real to me, That Thou experienced might be.

Today we have good materials, such as the Life-studies, from which to speak. We can pick up any Life-study message and speak the sentences in it one by one. After speaking several pages, we will receive a very good message even without a designated speaker. All the printed materials are composed with much consideration and with many good points and sentences. To speak by using the Life-studies causes the messages in them to be rich, living, and uplifting in our experience. We can also use the Bible and a hymnal. Almost every hymn is a good message. Hymns, #501 says, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine." If we speak this hymn, we will receive a good message.

Most Christians today have left the proper truth and have turned from the inward dispensing of Christ to human work, merits, and religion. We ourselves have been under this influence and are not free from it even up to today. Whenever we read something from the Bible, we make up our mind to do and to fulfill it. However, such determination should be condemned and rejected. God does not want us to determine to do what the Bible says; He only wants us to receive His dispensing.

Here I would like to read to you Hymns, #501. This hymn expresses very well what I want to say. Verse 1 says:

O glorious Christ, Savior mine,
Thou art truly radiance divine;
God infinite, in eternity,
Yet man in time, finite to be.
Oh! Christ, expression of God, the Great,
Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet!

The Spirit declares the Son with the Father to the believers. He makes all that Christ is and has real to us. Stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 speaks of this matter: "All things of the Father are Thine; / All Thou art in Spirit is mine; / The Spirit makes Thee real to me, / That Thou experienced might be."

[Therefore, life is imparted to us in a threefold way: Our spirit becomes life, our mind becomes life, and life is imparted to our mortal bodies. For this reason we can say that, according to Romans 8, the Triune God is dispensed into the tripartite man and gives life to man's spirit, soul, and body.]

D. Our Whole Being Saturated with God
Thy Spirit will me saturate,
Every part will God permeate....
Hymns, #501

[Our relationship with God should reach to this extent. Our whole being must be saturated with Him. We should not be content with outwardly worshipping Him, loving Him, fearing Him, and doing things to please Him. This mysterious God has passed through a process: creation, incarnation, human living, death, resurrection, and ascension. Now He has returned as the Spirit to enter all who believe in Him. Such is our God and our Savior.

References: Life-study of Luke, Message 1, pp. 4-5; Message 3, pp. 25-29; Message 6, pp. 47-50; Luke 1:32, footnotes 1-2; 1:35, footnote 2; 2:2, footnote 1; 2:7, footnotes 1-2; 2:8, footnote 1; 2:14, footnotes 1-2; Hymns, #82, #84, #85, #501; The Triune God, A Lesson Book, Lesson 14; Truth Lessons, Level 1, Volume 2, Lesson 18, pp. 85-88; Lesson 20, p. 131; Gospel Outlines, Subject 80.

B. We all need Christ, the God-man, for our salvation.

Chapter(s): Isaiah 2, 7, 9.

Background Reading: Truth Lessons, Level 1, Volume 2, Lesson 14, pp. 28-30.

References: Life-study of Isaiah, Messages 1, 4-5, 9-10, 12; The Conclusion of the New Testament, Message 26, pp. 286-287; Message 34, p. 370; Truth Lessons, Level 1, Volume 2, Lesson 14; Hymns, #501; Gospel Outlines, Subjects 42-43.

Much of the terminology in the Old Testament psalms is good, but it is good in a natural realm. It has nothing to do with the Spirit. The New Testament is altogether in another field, in another world. It is altogether in the Spirit, who is the consummation of the Triune God. Thus, everything in the New Testament is altogether a matter in the Triune God. Our honesty, faithfulness, patience, endurance, kindness, and everything we are and do involves the Triune God. All of our virtues should be the expression of the Triune God, not of ourselves. The Christian life in the New Testament is not our doing, but is altogether a matter of our living Christ. To live Him in order to magnify Him is to enjoy Him. Thus, every day we should not do anything but enjoy Christ. Christ is our enjoyment.

This thought is in Hymns, #499, #501, and #841. These three songs were written absolutely according to the New Testament economy. Hymn #841 is concerning the building up of the church. Many Christians, however, still exalt the law, remaining in the Old Testament economy.

One of the greatest verses in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 6:17, says, "He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit." The implications of this verse are marvelous and far-reaching. We, the believers, are one spirit with the Lord. How tremendous! This implies that we are in Him and that He is in us. It also implies that we and He have been mingled, blended organically, to become one in life. To be one spirit with the Lord implies that we and He are a living entity. We simply do not have words to explain the significance of this verse. To say that we are one spirit with the Lord definitely does not mean that we are deified in the sense that we have any part in the Godhead. However, it certainly does imply the mingling of divinity with humanity. In the words of Hymns, #501, "God mingled with humanity / Lives in me my all to be." To be one spirit with the Lord means that we are blended with Him organically and mingled with Him in life. We urgently need more experience of this. We need to remain rooted in Christ and absorb all that He is into us. Then we and He, He and we, will be blended together in life organically to be one spirit. How profound! How wonderful!

In order to do the translation work well, you must be able to write well. Translating can be compared to writing poetry. Writing poetry requires hard work. Similarly, translation requires hard work in order for it to be done wel1. This work can also be compared to building a house in a sloppy or a careful way. In order to build carefully, one must take care of many fine details. Such details include polishing everything and even doing fine engravings. The hymns that I wrote, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (Hymns, #501) and "Thou art all my life, Lord, / In me Thou dost live" (#841), are good examples. I spent much time and effort on these hymns, considering and revising where to place certain words. The translation of the Recovery Version into Chinese requires even more consideration and time. The serving ones must set aside the time and come to the Book Room to work during normal office hours as if they were in the army. They must come to work in the morning and depart in the afternoon. In order to be in the church life or to serve in the churches, the serving ones in the Book Room must use their spare time after work for this in the same way as other working saints. Eight hours of the day must be spent on the work of the Book Room, and the serving ones must coordinate in a good way. Even if the church has a conference, they cannot miss work to attend the conference. This is the only way for us to get the work done. If we do not do this, we will not know when we will be able to publish something, nor will we have the assurance that the work will be done well. Everything depends on time. We cannot have an attitude of doing things carelessly or finishing in a hasty way. We cannot make many mistakes, because it is hard to make corrections after a book has been sent to the printer.

I wrote some of the hymns in our Chinese hymnal in 1961, and I composed them by walking while intoning. It would be difficult to improve Hymns, #501, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine," because the rhythm and rhyme are very good, the parallel structures are proper, and the composition is excellent. However, I did not spend the same amount of time on the other hymns that I translated from English; therefore, the rhythm and meter of some hymns can still be improved. In order to write a good composition, we must spend an adequate amount of time, especially to study poems and songs. The text of the Bible is a classic work; therefore, our translation must have a certain elegance. In translating the New Testament we must pay attention to the meaning of the Greek text, but we cannot neglect the writing style. For this reason we should not depart from the writing style of the Chinese Union Version unless it is absolutely necessary.

The fifth "gold bar" is in 1 Corinthians 12:12-13, which says, "Even as the body is one and has many members, yet all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also is the Christ. For also in one Spirit we were all baptized into one Body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and were all given to drink one Spirit," This shows that we all are members of the Body of Christ and have the same life and element as Christ; thus, all the members joined together constitute the Body of Christ.

Verse 13 says that in one Spirit all the believers were baptized into one Body. This Spirit is the life-giving Spirit. This Spirit may be compared to a large pool of water. Thousands upon thousands of believers have been baptized in it into one Body. Not only so, we also drink of this one Spirit. Thus, we not only have the Spirit as our sphere outwardly but also are filled and saturated with the Spirit inwardly. The Spirit that we drink will ultimately saturate and permeate us. Drinking the Spirit may sound a little wild, but 10:4 also says that the Israelites "drank the same spiritual drink"; thus, we certainly see the concept of drinking in this book. Christ is the portion of us all; the way to enjoy Him is to be baptized into the Spirit and to drink the Spirit until we are wholly saturated by the Spirit, and our whole being is full of the Spirit. At that time our condition will be like the condition described in Hymns, #501: "Thy Spirit will me saturate, / Every part will God permeate." The way to be saturated and permeated is by drinking the Spirit.

You must see clearly what the Lord is recovering today. First, this is the recovery of Christ. Christianity preaches merely that the Lord Jesus was crucified to save you from your sins so that you would not go to hell but would go to heaven. This is too low and shallow; this is a low gospel. According to the revelation in the Bible, we see Christ. Stanza 1 and the chorus of Hymns, #501 say, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine, / Thou art truly radiance divine; / God infinite, in eternity, / Yet man in time, finite to be. / Oh! Christ, expression of God, the Great, / Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet! / God mingled with humanity/ Lives in me my all to be." This is the Christ whom we know today in the Lord's recovery. The subject of the recent summer training was "The Conclusion of the New Testament." In this training we presented over four hundred aspects of the riches of Christ. We should know and experience all these riches.

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In the Lord's recovery we see a rich Christ who is unlimited and immeasurable. This Christ is the all-inclusive life-giving Spirit. This is a great recovery, and this recovered truth has been published in our various publications, but unfortunately, many among you have not gotten into them. Therefore, I want to solemnly fellowship that the first thing you should know in the Lord's recovery is this all-inclusive rich Christ. The Son is the embodiment of the Father, and the Spirit is the realization of the Son. Today He is the Spirit dwelling in our spirit. Stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 says, "All things of the Father are Thine; / All Thou art in Spirit is mine; / The Spirit makes Thee real to me, / That Thou experienced might be." This is absolutely a word of truth as well as a word of experience and a word of life. We must know Christ to such an extent.

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You must first exercise the part in you where Christ is. This part is your spirit. Stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 says, "The Spirit makes Thee real to me." The Spirit is Christ as the Spirit, who enters into your spirit. This Spirit is not in your mind, emotion, or will. If you think about what you should speak or utter as you come to a meeting, you are exercising your mind. If you feel happy and want to say something, you are exercising your emotion, and if you decide not to speak in the meeting, you are exercising your will. All these do not involve the Spirit. You should not meet in such a way. When you come to a meeting, you must put aside your mind, emotion, and will, and exercise your innermost part, your spirit. Calling, "O Lord Jesus!" is not about calling based on your emotion, mind, or will, because Paul says that no one can say, "Jesus is Lord!" except in the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 12:3). All proper calling comes from your spirit.

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It is not sufficient for us to follow the Spirit, exercise the spirit, and grow in life; we must also know the Bible. Stanza 4 of Hymns, #501 says, "The Spirit of life causes Thee / By Thy Word to transfer to me," The Spirit is the Lord Jesus. Today the Spirit is very abstract, but we also have the Bible, which is the Lord's embodiment. In the beginning was the Word (John 1:1), and this Word is the Lord. Therefore, we must study the Bible diligently in order to know the Lord.

We should realize that the Lord's recovery is to recover Christ, the Spirit, life, and the church. Christ is the embodiment and expression of the Triune God; He is the all-inclusive God-man. Concerning this point, Hymns #501 has given a simple, clear, and appropriate description. The Spirit is the ultimate expression of the Triune God. The theology in Christianity has separated God into three Persons: the Father being one Person, the Son being one Person, and the Spirit being another Person. But we see from the Bible that Christ is the embodiment of God and is not separate from the Father. He Himself says, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30). Then, again, He says, "You, Father, are in Me and I in You" (John 17:21). The Bible also says that the Holy Spirit is the reality of the Son (John 14:17-20; 1 John 5:6). Hence, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one. This Triune God has passed through incarnation, human living, crucifixion, and resurrection from the dead, and He has become the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45). Therefore, now the Lord is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:17). At the end of the Bible it says, "The Spirit and the bride say, Come!" (Rev. 22:17). The Spirit here is the ultimate expression of the processed Triune God. Moreover, life is simply Christ, and life is also the Spirit. In John 14, Christ says, "I am the life." This Christ who is life, having passed through the processes to become the life-giving Spirit, entered into us to be the life that we enjoy.

Wherever I went, I always preached Brother Nee's teachings. Some people considered this a shame, but to me it was a glory. At the beginning of my speaking I would tell people that what I was sharing was Brother Nee's message. I even learned to follow Brother Nee's gestures, posture, and accent. It was a glory to speak what he spoke. Before I began the work in the United States, I wrote Hymns, #203, which speaks of the one grain that became many grains to be the Lord's continuation. The Lord covers me to say that this is a very deep hymn. I also wrote "O glorious Christ, Savior mine" (#501) and "Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!" (#499). When I came to the United States, the first message of the first conference I gave in English was on the all-inclusive Christ, based on Deuteronomy 8:7-9. However, in all this I never changed. What I speak is still from Brother Nee.

Much of what I have spoken and written since 1963 has been concerning the eight sections of God's organic salvation. For example, regarding Christ, Hymns, #501 says, "All things of the Father are Thine; / All Thou art in Spirit is mine; / The Spirit makes Thee real to me, / That Thou experienced might be." All that the Father has is the Son's, and all that the Son possesses is in the Spirit, who brings everything into us so that it becomes real to us for our experience. Hymns, #750 concerns transformation. It is brief, dear, and to the point. We have seen these things in the past but never as completely and wholly as we do now. The Lord has given us a complete picture of what He is doing.

After returning from England, I spoke on the building of the church, but I discovered that everyone's spirit was not living. How can there be the building up of the church if the spirit does not rise up? Therefore, by 1961 I began to speak on the matters of exercising the spirit, releasing the spirit, and being mingled in spirit. I even wrote new hymns, such as "Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!" and "O glorious Christ, Savior mine, / Thou art truly radiance divine" (Hymns, #499, #501). These hymns caused people to become more living, but I eventually discovered that the co-workers sang them to the point that they did not like to sing them as much. The more I spoke on exercising the spirit, the less spirit there seemed to be. At the end of that year I went to America.

The troubles in Manila were provoked by the people in Taiwan, and the troubles in Taiwan were incited by the people in Manila. They joined together with one another just like Herod and Pilate. In the summer of 1961 I went to the Philippines to lead the young people's training in Baguio, a city situated on a mountain. That training was unprecedented. The young people became vitalized, and everyone was praying. During the meetings they sang from the eighty-five new hymns that I wrote, including, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine, / Thou art truly radiance divine," "Oh, what a life! Oh, what a peace!" and "O Lord, Thou art the Spirit now" (Hymns, #501, #499, #493). The more everyone sang, the more they were released; eventually, everyone was released.

The younger saints are blessed because they can be filled with God in their youth. However, in addition to being filled with God, we also need to be saturated with God and allow Him to be expressed through us. One of our hymns says, "Thy Spirit will me saturate, / Every part will God permeate" (Hymns, #501). I hope that the younger saints will be saturated and permeated with God until God can be seen in every part of their being, that is, until God is in their tongue, eyes, shoulders, walk, and words. Then they will be young persons who truly belong to God.

When we compiled the hymnal, we did consider this matter of the "rind" and the "flesh." Since a watermelon must have both rind and flesh, we kept the "rind" hymns. However, we must learn to eat the "flesh," because the essence and nutrients are in the flesh. We must not eat only the rind. The saints seldom call hymns on experiencing Christ as life, such as Hymns, #841 and #501, or hymns on Christ as the all-inclusive Spirit, such as #450 in the Chinese hymnal and Hymns, #612. Some may not even know the tune to these hymns. We do not call these hymns, because we lack a vision of the treasure within these hymns. These hymns are on the riches of Christ who, as the all-inclusive Spirit, is in us to be our supply. Regrettably, the brothers and sisters do not know how to appreciate these hymns. They prefer to sing "rind" hymns.

We belong to Christ, and by our receiving Him daily, He fills us until we are transformed into the fullness of Christ. Then we corporately become the church, which is the Body of Christ and the fullness of Christ for His expression. The expression of the fullness is not the result of cultivating our character. It is the result of our enjoying and receiving Christ. As we daily receive and enjoy Christ, our whole being is filled, saturated, with His spiritual elements. These elements are His essence; they are what He is, His attributes, and His virtues. This is expressed in Hymns, #501: "Thy Spirit will me saturate, / Every part will God permeate." When every part of our being is permeated with God, we become the fullness of God and of Christ.

The problem is, by what life will we live? By the first life or the second life? By the natural life or the divine life? By our self or by Christ? I say again that I have not found anyone, even one who is very much in the church life, who lives Christ day by day and hour after hour and does not live himself. Hymns #841, 499, and 501 (Hymns) speak of living Christ and not ourselves. We need to check to see if our life matches the standard expressed in these hymns. We need to realize that we were created to be like God, even to be one with God. Furthermore, we have been saved into God to be regenerated by Him that we may be His children and may be members of Christ to constitute the Body of Christ. However, we need to ask ourselves whether we live God or not. We do have a marvelous provision. God has provided us with a body and with a spirit, which are very sufficient for us to live as a man to worship God, to receive God, and to contain God that we may live God and express Him.

Even after being saved by God, we may not live Him. We may be gentlemen, men who are right, but we may not be able to say, "It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2:20a). We may not be able to apply this holy word to ourselves. We need to realize the organic union between us and God. We need to behave ourselves, to walk, to live, to do everything, in this organic union. It should not be I but Christ; it should not be I by myself, but I with God, united, mingled, and blended to be one person, a God-man.

The first stanza of Hymns, #501 says, "O glorious Christ, Savior mine,/Thou art truly radiance divine;/God infinite, in eternity,/Yet man in time, finite to be." This God infinite in eternity came to be a man finite in time. Where is He being a finite man? He is in us as a finite man. Have we experienced these two lines? The Lord, who is the embodiment of the great God, was the infinite God in eternity, yet today He came into us, human beings who are so small, to be a finite man. Praise the Lord that for us to live is He who is the infinite God, the God in eternity. Although we are finite men in time, He is living within us today. We should learn to apply the truth in this way. Otherwise, even though we have a very good Bible and hymnal, we cannot apply them to us.

The chorus of this hymn says, "Oh! Christ, expression of God, the Great,/Inexhaustible, rich, and sweet!/God mingled with humanity/Lives in me my all to be." We need to learn to apply these words to our daily life.

Stanza 2 says, "The fulness of God dwells in Thee;/Thou dost manifest God's glory;/In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought;/As Spirit, oneness with me sought." These lines are really good, but we should not simply remain in the appreciation of them. We need to ask ourselves whether this is the life we live. God's glory was manifested in Him, but is He manifested in us today? Furthermore, is the Spirit one with me today? Husbands, when you talk to your wife, is Christ one with you? Perhaps in experience you can only say, "In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought," but you cannot say, "As Spirit, oneness with me sought." Hence, although we sing this hymn, we do not have its reality.

Stanza 3 says, "All things of the Father are Thine;/All Thou art in Spirit is mine;/The Spirit makes Thee real to me,/That Thou experienced might be." This is an excellent stanza. All that the Father has, was received by the Son, and all that the Son is, was given to the Spirit. This Spirit comes into our spirit to become our reality so that the all-inclusive Christ may be our experience. Have these words become our experience? Do we have this reality in our living? If we check our condition, we have to say that we are short of such experience.

In a previous chapter we saw that the degradation of the church is due to our not enjoying the Christ who is in our spirit. Second Timothy 4:22 says, "The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you." To overcome today's degraded Christianity, we need to enjoy Christ in our spirit as our portion to be the abounding grace to us. Brothers, we need to bow our heads and confess that we are short of this. Among us, we have the light in the books and the hymns, but we have neglected the practical experience in our living.

Although we may sing a hymn of high quality, the husbands and wives still quarrel. We do not allow the Spirit to make the Lord real to us that the Lord may be experienced by us. Our experience is not "the Spirit makes Thee real to me." Rather, we make our temper and our disposition real to us. When we sing such a hymn, we should sing it with tears, saying to the Lord, "Lord, all things of the Father are Thine; all Thou art in Spirit is mine; the Spirit makes Thee real to me, that Thou experienced might be. Forgive me, Lord, I am not like this. I need Your Spirit to make You real to me that You may become my experience." We need to weep while singing. This is what we should have, even daily. Christianity is poor; the light we have is rich. However, we rarely apply these riches to our daily life. As a result, very little of the riches of Christ are manifested in our living. This is why the burden upon me today is very heavy. I am very happy to have such a meeting. A great number of elders and co-workers in the Lord's recovery around the globe are here. I like to grasp this opportunity to speak a word of love. Brothers, awake! We have the messages and the hymns, but we are short of the practical living.

Stanza 4 of this hymn says, "The Spirit of life causes Thee/By Thy Word to transfer to me./Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received,/Thy life in me is thus conceived." In our daily life, do we allow the Spirit to cause the Lord to be realized in us through His living word? Do we, moment by moment, touch the Spirit and receive the Lord's word that we may receive the Lord as our supply?

If we compare the poetic words in this hymn with our living, we will find that there is quite a discrepancy. We have such a hymn, but we have very little of the reality of what it speaks. How poor our living is when we compare it with the unsearchable riches of Christ. Paul said that he announced to the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ as the gospel (Eph. 3:8). If we desire to announce to people the unsearchable riches of Christ, we need to experience Him richly in our living. The riches of Christ are unsearchable, but how much reality do we have in us? Therefore, this is a warning; this is something we need to beware of.

The way to be transformed is first by fellowshipping with the Lord without any barrier, that is, with an unveiled face beholding and reflecting like a mirror the glorious image of the Lord (3:18a). Stanza 5 of Hymns, #501 reads, "In spirit while gazing on Thee, / As a glass reflecting Thy glory, / Like to Thyself transformed I'll be, / That Thou might be expressed thru me." We must be this way every day. There is a distinct difference between one who reads the Word for ten minutes and prays for five minutes in the morning and one who neither reads the Word nor prays. Every morning we must have fellowship with the Lord in this way, even if we are very busy. Moreover, during the day we also must find time to draw near to Him, to be face to face with Him. Then we will be like a mirror beholding Him and reflecting His glory. Thus, the Lord will transfuse into us the elements of what He is and what He has done. By the power of His life and with His life elements we shall gradually be metabolically transformed to have His life shape. What is most important is that through the renewing of our mind we shall gradually be transformed into His image.

The way to worship in the New Testament is for all of us to use our spirit. Before we attend a meeting, we are a worshipper of God already. Every morning we have a revival, and every day, in our daily living, we are constantly renewed and overcoming and are in constant touch and fellowship with the Lord. In addition, our lives are filled with hymns. Hymns, #501 and #1068 or a more simple one such as #1024 are hymns that I like to sing. They are all very good songs. We can learn to sing them often in our daily lives.

Today among Christians there exists an erroneous traditional saying that Christ is in the Holy Spirit, that is, that the Son is in the Spirit. We must be careful; otherwise, we will make the same mistake. For example, the last two lines of the second stanza of Hymns, #501 says, "In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought; / As Spirit, oneness with me sought." The line cannot be written as: "In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought; / In Spirit, oneness with me sought." We must discern the difference between the two. I do not mean to say that it is definitely wrong to say that "the Son is in the Spirit." Such a statement, however, is certainly not in the Bible. What the Bible says is that "the last Adam became a life-giving Spirit" and that "the Lord is the Spirit." Bible expositors are puzzled about the matter of the Son's being the Spirit. Many of them do not dare to say that Christ is the Spirit. To avoid being troubled or condemned, they have coined the term "the pneumatic Christ." Nevertheless, is not the pneumatic Christ simply the Spirit?

Stanza 3 of Hymns, #501 says, "All things of the Father are Thine; / All Thou art in Spirit is mine; / The Spirit makes Thee real to me, / That Thou experienced might be." This stanza, which is written exactly according to John 16:15, says that all that the Father has is given to and received by the Son; all that the Son has received and all that He has is in the Spirit; the Spirit makes the Son real to us by entering into us; and as a result, this reality may become our experience. This means that if we listen to many messages concerning Christ, the Son, but do not have the Spirit of reality coming into us, none of the messages will be reality. When the Spirit comes into our spirit, this is the coming of the reality of the Son, and the result is that this reality becomes our experience. This may be considered the best explanation of John 16:15.

Hymn 501 can be considered a masterpiece in our hymnal. It extracts the focus of the Bible from the New Testament and describes it fully. Verse one of this hymn says:

O glorious Christ, Savior mine,
Thou art truly radiance divine;
God infinite, in eternity,
Yet man in time, finite to be.

Then verse two says:

The fulness of God dwells in Thee;
Thou dost manifest God's glory;
In flesh Thou hast redemption wrought;
As Spirit, oneness with me sought.

This hymn does not speak of the love of God or of the grace of God. It does not talk about God's mercy or lovingkindess. Rather, it speaks of the fulness of God and the glory of God.

The phrase "As Spirit, oneness with me sought" speaks of the focus of the Bible. This focus is the Triune God, the Creator of the universe, the eternal God, who came one day to the earth to become a finite man. He accomplished redemption in the flesh, and on the cross He terminated sin, the world, darkness, the self, the flesh, and everything of the old creation. Then in resurrection He became the life-giving Spirit. When we believe in Him, He enters into us to have an organic union with us. In this way this life-giving Spirit becomes one with us.

This union is not a union like one hand holding another hand. It is a union comparable to the grafting of a branch into a tree. Romans 11:24 says that we are the wild olive branches that have been grafted into the cultivated olive tree. The cultivated olive tree is Christ, and the wild olive branches are we the sinners. Without passing through the redeeming death of Christ, we and Christ can never be grafted together. It is through the death and resurrection of Christ that He became the life-giving Spirit to enter into us and to have an organic union with us.

Verse three of hymn 501 says:

All things of the Father are Thine;
All Thou art in Spirit is mine;
The Spirit makes Thee real to me,
That Thou experienced might be.

All that the Father has is the Son's, and all that the Son is, is in the Spirit (John 16:13-15). This Spirit is the ultimate expression of the Triune God. The Bible explains in detail how all that belongs to the Father is inherited by the Son, and how all that the Son is, is in the Spirit. Hence the Spirit becomes the reality of the Son, and the Son is the expression of the Father. In this way, the Son is the manifestation of the Father, and the Spirit is the realization of the Son. Today this Spirit has entered into our spirit to become our reality. The result is that our spirit is organically joined to His Spirit, and His story becomes our history.

As descendants of the Chinese race we are spread today throughout the whole world. In the early days our ancestors crossed a vast span of land. When they did this, we also crossed over together with them. Hence their story is our history. In the same way, all that the Lord Jesus has passed through—His incarnation, human living, crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension—has become our experience by His being joined to us.

Verse four continues:

The Spirit of life causes Thee
By Thy Word to transfer to me.
Thy Spirit touched, Thy word received,
Thy life in me is thus conceived.

Today this Spirit enters into our spirit to make His history our experience. But that is not all. By the word of the Bible He is making Himself real to us. Whenever we come to read the Lord's Word, we touch this Spirit, and He becomes our supply.

Verse five says:

In spirit while gazing on Thee,
As a glass reflecting Thy glory,
Like to Thyself transformed I'll be,
That Thou might be expressed thru me.

Every time we come to the Lord, it is a matter of the spirit. We must forget about our culture and forget about teachings. We must drop our religion and philosophy, and we must drop our ethics, our morality, and all our customs and habits. Of course, this does not mean that we can indulge ourselves in whatever we desire. It means that we should forget all these things and turn to our spirit. In spirit we should worship and behold the Lord, as a mirror reflecting the Lord's glory.

I was born in northern China, but when I went to Shanghai, I did not reflect the North, and when I came to the West, I did not reflect the East. What I reflected was Christ. On the one hand Christ is in the heavens; on the other hand He is in our spirit. As long as we will turn to our spirit, we can contact Him and enjoy Him, as a mirror reflecting His glory. The result is that we are transformed into His image, and He is expressed through us.

Verse six continues:

In no other way could we be
Sanctified and share Thy vict'ry;
Thus only spiritual we'll be
And touch the life of glory.

Today we have only one way—the way of the spirit. The Triune God, the Creator of the universe, who was incarnated, died on the cross, and rose from the dead, is now the life-giving Spirit. This Spirit is the ultimate expression of the Triune God. He is also the consummation of the Triune God. He has entered into the spirit of us who have believed and is now being mingled with us as one spirit. Now we should walk according to this mingled spirit and live a daily life that is inseparably attached to this spirit.

Unfortunately, many people read the Bible as if they are wearing a pair of colored eyeglasses. They read into the Bible many things of culture, teachings, ethics, morality, religion, philosophy, customs, and traditions. As a result, they do not receive any light from the Bible. Even many seminary students are coming to the Word in this way. They come with their colored eyeglasses. I hope that the Lord will be merciful to us all, so that we may all remove our colored glasses to read the Word of God solely with our God-created spirit.

The last verse of hymn 501 says:

Thy Spirit will me saturate,
Every part will God permeate,
Deliv'ring me from the old man,
With all saints building for His plan.

This mingled spirit is in you saturating and permeating your whole spirit, soul, and body. The result is that your whole being will be filled with the Triune God, so that in every part of your being you will see God. In this way, every part of your being will be saturated with God, and you will be delivered from the natural self and be built together with all the saints to become God's habitation.

Ephesians 2:22 says, "In whom you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God in spirit." Only when we are all living in spirit, worshipping in spirit, beholding and reflecting His glory in spirit, and being transformed in spirit will it be possible for God to have a way. And only then will it be possible for us to be built together in spirit to become the dwelling of God.