the only requirement the Bible has from us is that we live in our mingled spirit

It is so wonderful that we as believers in Christ have a mingled spirit – the divine Spirit is mingled with our human spirit!

Ultimately, the Bible requires only one great thing from us – that we may walk according to the mingled spirit! We are joined to the Lord as one spirit (1 Cor. 6:17), but practically and daily, in our day-to-day life, we need to live a life in our mingled spirit!

Everything is in our spirit – salvation, sanctification, renewing, the building up of the church as the Body of Christ, the entire Triune God, the testimony of the church, etc. All we have to do as Christians is to live in our mingled spirit!

The bountiful supply of the Spirit

In Phil. 1:19 we see the bountiful supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. The Spirit mingled with our spirit is bountiful – this Spirit includes the entire Triune God, the riches of the Father and the Son, the humanity of Jesus, Christ’s accomplishments, crucifixion, resurrection, ascension, and everything that God is and in Christ has passed through.

Everything is in the rich and bountiful Spirit. Even more, in Rev. 5:6 we see that this Spirit has been intensified sevenfold – He is the seven Spirits of God sent forth in all the earth! We need to see this Wonderful and Rich Spirit mingled with our spirit!

If we pray over all the details and components of this bountiful Spirit, we will have a thorough and rich realization of how amazing and awesome our mingled spirit is.

We need to appreciate what we have – our human spirit is mingled with the all-inclusive, life-giving, compound, sevenfold intensified Spirit!

When we see this and we pray ourselves into the realization of this Spirit with our spirit, we will be bountifully supplied in our daily living!

The only way is to live in the spirit

Paul discovered this way, and he encouraged us to live in our spirit and walk according to the spirit. This is what the Bible basically tells us – all we need to do is to live in the spirit. We may be students going to our classes or writing our essays, or we may be parents and our kids are naughty – we need to live in the spirit.

Whether the environment is good or it is not so pleasant, we need to live in our spirit. In good things, in bad things, in big things, in small things, in all things – we need to live in our spirit! As long as we live in spirit, we spontaneously bear the cross, because the cross is in our spirit.

We don’t need to fight or struggle with our disposition or temper, trying to put it down whenever we feel it rises up and makes us do or say things that we shouldn’t. No, all we have to do is turn to our spirit and live in our spirit.

The only way we can deny our self and we can bear the cross is by living in the spirit. “In the spirit Christ is life to me, / Strengthening and blessing all-inclusively; / Living in the spirit, holiness I prove, / And the triune God within my heart doth move” (Hymns #593, last stanza).

Living in the spirit is what matters

Paul thought that he was serving God by being zealous for the law and imprisoning the believers in Christ (Acts 22:3) – but he was actually under the authority of Satan! Merely being zealous for God and “doing our best in our power and knowledge to serve God” is not enough – we may still do these things and be under Satan’s authority.

What we have to do is to turn to our mingled spirit and live in our spirit. This is the key and the only way – living in our spirit. Even in having morning watch or morning revival, we need to do it in our mingled spirit. Then throughout the day, we need to keep turning to our spirit that we may live in spirit!

Lord, may we stop our trying and our struggling and simply turn to our wonderful mingled spirit! Thank You that everything is in our spirit. All we need to live our human life and our Christian life is in our mingled spirit! Lord, keep us turning to our spirit! May we learn to live in spirit in any kind of situation and condition. Bountifully supply us, Lord, that we may live, walk, and be in our spirit daily!

References and Further Reading

• Inspired from Living in the Spirit, chs. 1-2, and Basic Training, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Focus of the Lord’s Recovery, week 4;
• Hymns #593 – All we have to do is mind our spirit and live in our spirit!