As believers in Christ we have been rooted in Christ and we need to grow in Him and be built up in Him by spending adequate time with the Lord in His word to absorb His riches.
Christ has been allotted to us as the portion of the saints in the light; we have been given by God a lot of inheritance, a “plot of Christ” to enjoy and partake of.
We do not belong to the world – we have a land, a promised land, which is the all-inclusive Christ; we need to enter into the possession of this good land and enjoy this good land. This land is not a physical land but a spiritual one – it is the all-inclusive Christ who, as the Spirit, is the pledge of our inheritance.
God’s intention is to bring us all – all the people of God – into the enjoyment of the good land, which typifies Christ as the goal. Christ is the allotted portion of the saints as our divine inheritance for our enjoyment.
How do we enjoy this good land and how do we enter into the possession of our inheritance?
We need to realise that we have been rooted into Christ; as living beings, we are like plants that have been rooted into the rich soil of Christ, the good land, and now we need to exercise to absorb the riches of Christ into our being to grow up in Him and be built up in Him.
Day by day, even moment by moment, we need to live the plant life, that is, we need to be intimately connected to the Lord and send roots deep down in Him to absorb His riches into our being.
We do this by spending adequate time with the Lord especially in the morning, and also throughout the day; when we set aside times all throughout the day to be with the Lord, contact Him, pray over His word, and fellowship with Him, we send roots down in Him, and we absorb His riches.
This will cause us to have a metabolic change which will also manifest in an exterior change in our behavior and attitude; we will look more and more like Christ, and our living will become more and more the living of Christ for the building up of the Body of Christ.
First we need to grow downward, sending roots deep down in Christ, and then we will grow upwards, bearing fruit and having a certain manifestation of Christ.
May we realise that we have been rooted into Christ as the good land, and may we daily take time to enjoy the Lord, not rushing our time with Him but taking adequate time to absorb Him.
Merely knowing about the Lord being the good land is not enough – we need to spend time with Him and exercise our spirit to absorb His riches into our being.
Having been Rooted in Christ, let us Walk in Christ by Walking according to the Spirit
The good land today is Christ as the all-inclusive Spirit (Gal. 3:14) who dwells in our spirit (2 Tim. 4:22; Rom. 8:16) to be our enjoyment; to walk according to this Spirit (Gal. 5:16) is the central and crucial point in the New Testament.
The good land is the all-inclusive Christ as the Spirit in our spirit, and when we walk according to the spirit and walk in spirit, the Spirit imparts the riches of Christ into us for our enjoyment and participation.
As we have received Christ Jesus the Lord, we need to walk in Him by walking in the spirit. May we be brought back to this basic yet crucial matter, walking according to the spirit.
We have a mingled spirit – the Lord Jesus is with our spirit, and this spirit is the all-inclusive Christ as the good land; now we need to walk in Him.
Wherever the soles of our feet treads upon, that land is ours; the more we walk in Christ, the more we have of Christ, but the less we walk in Christ, the less of Christ we own in reality.
We need to walk the length and breadth of the good land, the immeasurably rich Christ, so that we may gain Him and possess Him. If we have been rooted in Christ, we shall spontaneously walk in Christ by living, acting, moving, and having our being in Christ.
The more we send roots down in Christ by spending adequate time with Him in His word to absorb His riches, the more spontaneously we will walk in Him.
But if we don’t absorb Christ, if we don’t receive His riches into us, we can’t walk in Him; the walk in Christ is a spontaneous result of our absorbing Christ.
Every day in our personal life, marriage life, and family life we need to live, act, and have our being in Christ; this is what is critically needed in the churches today.
We all need to be those living, acting, moving, and having our being in Christ every moment; we want to be found in Him, doing the most little of things in Him.
May we seek to be found in Christ even in the most common and insignificant of things, so that we may send our roots deep down in Christ and walk in Christ by walking according to the spirit.
While we walk in Christ, we will be built up in Christ to live out Christ; this living out of Christ will produce the corporate expression of Christ, the church life (Col. 2:6-7).
Hallelujah, we have been rooted into Christ, and we daily can be deeply rooted into Him in our experience by spending time with Him in His word to absorb His riches.
And as we are rooted in Christ, we can walk in Christ, so that just as inwardly we’re rooted in Christ we may outwardly express Him by walking according to the mingled spirit. In this way we become the corporate expression of Christ, the church life.
Lord Jesus, thank You for rooting us into You, the rich soil of the all-inclusive good land. We want to daily exercise our spirit to enjoy You and be deeply rooted into You so that we may spontaneously walk in Christ by walking according to the spirit. Amen, Lord Jesus, may our living, moving, speaking, and everything about us be in Christ so that we may walk in Christ in our daily life for the corporate expression of Christ. We turn to You, Lord, and we exercise our spirit; we choose to walk according to the spirit and be in the spirit today!
Being Deeply Rooted in Christ by Spending Time with Him in the Word to Absorb His Riches
Col. 2:6-7 reveals that Christ as the good land is the rich soil in which we have been rooted so that we may grow with the elements that we absorb from the soil (see 1 Cor. 3:6, 9; Col. 2:19).
The good land is made of the good soil of Christ; for us to walk in Christ, we first need to be deeply rooted into Christ, just as the plants are rooted into the soil.
In 1 Cor. Paul said that Apollos watered, Paul planted, but God gives the growth; Paul planted us in this good land, into the rich soil of Christ, and now as plants in Christ we need to absorb from Him all His riches.
The only way for us to be deeply rooted in Christ is to contact Him and spend time with Him in the Word with much prayer; first, we grow downward, and then we will bear fruit upward (Eph. 5:26; 6:17-18; Isa. 37:31).
We all know that we need to contact the Lord and spend time with Him, but we may not all practice this in an adequate way.
On one hand we have already been rooted in Christ, and on the other, we need to continue to be deeply rooted in Christ by spending time with Him in the Word to absorb His riches.
We should forget our situation, our condition, our failures, and our weaknesses, and simply take time to enjoy the Lord so that we may absorb Him and assimilate the rich elements from Him as the soil.
Especially in the morning we need to take adequate time to enjoy the Lord in His word; we should not rush our time with Him but rather, spend adequate time with Him at the start of each day.
As we spend time with the Lord in His word to absorb His riches, the negative things will not bother us; in the riches of Christ that we absorb we receive the Satan-repellent that we need to not be bothered by his temptations, troubles, and problems.
We need to spend time with the Lord in the morning and also throughout the day so that we may enjoy a feast in Him and with Him. Again and again we need to turn from our thought, emotion, and intention, and simply open to the Lord by exercising our spirit to tell Him,
Lord Jesus, I love You and I open to You! I adore You, Lord, and I worship You. I turn to You from my thoughts, worries, emotions, and intentions, and I just open my being to You! Lord, I give myself to You. I give You my heart and everything concerning my day. I love You, Lord Jesus!
Every morning we need to take adequate time to absorb the Lord; although even ten minutes is good, it is best to spend thirty minutes to enjoy Him at the start of each new day.
As we spend time contacting the Lord in the morning and throughout the day in our spirit, we will spontaneously absorb into us the riches of Christ as the soil.
We shouldn’t just have a “coffee and doughnut” of Christ every morning but take time to absorb Him.
A plant is rooted in the soil to absorb the nutrients and riches from the soil; this absorption is not just ten minutes in the morning and then ten minutes at night but rather, it is something constant, non-stop, 24/7, or else the plan will die.
As believers in Christ we have been rooted into Christ, and we need to daily, hourly, even moment-by-moment contact Him and be in the organic union with Him to absorb the rich nutrients in Christ for our growth in life, walking in Christ, and becoming the expression of Christ.
We must take time to enjoy the Lord as the all-inclusive good land so that all the elements of Christ as the rich soil may be absorbed into us for us to be made full in Him in our experience.
Christ is the fullness of the Godhead, and we have been made full in Him by absorbing His riches into our being.
If we would absorb the riches of Christ as the soil, we need to have tender, new roots; we shouldn’t let ourselves get old or stale in our relationship with the Lord but be fresh and renewed every day (2 Cor. 4:16; cf. Deut. 34:7; Luke 11:34-36; Acts 3:19-20; Psa. 16:11).
The best absorption takes place not with the big old roots but with the root hairs, for they have the most contact surface with the soil, and through that the nutrients with the water penetrates into the cells of the plant.
The plant doesn’t go out there to look for nutrients – the roots are going down in the earth and they do something to draw the nutrients to themselves; they actively draw, absorb, and “suck” the riches from the soil.
Every day we need to develop some new roots, some root hairs, so that we have some new and fresh absorbing of the riches of Christ.
We need to forget our situation, our condition, our failures, and our weaknesses and simply take time to absorb the Lord so that we may be built up in Him for the building up of His Body, His corporate expression (Luke 8:13; Matt. 14:22-23; 6:6). Amen!
May we have a change in our way and our practice; may we put aside the things that distract us and focus only on the Lord to spend adequate time with Him and absorb His riches.
Lord Jesus, we consecrate afresh to You; we open to You in a new way, and we come to You to absorb Your riches into our being. May our roots be tender and new to absorb You moment-by-moment into our being. Amen, Lord Jesus, may we never get old or stale in our fellowship with You. May we not just go through a schedule or do our Bible reading – may we take adequate time to enjoy You in Your word through the exercise of our spirit so that we may absorb Your riches into our being and thus grow in life, be built up in Christ, and walk in Christ to become the corporate expression of Christ.
This article can also be read in the Romanian language / Citiți acest articol în limba română vizitând următorul link, Fiind adânc înrădăcinați în Cristos petrecând timp cu El în Cuvânt pentru a-I absorbi bogățiile.
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by bro. Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Colossians, msgs. 53, 55-57 (by Witness Lee), 10-11, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Numbers (2), week 7, The All-inclusive Christ Being the Allotted Portion of the Saints, according to God’s Choice, as Their Divine Inheritance for Their Enjoyment.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Take time to absorb Him, to gain the supply, / That we may be watered and nourished thereby; / The deeper the roots spread, the deeper the flow, / And richer and higher within us He’ll grow. (Song on, Take time to absorb Him)
# Take time to behold Him, / Let Him be thy guide; / And run not before Him / Whatever betide; / In joy or in sorrow / Still follow thy Lord, / And, looking to Jesus, / Still trust in His Word. (Hymns #643)
# Begin the day with God, He’s waiting there for you. / Morning by morning come, His mercy is brand new. / Rise up! Don’t wait! You’ll miss the Son. / He has so much for you. / Enjoy your portion and your part / Until the Morning Star rises in your heart. (Song on, Begin the day with God)
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