For us to live out and work out the New Jerusalem is for us to live out and work out God’s complete salvation according to the unique New Testament ministry, the ministry of the age; this ministry is the ministry of the Spirit – the ministry of the new covenant – to deify us by inscribing with the Spirit to make us living letters of Christ. Amen!
God’s intention from the very beginning was not just to create man so that He may have a companion to fellowship with; rather, He created man in His image and according to His likeness so that man would take God in as life and become the same as God in life, nature, expression, and function, but not in the Godhead.
This is what the highest peak of the divine revelation in the Bible reveals, and this is what God is working to obtain.
If we look at the New Jerusalem, the consummation of the work of God in and with man, we will see that God and man are mingled together, God is in man and man is in God, God dwells in man and man dwells in God, and God and man are joined, mingled, and incorporated together to be one corporate entity for eternity for the expression of God in man throughout the universe.
How does God accomplish this marvellous work? How does God take man from being sinful and rebellious and makes him a part of His corporate expression, even the corporate Christ, to express and represent God?
The New Testament reveals the organic salvation of God based on His judicial redemption; this is the way that God accomplishes His purpose.
First, because man fell, God became man and accomplished an all-inclusive judicial redemption to lay the foundation for the carrying out of His organic salvation.
Based on Christ’s death on the cross, man can believe into the Lord Jesus and have Him as his righteousness; then, man can be regenerated, sanctified, renewed, transformed, and conformed and glorified to bear the image of God in full.
This is a lifelong process of organic salvation of which Rom. 5 speaks, “much more now we are being saved in His life”.
There’s a process of being saved in the divine life, that is, of having the divine life wrought into us, saturate us, and permeate us until our entire being – spirit, soul, and body – are filled with life and we are glorified! Hallelujah!
The consummation of God’s organic salvation is our being glorified with Christ, sharing in the glory of God.
The Lord Jesus prayed in John 17 and said that He has given us His glory, and now He as the Firstborn Son of God is leading many sons into glory.
What the Lord will gain as the final product, the masterpiece, is the New Jerusalem as a miraculous structure of treasure for His corporate expression and representation for eternity. Hallelujah!
May we live our daily life with the New Jerusalem in view, even under the vision of the New Jerusalem, so that we may live out and work out the New Jerusalem in our daily living!
The Ministry of the Spirit is the Ministry of the New Covenant to Deify us by Inscribing our Hearts with the Spirit to make us Living Letters of Christ
In a wonderful yet mysterious way, we are letters of Christ inscribed with the Spirit of the living God so that we may express Him, and the New Jerusalem is a giant letter of Christ expressing and manifesting Christ to the whole universe.
The ministry of the Spirit is the ministry of the new covenant to deify us by inscribing our hearts with the Spirit of the living God (the divine and mystical ink) to make us the living letters of Christ (see 2 Cor. 3:3, 6, 8, 18; 4:1; Isa. 42:6; 49:6; Psa. 45:1-2).
Paul didn’t just preach the gospel, teach the truth, and shepherd the saints in the church life; he cooperated with the Triune God to inscribe them with the Spirit of the living God as the ink so that they may become living letters of Christ read by all men.
The Spirit of the living God is being inscribed on our whole being so that we may become living letters of Christ; as this takes place, Christ is being read in us and others can see Christ in us.
The divine and mystical ink is the Spirit of the living God; the Spirit is not an instrument for writing but the very element with which the apostles minister Christ as the content for the writing of living letters that convey Christ to all men.
When Paul ministered the Spirit to the saints, they were inscribed to be living letters of Christ; the Spirit is the ink, and Christ is the realization of the ink, with the result that we become a letter of Christ.
All of God’s organic salvation for us to be deified, and the ministry of the Spirit results in our being an expression of Christ.
By the ministry of the Spirit, we are “Christified” to become the city of life and the bride of Christ; thus, the Spirit as the consummated Triune God marries the bride as the transformed tripartite church to live a life that is the mingling of God and man as one spirit, a life that is superexcellent and that overflows with blessings and joy (Rom. 5:10; Rev. 2:7; 22:1-2, 17a). Wow!
We believers in Christ are in the process of being Christified to become the New Jerusalem, the city of life and the bride of Christ.
At the beginning of Revelation, in chs. 2-3, the Spirit was speaking to the churches and was saying, He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit speaks to the churches; at the end of Revelation, we see that the Spirit and the bride speak in oneness (Rev. 22:17).
This shows that the Spirit has been wrought into the church to such an extent that the Spirit and the bride become one entity, speaking in oneness. Amen!
We become one with the Spirit to be living letters of Christ not by teaching or instructions but by being inscribed with the Spirit.
The new covenant ministry inscribes us not with concepts, knowledge, or theology, but with the essence of Christ, the Spirit Himself, so that we may be living letters of Christ. Hallelujah!
In order for us to be constituted the ministers of the new covenant for the building up of the Body of Christ, we must experience all the aspects of the all-inclusive Spirit in 2 Corinthians so that we may be filled and saturated with the Spirit.
What a rich Spirit we see and enjoy in 2 Corinthians!
We need to experience the rich and all-inclusive Spirit, who is the anointing Spirit, the sealing Spirit, the pledging Spirit (2 Cor. 1:21-22; 5:5), the inscribing Spirit (3:3), the life-giving Spirit (v. 6), the ministering Spirit (v. 8), the freeing Spirit (v. 17), the transforming Spirit (v. 18), and the transmitting Spirit (13:14).
What a Spirit we have!
This Spirit is being wrought into us, inscribed on us, and working in and on us to make us living letters of Christ, deifying us to make us the city of life and the bride of Christ for the corporate expression of the Triune God!
As we are being saturated with the Spirit day by day and as we allow the Spirit to work in us, we are being Christified to become God in life and nature but not in the Godhead for the preparation of the bride of Christ, the New Jerusalem!
Lord Jesus, we open to the ministry of the Spirit to be inscribed with the Spirit of the living God and be made living letters of Christ. Amen, Lord, we open our whole being to You and to the saints in the Body to be infused with the Spirit and saturated with the Spirit so that we may be deified and express Christ in full! Hallelujah, the Spirit is a divine and mystical ink inscribed on us to make us letters of Christ read and known by all men! Amen, Lord, gain in us what You are after. Keep us enjoying and experiencing the Spirit with all its wonderful aspects! We open to the Spirit’s anointing, sealing, pledging, inscribing, life-giving, ministering, freeing, transforming, and transmitting! Saturate us, permeate us, and Christify us to make us living letters of Christ read and known by all men, consummating in the New Jerusalem!
The Ministry of Righteousness is the Ministry of Christ as our Objective and Subjective Righteousness for the Expression of Christ
In 2 Cor. 3:9 we see that there is the ministry of righteousness; this is the ministry of Christ as our objective righteousness for our justification and as our subjective righteousness “embroidered” into us by the transforming work of the Spirit for the living out and genuine expression of Christ (Psa. 45:13-14; Rom. 8:4; Psa. 23:3).
Such a living is the God-man living to express Christ. By the ministry of righteousness, we receive Christ as our objective righteousness (typified by the best robe in Luke 15) and also as our subjective righteousness (the “righteousnesses of the saints”) to become the New Jerusalem as the new creation of righteousness in the new heaven and the new earth (1 Cor. 1:30; Phil. 3:9; 2 Pet. 3:13; cf. Isa. 33:22).
Today on earth everything is chaos, a universal heap of collapse; Christ is working to head up all things in Himself, and through the ministry of righteousness we receive Christ as our objective and subjective righteousness for us to express Christ.
When we believe into the Lord Jesus, we receive Christ as our objective righteousness, covering us before God to make us acceptable to Him.
Whenever we confess our sins, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from every sin and we become righteous in Him.
Christ is given to us to be our covering before God, our objective righteousness.
Such objective righteousness issues in grace (Christ enjoyed by us), and grace issues in subjective righteousness, which is Christ lived out of us (see Rom. 5:1-2, 17-18; Luke 15:22-23).
The power of grace operates in us and produces subjective righteousness, making us right with God, with others, and even with ourselves; this power operates in us not only to subdue sin but also to overcome Satan, sin, and death in our being, causing us to reign in life (2 Tim. 2:1; Rom. 5:17, 21). Amen!
Many times we are not righteous with ourselves or with others; slamming the door when we leave the house shows that we are not righteous to others and to ourselves.
However, we are daily being saved in life and, as we repent and confess, the Lord becomes our objective righteousness, which results in grace, and the power of grace – our enjoyment of Christ – subdues and overcomes Satan, sin, and death in our being, causing us to reign in life. Amen!
We need to be much more saved in His life by receiving the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness so that we may be those who reign in life over Satan, sin, and death!
The righteousness we receive for our justification is objective and enables us to meet the requirements of the righteous God; we thank and praise the Lord for Christ as our objective righteousness!
Even more, the righteousnesses of the overcoming saints are subjective and enable them to meet the requirements of the overcoming Christ (Rev. 22:14; 19:7-8).
On one hand, Christ is our objective righteousness covering us before God and qualifying us to enjoy Him; on the other hand, Christ is being wrought into us “stitch by stitch”, being embroidered in us to become the righteousnesses, the lived out Christ in our daily living, to be our subjective righteousness.
This second aspect of righteousness, the subjective righteousness, is the wedding garment of the bride worn by the overcoming saints for their victory and participation in the wedding feast of the Lamb.
May we stand with the fact that Christ is our righteousness, not believing our situation and our condition, and may we cooperate with the Lord in His ministry of righteousness to let Him work Himself into us and be lived out of us as our righteousnesses so that we may have the wedding garment for the wedding feast!
Through the ministry of righteousness, Christ becomes our objective and subjective righteousness for us to express Christ; the result is that we have a God-man living as the living out and genuine expression of Christ!
Hallelujah for the ministry of righteousness, the ministry of Christ as our objective righteousness for our justification and as our subjective righteousness for the expression of Christ! Thank You Lord we can take You as our righteousness by faith; You qualify us to enjoy God! We open to You, dear Lord, to have Christ wrought into us to become our subjective righteousness. Amen, Lord Jesus, may the power of grace operate in us to produce subjective righteousness in us to make us right us with God, with others, and even with ourselves. We open to You, Lord, and we allow You to be wrought into us day by day until You are lived out of us for the expression of Christ. Guide us into the reality of enjoying You and gaining You in the fullest way possible! We open to receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness so that we may reign in life through You!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Sources of inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Life-study of 2 Corinthians, msgs. 25-29, by Witness Lee, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Vital Factors for the Lord’s Recovery of the Church Life (2021 ITERO), week 2, The Factor of Closely Following the Completed Vision of the Age through the Ministry of the Age.
- Hymns on this topic:
– In our heart, in our heart, in our heart, in our heart, / Christ is inscribed in us; / In the church, in the church, in the church, in the church / A living letter, the apostle’s ministry / Not with ink but the Spirit, / In the apostle and me, / Seen and read by the nations, / Shining forth this glorious ministry! (Scripture song)
– Christ to minister is service / Both to God and others too, / Christ, the surplus, e’er supplying, / Off’ring Him as service true. (Hymns #912)
– Let us rejoice and exult, / And let us give glory to Him, / For the marriage of the Lamb has come, / And His wife has made herself, / Made herself ready. / And it was given her that / She should be clothed in fine linen, /Bright and clean; / For the fine linen is / The righteousnesses of the saints, / of the saints. (Scripture song)
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