Message One

The Church in the Triune God

(1)
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 1:1, 3-6, 10; 2 Thes. 1:1
1. The New Testament, like the Bible as a whole, is fully composed
of and structured with the Divine Trinity—Matt. 28:19; Rev. 1:4-5;
22:1-2:
1. The entire New Testament is related to the Triune God; the
Triune God is the element for the construction of the New
Testament—Eph. 3:16-19; 4:4-6.
2. The Bible presents us a picture of the move of the Divine
Trinity for the accomplishment of His economy—Luke 15:3-
32; Eph. 2:18.
3. The Bible was written according to the governing principle
of the Triune God wrought into His chosen and redeemed
people as their enjoyment, their drink, and their fountain of
life and light—Psa. 36:8-9.
4. The revelation concerning the Triune God in the Word of
God is for the dispensing of God in His Divine Trinity into His
chosen and redeemed people for their experience and
enjoyment so that they might become His corporate
expression for eternity—Eph. 1:3-23; 4:16; Rev. 21:2, 10-11.
2. In 1 Thessalonians 1, the Triune God is revealed in His triune work
—vv. 1, 3-6, 10; 2 Thes. 1:1:
1. The Father selected us (1 Thes. 1:1, 3-4), the Son delivers us
(v. 10), and the Holy Spirit propagates, imparts, and
transmits the Triune God into us (vv. 5-6); such a triune
work is for our enjoyment of His salvation.
2. This portion shows the activity of the Divine Trinity in the
service of the gospel:
 1. The believers are beloved of God the Father—vv. 1, 4.
2. After the believers receive the gospel in the power of
the Spirit and with the joy of the Spirit, they become
imitators of the Lord—vv. 5-6.
3. The Epistle of 1 Thessalonians is addressed to “the church of the
Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ”—1:1:
1. On the one hand, the church of the Thessalonians was of
the Thessalonians; on the other hand, this church was in
God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ:
1. Such a church is born of God the Father with His life
and nature and is organically united with the Lord
Jesus Christ in all that He is and has done—John 1:12-
13; 1 Cor. 1:30; 6:17.
2. We need to see that the church is composed of
human beings who are in God the Father and in the
Lord Jesus Christ, those who have the life of God and
who are in the organic union with Christ—John 3:15;
15:1, 5.
2. When Paul speaks of the church in God the Father and the
Lord Jesus Christ, he actually means that the church is in
the Triune God—1 Thes. 1:1; 1 Cor. 1:2; 12:4-6:
1. The expressions God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ both imply the Spirit; therefore, in 1
Thessalonians 1:1 the Spirit is implied and
understood, and we may speak of the church being in
the Triune God.
2. Because the three of the Divine Trinity are
inseparable, whenever we have the first, the Father,
we also have the second, the Son, and the third, the
Spirit—Matt. 12:28; Rom. 8:11; Gal. 4:4-6.
3. The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are one God, not
 three; They are distinct but not separate—2 Cor.
13:14:
1. We cannot separate the Son from the Father, or
the Father and the Son from the Spirit, because
all three coexist and coinhere—John 14:10-11.
2. In Their eternal coexistence the three of the
Godhead are distinct, but Their eternal
coinherence makes Them one.
4. In the divine economy the three of the Divine Trinity
work and are manifested respectively in three
consecutive stages—Eph. 1:3-14:
1. The Father is the One who plans, originates, and
initiates—vv. 3-6.
2. The Son accomplishes everything that the
Father has planned, originated, and initiated—
vv. 7-12.
3. The Spirit executes and applies what the Father
has planned and what the Son has
accomplished—vv. 13-14.
4. Selection is of the Father, deliverance is of the
Son, and imparting, or propagating, is of the
Spirit—1 Thes. 1:3-6, 10.
5. When the Son comes, He comes with the Father and
by the Spirit; the Son is realized as the Spirit, and the
Spirit comes as the Son with the Father—John 14:26;
15:26.
3. For the church to be in God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ means that the church is in the processed Triune God
—Matt. 28:19; Eph. 4:4-6:
1. According to the Bible, there is no such thing as the
 church being merely in God; rather, the church is in
the processed Triune God—2 Cor. 13:14.
2. In Genesis 1 God was the unprocessed God, but in the
New Testament He has become the processed Triune
God—John 7:37-39; Phil. 1:19.
3. Processed refers to the crucial steps through which
the Triune God has passed in the divine economy:
incarnation, human living, crucifixion, and
resurrection:
1. In crucifixion the Lord accomplished
redemption, the termination of the old
creation, and the destruction of Satan—Eph.
1:7; Rom. 6:6; Heb. 2:14.
2. In resurrection He germinated the new creation
—2 Cor. 5:17.
3. Now He is the life-giving Spirit as the ultimate
consummation of the processed Triune God—1
Cor. 15:45b; 2 Cor. 3:17a.
4. The church in the processed Triune God is the church
in the One who has become the life-giving Spirit with
the Father and the Son—John 14:20:
1. The processed Triune God reaches us, contacts
us, and is applied to us in our experience as the
life-giving Spirit—1 Cor. 15:45b.
2. The Father is in the Son, and the Son is now the
life-giving Spirit dwelling in us—John 14:10-11,
16-17, 20.
3. When we are in God the Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ, we are in the Spirit; thus, we are
the church in the processed Triune God.
 4. If we see the vision of the church in the Triune God, this
vision will control our thinking, our activities, and our entire
life—Prov. 29:18a; Acts 26:19.
Message Two
The Church in the Triune God
(2)
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 1:1, 3-6, 10; 2 Thes. 1:1
1. The church is in God the Father—1 Thes. 1:1; 2 Thes. 1:1:
1. For the church to be in God the Father, God must become
the Father to us, and we need to have a life relationship
with Him—John 20:17:
1. In a way that is organic and full of life, God the Father
has made it possible for the church to be in Him—1
John 5:11.
2. In the New Testament, especially in the Gospel of
John, the Father denotes the source of life—5:26.
3. The title God refers to creation; the title Father refers
to the impartation of life and indicates a relationship
of life—20:17:
1. The Father, the source of life, is for the
propagation and multiplication of life—1 John
3:1.
2. God is no longer merely our Creator; He is also
our Father, our Begetter, for He has begotten us
with His life—John 1:12-13.
3. We call God our Father because we have been
born of Him, and now, as His children, we have
a life relationship with Him—Rom. 8:15-16.
4. Through His life-releasing death and life-imparting
 resurrection, the Lord has made us, His believers, one
with Him; thus, His Father is now our Father—John
20:17.
5. By His death and resurrection, the Lord Jesus has
brought us into Himself; since He is in the Father, we
are in the Father by being in Him—14:20.
2. The church in God the Father is a composition of the sons
of God—Heb. 2:10-12:
1. The New Testament reveals that God wants many
sons and that He has predestinated us unto sonship—
Gal. 3:26; 4:4-6; Eph. 1:5.
2. God’s good pleasure, the desire of His heart, is to
have many sons for the expression of His Son—Matt.
5:45; Gal. 1:15-16; Heb. 2:10.
3. For the church to be in God the Father means that the
church is in the One who is the unique source, Originator,
and Initiator—1 Cor. 8:6:
1. This implies that the church is in God’s purpose, plan,
selection, and predestination—Eph. 1:5, 9, 11; 3:11.
2. To know God as the Father is to know that everything
originates from Him and that everything proceeds
from Him—Matt. 15:13; Rom. 11:36.
3. In the church life the Father should be the unique
source, and we all should be in His unique purpose
and plan—2 Tim. 1:9; Rom. 8:28.
4. In the church life, we need to have the loving, receiving,
and forgiving heart of our Father God—Luke 15:11-32.
2. The church is in the Lord Jesus Christ—1 Thes. 1:1; 2 Thes. 1:1:
1. When Jesus Christ becomes our Lord, we are in Him,
 organically united to Him—1 Cor. 1:30; 6:17; John 15:5.
2. In the New Testament, the name Jesus refers primarily to
the Lord in His experiences from incarnation to resurrection
—Matt. 1:25:
1. Jesus is the name of the Lord with respect to His
humanity; this name denotes His life experiences and
the things He passed through before His resurrection
—2 Cor. 4:10-11; Eph. 4:21.
2. Jesus means “Jehovah the Savior” or “Jehovah our
salvation”; for Jehovah to become our Savior and our
salvation, it was necessary for Him to pass through a
long process—Matt. 1:21.
3. The title Christ refers to what the Lord is in resurrection and
to His experiences, position, life, and actions after His
resurrection—Acts 2:36:
1. As the Christ, the anointed One, the Lord Jesus has
been appointed and commissioned by God to
accomplish His eternal purpose—Matt. 16:16.
2. The church is in Christ, who in His resurrection has
become the life-giving Spirit—1 Cor. 15:45b:
1. In Christian experience, Christ is identical to the
Spirit—2 Cor. 3:17a.
2. By the Spirit, with the Spirit, through the Spirit,
and in the Spirit, we are in Christ.
3. To be in Christ is to be terminated and buried, for to
be in Christ is to be in His death, where all the
negative things—sin, the flesh, the self, the old man,
the natural life, the world, death, and Satan—have
been terminated—Rom. 6:4-5.
4. The title Christ implies all the riches of the Lord’s
 resurrection; thus, to be in Christ is to be in
resurrection—v. 4; 8:10-11.
4. According to the New Testament, the title Lord is all-
inclusive—Phil. 2:11:
1. This title applies to the entire life and ministry of the
Lord Jesus.
2. As the incarnated, crucified, resurrected, and
ascended One, Jesus Christ has been made the Lord
of all; all this process and everything related to it is
implied in the title Lord—Acts 10:36; Rom. 10:12.
3. Seeing that the church is in God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ is basic to living a holy life for the church life—1 Thes. 1:1;
4:7; 5:23:
1. If we see that the church is an entity in the Triune God, we
will realize that we have been absolutely separated by God
Himself and are now encompassed by the Lord Jesus Christ
—1 Cor. 1:2, 30.
2. To be in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ is to be in
sanctification:
1. Only when we are in the Triune God are we truly
separated unto God from everything other than God
—1 Thes. 5:23.
2. This makes us a holy people, living a holy, separated
life; this life is for the church—3:13.
4. The church in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ should be
composed of those who are increasing and abounding in love to
one another and to all men—v. 12:
1. The church in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ is
characterized by this increasing and abounding love—Phil.
2:2; 1 Pet. 1:22.
 2. If we truly are a church in the Triune God, the love we have
for one another will increase and abound—2 Pet. 1:7; 1
John 4:7, 11; 5:1.
Message Three
Faith, Love, and Hope—
the Structure of a Holy Life for the Church Life
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 1:2-3
1. Faith, love, and hope are the structure of a holy life for the church
life, which is the genuine Christian life and the content of Paul’s
first Epistle to the Thessalonians—1:2-3; 1 Cor. 13:13:
1. Faith is the nature and strength of the work; love, the
motivation for and characteristic of labor; and hope, the
source of endurance—1 Thes. 1:3.
2. Faith is toward God (v. 8), love is toward the saints (3:12;
4:9-10), and hope is in the Lord’s coming (2:19).
3. To turn to God from the idols is accomplished by faith
infused into the new converts through their hearing of the
word of the gospel; to serve a living and true God is by love
produced within the believers by the Triune God as the all-
inclusive Supplier who lives in them; to await the Son of
God from the heavens is the hope that strengthens the
believers to stand steadfastly in their faith—1:3, 9-10.
2. The work of faith is the foundation of our Christian life and
service—v. 3:
1. The word faith refers both to the things the believers
believe in (the objective faith—Eph. 4:13; 1 Tim. 1:19b; 2
Tim. 4:7) and to the believing action of the believers (the
subjective faith—Gal. 2:20).
2. The faith of the believers is actually not their own faith but
Christ entering into them to be their faith—Rom. 3:22 and
 note 1; Gal. 2:16 and note 1.
3. Faith comes out of hearing, hearing is through the word of
Christ, hearing equals seeing, and seeing equals knowing
Christ—Rom. 10:17:
1. When the word of the Bible is spoken to us and heard
by us, we contact Christ as the living Word in the
written Word, and He becomes the applied word as
the life-giving Spirit in us—John 1:1; 5:39-40; 6:63.
2. When we look away unto Jesus, He as the life-giving
Spirit imparts Himself as the believing element into us
that He may believe for us; hence, He Himself is our
faith—Heb. 12:2a.
4. Faith is the substantiation of things hoped for, the
conviction of things not seen; nothing is impossible to faith
—11:1; 2 Cor. 4:18; Matt. 17:20b.
5. Faith is the indicator of the believers’ life in the enjoyment
of the Divine Trinity—1 Thes. 1:3, 5, 7-8; Rom. 1:8:
1. Faith is God’s word accepted by us; because this faith
is living and active, it results in the work of faith,
which includes all the proper actions that issue out of
our living faith—1 Thes. 1:7-10.
2. Faith is to believe that God is; to believe that God is
implies that we are not; He must be the only One, the
unique One in everything, and we must be nothing in
everything—Heb. 11:6; Gen. 5:24; John 8:58; 2 Cor.
5:7.
6. The way to receive such a faith is to contact the source, the
Lord, the processed and consummated God, by calling on
Him, praying to Him, and pray-reading His word—Heb.
4:16; Rom. 10:12; 2 Tim. 2:22; Eph. 6:17-18.
7. We must exercise our spirit of faith to believe in and to
 speak forth the Lord; faith is in our spirit, which is mingled
with the Holy Spirit—2 Cor. 4:13.
3. The labor of love is the key of the fruitfulness of our work of faith
—1 Thes. 1:3:
1. Love is the intrinsic motivation, the inner life, and the real
strength of our work of faith—Gal. 5:6; cf. Col. 1:28—2:1; 1
Cor. 15:58; Acts 20:20, 31.
2. God is love; we love because He first loved us—1 John 4:8,
19:
1. God’s love motivates us, His children, to love people
without any discrimination—Matt. 5:43-48; cf. 9:12-
13; 27:38; Luke 23:42-43.
2. Love motivates us to shepherd people with the loving
and forgiving heart of our Father God and the
shepherding and seeking spirit of our Savior Christ—
15:3-10, 17-18; John 10:11, 16; 21:15-17; 1 Pet. 2:25;
5:4.
3. Love is not jealous, is not provoked, does not take
account of evil, covers all things, endures all things,
never falls away, and is the greatest—1 Cor. 13:4-8,
13.
4. The Body of Christ builds itself up in love—Eph. 4:16;
1 Cor. 8:1.
5. We need a burning spirit of love to overcome the
degradation of today’s church—2 Tim. 1:6-7; 2 Cor.
5:14; 12:15.
6. To overcome the degradation of the church, we need
to pursue love with those who call on the Lord out of
a pure heart—2 Tim. 2:22; 1 Cor. 13:1.
7. Love is the most excellent way for us to be anything
 and to do anything for the building up of the Body of
Christ—12:31b—13:1.
4. The endurance of hope is the long life of our work of faith:
1. The life that we have received through regeneration
enables us to have a hope, with numerous aspects, for this
age, for the coming age, and for eternity—1 Pet. 1:3; Titus
1:2:
1. In this age we have the hope of growing in life, of
maturing, of manifesting our gifts, of exercising our
functions, of being transformed, of overcoming, of
being redeemed in our body, and of entering into
glory—Col. 1:27; 1 Pet. 1:3-5, 9; Rom. 8:23-25, 30;
Phil. 3:21; 2 Tim. 4:7-8.
2. In the coming age we have the hope of entering into
the kingdom, of reigning with the Lord, and of
enjoying the blessings of eternal life in the
manifestation of the kingdom of the heavens—Rev.
5:10; 2 Tim. 4:18.
3. In eternity we have the hope of being the New
Jerusalem, when we will participate fully in the
consummated blessings of the eternal life in its
ultimate manifestation in eternity—Rev. 21:1-7; 22:1-
5.
2. The endurance of hope subdues all kinds of
disappointments, discouragements, and impossibilities; it
overcomes all kinds of oppositions, obstacles, and
frustrations—Heb. 4:16; Phil. 2:13; 4:11-13; 1 Cor. 15:58; 2
Thes. 3:5.
3. Such endurance consummates in gaining sinners, feeding
the believers, perfecting the saints, and building up the
church, the Body of Christ, for the kingdom of God and of
Christ—2 Cor. 6:4; 1 Cor. 15:58.
 5. Our work of faith, labor of love, and endurance of hope are
“according to the measure of the rule which the God of measure
has apportioned to us”—2 Cor. 10:13:
1. In spiritual work, the most important thing is to know “the
pattern...in the mountain” (Heb. 8:5); if there is no
comprehension of God’s plan, there is no possibility for
God’s work (Acts 26:19).
2. Every worker has a specific work which God measures to
him and a pathway upon which God wants him to walk; if
you are standing in your rightful position, working in your
rightful service, and walking on your rightful pathway, that
is the highest glory—13:25a, 36a; 20:24; 2 Tim. 4:7.
Message Four
The Pattern of the Apostle Paul
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 2:1-12
1. The apostles were a pattern of the glad tidings that they spread
—“you know what kind of men we were among you for your
sake”—1 Thes. 1:5b:
1. In the church the most important thing is the person; the
person is the way and the person is the Lord’s work; what
you are is what you do—John 5:19; 6:57; Phil. 1:19-26; Acts
20:18-35; Matt. 7:17-18; 12:33-37.
2. We need to follow the pattern of the apostles to pay more
attention to life than to work—John 12:24; 2 Cor. 4:12.
2. Paul was a pattern to the believers of living and ministering Christ
as the Spirit in his spirit for the building up of the Body of Christ—
1 Tim. 1:16; 4:12; Rom. 8:16:
1. The Lord appeared to Paul to appoint him as a minister and
a witness both of the things in which Paul had seen Him and
of the things in which He would appear to Paul—Acts
 26:16-19; cf. 1:8; 23:11; 20:20, 31.
2. Paul took Christ as everything—as his living, pattern, goal,
and secret—Phil. 1:19-21a; 2:5-16; 3:7-14; 4:11-13.
3. Paul lived by the Spirit, walked by the Spirit, sowed unto
the Spirit, and ministered the Spirit as a spiritual man who
lived and served in his spirit—Gal. 5:16, 25; 6:8; 2 Cor. 3:6;
1 Cor. 2:15; 2 Cor. 2:13; Rom. 1:9; 8:16.
4. Paul was infused with God to shine forth God in the
ministry of the new covenant, which is the ministry of the
Spirit, the ministry of righteousness, and the ministry of
reconciliation—2 Cor. 3:18; 4:1; 3:6, 8-9; 5:18-20.
5. Paul lived and did everything in the Body, through the Body,
and for the Body—Rom. 12:4-5; 1 Cor. 12:12-27; Eph. 4:1-6,
15-16; Col. 2:19.
3. The best way to shepherd people, to cherish and nourish them, is
to give them a proper pattern; Paul fed his spiritual children with
his own living of Christ—1 Thes. 2:1-12; 2 Cor. 1:23—2:14; 11:28-
29; 1 Cor. 9:22; Acts 20:28:
1. The apostles not only preached the gospel but also lived it;
their ministering of the gospel was not only by word but
also by a life that displayed the power of God, a life in the
Holy Spirit and in the assurance of faith—1 Thes. 1:5.
2. The saints in Thessalonica became imitators of the apostles;
this led them to follow the Lord, to take Him as their
pattern, thus making them a pattern to all other believers—
vv. 6-7.
3. The apostle Paul stressed repeatedly the apostles’ entrance
toward the believers; this shows that their manner of life
played a great role in infusing the gospel into the new
converts—vv. 5, 9; 2:1:
1. The apostles were struggling and speaking the gospel
 to the Thessalonians in the boldness of God—v. 2.
2. The apostles were free from deception, uncleanness,
and guile—v. 3.
3. The apostles were first tested and approved by God
and then were entrusted by Him with the gospel;
hence, their speaking, the preaching of the gospel,
was not of themselves to please men but of God to
please Him; God proved, examined, and tested their
hearts continually—v. 4; Psa. 26:2; 139:23-24; 2 Cor.
1:12; 6:6; 7:3.
4. The apostles were never found with flattering speech
nor with a pretext for covetousness—1 Thes. 2:5:
1. To have any pretext for covetousness is to
peddle or adulterate the word of God—2 Cor.
2:17; 4:2.
2. It is also to pretend to be godly for the sake of
gain—1 Tim. 6:5; Titus 1:11; 2 Pet. 2:3.
5. The apostles did not seek glory from men—1 Thes.
2:6a:
1. To seek glory from men is a real temptation to
every Christian worker; many have been
devoured and spoiled by this matter—cf. 1 Sam.
15:12.
2. Lucifer became God’s adversary, Satan, because
of glory-seeking; anyone who seeks glory from
men is a follower of Satan—Ezek. 28:13-17; Isa.
14:12-15; Matt. 4:8-10.
3. How much we will be used by the Lord and how
long our usefulness will last depends on
whether we seek glory from men—cf. John
7:17-18; 5:39-44; 12:43; 2 Cor. 4:5.
6. The apostles did not stand on their own authority or
dignity as apostles of Christ—1 Thes. 2:6b:
1. To assert authority, dignity, or right in Christian
work damages that work; the Lord Jesus, while
on earth, gave up His dignity (John 13:4-5), and
the apostle preferred not to use his right (1 Cor.
9:12).
2. If we follow this pattern, we will kill a deadly
disease in the Body of Christ, the germ of
assuming a position—Matt. 20:20-28.
7. The apostles cherished the believers and yearned
over them as a nursing mother would cherish and
yearn over her own children—1 Thes. 2:7-8; cf. Gal.
4:19; Isa. 49:14-15; 66:12-13:
1. To cherish people is to make them happy, to
comfort them, to make them feel that you are
pleasant to them, easy to be contacted in
everything and in every way.
2. To cherish people in our natural humanity is not
genuine; we must cherish people with the
Lord’s presence as the charming factor, as the
reality of resurrection.
3. Cherishing includes nourishing; to nourish
people is to feed them with the all-inclusive
Christ in His full ministry of three stages—Eph.
5:29.
8. The apostles not only imparted the gospel of God to
the Thessalonians; they also imparted their own souls
—1 Thes. 2:8:
1. To live a clean and upright life (vv. 3-6, 10) and
to love the new converts, even by giving our
 own souls to them (vv. 7-9, 11), are the
prerequisites for infusing them with the gospel.
2. Paul was willing to spend not only what he had
but also himself, his very being, on behalf of the
saints—2 Cor. 12:15.
9. The apostles considered themselves as fathers in
exhorting the believers to walk in a manner worthy of
God, to have a walk that will enable them to enter
into the kingdom of God and usher them into the
glory of God—1 Thes. 2:11-12.
Message Five
Walking in a Manner Worthy of God
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 2:12;
Phil. 1:20-21a; Rom. 8:4; Gal. 5:16, 25
1. As believers in Christ and children of God, we should walk in a
manner worthy of God—1 Thes. 2:12:
1. First Thessalonians 2:12 is an explanation of 1:1; in order
for the church to be in God the Father and the Lord Jesus
Christ in a practical way, the believers must walk in a
manner worthy of God—Eph. 4:1, 17; 5:1-2, 8; 2 Cor. 5:7; 1
John 1:7; 2:6.
2. To walk in a manner worthy of God actually means to live
God—Phil. 1:20-21a:
1. Our daily life should actually be God Himself—John
5:26:
1. Only God is worthy of Himself, and only God
can be compared with Himself and match
Himself—1 Pet. 1:15-16.
2. Since only God is worthy of Himself, to walk in a
 manner worthy of God is to live God, that is, to
express God in our daily living—1 Cor. 10:31:
1. 1) As children of God with the life and
nature of God, we can walk in a manner
worthy of God by living God—John 1:12-
13; 1 John 3:1.
2. 2) To live God’s life means to live by God
and even to live God Himself.
3. 3) Only a life that lives God is worthy of
God; when we live God, we walk in a
manner worthy of Him—Phil. 1:20-21a; 1
Thes. 2:12.
2. God’s economy is a matter of having God as life and
living Him; according to His economy, God’s intention
is to impart His element, His substance, and the
ingredients of His nature into our being that we may
live Him—1 Tim. 1:4; Eph. 3:16-19; Phil. 1:20-21a.
3. To know God is to live God, and to live God is to know
God—Heb. 8:10-11.
4. God’s aim in His economy is that we, His chosen and
redeemed people, have His life and nature inwardly
and His image and likeness outwardly—Gen. 1:26;
2:9:
1. In the divine life and by the law of the divine
life, God will be wrought into us, and we will
live Him and be constituted with Him in His life
and nature but not in His Godhead—Rom. 8:2,
6, 10-11, 29.
2. Eventually, we will be a corporate entity—the
Body of Christ—to be one with Him and live
Him for His corporate expression—Eph. 4:4-6.
 5. God’s intention was to make Job a man of God, filled
with Christ, the embodiment of God, to be the
fullness of God for the expression of God in Christ—1
Tim. 6:11; 2 Tim. 3:17; Eph. 3:16-19:
1. God’s purpose in dealing with His holy people is
that He desires that they would be emptied of
everything and receive only God as their gain—
Job 2:4-6.
2. God’s intention is to tear us down and rebuild
us with Himself as our life and nature so that
we may be persons who are absolutely one
with Him.
3. God’s stripping and consuming were exercised
over Job to tear him down so that God might
have a base and a way to rebuild him with God
Himself, thereby making him a God-man—42:1-
6.
6. To walk in a manner worthy of God by living God is to
live the life of a God-man:
1. We need to see that we are God-men, born of
God and belonging to the species of God—John
3:3, 5-6.
2. A God-man lives God and expresses God; the
living of a God-man is the living of God in man—
Phil. 1:20-21a.
3. God-men are divine and mystical persons, doing
everything with God, in God, by God, and
through God—1 Cor. 10:31; Col. 3:17.
2. To walk in a manner worthy of God is to walk according to the
mingled spirit; this is to live, move, have our being, and do
everything according to the Spirit in our spirit—Rom. 8:4; Gal.
5:16, 25:
1. The spirit in Romans 8:4 is not merely the Spirit of God, nor
is it simply the spirit of man; rather, it is the mingled spirit,
the mingling of God’s Spirit with man’s spirit—1 Cor. 6:17.
2. To walk according to the mingled spirit is not only to walk
according to the Spirit of God but also to walk by following
our regenerated spirit, which is indwelt by the Spirit of
God’s life—John 3:6; Rom. 8:2, 10-11.
3. Obeying the sense of life, obeying the teaching of the
anointing, and walking according to the spirit are three
aspects of one thing—v. 6; 1 John 2:27:
1. Obedience to the sense of life is related to Christ as
life and is a matter of life—Rom. 8:6; Col. 3:4.
2. Obedience to the teaching of the anointing is related
to the Holy Spirit’s moving as the ointment and is a
matter of the Spirit of life—Rom. 8:2.
3. Walking according to the spirit concerns our walk
according to the mingled spirit and is a matter not
only of the Spirit of life but also of our regenerated
spirit—v. 4; 1 Cor. 6:17.
4. Walking according to the mingled spirit causes our flesh,
self, and natural life to lose their position and function—
Gal. 5:16; Matt. 16:24; 1 Cor. 2:11-15.
5. Walking according to the mingled spirit allows the
processed and consummated Triune God—the Spirit—to
gain the full ground in us so that we may be one with Him
for His corporate expression—Eph. 3:16-21.
6. Every believer in Christ should have two kinds of walk by
the Spirit—Gal. 5:16, 25:
1. In the first kind of walk (peripateo) we take the Spirit
 as the essence of our life in our daily living—v. 16.
2. In the second kind of walk (stoicheo) we take the
Spirit as the path for our way so that we may fulfill
God’s purpose and reach the goal of our life on earth
—v. 25.
7. By walking according to the mingled spirit, we keep
ourselves under the “shower” of the divine dispensing of
the Divine Trinity—Rom. 8:4, 11.
8. Ultimately, the Bible requires only one thing of us—that we
walk according to the mingled spirit—v. 4.
9. To walk according to the mingled spirit is to let the
processed Triune God fill and saturate us until He
permeates our whole being to be expressed through us in a
corporate way as the Body of Christ consummating in the
New Jerusalem—Eph. 3:16-21; 4:4-6, 16; Col. 1:27; 2:19;
3:4, 10-11; Rev. 21:2, 10-11.
Message Six
Called into God’s Kingdom and Glory
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 2:12; 2 Thes. 1:5;
Mark 1:14-15; John 3:3, 5; Rev. 1:9
1. God has called us to enter into His kingdom and glory—1 Thes.
2:12:
1. The kingdom of God is the sphere for us to worship God
and enjoy God under the divine ruling with a view of
entering into God’s glory—Matt. 6:13b.
2. Paul’s work with the new believers nourished them,
cherished them, and fostered them to walk in a manner
worthy of God so that they might be able to enter into His
kingdom and participate in His glory—1 Thes. 2:12.
2. The New Testament is a book of the kingdom of God; the entire
New Testament is on the kingdom—Matt. 3:2; 4:17; Rev. 11:15;
12:10:
1. The kingdom of God is a divine sphere for God to work out
His plan; it is a realm where God can exercise His authority
to accomplish what He intends—Matt. 6:10.
2. The kingdom of God is not only God’s reign over the
universe in a general way by His authority and power but
also God’s reign in a particular way in the sense of life—
John 3:5, 15; Rom. 14:17; 8:2, 6, 10-11.
3. As God incarnate, the Lord Jesus came to establish the
kingdom of God, to establish a realm in which God can carry
out His purpose through the exercise of His authority—John
1:1, 14; 3:3, 5; 18:36.
4. The New Testament preaches the gospel in the way of the
kingdom; the gospel is for the kingdom, and the gospel is
proclaimed so that rebellious sinners might be saved,
qualified, and equipped to enter into the kingdom—Mark
1:14-15; Matt. 4:17; Acts 8:12.
5. In the New Testament, the kingdom of God goes with His
salvation, and God’s salvation goes with the kingdom—Eph.
2:8, 19; Rev. 12:10.
6. Repentance is mainly for us to enter into the kingdom of
God; unless we repent—that is, have a change of concept—
we cannot enter into the kingdom—Mark 1:15; Matt. 3:2;
4:17.
7. The kingdom of God is God Himself, and God is life, having
the nature, ability, and shape of the divine life, which forms
the realm of God’s ruling—Mark 1:15:
1. The drawing near of the kingdom of God is the
drawing near of God Himself.
 2. The nature of the kingdom of God is divine because it
is the kingdom of God with the divine attributes of
love, light, holiness, and righteousness—1 John 4:8,
16; 1:5; 2:29; 1 Pet. 1:15-16.
3. Only by having the divine life can we enter into the
divine realm.
4. The only way to enter into the kingdom of God is to
receive God as life and to gain God Himself—John 1:1,
14; 3:15; 1 John 5:11-12.
5. Because through regeneration we receive the divine
life, the life of God, regeneration is the unique
entrance into the kingdom—John 3:3, 5, 15.
8. Through regeneration we have been transferred into the
delightful kingdom of the Son of God’s love—a realm where
we are ruled in love with life—Col. 1:13.
9. The kingdom of God is a realm of the divine species; in
order to enter into this divine realm, we need to be born of
God to have the life and nature of God, thereby becoming
God-men in the kingdom of God—John 1:12-13; 3:3, 5.
10. The kingdom of God is the Lord Jesus as the seed of life
sown into His believers and developing into a realm over
which God can rule as His kingdom in His divine life—Luke
17:20-21; Mark 4:3, 26.
11. The eternal kingdom of God is the increase of Christ in
administration—Dan. 2:34-35, 44; Mark 4:26-29.
12. Today the believers live the kingdom life in the church, for
the church is the kingdom of God in this age—Matt. 16:18-
19; 1 Cor. 6:10; Eph. 5:5:
1. The church life is the kingdom in a developmental
stage, a preliminary stage—Rev. 1:9.
 2. When the authority of God’s kingdom is allowed to
operate in us, righteousness, peace, and joy will
characterize our daily life—Rom. 14:17.
3. The work of the church is to bring in the kingdom of
God—Matt. 13:43; 6:10; 12:22-28; Rev. 11:15; 12:10.
4. God’s goal is that we live a church life that will usher
us into the kingdom; this means that we should live in
the preliminary stage of the kingdom that will lead us
into the full manifestation of the kingdom—Matt.
13:43.
13. The New Testament emphasizes the cross, the church, and
the kingdom; the cross produces the church, and the
church ushers in the kingdom—16:18-19, 24.
14. To enter into the kingdom of God, we need to pass through
sufferings; to be “accounted worthy of the kingdom of
God,” we need our faith to grow, our love to increase, and
our endurance to be maintained—Acts 14:22; 2 Thes. 1:5.
15. After we have entered into the kingdom of God through
regeneration, we need to go on to have a rich entrance into
the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by
experiencing the full development of the divine life as
revealed in 2 Peter 1:5-11.
16. As a result of the growth and development of the divine life
to maturity and of living in the reality of the kingdom in the
church life today, we will inherit the kingdom of God—cf. 1
Cor. 15:50; Gal. 5:21.
3. God’s glory goes with His kingdom and is expressed in the realm
of His kingdom—Matt. 6:10, 13b; Psa. 145:11-13:
1. The kingdom is the realm for God to exercise His power so
that He may express His glory—Rev. 5:10, 13.
2. The shining of the kingdom is for the glorification of the
 Father—Matt. 5:16.
3. The kingdom of God is God being manifested through us;
the expression of God from within us is the kingdom—vv.
14-15; 1 Cor. 4:20; 10:31.
4. First Thessalonians 2:12 indicates that we enter into the
kingdom of God and into the glory of God simultaneously.
5. The kingdom of God is God’s manifestation in His glory with
His authority for His divine administration; hence, to enter
into the kingdom of God and to enter into the expressed
glory of God take place at the same time as one thing—
Heb. 2:10; Matt. 5:20; Rev. 21:9-11; 22:1, 5.
Message Seven
Salvation in Sanctification
Scripture Reading: 2 Thes. 2:13-14; 1 Thes. 5:23;
John 17:17; Col. 1:27
1. From eternity past, God chose us “unto salvation in sanctification
of the Spirit and belief of the truth”—Eph. 1:4; 2 Thes. 2:13:
1. God’s salvation includes not only salvation from eternal
perdition but God’s full and complete salvation—1 Pet. 1:5:
1. In eternal salvation all the effects, benefits, and issues
are of an eternal nature, transcending the conditions
and limitations of time—Heb. 5:9.
2. The full salvation of God is in three stages: the initial
stage—the stage of regeneration; the progressing
stage—the stage of transformation; and the
completing stage—the stage of glorification—1 Cor.
6:11; Rom. 5:10; Phil. 3:21.
3. God’s salvation includes the salvation from many
things in our daily life, the salvation from suffering
 during the great tribulation, and the salvation of our
soul, which will save us from dispensational
punishment—1:19, 28; 2:12; Luke 21:36; 1 Thes. 5:9;
Rev. 3:10; 1 Pet. 1:9.
2. God’s salvation is in sanctification of the Spirit—2 Thes.
2:13:
1. Salvation in sanctification means that if we would
enjoy and participate in God’s complete salvation, we
must be in the sanctification of the Spirit.
2. The Spirit dwells in us with a unique goal—to sanctify
us, to separate us entirely for God’s purpose—1 Thes.
1:6; 4:8:
1. The Holy Spirit is moving, working, and acting
within us constantly to sanctify us—Heb. 12:14.
2. The Spirit is always sanctifying us, applying to us
what the Father has planned and what the Son
has accomplished—Eph. 1:3-14.
3. God has placed us into the process of sanctification,
which is a matter of transformation—1 Thes. 5:23;
Rom. 12:2; 2 Cor. 3:18:
1. God’s salvation involves a continuing process
through which we are being made holy—1 Pet.
1:15-16.
2. To be in sanctification is to be in the process of
being made holy—1 Thes. 5:23.
3. As saved ones, we are all in the process of being
sanctified, and we are thereby enjoying God’s
saving power—Rom. 6:19; Heb. 7:25.
4. “The Spirit, the Holy” is for making man holy, that is,
for making man God in life and nature but not in the
 Godhead—Eph. 1:4; 1 Thes. 4:8.
5. God makes us holy by imparting Himself, the Holy
One, into us so that our whole being may be
saturated and permeated with His holy nature—1
Pet. 1:15-16.
6. As the Spirit carries out His sanctifying work, He
imparts God’s life into us; the extent to which the
impartation of life will proceed depends on the
degree to which the Spirit is able to sanctify us—Rom.
6:22; 8:2, 11.
3. Salvation in sanctification is not only of the Spirit but also in
belief of the truth, that is, in the word as the truth—2 Thes.
2:13; Col. 1:5:
1. To be sanctified in belief, or faith, of the truth in 2
Thessalonians 2:13 corresponds to the Lord’s word in
John 17:17, where He asked the Father to sanctify us
in the truth and declared that the Father’s word is
truth.
2. In order to receive the sanctification of the Spirit, we
must go to the Word.
3. The more we see the truth, the reality, revealed in
the New Testament, the more we enjoy sanctification
—1 Tim. 2:4; 2 Tim. 2:15, 25.
4. To be sanctified in belief of the truth is subjective;
God’s salvation in sanctification is carried out not
merely in our objective knowledge of the truth but in
our subjective apprehension of the truth—John
17:17, 19.
2. God has called us to salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and
belief of the truth through the gospel “unto the obtaining of the
glory of our Lord Jesus Christ”—2 Thes. 2:14:
1. Salvation in sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the
truth is the procedure; the obtaining of the glory of our
Lord is the goal—Heb. 2:10.
2. The glory that the Father has given to the Son is the sonship
with the Father’s life and divine nature to express the
Father in His fullness—John 17:22; 5:26; 1:18; 14:9; Col. 2:9;
Heb. 1:3:
1. This glory the Son has given to His believers that they
also may have the sonship with the Father’s life and
divine nature to express the Father in the Son in the
Son’s fullness—John 1:16; 17:2; 2 Pet. 1:4.
2. God has called us unto the obtaining of this glory, the
glory of the divine life and the divine nature to
express the Divine Being—1 Pet. 5:10.
3. Second Thessalonians 1:10 speaks of Christ’s coming “to be
glorified in His saints and to be marveled at in all those who
have believed”:
1. Christ as the Lord of glory has been glorified in His
resurrection and ascension, and now He is in us as the
hope of glory to bring us into glory—1 Cor. 2:8; John
17:1; Luke 24:26; Col. 1:27; Heb. 2:9-10.
2. At His coming back, on the one hand, He will come
from the heavens with glory, and on the other hand,
He will come from within His saints so that He may be
glorified in His saints—Rev. 10:1; Matt. 25:31; 2 Thes.
1:10; Col. 1:27.
3. For Christ to be glorified in His saints means that His
glory will be manifested from within His members and
that it will “transfigure the body of our humiliation to
be conformed to the body of His glory”—Phil. 3:21.
4. Second Thessalonians 1:12 says, “So that the name of our
 Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in Him,
according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus
Christ”:
1. The grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ is the
Lord Himself within us as our life and life supply that
we may live a life that will glorify the Lord and cause
us to be glorified in Him—1 Cor. 15:10; Gal. 6:18; Phil.
4:23; 2 Tim. 4:22.
2. It is according to such a grace that the name of the
Lord Jesus will be glorified in us and that we will be
glorified in Him—John 1:16; 17:21-22, 26.

Message Eight
Our Heart to Be Established Blameless in Holiness
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 3:13; Prov. 4:23
1. The heart is the conglomerate of man’s inward parts, man’s chief
representative, his acting agent:
1. Our heart is a composition of all the parts of our soul—the
mind, the emotion, and the will (Matt. 9:4; Heb. 4:12; John
14:1; 16:22; Acts 11:23)—plus one part of our spirit—the
conscience (Heb. 10:22; 1 John 3:20).
2. Our heart with its condition before God is organically,
intrinsically, and inseparably related to the condition of our
spirit, soul, and body before God:
1. The exercise of the spirit works only when our heart is
active; if man’s heart is indifferent, the spirit is
imprisoned within and is unable to show forth its
capability—Matt. 5:3, 8; Psa. 78:8; Eph. 3:16-17.
2. The soul is the person himself, but the heart is the
person in action; the heart is the acting agent, the
 acting commissioner, of our entire being.
3. The activities and movements of our physical body
depend on our physical heart; in like manner, our
daily living, the way we act and behave, depends on
what kind of psychological heart we have.
3. The heart is the entrance and exit of life, the “switch” of
life; if the heart is not right, life in the spirit is hindered, and
the law of life cannot work freely and without obstruction
to reach every part of our being; though life has great
power, this great power is controlled by our small heart—
Prov. 4:23; Matt. 12:33-37; cf. Ezek. 36:26-27.
2. In order to live a holy life for the church life, we need the Lord to
establish our heart blameless in holiness—1 Thes. 3:13:
1. God is the unchanging One, but according to our natural
birth our heart is changeable, both in our relationship with
others and with the Lord—cf. 2 Tim. 4:10; Matt. 13:3-9, 18-
23.
2. There is no one who, according to his natural, human life, is
steadfast in his heart; because our heart changes so easily,
it is not at all trustworthy—Jer. 17:9-10; 13:23.
3. Our heart is blamable because it is changeable; an
unchanging heart is a blameless heart—Psa. 57:7; 108:1;
112:7.
4. In God’s salvation the renewing of the heart is once for all;
however, in our experience our heart is renewed
continually, because it is changeable—Ezek. 36:26; 2 Cor.
4:16.
5. Because our heart is changeable, it needs to be renewed
continually by the sanctifying Spirit so that our heart can be
established, built up, in the state of being holy, the state of
being separated unto God, occupied by God, possessed by
 God, and saturated with God—Titus 3:5; Rom. 6:19, 22.
3. In order to be “those who are being sanctified” in living a holy life
for the church life, we must cooperate with the inner operating of
the One “who sanctifies” by dealing with our heart—Heb. 2:11;
Psa. 139:23-24; Hymns, #744:
1. God wants our heart to be soft:
1. When God deals with our heart, He takes away the
heart of stone out of our flesh and gives us a heart of
flesh, a soft heart—Ezek. 36:26.
2. To be soft means that our heart is submissive and
yielding toward the Lord, not stiff-necked and
rebellious—cf. Exo. 32:9.
3. A soft heart is a heart that is not hardened by worldly
traffic—Matt. 13:4.
4. God softens our heart by using His love to move us; if
love cannot move us, He uses His hand through the
environment to discipline us until our heart is
softened—2 Cor. 5:14; 4:16-18; Heb. 12:6-7; cf. Jer.
48:11.
2. God wants our heart to be pure:
1. A pure heart is a heart that loves God and wants God;
besides God, it has no other love, inclination, or
desire—Psa. 73:25; cf. Jer. 32:39.
2. Our heart should be single for God so that we are
fearful of nothing except offending Him and losing His
presence—Psa. 86:11b.
3. Our goal and our aim should be God Himself, and we
should not have any other motive—Matt. 5:8.
4. We must pursue Christ “with those who call on the
 Lord out of a pure heart”—2 Tim. 2:22; 1 Tim. 1:5;
Psa. 73:1.
3. God wants our heart to be loving:
1. A loving heart is a heart in which the emotion loves
God, wants God, thirsts after God, and yearns for
God, having a personal, affectionate, private, and
spiritual relationship with Him—42:1-2; S. S. 1:1-4.
2. We must turn our heart back to the Lord again and
again and have it continually renewed so that we may
have a new and fresh love toward the Lord—2 Cor.
3:16; Hymns, #546 and #547.
3. All spiritual experiences start with love in the heart; if
we do not love the Lord, it is impossible to receive
any kind of spiritual experience—cf. Eph. 6:24.
4. Our love for the Lord qualifies, perfects, and equips us
to speak for the Lord with His authority; if we love the
Lord to the uttermost, we will be filled and
overflowing with Him—John 21:15-17; Matt. 26:6-13;
28:18-20.
4. God wants our heart to be at peace:
1. A heart at peace is a heart in which the conscience is
without offense, condemnation, or reproach—Acts
24:16; 1 John 3:19-21; Heb. 10:22.
2. If we confess our sins in the light of God’s presence,
we receive His forgiveness and His cleansing so that
we may enjoy uninterrupted fellowship with God with
a good conscience—1 John 1:7, 9; 1 Tim. 1:5.
3. The result of practicing fellowship with God in prayer
is that we enjoy the peace of God, which is actually
God as peace mounting guard over our heart and
thoughts in Christ, keeping us calm and tranquil—Phil.
 4:6-7.
4. We need to let the peace of Christ arbitrate in our
heart by forgiving one another to put on the one new
man—Col. 3:13-15.
4. As our heart is being established blameless in holiness by the
continual renewing of the sanctifying Spirit, we are becoming the
New Jerusalem with the newness of the divine life and we are
becoming the holy city with the holiness of the divine nature—
Rev. 21:2; 1 John 5:11-12; 2 Pet. 1:4.
Message Nine
To Be Sanctified Wholly
with Our Spirit, Soul, and Body Preserved Complete
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 5:12-24
1. God not only has made us holy in position by the redeeming
blood of Christ to separate us unto Himself in His judicial
redemption but also is sanctifying us in disposition by His own
holy nature to saturate us with Himself in His organic salvation—
Heb. 13:12; 10:29; Rom. 6:19, 22; Eph. 5:26:
1. God’s dispositional sanctification of our spirit, soul, and
body is to “sonize” us divinely, making us sons of God that
we may become the same as God in His life and in His
nature but not in His Godhead so that we can be God’s
expression—1:4-5; Heb. 2:10-11.
2. By sanctifying us, God transforms us in the essence of our
spirit, soul, and body, making us wholly like Him in nature;
in this way He preserves our spirit, soul, and body wholly
complete—1 Thes. 5:23.
2. God not only sanctifies us wholly but also preserves our spirit,
soul, and body complete:
1. Quantitatively, God sanctifies us wholly; qualitatively, God
 preserves us complete; that is, He keeps our spirit, soul, and
body perfect.
2. Although God preserves us, we need to take the
responsibility, the initiative, to cooperate with His
operation to be preserved by keeping our spirit, soul, and
body in the saturating of the Holy Spirit—vv. 12-24.
3. In order to cooperate with God to preserve our spirit in
sanctification, we must keep our spirit in a living condition by
exercising our spirit:
1. In order to preserve our spirit, we must keep our spirit
living by exercising it to have fellowship with God; if we fail
to exercise our spirit in this way, we will leave it in a
deadened situation:
1. To rejoice, pray, and give thanks are to exercise our
spirit; to preserve our spirit is first of all to exercise
our spirit to keep our spirit living and to pull it out of
death—vv. 16-18.
2. We need to cooperate with the sanctifying God to be
separated from a spirit-deadening situation—cf. Num.
6:6-8; 2 Cor. 5:4.
3. We must worship God, serve God, and fellowship
with God in and with our spirit; whatever we are,
whatever we have, and whatever we do toward God
must be in our spirit—John 4:24; Rom. 1:9; Phil. 2:1.
2. In order to preserve our spirit, we need to keep it from all
defilement and contamination—2 Cor. 7:1.
3. In order to preserve our spirit, we must exercise ourselves
to have a conscience without offense toward God and men
—Acts 24:16; Rom. 9:1; cf. 8:16.
4. In order to preserve our spirit, we must take heed to our
spirit, setting our mind on our spirit and caring for the rest
 in our spirit—Mal. 2:15-16; Rom. 8:6; 2 Cor. 2:13.
4. In order to cooperate with God to preserve our soul in
sanctification, we must clear the three main “arteries” of our
psychological heart, the parts of our soul—our mind, emotion,
and will:
1. In order for our soul to be sanctified, our mind must be
renewed to be the mind of Christ (Rom. 12:2), our emotion
must be touched and saturated with the love of Christ (Eph.
3:17, 19), our will must be subdued by and infused with the
resurrected Christ (Phil. 2:13; cf. S. S. 4:4a; 7:4a), and we
must love the Lord with our whole being (Mark 12:30).
2. The way to unclog the three main arteries of our
psychological heart is to make a thorough confession to the
Lord; we need to stay with the Lord for a period of time,
asking Him to bring us fully into the light, and in the light of
what He exposes, we need to confess our defects, failures,
defeats, mistakes, wrongdoings, and sins—1 John 1:5-9:
1. In order to unclog the artery of our mind, we need to
confess everything that is sinful in our thoughts and in
our way of thinking.
2. In order to unclog the artery of our will, we need to
confess the germs of rebellion in our will.
3. In order to unclog the artery of our emotion, we need
to confess the natural and even fleshy way that we
express our joy and sorrow and also that, in many
cases, we hate what we should love and we love what
we should hate.
4. If we take the time necessary to unclog the three
main arteries of our psychological heart, we will have
the sense that our entire being has become living and
is in a very healthy condition.
 5. In order to cooperate with God to preserve our body in
sanctification, we must present our body to Him so that we may
live a holy life for the church life, practicing the Body life in order
to carry out God’s perfect will—Rom. 12:1-2; 1 Thes. 4:4; 5:18:
1. Our fallen body, the flesh, is the “meeting hall” of Satan,
sin, and death, but by Christ’s redemption and in our
regenerated spirit as the “meeting hall” of the Father, the
Son, and the Spirit, our body is a member of Christ and the
temple of the Holy Spirit—Rom. 6:6, 12, 14; 7:11, 24; 1 Cor.
6:15, 19.
2. To preserve our body is to glorify God in our body—v. 20.
3. To preserve our body is to magnify Christ in our body—Phil.
1:20.
4. To preserve our body, we must not live according to our
soul, the old man; then the body of sin will lose its job and
become unemployed—Rom. 6:6.
5. To preserve our body, we must not present our body to
anything that is sinful but instead present ourselves as
slaves to righteousness and our members as weapons of
righteousness—vv. 13, 18-19, 22:
1. “For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that
you abstain from fornication; that each one of you
know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification
and honor”—1 Thes. 4:3-4.
2. That they do not know God is the basic reason that
people indulge in the passion of lust—v. 5.
6. To preserve our body, we must buffet it and lead it as a
slave to fulfill our holy purpose to become the holy city—1
Cor. 9:27; Rev. 21:2.

Message Ten
The Coming of Our Lord Jesus Christ
and Our Gathering Together to Him
Scripture Reading: 1 Thes. 4:15-18; 5:16-18; 2 Thes. 2:1-12;
Dan. 2:28; 9:24-27
1. The two Epistles to the Thessalonians were written in the light of
the Lord’s coming; the Lord’s coming (Gk. parousia) is His
presence:
1. Every chapter of 1 Thessalonians ends with the coming of
the Lord; this shows that the writer, Paul, lived and worked
with the Lord’s coming before him, taking it as an
attraction, an incentive, a goal, and a warning—1:10; 2:19;
3:13; 4:15-18; 5:23.
2. Because we are awaiting the Son of God from the heavens,
our future is focused on Him; our life declares that we have
no hope on this earth and no positive destiny in this age,
and that our hope is the coming Lord, who is our destiny
forever; this governs, holds, and keeps our Christian life for
the church life—1:10; 2 Thes. 2:1, 8.
2. We need to see “the coming [presence—Gk. parousia ] of our
Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him”—vv. 1-12:
1. Before the three and a half years of the great tribulation,
the overcomers among the believers will be raptured into
Christ’s presence (parousia) in the heavens—Rev. 12:5-6;
14:1-5; Luke 21:34-36; Matt. 24:36-44.
2. At the end of the three and a half years of the great
tribulation, the second half of the last week in Daniel 9:27,
the majority of the believers, both the dead and
resurrected and the living, will be raptured into Christ’s
presence (parousia) in the air; 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17
speaks of this rapture, which corresponds to the reaping of
the harvest in Revelation 14:14-16.
3. The prophecy of the seventy weeks in Daniel 9:24-27 shows that
the day of the Lord’s coming is very near; the seventy weeks are
divided into three parts, each week being seven years in length—
cf. 2 Pet. 1:19:
1. First, seven weeks (forty-nine years) were apportioned
from the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild
Jerusalem (Neh. 2:1-8) to the completion of the rebuilding.
2. Second, sixty-two weeks (434 years) were apportioned
from the completion of the rebuilding of Jerusalem to the
cutting off (crucifixion) of the Messiah—Dan. 9:26.
3. Third, the last week of seven years will be for Antichrist to
make a firm covenant with the people of Israel (v. 27); in
the middle of that week he will break the covenant,
terminate Israel’s sacrifices and oblations to God, and
persecute those who fear God (v. 27; Rev. 13); this will be
the beginning of the great tribulation, which will last for
three and a half years:
1. When there is news that such a strong man signs a
treaty of seven years with Israel, we have to prepare
ourselves to be raptured—Matt. 24:32-44.
2. At the beginning of the great tribulation, Antichrist’s
image will be set up in the temple as an idol, and he
will sit in the temple of God, exalting himself above
every object of worship; this means that the temple
must be rebuilt before the great tribulation begins—
vv. 15, 21; Rev. 13:14-15; 2 Thes. 2:3-4; Dan. 11:36-
37.
4. There is a gap of unknown duration between the first sixty-
nine weeks and the last week of the seventy weeks; this
gap is the age of mystery, the age of grace, the age of the
church—Eph. 3:3-11; 5:32; Col. 1:27:
1. During this age Christ is secretly and mysteriously
 building up the church in the new creation to be His
Body and His bride—Eph. 5:25-32.
2. At the end of the last week of the seventy weeks,
Christ with His overcomers, His bridal army, will come
as the smiting stone to crush the totality of human
government and become a great mountain, the
kingdom of God, that fills the whole earth—Dan.
2:34-35; 2 Thes. 2:8; Rev. 19:19-20.
4. We must be those who have dispensational value to God “in the
last days,” those who are being prepared to be God’s
dispensational instrument, Christ’s bridal army, to turn the age
for the glory of God and the kingdom of God—Dan. 2:28; Rev.
12:1-5; 14:1-5; 19:7-9, 13-16.
5. The Lord will come secretly as a thief to those who love Him and
will steal them away as His treasures to bring them into His
presence in the heavens; hence, we must watch and make
ourselves ready to be His bride—Dan. 10:19; Matt. 24:42-44;
25:13; Rev. 19:7; 22:20:
1. Every day that we have is truly the Lord’s grace; therefore,
as long as we have today, as long as we still have breath, we
must love the Lord and His appearing, await the Lord’s
coming, and always take His coming as an encouragement
—1 Thes. 5:1-11; 2 Tim. 4:1, 6-8; Luke 12:16-20.
2. We must be absolutely consecrated to God, having one
heart to love Him, seek Him, live Him, and be constituted
with Him to be His expression—Jer. 32:39.
3. We must be reconstituted with the holy Word of God,
reading the Bible all the days of our life—Col. 3:16; Deut.
17:18-20; Psa. 119:15-16; 2 Tim. 3:16-17.
4. We must persevere in prayer to glorify God, thank God,
worship God, and serve God; our prayer and our being
should be totally for God’s interests—Dan. 6:10; 9:17; 1
 Kings 8:48; cf. Rom. 1:21, 25.
5. We must be self-sacrificing persons in oneness with Christ
as the One who sacrifices Himself for others—1 Thes. 2:1-
12, 19-20; 5:12-15; Phil. 1:22-26.
6. We must be watchful, on the alert, for our prayer life,
cooperating with the indwelling, sanctifying Spirit to live a
rejoicing, praying, and thanking life as a glory to God and a
shame to His enemy—Matt. 25:13; Col. 4:2; 1 Thes. 5:16-
18.
7. We must not beat our fellow slaves, eat and drink with the
drunken, or bury the Lord’s gift; instead, we must feed
God’s children, spreading the truth of the gospel of the
kingdom to the whole inhabited earth—Matt. 24:14, 45-51;
25:25.
8. We must keep the word of the Lord’s endurance, standing
against the wearing-out tactics of Satan, and live, walk, and
work by faith and love in the hope of the Lord’s coming
back—Rev. 3:10; Dan. 7:25; 1 Thes. 1:3.
Message Eleven
Working with the Lord for His Body
Scripture Reading: S. S. 6:13—7:13
1. In Song of Songs 6:13 the lover, having passed through various
stages of transformation, has become the Shulammite, Solomon’s
duplication:
1. She is the same as Solomon in life, nature, expression, and
function, as Eve was to Adam—Gen. 2:20-23.
2. This signifies that in the maturity of Christ’s life the lover of
Christ becomes the same as He is in life, nature, expression,
and function but not in the Godhead—2 Cor. 3:18; Rom.
8:29.
 3. At this point the Shulammite becomes Solomon’s co-
worker; this indicates that eventually Christ’s lovers need to
share in the work of the Lord, working with Him for His
Body—Eph. 4:12; 1 Cor. 15:58; 16:10; Col. 4:11.
2. To share in the Lord’s work, we need to be qualified, and our
qualification depends on our being equipped with all the
attributes of the divine life expressed in human virtues—S. S. 7:1-
9a:
1. The Spirit reviews the lover’s virtues, which are signs of her
maturity in the divine life and qualify her to work with the
Lord—vv. 1-5; cf. 2 Cor. 1:12; 2:14-17; 11:10a; 1 Thes. 2:1-
12:
1. The Spirit reviews her beauty in the gospel preaching
(footsteps in sandals—Rom. 10:15) and in her
standing power (thighs) produced through the skillful
transforming work of God the Spirit (jewels—2 Cor.
3:18)—S. S. 7:1.
2. Prince’s daughter (v. 1) indicates that a lover of Christ
should reach the maturity in His royal life to reign as a
king with Christ—Rom. 5:17.
3. Her inward parts (navel and belly) are filled with the
divine life received through the drinking of Christ’s
blood (wine) and the eating of His flesh (wheat) by
faith (lilies)—S. S. 7:2; John 6:53-54.
4. In Song of Songs 7:3 the Spirit reviews her beauty in
her active ability to feed others in a living way—John
21:15, 17; cf. S. S. 4:5.
5. In 7:4 the Spirit reviews her beauty in her submissive
will (neck) wrought by the Spirit’s transforming work
through sufferings for the carrying out of God’s will,
in the expression of her heart, which is open to the
light, clean, full of rest, and accessible (eyes like pools
 —cf. 1:15; 4:1; 5:12), and in her spiritual sense of high
and sharp discernment (nose—cf. Phil. 1:9-10; Heb.
5:14).
6. The Spirit reviews her beauty in her thoughts and
intentions (head), which are strong for God (Carmel—
cf. 1 Kings 18:19-39), and in her submission and
obedience for her consecration (locks of her head—
cf. Num. 6:5a), which are for the glory of God (purple)
and capture (fetter) her Beloved, who is the King—S.
S. 7:5.
2. In verses 6 through 9a Christ, the Beloved, offers words of
praise for His lover:
1. The Beloved praises her in her beauty and
pleasantness, which delight others, and in her mature
stature, in which she is like Christ (a palm tree—Eph.
4:13), and in her rich feeding of others (breasts like
the clusters)—S. S. 7:6-7.
2. The Beloved will enjoy her mature stature of Christ
(palm tree) and share it with the members of His
Body (branches—John 15:5a)—S. S. 7:8a.
3. The Beloved wishes that her feeding of others would
be rich (breasts like clusters of the vine), that her
intuition (nose) would be fragrant for nourishing
others in life (apples), and that her foretaste would be
of the power of the age to come (best wine—v. 9a;
John 2:10; Matt. 26:29)—S. S. 7:8b-9a.
3. Song of Songs 7:9b-13 reveals that the lover works with her
Beloved for His Body:
1. To share in the work of the Lord is not to work for the Lord
but to work with the Lord—1 Cor. 3:9a; 2 Cor. 6:1a.
2. To work with the Lord we need to be one with Him;
 actually, to work with Christ we must become Christ—1
Cor. 6:17; John 15:4-5; Phil. 1:21a.
3. To work with the Lord we must teach the high truths—S. S.
4:8; 1 Tim. 2:4.
4. To work with the Lord we need the maturity in life—Eph.
4:13-14:
1. We need to grow and mature unto perfection in the
divine life—Matt. 5:48.
2. To enter into God’s New Testament economy
requires that we grow and mature in the life of God—
1 Cor. 2:6; Col. 1:28.
3. To be transformed is to be metabolically changed in
our natural life, but to be matured is to be filled with
the divine life that changes us—Heb. 6:1.
4. Maturity is a matter of having the divine life imparted
into us again and again until we have the fullness of
life—John 10:10b; 2 Cor. 5:4b.
5. To work with the Lord our work must be for His Body—Eph.
4:4, 16:
1. The Body is the governing law of the life and work of
the children of God today—1:22-23; 1 Cor. 12:4-6, 12-
13, 27.
2. The work of the Triune God in us is to produce and
build up the Body of Christ—Eph. 3:16-21; 4:4-6, 12,
16:
1. Our work in the Lord’s recovery is the work of
God’s economy, the work of the Body of Christ
—1 Cor. 15:58; 16:10; Col. 4:11.
2. All the co-workers should do the same one
 work universally for the one unique Body; the
starting point of the work is the oneness of the
Body—Eph. 4:4; 1 Cor. 16:10.
3. According to Song of Songs 7:11, Christ’s lover wants
to carry out with her Beloved the work that is for the
entire world (fields) by sojourning from one place to
another (lodging in the villages); this indicates that
our work must be for the Body—Eph. 4:12.
4. In the churches (vineyards) Christ’s lover renders her love to her
Beloved—S. S. 7:12:
1. At the place of His work, she expresses her love to the Lord:
1. In the midst of the Lord’s work, we give Him our love
—Mark 12:30.
2. This kind of fellowship with the Lord is an issue of an
absolute union with the Lord in life—1 Cor. 6:17; John
14:20; 15:4-5.
2. In her working together with her Beloved there is a mutual
love (signified by mandrakes—S. S. 7:13; Gen. 30:14-16)
giving forth its fragrance between them as a couple who
love each other, signifying the bridal love between the lover
of Christ and Christ, and in their working places there are
plenty of fragrant and choice fruits (cf. Gal. 5:22-23; Eph.
5:9), new and old, which she stores up for her Beloved in
love.
3. Here we see the relationship between the first love and the
first works—Rev. 2:4-5:
1. The first works are works that issue from and express
the first love.
2. Only those works that are motivated by the first love
are the gold, silver, and precious stones—1 Cor. 3:12.
 3. When we are filled with the first love of the Lord,
everything we do issues from and expresses our love
for Him—Eph. 3:19; 4:16.

Message Twelve
Hoping to Be Raptured
Scripture Reading: S. S. 8:1-14
1. Through her growth and transformation in life, the lover of Christ
becomes mature in life to the extent that she has become the
same as Christ in every respect, except that she still has the flesh
—S. S. 8:1-4:
1. When her body is transfigured (Phil. 3:21), she and the Lord
will be the same (1 John 3:2), and no one will despise her
because of her shortage in the flesh—v. 1.
2. She is hoping to be saved from her groaning for the flesh,
indicating that she hopes to be raptured through the
redemption of her body—vv. 2-4; Rom. 8:23; 2 Cor. 5:1-8;
Eph. 4:30b.
2. “Who is this who comes up from the wilderness, / Leaning on her
beloved?”—S. S. 8:5a:
1. The lover of Christ who came up once from the spiritual
wilderness (the worldly environment) by herself (3:6) now
comes up from the fleshly wilderness (the earthly realm) by
leaning on her Beloved, trusting in Him helplessly:
1. Leaning on her beloved implies her feeling that she is
powerless and unable to walk apart from the Lord;
she makes herself a burden for her Beloved to carry—
cf. 2 Cor. 12:9-10; 13:3-4.
2. Leaning on her beloved implies that, like Jacob, the
socket of her hip has been touched, and her natural
 strength has been dealt with by the Lord—Gen.
32:24-25.
3. Leaning on her beloved implies that she seems to find
herself pressed beyond measure, and this seems to
last until the wilderness journey is over—cf. 2 Cor.
1:8-9.
2. As she is waiting for His coming, she is going out with Him
to meet Him (cf. Matt. 25:1); by leaning on our Beloved, we
constantly enjoy Him as our “going-out” strength to leave
the world behind—cf. Gen. 5:22-24; Heb. 11:5-6.
3. “Set me as a seal on your heart, / As a seal on your arm; / For love
is as strong as death, / Jealousy is as cruel as Sheol; / Its flashes
are the flashes of fire, / A flame of Jehovah”—S. S. 8:6:
1. She asks her Beloved to keep her by His love (heart) and His
strength (arm), for His love is as strong as unshakable death
and His jealousy is as cruel as unconquerable Sheol, which
is like the jealous Jehovah, who is a consuming fire (Deut.
4:24) that burns up all the negative things.
2. “When she recalls her original condition, she cannot help
but be filled with humility. She cannot help but consider her
emptiness, the vanity of her experience, the
undependability of her mind, and the futility of her pursuit.
Her only hope is the Lord. She realizes that whether she can
endure to the end does not depend on her own endurance,
but on the Lord’s preservation. No spiritual perfection can
sustain a person until the Lord’s return. Everything depends
on God and His preserving power. When she realizes this,
she cannot help but exclaim, ‘Set me as a seal on your
heart, / As a seal on your arm.’ The heart is the place of
love, while the arm is the place of strength. ‘Set me as
permanently as a seal upon Your heart, and as indelibly as a
seal upon Your arm. Just as the priests bore the Israelites
upon their breasts and their shoulders, remember me
 constantly in Your heart and sustain me with Your arm. I
know that I am weak and empty, and I am conscious of my
powerlessness. Lord, I am a helpless person. If I try to
preserve myself until Your coming, it will only bring shame
to Your name and loss to myself. All my hopes are in Your
love and power. I loved You before. But I know the
undependability of that love. Now I look only to the love
You have toward me. I held You once, and it seemed to be a
powerful grip. But now I realize that even my strongest grip
is just weakness. My trust is not in my holding power, but in
Your holding power. I dare not speak of my love to You any
longer. I dare not speak of my grasping of You any longer.
From this point on, everything depends on Your strength
and Your love’” (Watchman Nee, The Song of Songs, p.
119).
3. His love cannot be quenched by trials nor drowned by
persecutions nor replaced by any wealth—S. S. 8:7; Rom.
8:35-39; 1 Cor. 13:1-3.
4. The lover of Christ asks Him who dwells in the believers as His
gardens to let her hear His voice while her companions listen for
His voice—S. S. 8:13; cf. 4:13—5:1; 6:2:
1. This indicates that in the work that we as the lovers of
Christ do for Him as our Beloved, we need to maintain our
fellowship with Him, always listening to Him—cf. Luke
10:38-42.
2. Our lives depend on the Lord’s words, and our work
depends on the Lord’s commands; the central point of our
prayers should be our longing for the Lord’s speaking—Rev.
2:7; 1 Sam. 3:9-10; cf. Isa. 50:4-5; Exo. 21:6.
3. Without the Lord’s words, we will not have any revelation,
light, or knowledge; the life of the believers hinges totally
upon the Lord’s speaking—Eph. 5:26-27.
5. As the concluding word of this poetic book, the lover of Christ
prays that her Beloved would make haste to come back in the
power of His resurrection (gazelle and young hart) to set up His
sweet and beautiful kingdom (mountains of spices), which will fill
the whole earth—S. S. 8:14; Rev. 11:15; Dan. 2:35:
1. Such a prayer portrays the union and communion between
Christ as the Bridegroom and His lovers as the bride in their
bridal love, in the way that the prayer of John, a lover of
Christ, as the concluding word of the Holy Scriptures,
reveals God’s eternal economy concerning Christ and the
church in His divine love—Rev. 22:20.
2. “Come, Lord Jesus!” is the last prayer in the Bible (v. 20);
the entire Bible concludes with the desire for the Lord’s
coming expressed as a prayer.
3. “When He comes, faith will be turned to facts, and praise
will replace prayer. Love will consummate in a shadowless
perfection, and we will serve Him in the sinless domain.
What a day that will be! Lord Jesus, come quickly!”
(Watchman Nee, The Song of Songs, p. 126).