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We need to abide in Christ as our King and as our royal abode so that He can abide in us to make us His queen and His royal palace, His glorious church—Psa. 45:13, 8; John 15:4-5; Eph. 5:27; Rev. 22:5; Rom. 5:17; cf. S. S. 6:4:
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To abide in Christ is to dwell in Him, the eternal God, as our Lord, having our living in Him and taking Him as our everything—John 15:4-5; 1 John 4:15-16; Rev. 21:22; Deut. 33:27a; Psa. 90.
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We need to dwell in God, living in Him every minute, for outside of Him there are sins and afflictions—vv. 3-11; John 16:33.
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To take God as our habitation, our eternal dwelling place, is the highest and fullest experience of God—Psa. 91.
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To abide in Christ, taking Him as our dwelling place, and to allow Him to abide in us, taking us as His dwelling place, is to live in the reality of the universal incorporation of the processed and consummated Triune God with the redeemed and regenerated believers—John 14:2, 10-11, 17, 20, 23:
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The New Jerusalem is the ultimate incorporation of the processed and consummated Triune God with the regenerated, sanctified, renewed, transformed, conformed, and glorified tripartite church—Rev. 21:3, 22.
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The New Jerusalem is the tabernacle of God, and the center of the tabernacle is Christ as the hidden manna; the way to be incorporated into this universal, divine-human incorporation, the mutual abode of God and man, is to eat Christ as the hidden manna—v. 3; Exo. 16:32-34; Heb. 9:4; Rev. 2:17.
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We abide in Christ so that He may abide in us by loving Him—John 14:21, 23:
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When we love the Lord Jesus, He manifests Himself to us, and the Father comes with Him to make an abode with us for our enjoyment; this abode is a mutual abode, in which the Triune God abides in us and we abide in Him—v. 23.
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The more we love the Lord, the more we will have His presence, and the more we are in His presence, the more we will enjoy all that He is to us; the Lord's recovery is a recovery of loving the Lord Jesus—1 Cor. 2:9-10; Eph. 6:24.
Morning Nourishment
Psa. 90:1-2 O Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations. Before the mountains were brought forth, and before You gave birth to the earth and the world, indeed from eternity to eternity, You are God.[In Psalm 90 Moses proclaimed] that God is our dwelling place in all generations....This was a new thought, something altogether unprecedented.
In John 15 the Lord Jesus said, “Abide in Me and I in you” (v. 4a)....To abide in Christ is to dwell in Him, not just remain or stay in Him. When we dwell in our house, we have our life and our living there.
According to Moses' word in Psalm 90:1, our house, our dwelling place, is the Triune God as our Lord... When we experience the Triune God to the degree that we take Him as our dwelling place, we have the deeper experience of God. (Life-study of the Psalms, p. 399)
Today's Reading
To take God as our habitation, our dwelling place, is the highest and fullest experience of God. To take God as our dwelling place is to experience Him to the fullest extent. Probably no one among us would dare to say that he dwells in God all the time. But this is what Christ did. When He was living His human life on earth, He continually took God the Father as His habitation. The only way that we can be identified with Christ in His death, resurrection, and ascension is to abide in Christ, and to abide in Christ is not only to remain in Him but also to dwell in Him, taking Him as our everything.... To dwell in God is to have our living in God.... I want to dwell in God, living in Him every minute, for outside of Him there are sins and afflictions. (Life-study of the Psalms, pp. 400, 402)The Epistles reveal that God's goal is to have a great universal incorporation of Himself with His believers. Ultimately, this incorporation is the New Jerusalem, which is God's goal. The way to be incorporated into the tabernacle is to eat the hidden manna. The more we eat Christ, the more we are incorporated into the Triune God as a universal incorporation. By eating the hidden manna we are incorporated into the tabernacle. The tabernacle in the Old Testament is a figure of the New Jerusalem, which is called the tabernacle of God. As the tabernacle of God, the New Jerusalem is the universal incorporation. This universal incorporation is God's eternal goal. The New Jerusalem is the tabernacle of God, and the center of this tabernacle is Christ as the hidden manna for us to eat. The way to be in the New Jerusalem is to eat Christ. (CWWL, 1994-1997, vol. 5, “The Issue of Christ Being Glorified by the Father with the Divine Glory,” pp. 347-348, 341)
When we love [the Lord], not only does His Spirit abide in us but also He Himself will manifest Himself to us. This means that we have the presence of the One whom we love in our fellowship with Him. If we love Jesus, Jesus loves us, and the Father loves us also. When the Son manifests Himself to us, the Father comes with Him to make an abode with us, to stay with us.... By loving Him,...He will manifest Himself to us, and the Father and the Son will make Their abode with us for our enjoyment. (CWWL, 1988, vol. 1, “Living in and with the Divine Trinity” pp. 304-305)
The more we love Him, the more we enjoy His presence. What is His presence? It is simply the enjoyment of Himself. As long as we have His presence, we enjoy Him. The more we love Him, the more we shall have His presence. The more we are in His presence, the more we shall enjoy all that He is to us. We need only to love Him. Knowing means nothing; only loving counts. How we all need to love Him! I have been loving Him for fifty years, and today I feel that He is more lovable than ever. No one is as lovely as He is. Song of Songs says that He is altogether lovely (5:16). The Lord's recovery is a recovery of loving the Lord Jesus. If we do not love Him, we are finished with His recovery. (Life-study of John, p. 383)
Further Reading: CWWL, 1969, vol. 3, “Christ and the Church Revealed and Typified in the Psalms,” ch. 16; CWWL, 1994-1997, vol. 3, “Crystallization-study of Song of Songs,” ch. 11