Outline
Ⅱ
In order to enjoy the eternal blessing of the Triune God dispensing Himself into us, we need to enter into and keep ourselves in the eternal love of God—Jer. 31:3:
A
“We love because He first loved us” (1 John 4:19); God first loved us in that He infused us with His love and generated within us the love with which we love Him and the brothers (vv. 20-21).
B
Deuteronomy 30:19 and 20 say, “I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life that you and your seed may live, in loving Jehovah your God by listening to His voice and holding fast to Him; for He is your life and the length of your days”:
１
These verses reveal that the way to choose life is to love the Lord, and the way to love the Lord is to listen to His voice and hold fast to Him—vv. 19-20; Rev. 2:4, 7; S. S. 3:4; 8:13-14.
２
Acts 11:23 reveals how we can hold fast to Him; when Barnabas went to Antioch, he “encouraged them all to remain with the Lord with purpose of heart”:
ａ
To hold fast to the Lord is to remain with the Lord with purpose of heart.
ｂ
This is to be persistently faithful to the Lord, cleave to Him, and live in close fellowship with Him.
C
As we love the Lord Jesus, we become the same as He is in His divinely enriched humanity; the bountiful God in His rich attributes is expressed through our aromatic “Jesusly” human virtues—2 Cor. 2:15.
D
These “Jesusly” human virtues include extraordinary love, boundless forbearance, unparalleled faithfulness, absolute humility, utmost purity, supreme holiness and righteousness, and brightness and uprightness; these virtues describe the actual life of Jesus as recorded in the four Gospels, which is now our indwelling life for us to experience, enjoy, and express—Eph. 4:20-21.
E
Christ as our indwelling life enables us to live a life that is absolutely for God and for God’s satisfaction—our living becomes a reproduction of the human living of Jesus typified by the burnt offering—Lev. 1:4, 13.
F
We all need to spend an adequate amount of personal time with the Lord to have affectionate, private, and spiritual fellowship with Him in our spirit so that we can be filled with His loving essence for Him to shepherd others through us and so that we can be filled with His shining element for others to see Him in us—S. S. 1:1-4; John 4:24; Luke 15:20; Matt. 5:15-16.
G
The humanity of one who serves the Lord is safeguarded through his loving the Lord; our loving the Lord keeps us in the realm and sphere of Jesus’ humanity; if we do not love the Lord, we lose the restraint that comes from His attraction, and we are liable to do anything and everything—2 Tim. 4:10, 14; Eph. 4:17-21.
Morning Nourishment
Jer. 31:3 Jehovah appeared to me from afar, saying, Indeed I have loved you with an eternal love; therefore I have drawn you with lovingkindness.1 John 4:19 We love because He first loved us.
The highest morality is one in which divinity is added to our humanity. This is the divine attributes of God expressed in the created virtues of man. It is also the most excellent virtue. According to our understanding of the Bible and our personal experience, there are seven items of these excellent virtues.
Love is the first item of these excellent virtues. This love is extraordinary.
We can love to an extent that we even love our enemies (Matt. 5:44).
To forbear is to forgive. When we forgive, our hearts have to be boundless. A narrow person cannot forgive. Hence, we need to have a boundless forbearance. We have to forbear to an extent that we can forgive our enemies and those who hate us. (CWWL, 1989, vol. 1, “The Glorious Vision and the Way of the Cross,” pp. 458-459)
Today’s Reading
Sometimes we can love others but cannot forgive them…Because I love you, even though you are my enemy, I can give you a Bible. But it is very difficult for me to forget the offense that you have done to me. Hence, it is not easy to forgive. For this reason the Lord set a good example for us in the Gospels. Although men reviled Him unceasingly while He was on earth, His last act on earth before He died was a prayer for man: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34a). This is boundless forbearance.We have to deal with others with consistency and in faithfulness. We should not betray others or the Lord. There must be unparalleled faithfulness. Our humility has to be absolute. Not only do we have to be humble. We have to be in humiliation. To be humble is to be low, but to be humiliated is to be made small. To serve the Lord we need an absolute humility. We have to be pure…, and this purity must be to the utmost. Toward God we have to be supremely holy, and toward man we have to be supremely righteous. Toward God we have to be fully separated, and toward man we have to be fully proper, with no fault whatsoever. The first item is love, and the last item is light…We have to walk in light. Everything we do must be in the light and must not be in darkness. We must be thoroughly upright and forthright and must not be narrow-minded or suspicious in any way.
All the seven items combined give a proper humanity for a servant of the Lord. Since God lives in our spirit, He lives in our conscience. However, God does not use brute force to rule over this part of us. Rather, He draws us with His love. We see this in the Lord’s question to Peter: “Do you love Me?” Peter answered, “Yes, Lord, You know that I love You.” The Lord said to him, “Shepherd My sheep” (John 21:16). This is His drawing us with His love. If we do not love the Lord, we lose the restraint that comes from this kind of attraction and are liable to do anything and everything.
For a Christian to serve the Lord, he must have the humanity of a servant of the Lord…Our humanity comes from our loving of our God. We have been planted in Him. Now we are willing to live in Him and are willing to be found by others to be a person in Him. Furthermore, what we live out is just Christ. We always allow Christ to be magnified in our body. No matter what kind of circumstance, whether it be poverty, riches, suffering, enjoyment, peace, danger, or even death, I magnify Him. In this way He becomes my humanity.
Whether our humanity will be safeguarded or not depends on whether or not we continue to love the Lord and consecrate ourselves. (CWWL, 1989, vol. 1, “The Glorious Vision and the Way of the Cross,” pp. 459-460, 467-468)
Further Reading: CWWL, 1989, vol. 1, “The Glorious Vision and the Way of the Cross,” chs. 3—4