«　WEEK 2　DAY 4　»

　　Rom. 8:16 The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God.

　　Eph. 3:17 That Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith…

　　The God-men have the divine right to be Godkind—God’s species (John 1:12; Rom. 8:14, 16). We have been regenerated to be Godkind. As God’s sons, we are God’s kind, God’s species.

　　We have received the Lord Jesus by believing into Him, and God has given us the authority, the right, to be God’s children [John 1:12]. “The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit that we are children of God” (Rom. 8:16). Such a witnessing testifies to us and assures us that we are children of God, who possess His life. We need to realize this and remember it. Wherever we may be, we need to remember that we are God-men with the divine right to participate in God’s divinity. (CWWL, 1994-1997, vol. 4, “Incarnation, Inclusion, and Intensification,” p. 218)

　　If we read the Bible without paying attention to this crucial point, then, in a very real sense, the Bible is to us an empty book. This means that although the Bible is real in itself, in our understanding of it, the Bible is empty. As an illustration, let us suppose that a certain box, which is quite attractive, contains a large diamond. A child may be interested in the box but not in the diamond. An adult, however, would focus his attention on the diamond contained in the box. Today many Christians care for the Bible as the “box,” but they have not seen and do not appreciate the “diamond,” which is the content of this box, and they may even condemn those who have a proper appreciation of the “diamond” in the “box.” The “diamond” in the “box” of the Bible is the revelation that in Christ God has become man in order that man might become God in life and in nature but not in the Godhead.

　　We need God to build Himself in Christ into our humanity. This means that we need God to work Himself in Christ into us as our life, our nature, and our constitution. As a result, we are not simply a man according to God’s heart—we are God in life and in nature but not in the Godhead.

　　In order to accomplish this, God in Christ became a man and went through some processes that this man could be designated something divine. In resurrection He was designated the firstborn Son of God. In and through resurrection Christ, the firstborn Son of God, became the life-giving Spirit, who now enters into us to impart, to dispense, Himself as life into our being to be our inner constitution, to make us a God-man just like Him. He was God becoming man, and we are man becoming God in life and in nature but not in the Godhead.

　　Ephesians 3:17 tells us that Christ is now within us doing the work of building Himself into us to produce [a] mutual abode…Christ is working in us to build up God’s habitation by building Himself into us. This mutual abode is also unveiled in John 14:23: “If anyone loves Me,…My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him.” This abode will be not only for the Triune God but also for us. What God builds up in us is both God’s habitation and our habitation. God will have a habitation not by our doing or working but by His building. Christ builds the church (Matt. 16:18) by coming into our spirit and spreading Himself from our spirit into our mind, emotion, and will to occupy our entire soul. This church will become His habitation and our habitation.

　　There is no need for us to build anything for God. Rather, God needs to build Himself in Christ into us as our life, nature, and essence. Eventually, the Triune God will become our intrinsic constitution. We will be constituted with the Triune God…The New Jerusalem is the consummation of this mutual abode, and we will all be there. (Life-study of 1 & 2 Samuel, pp. 206, 170-171)

　　Further Reading: Life-study of 1 & 2 Samuel, msgs. 25, 31; CWWL, 1994-1997, vol. 1, “Living a Life according to the High Peak of God’s Revelation,” ch. 4

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