Outline
Ⅲ
The Triune God is the structure of the New Testament:
A
"If I, by the Spirit of God, cast out the demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you"—Matt. 12:28.
B
"Disciple all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit"—28:19.
C
"The Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and remind you of all the things which I have said to you"—John 14:26.
D
"When the Comforter comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of reality, who proceeds from the Father, He will testify concerning Me"—15:26.
E
"Having been exalted to the right hand of God and having received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father"—Acts 2:33a.
F
"If the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who indwells you"—Rom. 8:11.
G
"Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father!"—Gal. 4:6.
H
"That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit into the inner man, that Christ may make His home in your hearts through faith"—Eph. 3:16-17a.
I
"One Spirit…one Lord…one God and Father"—4:4-6.
J
"How much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God?"—Heb. 9:14.
K
"Chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father in the sanctification of the Spirit unto the obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ"—1 Pet. 1:2a.
L
"Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is coming, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful Witness, the Firstborn of the dead, and the Ruler of the kings of the earth"—Rev. 1:4b-5a.
Morning Nourishment
John 14:16-17 And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may be with you forever, even the Spirit of reality…26 But the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and remind you of all the things which I have said to you.
According to the revelation of the Bible, the indwelling Spirit in us has the following six main functions:
First, the Spirit enters into us as the essential Spirit for our existence, being, life, and living. He is the ultimate consummation of the processed Triune God, the life-giving Spirit whom Christ became in resurrection (1 Cor. 15:45). This Spirit enters into us who have believed in Christ (John 20:22) and lives in us to be the essence of the divine life, nature, and being within us.
[Second], the Spirit enters into us as the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2). Life is the contents of the Divine Trinity. When the Spirit of life enters into us, He imparts the eternal life of God into us to be our life…[until] the Spirit of life fills our entire being, including our spirit, soul, and body, sanctifying us and conforming us to the image of the firstborn Son of God (v. 29) that we may become the many sons of God to be His corporate expression. (Truth Lessons—Level One, vol. 4, pp. 56-57)
Today’s Reading
[Third], the Holy Spirit enters into us also as the seal within us (Eph. 1:13; 4:30; 2 Cor. 1:22)…That we, the believers, are sealed with the Holy Spirit means that we are marked with the Holy Spirit as a living seal, indicating that we belong to God, that is, that we are God’s inheritance (Eph. 1:11)… This sealing is spreading from our spirit to our mind, emotion, and will for the sanctification and transformation of our soul. Eventually, even our body will be thoroughly sealed, that is, saturated and transfigured; that will be the redemption of our body.[Fourth], the Holy Spirit is…also the pledge of the divine inheritance (v. 14; 2 Cor. 1:22b; 5:5b). In God’s economy we are an inheritance to God (Eph. 1:11), and God is an inheritance to us (v. 14). God and we are a mutual inheritance…As the seal, the Holy Spirit forms the divine elements into an impression in us for God’s expression; as the pledge, He gives us a foretaste as a sample and guarantee of the full taste of God.
[Fifth], the Holy Spirit in us is also the indwelling Spirit (Rom. 8:9; 1 Cor. 6:19). In John 14:17 the Lord Jesus clearly and definitely promised that when the Holy Spirit came, He would indwell the disciples. Then on the night of His resurrection, He came into the midst of the disciples and breathed into them that they might receive the Holy Spirit (20:22)…The indwelling Spirit…comes into us not to visit but to settle down in us, to make His home in us, even to occupy our whole being, that He may reveal God and Christ to us and that we may receive and enjoy all the riches of God in Christ.
[Sixth], the indwelling Spirit in us is also the reality of Christ. John 14:16-20 reveals that the Comforter who was coming was the embodiment of Christ…The Spirit who indwells us is the Christ who died and was resurrected and who indwells us. [In verse 26] the Comforter is the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in the name of the Son. To come in the name of the Son is to come as the Son. This proves that when the Spirit comes, it is the Son who comes, and that when the Spirit dwells in us, it is Christ the Son who dwells in us. The Spirit’s indwelling the believers is to reveal Christ, to glorify Christ, and to make Christ real in the believers [16:12-15]…All that God is and has is embodied in Christ (Col. 2:9; John 16:15), and all that Christ is and has is received by the Spirit and is revealed to the believers through the Spirit (vv. 14-15). Therefore, when the Spirit is in us, it is Christ who is in us. (Truth Lessons—Level One, vol. 4, pp. 57-59)
Further Reading: The Conclusion of the New Testament, msg. 130; CWWL, 1978, vol. 3, “The Healthy Word,” ch. 2; CWWL, 1978, vol. 3, “Truth Messages,” ch. 2