Scripture Reading: Gal. 2:20; Eph. 2:15; 4:24; 3:17a; Col. 3:10-11; Phil. 1:21a
Ⅰ
In order to arrive at a full-grown man for the fulfillment of God's purpose, we need to take Christ as our person—Gal. 2:20; Eph. 3:17a:
A
For the new man we all need to take Christ as our person—2:15; 3:17a:
１
Christ is both the life of the Body and the person of the new man—Col. 3:4; Eph. 3:17a.
２
In the one new man the natural man has no place; we all have no place in the new man, for here Christ is all and in all—Col. 3:10-11.
３
Christ is in all of us, so we all have only one person—1:27; Eph. 3:17a.
４
What God cares for is whether or not we take Christ as our person—John 6:57b; Phil. 1:21a; Col. 3:4; Eph. 3:17a.
５
What is first is not taking Christ as our life but taking Christ as our person:
ａ
If we take Christ as our person, we will surely take Him as our life— 1 John 5:11-12; Col. 3:4.
ｂ
If we take Christ as our person, we will be able to grow and mature— 2:19; Eph. 4:13-16.
ｃ
Taking Christ as our person is for the growth of the new man—v. 13.
B
When we live our life by taking Christ as our person, especially in making decisions, our living will be the living of the new man—John 4:34; 5:30; 6:38; 17:4; Rom. 15:32; James 4:13-15:
１
In the new man we take Christ as our person to make plans and to decide how we should live—Rom. 15:32.
２
If we take Christ as our person, we will not decide anything in our life by ourselves—Philem. 14:
ａ
Once we see that we are a part of the one new man, we will not be able to decide things merely by ourselves.
ｂ
Since we are part of the new man, our decisions and our living should not be ours; they should be the decisions and the living of the corporate new man.
ｃ
The living of the new man is a corporate living; therefore, our decisions are corporate decisions and not our personal decisions—1 Cor. 4:19.
３
Paul is a pattern of taking Christ as our person—1 Tim. 1:16; Gal. 1:15a, 16a; 2:20; 4:19; Eph. 3:17a; Phil. 1:8; 2:5; 2 Cor. 2:10.
C
For the church as the one new man, we all need to take Christ as our person in the matter of speaking—Matt. 12:34-37; Eph. 3:17a; John 7:16-18; 8:28, 38a; 12:49-50; 14:10:
１
In the one new man there is one mouth to speak the same thing—Rom. 15:6; 1 Cor. 1:10.
２
We need to consider one new man in Ephesians 2:15 together with one mouth in Romans 15:6 and speak the same thing in 1 Corinthians 1:10:
ａ
There is only one new man, and the one new man has only one person, so the one new man speaks with one mouth and says the same thing.
ｂ
With one accord and with one mouth (Rom. 15:6) mean that even though we are many and all are speaking, we all speak the same thing—1 Cor. 1:10:
⑴
The church is the one new man with only one person—Christ—and this person controls our speaking; thus, whatever He speaks is surely thesamething.
⑵
If in our speaking we take Christ as the person, there will be one mouth, and everyone will speak the same thing.
ｃ
In the one new man there is only one person—Christ—and only this person has the freedom to speak; there is no freedom for us to speak our own things—Matt. 17:5.
３
Although we are many and come from many places, we all have one mouth and we all speak the same thing; this is because we all are the one new man having only one person—Eph. 2:15; 4:22-24; 3:17a; Rom. 15:6; 1 Cor. 1:10.
Ⅱ
In order to arrive at a full-grown man for the fulfillment of God's purpose, we need to live the life of a God-man—Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:21a:
A
In Christ God and man have become one entity, the God-man—Luke 1:35; John 1:14; Matt. 1:18, 20-23.
B
Initially, the Bible speaks of the God-man; today this God-man has become the God-men—Rom. 1:3-4; 8:29:
１
The Lord Jesus, the first God-man, is the prototype for the producing of the many God (1 Pet. 2:21); the many God are His reproduction.
２
God became man (Rom. 8:3) to have a mass reproduction of Himself and thereby to produce a new kind (v. 29; Heb. 2:10); this new kind is God-man kind.
３
We need to see that we are God-men, born of God, possessing the life and nature of God, and belonging to the species of God—John 1:12-13.
C
The one new man is the corporate God-man—Eph. 2:15; 4:24; Col. 3:10-11:
１
The first God-man, the firstborn Son of God, is the Head of this corporate God-man, and the many God-men, the many sons of God, are the Body of this corporate God-man—Rom. 8:29; Col. 1:18; 2:19.
２
The God-men, as the regenerated children of God, constitute the new man— Eph. 5:1; 4:24:
ａ
The one new man is a corporate man, and this corporate new man is the aggregate of all the God-men—2:15.
ｂ
Through His death and resurrection, Christ produced many brothers (Rom. 8:29; Heb. 2:11) who, with Him, have become the universal one new man; this is the corporate God-man, who is God yet man and man yet God.
D
For the one new man as the corporate God-man, we need to live the life of a God-man—Phil. 1:19-21a; 3:10:
１
Christ's human living was man living God to express the attributes of God in the human virtues—John 6:57a; 14:10:
ａ
His human virtues were filled, mingled, and saturated with the divine attributes—Luke 1:26-35; 7:11-17; 10:25-37; 19:1-10.
ｂ
The Lord Jesus lived God and expressed God in everything; whatever He did was God's doing from within Him and through Him—John 14:10-11.
２
As the expansion, increase, reproduction, and continuation of the first God-man, we should live the same kind of life that He lived—1 John 2:6:
ａ
The Lord's God-man living set up a model for our God-man living—being crucified to live that God might be expressed in humanity—Gal. 2:20.
ｂ
The One who lived the life of a God-man is now the Spirit living in us and through us; we should not allow anything other than this One to fill us and occupy us—2 Cor. 3:17; 13:5; Eph. 3:16-19.
３
A God-man who knows the excellent Christ should live a life conformed to the death of Christ by the power of His resurrection—Phil. 3:8, 10.
４
A God-man who has Christ living in him should live and magnify Christ by the bountiful supply of His Spirit—Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:19-21a.