Scripture Reading: 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:28-29; 12:2; Phil. 3:10; Heb. 10:19-20; 1 Pet. 2:21
Ⅰ
To be transformed is to have Christ added into our being to replace what we are so that Christ may increase in us and our natural life may decrease; it is a divine, spiritual metabolism by the addition of the new element of Christ as the life-giving Spirit to discharge the old element of our natural being and to make us a new creation—2 Cor. 3:18: Rom. 12:2; Gal. 6:15; John 3:30; Col. 2:19:
A
Our Christian life and church life are "from glory to glory"; the glory is the resurrected Christ Himself, the "blossoming" Christ as the life-giving Spirit— 2 Cor. 3:18; 4:1, 16-18; John 12:23-24; 17:1; Luke 24:26:
１
Now that we have the Spirit indwelling our spirit, we need to exercise our spirit more and more by praying, reading the Word, and calling on the name of the Lord—Eph. 6:17-18; Psa. 71:14; Prov. 4:18-23; Judg. 5:31; Matt. 13:43.
２
We are being transformed by being renewed in the spirit of our mind; the mingled spirit spreads into our mind to saturate, possess, conquer, subdue, and dominate it; then we are automatically renewed in the emotion and will, for the mind adjusts the emotion and influences the will—Rom. 12:2; 8:6; Eph. 4:23; cf. Rom. 7:25.
B
As a result of being transformed by the renewing of the mind, the believers become precious materials—gold, silver, and precious stones—for the building up of the church—1 Cor. 3:9-12; Psa. 68:11-13, 19-20:
１
Gold, silver, and precious stones signify the various experiences and attri-butes of the Triune God—God the Father in His divine nature as the gold, God the Son in His redeeming as the silver, and God the Spirit in His trans-forming work as precious stones—1 Cor. 3:12a.
２
Transformation is the working of the Triune God's attributes into the seek-ing believers to become their virtues; such transformation takes place only in the proper church life through some perfecters, "transformers," who coop-erate with the transforming Triune God—S. S. 1:10-11; Eph. 4:11-12.
３
As the current of the divine life flows in us in the midst of heat and pressure and through our practice of speaking with the Lord constantly, we partici-pate in God's divinity, which makes us the same as God in life and nature— Phil. 2:5; 4:6; John 3:15; 2 Pet. 1:4.
Ⅱ
Transformation issues in conformation to the image of God's Son so that He might be the Firstborn among many brothers; conformation to Christ is our destiny and our destination—Rom. 8:28-29:
A
Transformation is inward and involves a metabolic change in form, whereas conformation is outward and involves the shaping of the form into an image.
B
We need to be saved in the life of Christ from our self-likeness in order to bear the appearance of God's sons; to be saved from our self-likeness is to be conformed to the image of the firstborn Son of God for His corporate expression—5:10.
C
We are presently in the process of maturity, that is, in the process of transforma-tion and conformation so that we may become the sons of God in reality for the Lord's recovery of God's expression—Heb. 6:1a; 2:1, 3, 10-11.
D
Conformation denotes the shaping of life, shaping us into the form, the mold, the image, of the firstborn Son of God.
E
Concerning this, our self-effort does not work; only one thing is prevailing—the divine life that grows in us, sanctifies us, transforms us, and shapes us; what we need is a fuller experience of the divine life—Hymns, #395.
Ⅲ
We are being conformed to the death of Christ by the power of His resurrec-tion to be delivered from the introspective self—Phil. 3:10; S. S. 2:8-14:
A
We have been baptized into Christ and put into Christ; because we are in Him, whatever He has passed through is our history—Gal. 3:27; 1 Cor. 1:30.
B
We need to pray that the Lord would give us a clear vision of the fact that we are in Him and that we have been crucified with Him; knowing this in Romans 6:6 actually refers to the seeing of a fact in a spiritual vision.
C
Based upon the fact that our old man, our fallen and natural being, has been crucified with Christ, we must cooperate with the indwelling Spirit to crucify the flesh as the expression of our being in our practical living—Gal. 5:16, 24.
D
To put to death the practices of the body by the Spirit means that we do not live habitually according to the flesh; this requires coordination with the Lord through the exercise of our will; we need to make a strong decision and say, "Lord, I take sides with You. I want to be conformed to Your death. Lord, have mercy on me so that I will no longer live habitually according to the flesh but will set aside all the habits of my natural life"—Rom. 8:13; 1 Tim. 4:7; Phil. 1:21a.
E
We need to take the mold of Christ's death as the mold of our life; the mold of Christ's death refers to the continual putting to death of His human life so that He might live by the life of God—John 6:57; Isa. 7:14-15.
F
As we are being conformed to such a mold, we die to our human life in order to live the divine life; thus, we are conformed to Christ's death by the power of His resurrection to deliver us from the introspective self—S. S. 2:9, 14.
G
Being conformed to Christ's death must be our daily experience—1 Cor. 15:31.
H
To bear the cross is to remain under the killing of the death of Christ for the terminating of our self, our natural life, and our old man—Matt. 16:24.
I
The meaning of bearing the cross is to not depart from the cross, to stay in Christ's death and make His death our home; a person who bears the cross is one with the cross and inseparable from the cross—Gal. 6:17; cf. Rev. 21:21.
J
The genuine experience of denying the self, taking up the cross, and losing our soul-life takes place only in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit as we receive God into our spirit to express God through our soul for Him to be our exceeding joy; only as we live in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit is our seeing a real seeing and our experience a real experience—2 Cor. 13:14; 1 John 1:3; Psa. 43:4a.
K
For the believers to lose their soul-life is for them to hate (not love above the Lord) their father, mother, spouse, children, brothers, sisters, and, moreover, their own soul-life so that their soul can be saved in the coming age from dispensational punishment to participate in the joy of the Lord—Matt. 10:37-39; Luke 14:26; 1 Pet. 1:9; Matt. 25:30; 24:51; Heb. 10:39.
Ⅳ
We enjoy the dispensing of the Divine Trinity in the divine transformation for the divine conformation by entering into the Holy of Holies by the blood of Jesus to follow Jesus—vv. 19-20; 1 Pet. 2:21:
A
The Holy of Holies today is in heaven, where the Lord Jesus is, but the very Christ who is in heaven is now also in our spirit; when we turn to our spirit and exercise our spirit, we enter into the gate of heaven and touch Christ as the throne of grace and the heavenly ladder so that we may be thoroughly infused with God and joined to God—Heb. 9:12, 24; 2 Tim. 4:22; 1 Cor. 6:17.
B
When we come forward to Christ as the throne of grace, the ruling presence of the enjoyable God, in our spirit, we receive Him as mercy and find Him as grace for timely help, which exactly fits our situation and need—Heb. 4:16.
C
After indicating by what kind of death Peter would glorify God, the Lord Jesus said to him, "Follow Me!"—John 21:19:
１
The "Me" whom we are to follow is in us; we must not follow the Lord accord-ing to our own will but according to His leading—v. 18; Rom. 8:14.
２
Furthermore, we must follow Him without paying attention to others; when Peter inquired about John, the Lord told Peter that what would happen to John was none of Peter's business and that he had to follow Him—John 21:20-22.
D
To follow the Lord is to enter within the veil and go outside the camp—Heb. 6:19-20; 13:13; Exo. 33:7-11:
１
To be within the veil is to enter into the Holy of Holies, our spirit, where the Lord is enthroned in glory, and to go outside the camp is to go outside of religion, whence the Lord was cast out in rejection—1 Pet. 2:21.
２
When we enter within the veil by getting into our spirit, we taste the sweet-ness of the heavenly Christ so that we may be enabled to go outside the camp, forsaking the earth and its love.
３
The more we are in our spirit, enjoying the heavenly Christ, the more we will come outside the camp of religion, following the suffering Jesus.
４
To be within the veil is to be in the Holy of Holies, in a realm where we partake of Christ and enjoy Him as the hidden manna, the budding rod, and the law of life, issuing in God's corporate expression for the fulfillment of His eternal purpose—Heb. 9:3-4.