Scripture Reading: John 3:3, 5-6; 18:36; 1:12-13; 2 Pet. 1:4
Ⅰ
The kingdom of God is a realm not only of the divine dominion but also of the divine species, in which are all the divine things—John 3:3, 5; 18:36:
A
In John 3 the kingdom of God refers more to the species of God than to the reign of God.
B
God became man to enter into the human species, and man becomes God in life and nature but not in the Godhead to enter into His divine species— 1:1, 12-14; 2 Pet. 1:4.
C
In order to enter into the divine realm, the realm of the divine species, we need to be born of God to have the divine life and the divine nature— John 1:12-13; 3:3, 5-6, 15; 2 Pet. 1:4:
１
God created man, not after man's kind but in His image and according to His likeness to be God's kind, God's species—Gen. 1:26.
２
The believers, who are born of God by regeneration to be His children in His life and nature but not in His Godhead, are more in God's kind than Adam was—John 1:12-13:
ａ
Adam had only the outward appearance of God without the inward reality, the divine life.
ｂ
We, the believers in Christ and the children of God, have the reality of the divine life, and we are being transformed and conformed to the Lord's image in our entire being—2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 12:2; 8:29.
ｃ
Our second birth, regeneration, caused us to enter into the king-dom of God to become the species of God—John 3:3, 5-6.
ｄ
All the children of God are in the divine realm of the divine species— 1:12-13; 3:3, 5.
ｅ
The believers are God in the divine species, that is, in the kingdom of God—1 John 3:1a; John 1:12-13; 3:3, 5.
Ⅱ
In the Gospel of John we see many aspects of the believers' living in the kingdom of God as the realm of the divine species:
A
"Of His fullness we have all received, and grace upon grace"—1:16.
B
"He breathed into them and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit"— 20:22.
C
"The water that I will give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into eternal life"—4:14b.
D
"He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me"—6:57b.
E
"These things I have spoken to you that in Me you may have peace"; "My peace I give to you"—16:33a; 14:27b.
F
"As the Father has loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love"— 15:9.
G
"These things I have spoken to you that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be made full"—v. 11.
H
"He who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be mani-fested that they are wrought in God"—3:21.
I
"He who loves his soul-life loses it; and he who hates his soul-life in this world shall keep it unto eternal life"—12:25.
J
"If anyone serves Me, let him follow Me; and where I am, there also My servant will be. If anyone serves Me, the Father will honor him"—v. 26.
K
"An hour is coming, and it is now, when the true worshippers will wor-ship the Father in spirit and truthfulness, for the Father also seeks such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truthfulness"—4:23-24.
L
"Abide in Me and I in you"—15:4a.
M
"If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you"—v. 7.
N
"Love one another even as I have loved you"—v. 12.
O
"If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another's feet"—13:14.
P
"Feed My lambs"; "shepherd My sheep"; "feed My sheep"—21:15b, 16b, 17b.
Q
"You did not choose Me, but I chose you, and I set you that you should go forth and bear fruit and that your fruit should remain"—15:16a.
R
"Martha served…Mary took a pound of ointment, of very valuable pure nard, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped His feet with her hair; and the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment"—12:2b, 3.
S
"In My Father's house are many abodes…I go to prepare a place for you"—14:2.
T
"In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in you"—v. 20.
U
"If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him"—v. 23.
V
"Holy Father, keep them in Your name, which You have given to Me, that they may be one even as We are"—17:11b.
W
"The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, even as We are one"—v. 22.
Ⅹ
"I in them, and You in Me, that they may be perfected into one"—v. 23a.
Y
"Father, concerning that which You have given Me, I desire that they also may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory"—v. 24a.