Let’s look at a book. Let’s label Christ Jesus as this book. Now let us see ourselves as a piece of paper. We take the piece of paper and put into The Book, Christ Jesus. Whatever happens to the book will happen to us, because we are now “IN THE BOOK.” The great Chinese apostle Watchman Nee coined this example.
Brother Nee goes on to say that because every Christian is “IN CHRIST”, whatever happened to Christ happened to us. Therefore when Christ was crucified, we were crucified with Him, because we are “IN HIM” or IN THE BOOK. Therefore our sinful nature has been dealt a once and for all mortal blow.
When Jesus was buried, we were buried “IN HIM”. This means that our whole sinful nature has the potential to decay and be lost from our sight and forgotten.
When Christ was raised from the dead, we were raised “IN HIM”, far above in distance and authority over the realm of the demonic, diseases, circumstances and the like, to allow us to potentially live a victorious life here on earth.
We are automatically “IN THE BOOK, OR IN CHRIST” by what the Lord did. This is a reality! It is our position forever and we can praise the Lord for that. No one can ever get us out of our being “IN CHRIST”.
However as to our daily life, though we are always “IN CHRIST” if we fail to yield and surrender to Him we start to live like if we are outside of Him, or outside of the book. That is why we must daily abide IN THE BOOK through our uncompromising obedience to His Voice.
Obedience is nothing else than getting out of God’s way so that He can live His life without hindrance.
The second viewpoint of being “In Christ” is that God has tucked all of His treasures and blessings safely “INSIDE THE PERSON OF HIS SON”.
I always teach that Christ is God’s treasure chest.
The enemy has duped and blinded us, mostly through our own fault, and the church serves the Lord with a certain amount of deception. God has given us Christ, His only treasure chest, to live in us. All of what God needs, and we need, is locked up safely in His Son. The whole deal about Christianity is to bring up Christ from His hidden state in our hearts, and as He comes to view within us, all of the treasures within Him come to view alongside with Him!
As I have said before, the Christian life has very little to do with us asking God for blessings and things. Unfortunately, that is how we live for the Lord. The whole bottom line of our walk with the Lord has to do with us making Jesus to become manifested. Obedience is the only way!
Because everything that pertains to God is INSIDE OF JESUS, when He is manifested in us, all that is INSIDE of HIM become manifested WITH HIM and becomes a gradual but automatic reality in our lives.
The more that we obey, the more that Jesus becomes manifested, and the more that He is manifested, the more that we can get to the treasures IN HIM.
For In Him We Live, and Move, and Have Our Being
.Romans 11:36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen
“For of Him’ point to us that we must “live out of, or from Jesus”. Let me illustrate this point in the following way.
Visualize a large tree.
How does any tree or plant live? A tree or plant “LIVES OUT OF, OR FROM ITS ROOT SYSTEM.”
The roots provide all of the plant’s water and food as they absorb them from the soil. The root system of any plant is the source for everything that is needed by them.
Without a system of roots the greatest and sturdiest of plants will die.
“For of Him’ is defined in exactly this way. As any plant must “LIVE OUT OR FROM” its system of roots, so every believer must “LIVE OUT OR FROM” the Person, and the power of Jesus Christ.
The person of Jesus living within us is “OUR ROOT SYSTEM”. Jesus is our source of life.
Acts 17:28 For in him we live, and move ( kinetic energy ), and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.
Paul confirms to us once again us that Jesus is our life, our activity, and our existence. There is a progressive hierarchy found here. Life and energy, brings activity, which will define our existence and destiny.
The kind of life, which the Lord gives to us, is the “God kind” of life. It is a resurrection life, which is free from bondage and hurt. It is clothed in the power of God, and is eternal in its nature.
This “God type of life’ given to us by Christ our root system, sets us in motion; anoints us, animates us, and motivates to become vigorous in the things which please the Heavenly Father. Because we end up gratifying the Heavenly Father, our actions leads us into discovering what our true existence and purpose in life is all about.
2Cor 3:5 Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ( OUT OF) ourselves; but our sufficiency is of ( OUT OF) God;
“To be sufficient” has to do with making someone fit and equipped for a certain function. This in turn will allow the believer to become competent and qualified to carry out all activities pertaining to this certain function.
We are unable to equip ourselves, and make ourselves competent for even the smallest of activities that relate to the kingdom of God.
In order for us to qualify, and successfully carry out God’s plans in this world, we must absorb the Lord’s life, His power; His will and so forth and live out from the Lord Himself.
2 Cor 5:18 And all things are of( OUT OF) God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation;
Second Corinthians five and eighteen goes even further than this by telling us that everything that we are dependent upon must be absorbed by us from the Lord.
Romans 8:37 (Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.)
By “Through Him” we are in fact setting apart the Lord as our agent of action. What does this mean? The Lord Jesus has not only taken it upon Himself to be our root source on which we feed. Jesus has goes even further than this!
For everything that that Lord solicits of us, He also provides the avenues, the doors, and the individual steps for us to successfully conduct His every order. With every step that we must take to obey Him, the Lord will also provide us with the anointing, strength, motivation, the peace and joy, and the blessings that will lead us to successfully accomplish each one of His affairs.
.Phillip 2:12 Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
13 For it is God which worketh (IS PUTTING HIS ENERGY)) in you both to will (FOR YOU TO DESIRE) and to do(AND FOR YOU TO CARRY OUT THE DESIRES WHICH HE PLACED IN YOU) of his good pleasure
Philippians two, twelve and thirteen, marvelously show us all that we have been speaking about. In verse twelve, the phrase “to work out your own salvation” is defined as a continuous and persevering execution of absolutely everything that God desires, until a through success is attained in everything that pertains to salvation. The Greek grammar here is in the middle voice. This means that the responsibility for the execution of our salvation lies with us.
However, there is more! Verse thirteen tells us that it is God who is continually energizing us. Remember God as the agent of action? When God energizes us, He always has a two-fold function behind it. His energy puts His will into our hearts.
Afterwards, His energy gives us all of the strength that we need to carry out each and every desire of the Lord. In reality, it is God living through us.
Rom 15:18 For I will not dare to speak of any of those things which Christ hath not wrought (accomplishing and totally executing) by me ( through me), to make the Gentiles obedient, by word and deed,
In this discourse Paul tells us that he dares not to mention anything that The Lord has not performed through Him. You see, Paul does not want to brag about what He is doing for the Lord. He has come to recognize that it the separate person of Christ executing His life, and His actions in us that only counts. Paul is simply Jesus arms and legs. What Christ reveals and feeds us with as our root system, He also holds Himself responsible to accomplish it in us.
1 Corinthians 8:6 But to us there is but one God, the Father, of (OUT OF) whom are all things, and we in ( INTO HIM) him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom(THROUGH WHOM) are all things, and we by( WE EXIST THROUGH) him. {in: or, for}
“And to Him” (Christ is the Goal of Everything)
This phrase identifies the Lord the Lord as the goal of everything we do. Once that He has revealed to us what He wants to do and accomplishes it, His desire is that everything is done for His cause and His will.
“We In Him” (We Have to Abide in Jesus)
We have already ascertained to the fact that God is our absolute source for everything that we need. Secondly, we have confirmed that whatever God wants God will also execute through us; He is our agent of action, we are His hands and feet and mouth. God reveals and God performs everything He reveals in us. We just have to let Him live his life by obeying all that He speaks. In other words we just have to get out of His way and let Him do His thing.
So we ask ourselves, “Okay, God wants to do this thing in us. I know now that whatever He tells us He will also want to do it by Himself. He does not need our good ideas. It will just mess Him up. So what is the answer? God needs our obedience
“WE IN HIM” has to with obedience. We all have dealt and used such slang expressions as “Man, I am really into the music” or “Man, I am really into this football game”. When we really love something we get lost into it and just flow with it, right? What about saying, “Man I am really into Jesus.” When we love Jesus like this, then obeying Him becomes pleasure and a breeze.
You see God’s steps? He reveals what He wants to do. We know now that He also wants to and has to do it for it to turn out right. Our job is to get “INTO WHAT” wants to do, yield (SURRENDER) and be his mouth, arms and legs to carry Him wherever He wants to go.
It is also very interesting that when Jesus uses the expression “Believe on Me” He is really saying, “BELIEVE INTO ME”! Many a good believer thinks that believing in Jesus is simply utilizing a mental confession of agreement of what is in the Word of God. True believing has to do with us getting into Jesus’ plans and desires so much that we will obey Him without fail.
John 7:38 He that believeth on me ( INTO ME), as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.
John 7:31 And many of the people believed on (INTO HIM) him, and said, When Christ cometh, will he do more miracles than these which this man hath done?
John 14:20 At that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you.
As we start to conclude our teaching for today lets us knit everything together. Look at what Jesus says in John fourteen and twenty. The “YE IN ME” has to do with our maintaining ourselves smack inside the book, which is Christ. We accomplish this, as we are careful to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling.” As we “believe on Jesus” we are sure to always get INTO HIS plans and not ours. As we keep ourselves IN CHRIST, He promises to manifest Himself to us, and in us.
His manifestation will also manifest alongside Him, all of God treasures, which reside in Him, as well. This is now the “I IN YOU”; Christ, and all that He has and is, becomes automatically assimilated in us. Because we are dead, and Christ is our lives, His manifestation becomes our reality. His victory over the devil becomes our victory, and we gradually find ourselves becoming free from the oppressive lies of the Evil One. His victory over sin becomes an automatic reality to us as we assimilate His infilling presence or manifestation. Remember all blessings, treasures and victories become manifested with Him.
The more that Jesus is revealed in our lives, the more that all of these treasures are revealed with Him. Christianity is not about trying but about becoming.
Christianity is about us becoming less manifested, so that Christ can become more manifested. Christianity is not about us getting blessings and things but about knowing a Person who contains all blessings and things.
Jose and Mary Alvarez 