First our spirit becomes life and then our mind becomes life. This means that the divine life has spread from within our spirit into our soul to saturate our mind. Here we need to tell the saints that our mind actually represents our soul. It is not too much to say that the mind here is our soul. The mind here is the soul because it is the main part of our soul. When our mind is really married to our spirit, set upon our spirit, relying upon our spirit to be one with our spirit, such a mind becomes life.
Romans 8:11 says that the Spirit of the very God who raised Christ Jesus from the dead gives life to our mortal body, our dying body, through the Spirit who indwells us. The word mortal in this verse implies not only the thought of death but also the thought of weakness. A mortal body is a weakened body, a dying body. Romans 7 calls our fallen body the body of this death (v. 24). Even such a weakened, dying, mortal body, a body of death, can be given life.
Thus far, we can see that the divine life mentioned in Romans 8:2 is imparted, or dispensed, into our spirit in verse 10 and spreads into our mind in verse 6. Then it is dispensed into our mortal body in verse 11. Thus, the divine life is dispensed into all three parts of our being.
This dispensing of life into our mortal body is through the indwelling Spirit. Without the Spirit indwelling us, life cannot be dispensed from the center of our being to the circumference of our being. Our spirit is our center and our body is our circumference. So the divine life first is dispensed into the center, and from the center it spreads to the circumference. Then our body is enlivened through the indwelling Spirit.
We have covered this already, but when we give this message, we need to dwell upon this point. Very few Christians realize that the divine life can even be dispensed into our body. We should give the saints some illustrations of this. Sometimes after work in the evening, we are worn out and weakened and do not think we can attend the meeting. But if we would exercise our spirit to pray and contact the Lord, this will allow the indwelling Spirit to move in us. Spontaneously the divine life will be dispensed into our weakened body, and our weakened body will be vitalized. Then we will have the physical strength to go to the meeting. This is a proof that life can be dispensed into our weakened body.
Brother Watchman Nee practiced this. He had a very troublesome heart that was always weakening his body. Many times while he was speaking, the trouble came. He no doubt at that juncture exercised his spirit to let the indwelling Spirit vitalize, or enliven, his weakened body, so his body did not frustrate or delay his ministry. He surely experienced the divine life being dispensed from his spirit into his weakened body. We can also give testimonies of our own experiences in this matter. Our weakened, dying, or sick body can be vitalized by the divine life through the indwelling Spirit.