After man fell, there was not only a barrier between him and God but also a distance. Originally man lived before God in the garden of Eden and had a face to face relationship with God. There was no barrier or distance between man and God. After man fell, however, many things entered into man that became a barrier between him and God.
If we want to live out Christ in our Christian living, we need to have fellowship with the Lord. Only the Lord’s life in us can enable us to spontaneously live Him out. However, sometimes it seems very difficult to have fellowship with the Lord because there are many persons, things, and matters that alienate us from the Lord, preventing us from having fellowship with Him. God placed the tree of life and also the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the garden of Eden. In the New Testament, when the Lord appeared to the disciples after His resurrection, He said to Peter, “Do you love Me more than these?” (John 21:15). The Lord was comparing the things in front of Peter-the fish, the net, and the sea-with Himself. In the same manner, the Lord often places something between us and Him to see if we love Him more than that thing. Only a comparison can manifest how deep our love toward Him is. Therefore, the Lord’s way is to place persons, things, or matters before us in order to see whether or not we love Him more than them.
Man cannot live life in an indifferent way, because within man there is a desire to love. God created man in this way so that man would love Him. Man cannot live apathetically; he is always looking for something to love. Thus, God Himself came to be the object of man’s love. Apart from God, whatever man loves will ultimately be harmful to him, no matter how good it is. No matter what man loves, he can only love it to a certain extent, because the thing he loves may be harmful to him. Therefore, if man loves something apart from the Lord without limitation, eventually he will be hurt. Only loving God, approaching God, and taking God as our joy is not harmful to us. On the contrary, loving God is better than loving anything else. We should allow God to regulate us not only in certain matters but in all matters.
We all know that we should love God, but sometimes it seems that we are not able to love Him. This is because our behavior is mostly formed by our habits. If we were to frequently study a certain thing or matter and get to know it intimately, after a while it would become part of our habit. Then we would have an affection for it, which would eventually produce love. In the same way, the more we draw near to God, love God, and consider God, the more we will spontaneously have a sense of affection toward God. Ultimately we will not be able to stop loving God. In this way God will be able to enter into us and into all our situations in order to regulate us in every way.
In practice, for us to live such a life of drawing near to God and loving God, we must do four things every day. First, we need to speak to God. This is to pray. It is the first thing we should do after waking up early in the morning. Second, we need to listen to God’s speaking; this is to read the Word. We should do this after praying. Third, we need to speak with our fellow Christians. This is to have fellowship with them, not only in the meetings but also in our daily living. Fourth, we need to speak to unbelievers. This is to preach the gospel, and it is something we should do in season and out of season.
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