In the Gospel of John, there is the line of life, and there is also the line of the spirit. The line of the spirit begins in John 3:6 where the Lord says, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” This line continues in John 4:24, “God is Spirit; and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and reality.” In these verses we can see both the divine Spirit and the human spirit. Our human spirit has been born of the divine Spirit, and we must worship God, who is Spirit, in our human spirit. If we are to worship God, we must worship Him in our spirit. This means that if we are to deal with God, contact God, enjoy God, and partake of God, we must contact Him in our spirit, exercising our spirit. God is Spirit, and this God includes Christ as our life, our food, our water, our air, our light, and our abode. He is everything!
John 6:63 as a continuation of the line of the spirit says, “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words which I have spoken unto you are spirit and are life.” It is the Spirit who gives life. It is the Spirit who nourishes. If you are in your spirit enjoying the life-giving Spirit, He will nourish you as food. This Spirit will also be the living water flowing out from your innermost being (7:38-39). The Spirit will be a source of life within you, in your spirit, your innermost being.
In chapter fourteen of the Gospel of John, the Lord Jesus reveals that He must be transfigured into the Spirit in order that He may dwell within us and be one with us (vv. 17-18). If He had not been transfigured into the Spirit, there would be no possibility for us to abide in Him or for Him to abide in us (15:4-5). In order to come into us, He had to be transfigured from the flesh to the Spirit through death and resurrection.
The secret of taking Christ as our food, water, air, light, and abode is to turn to our spirit. To illustrate, let us consider the matter of light. In order to maintain life, the first item is light. Without physical light in the universe, all the living creatures on this earth would be in darkness. We must realize that whenever we are not in spirit, we are just in darkness. Regardless of how much knowledge we have, or how much we read the Scriptures, as long as we are out of the spirit, we are in darkness. The place of light is in our human spirit (Prov. 20:27), regenerated and indwelt by the Holy Spirit. In our soul is darkness, and in our flesh, our body, is sin (Rom. 7:17-18). Outside of the spirit, we are either in darkness or in sin. If we are in our soul trying to seek the guidance of the Lord, regardless of how much energy or effort we exercise, we will still be in darkness. On the other hand, if we turn to the spirit and remain there, immediately we will sense the light, and everything will be clear and transparent. One minute everything can be transparent, and the next minute everything can be in darkness. In the morning we can be so clear, and later in the day we can be in darkness. The reason for this is that perhaps in the morning while we were praying, we prayed ourselves into the spirit. But after the prayer, we came out of the spirit. If we just turn back to the spirit again, the sky will be clear, and everything will be transparent. However, if we turn to the mind to analyze or consider, we will again be in darkness. To be clever in our understanding does not help. Whenever we have a problem, the best way to handle it is to turn back to the spirit. If we turn to the spirit, everything will be so clear. To be in the light is easy. Our problem is that we do not practice to be in the light by turning to our spirit.
Most of the time when we have problems, we exercise the mind to solve them or we go to other people to help us solve them. The more people that we go to with our problems, the more complicated we become. The best way is to simply turn quietly to the spirit. This is so easy that even a new believer can practice it. We must learn to practice this reality. Christ, the living Lord, is so real; He is the dynamic center of the Christian life because He is the life-giving Spirit. Whenever we turn back to our spirit, we meet Him.
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