The indwelling Spirit is the firstfruit (foretaste) of the believers’ divine inheritance, which is the Triune God Himself. Romans 8:23 says, “We ourselves also, having the firstfruit of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan in ourselves, eagerly expecting sonship, the redemption of our body.” The word “firstfruit” here refers to a foretaste that is a guarantee that we shall experience the full taste. God Himself is the full taste, and He has given us His Spirit as the firstfruit to be our foretaste. This means that within us we have the Spirit of God for our enjoyment and this enjoyment is the foretaste and guarantee that we shall have the full taste. This is the guarantee that at the Lord’s coming back we shall enjoy God in full.
The firstfruit of the Spirit is not the foretaste of the coming age (Heb. 6:5) but the firstfruit of the rich God to be our portion. The foretaste of the coming age is a taste of outward things, but the firstfruit is the foretaste of the processed Triune God Himself. What we have enjoyed and what we are still enjoying of God is just a foretaste. The full taste is coming. The Holy Spirit, the all-inclusive Spirit, is the firstfruit of all the riches of God’s being for our enjoyment. We are tasting a foretaste of God, and a full taste will come. We shall enjoy the full taste of the Triune God in eternity.
Ephesians 2:18 reveals that the Spirit is the access for the believers to contact the Triune God: “Through Him we both have access in one Spirit unto the Father.” Here the Trinity of the Godhead is implied. Through God the Son who is the Accomplisher, the means, and in God the Spirit who is the Executor, the application, we have access to God the Father, who is the Originator. Through Christ the Son we have access in one Spirit unto the Father. Notice that this verse does not say that we have access unto the Spirit; it speaks of access unto the Father. The Spirit is unto us, whereas we are unto the Father. The Father came to us in the Son, and the Son came into us as the Spirit. Now through the Son the Spirit brings us unto the Father. This is for the dispensing of the Triune God into us so that the church may come into existence.
To have access unto the Father is to contact God for enjoyment. Whenever we come to God to contact Him, we enjoy Him. There is no enjoyment better than this. When we contact God, we come to Him through Christ in the Spirit to the Father. This is the divine Trinity in our experience as our enjoyment. We all have been sealed with the Spirit as a pledge that God is our inheritance for us to enjoy. Now through the Son in the Spirit we come to the Father to enjoy Him.
According to the context, this verse also indicates that through Christ all the Jewish and Gentile believers, who were once at enmity, have access to the Father in one Spirit for their enjoyment. No matter whether we are Jewish or Gentile believers, we all are coming to the Father, through the Son, in the one Spirit, to enjoy the Father as our inheritance.
The access in one Spirit is unto the Father. Positionally we were reconciled to God; experientially we have access unto the Father. To be reconciled to God is to be saved; to have access unto the Father is to enjoy God, who, as the source of life, has regenerated us to be His sons. In the one Body we have been reconciled to God through the cross (Eph. 2:16). This is a fact. Now we have access unto the Father and contact Him directly. This is an experience. Having been reconciled to God once for all, we now have access to the Father for a continual enjoyment.
Chapter two of Ephesians tells us that God loved us (v. 4), enlivened us (v. 5), raised us up (v. 6), and seated us in the heavenlies (v. 6), to make us His poem, His masterpiece (v. 10). The God who did this is the Father as the source acting through a channel, Christ the Son. When the Son came, He came in the Father’s name (John 5:43); He came with the Father (John 8:29; 16:32). The Father is the source who planned all things, and the Son is the means, the course, who accomplished the Father’s purpose. Christ became the channel in which and by which God enlivened us, raised us up, and seated us in the heavenlies. After His death and resurrection, Christ came as the Spirit to preach the gospel (Eph. 2:17). When the Spirit came, He came with the Father (John 15:26) in the Son’s name (John 14:26). This means that when the Spirit came, the Son came. Therefore, when the Son comes to preach the gospel to us, the Spirit also comes. When we receive the Son in His preaching, we receive the Spirit. The Spirit then brings us back to the Father through the Son. The Father came to us through the Son in the Spirit, and now the Spirit brings us back to the Father through the Son. Through this wonderful two-way traffic we enjoy the dispensing of the Triune God.
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