In this message we shall cover more aspects of the believers’ experiencing and enjoying Christ as the One living in them.
Christ lives in the believers for them to have Him formed in them. In Galatians 4:19 Paul says, “My children, of whom I am again in travail until Christ is formed in you.” To have Christ formed in us requires transformation. According to the book of Galatians, Christ has been revealed in us (1:16), He is now living in us (2:20), and He will be formed in us. To have Christ formed in us is to have Christ grown in us in full. First, Christ was born into us at our regeneration, now He lives in us in our Christian life, and He will be formed in us at our maturity.
Paul’s word about Christ being formed in the believers implies that we are being constituted of Christ. Christ is living in us, He is being formed in us, and He is becoming our constitution. To have Christ formed in us is a living, organic matter. Christ is now living in us so that we may be constituted of Him organically. He intends to constitute our whole being-our mind, emotion, and will-of Himself. Eventually, our whole being will be constituted of the element of Christ. This means that He will constitute every part of our soul so that we may have His form, His image, in every part of our being.
For Christ to be formed in us means that His element is being constituted into us. In other words, His constitution is becoming our constitution. This is not merely a matter of the element of Christ being within us but of having the element of Christ constituted into us. To be constituted of Christ in this way involves a process of organic transformation and formation.
The word “formed” in Galatians 4:19 corresponds to the word “image” in 2 Corinthians 3:18, where Paul tells us that we are being transformed into Christ’s image. This image is a form. Christ must be formed in us so that we may express Him by being in His image. As the living One, He with His element is working within us organically, constituting Himself into our being so that we may have His form and express His image.
Christ lives in the believers for them to magnify Him. Paul said, “Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether through life or through death” (Phil. 1:20). In Paul’s bodily sufferings Christ was magnified, that is, shown or declared great (shown to be without limitation), exalted, and extolled. Therefore, to magnify Christ is to express Christ without limitation. It is to show to the whole universe that the Christ who lives in us and whom we live is unlimited. Paul, even when mistreated in prison, could display the unlimited greatness of Christ. Paul was happy in the Lord, and in his happiness he showed forth the immeasurable Christ he experienced and enjoyed. In this way Paul expressed, exhibited, exalted, and extolled Christ. He was a living witness of Christ, testifying of His ability, power, patience, love, and wisdom, all without measure. While Paul was in prison, he expressed the greatness of Christ in an enlarged way.
The word “magnify” means to make something large to our sight. We may wonder how Christ can be magnified since He is already universally great. According to Ephesians 3:18, the dimensions of Christ-the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth-are immeasurable, for they are the dimensions of the universe. Although Christ is vast, extensive, and immeasurable, in the eyes of unbelievers He may be virtually nonexistent. Therefore, in our daily living we should magnify Christ, making Him great in the eyes of others. We need to let others see Christ in the way of enlargement, in the way of magnification. According to the human concept, Christ is limited. But when others see us living Christ, they will realize that He is not limited.
As believers, we should be a magnifying glass in relation to Christ so that others may see Christ magnified through us. As Christ lives in us and is formed in us, we shall live Him. Then Christ will be magnified in us.
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