Message Three

The Divine Revelation
of the Eternal Life for Our Enjoyment

Scripture Reading: 1 John 1:1-3; 2:25; 3:15; 5:11-13, 20

1. The Lord’s recovery today is in the time of the mending ministry of John, mending the rents in the church by the ministry of life for God’s building in life; the focus of John’s writings is the mysteries of the divine life—Matt. 4:21; John 1:4; 10:10b; 14:6a; 1 John 1:1-3; 2:25; 3:15; 5:11-13, 20:
   1. John’s Gospel, as the consummation of the Gospels, unveils the mysteries of the person and work of the Lord Jesus as the manifestation of the divine life.
   2. John’s Epistles (especially the first), as the consummation of the Epistles, unfold the mystery of the fellowship of the manifested divine life.
   3. John’s Revelation, as the consummation of the entire Bible, reveals the mystery of Christ as the life supply to God’s children for His expression and as the center of the universal administration of the Triune God.
   4. The way of the Lord’s recovery is the way of life; we need to know the intrinsic essence of life in the Lord’s recovery—John 1:4; 10:10b; 14:6a; 1 Cor. 15:45b; 1 John 1:1-3; 5:11-13; Rom. 8:2, 10, 6, 11.
2. The eternal life is the life “which is really life”—1 Tim. 6:19b:
   1. Life is not devotion:
      1. Devotion is our exercise of piety.
      2. Life is Christ living in us—Gal. 2:20a.
   2. Life is not good behavior:
      1. Good behavior is our doing.
      2. Life is Christ lived out from us—Phil. 1:21a.
   3. Life is not power:
      1. Power is for work—Acts 1:8.
      2. Life is for living—John 6:57b.
   4. Life is not gift:
      1. Gift is the ability for function—Rom. 12:6.
      2. Life is the Divine Being in our being—John 1:13b.
   5. Life is not the growth in knowledge:
      1. The growth in knowledge is the increase in knowledge.
      2. Life is the increase of God—Col. 2:19b.
   6. Life is not our human life:
      1. Our human life (bios and psuche) is mortal—Luke 8:43b; 21:4b; Matt. 16:25-26.
      2. Life (zoe) is eternal—1 John 1:2; Psa. 90:2b.
   7. Life is God’s content and God’s flowing out:
      1. God’s content is God’s being—Eph. 4:18a.
      2. God’s flowing out is the impartation of life to us—Rev. 22:1.
   8. Life is Christ—John 14:6a; Col. 3:4a; 1 John 5:12a:
      1. Christ is the embodiment of God, who is life—Col. 2:9.
      2. Christ is the expression of God—John 1:18; Heb. 1:3a.
   9. Life is the Holy Spirit:
      1. The Holy Spirit is the reality of Christ—John 14:16-18; 1 Cor. 15:45b.
      2. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of life giving life to us—Rom. 8:2a; 2 Cor. 3:6b.
   10. Life is the Triune God dispensed into us and living in us:
       1. God the Father is the source of life (John 5:26), God the Son is the embodiment of life (1:4), and God the Spirit is the flow of life (4:14b).
       2. God the Father is the light of life (Rev. 21:23; 22:5), God the Son is the tree of life (v. 2), and God the Spirit is the river of life (v. 1).
3. Christ as the Word of life, the eternal life, was manifested through incarnation as the embodiment of the Triune God to make God contactable, touchable, receivable, experienceable, enterable, and enjoyable—1 John 1:1-2; John 1:14:
   1. The eternal life, which is the Son, not only was with the Father but also was living and acting in communion with the Father in eternity—1 John 1:1-2; John 1:1-2.
   2. The eternal life was manifested to the apostles, who saw, testified, and reported this life to people; the manifestation of the eternal life includes the revelation and impartation of life to men, with a view to bringing man into the eternal life, into its union and communion with the Father—1 John 1:1-3.
   3. The eternal life was promised by God, released through Christ’s death, and imparted to the believers through Christ’s resurrection—2:25; John 3:14-15; 12:24; cf. Luke 12:49-50; 1 Pet. 1:3.
   4. The eternal life was received by the believers through believing in the Son; after the believers receive eternal life, this life becomes their life—John 3:15-16, 36; Col. 3:4a; John 1:12-13.
   5. The believers are being saved in the eternal life to reign in this life—Rom. 5:10, 17.
   6. The believers need to lay hold on the eternal life in this age so that they may inherit eternal life in the manifestation of the kingdom—1 Tim. 6:12, 19; Matt. 19:17; Luke 18:29-30; Rev. 2:7.
   7. The believers will fully enjoy eternal life in eternity—22:1-2, 14, 17, 19.
4. When we are in the fellowship, the enjoyment, of God as the eternal life, we partake of God in His divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4) as Spirit, love, and light; Spirit is the nature of God’s person (John 4:24), love is the nature of God’s essence (1 John 4:8, 16), and light is the nature of God’s expression (1:5):
   1. If we spend an adequate amount of personal time with the Lord and remain in the fellowship with Him daily and hourly, we will enjoy the Lord as the Spirit, and we will become persons who are full of the divine love (the inner substance of God) and the divine light (the expressed element of God)—v. 3; 2 Cor. 13:14:
      1. The divine love is God Himself poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit to be the source for our enjoyment of the dispensing of the Triune God and the motivating power within us, that we may more than conquer over all our circumstantial situations—Rom. 5:5; 8:37, 39.
      2. The divine light is the divine life in the Son operating in us; this light shines in the darkness within us, and the darkness cannot overcome it—John 1:4-5; 1 John 1:5.
   2. When we enjoy God by touching God and being infused with God in the divine fellowship, we walk, live, move, and have our being in His Spirit as our person, in His love as our essence, and in His light as our expression for us to be His corporate testimony—Rom. 8:4; Eph. 5:2, 8; Matt. 5:14-16.