Eventually, all three, the righteousness of God, the life of Christ, and the faith of the believers, become the all-inclusive Christ. Hence, this all-inclusive Christ is not only the center but also the structure of the dynamic salvation of God.
Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith it is impossible to please God. This is a very strong word in the whole universe. To please God is to make God happy. Without faith it is impossible for you and me to make God happy. God could not and would not be happy with anyone without faith. This shows us the importance of faith.
According to the New Testament, we are the believers. The name Christian is used in the New Testament only three times (Acts 11:26; 26:28; 1 Pet. 4:16). But we are referred to repeatedly as believers in the New Testament. Galatians 6:10 says that we are the household of the faith, that is, the household of believers. The name Christian in its original usage was actually a nickname, not a proper name. Acts 11:26 says, “The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.” The disciples were given such a nickname, a term of reproach, in Antioch. So in this sense, the name Christian is not a good name. If I come here to speak to you by addressing you as Christians, I would be like a Gentile professor giving you a lecture. But if I address you as believers, this makes a difference. Believers is a sweet title.
First Peter 4:16 uses the title Christian, saying, “But if as a Christian, let him not be ashamed, but let him glorify God in this name.” Note 161 in the Recovery Version says:
Gk. Christianos, a word formed from Latin. The ending ianos, denoting an adherent of someone, was applied to slaves belonging to the great families in the Roman Empire. One who worshipped the emperor, the Caesar, or Kaisar , was called Kaisarianos, which means an adherent of Kaisar , a person who belongs to Kaisar. When people believed in Christ and became His followers, some in the Empire came to consider Christ a rival of their Kaisar. Then, at Antioch (Acts 11:26) they began to call the followers of Christ Christianoi (Christians), adherents of Christ, as a nickname, a term of reproach. Hence, this verse says, “As a Christian, let him not be ashamed”; that is, if any believer suffers at the hands of the persecutors who contemptuously call him a Christian, he should not feel ashamed but should glorify God in this name.
We should not prefer to call ourselves Christians. Instead, we are bonafide believers of Christ. The name Christian is not related to faith. But the title the believers is related to faith. Without this faith, we can never please God. The only thing that can make our God happy every day is to believe in Him, to have faith.
He who comes forward to God must believe that God is (Heb. 11:6b). This is very simple. God requires you only to believe that He is. The verb to be is actually the divine title of our Triune God. In Exodus 3 Moses asked God what His name was. God answered that His name is I Am That I Am (vv. 13-14). Our God’s name is the verb to be. He is “I Am That I Am.” He is the only One.
Thus, when Jesus came, He declared that He was the I Am three times in John 8. He told the unbelieving Pharisees, “Unless you believe that I am, you will die in your sins” (v. 24). He also said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am” (v. 28). At the end of the chapter, the Jews said to Him, “You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?” (v. 57). Jesus responded, “Truly, truly, I say to you, Before Abraham came into being, I am” (v. 58). According to grammar, this is the wrong tense. The Lord should have said, “Before Abraham came into being, I was.” But the Lord said that He is the I Am, indicating that He is the very Jehovah. This is why Paul said in Hebrews 11:6, “He who comes forward to God must believe that He is.” God is always, eternally, in the present tense.
Revelation 1:4 and 5 say, “John to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is coming, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful Witness, the Firstborn of the dead, and the Ruler of the kings of the earth.” In these verses we see the Three of the Divine Trinity. God the Father is called by John in Revelation 1:4 Him who is and who was and who is coming. The One who is coming is the One who will be. This means that in the whole universe, nothing else is. Only One is. He is, because He is real. All other things created by Him are not real. This is why Solomon, the wise king, said that all things are vanity (Eccl. 1:2). You think you are, but you are vanity. Everything is vanity. The sun, the moon, the living creatures, the heavens, and the earth are all vanities. Only One is. This “Is,” the verb to be, implies existing. He is the One who was existing, who is existing, and who is to be existing. No human language can adequately express what this title I Am means.
Paul said that he who comes forward to God must believe that God is. The Chinese version says that when you come forward to God, you must believe that there is God. This is too shallow. The English translation is very good because it is equivalent to the Greek—we must believe that God is. This implies everything. Do you need God? God is. Do you need food? God is. This is why we use the word great in saying that Jesus is the great I Am. He told us, “I am...the life” (John 14:6a). “I am the resurrection” (11:25). “I am the door” (10:7, 9). “I am the good Shepherd” (10:11). “I am the bread of life” (6:35). He is the real food. There is only one kind of food that is. This food is Jesus, the great I Am. He is the breath (20:22), the living water (4:10, 14), and the tree of life (15:1; 14:6a; Rev. 2:7). He is God (John 1:1; 20:28-29; Rom. 9:5), the Father (Isa. 9:6; John 14:9-10), the Son (Mark 1:1; John 20:31), and the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:17; 1 Cor. 15:45b). He is everything to us.
The Bible says that if you do not believe in Christ, you have no life (John 3:15-16, 36). When I was young, I could not understand this. I thought that as a strong boy, I did have life. Later, I realized that our life is a false one. It is not the life that is. This means that our life is not something that exists forever. We are today, but eventually we will not be tomorrow. So in the whole universe, we are nothing. I am nothing. Our hall is nothing. Anaheim is nothing. California is nothing. The United States is nothing. And the whole globe is nothing! This is because they do not exist forever. The day will come when they will not exist; they will be over. Actually, the things that are seen are not the things that exist; they are vanities (2 Cor. 4:18).
Then what is existing? Who exists? Only the great I Am—I Am That I Am. He who comes forward to God must believe that God is! Faith is so critical. Without this, you can never make God happy. You must believe that God is. Let me illustrate. If a husband realized that only God is and he is not, then he would not love his wife by himself and in himself. Sisters, when you go shopping, if you realized that in the whole universe only God is, would you buy anything you want? You would realize, “I am not. I am nothing. I don’t go shopping, but He is, so He goes.”
What is faith? Faith is to stop yourself from doing anything. You are nothing. Faith joins you with God to make God the only One who is. I am not, so I should not be the one who loves my wife. It should be Christ loving my wife. He is; I am not. I should not be the one to go shopping. He should be the One. When you pick up something on sale in the department store, you have to check, “He is or I am?”
Faith is to stop you from doing anything but to make God everything to you. This equals Paul’s word in Galatians 2:20: “I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” Who lives? It is no longer I. I do not exist. I was terminated. I was crucified. I am finished. It is no more I, but Christ lives in me. Christ lives. Christ is. Christ exists. I do not exist. This is the very essence of the short word believe that God is. To believe that God is implies that you are not. He must be the only One, the unique One, in everything, and we must be nothing in everything.
The brothers need to ask themselves, “Is it me or Christ who is the husband to my wife?” If a sister has a husband who does not take Christ as the One who is, she will be miserable. But if her husband is Christ, she has the only Husband, the unique Husband. Only Christ is the Husband. No husbands are real husbands. They are all vanity. Do you come forward to God? If you say yes, then you have to believe that God is, implying that you are nothing. You are finished.
It would be good to speak a word like this at a wedding. The person marrying a couple could say to them, “Are you the dear bride, and are you the dear bridegroom?” The bridegroom should say, “No. I am not. But Christ is.” The bride should say, “I am not the bride. I am so ugly and poor. I am not pretty. Christ is the beautiful One. I am not the bride, but He is.” This is a believer.
When you say what Paul said, “It’s no more I, but Christ,” you believe that God is. To believe that God is, is so deep. It implies that you realize that you are not, but He is. You are not means that you do not exist. This is what the Bible means when it says to deny yourself. When a sister is about to be married, she needs to realize that she is nothing. She should not feel that she is the most beautiful and wonderful one. If she does, her marriage will be finished. That is not a believer’s marriage. A believer who is about to be married should say, “Lord, I am going to marry this man. Lord, You know I am nothing. I cannot be the proper wife. I am nothing, Lord.” What a blessing this is! This is the blessing of denying yourself in everything.
The Lord Jesus said, “If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself” (Luke 9:23). This word is the same as what Paul said: “He who comes forward to God must believe that He is.” To deny yourself equals to believe that God is, and to believe that God is equals to deny yourself. This is because you believe that only He is. In the whole universe He is, and all of us are nothing. I should not be anything. I should not exist. Only He should be everything. Only He should exist. So Paul says, “I have been crucified. It is no more I, but Christ.”
When the apostle Paul was Saul, he was a very aggressive young man. Everything with him was “I, me, my, and mine.” With Saul it was “I first, my and mine in the middle, and me last.” Everything was Saul of Tarsus. But the Lord Jesus knocked him down on the road to Damascus, and Saul asked, “Who are You, Lord?” (Acts 9:5). The Lord said, “I am Jesus” (v. 5). The Lord was saying, “I am the great I Am. I am the One that is. You must believe that I am and you are not.” Eventually, Saul changed his name. Saul was over, and Paul came up (Acts 13:9 and note 1). This Paul was the one who told us, “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.” This is to believe that God is.
Nothing can make the unique God happy except one thing. That is faith. Faith is to believe that God is. Then I would check with you, “If only God is, where are you?” The first stanza of Hymns, #483 says, “Buried with Christ, and raised with Him too; / What is there left for me to do? / Simply to cease from struggling and strife, / Simply to walk in newness of life. / Glory be to God!” Where are you? You are in the tomb. Today who are you? You need to say, “It is no more I, but Christ.” I would like again to refer to what Darby said: “O the joy of having nothing and being nothing, seeing nothing but a living Christ in glory, and being careful for nothing but His interests down here.” This is faith. We care for nothing but His interest. We should always say, “Not I, not me, not my, not mine; but He, Him, His. He is the first and the last and everything in between.” “Christ, only Christ” (see Hymns, #591— stanza 5).
Why did John write the book of Revelation and declare, “Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is coming” (1:4)? This was because the degraded church had become too much. The biggest religious society on this earth is the Catholic Church. They use the term the Church, which refers to the pope. They do not say, “Christ says....” Instead, they say, “The pope says....” Whatever the pope says is what they do. But it should be no more the Catholic Church, no more the pope, but Christ. This is to believe that God is, and this is the faith of the believers.
Only faith can make God happy, and faith is to believe that God is. It is not I, but Christ. To believe that God is, is the only way, the unique way, to make God happy, to please God. I would like to ask the sisters, “When you are combing your hair, who is combing it?” While you are combing your hair, you should say, “No longer I, but Christ.” But with many sisters it is not Christ, but them. If Christ were doing the combing, He would not comb your hair according to your way. You have to remember this. When you comb your hair, you should be able to say, “Praise the Lord. It is no more I, but Christ.” You and I have to do everything in this way.
When brothers come to visit me, quite often I pray, “Lord, the brothers are coming to see me. I am not the one that can meet their need. Lord, You are the One.” This is faith—believing that I should be out and believing that He should be in. I must deny myself in everything and trust in Him in everything. To deny yourself and to trust in Him is faith. This is to believe that God is.
Even at the end of a ministry meeting, we may say, “Saints, now it is your turn to share.” But we have to say, “It is not our turn, but Christ’s turn.” If we live in this way, the riches of Christ will come out of our mouth. Quite often before coming to a meeting, I pray to the Lord, “Lord, I should not be the speaker, but You. I have been crucified, but You live in me. You should be the speaker.” This makes a big difference—to deny the self, to trust in the Lord, that is, to believe that God is.