The Spirit abides with the Son and the Father in the believers (John 14:17, 23; Rom. 8:9-11). In Romans 8:9-11 three divine titles are used interchangeably: the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and Christ. This indicates that Christ is the Spirit of Christ and the Spirit of Christ is the Spirit of God. These three divine titles are used interchangeably to describe the dispensing of the Trinity into our three parts to mingle Himself fully with our being. The Trinity is mingled with our three parts. This is really wonderful! This is the abiding of the Triune God in His ultimate consummation, which is the life-giving Spirit.
Why must we spend so much time on this? It is because the leavened truth still remains in our concept. This leavening element is universally common among Christians. Christians have a subconscious understanding that the Three of the Trinity are divided and separated. They think that today they have only the Holy Spirit in them; they don’t have the Father, and they don’t have the Son. This is why in our study of the holy Word concerning the Trinity we have picked up point after point which give us a clear view that first, the Son comes in the Father’s name, and the Spirit is sent in the Son’s name and second, that the Son comes with the Father, and the Spirit comes with the Father and the Son. These two points prove that the Triune God is uniquely one. Although the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, are distinct, they are one, inseparable, indivisible, and undivided. When you have one, you have all Three.
But the Father never comes first. The one who comes first is always the Spirit. When you have the Spirit, the Son is with you; when you have the Son, you also have the Father. First John 2:23 says, “He who confesses the Son has the Father also.” So when you have the Son, you have both the Son and the Father. Because the Son comes as the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:17), He is the pneumatic Christ.
This is what the New Testament calls eternal life (1 John 5:20). Eternal life is the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, who come to us in the ultimate consummation of the Triune God, the all-inclusive, life-giving Spirit. This Triune God is the reality of eternal life. When we Christians say that we should grow in life, we mean that we should grow with the element and essence of the Triune God. When we say life, we mean the Triune God. We don’t mean something apart from the Triune God. Life in our Christian experience is just the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. Life is the Triune God, and this life is within us. What a wonder! What a blessing! The Triune God is within us as our life.
Before the death and resurrection of Christ, the Spirit was not yet (John 7:39), because Christ had not completed the process which He had to go through. He had been incarnated, but He had not yet passed through death and entered into resurrection. One day He went into death, passed through death, and entered into resurrection, and then He became the life-giving Spirit (1 Cor. 15:45b). John 7:39 says that the Spirit was not yet. That means that the process for the Spirit of God to be the life-giving Spirit was not completed, because Jesus was not yet glorified, that is, He had not yet gone through death into resurrection. But after He went through death and entered into resurrection, He was glorified, and the process for the bringing forth of the life-giving Spirit was completed.
After His resurrection He disclosed the title of the Trinity clearly to the disciples. In Matthew 28:19, after His resurrection and in His resurrection, He came back to His disciples and charged them to disciple the nations and baptize the believing ones into the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Not until He had passed through all the necessary processes was the Divine Trinity, as the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, clearly revealed in the Scriptures. After and in His resurrection, man can be baptized into the fully processed Trinity that he may have an organic union with the dispensing Triune God. Now we, the believing and baptized people, are one with the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. We participate in the Triune God and enjoy His dispensing of Himself into us.
The Spirit of the resurrected Christ comes to testify concerning the Son and to glorify Him (John 15:26; 16:14). As the transfiguration of the Son, He makes the Son real in the believers’ experience. This is to testify concerning the Son. Without the Spirit, the Son would be objective to the believers and could not be subjective to them in their experiences of Him.
When the Spirit discloses what the Son is to the believers and makes Him real to them in their life, the Son is glorified. By this the Son becomes the believers’ life within and their expression without. This is to glorify the Son.
Eventually, this Spirit will fill up the believers and overflow from within them as rivers of living water in many aspects of their Christian life (John 7:38-39). This is for the believers in Christ to experience and enjoy the Triune God to the uttermost. This is the ultimate consummation of the divine dispensing of the Divine Trinity into God’s chosen people.