God, however, cannot come into us through the Son. According to the first steps of His economy, the Father placed Himself in the Son, and the Son has the seven elements mingled with Himself. But we still need another step, a third and final step, for God to dispense Himself into man. The first step was that the Father embodied Himself in the Son, and the second step was that the Son became incarnated in humanity to have all the seven wonderful elements mingled with Him. The third step is that both the Father and the Son are now in the Spirit. All that is in the Father is in the Son, and both the Father and the Son, containing all the elements in Christ, are brought into the Spirit (John 16:14-15).
The Holy Spirit, after the Lord’s ascension, is no longer the same as the Spirit of God in the Old Testament times. The Spirit of God in the Old Testament had only one element-the divine nature of God. As the divine Spirit, He did not have the elements of Christ’s human nature, His daily human life, the effectiveness of His death, His resurrection, His ascension, and His enthronement. Today, however, under the New Testament economy all the seven elements of Christ have been placed in the Spirit, and this all-inclusive Spirit has come into us and upon us. In other words, He is in us and we are in Him. This is the real mingling of God with man, which we can experience at any time. We are mingled inwardly and outwardly with the Holy Spirit.
What is the Holy Spirit? He is the Spirit of truth (14:26; 15:26; 16:13). But what is truth? The meaning of the Greek word for truth is “reality.” Therefore, the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of reality. As such, He is the full reality of Christ. Just as God is embodied in Christ, so Christ is realized in the wonderful person of the Holy Spirit. Christ is not separate from God, and the Spirit is not separate from Christ. Christ is God expressed, and the Spirit is Christ realized in reality.
Second Corinthians 3:17 says, “The Lord is the Spirit.” This verse proves that the Holy Spirit is not separate from Christ. The Lord is Christ Himself, and He is referred to as the Spirit. First Corinthians 15:45 says, “The last Adam became a life-giving Spirit.” Again, the Scriptures point out that Christ, the last Adam, is the Spirit. We must admit that this life-giving Spirit is the Holy Spirit (John 6:63; 2 Cor. 3:6).
Furthermore, God the Father is also the Spirit (John 4:24). Hence, all three persons of the Godhead are the Spirit. If God the Father is not the Spirit, how could He be in us, and how could we contact Him? Moreover, if God the Son is not the Spirit, how could He be in us, and how could we experience Him? Because the Father and the Son are both the Spirit, we can easily contact God and experience Christ.
Consider the following verses (italics added for emphasis): “One God and Father of all, who is...in all” (Eph. 4:6); “Jesus Christ is in you” (2 Cor. 13:5); “His Spirit who in dwells you” (Rom. 8:11). These three verses reveal that the Father, the Son, and the Spirit are in us. How many persons, then, are in us? Three or one? We should not say that three separate persons are in us, nor should we say that only one person is in us. Rather, we should say that the Three-in-one is in us. The three persons of the Godhead are not three Spirits but one Spirit. The Father is in the Son, and the Son with all His seven wonderful elements is in the Spirit. When this wonderful Holy Spirit comes into us, the Godhead is dispensed into us. Because the three persons are in one Spirit, we have the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit within us. Later, we will see that the Triune God is in our human spirit to be our spiritual, inner life. This is the very mark of God’s economy, and this is the method whereby the Godhead is dispensed into us. The goal of the divine economy is to dispense the Triune God in one Spirit into our human spirit. Hence, we must now focus our whole attention on living by the Triune God, who dwells in our human spirit. If we are distracted from this, however good and scriptural other things may be, we will surely miss the mark of God’s economy. The Lord today is recovering His children by causing them to center on this mark of His divine economy.
O Lord, Thou art in me as life
And everything to me!
Subjective and available,
Thus I experience Thee.
O Lord, Thou art the Spirit!
How dear and near to me!
How I admire Thy marvelous
Availability!
To all my needs both great and small
Thou art the rich supply;
So ready and sufficient too
For me now to apply.
Thy sweet anointing with Thy might
In weakness doth sustain;
By Thy supply of energy
My strength Thou dost maintain.
Thy law of life in heart and mind
My conduct regulates;
The wealth of Thy reality
My being saturates.
O Thou art ever one with me,
Unrivaled unity!
One spirit with me all the time
For all eternity!
Hymns, #539