Learning to live in the fellowship of life does not mean that we need to continuously pray behind closed doors. Many people think that this kind of prayer before the Lord is to live in the fellowship of life. This is not wrong, but strictly speaking, a person learning to live in the fellowship of life must see that fellowship is of life and that this life is the Holy Spirit in our spirit. In order to live in the fellowship of life, we must learn to live in the spirit. This is the basic lesson. In order to learn to live in the spirit, we must learn to deny the self and to thoroughly and seriously reject whatever is of our mind, emotion, and will. Only in this way can we live in the spirit. Only when we truly live in the spirit can we sense the fellowship of life that is in the Spirit.
If we have not learned the lesson of being conformed to the mold of the Lord’s death, we are still living according to ourselves, that is, we love by ourselves, express opinions by ourselves, and make decisions by ourselves. We do not have the experience of death if we have not allowed the death of Christ to be imprinted on our mind, nor allowed the death of Christ to kill our mind. As such, we will live according to our thinking, and we will let our thoughts be loose instead of holding them back. Therefore, when we desire to turn from our mind to our spirit to have fellowship with the Lord, it will be impossible because our mind will not listen to us. When we desire to adjust our mind, it will not respond because we have indulgently and loosely lived in our mind much of the time.
In our living, we must continually learn the lesson of allowing the Holy Spirit to apply the death of Christ in our mind. In our daily living and contact with people and matters, we need to let the death of Christ do a killing work in our mind. We must learn to deny our mind in everything. If our mind bears the mold of Christ’s death, we will easily be able to live in the spirit, and without much effort, we will be able to turn back to the inner man.
If we desire to learn the inward fellowship of life, we must allow the Holy Spirit to continually kill everything in our mind, emotion, and will, continually putting every part of our soul to death. This is the reason the Holy Spirit often raises up a specific environment to deal with us; this is the discipline of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit conquers our mind, overcomes our emotion, and subdues our will through the things we encounter. Furthermore, in coordination with His work through the outward environment, the Holy Spirit also works within us to put us in the place of death. He does this time after time and little by little until we are put to death completely.
Real growth before the Lord involves the breaking of our self, and it involves being put to death little by little. We often think that a person’s growth depends on his ability to give a better message, to study the Bible more thoroughly, and to handle matters more skillfully. Such things, however, are not indications of real growth. However, when the saints can testify that a brother, who lived by his natural mind, emotion, and will, has been deeply touched by the Lord in his mind, has been dealt with by the Lord in his emotion, and has been broken by the Lord in his will, we should worship God and acknowledge that this person has grown. If this is the case, then the marks of death, the mold of death, and the seal of death surely have been increased in this brother’s mind, emotion, and will. A person can discern the spirit from the soul only when his self has been dealt with sufficiently by God. When the natural man has been dealt with severely enough by God, he will not rely on his soul but rather learn to live by the spirit.
Peace Wang was a sister who learned many spiritual lessons. She always handled matters calmly, being neither quickly nor slowly. On one occasion, she was going to northern China. As she was about to board the boat, people were rushing to get off the boat while others were rushing to get on the boat. The sisters who were seeing her off were quite anxious, but she remained calm and was not hurried at all. The sisters were very impressed by this and felt that they should imitate her by being calm and composed. However, this kind of imitation is useless. A person who has not dealt with his emotion is always in turmoil. If a person constantly allows God to deal with his emotion, his emotion will be broken. It can be compared to an amplifier that cannot give out sound or a torn eardrum that cannot hear. Only those whose emotions have been smitten, broken, and touched by God and have been dealt with by the cross can remain calm and be neither fast nor slow regardless of the circumstances. Such calmness cannot be imitated.