We have to realize that all of God's provisions in Christ are our inheritance. If we want to understand the extent of God's inheritance for us and if we want to know the extent of the enjoyment of our inheritance, we must see that we are in Christ and that Christ is in us. Everyone who wants to know the Lord has to know Him in these two aspects. If we only know that we are in Christ, but do not know that Christ is in us, we will be weak and empty, and everything will be theoretical. We will fail again and again. However, if we only know that Christ is in us, without knowing that we are in Christ, we will suffer a great deal. We will find that we do not have the means to do what we want to do. No matter how hard we try, we will be left with imperfections. We have to realize that God's inheritance for us in Christ contains these two aspects. On the one hand, we are in Christ, and on the other hand, Christ is in us. These two aspects of our inheritance provide us with a rich enjoyment in the Lord. All the matters related to life and godliness, holiness and righteousness, and everything pertaining to this age and the next are included in the two phrases: "we in Christ" and "Christ in us." Both of these aspects of grace are a Christian's enjoyment. If we enjoy these aspects of grace, we will not need any self-effort. These two aspects of grace will deliver us from our own work. They will show us that everything is of God and that nothing is of ourselves.

We were sinners, and in order to go on, there was the need for a new start and a new stand. We were stuck in the mire. If we were left to ourselves, we would be in the mire forever. In order to give us a new standing, God pulled us out of the mire and set our feet on the rocks. Once we have a new standing, we have a new beginning, and we can go forward from there. We need to be delivered from sin, the mire, and we need to take a new standing. What kind of standing is this new standing? It is a standing before God. How can we be delivered from the mire, and how can we take this new standing? How can we come before God? We have the Adamic life in us, and we are wicked. We did not become wicked after we did something wrong; we were wicked as soon as we were born. Our conduct is wrong because we inherited a wrong life. When we first became Christians, we only saw that our conduct was wrong. After a long time, the cross did some work in us, and under God's dismantling work, we saw that not only was our conduct wrong, but our person was wrong as well. Not only is our conduct wrong, but the Adamic life within us is wrong. Our life is wrong; therefore, our conduct is wrong. This is what the book of Romans tells us. The first three chapters of Romans show us that our conduct is wrong, while chapters five through eight show us that our person is wrong. Since our person is wrong, what should we do? God's Word says that we should die. God requires that man's sins be washed away and the man who sins be put to death. "For he who has died is justified from sin" (6:7). Therefore, the only way to deal with the sinning man is to put him to death. But this is not all. In addition to death, we need a new life. When we die, everything is finished. If we want to have a new start before God, we need a new life. Therefore, we not only need to die, but we also need to resurrect. But we cannot stop at this point either. Resurrection is not enough, and a new life is not enough. We still need a new position. Therefore, God transfers us out of the old position and puts us in a new position in heaven so that we can live before God. From this point on, we have a new position and have nothing more to do with the old position. Simply put, as sinners we have three great needs: death, resurrection, and ascension. With death, resurrection, and ascension, everything we have in Adam is terminated and we can have a new beginning.