The way to practice being one spirit with the Lord is to call on His name unceasingly. Do not call on the Lord only before the meeting, after the meeting, or in the meeting. You have to call, “O Lord Jesus,” all the time. This will always keep you in the element of the divine mingling. Then, in all that you do and say, you will act as a person being one spirit with the Lord. You will not simply be a good person, a person full of proper character and ethical morality. You will be a person full of God. God will be expressed and manifested through you.
The mingled spirit is a strong, basic factor of the Christian meeting. Who comes to the Christian meeting, you or God? It should be that both you and God come in the way of being one spirit. When we come to the meeting with God, we come as a wonderful person, a God-man. When we come, God comes; when God comes, we come. We do not only come together, but we and He come as one spirit. If fifty people met together in this way, that meeting would be glorious.
Sometimes the strong factor of the mingled spirit is not in the meeting. There is nothing of the divine Being to be the very element that sustains the meeting. To have the factor of the mingled spirit in our meetings requires not only our exercise in the meeting but also the practice of being one spirit with the Lord in our daily life to let the divine Being saturate our human being. Then we will come into the meeting as a God-man. You may have come to the meeting in a defeated way apart from God. You may have called a hymn in the meeting, but it was altogether you who did it, not God. When you come into the meeting, God should come with you. When you sing, God should sing.
The indwelling Spirit within us must have the full freedom to move and act. We have had many experiences in which we sensed the indwelling Spirit moving in us, yet with little freedom. We give Him too much restriction, and we confine Him. As a result, we may have the Divine Trinity in our being, but we do not have the Divine Trinity saturating us. When we come to the meeting, it is only we who come and not God. If we do something in the meeting, it is merely we who do it. The meeting is not sustained by our being there.
But if we are persons practicing to be one spirit with the Lord, we will be a strong, sustaining element in the meeting. If there are even three to five such persons among fifty meeting together, that meeting will be very strong because that meeting has some who are the very sustaining essence. They do not necessarily need to speak or to do anything. Even if they just sit there, their presence will sustain the meeting. Often when certain brothers were absent from the meeting, it became weak, empty, and poor. When these brothers come in, their presence brings in the strengthening essence of the mingled spirit. Simply to learn how to set up home meetings in the new believers’ homes is not adequate. Your being must be dealt with. Your being must be filled and saturated with the divine element. When you go to the home meetings as such a person, you will sustain the meetings.
In the recent past a certain denomination began to practice meeting in small groups in many saints’ homes. When they came together, however, the attendants just sat there without knowing what to do. Even the leader did not know what to do. There was the real absence of the sustaining element in the meeting. If there is little Christ in our daily life and no Spirit in our very being saturating us and making us one spirit with the Divine Trinity, our meetings will be empty. Sometimes our meetings have been like this. The meeting may have been scheduled to begin at 7:30 p.m., but by 7:35 p.m. only one person had arrived. Gradually the saints came in one by one. The meeting was deadened, and there was no sustaining essence, that is, no factor of God in the Spirit. The Lord’s new way is not just to set up meetings in the homes. We have to have ourselves dealt with by the infilling and the saturating of the Divine Trinity.
We need to exercise our spirit for the church meetings. The way to exercise is to call “O Lord Jesus.” Even early in the morning we still can call on the name of the Lord without bothering others. We have to be persons practicing to call on the name of the Lord. Then we have to live by the Spirit (Gal. 5:25a) and walk by the Spirit (Gal. 5:16, 25b). To walk means to have our being, to move, to live, and to do all things. We should have our entire being by the indwelling Spirit, by the mingled spirit. Actually, it is hard to know when we are walking by the Spirit. But if we are not walking by the Spirit, we surely will know it.
Some Christians have strict regulations for their living. One group practices wearing only clothes of a certain color, using mule wagons for transportation, and not using telephones. This kind of practice is a practice without the Spirit. In the New Testament, what God requires is a life with the Spirit. Such a life does not require outward regulations. Once when I was putting on a new tie, the dear Spirit within me bothered me and said, “No.” I do not have a pastor to come to approve my tie, but I do have the Spirit to restrict me. If I would wear such a tie against the Spirit’s restriction, I would not be able to speak in the meetings. My strength, my secret, my impact, is this bothering Spirit. If I became “divorced” from Him in my daily life, I would be through. The real Christian walk revealed and required by the Bible is to walk by the Spirit and live by the Spirit.
Galatians 5:25 says, “If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit,” and 5:16 says, “Walk by the Spirit.” To walk by the Spirit in verse 16 differs from to walk by the Spirit in verse 25b. In verse 16 to walk is to walk in a general way, and in verse 25b to walk is to walk orderly, to walk along a line or by a rule to fulfill a purpose. This indicates that our Christian walk must be a walk generally by the Spirit, and this walk must be also according to the particular rule, that is, to live Christ for the purpose of building up His Body. Galatians 5:16 and 25 show us that the Christian walk must altogether be in this mingling, saturating Spirit, who is one spirit with us. We do not need any outward regulations. When we come to the meeting, we should not care for regulations. We should come in with Him and as Him. When we come, He comes. When we are here, He is here. When we are speaking, He is speaking. To live by the Spirit, walk by the Spirit, pray with the spirit (1 Cor. 14:15a; Eph. 6:18), sing with the spirit (1 Cor. 14:15b), and be strong in the spirit (2 Tim. 1:7) is to exercise the spirit. When we exercise the spirit, the mingled spirit becomes the very factor of the Christian meeting.
In order to exercise our legs, we should walk. If we use our legs all the time, they will become strong. Sometimes when I am sick, I must stay in bed for several days. After three days in bed, my legs become weak. Then I need to walk to recover the strength in my legs. To strengthen our eyes, we need to use our eyes. To strengthen our arm, we need to exercise our arm. Likewise, if we are going to be the sustaining, strengthening factor in the meeting, we need to exercise our spirit all day and every moment, in all things and in all matters. If we go to a home meeting as persons who practice exercising the spirit, we will be a living, strengthening, sustaining, refreshing, supporting, and enriching factor to that meeting. Merely what we say and what we do is not adequate. We must be persons full of the Spirit and saturated with the Spirit to practically become one spirit with the Lord in our daily experience.