We all know what it means to be limited. Married life, for example, is a limitation and a restriction. Marriage certainly places limitations on us. Although the young people may be free as the birds in the air, they experience limitations when they get married. Although you may be as free as a bird today, you will find yourself in a cage after you get married. Every wife is a cage to her husband, and every husband is a cage to his wife. Before I was married, I kept my bedroom window open at night because I enjoyed the fresh air. But my wife would close all the windows and turn the bedroom into a cage. Before I was married I had the freedom to spend as much time as I wanted reading the Bible. I could study the Bible from 7 p.m. until 2 a.m. However, after I was married, my time spent in studying the Bible in the evening was limited. At 9:30 my wife would want the lights turned out because she felt it was time to go to sleep. Although we may not always be happy in the cage of our married life, there is no escape from it. For us Christians, there is no divorce or separation. We cannot flee the cage of married life. After a period of time, some little birds are born into this cage. What a further restriction this is! As the years went by and children were born, I experienced many more limitations. I cried out to the Lord and said, “O Lord Jesus! What should I do?” The Lord seemed to say, “Simply be limited and restricted. Look at Me. Although I am the unlimited God, I was incarnated and limited for thirty years. I can promise you that after thirty years you will be released.”
One day, thirty years later, I said to the Lord, “Lord, You told me that I would be released after thirty years, but now I am more limited than ever. I have not only sons and daughters, but daughters-in-law, sons-in-law, and grandchildren. I also have the limitation of so many churches and elders. Lord, what shall I do now?” Then the Lord said, “Look at Me again. Although I was released after thirty years, don’t you know that I am still being limited by you and all the other believers?” Eventually, I saw the vision of Christ as the wheat. The very Christ who indwells me is the incarnated One. In a sense, He is still incarnated today, for the indwelling Christ is willing to be limited, caged, in us. When I saw this vision of the limited Christ, I began to worship Him, saying, “O Lord, thank You for my wife, for all my children, for all the churches, and for all the elders. How I thank You, Lord, for my cage.” Such a prayer causes wheat to begin to grow immediately. I can testify that I have a wheat field in my Christian life. How I thank the Lord for my wife, my children, my in-laws, my grandchildren, the churches, and the elders. All these produce the environment that enables me to grow wheat.
The young brothers and sisters who soar like birds in the air do not have any wheat. Whenever they come to a meeting of the church, they fly freely, but they do not have any wheat in their hand. But after they get married and experience Christ in their limitations, the limited Jesus will begin to grow in them as wheat. The brothers who take responsibility in the churches are also limited by one another. But this limitation gives Christ the opportunity to grow in them as wheat. This wheat is the incarnated Jesus growing in the midst of our limitations.
Eventually, these limitations will put us to death. Limitation always leads to crucifixion. Husbands and wives not only limit each other; they also crucify each other. Without exception, every husband crucifies his wife. If you are honest, you will admit that you have crucified your wife many times. But how good it is to be crucified! The more we are crucified, the more the wheat grows within us. The way to eat Christ as wheat is to be limited and crucified. If you are not willing to be limited and crucified, you will not have any wheat. There will be no need for you to talk about how to eat the wheat because there will not be any wheat to eat. You must grow the wheat before you can eat it. And in order to grow wheat you must be limited and crucified. Hallelujah for this limitation and crucifixion!
Paul said, “For we which live are alway delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake” (2 Cor. 4:11). Day after day, the wives and the husbands deliver one another to death. Although your honeymoon may have been very sweet, I am sure that it did not last very long. I do not know of any honeymoon that has lasted for even thirty days. It seems that the honeymoon often becomes a “vinegar-moon.” Although you may tell your wife that you love her, you are ready to crucify her several days later. During the first few days of your honeymoon you may say, “Dear, I love you.” But after those days, you will feel like saying, “I will nail you to the cross and put you to death.” This kind of crucifixion does not take place once for all; it is continual. My wife has crucified me many times. Whenever I think that this crucifixion will be over once and for all, I am crucified again a few days later. This is the experience of the incarnated and crucified Jesus. When we experience Jesus as the limited One and as the crucified One, He grows in us as wheat.