Regrettably, there are very few normal Christians. It is as if we are all bad actors in a two-man comic show, who cannot act in unison and who are not “professional.” God’s life may move in us, but we do not move according to Him; we are not one with Him. We do not cooperate with Him and obey Him. Thus, God’s life encounters obstacles in us. These problems can be divided into three categories, but there may also be a fourth category that needs some final consideration.
Our spirit is the deepest part of our being, and God’s life is in His Spirit. When the Spirit comes into us, He comes into our spirit. The spirit in us can be compared to a filament in a light bulb. The filament is the innermost part of a lamp, and it allows the electrical current to flow. When electricity flows into a light bulb, it flows into the filament of the light bulb. If there is no filament in a light bulb, electricity cannot flow into it and the bulb cannot shine forth any light. The filament can be compared to the spirit in us with the Holy Spirit coming into our spirit with God’s life. Our mingled spirit can also be compared to the hidden actor in a two-man comic show: The Spirit, hidden in our spirit, prompts us with orders and feelings in our spirit.
Our innermost part is our spirit, but surrounding our spirit is our person, our self, which is also the soul spoken of in the Bible. Our soul surrounds our spirit. The three parts of our soul are the mind, which is the organ through which we think; the will, which is the organ through which we choose and make decisions; and the emotion, which is the organ through which we express feelings. The mind, emotion, and will equal our self, which is also our person, our soul. The Holy Spirit dwells in our spirit, which is in the deepest part of our being. Surrounding our spirit is our mind, emotion, and will. Therefore, in order to be consistent within and without, our mind, emotion, and will in our soul must cooperate with our spirit. The mind, emotion, and will equal our person, which is the outer man spoken of in the Bible; the Holy Spirit in our spirit is the inner man (2 Cor. 4:16). Our soul can be compared to the actor at the front of the stage, and our spirit can be compared to the person hiding at the back of the stage. There is one person inside and another person outside.
A proper Christian is one whose mind, emotion, and will cooperate with his spirit. An abnormal Christian is one whose mind, emotion, and will cannot cooperate and even contradict his spirit. Thus, he lives under a veil. If our mind, emotion, and will cannot adequately cooperate with our spirit, we will have problems.
A certain brother may be very zealous after he is saved, and he may have the concept that he should preach the gospel for the Lord and save sinners. This concept comes from his mind. He thinks that once he becomes a Christian, he should be zealous for the Lord and preach the gospel because this is what a proper Christian is supposed to do. However, he does not realize that this is only a natural opinion, which comes from his mind and thoughts. The Lord Jesus lives in his spirit, and when he prays in the morning, the Lord may give him a feeling to apologize to his wife. This feeling does not come from his mind and thoughts; instead, it comes from his spirit, which is where the Lord’s Spirit dwells. Such a thought is unrelated to his natural mind or natural thoughts. He has absolutely no concept of apologizing to his wife.
While he desires to zealously preach the gospel for the Lord, the Spirit of the Lord is moving in his spirit and urging him to apologize to his wife. This shows that the thought in his mind of going to preach the gospel is different from the feeling in his spirit that he should apologize to his wife. The thought in his mind and the feeling in his spirit do not match. Inwardly, there is a sense that he should apologize, but outwardly, his thoughts are focused only on preaching the gospel. The two are not one. This is a problem because his thoughts do not match the sense in his spirit. His only consideration is to preach the gospel zealously; he has no thought to apologize to his wife, even though he has a sense in his spirit. There are thousands of stories like this. This shows the problem of our mind.
The year after China won the Sino-Japanese War, I went to Nanking and met a brother whom I had known for ten years. He was prominent in the textile industry. One day, he invited us to eat with him, and he purposely sat beside me. He said, “Brother Lee, I genuinely feel that I should do more things; that is, I should do more things for the Lord.” When I heard this, I did not agree with him, and I did not feel very comfortable within. I looked at him, and he continued to tell me that he wanted to care for orphans and that he wanted to do this and that. He spoke of many things, and the more he spoke, the more excited he became. At the end of our time, he asked, “Brother Lee, what do you think?” I could not say anything. I could only think inwardly, “Do these things come from the moving of Christ within?”
I was very disappointed that day. This brother had been saved for a long time, and he had passed through many things, but it seemed as if he had not learned any lessons or made any advance. I actually wanted to ask him, “Is this something that the Lord wants you to do, or does it come from your own thoughts and opinions?” I also wanted to ask, “Brother, have you dealt with the matter of consecration over these past few years? Have you dealt with sin thoroughly? Has the Lord gained the ground in you? If the things you want to do originate from your thoughts, then they will be nothing more than religious activities even if they are successful. They will not help people see and gain Christ, because they are merely religious activities that originate from your thoughts; they are not a testimony of Christ being lived out from your spirit.”
Christ is the Spirit, and the Spirit dwells in our spirit. When the Spirit comes out of us, it is life. Nevertheless, we are often like an unwilling participant in a two-man comic show with God. When the Spirit moves in us, we ignore, suppress, and put Him aside; instead, we exercise our mind to think and our eyes to watch. We use our mind to think about what others would do, and we use our eyes to watch what others are doing rather than following the living Christ in us. Consequently, even if we accomplish some religious enterprise, we are not living out Christ’s life. His life will be blocked and unable to get through in us. Although we have the life of Christ within, we do not cooperate with Christ’s life in our thoughts and in our actions, and so this life cannot be lived out from us. This is the problem of our mind.