The Bible says that Christ is the mystery of God (Col. 2:2). If we want to know God, then, we must know Christ. God is true and living, but He is mysterious. Christ explains Him. This He does, not only by His words, but mostly by His very Person. “No one has ever seen God; the only begotten Son, Who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him” (John 1:18). Man cannot see God, but there is One who declares Him. He is God’s expression.
In Hebrews 1:3 He is called the effulgence of God’s glory and the express image of His substance. Electricity cannot be seen, but when the lights shine we can see its glory. God is like the invisible electricity; Christ is His shining forth, the effulgence of His glory. God has an eternal essence, which is not material but spiritual. It is because the Lord Jesus expresses this essence, God’s very substance, that He is the mystery of God. All the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him (Col. 2:9). Where He is, there God is, for He Himself is God.
The first chapter of the Gospel of John goes into this matter also. The Word was in the beginning, the Word was with God, and the Word was God (v. 1). How could the Word be God? How could the Word become flesh (v. 14)? In our mentality the Word is one thing, God is something else, and the flesh is another thing. John tells us that these three are one. “Great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh” (1 Tim. 3:16). When the Word became flesh, God was manifested in the flesh. This is the Lord Jesus, the mystery of God.
We all need to be brought “unto the full knowledge of the mystery of God, Christ” (Col. 2:2). Have you seen God? Your answer should be, “I have seen Christ!” God is in Christ, and Christ is God. Apart from Christ, you cannot find God. To have Christ is to have God. To belong to God is to belong to Christ. With God there is a mystery, but with Christ the mystery is revealed.
God has been revealed. We can contact Him. We can fellowship with Him. We can walk with Him. We are even one spirit with Him, because we are one spirit with the Lord (1 Cor. 6:17). We have God because we have Christ, who is the mystery of God.
The word economy means an arrangement for getting things done. Young people make studying their economy. Cooking is the economy of a cook. Businessmen operate under an economy; that is, they have a way of doing things in order to accomplish their ends. Only those who are idle have no economy. Since our God neither slumbers nor sleeps (Psa. 121:4), surely He has an economy.
What is God’s economy? Christ! Laboring in the kitchen may be the cook’s economy. She may be hard at work, preparing meat, vegetables, fish, and bean curd. What is God doing in His kitchen? He is preparing Christ. Every dish that He turns out for our enjoyment is simply Christ! I am not speaking nonsense! The Lord Jesus told us that He is the bread of life (John 6:48). When we break the bread, we are touching His body. Colossians 2:16-17 says that eating, drinking, feasts, new moons, and Sabbaths are all “a shadow of things to come, but the body is of Christ.” Bean curd is a shadow; the body of the bean curd is Christ. He is the most nutritious food, much better than bean curd! When you are thirsty, you like to have a refreshing drink. Have you not had the experience of calling on the Lord when you feel dry within, and finding yourself refreshed? The material drink is only a shadow of Christ as the real drink.
For more than thirty years I have been speaking on the tree of life, on the enjoyment of God through eating and drinking Him, and on Christ as God’s economy. It seems that we still do not have a thorough understanding, and therefore our experience is limited. My own experience also seems inadequate. God’s economy is mysterious, rich, and profound. It is the focus of the whole Bible. Even at the end of the Bible there is the promise of the tree of life to those who wash their robes (Rev. 22:14) and a call to the thirsty to come and drink of the water of life (v. 17). In this final chapter of the Word, eating of the tree of life and drinking of the water of life are again brought into view.
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