We also need to exercise our spirit. A loving heart is not sufficient. In addition to a loving heart, we need a renewed, receiving spirit.
We had a human spirit before we were saved, but it was deadened. In Ephesians 2:1 Paul says that we were dead in offenses and sins. This surely means that we were dead not in our body or in our soul but in our spirit. While we were living in our body, we were deadened in our spirit. When we were saved, the Lord Jesus enlivened our spirit. Thus, we now have an enlivened and renewed spirit.
You may feel that it is difficult to discern the difference between your spirit and your heart. Instead of trying to analyze the difference, we can recognize the difference according to our experience. When we consider how sweet and precious the Lord Jesus is and how much He has done for us, we may become stirred in our emotion and say, “Lord Jesus, I love You!” This is an expression of our loving heart. But when we call on the name of the Lord Jesus, we can sense that deep within something other than our heart has been exercised. This is our spirit. Just as we know that we have two feet by using them to walk, we know that we have a spirit by exercising our spirit to contact the Lord. One of the best ways to use our spirit to contact the Lord is to call, “O Lord Jesus!” When we exercise our spirit in this way, we have the sense of something moving deep within our being. That something is our spirit.
In his subtlety, Satan has hidden this matter of the human spirit from most Christians. When many believers read the Bible, they do not exercise their spirit but exercise only their mind. When we read the Bible, we need to exercise our spirit as well as our mind. We should never neglect our spirit. If we do not exercise our spirit, we cannot be proper Christians. It is tragic that Christians are taught to take care of the mind but not to care for the spirit. Many care either for fundamental teachings or for Pentecostal gifts, but according to history teachings and gifts have not been effective in building up the church. Of course, teachings and gifts have some value, but the main thing we need today is the exercise of the spirit. This is the most crucial, vital, and prevailing thing.
First Corinthians speaks not only of gifts but also of many other things. For example, in chapter three Paul talks about food and growth. Verse 2 says, “I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, for you were not yet able to receive it. But neither yet now are you able.” In verse 6 he goes on to say, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth.” This is not a word concerning gifts. In 12:13 Paul says, “For also in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and were all given to drink one Spirit.” In this verse Paul says that we have been positioned to drink of one Spirit, but he says nothing about gifts. Another crucial verse in 1 Corinthians is 15:45b: “The last Adam became a life-giving Spirit.” Many readers of 1 Corinthians appreciate the word in chapters twelve and fourteen about speaking in tongues and prophecy but neglect 15:45b. Which do you prefer—speaking in tongues or Christ as the life-giving Spirit? If we compare the life-giving Spirit to speaking in tongues, we can say that the life-giving Spirit is like gold and that speaking in tongues is like brass. In 13:1 Paul says, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels but do not have love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal.” This indicates a sound without life. If we speak in the tongues of men and of angels and yet have no life in our spirit, this speaking is like sounding brass. Paul’s word here indicates that speaking in tongues is not a matter of life. Speaking in tongues is not an expression of life.
At this juncture, we need to consider Paul’s way of speaking in 1 Corinthians 7. In contrast to many in today’s Pentecostalism, Paul did not say, “Thus saith the Lord.” Rather, in verse 25 he said, “I have no commandment of the Lord, but I give my opinion as one who has been shown mercy by the Lord to be faithful.” The expression Thus saith the Lord is taken from the Old Testament, but it is not used by the New Testament writers. Peter, Paul, and John did not use this expression. Instead of following Pentecostalism to adopt Old Testament expressions, we should learn to exercise our spirit to be one spirit with the Lord (1 Cor. 6:17). This means that we need to realize that, in His inward recovery by life, He has given us a new spirit.
Ezekiel 36:27 says, “I will put My Spirit within you” (NASB). Here we see that the Lord said not only that He will give us a new heart and a new spirit but that He will put His Spirit in us, putting His Spirit into our spirit. We should not neglect our spirit, because our spirit is the vessel which contains the divine Spirit. When believers hear the word spirit, they usually think of the Holy Spirit. They seldom consider that they have a human spirit. Yes, we need the Holy Spirit, but we need to realize that the Holy Spirit is in our regenerated human spirit. “The Spirit Himself witnesses with our spirit” (Rom. 8:16). Praise the Lord that we have a new heart and a new spirit and that we have the Holy Spirit within our spirit strengthening us all the time.
This enables us to keep God’s commandments. God’s commandments are according to His nature, and we have the nature of God within us because we have His Spirit within us. Now there is something within us that corresponds to God’s law. God’s Spirit within us contains God’s nature, and God’s nature corresponds to God’s law. Because we have God’s nature within us, it is easy for us to keep His law. Formerly it was difficult for us to love others, but now it is easy to love others and difficult to hate them because we have a new nature, God’s nature, within us.
In 36:34-36 the Lord promised that the desolate and waste places would become like the garden of Eden. There the plant of renown (34:29), Christ as the tree of life, would be their rich supply. The local churches need to reach such a high condition that they are like the garden of Eden. Even today, often in the church meetings we have the sense that we are in the garden of Eden.
Ezekiel 36:37-38 says, “Thus saith the Lord God; I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them; I will increase them with men like a flock. As the holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts; so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of men: and they shall know that I am the Lord.” Here the Lord promised that He would bring in flocks of people. Although He has promised to do this, we still need to inquire of Him. This means that we need to pray for the increase, saying, “O Lord, flock people in. You promised this to us.”
In the past, whenever we prayed for an increase of number, the Lord answered. I feel that we need to pray more. The Lord promised, yet He needs our inquiring. He promised that He will increase our number by flocks of men, but we need to pray for this and ask Him to do it. I hope that the saints in all the local churches will pray definitely and specifically for the increase of numbers. We should never be content with our present number. Rather, we should all aspire to be doubled within a period of time. Thus, we need to pray, “Lord, flock people in.”
In 1963 in Los Angeles, we had only twenty to thirty people, but after we prayed for six months, the number was greatly increased. In Elden Hall we also prayed that the Lord would flock people in. We prayed, “Lord, bring flocks of men to us,” and the Lord heard this prayer. I feel that today we need to pray even more, standing upon and claiming Ezekiel 36:37-38 concerning the increase of numbers.
We should not say that numbers do not mean anything and that we do not care for numbers. We should not comfort ourselves with any failure in the matter of increase. We surely need the increase in numbers. We need to pray for the increase, claiming the Lord’s promise in Ezekiel 36. When some hear this, they may say that they care not for quantity but for quality. However, quality comes out of quantity. Therefore, we need to pray that the Lord will give us the increase and that He will bring in flocks of men.