We may experience Christ also in His being a delight to God. The Lord Jesus was always a delight to God. On two occasions a voice from the heavens said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I delight” (Matt. 3:17; 17:5). If we today live a life of Christ as our burnt offering, we too shall be a delight to God.
Paul experienced Christ in this way. In Galatians 1:10 he says, “For am I now persuading men or God? Or do I seek to please men? If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a slave of Christ.” Paul lived a life which was a repetition of Christ’s life, pleasing God all the time. His life, therefore, was a delight to God.
We may think that Paul was extraordinary, that his living was incomparable, and that his standard is too high for us. Yet Paul told us to be imitators of him (1 Cor. 4:16; 11:1). Paul was the same as we are. He was a human being, he was part of the old creation, and he lived in the flesh. Whether we imitate Paul in being a delight to God depends on whether we live or Christ lives in us. If we are the ones living, we cannot be a delight to God. But if we let Christ live for us and if we live by Christ and even live Christ, our life will surely be a delight to God. Whenever our life is a delight to God, we shall have within us a deep sense regarding this. We shall know that we are living a life which is a repetition of the life of Christ and which is a delight to God.
I believe that all of us have had at least a limited experience of this and have had the deep sense that we are pleasing to God and pleasing also to ourselves. Quite often, however, we are not pleasing to God and thus are not pleasing even to ourselves.
What kind of life is pleasing to God? The only life that is pleasing to God is the life that is a repetition of the life Christ lived on earth. A life that experiences Christ in His experiences as the burnt offering is a God-pleasing life. Such a life is a delight to God.
In Romans 14:18 Paul says, “He who in this serves Christ as a slave is well-pleasing to God.” The “this” here refers to verse 17, which tells us that the kingdom of God is righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. He who serves as a slave in this-in the kingdom of God-is well-pleasing to God. When we live a kingdom life, we live a life that is righteous and full of peace and joy. Such a living is a repetition of Christ’s life as the burnt offering, which is always a delight to God.
Christ’s inwards denotes all the inward parts of His being, including His mind, emotion, will, and heart with all their functions.
The leading part of our inwards, of our inner being, is the mind. “Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 2:5). The mind which was in Christ should be in us today. This means that we should take His mind as our mind. We should be those not with our own, natural mind but with the mind of Christ.
In 1 Corinthians 2:16b Paul says, “We have the mind of Christ.” Because we are organically one with Christ, we have all the faculties He has. The mind is the intelligence faculty, the understanding organ. We have such an organ of Christ so we can know what He knows. Therefore, we may have not only the life but also the mind of Christ. Christ must saturate our mind from our spirit, making our mind one with His.
In Romans 8:6 Paul speaks of setting the mind on the spirit. This word is not as strong as his word concerning the mind of Christ. We should not merely set our mind on the spirit but have the very mind of Christ.
“I long after you all in the inward parts of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 1:8). The Greek word translated “inward parts” literally means bowels, signifying inward affection, then tender mercy and sympathy. Paul was one with Christ even in the bowels, the tender inward parts of Christ, in longing after the saints. This indicates that Paul did not keep his own inwards but took Christ’s inwards as his. He took not only Christ’s mind but also His entire inward being. Paul’s inner being, therefore, was changed, rearranged, remodeled, reconstituted. His inner being was reconstituted with the inwards of Christ. Paul did not live a life in his natural inner being; he lived a life in the inwards of Christ.
“The truth of Christ is in me” (2 Cor. 11:10). “Truth” here means honesty, faithfulness, trustworthiness. What was in Christ as truth, that is, as honesty, faithfulness, trustworthiness, was also in the Apostle Paul.
“My love be with you all in Christ Jesus” (1 Cor. 16:24). Paul’s love for the Corinthians was not his love but the love in Christ, which is Christ’s love. Paul loved the saints not by his natural love but by the love of Christ.
If we put these verses together, we shall see that Paul was a man who continually experienced Christ’s inwards. Because he experienced Christ in this way, he surely was able to offer Christ according to his experience of Him.
Home | First | Prev | Next