Many Christians do not realize that as believers we should experience Christ subjectively. The Bible reveals that God’s desire and intention is to work Christ into us. What could be more subjective than having Christ wrought into our very being? Paul refers to this when he speaks of Christ making His home in our hearts (Eph. 3:17). As the extensive, all-inclusive One, the One anointed by God, Christ wants not only to dwell in us, but also to make His home in us. This certainly is a subjective matter. The root of the Greek word rendered “make home” in Ephesians 3:17 is the same as that for house. It is not adequate merely to speak of Christ dwelling in us, for this does not convey the full meaning of the Greek word. We must say that Christ wants to house Himself, make His home, in us. The experience of Christ housing Himself in us is indeed very subjective. However, for the most part, this experience is neglected by Christians today.
The teachings among Christians mainly stress that Christ is our Redeemer and Savior, that as God Christ should be the object of our worship, and that Christians should improve their behavior. We fully believe that Christ is our Redeemer and Savior, that He is God, and that we should worship Him. However, according to the Bible, the point about Christians improving their behavior is questionable. What is meant by good behavior? We do not agree with good behavior that is merely the product of a person’s self-effort. But we definitely agree that we need good behavior which is the product of the Christian life transformed with Christ. When the Bible speaks of good behavior, it does not refer to the good behavior of the natural life. On the contrary, it denotes the proper living, or behavior, of a transformed life. The important matter here is that many Christians have missed the mark, the focal point, of God’s economy. They do not see from the Word of God that the Triune God desires to come into us to be our life, our life supply, and everything to us, even our person, that we may be one with Him.
I wish to emphasize once again that to be in the name of the Lord is not merely to use His name as a stamp or signature at the end of a prayer. It means to be in the person of the Lord Jesus. When Christ the Son came in the name of the Father, He did not use the Father’s name as a signature or stamp. Instead, He came in the person of the Father. We should not think that when the Lord Jesus came, only the Son came and not the Father also. No, when the Son came, the Father came in Him and with Him. John 14:23 proves this: “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word, and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make an abode with him.” On the one hand, here the Lord speaks of the Father loving us; on the other hand, He speaks of the Father and the Son coming to us and making an abode with us. According to this verse, if we love the Son, the Father will love us. Then the Father and the Son will make an abode with us. This indicates that when the Son comes to us, the Father comes also. However, this does not mean that the Father comes alongside the Son. The Father comes in the Son, in the way of coinherence, of mutual indwelling. John 14:11 speaks of the Son being in the Father and the Father being in the Son. The little word in is very important, for it points to the matter of coinherence. The Lord came in the Father and with the Father in Him. This is what it means to say that the Son came in the name of the Father.
Our thinking needs to be renewed with respect to the meaning of praying in the Lord’s name and of doing things in His name. No longer should we consider the expression, “in the name of the Lord Jesus,” as a stamp of endorsement. It is vital for us to see that to be in the name of the Lord Jesus means that we are one with Him, that we are in Him and He in us. As the Son is in the Father and the Father in the Son in the way of coinherence, we also must be one with the Lord in this way. We and the Lord Jesus should coinhere; that is, we need to be in Him and have Him in us. Then truly we shall be in the Lord’s name.