In reality the Lord’s saving power is the Lord Himself. Today He is the all-inclusive, life-giving Spirit. He has both the element of divinity and the element of humanity within Him. In addition, God’s divine attributes, the human virtues, the elements of redemption, His all-terminating crucifixion, His all-inclusive death, His resurrection, His ascension, and righteousness, holiness, light, life, love, and victory are all in Him. Everything is in the Spirit. The composition of the Spirit is rich and bountiful. This is why we call Him the all-inclusive Spirit. Our Lord is such a Spirit.
When the all-inclusive Spirit enters into us, first He becomes our life, and second He becomes our life supply. These two steps involve a great deal. We can illustrate these two steps with the food that we eat. The Lord Jesus likened Himself to food in John 6:57. He said, “He who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me.” We all know that food is for our inward supply. A proper meal contains many vitamins and nutrients. After these nutrients have been digested by our stomach, they are absorbed and transported to the different parts of our body to become our many elements. The food that we eat is organic. Thus, by being metabolized into our body, it produces an organic change within us.
If a brother is very weak, his face will be pale and skinny. If this is the case, how can we help him? If we expend some effort to improve his outward appearance by rubbing some white powder or some red or black make-up on his face, this is not organic but artificial. This will not help him to become healthy. It may even damage him. What then is the proper thing to do for him? The proper thing to do is to have him drink the best drink and eat the most nutritious food. If he eats in this way for four consecutive weeks, his complexion will become fair, ruddy, and healthy. This is an illustration of inward organic transformation. This is metabolism.
Please forgive me for speaking about myself. I am one who ministers the word all year round. For every one hour that I speak, I must have three hours of sleep. I also have to eat well. In America even the young people who are in their twenties or thirties cannot catch up with an old man like me. I can speak for five to six hours straight, but this would totally exhaust them. You ask me what the secret is? It is the Lord’s mercy that I am able to eat, drink, and sleep. What I eat and drink becomes a supply to my body. In 1948 I went to Foochow and lived there for about two to three months. The schedule that the brothers arranged for me was very tight. There were at least three meetings a day—morning, afternoon, and evening. It was really tiring. However, Foochow produces a certain kind of mandarin orange. After every message that I gave, they would give me a glass of mandarin orange juice. Two minutes after I drank the juice, I would be energized again. I was energized because I had received an inward supply.
Today the Lord Jesus is the all-inclusive Spirit of life. The ingredients in Him are much richer than any food or drink. Whatever we need is in Him. He is truly a bountiful supply. His supply comes into us not only to give us power but also to work His elements; into us so that we can be transformed metabolically. Change is outward, but transformation is inward. Your goal may be to receive power, but His goal is not to merely give you power but to transform you.
Suppose I have a plain cup of water. Now suppose that I add a little bit of lemon, tea, and honey to it. If I do this, I will now have a cup of lemon tea, containing the ingredients of water, honey, lemon, and tea. When these ingredients are mixed together, they have an organic, nutritional capability of supplying you with energy. The Lord enters into us with all His elements; however, His goal is not just to supply you with power. His goal is to work His elements, His essence, into you for you to be organically transformed within.
We cannot obtain the Lord’s elements just by listening to messages, because messages, even when repeated over and over again, can only give us a kind of knowledge, understanding, and comprehension. They cannot give us the Lord’s essence, the Lord’s elements.
For example, suppose a brother catches a serious cold, and after being sick for six weeks he is pale and thin. Suppose I wish to help him, but I know only how to talk and do not know how to do anything else. I only know how to tell him about nutrition, but I do not know how to cook for him. From morning to evening I just lecture him from a book on nutrition, telling him that he is missing this and that, and that he should do this and that. I tell him all that is relevant regarding nutrition. If I did this, would it do him any good? Actually, he probably would be better off if I did not speak to him so much. The more I speak, the skinnier he becomes. He receives a lot of knowledge, but it is all useless to him. Now suppose his mother comes to see him. She loves him very much, and without saying a word to him, she just cooks three good meals for him each day. The result of eating these meals will be that he will become healthy.
What is the problem with Christianity today? The problem is that Christianity has nutritional talk without actual cooking. I include myself in this. I am afraid that I may be just speaking on nutrition and not cooking for you to eat. I am afraid that many who have come from different localities to listen will say, “Brother Lee is still giving the same messages as he gave before. He is still talking about calling on the name of the Lord and pray-reading the Lord’s word. We have heard all of this before.” Dear brothers and sisters, I am not asking if you have heard this before. I am asking you whether or not you have eaten. I am not here to give you make-up lessons. I am here to nourish you. Messages will do you little good; only the Spirit is profitable. The Spirit is the Lord Himself, the Spirit is food, the Spirit is life, and the Spirit is the life supply. The supply of the Spirit is a bountiful supply that meets every need.
It is difficult for us to make a turn and to enter into this point. From birth we have been in our naturalness, and as we grew up, we got into culture; after we believed, we entered into religion. These three things—naturalness, culture, and religion—are wrapped around us. They have become three layers of veils. We do not have just one layer; we have three layers of veils. One is our naturalness, another is human culture, and still another is religion. I am afraid that even after hearing a thousand or even ten thousand messages, you will still have your religious concept.
The Spirit is missing in religion. A religion is a set of beliefs with corresponding teachings. Religion always teaches us to do this and to do that. Religion is full of teachings. However, religion never supplies us. We may think the church is the same. We may think that the church is nothing more than speaking the word and listening to the word. This concept is wrong. Hence, within me there is a heavy burden. I have been before the Lord, looking to Him from deep within. I have prayed, “Lord, open the understanding of the saints in the churches in every locality so that they can see that what they need today is not just the word but also the Spirit.” Today we need not only the word; we need the Spirit also. The word teaches you; the Spirit supplies you.