After seeing that Christ is our life, the second aspect of the revelation that we must see is that we are dead, buried, and finished. Some may ask, “When did we die, and when were we buried?” We died with Christ on the cross on the day that Christ died, and we were buried on the day that we were baptized (Rom. 6:6; Col. 2:12). After someone dies, most of the time he is buried right away. With us, however, we were dead for more than one thousand years before we were buried. After being dead for over one thousand years, one day we were baptized by the church. Once a person is buried, he is completely finished. Eventually the Holy Spirit will reveal to us that we are dead, buried, and therefore completely finished. We all need such a revelation. Most of us know the doctrine that we were buried in our baptism, but we need not only the truth of this matter but the revelation. We need the Holy Spirit to reveal the spiritual fact to us that we have been buried with Christ.
A good indication of whether or not we have seen this revelation is how we feel about ourselves. Some may feel that they are good, while others may feel that they are evil. Both of these feelings are wrong. If someone were to ask me whether I feel that I am good or evil, I would simply answer, “I am dead and buried. I have nothing to do with good, and I have nothing to do with evil. I am finished. I am through with good as well as with evil.” Do we all have such a realization? One day, more than twenty-five years ago, the Lord revealed this matter to me. I was beside myself, and I could not stay in my room. I wanted to run out to the street to tell people that I had been buried and that I was through with this world. One day the Holy Spirit will reveal this to you, and it will no longer be a saying or a doctrine to you; it will be a fact, a reality, revealed to you in your spirit. You will realize that you are absolutely finished and completely through with this world. Then the Holy Spirit will also reveal to you that you have also been raised up and made alive together with Christ.
If you have this revelation that you are dead, buried, and finished, it will completely change your mind, thinking, understanding, apprehension, and spiritual realization. Before you receive such a revelation, you may read the Scriptures, pray, come to the meetings, and try to do good and overcome evil. In doing all these things, you will think that you are a normal Christian. When faced with evil, you will try your best to overcome, and when faced with the opportunity to do good, you will try your best to do it. This is the condition of the majority of Christians today. If, however, the Holy Spirit comes to you and reveals to you that you have been buried and raised up with Christ, you will experience a big change. After seeing this revelation, when faced with evil, you simply will not try to overcome it. You will not try to overcome it because you will have the deep realization that you have been buried and are through with this world. Likewise, when you have the opportunity to do good, since you realize that you have been buried, you simply will not try to do it. Hymns, #483 matches this thought. It asks, “Buried with Christ, and raised with Him too; / What is there left for me to do?” The answer to this question is that there is nothing left for us to do. There is nothing left for us to do, either good or bad. We are buried, finished, and through.
If you do not have this realization, and one of your classmates asks you to go to the movies, you would probably say something like, “I cannot go to the movies because I do not have time. Movies are a waste of time, and they cost too much money. Also, I do not particularly like today’s movies.” It is not wrong to say all these things, but to answer in such a way indicates that you have not realized that you have been buried. Your answer would show that you are still very living. If, however, you were to come to me and ask me to go to a movie with you, I would not answer you. Even if you were to ask me a thousand times, you would not receive any answer. If you were to go to a cemetery and speak to the people who have been buried there, would you receive an answer? Would any of the people buried there rise up and say, “I cannot go to the movies because I do not have any time, and because I do not like today’s movies”? Surely you would not receive any answer. Everyone in the cemetery is dead and buried, and there is nothing left for them to do. The same principle applies if one of your schoolmates suggests to you that you do something good to help others. If this were to happen to you, what would you think, and what would you say? In this situation you should take the attitude of one who is dead and buried.
We have been buried, and we have nothing to do with good or evil. The only thing we have anything to do with is Christ. We are living Christ and walking in Christ as our kingdom. We have nothing to do with anything that is outside of Christ, regardless of whether it is good or bad. We have been buried, and we are out of this world. We can even say that we have been “buried out” of this world. Sooner or later the Holy Spirit will show us these two aspects of this revelation—that Christ is our life, and that we have been buried with Christ. If we see this revelation, it will rule us, change us, and transfer us from one world into another.
Among us, we speak very much about the building up of the church. Thus, I would ask, what kind of brother is good for the building up of the church—one with a very bad temper who is proud and easily angered or one with a very good temper who is gentle and good? Which kind of brother would you choose for the building up of the church? To tell you the truth, neither a brother with a bad temper nor a brother with a good temper can be built up with others. A brother with a bad temper can never be built up with others because such a brother is a troublemaker. A brother with a good temper who is a gentleman cannot be built up with others because he is nothing but clay. He may be good, gentle, and nice, but once you pour a little hot water on him he dissolves. It is even more difficult for a gentle brother to be built up with others than for a brother with a bad temper to be built up with others, because a gentle brother is often full of criticism within. Outwardly he is gentle, but inwardly he is full of pride. The natural man, whether good or bad, is absolutely contrary to the building. In fact, anything that is out of us is contrary to God’s building.
We all must realize the fact that in God’s salvation, He makes Christ to be our life and He puts us to death. If we realize this reality, then regardless of what comes to us, whether it be good or bad, we will take the attitude that we are not the ones living but that Christ is the One living within us. This realization will even affect the way that we read the Bible. We may read the Bible, but how do we read it? There are two possible ways in which we can read the Bible—we can read the Bible as a natural man who does not realize that he has been buried, or we can read the Bible with the eyes and mentality of one who realizes that he has been buried and raised up with Christ. There is a real difference between these two ways of reading the Bible.
Once when I visited a certain place to work for the Lord, I stayed in the home of a brother and his wife. This couple loved the Lord very much and always attended the meetings. By staying in their home, I discovered that both of them had the practice of keeping a morning watch in which they rose up early to pray and read the Scriptures. One morning when we were all at the breakfast table, I asked the sister what she had read during her time of morning watch. She replied that she had read Ephesians 5, so I asked her what light she had received from this chapter. She answered, “I received the light that husbands must love their wives in the same way that Christ loves the church. This is truly wonderful.” Then I turned to the husband and asked him what portion of the Word he had read and what light he had received. He replied that he also had read Ephesians 5 and had received the wonderful light that wives must subject themselves to their husbands. Both the husband and the wife had read the same portion, and at the very same table the wife said that she had received the light that husbands must love their wives, and the husband said that he had received the light that wives must submit to their husbands. This made me very afraid. I feared that there would be some struggle between the two of them right there at the breakfast table. They were both believers, yet within they were very different, and there was some contradiction between them. By this we can clearly see that both of them had gone to the Word as a natural man with a natural mind. If one day they were both to receive the revelation that they have been buried and are finished, then when they came to the Word in the morning on this ground, the Holy Spirit would have the way to reveal something spiritual to them. Then they would not pay attention to things that appeal to their natural mentality.
One time I asked another brother what he had read during his morning watch, and he replied that he had carefully read every verse in Colossians 3. Then I asked him what he had received from his reading. He answered that he was enlightened to see that love is the bond of all perfectness and good works (v. 14). This is the truth and this sounds very nice. It is correct that love is the bond of all things. But after he answered, I asked him if he had seen anything else in this chapter. He responded, “I simply do not understand and do not like the other things in this chapter. What I like are teachings concerning love, patience, and humility. I do not like to read about putting off the old man and putting on the new man. This kind of teaching gives me a headache. I do not understand it, nor do I like it. What is the old man, and what is the new man? I do not understand these matters, but I do like to read about love, patience, and humility.” From such an answer we can see that when a person comes to the Word in such a way—one hundred percent on the ground of being a natural man—he can never receive any spiritual revelation.
When you come to Colossians 3, and every other chapter in the Bible, you must take the ground that you have been buried and raised up with Christ. Then when you come to verse 14, which speaks of love being the uniting bond of perfectness, you will check with yourself and inquire of the Lord, “Lord, this is the kind of word that I love. Is this the word that You are speaking to me right now? If it is, I receive it from You, but if it is not, then I reject myself and open to You to receive what You would like to give me.” If you have such an attitude when you come to the Word, the Word will be open to you and you will receive revelation in your spirit. When you take the ground of being buried and raised with Christ, you will receive revelation and you will be hidden with Christ in God (v. 3), the old man will be put off (v. 9), and the new man will be put on (v. 10).
Then, having received this revelation, it will become a ruling power within you throughout the entire day. This revelation will rule you, protect you, and shine upon you all day. The light that you have been raised with Christ and hidden with Christ in God, as well as the revelation that you have put off the old man and put on the new man, will rule you and protect you, keeping you away from the old man and in the new man all day long. Through this, you will experience Christ as your life and will be able to declare, “Christ is my life, and it is Christ who lives in me. I have nothing to do with good and evil. These things are foreign to me. My business is to deal with the living Christ who is my life. Day by day, and moment by moment, I am continually taking the ground that I have been buried with Christ and raised with Him too. Christ is my life.” You will experience Christ more and more in your daily life and will avoid the temptation to do good and to overcome evil. This may sound strange to you, but the devil will tempt you to do good. If he is successful in tempting you to do good, then he will surely be successful in tempting you to do evil. Thus, whenever the enemy comes to tempt you to do good or evil, you do not need to say a word to him. You simply need to take the ground that you have been buried and that by being buried you have been transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of Christ. If you do this, you will experience Christ as your life and will realize how easy it is to overcome evil. In fact, in a sense you will not even overcome it; you simply will have nothing to do with it because you have been buried and are in another realm—the kingdom of Christ. In this way Christ being your life will be a reality to you, and you will live by Christ and walk in Christ. Christ will increase in you and become everything to you. In addition, you will be built together with others to be a company of believers who are builded together in the Holy Spirit and with the life of Christ to be the real expression of the Body of Christ. May we all look to the Lord that He would have a way to carry out this work in these days.