Romans 8:4 speaks of the righteous requirement of the law being fulfilled in those who walk according to the spirit, that is, the regenerated human spirit indwelt and mingled with the Spirit, who is the consummation of the Triune God. This verse indicates that we can be justified by God in His presence only if we do everything according to the spirit. If we do not conduct ourselves according to the spirit, we cannot be justified before God. Many believers who hold the so-called reformed theology do not care for the subjective experiences of Christ; they care only for the objective side of Christian experience. They say that since Christ is our righteousness, we are justified by God. Although this is true, it is only a part of the proper theology. The Bible tells us that justification is first objective (Rom. 3:24, 26) and then subjective (Rom. 4:25 and note 1; Rev. 19:8 and note 2). First, Christ is our righteousness objectively for us to be justified by God that we may be saved. However, if we are going on to live as a child of God and a member of Christ, we must live Christ (Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:19-21), making Christ also our subjective righteousness (Phil. 3:9). In Galatians 2:20 the apostle Paul said, "I am crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me." Then, in Philippians 2:12-13 Paul told the believers to work out their own salvation, for it is God who operates in them both the willing and the working for His good pleasure. God not only lives in us, but He even operates in us.

In His creation of man God produced a spirit for man. According to Genesis 2:7, the issue of God's breathing the breath of life into man's body of dust was that man became a living soul. Thus, man is a tripartite being of body, soul, and spirit. Man's body is his outer frame, his spirit is his inmost organ, and his soul is his inner being, his person. In the New Testament Paul said, "And the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly, and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thes. 5:23), confirming that man is tripartite.

Although the details of God's creation of man may be familiar to us, we need to be reminded that day by day we should live Christ, doing everything according to the inner spirit. In 2 Timothy 4:22 Paul said, "The Lord be with your spirit." Christ is with our spirit. This is all that we need. We need Christ within our spirit that we may live Him. We should not live a Chinese, an American, a German, or a Frenchman; we should live Christ by doing everything according to our spirit. In doing everything we should not do it by our self but by Christ according to our spirit. Then we will live Christ.

We have not been fully faithful to what we have heard of the Lord through the years. In this one thing we have all offended the Lord—in our not living Him by doing everything according to the Spirit. In God's creation of man, God purposely breathed the breath of life into man that man might have an inmost organ to contact God, to make man himself a God-man. This is to be a human being by exercising our spirit in everything. We need to practice this; otherwise, we can never be a proper Christian. We may speak, teach, preach, and expound the Bible to others, but if we do not do everything according to the Spirit, we are practicing hypocrisy and falsehood. We may claim that we are loving the Lord and seeking Him, and that we are in His recovery for His testimony, yet we may be persons who do things not according to the Spirit. Instead, we may do things according to right and wrong, by avoiding what is wrong and doing our best to do what is right. However, it is possible to do many right things without doing them according to the Spirit. To do things according to right and wrong is based on the principle of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; to do everything according to the Spirit is based on the principle of the tree of life.