“As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.” The sons of God have God’s life. When we speak of God’s life, we understand it in a very general way. We don’t realize that God’s life given to us now becomes our life. And this life now implies God’s residing. And it implies God’s life giving. This life also implies a spontaneous putting to death. And these are not three things happening in three steps. These are three things happening at the same time. When God resides in you, He gives life. When He gives life, you put to death. When you put to death, God resides in you more. It is a spontaneous cycle. The experience of this cycle is the leading. We who are the sons of God must live, act, move, and behave ourselves under this lead. So we are led by the Spirit of God.
Who is this Spirit of God? We have to remember that He is the ultimate expression of the processed Triune God. We are sons of God having God’s life in us, and this life is just the residing God. That we are sons of God implies His residing, His life giving, and even implies our putting to death. If we live in this way, spontaneously we are under the leading of such a wonderful thing. We are led by God Himself. This means we are led by the processed God Himself. The leading of our Christian life is not just circumstances or happenings or persons. The lead under which we Christians live is just the processed God indwelling within us, giving life to us so that we put to death all the things of the old creation.
Human language is not adequate to utter these kinds of things. I just don’t have the way to express what I realize concerning these matters. Because we don’t have the adequate experience of these things, and because we are short of the language to express it, it is easy for us to misunderstand the matter of the leading. We usually understand that God’s leading is simply to tell us what to do. To know the Lord’s real leading, you must live in Romans 8:11-13. You must experience the residing of the Triune God, and you must experience the life giving of this processed Triune God. And you must have adequate experience of the putting to death. Then you are under the lead.
You don’t need to depend upon the outward circumstances to confirm whether or not you are under the leading of the Lord. To depend upon the outward circumstances doesn’t necessarily mean that you are so one with the Lord. Rather it may mean that you are not so one with the Lord. If you are so one with the Lord you are under the lead, and you will know the leading. You will not seek after it. You will simply have it. You will be in it. When you talk with people, every sentence should be under the leading. Sometimes you realize you are going to say something that is not under the leading and not under a clear sky. So you have to refrain from that kind of talk.
When Paul describes all these things, he describes them in a clear way. But when you experience them, they are not so clearly separated. Rather to set the mind on the spirit is simultaneously one with the walking according to spirit. In description, you have to make these two items distinct. In description to set the mind on the spirit is one thing, and to walk according to spirit is another. But in experience these two things happen simultaneously with God’s residing, with God’s life giving, and with your putting to death. When you have all these things you have the leading.
To illustrate once more, dogs and cats and other animals behave and act under their lead. If someone is teasing a dog, and the dog is running, you may think that the teasing of that person is the lead. Actually it is not. Actually the dog’s life is its lead. When a dog runs away from you it is a little different from a cat running away. When a cat runs away from you it is somewhat different from a chicken running away. And a chicken running away is somewhat different from a boy running away. All these living creatures run away in their own way because of the lead in their life. This illustrates that the outward circumstances are not the real leading. The real leading is within them according to their kind of life. A cat has a cat’s life, and that life is actually its lead. If you have a human life, this life is your lead.