At this moment, we will live before God, and at this time, God will show us the glorious fact that apart from the Lord we can do nothing. Apart from the Lord whatever we do cannot please God. Only when the Lord becomes our strength are we able to please God. In John 15:5 the Lord said, “For apart from Me you can do nothing.” On the one hand, the Bible shows us that we are able to do all things in Him who empowers us (Phil. 4:13), and on the other hand, it says that apart from Christ we can do nothing. This means that not only do we need to be delivered from ourselves, but we also need to be in Christ. In other words, God is breaking us so that we would not rely on ourselves and would be delivered from the self; He is also showing us that Christ is both our strength and our power.
It is through this kind of process that our strength goes bankrupt, and it is also through such an experience that God shows us that Christ is our strength and that He is living and powerful within us. For this reason we can testify that it is “no longer I...but...Christ” (Gal. 2:20). At this time, we will praise and thank the Lord from within, and we will tell the Lord, “Lord, You are my life, and You are my power.” We will put ourselves aside and say, “Lord, we have Your life and Your power in us. We would not use our own strength or method any more.” This is the holy living of a Christian, and this is the overcoming living of a Christian. We do not need to resolve to be submissive, because there is a power which enables us to be submissive. There is no need to make a resolution, because the power, which is just the Lord Himself, comes from within. At this point we will realize that everything we do is not merely good but is the Lord Himself.
The power of God is Christ, but in our experience several steps are needed for Christ to express His power from within us. The first step is that He draws our heart to love Him. The second step is that we try to love Him by ourselves, but we fail and are discouraged. Then at this very moment God shows us that it is not our own strength but Christ’s; it is not we but Christ; it is not our way but Christ’s; it is not our wisdom but Christ’s. God shows us that we have to put our own effort and methods aside. Then even though we do not do it intentionally, we put ourselves aside, because we have had so many failures which have caused us to lose our self-confidence. While other people are able to overcome, we cannot; we fail incessantly. We realize that people like us are not able to please God. At this point we are broken; we are thoroughly broken. We see that it is no longer we but Christ. Only when we are in Christ are we able to do all things. In this way the Lord Jesus spontaneously becomes the power in us. All the holiness and overcoming that we will have will have come through this breaking process.
When a person becomes zealous for the Lord and wants to do many things for the Lord, I always have two different feelings. On the one hand, I feel that it is always good for someone to have the willingness to serve the Lord; on the other hand, I have the feeling that his zeal is not of much use and that he is destined to fail. Not only so, failing and falling are good for a Christian.
There was a saint whose situation and prayer were good before he got married. But after he was married, he was not able to read the Bible or fellowship with God properly because he had a problem before God. He did not understand why this was the case. Before he was married, he did not have any problem with the Lord; once he married, not only was he unable to pray, but he was also discouraged within. If he did not go to the meetings, his inner being would disagree, but if he went to the meetings, his inner being would be discouraged. He knew that he had to love the Lord, but he was not able to do so. He was depressed to the uttermost. When I saw this situation, I was really joyful. He asked me what he should do, and I told him that he did not need to do anything or worry about anything. This was nothing but the Lord’s breaking him.
We often think that we are able to please the Lord with our own strength. However, man’s effort plus man’s methods merely represent the self. When we try to please God in this way, it is our own power, not the life of Christ. It is our own way, not Christ’s enlightening. It is we who are expressed, not Christ. It is we who are trying to please God, not Christ pleasing God. In this way, Christ Himself is not expressed, and there is no way for Christ to be expressed as our life and power. We have to know that the Christian life is not to do good but to express Christ. God’s purpose is to work Christ into us that He would be expressed from within us.
Every time we make a resolution to please God, we have to realize that what follows will always be discipline, failures, and bankruptcy. This bankruptcy does not refer to something physical but to something ethical. We will be unable to stand hardships. The environment will be raised up by God to suppress us, to break us, to cause us to be disappointed in ourself, and to esteem ourselves as nothing. At this moment, we will see that we cannot please God by our own strength. What pleases God is what Christ does through us; what pleases God is when Christ gains ground in us. However, for Christ to gain ground in us and be expressed through us, we have to allow our strength, our methods, and our wisdom to be broken by God.
The majority of people think that man’s problem is sin and that sin is the enemy of God. In fact, man’s problem is not sin but his own strength and his own way. It is because man has too much strength, too many ways, and too much wisdom that Christ does not have any ground in him. For Christ to gain ground in man, God has to do one thing. What is that one thing? He has to break the human strength, methods, wisdom, and determination. All of man’s strength, methods, wisdom, and determination have to be broken by God.
Our experience tells us that the more we struggle, the more breaking there will be. The more we pray to ask God to fulfill our desire to please Him, the more God will break us. God will particularly create situations that we are not able to stand; eventually, all our strength and methods will go bankrupt because we will not be able to bear the environment. Both our strength and methods will go bankrupt. Then we will say, “O God, I cannot do it. I do not have anything other than a heart that loves You.” At this time God will show us that the Lord Jesus is living in us to be our life and our strength. Then we will prostrate ourselves and say, “O God, it is no longer I but Christ; it is no longer my methods but Your leading; it is no longer my determination but Your shining.” As a result we will be able to please God, and Christ will be able to fill us within and be expressed without. Whoever has reached such an extent has had to pass through many sufferings and breakings. Blessed are those who can pass through all these sufferings and breakings. In this way we will know how Christ can be the power in us. Apart from Christ we can do nothing, but we are able to do all things in Him.