The Lord Jesus did not go to die on the cross with His flesh immediately after His incarnation. Instead, He lived the human life for thirty-three and a half years on the earth. The four Gospels show us that the Lord lived out God in His humanity when He was in the process of experiencing the human life. While He was living out God, He did not make it known, saying, “Behold, here comes God! When I come, God comes.” Rather, He lived out God in His living that people might see God. The main thing He did in His thirty-three and a half years of living on the earth was to live out God. He did not bring God out for people to see. Instead, He simply lived out God in His humanity. What He lived out always had the element of humanity, yet that humanity was full of divinity. He lived out human virtues, yet every virtue incorporated a divine attribute. The divine attributes were lived out in His human virtues. When He loved people, you may say that was man’s love, or you may also say that was God’s love shown in man’s love. In any case, that was God’s love and that was God expressed in Jesus’ humanity. He lived such a life of the mingling of God with man for thirty-three and a half years.
Today most Bible readers only see the miracles in the Gospels, such as the blind receiving sight, the lame walking, the lepers being cleansed, the deaf hearing, and the dead being raised (Luke 7:22). They have not seen that these four biographies are a portrayal of a man who passed through human life to live out another life. The Lord Himself clearly said, “As the living Father has sent Me and I live because of the Father” (John 6:57a). This means that although the Lord was a man, He lived out God’s life and not His own life. As a result, God and He, He and God, had one life and one living; They both lived by the same life and lived out the same living. This is such a marvelous thing that it cannot be expressed even by the relationship between husband and wife. We must have a clear realization concerning this matter. We need to know that after we have been saved, we should be such persons living such a life. After saying that He lived because of the Father, the Lord went on to say, “So he who eats Me, he also shall live because of Me” (v. 57b). Just as He lived out God’s life, so we should likewise live out His life. Just as He had one life and one living with God, so we also should have one life and one living with Him. This is the truth in the Bible.
The truth in the Bible is not meant to improve you. It is meant only to work the Triune God into you to be your life and living. The thirty-three and a half years of human living of the Lord Jesus on earth are a pattern and a model. According to our experience, after being saved we often feel that the life we live is indescribable because it is a living of God mingled with man in which God and man have one life and one living. We should live this kind of life every day. It seems that the New Testament contains some words for improvement, words that teach us to reform ourselves and to do good. However, if we study the context carefully, we will see that those are the fruits of our having the same life and the same living with Christ our Lord. We all must see this.
In His experience of the human life the Lord Jesus lived out God among men that God might be expressed in humanity. I hope that you all can see and be controlled by this vision. Thus, you will know the meaning and the goal of your pursuit for the growth in life and your endeavor in the spiritual service. The goal of our pursuing is to allow God to be lived out through us that we and He may have one life and one living and also to allow Him to express His divine attributes through our human virtues. These are the words in the Bible with the most intrinsic life element. I hope that you can see this clearly. Furthermore, I hope that you will look up the relevant Scripture verses, studying and digesting them carefully, and then apply, pursue, and learn them practically in your living.
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