Our living may be upright and ethical, but is our walk and upright condition produced by our spirit touching the Spirit of God, or is it unnecessary for us to touch the Spirit of God in order to have such a living? This makes a big difference. In our daily life, a spiritual living can be produced only by our spirit touching the Spirit of God. Only when the spirit of man touches the Spirit of God will there be spiritual reality. We should check our experience. How many of the proper, upright, and even ethical things that we do throughout the day are produced by our spirit touching the Spirit of God? We need to ask God to be gracious to us and to enlighten us so that we may see that today as Christians it is a matter of the Spirit of God living in our spirit. We need to interact and mingle with the Spirit of God in our spirit that we may live in the spirit day by day.
In this way, as soon as we get up in the morning, we will spontaneously be in the spirit. We will come to God and interact with the Spirit of God by the spirit. Then throughout the entire day we must remain in the spirit and walk according to the spirit. We should honor our parents the way our spirit wants us to honor our parents. We should treat our husband the way our spirit wants us to treat our husband. We should love our wife the way our spirit wants us to love our wife. In whatever way our spirit wants us to love, to be sympathetic, and to be meek and humble toward people, we should take that way, and spontaneously we will live according to the feeling of our spirit. Then what will come forth will not be merely an ethical living or a spiritual living but a spiritual living that includes an ethical living. This kind of morality is much higher than morality by itself. Sadly, many Christians do not have much of the spiritual element in their living. Their honor toward their parents comes from them, not from touching the spirit. Their sympathy and love toward others are merely their own sympathy and love and do not come from touching the Spirit of God. Their kind of living does not have God or any spiritual element in it.
In addition to an ethical living and a spiritual living, there is a religious living. If we have a religious living, we will get up in the morning and pray regardless of whether or not we touch the spirit, as if prayer were a regulation, an obligation, or a religious ritual. We pray, but we do not touch the spirit. Instead, we merely recite a prayer from our mind. This kind of prayer is religious prayer, and this kind of living is a religious living. It is the same with praying before meals. We may be bothered if we do not pray, but when we do pray, we do not touch the spirit. We merely put our heads down, close our eyes, and say a few sentences of thanks and praise. This is a religious ritual. This is the prayer of religious people. They feel uneasy when they do not pray, but nothing happens after they pray. Many times our prayers are the same. Our prayers are religious and ritualistic and do not touch the spirit. Of course, if some people touch the spirit when they pray before meals, then their prayer is not ritualistic. But for the majority of Christians, praying before meals is merely part of a religious living, because in their prayers they do not touch God. Anything that we do without being touched in our spirit is part of a religious living.
We may be doing activities that are seemingly spiritual, such as distributing gospel tracts, preaching the gospel, and visiting people, but if we are doing them without touching the spirit, then they do not have any spiritual weight or spiritual element. If we are not moved in the spirit, then our outward gospel preaching is a religious ritual; it is an aspect of the religious living. If our spirit does not touch the Spirit, then even our coming to the meetings may be an aspect of a religious living. While the unbelievers watch television or play mah-jongg after work, we Christians rush to the meeting hall to attend meetings. However, if our spirit is not moved and does not touch God, we are just the same as the unbelievers. This kind of meeting life may actually be part of our religious living.
Any aspect of our living that is not a result of our spirit touching the Spirit of God is part of either an ethical living or a religious living. We can live out these two kinds of living without fellowshipping with God, without the Spirit of God, and without the exercise of our spirit. Our daily living and work must come from our spirit touching the Spirit of God and must come from our spirit. Our humility should be the result of our spirit touching the Spirit of God. Our love should come from our spirit touching the Spirit of God. When our spirit touches the Spirit of God and when we fellowship with the Spirit of God, the Spirit of God will move us and urge us so that we cannot help but love man. This kind of love does not come merely from us but is produced from our fellowship with God, our union with God, and our contact with the Spirit of God.