In preaching the gospel, most people speak much about the Lord’s coming but not about His going. The Lord Jesus Himself said, “But I tell you the truth, It is expedient for you that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Comforter will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you” (John 16:7). When the Lord mentioned His coming, He simply touched on it lightly. He said that the Son of Man had come to seek and to save that which was lost (Luke 19:10). When He mentioned His going, however, He stressed it very much. The Lord’s going was expedient for us. If He had not gone, the Holy Spirit would not have come. In John 14, 15, and 16, the word going is very significant. The Lord Jesus is not only the Lord who came but also the Lord who went. His coming was His incarnation, and His going was His death and resurrection.
We already know that we all have the principle of “coming,” that is, the principle of incarnation in us, but do we have the principle of “going”? Do we have the principle of death and resurrection in us? The principle of death and resurrection is to bring man to the heavens, to bring man into God. The Lord has now come into us, and His life has passed through death and resurrection. Thus, the One who dwells in us is the God of death and resurrection. When we are joined to Him, we are joined to His death and resurrection, so we also have the principle of death and resurrection. Objectively, we have died and were resurrected, but subjectively, we have not completely died and been resurrected.
According to the objective aspect, when Christ died and was resurrected, we also died and were resurrected. But according to the subjective aspect, we seldom have the experience of death and resurrection. When we were saved, the principle of incarnation took place in us, and God truly dwelt in us. Now all of our experiences, history, and progress should be in the principle of death and resurrection. The principle of incarnation took place in us when we were saved, but now all of our spiritual experiences, history, and progress hinge on the principle of death and resurrection.
Every saved one experienced regeneration when God entered into him. What is regeneration? Regeneration is God coming into man. Thus, incarnation already took place in us in our salvation. From the time of our salvation, our experience, progress, and spiritual story depend on the principle of death and resurrection. Hence, the story of a Christian is exactly the same as the story of Christ. The stories of Christ are the stories of incarnation and of death and resurrection, that is, the stories of God entering into man and man entering into God. These are also our stories—the stories of incarnation and of death and resurrection, of God entering into man and man entering into God.
What are death and resurrection? Death and resurrection are man’s entering into God. All of our experiences after salvation are to bring us into God. So what does it mean to have “death” in us? We have already said that for us to know Christ, we must know His death and resurrection and the power of His resurrection. All that Christ had was brought through death—His mind, His emotion, His will, His actions, and even the life of God in Him were brought through death. Everything that He had was brought into death to pass through death. With us, the principle is the same. Everything that we have must be brought through death. If you say that you have the principle of death and resurrection, then I would ask you if everything you have has been brought into death. Has everything you have passed through death? Some people may be deep in their experience of this whereas others may be more superficial. Some may experience this principle in a partial way whereas others may experience it in many ways. Regardless of how we experience this, none of us have fully passed through death. Not until we are raptured will we have fully passed through death and resurrection.
We need to know Christ according to these two principles. In His incarnation He brought God into man, and through His death and resurrection He brought man into God. All of us saved ones have some experience of incarnation because we have God in us. However, we still need to experience death and resurrection. We need the experience of our mind, emotion, will, and everything being brought into death and passing through death so that through the principles of incarnation and of death and resurrection we may have a living knowledge of Christ, a knowledge which is subjective and of life.