The Spirit is one, and this life also is one, but in the matter of supplying, this life is sometimes like water and sometimes like fire. When this life waters and supplies us inwardly, it enables us to touch the presence of God and transforms us so that our mind, emotion, and will are like God’s. At the same time, this life also burns in us, burning away our flesh, self, and corruption.
In our actual experience, many times we feel that this life in us is like water that quenches our thirst. When we are thirsty, He is there watering us, and when we are weak, He is there empowering us. In this way we experience the presence of God so that what we think, what we love, what we incline to, and what we desire match the condition of God. Then our inner being is comfortable, satisfied, living, fresh, bright, strong, and powerful. This is the issue of the supply of the water of life and the condition of our being filled with the water.
Sometimes, however, the Spirit as the fire burns in us, making us sorrowful and uncomfortable so that we grieve and abhor ourselves on the one hand and desperately want to do something for the Lord on the other. More than twenty years ago, for several months I went to pray on a hill every morning. At that time the fire was especially burning within me, and I would pray and weep at the same time. On the one hand, I was willing to live for the Lord and preach the gospel for the Lord, but on the other hand, I abhorred myself, feeling that I was so corrupted and that every bad thing or matter in the world was in me. This was the taste of the fire burning in me. In this way I had a genuine repentance and confession.
If we confess merely because we have heard the doctrine about confession, our confession is something taught, something that is the result of persuasion. It is not the issue of the burning of the Holy Spirit in us. When the Holy Spirit burns in us, we do not need people to tell us that we are sinful. Instead, we will confess that we are sinful, filthy, and evil and that our sins far exceed the sins of others. This kind of humble confession is real only in Spirit. Not only so, this fire also burns away our flesh and our disposition.
Before Satan came into man, it was sufficient for this life to be merely water. At that time man had not been mutated and did not have the evil element in him. Second Corinthians 4:7 says, “We have this treasure in earthen vessels.” Earthen vessels denotes vessels made of clay, which indicates that we are made of clay. In the garden of Eden before he sinned, Adam was also a vessel of clay, an earthen vessel. But after Satan entered into Adam, this vessel of clay became a corrupted vessel.
In Genesis 4 we see the murder of Abel, showing that something of Satan had come in (v. 8). Hence, from Genesis 3 to Revelation 20, Satan walks with man and follows man. Man and Satan are linked together. When God’s life comes into man, this life is water to God and fire to Satan. Water brings in the supply of God’s life, and fire burns away everything of Satan. Thus, after Satan entered into man in Genesis 3, the flow of fire came in. Then after Satan is cast out from man in Revelation 20, the flow of fire disappears. Instead, a river of water of life proceeds out of the throne of God. What flows out is the Spirit, and what flows into us is life. This life in us is sometimes like water and sometimes like fire. When our inner being is pure, and we reject evil and do not mind the flesh, the water flows through us to water and supply us in order that we would be fresh, bright, strong, at peace, and satisfied. However, when the things of Satan—the world, sins, and the flesh—hang on us, the life in us is like fire burning in us. This is our experience.
Today we have not yet arrived at Revelation 21; we have still not come to chapter twenty. We still have sins, the flesh, the world, and many things of Satan in us. Hence, this life is always burning in us as fire. After the burning, the water comes. Our experience is always like this—the more burning there is, the more our inner being is living, fresh, and bright, and the more peace, satisfaction, and comfort we have.
Hence, after the burning of the fire, the water comes. The water and the fire are not two rivers but one. One day there will no longer be fire. Everything of Satan will be terminated in us. This will be our transfiguration, in which we will be delivered from our flesh and the old creation. When everything of Satan is put off in us, there will no longer be fire; instead there will be water proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. When this water flows out, it is the Spirit, and when it flows into us, it is life.
Today eternity has not yet arrived, but we can have a foretaste of the eternal power. May the Lord have mercy on us that while we are still living on the earth, we would be living in spiritual reality and in a spiritual condition, being able to see one thing—whether it be fire or water—coming out of God and passing through the Lamb. That which comes from God and the Lamb is the Spirit, and the Spirit enters into us as life, the life of God. This life is sometimes like fire that burns us and sometimes like water that waters us. When we are pure inwardly, He is the water of supply, but when there is mixture in us, He is the burning fire. May we all see these two aspects of life—the watering of the water and the burning of the fire.