In the progressing stage of God's full salvation, the stage of transformation, the believers experience and enjoy the processed Triune God in the dispensing of the Divine Trinity. The previous five lessons covered the believers' experience and enjoyment of God as the Father in the love of the Triune God. Beginning with this lesson we will go on to see the believers' experience and enjoyment of Christ as the Son in the grace of the Triune God.
According to the New Testament, grace is what Christ is to us for our enjoyment (John 1:16-17), that is, Christ as the embodiment of the Triune God (Col. 2:9) experienced and enjoyed by us through the divine dispensing. Second Corinthians 13:14 says, "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all." The love of God is the source, the grace of Christ is the course, and the fellowship of the Spirit is the transmission of the course with the source. Hence, grace issues from God's love. The divine love is with the Father. When this love comes with the Son, it becomes grace (John 1:17). Therefore, grace is not separate from love; love and grace are one reality in two aspects. With the Father we experience and enjoy the divine love; with the Son we experience and enjoy the divine grace. As we experience and enjoy the processed Triune God in the dispensing of the Divine Trinity, we experience and enjoy Christ as the Son in the grace of the Triune God.
As we experience and enjoy Christ as the Son in His grace, we enjoy Him as our portion. In Colossians 1:12 Paul speaks of Christ as the portion of the saints. The Greek word for portion here may also be translated "lot." Paul used this term with the allotment of the good land among the Israelites in the Old Testament as the background. Among the twelve tribes, every tribe was given a lot, a portion of the good land, as their inheritance. The good land is a type of the all-inclusive Christ. Today, as the New Testament believers, we do not have the physical land as our portion; rather, our portion is Christ. As the portion of the saints, Christ becomes our divine inheritance for our experience and enjoyment.
First Corinthians 1:2 says that Christ is "theirs and ours." Christ as the all-inclusive One belongs to all the believers, for He is the portion given to us by God. We have been called by the faithful God into the fellowship of such a Christ (v. 9), that is, a fellowship in which we partake of the union with, and participate in, God's Son, Jesus Christ, that we may have Him as our portion.