Furthermore, in the church life we must not only have virtue, but transformed virtues (Rom. 12:2; Eph. 4:23-24; 2 Cor. 3:18). Transformed virtues are the human virtues with the element of the divine nature added into them. A type of transformation takes place when you eat nourishing food. Before eating the food, you may be weak and pale in appearance. But after eating well for a few days your countenance becomes bright and ruddy. In the church life, all the virtues should be transformed. You may be a good man, and now that you have been regenerated, you may still try to behave yourself. However, in addition, because you pray and contact the Lord every day, the Lord infuses you. For the Lord to infuse you is for Him to inject you with the divine essence. When the divine essence has been infused into your being, your human virtues will be altogether transformed, strengthened, and enriched. Your human virtues will be strengthened and enriched with the divine attributes. Then you will live in the church a life that is full of virtues. These virtues are not angelic; they are still very human. But all the human virtues have been enriched by the divine attributes. This is marvelous.
In Ephesians 3:8 Paul tells us that he was ministering the unsearchable riches of Christ to the believers. Paul ministered not doctrine, but the unsearchable riches of Christ. Doctrine may be likened to a menu or a recipe, while the unsearchable riches of Christ may be compared to the food itself. Paul did not minister the menu or the recipes, but all the rich food. By eating the food, we obtain all the riches. Paul ministered the unsearchable riches of Christ. After ministering these riches to the believers, he prayed, “I bow my knees unto the Father...that He would grant you...to be strengthened with power through His Spirit into the inner man, that Christ may make His home in your hearts” (Eph. 3:14-17). Paul prayed that the believers would not only enjoy the riches of Christ, but be completely filled up and occupied by Christ. In this way Christ would make His home in the believers’ hearts, and this very Christ would saturate their entire being. He would fill, strengthen, and enrich all their virtues. Eventually, all the believers would be filled unto all the fullness of God (Eph. 3:19).
By this we may realize what kind of persons the believers are. The believers are persons who always enjoy Christ and are filled with Christ, saturated with Christ, until they are full of God. Thus they become the very expression of God. They are saturated with God and even one with God. Their love, humility, and meekness are full of the divine essence. Their virtues are actually the mingling of divinity with humanity. Eventually, all the virtues in the church life should be just the mingling of God with man. In other words, the virtues in the church life should be God’s expression in man. We are human beings, but we should live a life full of virtues, a life which expresses God. According to Paul’s words in 1 Timothy 3:16, this is a great mystery, that God is manifested in the flesh. The church life is simply God manifested in the flesh. We all are flesh, yet we manifest God and God is manifested in our virtues. To repeat, the church life is just the divine attributes expressed, manifested, in human virtues. In other words, the church life is human virtues expressing God.
May we all be persons who enjoy the riches of Christ. Then Christ will make His home in our entire being, filling us and saturating us until we are filled unto all the fullness of God. Then we shall become the manifestation of God in the human virtues which express the divine attributes. This is the factor of the transformed human virtues for the church life. For the church life, there is the need of such transformed virtues, virtues that are human but strengthened, enriched, and transformed by the divine attributes. These are human virtues, but they express God.
Let us go on to see what the main virtues are for the church life. These are not virtues for the human society, but virtues for the church life.