Ministry given by Brother Stephen Kaung, Richmond, Virginia, September 11, 1972
This is Monday morning, September 11, 1972, in Richmond, Virginia. Ministry given through Brother Stephen Kaung.
May we look to the Lord.
O Lord, how we praise Thee that Thou hast come into this world to give life to those who believe in Thee. We praise and thank Thee for this life which Thou hast given to us. Indeed, it is the light of men.
How we praise and thank Thee because Thou art in us, and we are in Thee, and nothing can separate us from Thy love. O, we do worship Thee together this morning. We draw nigh to Thee, Lord.
Breathe upon Thy Word. Make it living to all of us as we fellowship in Thy Word. We just commit this time into Thy hands, Lord.
We look to Thee for wisdom and revelation. We want to see Thee. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
Last night, we fellowshipped together on the writer of the Gospel according to John. In other words, we fellowshipped on the life of John the evangelist.
Now this morning, we would like to go into this Gospel according to John. So, will you please turn to the Gospel according to John, Chapter 1?
We will read the first eighteen verses, because the first eighteen verses serve as an introduction to the whole Gospel.
In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God,
and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
All things were made through Him;
and without Him was not anything made that hath been made.
In Him was life;
and the life was the light of men.
And the light shineth in the darkness;
and the darkness apprehended it not.There came a man, sent from God, whose name was John.
The same came for witness, that he might bear witness of the light,
that all might believe through him.
He was not the light,
but came that he might bear witness of the light.
There was the true light, even the light which lighteth every man, coming into the world.He was in the world,
and the world was made through Him,
and the world knew Him not.
He came unto His own,
and they that were His own received Him not.
But as many as received Him,
to them gave He the right to become children of God,
even to them that believe on His name:
who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh,
nor of the will of man, but of God.And the Word became flesh,
and dwelt among us
(and we beheld His glory,
glory as of the only begotten from the Father),
full of grace and truth.John beareth witness of Him, and crieth, saying,
This was He of whom I said,
He that cometh after me is become before me:
for He was before me.
For of His fullness we all received,
and grace for grace.
For the law was given through Moses;
grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
No man hath seen God at any time;
the only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father,
He hath declared Him.
Then we turn to the end of the Gospel, John Chapter 20, verses 30 and 31.
Many other signs therefore did Jesus in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book:
but these are written, that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God;
and that believing ye may have life in His name.
That is all we will read for this morning.
We mentioned in the past that the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ is presented to us with four different approaches. Some people, in order to help us remember these four different faces, or aspects, of our Lord, try to give us symbolic pictures.
As you remember, before the throne of God there are four living creatures. You find that in Revelation 4. The first living creature is like a lion; the second one is like a calf, or an ox; the third one is like a man; and the fourth one is like an eagle.
Now, brothers and sisters, just to help us remember: the first living creature, which has the resemblance of a lion, represents, or helps us to remember, the Gospel according to Matthew. In Matthew, you find our Lord Jesus presented to us as the King—the Lion of the tribe of Judah: majestic, glorious, mighty, powerful.
In the Gospel according to Mark, our Lord is presented to us as a Servant of God, most humble, and giving His life for the ransom of many. It is like the calf, the ox, that always serves.
Then, in the Gospel according to Luke, you find the Lord presented to us as the Son of Man—a new mankind, the beginning of a new race, the Man after God’s own heart. Here, you find the third living creature has the resemblance of a man.
Finally, the last living creature is like an eagle. This is what we find in the Gospel according to John. John presents to us Christ as the Son of God, as God, like an eagle in heaven.
Now, brothers and sisters, I do believe that everyone who reads the Gospel according to John will come to this conclusion: that in the Gospel of John, he presents Christ to us as the Son of God.
John himself says it explicitly at the very end of the Gospel: he writes these things in order that we may see that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that, believing in Him, we will receive eternal life.
But I wonder, brothers and sisters, do we know what is the meaning of our Lord Jesus being the Son of God?
Now, we know that He is the Son of Man. As the Son of Man, there is a peculiar meaning to it. In other words, as the Son of Man, you do not think of Him merely in terms of a man’s form. Rather, you think in terms of His being the beginning of a new mankind.
He is different from the first man. He is the second Man, a new mankind. That is the reason why He is called the Son of Man. Out of Him comes a new race.
When you think of our Lord Jesus as the Son of God, what do you mean by His being the Son of God? Of course, He is God’s Son; that is right. But then you probably will ask the question, “When was He born?”
You know, this is a theological question. When we tell people that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, immediately their question will be, “Now, when was He born?” Theologians try to solve that mystery and say that He was eternally generated. Still, we do not understand what it means.
It is true that His generation is different from our generation; that is clear. But it is still a mystery to us. Dear brothers and sisters, when we think of the Lord Jesus as the Son of God, what really does it mean? What does God try to tell us?
I believe the Lord does not want us to think merely in theological terms—when was He born, whether He was eternally generated or not. Probably God does not want us to think of these things because it is a mystery. No matter how we explain it, it is still a mystery; we do not understand.
But I do believe that when Christ is presented to us as the Son of God, there is a special significance to it. This you find in the Gospel according to John.
What do you mean by Christ being the Son of God? It simply means that He is a revelation of God. No one has ever seen God, but the One who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
That is the meaning of the Son of God. If you see this, it is very clear. You do not need to delve into the mystery of God. You simply accept what the Scripture has told us: Christ is the Son of God. Why? Because He declares God. He reveals God. He is the revelation of God.
No one has ever seen God. No one has ever known God. God was the great Unknown, but this great Unknown is now being made known to us by our Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Because He is the Son of God.
Again and again in the Gospel according to John, you find Him saying, “When you see My works, you know that the Father is in Me, and I am in the Father.”
He said, “If you see Me, you see the Father. If you honor Me, you honor the One who sent Me.” Toward the very last, even Philip asked the Lord, “Show us the Father.” The Lord said to him, “Have I been so long with you, and you still ask, ‘Show us the Father’? Do you not know that the Father is in Me, and I am in the Father? If you see Me, you see the Father. I have declared Him. I am the Son.”
This is the meaning of Christ being the Son.
But in order to reveal, or declare, the Father, two things are necessary. First, He has to be the fullness of the Godhead in order to declare God. All that the Father is, and all that the Father has, must be in Him.
We have just mentioned that the Gospel according to John presents Christ to us as the Son of God. The special meaning of the term the Son of God is that He is the One who has declared the Father.
No one has ever seen God. No one has ever known God. But the Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him. Now, that is the Scriptural meaning of the term the Son of God.
But in order to reveal the Father, in order to declare the Father to us as the Son, two things are necessary. First, all that the Father is, all that God is and has, must be in the Son. Otherwise, He will not be able to fully declare the Father.
Otherwise, there will be something lacking, and it will not be a full revelation. He will not be able to be the Son of God as He is. Therefore, you find in the Gospel according to John, again and again, He says, “The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hand.”
“The Father loveth the Son, and showeth Him all things.” “Whatever the Father has shown Me, this I do.” Why? Because unless all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him bodily, He will not be able to be that revelation of God.
So, dear brothers and sisters, we see here that as the Son of God, He is also the fullness of the Godhead. There is nothing that belongs to the Godhead, nothing that belongs to the Father, nothing that the Father is, that is not in Him. Everything, all things, are in Him. He is the fullness of the Godhead.
You see how rich is the Son. He is as rich as the Godhead.
Secondly, He must not only be the fullness of the Godhead; He has to empty Himself completely in order that He may be a pure representation, a pure declaration, of the Father.
In other words, there cannot be anything that is of Himself remaining. If there is anything of Himself remaining, it will distort the picture; it will distort the testimony of God.
Of course, this refers especially to our Lord Jesus as a man. That is the reason why you find that He had to empty Himself of His glory, of His honor, of His position, and of His power, and become a man. He submitted Himself completely under God, under the Father.
Again and again in the Gospel according to John, you find Him saying, “I can do nothing by Myself. I do it because the Father has done it, and I have seen Him doing it. I can say nothing by Myself. Whatever I say is because I have heard My Father say it.”
Now, dear brothers and sisters, why is this necessary? Because He is the Son of God. You know, as God, He has all the glory, all the honor, all the position, and all the power that are His due.
But in order to be the Son of God, He has to put Himself under the Father. To put Himself under the Father, He has to empty Himself. That is what you find in the life of our Lord Jesus.
So, brothers and sisters, this is what you find in the Gospel according to John. He is the Son of God. On the one hand, He has the fullness of God in Him; yet, on the other hand, He seems to empty Himself of everything. With these two conditions in Him, He is presented to us as the Son of God.
The Son of God came to this world to declare the Father.
There is a great difference here between the Old Testament and the New Testament. In Old Testament times, God, as He is presented to the children of Israel and to the world, is the transcendent God.
In other words, He is the God who lives in the third heaven. He lives in glory. Even though He revealed Himself partially to the children of Israel and to the world, when He revealed Himself, He always revealed Himself with such majesty and such glory that the people were put in fear.
When God gave the law through Moses to the children of Israel on Mount Sinai, the children of Israel were in such fear that they pleaded with Moses, “Do not let God speak to us directly. Just speak to Him, and pass it on to us. That will be enough.”
Why? They were afraid. They saw God as transcendent. He was the God who was high above, full of glory and majesty. He was not One whom you could approach. He was One whom you worshiped at a distance.
The more you feared God, the more you retreated, because He was so full of majesty and glory. In the Old Testament, you find God presented to us as God the Transcendent, far above all.
Under the old covenant, the highest spiritual life you could ever achieve was, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” In other words, the more you were afraid of Him, the better you were. The more you worshiped Him at a distance, with fear and trembling, that was all you could do.
But, dear brothers and sisters, something happened when the Son of God came to this world. He brought God to us.
God is still the transcendent God. He is still the God who lives in the third heaven, and yet He is also God who is so near to us. Not only so near, but He is in us. God is immanent—not only transcendent, but immanent. This is the meaning of incarnation.
The Word became flesh. Why the Word? Because He was the utterance, the expression, of the Godhead. The Word became flesh. The Word has become flesh; He has tabernacled among men.
As John the apostle said, “We see Him. We hear Him. We touch Him. We contemplate Him.” He is no longer the God who is far, far away.
He is the God who can be seen, can be heard, can be touched, and can be contemplated. God is now here. God is now present.
Now, you find it is no longer merely a matter of “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” Here, you find the love of Christ. Through the Son of God, God has come to us. God is now with us, and God is now in us.
This is what Christ, the Son of God, has brought to us. Therefore John said, “The Word became flesh, and tabernacled among men, and we have beheld His glory, even the glory of the only begotten Son with the Father.”
Here you find our Lord Jesus in our midst, the Son of God. When we see the Lord Jesus, we see the Father. When we hear Him, we hear the Father. When we touch Him, we touch the Father.
O, grace and truth! Now why is it that He is full of grace and truth?
In 1 John, you find John showing us that God is light and God is love. The very qualities of God, the very nature of God—He is love, and He is light. This is what God is.
Then, in the Gospel according to John, you find Christ full of grace and truth. God is love; but when the love of God comes to us, it is grace—the grace of our Lord Jesus.
God is light; but when God’s light comes to us, it is truth. It is reality. It is true.
Therefore, you find our Lord Jesus, being the Son of God, is the One who reveals to us what God is. God is love; therefore, He is full of grace. All the grace that our Lord Jesus has shown us is but an expression of the love of God the Father.
It is not just grace in itself, but when we receive it, it is grace. What is grace? Something undeserved. We do not deserve it. It is free, freely given to us—we who are unworthy. Why such grace? Because of love. God is love.
Brothers and sisters, today we find truth not in cold doctrine, but in the sense of reality. How do we enter into the reality of all spiritual things? It is because God is light. There is no darkness in Him.
In the whole Gospel according to John, you find this book written in that way. I believe you must have noticed the way John writes his Gospel. Usually, he gives us an incident—something that happened, something that our Lord Jesus did.
After that incident or story, he enters into a kind of discourse or teaching, telling us what that story really means. When John writes his Gospel, you find that he always presents to us a story of grace, followed by a teaching of truth.
The story is the story of grace: what the Lord has done to us who are so undeserving. But after we have received such grace, the Holy Spirit begins to teach us what that grace really means. He brings us to the truth.
For instance, here was a man who was sick for thirty-eight years. The Lord Jesus came and said, “Wouldest thou be made whole?” He said, “Nobody puts me into the pool.” The Lord said, “Rise up, take up thy bed, and walk.” And he did.
Afterward, the Lord met him in the temple and said, “Now thou art healed. Sin no more, lest a worse thing befall thee.” This is the story. This is the story of grace.
But after the story, you find in John 5 that the Lord began a discourse. During His discourse, He said that the Father judges no one, because He has given judgment to the Son, so that people will honor the Son as they honor the Father.
Anyone who hears the voice of the Son and believes Him shall not be judged; he has passed out of death into life. Here the Lord shows us that He is the Judge. The Father has given judgment to Him, and He judges according to the Father. His judgment is true.
Yet He is able to dispense grace to us. Why? Because He Himself took upon Himself our judgment. Therefore, anyone who believes in Him will not be judged. So you find here first the story of grace, and then it is followed by a teaching of truth.
That is the whole method, we may say, by which the Gospel according to John is written.
But this grace and truth are not something apart from the Lord Jesus. Why? Because the Bible says, “The law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
There is a great difference here. The law came through Moses. Moses was the lawgiver; through him, the law was given to the children of Israel. But he was not the law.
Moses was the lawgiver, but he was not the law. You find that even in the lifetime of Moses, he himself violated and offended the Lord. Because he had offended the Lord, he was not allowed to enter into the promised land. He was put under discipline.
But with Christ Jesus it is different. Grace and truth subsist through Christ Jesus. What do you mean by subsist? It means that grace and truth are in Him. They are maintained by Him, and they are only real in Him.
He is not only the One who dispenses grace. He is not only the One who teaches truth. But He is grace, and He is truth.
Now, this is something we have to remember. Grace is not something that Christ dispenses to you as if you have a need, you ask the Lord for that need, and the Lord says, “All right, I will give you grace that your need may be met.” Then you take the grace and go away.
The Lord says, “I am the grace. I am the grace.”
This is why you find in 2 Corinthians 12 a man of God who had a problem. He had a thorn in his flesh. The reason why he had the thorn was not because he had sinned, but because he had received much revelation.
Is that not strange? Not because he had sinned, but because he had received such great revelations. Because he received so much revelation, God allowed Satan to attack him. Why did God allow Satan to attack him? That he might be humbled and not be exalted above measure.
Here you find that he had a problem, a thorn in the flesh, and it was very painful. I do not know whether you have ever been touched by a thorn. This morning, our brother and I were walking, and he was picking up a thistle. I had never seen a thistle before.
I mean, I read in the Bible, “thorns and thistles,” but I never knew what a thistle was. So he showed me one, and when I took it from my brother’s hand, I was pricked—only a little bit, of course, but I was pricked.
A thorn in the flesh is not merely a touch of the thorn, but the thorn is in the flesh. It is there all the time. It is so irritating; it is so painful.
Because of that, Paul prayed three times, “Lord, remove it. Remove it.” But the Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for thee: for My power is made perfect in weakness.”
What is this grace of which the Lord is talking? “My grace is sufficient for thee.” Did the Lord give him some kind of numbness, so that he would not feel the pain of the thorn? Or some kind of strength, some numbing sensitivity, so that he would not feel it as much or could overcome it? No.
The Lord says, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” In other words, “I am your grace. I am with you.” Even though you feel the pain of that thorn, yet you can overcome it.
“My power will be manifested in your weakness.” You are weak. You will continue to be weak. You will not come to a point and say, “Now I am strong.” Never. You will remain in weakness.
But at the same time, you will find the power of God is strong. You can overcome the thorn and turn the thorn into a crown. Why? Because the Lord is your grace.
Brothers and sisters, that is grace.
John is such a subjective person. His knowledge of the Lord is so intimate. You remember, when he first met the Lord, the Lord said, “What seek ye?” You remember, at the last supper, how he leaned upon the breast of the Lord.
With John, it is not a matter of things. With John, it is a matter of the life of Christ. What is grace? He is the Son of God, full of grace. But what is grace? It is not something that He dispenses.
You need one thing, and He says, “All right, I will give you one grace.” You need another thing, and He says, “I will give you another grace.” When you are sick, He gives you a grace called healing. When you are in lack, He gives you a grace called food.
No, He is that grace. He gave Himself to us. As we experience His life, we receive grace upon grace. In other words, there is no such thing as grace apart from the life of Christ.
The same thing is true with truth. Oftentimes, we take truth objectively. We say, “This truth and that truth: the truth of sanctification, the truth of redemption, the truth of transformation, the truth of the second coming,” and all these things.
We think of truth in terms of objective teaching. But according to the Gospel of John, truth subsists in Christ. In other words, when you take truth away from Christ, it no longer is truth.
How do you experience truth in your life? We say that we were crucified with Christ; no longer we, but Christ lives in us. Is it true? It is true. Do you believe in the truth? You do. But sometimes it does not work.
Why is it that sometimes it works and sometimes it does not work? The reason is that sometimes you abide in Christ, and sometimes you are away from Christ.
When you abide in Christ, it is true. It is reality. It works. But when you are not abiding in Christ, no matter how true the whole thing is, it is not real in your experience. It subsists in Christ.
Full of grace and truth—but all subsists in Christ.
There is one word that John uses very much, and that is the word life. In the Gospel according to John, he uses the word life, or live, fifty-two times. There is probably another word that he uses more than that: believe. Believe is used ninety-eight times.
But here you find the word life. The whole Gospel according to John emphasizes a great deal this matter of life.
It is just the combination of grace and truth. How does Christ dispense His grace to us? How does Christ teach His truth to us? It is by His life. It is all in His life.
God has come to us in the Person of His Son, and His Son gives us His life. His life may be imparted to us.
That grain of wheat must fall into the ground and die. If it does not die, it abides alone. That speaks of our Lord Jesus. When He was on this earth, before His death, He was that grain of wheat, alone in a field of death.
As you read the Gospel of John and the four Gospels, you find what a life that grain of wheat had! How did He speak? How did He walk? How did He act? How did He react?
In everything, you find that He is totally different. He is heavenly. He is spiritual. He is eternal. You look at the life of the Lord Jesus, and you cannot help but say, “Now here is a life full of grace and truth,” totally different from everybody else.
I was told that somebody discovered a grain of wheat, or something like it, after one hundred years. It was still living. After one hundred years, they put it in the ground, and it bore fruit. The life was still there.
Now, our Lord Jesus—outwardly you find a shell, the form of a man, but within Him is the divine life. In Him was life, and this divine life is full of love and light.
When this divine life walked upon this earth, you find it expressed in grace and truth. This is what we see in the life of our Lord Jesus. O, we admire that life!
But if He remained and did not die, He would abide altogether alone. He would be beyond human imitation. You can admire Him, but you cannot copy Him. It is impossible.
But one thing happened. On the cross, when He died, when His outward shell, as it were, was broken, then the life within was released.
With John, he emphasizes very much this life. God has come to this world in the Son, but how can the Son make God with us? How can the Son give us His life?
There is only one way: the release of life. Because of His death on the cross, dear brothers and sisters, now we have received eternal life. Eternal life simply means His life—God’s life.
By His death and resurrection, and by the Holy Spirit, today we who believe in the Lord Jesus have His life in us. To put it in another way, we are now united with God.
God is no longer the God who is far away from us. God is now in us, and we are in Him. As the Lord said, “My Father is in Me, and I am in the Father.” But now, “You are in Me, and I am in you.” You find this in John 14 through John 16.
So, dear brothers and sisters, the whole emphasis of the Gospel of John is not that we may see God apart from ourselves. The whole approach is that God has now come in the Son, and the Son, by His death and resurrection, is now able to bring God to us.
There is now a union. As the Father is in the Son, and the Son is in the Father, so we are now in Him, and He is now in us. It is very, very subjective, not merely objective.
Having received this life, brothers and sisters, the question is: what is the nature of this life? But before we say that, how do we know that today we do not know God merely as an objective object of worship?
He is still there, no doubt about it. But we know God more as our Father. In Old Testament times, people knew God as God, the Maker, the Creator. But they did not know God as Father.
Even though sometimes in the Old Testament you find such an expression—God is like a father to the children of Israel, to the nation of Israel—they did not have that personal relationship.
It is always in the Son that God has become our Father. It is the Son who has brought the Father to us. So now we know God not only as our Maker, as One whom we worship at a distance with fear and trembling, but we know Him as our Father.
God is now in us, and we are in Him. That is what the Son has done.
Now we have that life of the Son in us. He that hath the Son hath life. But, brothers and sisters, do you know what that life is? Do you know what is the nature of that life?
The nature of the life is light and love. We have in us a life—the life of the Son of God—and the nature of that life is light and love.
Because this is the nature of this life, what will be its expression? If we allow this life to take control of our lives, it will be grace and truth.
So our problem today is very simple: we have to follow the footsteps of our Lord. The Lord said, “Except a grain of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it beareth much fruit.”
Then the Lord continues: “He who loves Me should follow Me. Wherever I am, there he should be. If you lose your life for My sake, you will gain it unto eternal life.”
So, brothers and sisters, you find the same principle is now working in us. In that sense, the Word has become flesh in us. Christ is now in us. God is now in us. His life is now in us.
How can that life be released and multiplied? The same principle applies. The Lord had to go to the cross for death in order that His life might be released to us.
If we want to see the life of Christ multiplied and increased in us, we have to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Him.
The reason why the life of Christ is not more manifested through us is not because the life is not there. The reason why we are not so gracious and so truthful, the reason why we do not seem to express Christ in His grace and His truth, is not because the life is not there.
We already have that divine life. It is because we try to preserve our shell—that is, our outward man. If we try to preserve our outward man, the result is that life is imprisoned.
Here you find the same principle: we have to break forth. The life has to break through the shell. If we are willing to deny our soul-life and let our outward man be broken, then you will find the life of Christ revealed.
What do you find there? You will find within you love and light, and people will find without you grace and truth.
Therefore, the Gospel of John is not just presenting Christ to us as the Son of God in an objective way. John presents Christ as the Son of God in a most subjective fashion.
In other words, do not say merely, “The Lord Jesus came, the Son of God.” Why did He come? He came that He might have many sons like unto Himself. He is to lead many sons into glory. He is to be the Firstborn among many brethren.
He is the Son of God, but by sharing His life with us, we too may be many sons of God, just like Him. He is to lead many sons into glory.
To put it another way, He is a Bridegroom who came to this world to seek for His bride. That is the whole outlook of the Gospel according to John. In the beginning, you see the Son of God; toward the end, you see many sons brought into glory.
So, dear brothers and sisters, as we read the Gospel according to John, we should not read it merely objectively—knowing Christ as the Son of God in an objective way, and knowing that He gives grace and truth in an objective way.
That is not John’s approach. John’s approach is that he presents Christ as the Son of God that we may receive Him. As we receive Him, we allow His life to take control of us and to live out through us.
As He is, so are we. Why? Because He is in us. That is the whole approach of the Gospel according to John.
Let us pray.
O Lord, we do ask Thee that, as we read the Gospel according to John, we may truly see Christ, the Son of God, full of grace and truth, imparting Himself to us.
That we, in turn, may manifest Him as He has manifested the Father. O Lord, do let us see this union, this mystery.
Do allow this mystery of the union to be expressed and manifested, that Christ may be exalted in our lives.
We ask all in the name of our Lord Jesus and for His glory. Amen.