For bodily exercise is profitable for a little; but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the life which now is, and of that which is to come.
Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptation.
For to this end we labor and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of them that believe.
Pay attention to the life that now is and to that which is to come. This is a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptance. In other words, it can be believed, and it will be accomplished.
But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and truth: for such doth the Father seek to be His worshippers.
God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.
For ye received not the spirit of bondage again unto fear; but ye received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
The Spirit Himself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are children of God:
and if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him.
That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, that which we have seen with our eyes, that which we beheld, and our hands handled, concerning the Word of life
(and the life was manifested, and we have seen, and bear witness, and declare unto you the life, the eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us);
that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also, that ye also may have fellowship with us: yea, and our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ:
and these things we write, that our joy may be made full.
Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God abideth in him, and he in God.
And we know and have believed the love which God hath in us. God is love; and he that abideth in love abideth in God, and God abideth in him.
Herein is love made perfect with us, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment; because as He is, even so are we in this world.
As we gather before You, our hearts are full of praise and thanksgiving.
We thank and praise You because, in Your love, You were willing to come into this world and die on the cross for us. What we have become, who we are, is all the work of Your grace.
We thank and praise You that You have given us another opportunity to read Your Word. May Your Word transform us and conform us to the image of Your Son.
Then Your will can be accomplished, and Your glory can be manifested. We pray this in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
Well then, it is the Lord’s grace that we can, one more time, come into His presence.
I always feel that after the breaking of bread, it is difficult to share the Word. When we break bread, we have already reached the climax of the spirit. It is almost as if speaking after the breaking of bread is unnecessary. But we thank and praise God that He continues to give us another opportunity.
This time, we are not sharing any particular doctrine. You have not come here to hear any special message. As we gather here, we will be led by the Holy Spirit and exercise together.
The Word of the Lord is very clear: bodily exercise profits a little, but exercising ourselves unto godliness has a much greater purpose. The will of God is to help us conform to the image of His Son.
God is not satisfied merely because our sins are forgiven and we can go to heaven. The will of God is glorious, because He is glorious. Therefore, He wants to lead us into His glory.
It is true that one day the Lord Jesus will lead us all into His glory. But in order to enter that glory, first we need to have glory within us. Otherwise, we will not be able to enjoy that glory.
I remember a story. Once, a group of Christians were going on a trip. There were two ships: one for the people of the world, who had planned ahead for the trip, and another ship prepared for the Christians.
One brother was in a hurry. He saw a ship and went aboard, but he made a mistake and went onto the other ship. When the ship left, he realized the condition on that ship. There were all kinds of noises, and it caused him much discomfort and grief in his heart. He did not know that he had boarded the wrong ship.
So, brothers and sisters, today we all hope that one day the Lord will bring us into His glory. But if we do not allow His glory to be constituted in our hearts, I am afraid that even when we enter glory, we will not be able to experience it.
The will of God is to help us become like Him. Not only has He given us His life; He also wants us to exercise this life, that it may grow in us and transform us until the full stature of Jesus Christ is formed in us.
This is the will and desire of the Lord for every one of His children. He wants to accomplish this; therefore, He has prepared all things necessary. He also hopes that we will cooperate with Him.
God truly respects our personality. God is the highest will in this universe, yet He has given us freedom of will. He will never go against the will of His creation. Since He has given us this free will, He also respects it. He wants us to agree with Him, and then He can do His work in us.
Therefore, God wants us to exercise ourselves unto godliness so that we can be like Him. But how do we exercise godliness?
We know how to exercise our bodies, but how do we exercise godliness? Exercising godliness is not like exercising the body. The Bible says that God is Spirit. Because He is Spirit, to exercise godliness we need to exercise our spirit.
Bodily exercise has no benefit in this matter. That does not mean that bodily exercise has no value at all; it benefits our bodies. But it does not profit us in exercising godliness, in becoming like God. If we want to be like Him, we need to be like Him in spirit.
I remember a long time ago hearing about Russia sending a satellite into the sky. When the astronauts returned to earth, one of them said, “I was in the atmosphere. I looked everywhere, and I could not find God. Therefore, there is no God.”
He thought that God was like him, someone whom we can see with our physical eyes. But because God is Spirit, and that person had no spiritual perception, how could he see God?
Not only can our bodies not touch God; even our minds and our wills cannot touch God. Men try to examine and discover the mystery of God, but there is no way they can do that. God is beyond human wisdom and knowledge.
If we are to have contact with God, we need to contact Him in spirit. The spirit gives us the consciousness of God.
We thank God that when He created us, He breathed His breath into the nostrils of man. This breath of God, which entered man, became the spirit of man. Therefore, man and God could have contact.
Unfortunately, our ancestors, Adam and Eve, disobeyed God. God said concerning the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, “In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.”
Adam lived more than nine hundred years and had children, so his body did not immediately die. His soul did not immediately die. But in the day that he ate, his spirit died. We have explained this already.
The scientific meaning of death is separation from one’s proper environment—the cessation of communion with one’s proper environment. Since God is the proper environment of our spirit, if we cease to have communion with Him, that is death.
Therefore, Adam was driven out of the Garden of Eden. This represents the separation between man and God. Man became flesh. He had only a body and a soul; his spirit died.
But we thank God. Because He loves us, He prepared salvation for us. He sent His Son into this world, and He took away the iniquities of our hearts.
Actually speaking, He revived our spirit and gave us new life. He revived this spirit, which had been in a coma. Therefore, John 3:6 says:
That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.
When we are saved, our spirit is revived and we can have communion with God.
The Spirit that God has given us is the Spirit of the Son. The Holy Spirit and our spirit together testify that we are His children, and we can cry, “Abba, Father.”
Not only do we have the life of Christ, but our spirit is also revived. The Holy Spirit dwells in us—indeed, the Holy Spirit dwells in our spirit. What is the Holy Spirit doing? He teaches us in everything. He brings us into Christ.
When the Holy Spirit works in us, the functions of our spirit need to be exercised.
The Holy Spirit enlightens our conscience so that our conscience can tell right from wrong, what is proper and what is not proper. If we obey whenever He shows us what is not proper, and if we obey what He shows us to do, we will have a pure conscience.
If our conscience does not accuse us, we can live before God with righteousness. We need to exercise the conscience in our spirit.
If we lose our conscience, it is like a shipwreck. When we live with faith and a pure conscience, we preserve our faith. If we do not have a pure conscience, we will lose our faith. This is something we experience every day.
Therefore Paul said that he exercised himself to have a conscience void of offence toward God and men. We exercise our conscience all the time.
We not only exercise our conscience; we also exercise our intuition. The Holy Spirit enlightens us with His life so that we can know what is the will of God and what is not. Then we can walk in the will of God.
How do we know that something is the will of God and something else is not? It is through the teaching of the Holy Spirit in our intuition. We have already shared about this.
This morning we want to share about another function of the spirit, which is communion. Strictly speaking, communion is the highest function of the spirit, and it is also one of its most basic functions.
The reason God enlightens our spirit is so that we may have communion with Him. God loves to have communion with man. God wants to abide in us.
If He wants communion with us and wants to abide in us, we need to have fellowship and communion with Him in our spirit. The day you were saved, your spirit was revived, and immediately you had communion with God. Is that not our experience?
In the past, you had no communion with God. Perhaps you were born into a Christian family. Perhaps you participated in different activities of the church. You may even have known something about the Bible and participated in Christian activities. Yet you had no communion with God. What you did was only external.
The moment you are saved, you do not have to wait until the next day. The moment you are saved, your spirit is revived. You can immediately call God “Father,” and you have this connection with Him. This is the experience of every Christian.
But we need to remember that God does not want us to have communion with Him only at that moment. He wants continuous communion with us. In the spirit, we can have communion with Him, and therefore He can keep giving Himself to us.
Communion is based on two conditions. First, there must be the same nature. God is Spirit; this is His nature. If you are to have communion with God, your spirit must be alive. If your spirit is not alive, you cannot have communion with God.
The Bible says that deep calleth unto deep. God is Spirit, and therefore you can contact Him only in spirit. You cannot contact Him with your body, nor can you do so with your mind or will. You need your spirit to have contact with Him. The nature has to be the same.
Not only must the nature be the same; the condition also needs to be the same. What does that mean?
God is Spirit, so we need to communicate with Him in spirit. God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we walk in darkness, we cannot have communion with light.
Let us turn to 2 Corinthians 6.
Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers: for what fellowship have righteousness and iniquity? or what communion hath light with darkness?
Righteousness and lawlessness cannot have fellowship. This speaks about condition.
Not only do we need communion of spirit with Spirit; even though our spirit has been revived, if we do not have a pure conscience, we cannot have communion with God. God is light. If we as believers still walk in darkness, we cannot have communion with Him.
And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what portion hath a believer with an unbeliever?
And what agreement hath a temple of God with idols? for we are a temple of the living God; even as God said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.
Wherefore come ye out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; and I will receive you,
and will be to you a Father, and ye shall be to Me sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.
Some may think, “Now that I have the spirit, I can have communion with God anytime and anywhere.” Yes, you have the basis of communion with God. But if you want communion, you also need to have the same condition.
He is righteous; therefore, you need to walk righteously. He is light; therefore, you also need to walk in light. It is true that our degree of likeness to God is very limited. God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in Him. Even though we walk in the light, we still have much darkness. We need to enter into the light of life gradually.
But we thank God: He knows our condition. To babies, He treats them as babies. To young people, He treats them as young people. To the elderly, He treats them as elderly.
He will not say, “I am one hundred, and you are only one; therefore, you are missing ninety-nine, and I will not have communion with you.” He knows that we are all babies. If we obey according to the light He has given us, then He will have communion with us.
When Jesus Christ was on earth, He was with His disciples. When He spoke to them, they often misunderstood Him. When the Lord spoke about heaven, they thought He was speaking about the earth.
When the Lord spoke about the leaven of the Pharisees, the disciples thought He was speaking about bread. But the Lord was speaking about the teachings of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Yet the Lord continued to have fellowship with them. Gradually, He brought them up so that they would truly know Him.
Brothers and sisters, no matter what measure our spiritual life has reached, we need to have His same nature and His same condition. Even though our measure is different, that is not the important thing. If we have the same nature and the same condition, we can have communion.
As we continue in communion and enter deeper into communion, just as the Bible says, with unveiled face we behold Him. The veil is removed, and the Holy Spirit transforms us. Gradually, we are conformed to the image of Christ. This is the wonderful work of the Lord.
Therefore, the function of communion needs to be exercised all the time. To exercise it means that you have to use it. The more you use it, the sharper it becomes. If you do not use it, it becomes dull and useless.
God has already given you the ability to commune with Him. We need to use it in daily life. The question is: how do we use it?
The best way to explain this is through examples. In the Bible, we learn that there are several means of grace through which we obtain grace.
Why do Christians pray? Prayer is a means of receiving grace. We often think that prayer is asking for things, but asking for things is only a small part of prayer.
The reason Christians pray is because they want to have communion with God. Since God is Spirit, when we pray, we commune with Him in spirit.
The Lord gave us a parable about two men who went to the temple to pray. One was a Pharisee. He stood in the temple and said, “God, I thank Thee that I am not as the rest of men. Every week I fast twice, and I give a tenth of all that I possess. I am not like this tax collector.”
But the tax collector came to the temple and stood far away. He bowed his head and beat his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner. Hear my prayer and forgive my sins.”
When these two men returned home, who was justified by God? Not the Pharisee, but the tax collector. The Pharisee was merely murmuring. He did not pray with his spirit.
He used his mind and his body to declare his own goodness. He was praying for other people to hear. He was praying for himself to hear. God could not hear him. Therefore, when he returned home, he was not justified.
But the tax collector, from the depth of his heart, voiced his repentance and asked for forgiveness. God heard his prayer.
Brothers and sisters, the basic principle of prayer is fellowship. If your prayer is not fellowship with God, when your prayer hits the ceiling, it falls back down.
Often we make the same error, especially when we pray in public. We are always thinking about the people around us. “Am I praying in a very classical way? Am I using proper words?” Are you praying to others, or are you praying to God?
If it is not from your spirit, this prayer will not be answered. It cannot be counted as real prayer.
You may say, “I pray every morning.” Then I may ask, “How do you pray every morning?”
I remember when I first believed in the Lord, I was the first one awake every morning. I went downstairs, locked myself in a room, knelt down, worshipped, sang hymns, prayed, and read the Bible. I did this every morning as my devotion.
At that time, I heard that if I read three chapters in the Old Testament and one chapter in the New Testament each day, I could read through the Bible once a year. So I continued with three chapters in the Old Testament and one chapter in the New Testament. First I sang a hymn, then I prayed, then I read the Bible, and then I finished my devotion.
When I came out from my morning devotion, if you asked me what I had read that morning, I had forgotten. I could not remember.
We rush to God and say, “Here I am.” Then we utter words from our mouths and say, “Goodbye, Lord.” Did we use our spirit? No. We used our mouths. Sometimes we used our minds. We did not use our spirit.
Therefore, the Bible says that when you come to the Lord, you need to come into His light. You need to open your heart to the Lord. Before you even pray, you need to have contact with God.
If you merely say a lot of words and then leave, did you pray? No, you did not pray. God could not even hear you.
How do we have a morning devotion?
I really love one particular hymn, Hymn 570, written by Evan H. Hopkins. He was a servant used by God at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century. He was associated with the Keswick Convention, which emphasizes the victorious life.
He wrote this hymn. What does it say in the first stanza?
Nothing between my soul and the Saviour,
Naught of this world’s delusive dream;
I have renounced all sinful pleasure—
Jesus is mine! There’s nothing between.
He had very close fellowship with the Lord. I often use this hymn to begin my devotion.
I come quietly before the Lord, hoping that there is nothing between me and Him. I pray to God that I may see His glorious face and hear His will: “Nothing between, Lord, nothing between.”
The Bible says in James 4:8, “Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you.” If you draw close to God, thank God, He will draw close to you.
If you come to pray to God in a hurry and immediately begin speaking without first resting yourself, you need first to come into His presence. Draw close to Him.
May the Lord take away all the separation between you and Him, so that you can see His beauty in your spirit and your ears can hear His voice.
When you open your heart to the Lord in this way, then begin praying to Him. This is exercising communion in your spirit. Then you will have close fellowship with Him, He can speak to you, and you can pour out your heart to Him.
Therefore, brothers and sisters, when we pray, what are we using to pray? Do we use only our voices? Do we use only our minds? These cannot reach God. You need to open your spirit. There must be nothing between you and God. Then you can have communion with God.
Everything that comes from God is given to us in this communion.
What about reading the Bible? We praise and thank God that we do read the Bible. Some Christians do not read the Bible because they are too lazy. When they are joyful, they may read ten chapters; when they are not joyful, they do not read a single word.
Why do we read the Bible? Is reading the Bible only for the purpose of understanding the Bible?
When we read the Bible, we read and interpret it. We use our minds. Our minds may become full of Bible knowledge. If this knowledge is true and living, then praise God. But unfortunately, much knowledge remains only in the head.
Brothers and sisters, are our feet large enough? Our heads may be large, but our feet are small. We know many things in our heads, but we do not walk in them.
How should we read the Bible? Do we read the Bible in spirit? Why does the Bible continually tell us that we need to meditate on the Word of the Lord? We need to meditate on it.
Mary, the mother of Jesus, had something good. She did not understand many things, but when angels spoke to her and when the Lord spoke to her, she remembered those words and meditated on them.
When Jesus was twelve years old, He remained behind in Jerusalem. Mary did not understand when He said, “Did ye not know that I must be in My Father’s house?” Yet she remembered His words and meditated on them. Therefore, she could enter into the will of God.
When we read the Bible, we need not only to read and memorize it; we also need to meditate on it. We do not read the Bible merely for knowledge. We read the Bible because we want our life to grow.
Just as every day we collect manna as food for our bodies, so the Word of God becomes spiritual food for us.
I read the story of George Müller. George Müller was a German who went to England. God used him to open many orphanages. He never asked people for financial support, and he never told people about his needs. He brought all his needs to God in prayer.
He recorded more than one million answered prayers. He was a man of great faith.
Someone asked him, “You must have the gift of faith.” He said, “No, I do not. We all have the grace of faith.”
He had read the Bible more than one hundred times. He was a very disciplined person and recorded everything. He told us what he did every morning.
Every morning, before he prayed and read the Bible, he spent a little time—ten or fifteen minutes—drawing close to God.
Then he read one verse in the Bible. Every morning he did the same thing. He selected verses that were easy to meditate on.
For example, when he wanted to meditate on the Gospel of John, he read only one verse. He read it several times, and then he meditated. Then he turned his meditation into prayer.
Sometimes he confessed and repented before the Lord. Sometimes he prayed and thanked God. That Word became his food for that day.
When I read about this, I tried to learn from it. Every day, I read one verse—sometimes not even one verse—for about ten minutes.
Then I would have communion with God, and that Word would become my food for the whole day. When I had time, I would recall that verse. Thank the Lord. I practiced that for a long time, and I found it very helpful.
Even when we are reading the Bible, we need to exercise our spirit. We need to have a spirit of humility, a spirit like a child, and a clean spirit before Him.
When we come here to listen to a message, we are all experts in hearing messages. In our lives, we have heard so many messages. But how do you listen to a message?
You hear with your ears. Of course, you need your ears. But is it one ear in and one ear out? Do you use your mind to hear? How do you hear?
How is it that so many people hear so many messages, but those messages have no impact on their spiritual life? According to what they have heard, they should be spiritual giants, but they remain like babies. Why?
Even when we are hearing a message, we may not be using our spirit. Our spirit is closed. For this reason, we hear but do not really listen. You hear, but you do not hear inwardly, because your spirit has not opened up.
When we come to hear a message, if we come with an open spirit, even a simple phrase planted in our hearts can bear eternal fruit.
I am not trying to defend the speakers. The listeners also have their responsibility. Do not put all the responsibility on the person speaking.
If you do not exercise communion in the spirit, you cannot hear the Word of God. Sometimes a speaker cannot speak the Word of the Lord because he senses closed spirits. But if all the spirits are open, even someone who cannot speak well can speak.
This is the experience of speakers. Even when you are hearing a message, you need to use your spirit to hear. Then you receive grace, and the person speaking also receives grace.
If the spirits of the brothers and sisters are all closed, a speaker cannot speak anything. It is all the mercy of God. Therefore, those who are hearing also need to hear with their spirits.
What is fellowship? The apostle John said that we have fellowship with the Son of God, and we share with you the result of our fellowship with God, so that you also may have fellowship with us. Then our joy may be full.
Often, when brothers and sisters gather together for fellowship, it is fellowship of spirit with spirit. It is not fellowship between bodies. It is not fellowship between minds. It is fellowship between spirits.
You share with others what you receive when you have fellowship with God, and others share with you what they receive when they have fellowship with God. As a result, our joy may be full. This is fellowship.
Let us speak about abiding in the Lord. Abiding in the Lord is something we all hope for.
I remember that about two years after I was saved, I read Brother Lawrence’s book The Practice of the Presence of God. I thought, “This is what I want. Let me exercise it.” But I always forgot.
When I forgot, it was as if I had just left the Lord. I was trying to use my mind to have fellowship with God. If you use your mind or your voice alone, you will find fellowship with God very difficult, because when interruptions come, you forget.
In the morning, when we come to the Lord, we may have fellowship with God. In the evening, we may have fellowship with God again, but it can require effort because during the day we have gone into the world. When we need to come back, it is difficult.
But if we learn to have fellowship in spirit, and it becomes a habit, we do not need our minds to activate it. The Bible says that we abide in Him and He abides in us; therefore, we have fellowship with Him.
It is because we do not know how to exercise our spirit that abiding in God seems difficult. If we know how to exercise our spirit, abiding in God is normal. Losing the presence of the Lord is abnormal.
God has given us a very precious function of the spirit. Unfortunately, many of God’s children do not know how to apply it. Spiritual living is in the spirit. Transformation begins from the spirit.
Brothers and sisters, we have only one hope and one prayer. As we gather this time, let us not merely store these words in our minds. These are very basic words.
Let us begin to exercise God within us. As we exercise in this way, the will of God can be accomplished in us, and God will be glorified. Thank the Lord.
Lord, we thank and praise You. This is Your great grace, that You have allowed us to gather here at this time.
We believe that the Holy Spirit will turn this Word into our life. We thank and praise You because Your Holy Spirit dwells in us.
Your anointing continually teaches us how we can walk in spirit. Through this revived spirit, we can have communion with the Holy Spirit.
May Your will be accomplished. In Jesus’ name, amen.