KNOWING LIFE AND THE CHURCH
Message One
The Triune God Being Life to the Tripartite Man for the Fulfillment of God's Eternal Purpose
Scripture Reading: Eph. 3:11; Gen. 1:26-27; Rom. 8:11, 28; 2 Tim. 1:9; 1 John 5:11-12
I. The eternal purpose—the purpose of the ages—is the eternal plan that God made in eternity past for eternity future—Eph. 3:11:
A. God Himself is the initiation, the origination, and the sphere of His eternal purpose—1:9:
1. God's purpose in creating man was that man would express Him and represent Him; the eternal purpose of God is to have a corporate man to express Him and represent Him—Gen. 1:26-27.
2. Everything is working for God's purpose, and nothing can overthrow it—Rom. 8:28-29.
B. God's purpose is to have the church, the Body of Christ, through which He can express Himself—Eph. 1:5, 9, 11, 22-23:
1. God's will, good pleasure, and eternal purpose are to have the church—3:9-11.
2. God purposed to do one thing—to gain a group of people who would be the living Body of Christ for the expression of the Triune God—4:4-6.
C. The purpose of God in the universe is to produce a group of people who will be exactly the same as He; this is the unique subject of the Bible—John 1:12-13; 1 John 3:2:
1. God's eternal purpose is to dispense Himself into His chosen and redeemed people to make them the same as He is in life and nature but not in the God-head for His enlarged and expanded expression—Eph. 3:2, 8-11.
2. In life, nature, image, appearance, radiance, glory, and outward expression, they will be the same as God—Rev. 4:2-3; 21:10-11, 18.
3. God's eternal purpose is to work Himself in His Divine Trinity into His chosen and redeemed people to be their life, nature, and everything so that they may be saturated with God—Eph. 3:17.
D. God saved us and called us according to His own purpose, and now His purpose should become our purpose—Rom. 8:28-29; 2 Tim. 1:9; 3:10:
1. We need to view salvation from God's perspective; the purpose of God's salvation is for His created and redeemed ones to have eternal life in His Son and be conformed to the image of His Son so that the Son would be the Firstborn among many brothers—1 John 5:11-12; Rom. 8:29.
2. Salvation involves our being saved from a human life that is meaningless—Eccl. 1:2:
a. The gospel of God saves us out of a human life that is without meaning into the meaning of the universe—Rev. 4:11.
b. God created a man who had great meaning and purpose, but man fell, and the meaning of human life was lost—Gen. 1:26-27.
c. With His salvation, God rescues us and brings us back to our original purpose, which is the meaning of the universe—2 Tim. 1:9; Rom. 8:28.
E. God's eternal purpose is accomplished by the divine life dispensed into His chosen and redeemed tripartite people; as God's life is wrought into His people, a metabolic reaction takes place within them that causes them to be transformed and to become the same as God in life, nature, and expression—John 3:15; 1 John 5:11-12; 2 Cor. 3:18; Rom. 8:29.
II. The thought of the Triune God being life to the tripartite man runs through the entire Bible, from Genesis to Revelation—Gen. 1:26-27; 2:8-9, 16-17; 3:1-6, 22-24; Psa. 36:8-9; John 3:16; Eph. 4:17-18; Rev. 21:1-2, 10-11; 22:1-2, 14:
A. God's intention in creating man in His own image was that man would receive Him as life—Gen. 1:26-27; 2:9; 1 John 5:11-12.
B. God wants to be our life so that we may express Him; this is the desire of God's heart—John 1:4; 10:10; 11:25; Col. 1:15; 2 Cor. 3:18; Eph. 1:5.
C. For the fulfillment of His purpose God wants to be the fountain, the source, of living waters to satisfy His chosen people for their enjoyment—Jer. 2:13:
1. The goal of this enjoyment is to produce the church as God's increase, God's enlargement, to be God's fullness for His expression—Eph. 1:22-23.
2. God is the fountain of living waters to His elect because He has a purpose—to produce a counterpart, a bride, for Himself—John 3:29; Rev. 19:7-8:
a. God's intention is to dispense Himself as the living water to produce His increase, His enlargement, for His expression—Col. 2:19.
b. Nothing apart from God as the fountain of living waters can satisfy us; nothing apart from God dispensed into our being can make us His increase for His expression—John 4:13-14; 7:37; Rev. 22:17.
D. The divine life may be considered the first and the basic attribute of God—Eph. 4:18; John 5:26; 1 John 5:11-12; Rom. 8:2:
1. According to the divine and eternal nature of the life of God, God's life is the unique life; only the life of God can be counted as life—John 1:4; 10:10; 11:25; 14:6.
2. Life is the content of God and the flowing out of God; God's content is God's being, and God's flowing out is the impartation of Himself as life to us—Eph. 4:18; Rev. 22:1.
3. Life is the Triune God dispensed into us and living in us—Rom. 8:11.
E. God wants to be the fountain, the unique source, of our life and our being; when we take Him as the fountain of life, He becomes to us the fatness of God's house, the river of satisfaction, and the light of life—Psa. 36:8-9.
F. The Triune God has been processed and consummated in order to dispense Himself into our being as life—John 1:14; 12:24; 20:22; 7:37-39; Rom. 8:11:
1. God's economy is to dispense Himself into our being so that our being will be constituted with His being; this can be accomplished only by God working Himself into us as the divine life—vv. 2, 6, 10-11.
2. By dispensing Himself into us as life, God is fulfilling His purpose to have a corporate expression of Himself for eternity—Rev. 21:9-10; 22:1.