THE BELIEVERS’ EXPERIENCE OF THE DISPENSING OF THE PROCESSED TRIUNE GOD IN OTHER ASPECTS

THE BELIEVERS’ EXPERIENCE OF THE DISPENSING

OF THE PROCESSED TRIUNE GOD IN OTHER ASPECTS

                                                            In Spirit and Truth

Also, the believers serve and worship God in spirit and truthfulness (John 4:23-24). According to typology the worship of God should be in the place chosen by God to set His habitation (Deut. 12:5, 11, 13-14, 18) and with the offerings (Lev. 1—6). The place chosen by God for His habitation typifies the human spirit, where God’s habitation is today (Eph. 2:22). The offerings typify Christ. Christ is the fulfillment  and reality of all the offerings with which God’s people in the Old Testament worshipped Him.

Therefore, a crucial matter we need to see is that genuine worship, the worship God the Father is seeking, is not in a certain place but in the human spirit. In the Old Testament Mount Zion, the place of God’s habitation and the place of His name, is a type of the human spirit. According to the New Testament, God’s habitation is not on any mountain nor in the heavens; God’s habitation is in our spirit. If we go anywhere else to worship God, it indicates that we have given up God’s name. There is only one place where we can be preserved in God’s name—our spirit. When we come to our spirit, we keep God’s name, and we are preserved in His name.

The genuine worship of God the Father is also in truthfulness, reality. In the Old Testament the children of Israel were required to worship God on Mount Zion with the offerings. The offerings typify Christ as reality. Christ is the fulfillment and the reality of all the offerings with which God’s people worshipped Him. Christ is the genuine sin offering, trespass offering, burnt offering, meal offering, and peace offering. Today we worship God in our spirit with Christ as the reality of all the offerings. This is the genuine worship of the Father as well as the worship that He desires.

                                                 E. Having No Confidence in Their Flesh

Finally, in serving and worshipping God, the believers should have no confidence in the flesh (Phil. 3:3). We may think that to trust in the flesh simply means to trust in the fallen human nature. But the flesh actually comprises all that we are and have in our natural being. When Paul was a Judaizer, he trusted in his natural birth and qualifications, such as being circumcised on the eighth day, being of the race of Israel and the tribe of Benjamin, and being a Hebrew born of Hebrews. According to law, he was a Pharisee; according to zeal, he persecuted the church; and according to the righteousness in the law, he was blameless (vv. 4-6). All these things were aspects of Paul’s flesh. Hence, we should not trust in such things. Everything that Paul did according to the law and according to zeal was the flesh and was of the flesh; even his righteousness according to the law was flesh. This is because such things are natural and are neither of Christ nor of the Spirit of God. This indicates that the flesh includes not only evil things but also the honorable, lovable, and superior aspects of our natural being.

The Judaizers trusted in their flesh, trusting in what they were by their natural birth. But Paul says strongly that we who believe in Christ serve by the Spirit of God, boast in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. In order to render genuine service and worship to God, everything that we do must be by the Spirit of God, in Christ, and with no trust in the flesh. Although we are not Judaizers, in principle we may actually be the same as the Judaizers. Even though we have been regenerated, we may continue to live in our fallen nature, boast in what we do in the flesh, and have confidence in our natural qualifications. Therefore, we need the Lord’s light to shine on us concerning our nature, our deeds, and our confidence in the flesh. If we are enlightened by the Lord, we will see that we still live too much in the flesh, we will confess how unclean our nature is, and we will condemn everything that we do by our fallen nature. Then we will no longer trust in our natural qualifications, ability, or intelligence. After we are enlightened in this way, we will truly serve and worship God in our spirit and by the Spirit.

                                                                 SUMMARY

In the progressing stage of God’s full salvation, the believers experience the dispensing of the Divine Trinity not only by entering into the kingdom of God, by living in the church—the Body of Christ, by putting on the new man, and by wrestling against the devil and his spiritual forces of evil in the heavenlies. The believers experience this dispensing also in their service and worship of God.

We cannot truly worship God, that is, render worship that  satisfies God, that is accepted by Him as a real pleasure to Him, without God dispensing His divine essence into us. Through this divine dispensing we can worship God in a way that satisfies Him. We need to be reminded repeatedly that we serve and worship God through the dispensing of the processed Triune God. Serving God is actually the same as worshipping God. The God whom we serve and worship is the living and true God. Therefore, God must be living to us and in us in every aspect of our daily life. When God is living to us in our experience, He is also true.