THE THIRD PART: 24 CRUCIAL LINES IN THE BIBLE
The Mingling of Divinity with Humanity
Message Three
The Church Being the Mingling
of Divinity with Humanity
Scripture Reading: John 14:20; 15:4-5; 1 Cor. 6:17; Eph. 4:4-6, 16; Rev. 21:11-12
I. The mingling of divinity and humanity is a deep and central truth in the Scriptures—1 Cor. 6:17; John 14:20; 17:21-23: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
A. The mingling of God and man is an intrinsic union of the elements of divinity and humanity to form one organic entity, yet the elements remain distinct in the union—Luke 1:35; John 1:14. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
B. God’s unique purpose is to mingle Himself with us so that He becomes our life, our nature, and our content, and we become His corporate expression—John 14:20; 15:4-5; Eph. 1:5, 9; 3:11, 16-21; 4:4-6, 16. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
C. The will of God is the mingling of God with man, and the fulfillment of God’s eternal purpose depends on the mingling of divinity and humanity—1:5, 9; 3:11. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
II. The church, as the Body of Christ, is the enlargement of Christ, who is the mingling of God and man—Luke 1:31-35; Eph. 1:22-23; 4:16: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
A. The nature of the church is God mingled with man and man mingled with God; we need to understand the Body of Christ from the perspective of the mingling of divinity and humanity—3:14—4:6. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
B. The church, the Body of Christ, came into being through the mingling of God with man—1 Cor. 12:12-13: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
1. Formerly, this mingling involved only the Head, but the mingling has been enlarged to include the Body—Eph. 1:23. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
2. In the Gospels the mingling of God and man produced the Head; in Acts the enlargement of the mingling of God and man produced the Body of Christ—Eph. 1:22-23; 4:15-16. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
C. In Ephesians 4:4-6 four persons—the Body, the Spirit, the Lord, and God the Father—are actively mingled together: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
1. The Father is embodied in the Son, the Son is realized as the Spirit, and the Spirit is mingled with the believers—v. 6. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
2. The processed and consummated Triune God mingles Himself with His chosen people in their humanity; this mingling is the genuine oneness of the Body of Christ—v. 3; John 17:21-23. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
D. The church as the Body of Christ is a group of redeemed and regenerated people who allow God to be mingled with them—Eph. 3:16-17a; 4:4-6: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
1. The Body of Christ is the issue of the believers being mingled with God and constituted with Christ—1:22-23. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
2. The crucial matter is whether God is mingled with us; whenever we have this mingling within us, we have some amount of the reality of the Body of Christ—3:16-17a; 4:16. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
III. The Father’s house signifies God mingling Himself with His redeemed people to make them His dwelling place—John 14:2-3, 16-20, 23: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
A. The Father’s house is a sign signifying the mingling of the Triune God with His redeemed people to be a dwelling place for both God and them—vv. 2-3: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
1. God is dispensing Himself into His people and mingling Himself with them in order to make them such a mutual dwelling place—6:57; 7:37-39. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
2. God and we, we and God, are mingled together to become one abode, a mutual abode—15:4. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
B. By the Spirit and through His death and resurrection, the Lord Jesus Christ is building the church, His Body and the Father’s house, composed of the mingling of the Triune God with His chosen and redeemed people—14:2; Rev. 21:12. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
C. It is of vital importance that we see that the Father’s house is a matter of the Triune God—through incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection—working Himself into His believers in order to be fully mingled with them that He may build them up as an organism for His dwelling and expression—14:2; 15:5. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
D. We all need to be nourished with the truth concerning the mingling of God with us to produce a mutual dwelling place—Eph. 2:21-22. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
IV. In the mingling of divinity and humanity, we may live a meal-offering church life—1 Cor. 1:2; 58: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
A. The church life is a life of humanity oiled by and with the Spirit and joined to the Spirit—2:4, 12; 3:16; 6:17. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
B. We need to be blended together into one Body by living the meal-offering church life—12:24; Lev. 24: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
1. The flour meal offering signifies both the individual Christ and the individual Christian; the cake meal offering signifies the corporate Christ, Christ with His Body, the church—v. 4; 1 Cor. 12:12; 10:17. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
2. The meal offering is a type of the blending for the fulfillment of God’s economy—Lev. 2:4; 1 Cor. 10:17; 12:24; John 12:24. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
3. In order to be blended in the Body life, the meal-offering church life, we have to go through the cross and be by the Spirit, dispensing Christ to others for the sake of the Body of Christ—1 Cor. 1:23; 2:4; 6:17; 12:12-13. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
C. God desires that every local church be a meal offering to satisfy Him and fully supply the saints day by day—Acts 2:46-47; 4:33. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
V. The New Jerusalem is the ultimate consummation of the mingling of the Triune God with the tripartite man—Rev. 21:2; 2 Cor. 13:14; 1 Thes. 5:23: (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
A. The number twelve, which represents the New Jerusalem, indicates that the New Jerusalem is the mingling of the Triune God (three) with His creature man (four)—Rev. 21:12, 14, 21; 22:2. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
B. The New Jerusalem is the mingling of divinity and humanity to be the expansion, enlargement, and expression of the processed and consummated Triune God in humanity for eternity—21:11; 12:1. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)
C. The New Jerusalem is the mingling of the processed and consummated Triune God with His chosen, redeemed, regenerated, transformed, conformed, and glorified tripartite people; this mingling is the counterpart of Christ, a mutual dwelling place, our eternal destiny, and the ultimate manifestation of the processed and consummated Triune God for His eternal, corporate expression— 21:2-3, 9-23; 22:17. (2007 ITERO-Fall, msg. 3)