The work of God

Scripture Reading: John 6:28-29; Eph. 2:10; Gal. 1:11-12, 16; 1 Cor. 3:9-15

Man cannot work the works of God
In John 6:28 a group of people asked the Lord Jesus what they should do that they might work the works of God. They were zealous for God and wanted to do God’s work. But they did not know what it was to work the works of God. They thought that once they knew what to do, they could do it. Once the question of “what to do” was settled, they thought that they could engage themselves in God’s work. The question of whether or not they could actually do the work was not part of their consideration at all; they only needed to know what to do. Here we see man’s desire to participate in God’s work. He feels that he can work God’s work; he thinks that his ability is great enough to take up God’s work.

But the Lord’s answer was entirely different from man’s question. The Lord said, “This is the work of God, that you believe into Him whom He has sent” (v. 29). While man boasted of what he could do, the Lord replied that man ought to believe. Man’s trying to do something means that he wants to prove his ability; man’s believing means that he acknowledges his inability to do anything. Believing is receiving (John 1:12), and believing into the One whom God sent means believing into the Lord Jesus. There is no question of human merit or human ability. Man cannot do anything; God has done it all. All that man needs to do is receive, stretch out his hand, and take in the Son of God. Faith signifies that God has done all the work; He has given us His only begotten Son. There is no need for man to do anything; all he has to do is accept what God has done.

God having worked
Following this the Lord said, “This is the work of God.” The ignorant ones thought that they could work the works of God. They were zealous and trying to do something for God. But the Lord told them that the work of God is to believe into Him whom God has sent. This is the work of God. It is not what man has done for God but what God has done Himself. It is the work of God and not the work of man. For man to believe in the Lord Jesus is a work of God; it is not something that man does but something that God does. God’s work can only be done by God alone. Man cannot work God’s work; he has no part in God’s work.

Consider the story of Martha and Mary. It serves as a good illustration of our point. Martha was busily serving the Lord. She did a great deal of work and was so busy that she asked the Lord to send her sister over to help her. Perhaps she thought that by expending so much effort, paying such a price, and suffering so much hardship she would be considered as having served the Lord and having done some work for Him. Yet the Lord did not praise her. Instead He said, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things; but there is need of one thing, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:41-42).

What had Mary done? The Bible says that Mary sat at the feet of Jesus and listened to His word. Sitting and listening do not constitute a work at all. She was not as busy as her sister; she was quietly sitting at the Lord’s feet and drawing near to Him. Listening to His word is receiving His word. The Lord’s word is spirit and life, and He dispenses life to men through His word. Mary was receiving the Lord’s word and affording Him the opportunity to operate on her. She was giving the Lord the opportunity to dispense Himself into her through the word. Mary was just a receiving vessel. The One doing the work was the Lord, not Mary. She, the person, was the work of the Lord; she was the object of the Lord’s work. Ephesians 2:10 says, “We are His masterpiece, created in Christ Jesus for good works.” Thank the Lord that we are not the work of man but the work of God. God’s work is fully trustworthy. Oh, what a glorious fact that we are the work of God!

Man working together with God
Does this mean that man has no place in the work of God? Why did Paul say, “For we are God’s fellow workers” (1 Cor. 3:9)? He asked the Corinthian believers, “Are you not my work in the Lord?” (9:1). We must consider the way Paul became a fellow worker of God. First Corinthians 3 shows us that God is the Lord of the work and that all the workers are under His direction.

Paul told us in Galatians that the word he preached was according to revelation because it pleased God to reveal His Son in him. Through revelation, Paul received genuine spiritual knowledge of Christ. As a result, he did not confer with flesh and blood; instead, he preached the Christ whom he knew through revelation to the Gentiles. Paul was able to work because he first allowed God to work in him; he allowed God to work Himself into him. First God revealed His Son through the Spirit in Paul; he came to know Christ according to spiritual reality and not according to flesh (2 Cor. 5:16). Then Paul was able to preach this Christ he had received to others. Paul did not preach an objective Christ; he did not preach an intangible Christ. He preached a Christ whom he had experienced personally. Christ was as real in him as his very self. Christ was in him, and he was in Christ. Christ was in his thoughts, his words, and his actions. Christ was the Lord within Paul, and Paul was Christ’s outward expression. You may say that he was Paul. You may also say that Christ was seen in him and that he was Christ, for indeed he was taken possession of by Christ (Phil. 3:12, Darby’s New Translation). Paul’s preaching was based on what he had. The measure of Christ that he knew became the measure of Christ he preached to others.

Therefore, being a fellow worker of God does not mean that we should work for God. Rather, it means that we should first allow God to work Christ into us. Only then can we tell others about the Christ we know through revelation. The work is still the Lord’s; man is only there to report His work. Paul asked the Corinthian saints, “Are you not my work in the Lord?” (1 Cor. 9:1). Their being in the Lord was the result of Paul’s preaching the Christ he knew to them and of their receiving.

What was the message Paul preached among the Corinthians? He said, “For I did not determine to know anything among you except Jesus Christ, and this One crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2). This was the central message which he preached. Here we see the two aspects of the work of the Holy Spirit in the believers. On the negative side, there is the removing of the old creation from the believers through the cross. On the positive side, there is the constitution of Christ into the believers through revelation for the building up of the new creation. What Paul preached is the same as what the Holy Spirit is revealing in the believers today. Just as the Holy Spirit revealed the knowledge of Christ and His crucifixion to Paul, so also the Holy Spirit is revealing the knowledge of Christ and His crucifixion to us today. We repeat that the work is the Lord’s; man is here only to speak of His work within man.

The foundation of the work
This is why Paul said that the foundation of the work is Jesus Christ and that no one else can lay another foundation. He also said that we are God’s cultivated land and His building. If the seed sown in the cultivated land is Christ, the harvest must also be Christ. If the foundation of the building is Christ, the building itself must also be according to Christ. At the time of our regeneration, God put the life of Christ into us, and we received a life which we did not have before. The life which we received at the time of regeneration is an additional life. It is something added to us at the time of regeneration. This is the work of God. God’s work in man is absolutely based on this added life. This life is Christ (Col. 3:4), and it is the foundation of the work of God. Just as the regenerated life is absolutely of God, the growth and maturity of this life can only be brought about by God (2 Cor. 5:5). Man’s hand has no part in this, and even the best of what man has cannot participate in this. The greatest responsibility that man has is to cooperate with God and not afford any hindrance to His work. Sanctification is merely the continuation of this life, and victory is merely the outflow of this life in overcoming sin, the flesh, the world, and Satan. The growth and maturity of this life are simply the reigning and ruling of this life over the whole being. The life we received at the time of regeneration is the beginning of the work of God. Therefore, the continuation of this work cannot be affected by anything other than this life. Brothers and sisters, especially those who are called to the Lord’s work, we have to be very careful. If we really want to be fellow workers of God, our work must be this pure. We need to deny the best that we have in fear and trembling so that God’s work will not suffer any mixture. We must remember that without the revelation of the Holy Spirit, without seeing and experiencing something in the reality of the spirit, we cannot do God’s work.

Only a regenerated person can testify of the Lord’s salvation. Those who do not have the experience of regeneration cannot do this work. Victory, sanctification, the filling of the Spirit, and the reigning of the indwelling Christ can only be testified by those who by grace have passed through these experiences in a genuine way. Even while they are testifying, they must still trust in the working of the Holy Spirit. Without the working of the Spirit, there will not be any anointing from the Lord. Dependence is an absolute necessity in spiritual work. Unless the Spirit of the Lord works, no work of man will accomplish anything.

Please remember that God’s work is first God working in us and then God working out of us through the Spirit. Only such a work will build the church.

The material for the work
First Corinthians 3:12 tells us that the working material of some people is gold, silver, and precious stones, while the working material of other people is wood, grass, and stubble. The day will come and reveal everything by fire; the fire will prove of what sort is each one’s work. We know that wood, grass, and stubble do not remain once they are burned. But gold, silver, and precious stones are things that cannot be burned away. Gold signifies something of God; it is the work of God. Silver signifies redemption; it is the work of the Lord on the cross. The precious stones signify the work of the Holy Spirit, which is the Holy Spirit’s constitution of the life of God in man through revelation, blending God and man into one. This is our subjective experience today. The precious stones are compounds. In order to be compounded together, there is the need of intense heat. After this, there is still need of a carving work by the hand of the craftsmen before we can have some shining precious stones. This is how God constitutes Himself in the believers. On the one hand, God uses the environment to burn the believers. On the other hand, they must pass through God’s carving hand, which removes what He does not approve of and retains what He does approve of through the revelation of the Spirit. Only then will they shine and glorify God.

Those who have become precious stones, who are both human and divine, are the masterpieces of God in Christ. These are the ones in whom God can trust. First Corinthians 7:25-40 is clearly Paul’s own words because he said clearly that he did not have the Lord’s command. Yet at the end he said that he had the Spirit of God. For a period of time, Madam Guyon found that as soon as she set her mind on something within herself, it was accomplished around her. This is because her mind had become the mind of God. Although the words of these ones issue from themselves, God honors their words. He is not afraid of joining Himself to them. They have lost themselves in God as a drop of water has lost itself in the ocean; the water and the ocean have become inseparable. These are precious stones; they are the consummation of the work of the Holy Spirit and the glory of God.

We should humble ourselves before the Lord and allow Him to work on us, to constitute the life of Christ into us. Only then will we be able to help others, and only then will they know the constitution of the Holy Spirit. This is the work of precious stones.

The work of the Holy Spirit
Now let us consider the work of the Holy Spirit in man.

1. The beginning of the work — Pentecost
   At Pentecost, the Holy Spirit — the Worker — descended and began His work on earth, convicting men of sin and turning them to believe in Jesus. He continues His work by living within the believers, enabling them to grow in spiritual stature and to mature in life.
2. The place of the work — the Spirit of man
   The Holy Spirit abides in man’s spirit. This spirit is the place from which He works; it is the center of His operation. All spiritual work begins in man’s spirit. The work of the Holy Spirit is twofold: the direct work and the indirect work. The direct work of the Holy Spirit is to reveal God’s desire in man’s spirit, then to enlighten man’s soul so that his mind will understand, and finally to direct the body to execute God’s will. The indirect work of the Holy Spirit is God’s speaking to man through all kinds of circumstances. At times He uses the Bible, and at other times He uses angels, persons, things, or events. For example, He spoke to Brother Lawrence through the barren trees in winter and convinced him of God’s resurrection power. Our wise God speaks to man in many ways. Yet one thing is certain: The word spoken must be transmitted into man’s spirit before it will have any genuine effect on his spiritual life.
3. The direction of the work — from the center to the circumference
   God’s work always begins from the center and goes to the circumference. God reveals Himself within man’s center, his spirit, then extends to his soul, enlightening his mind, and finally directs his body to execute His will. Take the matter of sanctification as an example. The God we know in our spirit is absolutely holy. This holy God is joined to our spirit through the Holy Spirit (we become one spirit with the Lord). From this spirit God enlightens our mind, so that our mind begins to understand. The power of holiness thus begins to operate in our mind. All unholy thoughts are rejected, and anything that is incompatible with God is immediately denied. In this way, the soul becomes sanctified. At the same time, the effect reaches the body, particularly the eyes. The inward sanctifying power will direct the eyes, so that they can no longer look at anything that is contrary to holiness. The eyes will shun everything unholy. When the Holy Spirit speaks through the ones who know holiness in such a genuine way, their words will convey the sanctification that they have seen and experienced, and they will produce an effect in others.
4. The method of the work — revelation
   Revelation is the method by which God works. Revelation is something of the spirit. Hence, the spirit and not the mind comes first. The spirit and life take priority, while the mind and the intellect follow. Many people use their mind and intellect to seek after God’s will. The result is confusion in the mind. They will never know God’s will this way because the method is wrong. The first thing God wants us to do is to wait for His revelation in our spirit. After this, He will enlighten our mind. Only then will we know God’s will. We must remember that the mind is secondary and not primary in spiritual matters. This does not mean that we should not use the mind, but we should use it as a secondary means. We need to consider a few things that constitute a spiritual vision. God’s Word shows us that at least three things are needed. The first is revelation. The meaning of revelation is an unveiling or a removing of the covering. Suppose that there is a book in a cabinet, yet it cannot be seen because the door of the cabinet is closed. The door must be opened before the book can be revealed. The second thing is light. If this room does not have any light, one cannot see anything even when something is placed before his eyes. The third is opened eyes. A thing may be uncovered and light may be present, but one cannot see anything if his eyes are closed. The Holy Spirit unveils the reality of Christ to man through revelation. At the same time, He enlightens the mind in man’s soul. The mind is man’s inner eyes. As long as a man does not have the eyes of the Laodiceans, he will see. The Laodiceans did not see because they felt that they had something; they thought that they had something. Once there is a thought of having something, that thought becomes a veil to the eyes, and a person becomes blind. Blessed are those who are poor in spirit.
5. The lines of the work
   There are two lines in God’s work. On the negative line, God’s work leads man to a knowledge of himself through revelation. Once man sees himself, he will apply the cross to deal with sin, the flesh, and the world by the power of the Spirit. On the positive line, the Holy Spirit reveals Christ to man’s spirit and dispenses Christ to man. Man receives Christ by faith and abides in Him, allowing His life to be wrought into his being. The measure of revelation and knowledge of Christ determines the measure of the stature of one’s spiritual life. The destination of these two lines of work is the purifying of the “self” to the point that nothing of the “self” remains and only Christ occupies the whole being.
6. The pattern and goal of the work
   When Moses built the tabernacle, God showed him the pattern on the mount. He could not change anything; everything had to be built according to the pattern of God’s instruction. Today the building work of the Holy Spirit in us is according to the pattern of Christ. Nothing apart from Christ can be brought in. The work of the Holy Spirit is absolutely pure, and His work is to make men as pure as the Lord (1 John 3:3).

The proper attitude of those who are being worked on
Mary had a proper attitude. There are at least four aspects to a proper attitude.

(1) She was at the feet of the Lord Jesus, and not at the feet of anyone else. She was drawing near to the Lord. This is the shortest and quickest way to grow in life. No method is better than coming to Him moment by moment, loving Him, worshipping Him, and unceasingly fellowshipping with Him and remaining in His presence. Many who know God in a deep way have found this way. Madam Guyon said, “Our drawing near to God constitutes all service.” Paul also charged us to pray unceasingly (1 Thes. 5:17). If a man unceasingly fellowships with the indwelling Christ with an unveiled face, he will be changed into the Lord’s likeness (2 Cor. 3:18).

(2) She sat at the feet of the Lord. This means that she put herself in a humble position. Humility is a crucial condition for receiving God’s blessing. God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble (1 Pet. 5:5). Humility is not belittling ourselves; humility is ignoring ourselves, negating ourselves, and considering ourselves as nothing. If we draw near to God with deep humility, He will give grace to us.

(3) She was sitting down. She was not busy like her sister. Quietness is often the source of spiritual strength. The greatest challenge man faces is being quiet before the Lord. His eyes and thoughts often are distracted to the outside world. Of all the members in the body, the eyes are the busiest, and of all the faculties in the soul, the mind is the busiest. Those who are busy cannot receive revelation easily. A wandering mind and vacillating thoughts are like restless waves on a lake; the lake will never be able to clearly reflect the flowers and trees on the shore. If a man wants to have the Lord’s image imprinted in him and to be transformed into the Lord’s image, quietness is a necessity.

(4) She was listening to the Lord’s word. The words that the Lord speaks are spirit and life. Through this word, the Lord dispenses Himself to men. Her listening to the Lord’s word afforded the Lord the opportunity to communicate Himself to her so that she would gain the Lord and become like Him. She was continually receiving the Lord Himself. She did not just hear words; she was meeting the Lord. Brothers and sisters, it is a pity for anyone to just hear man’s voice in a sermon and not meet the Christ behind the voice.

Those who convey God’s word
In conveying God’s word to others, a servant of God has to take care of the following points:

(1) He should speak in the Spirit. On the one hand, he should be in fear and trembling concerning himself. On the other hand, he should be strictly controlled, restricted, and directed by the indwelling Spirit. Anything spiritual must be spoken in the Spirit; otherwise, it will make the listener feel extremely uncomfortable. Your inner sense (the spiritual consciousness) will tell you if the source is wrong, even though the words may be right. There may be nothing wrong with the wording, but the condition of the speaker may be wrong. When this happens, God will not seal His presence on the words. A more descriptive way of putting it is to call this a jewel of gold in a swine’s snout (Prov. 11:22); the two things do not match one another.

(2) He should not speak under an atmosphere dominated by the flesh. When others are jesting and there is an absence of any spiritual atmosphere whatsoever, one cannot speak. This is like putting an egg in a refrigerator; it is impossible to hatch an egg this way.

(3) He should dispense spiritual reality to others. God’s revelation always conveys spiritual things, which are as real as physical things. A cup is an object, and a chair is an object; they are real things. Spiritual things are just as real as physical objects. They are not theories or philosophies. In conveying the word, one should present real things to others.

(4) He should ask the Lord for suitable spiritual utterance to convey spiritual things. For example, in explaining self-analysis, Brother Lawrence said, “Self-analysis is the dying flicker left behind from self-love; it is the activity of self-love under the zealous mask of one’s pursuit for perfection.” Self-analysis is an undesirable element in our spiritual experience; it is a kind of introspection. Brother Lawrence explained this spiritual thing with a spiritual utterance. This is what it means to interpret spiritual things with spiritual words (1 Cor. 2:13).

(5) Spiritual things can only be understood by a spiritual man; a carnal man cannot understand them (1 Cor. 2:14). Since there is nothing spiritual within the carnal man, he cannot understand them. The spiritual man has the real thing within him; therefore, he can understand. Suppose you met a man who had never seen a watch before. It would not matter how much you explained what a watch is like; he would not understand. But if you showed him a watch and then told him what it was and what it was used for, he would understand. Hence, one must first see a thing before he can understand anything that is spoken concerning it. The same is true with spiritual things. For example, the matter of regeneration is the first spiritual experience of a Christian. Many people have listened to sermons for years without being regenerated. If you tell them about the experience of regeneration, it is like telling a naturally blind person about the light of the sun; he will not understand it. This is because he does not have that very thing within him. It is no wonder that he cannot understand. Some people are indeed regenerated. They have had the experience of regeneration, yet the gospel they received was not very complete. They do not know that they are regenerated and saved; they are still hoping to be saved. One needs to tell such people the truth of regeneration. Since they have the fact of regeneration, they will understand it once they hear. Hence, those who convey God’s word to others must first show them the real thing and then use suitable words to convey it to them so that the listener will receive not only the spiritual fact but also the spiritual knowledge. The principle that applies to regeneration applies to every subsequent experience. The more revelation a believer receives, the more his life grows. If someone with spiritual utterance points out the revelation, that is, if he points out the very thing he has received, others will not only see, but also understand. If a man preaches the word this way, the church will receive real edification.

Those who listen to the word
Those who listen to the word should also take care of a few things.

(1) Do not expect to hear good teaching. Instead, expect to meet Christ. Listening to a message is not for the purpose of satisfying the intellect but for the purpose of receiving the supply of life. Some people can give very thoughtful, clever, and persuasive messages. Yet they produce no spiritual result. We should not admire this kind of message. The kind of messages that we need are those that enable us to touch something spiritual in an inward way; they must be messages that allow us to touch the Christ behind the words. These words carry life and power, and they bring about a spiritual change as well as an increase of spiritual stature in a person. We have to ask the Lord to give us the grace to have the power of discernment so that we will pursue after the right things.

(2) When we hear something we do not understand, we should wait humbly for the Lord’s timing because spiritual understanding has quite much to do with spiritual age. We may not understand it now, but we may understand it a few years later. We should never criticize lightly the things we do not understand, lest we suffer a loss. On the other hand, never think that any spiritual thing is so easy and that we understand it all. We have to realize that it may have taken others a few years to learn certain lessons before they could deliver the messages they are giving.

(3) Beware of substitutes. When a person is talking about a deer, we may understand it to be a horse. Actually the two things are absolutely different. For example, when we talk about “reality,” we are referring to the things that the Holy Spirit reveals to us in Christ. But many people (even those who have been workers for years) have taken practicality to mean reality. If practicality is reality, the men in 1 Corinthians 13:3 have the most reality. But actually, they had no reality at all. (Of course, those who have reality have practicality also.) For example, when some say that they have received light, they mean they have received a new idea in their mind, a concept which they think is reasonable. The source is the intellect, and it is powerless. Other people think that light comes when the eyes see certain physical rays. But none of this is light. The genuine light of life comes from the revelation of the Spirit and is understood in the mind afterwards. It is something real that we see; it is a spiritual reality which the Spirit unveils to us, and it comes with power. Some brothers have stated that with light there is killing, shining, and burning, and it results in a change in life. For example, when a man is saved, the Spirit enlightens him and shows him his sins. He realizes the evil of his sins. He feels ashamed and hates his sins. The sins that we confess under the light can be far more numerous than the sins we know in our mind. This is the light of life. Unfortunately, some have substitutes and have not seen anything genuine. Therefore, we have to humble ourselves and not think that we understand and know everything.

(4) We should humble ourselves before God and pray for the speaker. We should pray that God will release the word of life. We should also pray for the audience and ourselves so that the words we hear will penetrate the depth of our being and become revelation and light to us and that the church will grow in the stature of Christ. This is the cooperation a listener can render to the speaker.

Finally, may the Lord be merciful to us, so that we realize that God alone is the One who can accomplish His work; we are merely speaking what we see through revelation. May we learn to cooperate with God, to remove all hindrances, to change nothing of the pattern on the mount, and to be purified by the light until we are free from all mixture. We need to always look to Him, always trust in Him, and acknowledge with fear and trembling that “we are unprofitable slaves” (Luke 17:10).