In 2:15 Paul says that the believers are children of God. This implies regeneration, the new birth. To be a child of God means that we have been born of God, that God has been conceived within us. When we were born of God in our spirit, we were mingled with Him. Conception always precedes birth. When we became children of God, God was conceived in our very being. This involves even more than mingling. However, we do not have words adequate to express the deep relationship between us and God that has been produced by God’s being conceived within us. He has been conceived within us, and we have been born of Him to become His children.
Now that we have been born of God, we need to eat Him and drink Him. To be sure, whatever we eat and digest is assimilated by us and mingled with us. The Lord Jesus said that He is the bread which came down from heaven and also that the ones who eat Him will live because of Him (John 6:50, 57). The Lord clearly likened Himself to food for us to eat, digest, and assimilate. Those who oppose the teaching that believers are mingled with God are short of the proper knowledge. They do not realize that at the time of our conversion, God was conceived within us, and we were born of Him. At that time, we and God, humanity and divinity, were joined in a marvelous way. After our spiritual birth, we need to feed on God day by day. The Triune God is our food and drink. We can truly say that the food we eat and the water we drink are not merely united to us, but also mingled with us. We simply cannot deny the fact that the food and drink we take in and digest are mingled with us and eventually saturate us metabolically. In the same principle, when we take in the Triune God as our food and drink, He is mingled with us, and we are mingled with Him. However, we must be clear that this mingling of God and man does not produce a mixture, or a confusion, of divinity and humanity. On the one hand, there is a genuine mingling; on the other hand, there is no mixture or confusion.
The expression “children of God” is very rich in its implications. It implies that God has actually been born into us and that we possess His life and nature. Christians often say, “I’m just a sinner saved by grace.” Although this, of course, is true, it is very shallow compared with the revelation in the New Testament. If we know the truth of the Word, we shall not say we are merely sinners saved by grace. We shall have the assurance to declare, “I’m a child of God born of the Spirit!” If you have truly seen the vision that you are a child of God, you will be filled with joy, wonder, and praise. If you were the son of the President of the United States, would you not have a special feeling? Would you not be proud of your status? Surely to be a child of God is infinitely greater than to be a child of the President. In a proper sense, we need to boast of our status as God’s children. No doubt, we are sinners who have been saved by God’s grace. But because we have also been born of God, we are now His children. How marvelous!
According to Paul’s word in 2:15, we are to be children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverted generation. The generation in which we live is crooked, warped, and twisted. We, however, as children of God, must be different. Because we are God’s children, we should be both blameless and guileless, without blemish.
We can be children of God only by having the life of God. How marvelous it is to have God’s life! All those who are truly the children of God need to realize that they have the divine life within them.
The divine life within us wants to grow. Recently I noticed how much a palm tree planted in my backyard has been growing, thriving, and spreading. It is almost unbelievable how much this tree has grown. What a testimony to the strength of the inner life of the palm tree and to the riches of this life! When I looked at that palm tree recently, I had the sense that the divine life within me is far more energetic than the life of that palm tree. Praise the Lord that we have God’s very life! How sad that few Christians today know of this life and live by it.
Along with the divine life, we also have the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4). Although we cannot fully define the divine nature, we know that as God’s children we partake of it and have it within us.
Every living thing acts according to its own nature. Everything it does comes out of its nature. For example, a peach tree produces peaches because it is in keeping with the nature of a peach tree to do so. It would be absurd for anyone to charge a peach tree not to bring forth apples, but only to produce peaches. As ridiculous as this is, in principle many Christians are doing this very thing. In giving commandments to others to behave in a certain way or to improve themselves, they neglect the fact that as children of God all genuine Christians have the divine nature. This nature should govern and direct us. Everything in the Christian life is according to the nature of God. How wonderful that we have God’s life with His nature!
As lights, or luminaries, the believers shine among those in this crooked and perverted generation. Actually, we have no light in ourselves; we are luminaries reflecting the light of the sun, Christ. Christ is the unique sun, and the church is the moon reflecting Him. Praise the Lord that we have a source of light to reflect!
In 2:16 Paul speaks of “holding forth the word of life.” The word of life is very different from doctrine in dead letters. The word of life is the living breathing of God (2 Tim. 3:16), the Spirit who gives life (John 6:63). We have the Lord Jesus as our pattern (vv. 6-11), we have God operating in us (v. 13), we are God’s children possessing God’s life and the divine nature (v. 15), we are luminaries qualified to reflect the divine light of Christ (v. 15), and we have the word of life to hold forth, to present to others. What a divine and rich provision! By such we are well able to carry out God’s salvation to the full extent.
The word of life we are holding forth is actually Christ Himself (John 1:1, 4). In order to have the experience of Christ revealed in the book of Philippians, we need to have Christ as our pattern, we need to have the Triune God operating in us, we need to be children of God with the divine life and nature, and we need to be luminaries positioned to reflect Christ. All these matters are necessary for the experience of Christ.
If we hold forth Christ as the word of life, the apostle will be able to boast in the day of Christ that he has not run in vain nor labored in vain. This is to make his joy full. In 2:1-16 we see that the way to make the apostle happy is to have a life of seeking Christ, living Christ, expressing Christ, and carrying out God’s salvation to its fullest. Because the apostle represents God, God will also be happy to see such a life. Then at the day of Christ, the day of the Lord’s coming, the apostle will be able to boast and rejoice.
© Living Stream Ministry All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.