Knowing And ExperiencingThe All-Inclusive, Extensive Christ
Opening Word of the Prophesying Meeting
Message Four
Knowing and Experiencing the All-inclusive, Extensive Christ as the Reality of All Positive Things
Reading the verses in each day.
Reading the main points in the outlines.
Pray-reading the verses:
Col. 2:16-17 Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of the Sabbath, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ.
2:19 … holding the Head, out from whom all the Body, being richly supplied and knit together by means of the joints and sinews, grows with the growth of God.
Word of Appetizer
Why does it say that “the all-inclusive, extensive Christ is the reality of all the positive things in the universe”?
Colossians 2:16-17, “which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ”; daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly, Christ is the reality of every positive thing, implying the universal extensiveness of the all-inclusive Christ. Because the universe with the billions of things and persons in it was created for the purpose of describing Christ, He, in revealing Himself to His disciples, could easily find in any environment something or someone to serve as an illustration of Himself. The Old Testament uses six major categories of things as types to describe Christ—human beings, animals, plants, minerals, offerings, and foods; in the New Testament, Christ is the Spirit of reality who makes the untraceable riches of all that He is real to us, guiding us into Himself as the divine reality.
Spiritual Burden
Our need is for the subjective Christ to become our enjoyment to complete the divine revelation within us; whatever we do day by day should remind us of Christ as the reality of that thing; if we follow the practice of taking Christ as the reality of all the material things in our daily life, our daily walk will be revolutionized and transformed, and we will be full of Christ.
Concluding Word of the Prophesying Meeting
The Revelation of the Truth
Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of the Sabbath, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ. Let no one defraud you by judging you unworthy of your prize.
The all-inclusive, extensive Christ is the reality of all the positive things in the universe.
The very Christ who is the reality of all positive things is the One who is the Head of the Body; thus, to hold the Head is simply to enjoy Christ as the reality of all positive things.
The Experience of Life
The elements of the reality of all the types are in the Spirit, and the Spirit transfuses and dispenses all these riches into us through the Lord’s words.
Since the Christ we enjoy as our everything is the Head of the Body, the more we enjoy Him, the more we become Body-conscious; the more we enjoy Christ, the more we love the other members of the Body.
Because Christ’s headship is in resurrection, the enjoyment of Christ spontaneously brings us into resurrection and saves us from our natural being.
Practice and Application
we all would learn to realize Him and love Him. Simply love Him, and do not seek anything else. Everything else is merely a shadow. We must learn to know Him, to live Him, to take Him, to experience Him, and to realize Him.
We need to enjoy Christ day by day as the reality of all our necessities: Christ is our breath; Christ is our drink; Christ is our food; Christ is our light; Christ is our clothing; Christ is our dwelling place.
Using Key Verses to Have a Bird’s-Eye View over the Whole Outline
Key Verses (1)
Col. 2:16-18a Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of the Sabbath, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ. Let no one defraud you by judging you unworthy of your prize.”
I. Let no one therefore judge you in eating and in drinking or in respect of a feast or of a new moon or of the Sabbath, which are a shadow of the things to come, but the body is of Christ. Let no one defraud you by judging you unworthy of your prize
- As with a man’s physical body, the body in 2:17 is the substance, and like the shadow of a man’s body, the rituals in the law are the shadow of Christ, who is the substance and reality of the gospel; Colossians unveils such an all-inclusive Christ as the focus of God’s economy.
- Daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly, Christ is the reality of every positive thing, implying the universal extensiveness of the all-inclusive Christ.
- The all-inclusive, extensive Christ, who is full of attractiveness and rich in magnetism, is the essence of the Bible.
- “the prize” in Colossians 2:18 is the enjoyment of Christ as the body of the shadows; to be defrauded of our prize is to be defrauded of the subjective enjoyment of Christ.
- Our need is for the subjective Christ to become our enjoyment to complete the divine revelation within us; whatever we do day by day should remind us of Christ as the reality of that thing.
Key Verses (2)
Rom. 1:20 For the invisible things of Him, both His eternal power and divine characteristics, have been clearly seen since the creation of the world, being perceived by the things made, so that they would be without excuse;
John 1:4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
6:63 It is the Spirit who gives life; …the words which I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
Ⅱ. The all-inclusive, extensive Christ is the reality of all the positive things in the universe
- Because the universe with the billions of things and persons in it was created for the purpose of describing Christ, He, in revealing Himself to His disciples, could easily find in any environment something or someone to serve as an illustration of Himself.
- The Old Testament uses six major categories of things as types to describe Christ—human beings, animals, plants, minerals, offerings, and foods.
- In the New Testament, Christ is the Spirit of reality who makes the untraceable riches of all that He is real to us, guiding us into Himself as the divine reality.
- The elements of the reality of all the types are in the Spirit, and the Spirit transfuses and dispenses all these riches into us through the Lord’s words.
Key Verses (3)
Col. 2:19 And not holding the Head, out from whom all the Body, being richly supplied and knit together by means of the joints and sinews, grows with the growth of God.
3:1-2 If therefore you were raised together with Christ, seek the things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things which are above, not on the things which are on the earth.
Ⅲ. The very Christ who is the reality of all positive things is the One who is the Head of the Body; thus, to hold the Head is simply to enjoy Christ as the reality of all positive things.
- Since the Christ we enjoy as our everything is the Head of the Body, the more we enjoy Him, the more we become Body-conscious.
- Because Christ’s headship is in resurrection, the enjoyment of Christ spontaneously brings us into resurrection and saves us from our natural being.
- The enjoyment of Christ brings us into the heavenlies in ascension; we can be experientially in the heavens only by enjoying Christ, the Head, as the life-giving Spirit in our spirit.
- As we enjoy Christ and hold Him as the Head, we absorb the riches of the all-inclusive, extensive Christ; these riches become in us the increase of God by which the Body grows for its building up.
Prophesying Topics—Twelve Topics per Week
D1
TI Christ Himself is the reality of all these things. (Col. 2:16-17)
(Please illustrate that everything is a shadow, not the real things)
T2 All the positive things in the universe are the shadow of Christ. (Col. 2:16-17)
(Please illustrate that everything we need is a shadow; the reality of all things is Christ.)
D2
TI The universal extensiveness of the all-inclusive Christ. (Col. 2:16-18a)
(Please illustrate that daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly, Christ is the reality of every positive thing.)
T2. God’s intention is that Christ would be everything to us. (Col. 1:30，John 14:6，Matt. 11:28-29）
(Please illustrate that Christ is our real wisdom, life, love, clothing, and our true rest.)
D3
TI Enjoying Christ day by day as the reality of all our necessities.( John 1:4，4:14，6:35)
(Please illustrate what the six major items of the enjoyment of Christ in the spirit are in the Gospel of John.)
T2 The practical way to enjoy Christ as all these items is in our mingled spirit. (Rom. 8:16; 1 Cor. 6:17)
(Please illustrate that whenever we have a problem, the best way to handle it is to turn back to the spirit.)
D4
TI There are six major categories of types in the Old Testament. (Rom. 5:14，John 1:29，1 Pet. 2:4，Deut. 8:8-9)
(Please illustrate that all these six major categories contain types of Christ.)
T2 The elements of the reality of all the types are in the Spirit. (John 6:63)
(Please illustrate with experiences that the Spirit transfuses and dispenses all these riches into us through the Lord’s words.)
D5
TI Holding the Head is simply to enjoy Christ as the reality of all positive things. (Col. 2:19)
(Please illustrate with experiences that the more we enjoy Him, the more we become Body-conscious.)
T2 The more we enjoy Christ, the more we love the other members of the Body. (Col. 1:4, 8)
(Please illustrate with experiences that the enjoyment of Christ causes us to love everyone in the church life.)
D6
TI The enjoyment of Christ also brings us into the ascension. (Col. 3:1-2)
(Please illustrate that through the enjoyment of Christ, we become heavenly; not only are we no longer natural, but we are no longer earthly.)
T2 If we would hold the Head, we must be in spirit. (Col. 2:19)
(Please illustrate how in our experience we can be in the heavens?)
