Life in the Word 195 teaches the lesson of spiritual generation. The life in those who have been quickened together with Christ (Eph. 2:5) is truly His life reproduced in them by the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, and whose law sets us free from the -law of sin and death (Rom. 8 :2). We may thus say, “Christ who is our life” (Col. 3:4) ; and as this new life un folds itself in the being of the believer, and manifests the characteristics of the One who is its source, the former is able also to say, “For me to live is Christ” (Phil. 1:21). Whether, therefore, we are regarding the Written Word or the Incarnate Word, it is true (as has been well ;said) that “the Word” is the whole matter or substance of what God has revealed; but it is also true that any portion of that matter or substance which enters into a human heart, and which, as a seed, germinates and performs there the stupendous miracle of reproduction, is also the Word, imparting life “after his kind” —life incorruptible and everlasting as the Word itself. Thus, in the highest sense of which we can take knowledge, the Word of God is a “Word of Life”—living and reproducing its kind; and thus is being fulfilled the promise to Him who died that we might live, of Whom it was said of old, “He shall see His seed, He shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in His hand. He shall see of the travail of His soul and shall be satisfied” (Isa. 53:10, 11). The believer, too, may say with David, “As for me, I will behold Thy face in righteousness: I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with Thy likeness”- (Psa. 17:15)., That will be' glory for us; but, what is more important, it will be glory also for Him. XI. THE LIFE-SUSTAINING WORD The life possessed by human beings is not only a derived life, that is, a life obtained from an external source, but it is a dependent life, requiring continual sustenance. It must be sustained by constant and suitable nutrition, received into the body at short intervals. Man’s strength whereof he boasts,
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