Copyright © 1997 Warren Litzman (Christ-Life Fellowship). From the booklet This Then is The Message Which We Have Heard of Him. Used by permission.
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This is The Message Which We Have Heard of Him Point Six: The Union
What are the ultimates of the Christ-life? Let's sum them all up in one word -- union. Someone says, "Why have this message? Why go into these truths? Why go to all this trouble? Isn't this what we've always believed? Isn't this what the Church has always taught?" Oh! that it had, for it would have saved me the hurt and the misery of a living hell on this earth, from which I needed to be delivered. It was a great struggle for me to come to this knowledge that Christ is my life. The simplicity of Christ in you is a whole lot more than just running around and saying "in Christ" or "Christ in you." That is not all God wanted. He did not just want to put Christ into earthen vessels, and say, "Now, I have the right thing in the vessel." It is much more than that. He said that the real love affair is going to hinge on whether or not that earthen vessel will become one with its contents so that He can look at it and say, "That is a Christ-vessel."
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We get a cup of coffee. We do not say, "Give me a cup and give me some coffee." Though they are two things, what you say is, "I want a cup of coffee." You take the two and make them one. The Bible teaches that husbands and wives are not to be two people; they're to be one. Paul plainly says, "He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit." They are two, but what God really wants, in love, is for the two to become one.
What is a Christian? A Christian is a Christ-person. A Christian is one who allows the indwelling Christ to be manifested through him by His personality and whose own personality is thus swallowed up. His ways of doing things are swallowed up. It will always be me, Warren Litzman, speaking. And you might not see anything but Warren Litzman, but if you had known me from the beginning, you would know that what I say now is Him -- that it is His personality, that it is His Word, that it is His life, for I determine. within myself, not to have a life of my own anymore. I reckon myself dead with Christ on Calvary (Romans 6:11). Yet I live. How? It is His personality now, it is His fruit now, and they are His gifts of the Spirit now. I have no gifts of my own. I have no ministry of my own. If He's the only life I have, I'd be a fool to say that He's my life and I'm in Christ, and then turn around and say that I have this gift or that gift. What I have is Christ. I have the fullness of the Godhead dwelling bodily within me.
What do we mean by "the ultimates of union"? This is when you get to the place where, in every circumstance and situation, it is not only you there -- it's Him in you. It's when you get up in the morning and say, "Jesus, here you go today." It's when you say on the job, "Christ, this is your job. What do you want to do?" and the slightest inclination you get, you carry through, and it's Him -- just like that. It's Him. You're in union. Two, but you become one by this union. "Greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world" (I John 4:4). John went on to say, in I John 4:17, that as Christ was in this world, so are we. What is that? That is His person, still here, represented by this branch, this wife, this temple, this house. It's Christ in me, alive on this earth, manifested and expressed by who and what I am. That's the ultimate.
Copyright © 1997 Warren Litzman; used by permission. The Bible text in this publication, except where otherwise indicated, is from the King James Version. This article appears on the site: http://www.peterwade.com/.
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