I.　According to the divine and eternal nature of the life of God, God's life is the unique life; only the life of God can be counted as life—John 1:4; 10:10b; 11:25; 14:6:

A.　The divine life may be considered the first and the basic attribute of God— Eph. 4:18; John 5:26; 1 John 5:11-12; Rom. 8:2.

B.　Life is the content of God and the flowing out of God; God's content is God's being, and God's flowing out is the impartation of Himself as life to us—Eph.4:18; Rev. 22:1.

C.　Life is Christ, and life is Christ living in us and lived out from us—John 14:6; Col. 3:4; Gal. 2:20; Phil. 1:21a.

D.　Life is the Holy Spirit—John 14:16-17; 1 Cor. 15:45b; Rom. 8:2; 2 Cor. 3:6.

E.　Life is the processed and consummated Triune God dispensed into us and living in us—John 1:14; 7:37-39; 20:22; Rom. 8:10, 6, 11.

II.　For the fulfillment of His purpose and for the carrying out of His recovery, God's intention is to be the fountain of living waters to His chosen people so that they may experience Him, enjoy Him, and express Him—Psa. 36:9a; Jer. 2:13:

A.　By dispensing Himself into us as life, God is accomplishing His economy in order to fulfill His purpose to have a corporate expression of Himself for eternity— John 7:37-39; Rom. 8:11; Rev. 21:9-10; 22:1-2, 14.

B.　The Lord's recovery of His people is by the divine life—Ezek. 34:11-31; 36:21— 37:14.

III.　God's original intention according to His economy for the fulfillment of His eternal purpose was that man should eat of the tree of life—Gen. 1:26; 2:9; Rev. 22:1-2:

A.　We need a vision to see that the Bible presents us a picture of God in Christ as the tree of life to be our food; this is why the tree of life is mentioned both at the beginning and end of the Bible—Gen. 2:9; Rev. 22:14:

1.　God's purpose in the creation of man in His image and according to His likeness was that man would receive Him as life and express Him in all His attributes—Gen. 1:26-27; 2:9.

2.　The tree of life signifies the Triune God in Christ to dispense Himself into His chosen people as life in the form of food—v. 9; John 11:25; 15:1.

B.　We need to know the significance of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and turn absolutely from this tree to the tree of life—Gen. 2:9:

1.　The tree of the knowledge of good and evil signifies Satan as the source of death to man—Heb. 2:14.

2.　The tree of the knowledge of good and evil also signifies all things apart from God, for anything that is not God Himself, including good things and even scriptural and religious things, can be utilized by Satan, the subtle one, to bring death into the church—Matt. 16:18; Prov. 18:21.

3.　We should care not for good and evil but for life—John 4:10-14, 20-21, 23-24; 8:3-9; 9:1-3; 11:20-27.

4.　The best way to discern a matter is to discern according to life or death; we must learn to discern by life and death, rejecting any speaking that deprives us of the experience of Christ as life but receiving the genuine ministry of the Lord, which always strengthens us in the experience and enjoyment of Christ as our life supply—Rom. 8:6; 2 Cor. 11:3.

IV.　In the church life we need to live by the sense of life—the feeling, the consciousness, of the divine life within us—Rom. 8:6; Eph. 4:18-19:

A.　The source of the sense of life is the divine life, the law of life, the Holy Spirit, Christ abiding in us, and God operating in us—Rom. 8:2, 10-11; Phil. 2:13.

B.　The sense of life guides us, governs us, controls us, and directs us, causing us to know whether we are living in the divine life or in the natural life and whether we are living in the flesh or in the spirit—Rom. 8:6.

V.　We need to be victorious over the attack of death upon the church and build up the Body of Christ in the resurrection life of Christ—Matt. 16:18; John 11:25; Eph. 1:22-23; 4:16:

A.　By the resurrection life of Christ in our spirit, we can be victorious over the attack of death upon the church—Matt. 16:18; Acts 2:24; 2 Tim. 1:10:

1.　From Eden onward, God's controversy with Satan has been on the issue of death and life—Rom. 8:6, 10-11; Heb. 2:15.

2.　Matthew 16:18 shows us from what source the attack upon the church will come—"the gates of Hades," that is, death; Satan's special object is to spread death within the church, and his greatest fear with regard to the church is her resistance to his power of death—Rev. 2:8, 10-11.

B.　We should be exercised in spirit to build up the Body of Christ in the resurrection life of Christ—Eph. 2:6, 21-22; 4:16; Rev. 1:18; 2:8; Phil. 3:10:

1.　The nature of the church as the Body of Christ is resurrection, and the reality of resurrection is Christ as the life-giving Spirit—John 11:25; Acts 2:24; Eph. 1:19-23; 1 Cor. 15:45b.

2.　When we live by the divine life within us, we are living a life in resurrection for the building up of the Body of Christ—Phil. 3:10-11; Eph. 4:15-16;Col. 2:19; 3:15.