GOD HIMSELF BECOMING A MAN
In order to carry out His economy, at a certain time God Himself became a man. In so doing, He brought God into man. God is the tree of life; when He came, He brought the tree of life into man (John 15:1, 4). Thus, God, the tree of life, and man were united into one. This One is Jesus Christ. I do not believe that anyone has ever told you that the tree of life was brought into man when God became flesh. We dare to say this because when He was on the earth, He said, “I am…the life” (11:25; 14:6), and He also said, “I am the true vine” (15:1). When you put these two statements together, you can see that this Jesus as the God-man was a union of man with the life of God.
TERMINATING THE OLD CREATION AND GENERATING THE NEW CREATION
This incarnated God-man lived on the earth for over thirty years expressing God fully. Then He died on the cross and was resurrected. In His death He completely terminated the degraded, deteriorated, corrupted, and rotten old creation (Rom. 6:6). In His resurrection He generated God’s new creation. Through His death He put an end to God’s old creation, and through His resurrection He brought forth God’s new creation (2 Cor. 5:17). The new creation is not shared by all the people in the world; it is centered on the people chosen by God. The archangel was the center of the original creation, and then Adam was the center of the restored creation. Now in the new creation the men chosen by God are the center. In His new creation, God has resurrected, that is, has regenerated, all His chosen ones together with Christ (Eph. 2:5; Col. 2:13) through the resurrection of Christ.
Therefore, in His resurrection Christ did such a great thing—He regenerated all of God’s chosen ones (1 Pet. 1:3). At the same time, in His resurrection Christ also uplifted the humanity which He had put on and brought it into divinity. Thus, He was begotten to be the firstborn Son of God in His resurrection (Rom. 8:29; Acts 13:33). The God-chosen ones whom He regenerated as His many brothers became the many sons of God. According to the teachings of the New Testament, the many sons of God and the firstborn Son of God are inseparable. The New Testament teachings are altogether on the matters concerning the firstborn Son of God and the many sons of God.
Furthermore, the old creation was dealt with by the firstborn Son of God in His death. When He died on the cross, He brought the old creation with Him and dealt with it there. Thus, He redeemed the God-created man, the man whom God desired to save. In His resurrection and through His resurrection He brought forth, regenerated, all the ones in the new creation. Then in time God calls them out and saves them out of every nation and from every place. They have all been set apart by the Holy Spirit and redeemed by God, and they have received Christ and have thereby become regenerated. These sanctified, redeemed, and regenerated ones are the believers in Christ.
(A General Outline of God's Economy and the Proper Living of a God-Man, Chapter 1, by Witness Lee)
