As believers following the Lord, losing our soul-life is not the end goal — the gaining of our soul is! We should stop insisting that we can do all these things to lose our soul-life, deny the self, and carry the cross (Matt. 16:24). If we are truthful, can we really? We cannot. When we do everything out of our own trying, we forgo and circumvent Christ in us. That is Satan’s evil, cunning plan — a highway into the gates of Hades. We are always doing the best we can, trying to be right, yet never really pleasing the Lord Himself. When will we stop trying to “serve Thee much, but to please Thee perfectly”?
This recognition that “we can’t” is the way out of the gates of Hades. It is the opening to gaining our soul. And the Lord designs specific journeys for each one of us so that we can finally see the ugliness of this flesh, our natural man, exposed once and for all, and to enable us to turn to Him unreservedly, without hesitation, and waste our all on Him. In John 11, we see the Lord Jesus delaying His journey for two days, so that by the time He arrived in Bethany, Lazarus was already dead and stinking for four days (v. 39). The Bible records that the Lord delayed because He loved Martha, Mary, and Lazarus. The condition of the people were all dead — dead in human opinion and religion — and they stunk. The Lord waited for this exposure. Just once in our lives, we need the Lord say to us, “Dead man, do you see that you stink? Do you see that you’re bound? Do you see that you have no ability to do more? Stop trying in your mortal flesh. It is death. But I am life, and I am the resurrection life — now” (v. 25).
In the following chapter, we see the result of the Lord’s resurrection life on His believers: Mary poured herself out, anointing the Lord with an alabaster jar of valuable, pure nard (12:3). She knew that the Lord was going to die — a victorious act for mankind in love. So she could pour herself out in a beautiful, noble deed. This woman could tell the Lord, “I cannot do anything, but this is how I am pleasing you.” As believers, we should always have this “memorial” as our foundation, a response of love to our Lord’s accomplishment (Matt. 26:7, 13). His death, resurrection, and ascension opened a new and living way for us to approach God with boldness, so that such a poor and wretched person as we may be counted worthy and faithful in His eyes. We have a new life through His death and resurrection, and this life is a life of reproduction and of mingling for the purpose of building the church.
The Lord makes it very clear to us that the builded church is what He desires. The aim is not losing, but gaining us toward this goal. It is true that Peter, after denying the Lord three times, went out to weep bitterly (Matt. 26:75). It is true that he could not deny his soul-life. But in the end, this process enabled Peter to live out his revelation — a vision revealed to him not by flesh and blood but by the Father — to serve and build the church. In this service, he really gained — not lost — his soul. In his mature stage, Peter served the saints to see the vision of Christ and the church, and could declare that Jesus is the Shepherd of his soul (1 Pet. 2:25). Our brother’s life is a proof of what it means to die to self and really gain Christ, to serve Him, to love Him, and to serve His multiplication, His dominion on this earth: to serve the church, shepherd His sheep, feed His lambs (John 21:15-17)!
Indeed, we are not just the many virgins who love Him, but we are His servants, His slaves, who serve His purpose. As slaves, we are utterly conquered. He gave Himself up for us in love, and we have been bought by His blood. Living a life to please Him, to serve His church is not hard. And it’s not only a “reasonable” service — it’s our joyful and glad life we’re pursuing and gaining today.
(Above are notes of fellowship taken from a gathering on 11/23/2024, not reviewed by the speaker.)